Russell Blackford’s excellent talk at Embiggen Books a couple of weeks ago is now online for your viewing pleasure. Russell is an author, philosopher and literary critic. He is editor-in-chief of The Journal of Evolution and Technology, and co-editor (with Udo Schuklenk) of 50 Voices of Disbelief:Why We Are Atheists. He blogs at Metamagician and the Hellfire Club, where he can be regularly engaged.

Russell’s talk focuses on why it is necessary to critique belief systems if we are to maintain the health of a secular society. Indeed some time is given to the notion that secularism has being given only lip-service recently under the current leadership of Kevin Rudd, following in the anti-secular footsteps of John Howard. He puts the continuing culture wars into an historical perspective delving deep into religious moralism and intolerance through the ages.