Book launch: The History of Atheism in Belgium

The History of Atheism in Belgium places the active denial of the existence of God in Belgium in a historical perspective for the first time. It is the work of several members of the SSAB, an interdisciplinary research group that brings together expertise on the thinking and actions of non-believers and secularists.

During the webinar, several authors will elaborate on freethinkers who, whether or not in dialogue with believers, dedicated themselves in various ways to spreading atheist thought throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.

Programme

Introduction

Welcome by Gert De Nutte (Humanistisch Verbond and Atheist Platform)

Introduction by Jeffrey Tyssens and Christoph De Spiegeleer: Why a history of atheism?

Atheism among freethinkers and freemasons

Christoph De Spiegeleer: Atheism and the 19th-century freethinking movement

Jeffrey Tyssens: Atheism and freemasonry

Critical philosophy

Niels De Nutte, also on behalf of Alain Vannieuwenburg: Moral science and critical reason: atheism at the Rijksuniversiteit Gent?

Willem Elias: Leopold Flam – “Philosophy is atheism”.

Question round

Questions from the audience, via chat

Christoph De Spiegeleer is affiliated with VUB and the heritage institution Liberas. Jeffrey Tyssens is professor of history at VUB and chair of SSAB. Willem Elias is VUB emeritus and affiliated with SSAB. Niels De Nutte is training coordinator for deMens.nu, PhD student at VUB and secretary of SSAB. Alain Vannieuwenburg is a member of the scientific board of Centrum van Academische en Vrijzinnige Archieven at VUB.

SSAB

The Vrije Universiteit Brussel has a strong name and long history in the field of research on secular thought, both in historical and contemporary perspectives. This is rooted in the university’s basic principle of free inquiry, which unites scholars from both the exact and human sciences. The SSAB unites academics as once the Center for the Study of Enlightenment and Free Thought did.

Its research focuses on secularism worldwide, death and secularism, freemasonry, bioethics, enlightenment and freethinking.