George

If you wanted to get a rise out of me - congratulations. While Herman Hesse has extensive knowledge of eastern religions, and used this in his wonderous Siddhartha, crediting the 20th century writer with the original words from Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama) is very cheap indeed and does no-one a service.

"Words do not express thoughts very well. They always become a little different immediately after they are expressed, a little distorted, a little foolish."
- Hermann Hesse (German-Swiss novelist and poet, 1877 - 1962): Siddhartha

"...Here we go again...
Though I have promised not to interfere any more, I cannot resist the temptation to repeat my earlier confession, namely that I myself am a victim of such indoctrination into, among other things, mathematics, having been "forced" as a toddler/child to count apples and bunnies before I had the “cognitive and developmental skills to critically examine“ what mathematics, science etc. are all about..."

But wasn't your schooling in maths a legal requirement? Parents are legally obliged to send their kids to school. Your school education is demanded by all of society so as not to disadvantage you against others and cause you to suffer from inequality.

If your parents indoctrinated you into maths before your school years commenced, they were doing it for themselves, not for you, same for religious indoctrination.

Fractelle, I think you were very gentle with George, I suspect I would have been quite rude.

Such a snotty little attempt at a put-down, was it not?

>>Thanks for reminding us of the beautiful quote from Hermann Hesse's famous novel<<

George, that rated a seven on the Boaz mendacity scale.

David,
"an even playing field is the way to go". I completely agree. Atheist organisations have the same right to lobby politicians or canvass for supporters as do others, especially if they think they are at a disadvantage. I was more concerned about the way debates about religion or “irreligion” - e.g. on this OLO - were conducted.

human interest,
I agree that maths, English etc are, and should be, compulsory subjects, whereas some foreign languages, RE etc. are not, and some must even be taken care of outside the school by the parents themselves. Nevertheless, I am grateful for the extra insights and skills I gained from being exposed also to subjects that were not prescribed by the state. I certainly do not know of many parents who educate their children having their own, and not the child's, benefit - rightly or wrongly - in mind. Or do you think parents should be given state guidelines on the background of what world-view they should or should not educate their children?

Fractelle,
apologies, I read Hermann Hesse's novel some 40-50 years ago. Apparently too superficially since i did not realise that this was a verbatim translation of Buddha's original Kalama Sutra, not Hesse's own words, though it was Hesse - and not e.g. D. T. Suzuki - who brought buddhism to Central Europe where I grew up. So if I cannot thank you for bringing it up, allow me at least to say that I am glad you did. A wisdom acceptable to Buddhists as well as Christians or atheists (and others) is a wisdom that can unite, irrespective of who first uttered the words.

In addition to my apologies I can only repeat my words from the previous post, that I hope that tolerant and polite people - who try to understand the other side rather than denigrate the insights they lack - will prevail on both (all) sides of the world-view debate, actually any debate.

"...I certainly do not know of many parents who educate their children having their own, and not the child's, benefit - rightly or wrongly - in mind..."

To whose benefit is it to have a child who is a little clone of themselves, one who mirrors the same ideology or worldview?

Rightly or wrongly? So as long as they can justify to themselves that what they do is for the child's benefit, it doesn't matter if they are doing more harm than good to the child!

"...Or do you think parents should be given state guidelines on the background of what world-view they should or should not educate their children?..."

Actually yes, we might end up with less troubled or mixed up kids in our society. Might end up with less troubled people altogether.

George,

I was not only referring to political even-handedness. I was also referring to fairness in the way children are educated, as they are future adult members of society and if indoctrinated to think certain unproven propositions are beyond questioning (There exists a particular god, life after death – heaven and hell – young age of earth – same sex orientation is wrong – women are inferior) can use their voting power to the disadvantage of others supported only by dogma. Thus we end up with unfairness all round.

Why worry how the debate regarding religion and Atheism is conducted on OLO? I see no problem, just various opinions.

David