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Over the weekend our website has been making some sweet, sweet link-love to other blogs around the net. Here’s a list of our link-lovers:
Thank you for helping us launch our site fellow secularist bloggers. I hope we can continue to work together to make some change in this world.
Do you find traditional is there a God debates a bit dull and stuffy?
Beyond Reasonable Doubt’s author Geoff Henley might agree, and is using the following add to promote his book:
At Ohio’s Lorain County Community College, an atheist group has made a lot of enemies over a new questioning whether Jesus had homosexual relations.
I think that poster just about speaks for itself.
My group at the University of Alberta was recently made office-mates with Outreach, the LGBTQ group on campus; we might have to hang some of these on our door.
Yesterday I linked to an article which demonstrated new lows in an assault on atheism. Luckily, today there are a couple articulate letters rebutting the article.
The first letter from Jonathan Williams lays out a nice atheist creed:
I do not believe in deities mainly due to the lack of empirical evidence to their existence.
Natural phenomena can and should be explained without resorting to the divine.
One can live a moral life without the promise of a reward or the fear of punishment.
People should be judged by their actions, not by their beliefs.
It is easier to follow and obey than it is to create and to learn.
I value life because it is fragile, fleeting and finite.
Humans knows they exist and thus believe they are too important to cease to exist.
One doesn’t believe who doesn’t live according to his belief.
Truth cannot be determined by majority vote.
The moral is the rational.
The study of ethics pre-dates Judaism, Christianity and Islam.
The basis for ethics is empathy.
Happiness is the only good. The place to be happy is here. The time to be happy is now. The way to be happy is to make others so.
The second article from Julian Peterson identifies the extreme intolerance in the article:
Blinded by his own bigotry, the writer fails to see what is patently obvious to the rest of us: that this article crosses the line of good taste and that it serves to reinforce, through misinformation those negative stereotypes long prescribed for atheists.
Finally, Nicole Gaal also points out the discrimination:
To be placed in the same category as Hitler and a few other tyrants is utterly ridiculous. Even to be called rude and told my belief is odd just because it is different from yours is close-minded
The best thing to note, however, is all three letters came from atheists in Colorado Springs! No need for a (inter)national letter writing campaign, just make sure you fight ignorance and intolerance at home.
The argument comes up far too often.
Morality requires an absolute reference point. Without God there can be no morals.
But it occured to me today that this parrots an argument made just over a hundred years ago in physics:
Light is a wave and therefore requires a medium to propagate. Without the aether in interstellar space, there can be no light.
A bit of a background:
Light was postulated by Issac Newton to be particles that flew like tennis balls through the air. This dominated until the single and double slit experiment showed the existence of diffraction, which could only be explained by a wave theory. So after James Clerk Maxwell postulated his famous equations, the world decided upon a wave theory of light.
However, waves require something to move in. Just like waves in the ocean require water, waves of light should require something (be it air or glass) to move in. But there wasn’t anything in space (as far as people could tell). So how did the light from the sun get to Earth?
This led physicists to postulate an everpresent aether which filled the entire void of space. This aether would allow the waves to get from the sun to Earth.
However, this aether should cause the speed of light to be different between a beam propagating with the Earth’s rotation versus a beam propagating perpendicular to the rotation. This should happen because as the Earth goes around the sun it will “drag” some aether with it, this dragged aether will slow light down that’s going into it, but speed it up if it’s going with it (imagine light getting a tail or head wind), but going North-South the light shouldn’t really experience any net difference. So when they performed very precise experiments to detect the aether, they found nothing!
The solution didn’t come until 1905 when Einstein was studying the photoelectric effect – basically a current is created when a light of a minimum energy is incident on a material. Einstein postulated that light existed in photons (discrete particles), which solved the aether crisis and won him the Nobel prize (this was more practical than Special Relativity, which he also discovered in the same year, as well as the cause of Brownian Motion).
So what does this have to do with theological arguments about morality?
Basically, my analogy is that people couldn’t understand how light could propagate the void of space without an aether, in much the same way that people can’t understand how morality can exist independant of an absolute objective standard.
It took arguable one of the most brilliant people of the past century to solve the issue of light in space, negating the need for an aether, however, it is arguablly more accessible to understand how morality can arise naturally.
For more on naturalistic ethics, see some of my older posts:
Here’s the thing: females aren’t a minority. Constant reminders consisting of everything from TV ads to misused pronouns don’t let us forget the struggle with basic civil and social rights that women have battled, past and present alike. Caught up in the urgent ideals of feminism and modern liberal values, it’s sometimes easy (even for women) to forget that females are half of the world’s population, especially when it comes to things like careers in math and science. A survey conducted by the Center for Inquiry shows that over 80% of atheists are male. What’s more, the same survey suggested that over 40% had at least a six-figure income.
It’s hardly a secret that there just tend to be more men in science. The times are a-changin’, but even so, let’s face it. The face of atheism is now, more than ever, a gray-haired sausage fest in a thousand dollar tux. This is one of the more unfortunate side effects of “new atheism” brought up by the (otherwise exceptional) lead of Dawkins, Hitchens and Harris: the “big three” of non-belief nowadays. (Ironically, I’m pretty sure Dawkins would have been Woodrow Wilson.) Personally, I’m not a complainer. Somebody needed to resurrect (excuse the poor choice of words) atheism, and that’s just what happens when the only people bold enough to do it happen mostly to be our male, bordering-on-senior-citizen counterparts. We’ll just have to problem solve, and put our noggins to use, as atheists and members of society.
Well, by now, we pretty much know that an atheist woman is kind of like your token gay uncle.
So now what?
Mass cultural change was never easy, especially since the problem lies beyond atheism itself. Obviously, much of it has to do with how women fit in with science. While valid, that point has been brought up enough times that if I had a dollar every time I heard it, by now I would have been able to afford a tux, a sex reassignment surgery, and a serious box of hair bleach instead of spending my time actually working on the issue.
As it is, no one gives out grants for counting the repetition of an argument.
Maybe instead of trying to draw in more women first, we should focus on encouraging the atheist females we already have. As Islam shows us, it’s better to have people following big rather than a big following. (It also shows us that having both isn’t half bad, either.) What I’m saying is that if you’re female… what are you doing reading my thoughts about feminism? Go start your own blog, and put yourself out there.
Next to religion, it’s no surprise that we’ve been losing the women. After all, they have things like the Virgin Mary, nuns, and Rebecca St. James. What can I say, they’ve one-up’d us in that respect.
We have no official organization, no official leaders, no Avril Lavigne wannabes to proselytize for us… in fact, we’re only left with one single thing which we all happen not to believe. It’s only to be expected that its public image would go uncontrolled. So who should control it?
Well, you already do. One of the nice things about atheism is that it’s sort of an anarchy in itself, but it’s also a democracy by default, because only the atheist public can really decide their own image. For example, with The God Delusion, Dawkins certainly decided what his was, and everyone else just kind of picked it up and followed his lead.
Which brings me to my point: it’s important over time that atheism gains some more female poster-children. Women otherwise attracted to religion should be shown that atheism is not a patriarchy (like religion is).
And getting those reps is not the onus of some pie-in-the-sky organization that controls atheism behind the scenes. We don’t have an atheist Vatican. It’s up to you to decide the image you put out of your own brand of atheism. We just have to remember to include women in the same outreach.
Cheers
So you are an atheist. So what!?
Atheism, as I understand it means not believing in God or gods, so if you believe that the whole world is held up by fairies and that your body is made up of candy canes, but you don’t believe in God or gods you are an atheist. Golly-gee, big accomplishment!
I will point out that the Stalinist Progressive Labor Party here in the U.S. is a 100% atheistic organization. From my understanding, the Neo-Nazi organization The Church of the Creator is also a 100% atheistic organization. Don’t let the name confuse you, the Creator is the white male. I would dare suggest that most of the readers of this blog have little in common with Stalinists and Neo-Nazis.
For me, atheism is a side effect of a much more important assertion, which is that the natural world is all that exists, and science is how we understand that world. Science is an application of what philosopher’s call methodological naturalism.
For those who study science and value science as a way to discover things about reality there is a bit of an existential conundrum. You basically have two choices, you can put your head in the sand and rant and rave about the limits of science (which are ever decreasing), or you can carry methodological naturalism to what seems to me to be the obvious conclusion which is philosophical naturalism.
The people who call themselves “atheists” that I count as my comrades are at the very least philosophical naturalists. Philosophical naturalists essentially treat reality as what science calls reality. Pretty fraking simple.
This carries with it a burden, and that burden is to try to advocate for action which is consistent with what we know to be real as a result of science. Only one of these things is the unlikelihood of the Abrahamic god (not to mention other gods).
I think of equal importance is that we advocate for other pertinent things which the scientific evidence is beginning to weigh in clearly on.
For example human affected climate change has reached as much of a scientific consensus as anything can in science. Yet, I see very little from the mouths of philosophical naturalists on this issue, I guess its just more fun to complain about young-earth creationists.
For me investing a lot of time and energy on young-earth creationists is a little like trying to prevent a violent take-over by the Amish. As far as affecting the ability of science to inform policy and science to cause real world action to improve the world, these whak-a-doos are not much of a threat. You just don’t hear too many senators argue their policies on the idea that cave men rode dinosaurs like horses. But the fact that human affected climate change has been framed as a scientific mystery with two sides to the issue, and the “atheists” have remained largely silent about it is a real threat to the ability of science to help us make wise decisions. Human affected climate change has two sides to the same extent that intelligent design and evolution do. Which hopefully you realize that means it doesn’t have two sides. The data is conclusive and a consensus has been reached, in science thats as good as it gets.
“Atheists” have also remained largely silent about stem-cell research and “abstinence only” sex education. Sam Harris will occasionally mention these two things as evidence of the fact that the religious exercise far too strong a foothold on policy, but I argue that this is not enough.
We know a great deal about human sexuality and the psychological factors at play due to a half century of psychological research. We also know a great deal about human development in utero and how the brain develops. We know what the brain needs, generally, to be self-aware, to suffer, to experience life in any meaningful way. We also know with great certainty that a blastocyst, which is the what the organism we use for embryonic stem-cell research is called, does not cut the mustard for consciousness, not even close. Fighting for better sex-education and funding embryonic stem-cell research should be on the forefront of a secularist agenda.
In essence what I am arguing is that those of us who have found ourselves energized in the secular movement, and inspired to fight superstition, need to ask ourselves what are we trying to do. Are we just searching for catharsis about how annoyed we are at the antics of the religious are we trying to make the world a better place?
If you are with me in trying to make the world a better place, I think that what we must do is make it a top priority to find out how science is weighing on issues of political consequence and speak on behalf of science.
Congratulations on your acceptance to the International School of Highly Emotive Knee-Jerk Reactionary Hissy Fits and welcome to your first seminar, Criticizing Atheism 101! Today we will be talking about the most successful, tried-and-occasionally-true techniques for criticizing the “New Atheism” as deployed by such renowned reactionary hissy fit-throwers as David Berlinski, Scott Hahn, Alister McGrath, and others! All of the important information for this course has been compiled below into a list of seven key points, which can easily be adapted for any critic of atheism to use in his or her particular tempter tantrum:
1. Ride those coattails. Remember, the New Atheists may be evil and hell-bound, but they are also your ticket to fame! Just make sure you drop all the right names in the title of your book and you are on the road to a career in reactionary tantrums. It’s easy: just reuse their names or their book titles for your own profit and you’re good to go; whether you’re Alister McGrath (”Dawkins’ God,” “The Dawkins Delusion?“), Scott Hahn (”Answering the New Atheism: Dismantling Dawkins’ Case Against God“), David Berlinski (”The Devil’s Delusion“), Thomas Crean (”God is No Delusion“), or anyone of similar integrity and contributive value, you’ll remember that your own name is obviously insufficient to sell books, so what better solution than to just use your opponent’s names? If you’re particularly desperate for sales/clever like John F. Haught, you’ll manage to squeeze several of the New Atheists’ names in (”God and the New Atheism: A Critical Response to Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens“) at once!
2. Snub them for not taking time to disprove God’s existence, ignoring your own failure to prove God’s existence. Several reviews of and responses to Hitchens in particular, as well as Harris and Dennett, contained some snide little attack about how none of these three atheists took the time out to properly address the arguments for the existence of Zeus/Demeter/Allah/Republican-Jesus/God. Now remember, even though popular religious books all the way from the bestselling populist The Purpose-Driven Life up through Charles Taylor’s highbrow A Secular Age spend not one word even trying to prove that God actually exists, who cares? If you’re religious enough to be writing on this subject in the first place, you threw away internal consistency a long time ago. As Dinesh D’Souza thundered during a debate with Dan Barker, “Harris refutes Anselm with a paragraph!” Who cares that you refuted Russell with zero paragraphs? Whatever it takes to make the New Atheists look lazy or uninformed. Which brings me to my next point…
3. Remember, the New Atheists failed to write a multi-volume complete summary of the entire history of Western theology, so they’re “ignorant of the finer points of religion.” One frequent criticism of the New Atheists is that, even if they claim to be targeting religious belief, they are avoiding the totally relevant and politically impotent/important field of highbrow theological writing. Because, unlike you, the New Atheists have not taken the decades of study required to lodge yourself in an obscure niche of your religion’s ivory tower to which nobody listens except the others trapped in the same nitch, you are understandably infuriated that Hitchens never once mentions Eric Rust’s clever interpretation of Tillich’s commentary on the epistemology of empiricism as applied to the miraculous, or that Harris never even bothers to set himself against every single sentence of The City of God. Sure, nobody cares about what theologians have to say, and their commentary is wholly irrelevant if there isn’t a God in the first place, but so what? You’re a religious writer; what do you need with honesty? Just make those atheists look unlettered, and don’t forget to end every chapter with a snippet of Bonhoeffer or Averroes or whoever it takes to confuse your reader into thinking you’re smart.
4. Alternately claim that science is just a hypothesis and so can’t be proven, and that proven science has been on your side all along. If you’re a particularly talented anti-atheism writer, you can sometimes manage to make both of these tactics work within the same exact book! For example, in Dinesh D’Souza’s famously whiny screed What’s So Great About Christianity?, chapter 8 tells us that science cannot exist apart from the (Christian theological) assumption of an ordered and logical universe, chapters 11-14 are dedicated to showing how science independent of Christian theology has arrived at the existence of God in the first place! Remember, not only has science demonstrated that the universe is irreducibly complex, science is also a faith-based assumption that the universe is ordered and rational. Who cares that scientists only concluded the universe to be rational upon empirical observation that effects tend to follow causes? Who cares that you’re whoring out your intellect to whichever side of the same bad argument you wish to make by routinely deploying two contradictory arguments to the same end? This isn’t about integrity, this is about religion!
5. Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao. Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin, Mao. Irrelevant ad hominem that does nothing to show the truth or falsehood of the idea of atheism, but who cares? As long as the reader’s attention is diverted away from the bloody history of your own religion. And when doing body counts, only count wars and Inquisitions, not things like the deaths from religious resistance to vaccines and medicines, religious opposition to condoms even in high HIV-risk parts of the world, day-by-day violence and discord within families over homosexuality and apostasy, etc. Also never mention that Pol Pot, Mao, and Stalin might have had other motives for their actions than their atheism.
6. Always point out that atheism is a faith just like any other. Atheism is the faith-based assumption that there is no Zeus, or whichever god you are apologizing for. This is one of those arguments that has been recycled over and over and over again in anti-atheism books marketwide, so it must be a good one. Do not worry about talking about whether or not your own lack of belief in the thousands of other extinct religions is also a faith, as this is likely to lead you into unChristian thought.
7. And if all else fails, you can always say that atheists “just don’t get it.” They haven’t had the divine, transcendent experiences you’ve had about Jesus, or Mohammed, or the Buddha, or David Koresh, or Sai Baba, or the UFO hiding behind the comet, or whatever. They just can’t get it because they’re too close-minded to see the truth and thanks to personal religious experience we know that those close-minded atheists are wrong without even doing any investigation! As long as your own mind is open to the possibility that your personal, local, favorite tribalism is the One True Way, and the atheists’ minds are closed to the idea that they are too blind and stupid to see that your personal theological suppositions must be accepted or else you’ll burn in Hell forever, you win. I mean, when you accuse the atheists of being too close-minded to accept Jesus as their personal savior out of fear of the scriptural, doctrinal, strictly unobserved reality of Hell, what are they going to say? That you’re the close-minded one?
Well, that is your lesson for today. I look forward to seeing your book right alongside the likes of the brilliantly untalented McGrath, Berlinski, and others: rotting in bargain bins next to old astrology guides and full-color atlases of Denmark, ten thousand ranks below The God Delusion on Amazon, or sitting on the shelf of some smarmy theology student who agreed with you before he ever even heard of you.
Rick Warren: Christianity is not like other religions because it is a personal relationship with Jesus. Christianity teaches that Christians will have a personal relationship with Jesus in a process of ‘falling in love with him’.
Here comes the fun part: I am going to refute Warren’s assertion using the Bible itself.
There are various passages that speak of how one is required to repent of sins and believe that Jesus was resurrected and is the only way to the Father to be saved. The act of believing in Jesus is a far cry away from actually having a personal relationship with Jesus, and here we shall see that nowhere in the Bible is there such a mandate for this personal relationship dogma. As far as the Bible is concerned, this doctrine is simply made up by evangelical Christian theologians.
Let us now take a look at John 15: 1-13.
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 The same was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. 4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. 6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. 7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. 8 He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light. 9 That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world. 10 He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. 11 He came unto his own, and his own received him not. 12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: 13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
Here, we can see that being a Christian involves a vague spiritual union with Jesus, but nowhere in there is the ‘personal relationship’ which is much touted by modern Christianity even seen. Warren’s “carrying on a continual conversation with Jesus” seems ridiculous in light of scripture. The Bible does not even say anything remotely like what Warren claims, yet he sums up Christian worship as having this very relationship (which is notably absent from the Bible)!
Next comes John 10:1-16, in which Jesus says that his sheep recognize his voice, while those not of his flock turn a deaf ear:
1 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber. 2 But he that entereth in by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. 3 To him the porter openeth; and the sheep hear his voice: and he calleth his own sheep by name, and leadeth them out. 4 And when he putteth forth his own sheep, he goeth before them, and the sheep follow him: for they know his voice. 5 And a stranger will they not follow, but will flee from him: for they know not the voice of strangers. 6 This parable spake Jesus unto them: but they understood not what things they were which he spake unto them. 7 Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. 8 All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. 9 I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. 10 The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. 11 I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. 12 But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep. 13 The hireling fleeth, because he is an hireling, and careth not for the sheep. 14 I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. 15 As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for the sheep. 16 And other sheep I have, which are not of this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there shall be one fold, and one shepherd.
These verses again have nothing to do with a personal relationship with Jesus and talking to him on a daily basis. These verses simply depict the reception and rejection of the gospel, where the non-believers are likened to Satan’s flock as opposed to the Christians of Jesus’ flock. Let’s take a look at John 10:14 in particular, as most Christians will pull out this verse haphazardly to save their precious doctrine. What this verse really means is that Jesus’ followers will be able to distinguish him from the false teachings and teachers that were earlier mentioned in John 10:8. It has nothing to do with the personal relationship that Warren so desires.
Christians will usually point out Revelation 3:20 next. Is this the saving grace for Warren’s assertions?
20 Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.
Sadly (at least for Warren and his followers), it falls short yet again. By itself, the verse sounds promising. It shows not only Jesus talking with you, but also eating with you! However, when put in context, the verse is contained in John’s letters to the seven churches, and the letters are regarding the events of the End Times, not a personal relationship with Jesus.
But, what about the whole context of the letter to Laodicea? Doesn’t the whole letter hint at a personal relationship with Jesus? Am I the one now following Warren’s cue at taking Bible verses out of context? Well, let’s take a look at the scripture:
14 And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write; These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God; 15 I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. 16 So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth. 17 Because thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing; and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked: 18 I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment, that thou mayest be clothed, and that the shame of thy nakedness do not appear; and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve, that thou mayest see. 19 As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent. 20 Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. 21 To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne. 22 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches.
What this letter really says is that Jesus is calling on those within the city, hoping that they will hear him so that they can be led to salvation. These events will take place just before the End Times, and all this has clearly nothing to do with having cozy personal conversations with Jesus. The supper that Jesus promises is not some one-on-one Warren-like meeting, but the Marriage Supper of the Lamb at the End Times:
Revelation 19: 7-9:
7 Let us be glad and rejoice, and give honour to him: for the marriage of the Lamb is come, and his wife hath made herself ready. 8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints. 9 And he saith unto me, Write, Blessed are they which are called unto the marriage supper of the Lamb. And he saith unto me, These are the true sayings of God.
Even further on, in Revelation 19: 17-21, Jesus is not even hinting at wanting a personal relationship with Christians at all. He is merely inviting his flock to witness and indulge in the slaughter of the non-believers and the beast:
17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God; 18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great. 19 And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse, and against his army. 20 And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone. 21 And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and all the fowls were filled with their flesh.
I have clearly shown that these gory details are nothing like Warren’s “falling in love with Jesus” and conversing daily with Christ. Even better still, I am relying solely on the *Bible (albeit without Warren’s back-and-forth hopping using about 15 translations) to show that Warren’s whole premise of “real Christian worship” is not founded upon anything in the Bible. There is simply no basis in scripture for claiming that Christianity entails having a personal relationship with Jesus, therefore, one of the most popular Christian slogans has been refuted using the Bible itself.
Will Wright, creator of the Sim games, is releasing a new game entitled Spore later this year, in which gamers will be able to play god for a world, developing life from single-celled organisms, to space-faring civilizations.
Religion can even develop in the game, which according to Wright, has only been criticized by ‘militant atheists.’ Wright describes himself as an atheist.
No reactions have hit the blogosphere yet regarding religion in Spore, but I personally don’t see how ‘militant’ atheists could have an issue with religion in a game.
In earlier news, Wright declard that Spore was performing at 38% the capacity of God, since it acheived 1,589,000 species in 18 days, which took God 7 (according to Wright, several commenters correctly pointed out God created all the animals in two days).
Evolutionary psychology has made further advances at demonstrating that morality requires no supernatural agent. Writes one Christian journalist:
Recent research suggests that we have been wrong, that morality can emerge and persist without religion. Evidence now points to the conclusion that early humans and prehumans were, long before religion started, predisposed to practice empathy, fairness and loyalty. In fact, these qualities are commonly found in bands of chimpanzees, and the normal behavior of very young children also reflects these attributes.
Evolutionary psychologists propose that natural selection resulted in brains that instinctually encouraged Australopithecines and other early hominids to be concerned about the welfare of others in their group, to share resources and information with them and to be loyal members of that band.
A recent article in the Toronto star entitled “Embracing Goodness without God” focused on the rising percentage of atheists in Canada.
A recent Harris-Decima poll found that 23 per cent of Canadians do not believe in any God.
Holy Frack! 23%!. As a Canadian I’m proud to see that enough people are finding the courage to come out of the proverbial atheist closet. Apparently Kathy Meidell agrees with me.
“The number just keeps going up – or, at least, the number of people willing to come out of the closet is going up,”
Now this brings up an interesting point of converstation among atheists. Is there a proverbial closet? Even as someone who wasn’t raised religious in any way, and as someone who finds themselves rather courageous to begin with (I can sleep in the dark), I still found it hard to tell many people I was an atheist. To many, the word is still associated with evil. I would say, from what I’ve observed, that coming out of the atheist closet is contextual. It was rather easy in a very liberal region of Canada, and even so, the fear of coming out was still there, even if only slightly.
How hard it must be in more conservative places I can only imagine.
An excellent video examining the phrase “militant atheism”:
In our normal experiences we know that every event is caused by something else. If a window breaks, it happened because a ball went through it, which happened because a kid threw it, and so on.
However, if the history of science teaches us anything, it is that our “normal experiences” have often been wrong.
The Earth is not flat, although it looks pretty flat (especially on the prairies). The Earth moves, although it seems like everything else does. Things tend to stay in motion, even though everything experiences some friction around us and eventually slows down. And not every event has a cause.
An atom can undergo three processes when emitting or absorbing light. First in can experience stimulated absorption, when a photon of light hits an electron in the atom and bumps it to a higher energy level. This is like coming along and picking up a pencil and putting it on a higher shelf – the overall energy is increased. It can also undergo stimulated emission, this is the key to what happens in lasers. A photon comes along, “bumps” the electron (that’s in its excited state) and the electron drops to a lower state, releasing its energy as another photon (1 photon in, 2 photons out). Basically it’s like coming along and knocking the pencil back down to a lower shelf, and as the pencil falls, rather than picking up speed with energy it emits energy in the form of light. These two processes fit our mold of having a nice explainable cause, and there isn’t anything to weird about them.
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Why atheism is a rich man’s world – and why it doesn’t matter.
Saturday, August 23rd, 2008This is a response to Chris’ post: Why atheism is a rich man’s world – and how we can change it
I get it, women like being included, and that’s fine. Honestly now, it’s not like we’re excluding women in this faction. But! Before I get to the meat of Chris’ post, I just wanted to comment on a couple smaller pedantic issues:
Yes, and consistently feminists all over North America are using these “reminders” to slam men every chance they get. But for some reason the sexism against men is completely over looked. There are ads in the Toronto subways right now for the restaurant Moxies. I hear a couple of girls talking about how “sexist” the ad is because the woman is depicted in a pretty slut-tastic dress and all her jewelry is being pulled to the man beside her who is wearing an outfit that would make him out to be a magnet. They ended their conversation with “the guy is pretty sexy though”. … WTF?
So is it because our “movement” is so science oriented that there are fewer women? Maybe we should focus on the arts more in our programming to draw in a new (and possibly more feminine […stereotype alert!]) crowd? Hmm. Just a thought.
I’m not sure that it’s their gender that is the unfortunate thing about these three men, it’s the lack of connection with individuals and how many people can’t relate to them that is truly unfortunate. What I’d like to see is someone who can talk reasonably about religion and life – but not be full of fluff with whom I can relate to. Woman or not.
Anyway, onto my real points!
The “new face” of atheism – as it seems to be called – is indeed very white male oriented. But why does this matter? Secularism in the public sphere is a somewhat innovative fad we’re diving into. Only recently have people felt comfortable enough to leap out and declare atheism as a way to brand themselves. Realistically, it just so happens that those who had the time and money to start this whole atheistic movement were white, well-off men. But the important part, is that it happened! And that it’s still happening! Now about who is running it.
Being involved with secularism, the movement, is a privilege. It’s a privilege that many people simply don’t have. It’s like complaining that you’re soup is too hot – people with another option can do it. And it seems like the people who did have this option, were white males, so they started this new stream of atheism. And it’s that, new… you can’t expect it to be a plethora of sexes and races when it’s barely accepted by the public at large!
But that entire point is extraneous, much like actively attempting to get women involved. It’s futile. The people who are currently involved are the ones who desire to be; at this point we should be attempting to get more people in general involved, not simply encouraging women to step into the movement. If I spent my time trying to get our women volunteers more active and encouraging them to be more vocal within our groups – I’d be wasting a whole lot of time where I could be doing more productive things like giving support to our already active volunteers.
Aggressively encouraging women to get involved is just like affirmative action. We start overlooking a plethora of capable people simply to be more inclusive. We look at a group of say 10 individuals, where 1 is a female…we ask the female to do the work simply because she’s a women and it turns out she’s the least capable. I’ve just wasted all of my time and invested interest in this person who is less capable than 9 other people, but I overlooked that point because for some reason we think that having women involved with organizations makes them more successful? Makes them more appealing? Makes us look less sexist? What?
Who cares what sex we have working with us? I don’t feel like I could relate to a woman Paul Kurtz any more or less than I can relate to the male Paul Kurtz. It’s reverse discrimination, as this unwarranted need for a closer male to female ratio requires the very discrimination that supporters are seeking to eradicate.
I personally think we have bigger fish to fry than putting energy into getting women involved. To be completely straightforward, I don’t have time to wave my hand at all the women screaming at them “Hey! Look! It’s fun! And non-patriarchal!” …Because those who want to be involved are already here, and are already contributing.
There is no “anti-women” sign on any of our doors. The exact same opportunities are available to women as are to men. When I’m looking for someone to fill a position, I’m just looking for a committed body and mind, not a gender. Why not invest our interests somewhere that it makes sense, like putting time, energy and money into art programs. (By stereotypical nature this would eventually lead to an increase in women, but that’s not the point.) It’s an entire social, cultural and academic side of things that we hardly ever touch on, but where there is a market for our mindsets and thoughts. Some of your are going to argue that women add more diversity, and different thoughts. …Any number of people despite sex, age or race are going to add diversity! I have the same opinions and thoughts as most of the guys in my little secular group. I don’t add diversity.
A social movement such as secularism is equal opportunity. If there are women out there pining to save the world from religion, teach other about science education or explore the paranormal they’re more than welcome to come on it. But I’m not going to waste my time convincing them that it’s okay to do that.
Tags: atheism, feminism, women
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