Humanist Symposium is Up

The 40th edition of the Humanist Symposium blog carnival is up at The Evolving Mind. My picks in this edition include:

Daylight Atheism looks at the story of Edward and Joan Downes who decided to die together when she was diagnosed with terminal cancer:

Voluntarily laying down your own life is the ultimate choice of a free individual, the ultimate affirmation that our lives are our own and we may direct them as we wish. However, in the U.K. (and in most of the U.S.), assisted suicide is still illegal - a regrettably irrational view, supported in large part by religious medievalists who want to dictate to other people how to lead their lives.

Fish Tells looks at how religion influences the goal for an open society:

Humans must be encouraged to think, to question, to be allowed to examine the world we live in and pursue courses that continually strive to improve it by destroying the false ideas of the past. Ironically, for all of the talk that religions have of damnation, it is damnation that religions bring to an open society. Religions claim absolute truth and claims to encourage followers to search for truth, while stifling those who question it openly. An Open Society asserts that truth is elusive and encourages participants to continuously question existing tenets of that society.

Blag Hag reflects on her personal views on the connection between atheism and a positive attitude about sexuality:

As for the relationship between sex and atheism, I do think naturalistic thinking leads to sex positivity. The vast majority of the weird social rules about sex are based on religion, superstition, misconception, or bad science.

There are many great posts in this edition so hurry on over and check them out.