DARWIN DAY and TFTD

Yesterday was Darwin Day, celebrating the birth of Charles Darwin on February 12 1809. In two years time it will be the 150th anniversity of the publication of Origin of Species and the 200th anniversity of Darwin's birth.

Meanwhile the Humanist Society of Scotland is protesting against the exclusion of secular thinkers from Radio 4's "Thought for the Day". Yesterday the society launched a series of podcasts entitled "Humanist Thought for the Day". The first was by the philosopher A.C. Grayling and today's by the stand-up comedian Stewart Lee. Radio's 4's Thought for the Day must be one of the most thoughtless and tedious things on earth. Politaholic rushes to turn off the radio whenever it comes on, but occasionally I have been caught unawares (e.g. in the bath) and have had to listen in pain to the witless wittering that TFTD has made its own (in particular I can't stand Jonahan Sachs whose repellent unctuousness oozes from every pore). I didn't hear Grayling yesterday (there doesn't seem to be a "listen again" facility on the Think Humanist web-site. Sadly, on the evidence of Lee's podcast, the style of the Radio 4 original appears to have been copied. I wouldn't say Lee is as boring as Sachs (that would be impossible). Let's say he is 10% as boring i.e. off the Richter scale. Still, I'm with the Humanists on this. Why should religious believers be given a propaganda platform courtesy of the licence fee? Why should humanists and atheists not enjoy the same privilege?

Can't resist the picture.