Obituary: Dan Ryder

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Dan Ryder died on Sunday, December 8, 2024, at home with his beloved wife, Zena, and their kids, Ben and Julia. Dan died a couple of weeks after celebrating his 53rd birthday with a family re-watch of The Empire Strikes Back. He’s survived by his wife and children, his parents Tom and Wendie, and many other family members, friends, colleagues, and students who were touched by his love and kindness, by his brilliance and fervent belief in the power of education.

Dan leaves an impressive body of work, a wonderful family, and thousands of former students who benefited from his teaching and his efforts in spearheading the addition of critical thinking as a foundational requirement for the BA degree at UBC Okanagan.
Dan’s vision was a citizenry armed with the skills needed to critically evaluate the bombardment of misinformation it receives through traditional and social media. He was one of the founders of the Centre of Inquiry in Kelowna which later rebirthed into the Kelowna Atheists, Skeptics and Humanists Association.
Read an interview with Dan discussing this work here: Philosopher Shines Light and see an example of how he brought scholars and public figures together on this topic here: The Misinformation Age

Dan frequently took action for the greater good. For example, in 2015, he laboured tirelessly to get political parties to cooperate to elect the first local non-Conservative MP in many years. He also volunteered with a couple of Green Party election campaigns. He spoke up — in person, in print, on the radio — against science-deniers of various persuasions (including anti-vaxxers, creationists, climate change deniers, and homeopaths). But he was always polite. He knew the strength of clarity, patience, and above all, supporting his positions with sound arguments and well-researched evidence.

A dedicated and well-loved teacher and professor of philosophy at the University of British Columbia Okanagan, Dan believed (based on empirical evidence, of course!) that adding explicit critical thinking instruction into educational programs would go far in helping make the world a better place. He led the effort to have critical thinking added as a foundational requirement for the BA degree at UBC Okanagan. Before he became ill, he’d planned to work on getting critical thinking into the K-12 curriculum, but never managed to start that project. Before he died, he was overjoyed to learn that some friends and colleagues wanted to continue his efforts through a foundation to promote critical thinking education, in collaboration with UBCO.

To that end, in lieu of flowers, donations may be made to the Ryder Foundation for Critical Thinking.

Goodbye Dan, and May the Force be with You. Always

Visit Dan’s Family Obituary HERE