Atheist Summer Camp for British Kids

by stevesmys | June 29, 2009 at 10:27 am

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A group of 24 British children will take part in the UK's first summer camp for atheists.

Camp Quest in the southern county Somerset will focus on swimming, canoeing, unicorn chasing and moral philosophizing. It's true.

Most importantly to the program, it will introduce the children to free thought.

The five-day retreat is being subsidised by Richard Dawkins, the evolutionary biologist and author of The God Delusion, and is intended to provide an alternative to faith-based summer camps normally run by the Scouts and Christian groups.

However, this won't be a case of hedonistic sexcapades around the campfire. Nor will the atheistic aspect be aggressively anti-religious. Organizers say it's merely a way to teach the children critical thinking skills instead of indoctrinating.

The emphasis on critical thinking is epitomised by a test called the Invisible Unicorn Challenge. Children will be told by camp leaders that the area around their tents is inhabited by two unicorns. The activities of these creatures, of which there will be no physical evidence, will be regularly discussed by organisers, yet the children will be asked to prove that the unicorns do not exist. Anyone who manages to prove this will win a £10 note - which features an image of Charles Darwin, the father of evolutionary theory - signed by Dawkins, a former professor of the public understanding of science at Oxford University.

Camp Quest originated in the U.S. in 1996 as a "godless alternative to religious summer camps," according to Wikipedia. There are currently six different operations across North America.