Bob Jones

Wither Tom Paine in any such list? Especially as he could qualify as English/American/French. Even America is rediscovering her own roots!! The Lost Founder : Thomas Paine My apologies to this excellent site for thinking it was associated with religion.....mea culpa.

Hi. The most interesting source (for my money) in the whole debate, is Tom Paine's classic work 'The Age of Reason'. He reaches the position as a committed 'Deist', believing in a scientific explanation for everything, noting only the evidence in observable creation. This was many years before the 'Voyage of the Beagle' and therefore Darwinian Revolution. Strange then,that the Amercan website 'tompaine.com', should be a religious organisation! They must only have read his seminal work 'Rights of Man', the founding document of the American Revolution. Age of Reason

I live in Leeds (UK). I retired from Bretton Hall, University of Leeds, in 1999, where I was latterly Practice Learning Coordinator for the Diploma in Social Work (BA) programme. I was a mature recruit to Social Work, qualifying in 1977. Prior to that time I worked in the Engineering Industry. I have been a regular visitor to and user of your 'Spartacus' site, which I find is an excellent resource. For the first time, last week, I visited the 'forum' pages and the hours seemed to pass too quickly....this was most stimulating and left me with the desire to join the forum and continue this process with perhaps the occasional contribution.