DangerousTalk

It’s official; I am now the coordinator of the Philadelphia Coalition of Reason. Basically, this means that it is my job to help the seven atheistic organizations in the Philadelphia area to work together to promote reason and humanistic values.

The problem with coordinating atheists is that we are frequently described as herded cats. We tend to all want to do what we want and not act well as a group. Then we form groups, but those groups tend to not want to work together. So I have my work cut out for me.

While I have had quite a few leadership positions before, I have never been in a leadership position within the atheist community. Already, I have gotten reminders from people that my position is more of a coordinator than a leadership position. Still, I think bringing some leadership to the position might be helpful but the real trick is to not overstep that leadership.

The first step with any type of new position is always to gather knowledge. So that will be my first step. I will be learning about the organizations that I have not had experience with and getting to know their leaders and members. I will essentially become a member of all of these organizations.

The thing that I am most looking forward to with this new position is getting to work with Fred Edwords of UnitedCoR. If you don’t know him, you should. He has quickly become one of my heroes ever since he kicked Bill O’Reilly’s ass on his own show. Don’t believe me? Check it out for yourself:

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Filed under: atheism, culture war, humanism, People of Reason | 7 Comments »

It has been a busy weekend and I will take a few days to talk about everything. Today, I want to talk about the Lehigh Valley Humanist picnic featuring Sam Singleton atheist evangelist… sort of.

I think it is really important for people or reason to have summer picnics. It gives us a chance to hang out and talk. While some of those conversations tend to discuss religion since our unity is centered on our lack of belief, we also talk about other topics too. It is good to know that we can discuss other topics with people who value reason over faith.

At the Lehigh Valley Humanist picnic for example, I got into conversations about politics, science, philosophy, book publishing, and of course the future of the greater atheist movement. Unlike Church conversations, atheists tend not to agree on every issue. This makes conversations more interesting since we get into sometimes heated conversations without resorting to faith or to “that’s what I believe” type bullshit. Everyone is trying to be reasonable and to make their points while willing to change their position if the evidence is convincing enough.

Sam Singleton, Atheist Evangelist was originally supposed to perform at the PhillyCoR picnic a few weeks ago, but his tour had to be re-scheduled. While there was no way to make up the PhillyCoR picnic he was able to schedule the Lehigh Valley Humanist picnic instead. Unfortunately, between Rosco’s car breaking down and getting lost, he came very late to the picnic.

Finally, Sam Singleton Atheist Evangelist made it to the picnic and performed a small part of “Patriarchs and Penises.” Sam even ate a baby. It was a fun time and I think more atheist groups should have summer picnics and just casual gatherings just to hang out.

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Filed under: atheism, humanism, People of Reason | 3 Comments »

Yesterday, the United States Senate confirmed this nation’s newest Supreme Court Justice, Elana Kagan. But while many of my progressive and freethinker friends are celebrating, I remain skeptical.

For starters, the Court is still middle of the road at best. We have four extremely right wing Justices who will nine times out of ten support the Religious Right on any and all issues that they bring forth. It is all but certain that they will vote to overturn Proposition 8 for example. Then you have five middle of the road Justices any one of which might support the Religious Right if a seemingly strong argument can be made.

There really isn’t a strong progressive Justice to make those strong arguments that might sway the middle of the road Justices. Kagan, is known for being very vocal as is Sotomayor, but will they make strong progressive arguments? It doesn’t seem like they will.

At best the Court is still exactly where it was under Bush and at worst, the absence of Justice Stevens weakens the Jeffersonian Wall. Stevens didn’t just rule to support separation of church and state, he was a strong advocate for that position. Hopefully Kagan will be as strong of an advocate. But that is by no means certain. In the end, time will be the ultimate judge of Obama’s Supreme Court picks.

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Filed under: church/state, Current Events, Politics | 4 Comments »

I am really getting tired of always being on the defensive. Why is it that the Religious Right are always trying to make these ridiculous laws and we are always trying to stop them? I think it is time we go on the offensive for a change.

Dangerous Talk has obtained this video (from YouTube) of Religious Right’s Tamara Scott talking about how we ought to enact Biblical Law and how gay marriage costs tax payers 280 billion dollars according to the fair and balanced Family research Council:

Well, I know of something that costs tax payers a whole lot more that 280 billion dollars a year. It’s called Church Tax-Exemptions and Faith Based Initiatives. Why haven’t we pushed Proposition 666 which would tax all Churches and end federal funding for Faith Based Initiatives? Oh I know, it wouldn’t pass, right?

So what? The fact is that just pushing such a proposition would cause these groups to go on the defensive. Maybe they will think it won’t pass either and not campaign hard against it and be surprised at how many Americans are tired of Churches getting away with all this stuff.

The Mormon Church funded most of the Proposition 8 campaign, why have they not lost their tax-exempt status for political activism? The Catholic Church fucks kids; you would think that would be enough to get their tax-exempt status revoked. Some fundamentalist churched are actually praying for the death of the President and they don’t even have to pay taxes.

I want to push some propositions against these people. It’s time to go on the offensive. Contact your representatives (state and federal) and tell them it is time to fight back against the Religious Right!

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Filed under: church/state, culture war, family values, Gay Issues, Law, Political Activism, Religion | 6 Comments »

Social media is a big thing these days. Facebook and Twitter have become missive hubs of global communication. Not surprisingly, atheists tend to have a larger than proportional presence on these mediums. Atheists dominate the internet. Now there is a new social network that atheists need to take over.

I recently joined a website called Empire Avenue. This social media outlet allows people to buy and sell stock in each other. By linking your facebook, twitter, and blog to your page, Empire Avenue is able to measure your influence on the interwebs. This makes your stock more valuable.

Empire Avenue is like a game, but it also is a networking and promotional tool. The more your stock is worth; the more people will want to see what you are up too.

The site is pretty new and already an atheist community is forming on there. But we are not alone. Christians are also on the site. In any case, I have been on this site for a few days to check it out and I really like it. So I would like to recommend that atheists join the site and join the atheist group there. We can join each other’s facebook and twitter pages and check out each other’s blogs and youtube channels. We can also make fake money and have lots of fun. My stock name on there is: STAKS – so buy my stock with your fake money when you join the site. 😉

Filed under: atheism, facebook, People of Reason, twitter | 1 Comment »

A lot of people have been asking me why I keep talking about Anne Rice’s decision to leave Christianity. One reason is because it is personal to me. Growing up, I was a big fan of most of her Vampire Chronicle series. They were the first vampire series that I am aware of that was strongly atheistic.

When Anne Rice started the series, she was an atheist and that is definitely reflected in her work. Most vampire stories before Anne Rice portrayed vampires as some sort of demonic creature which came about through some bad dealings with God or some deal with the Devil. This was not the case with Anne Rice’s vampires.

While there was certainly supernaturalism involved with the origin of vampires in the Vampire Chronicle universe, it had nothing to do with God or the Devil. It was an accident involving spirits, but with no purpose divine or demonic. In this universe, vampires don’t fear crucifixes or holy water. In fact, at one point in the books, there were some young vampire cult which claimed to be demonic and they were seen as silly and stupid. In fact, these vampires who focused on religion (even though they claimed to be Satanic) acted much like the religious fanatics of God fearing Christianity.

Now of course Anne Rice writes Jesus books. I confess that I haven’t read any of them and I stopped reading the Vampire Chronicles toward the end of the series. But I think Anne Rice has contributed a lot to the world of atheism by taking supernatural creatures like vampires (which everyone loves) and making them less religiously based. This was an important step in the vampire mythos.

Anne Rice’s books were well written and pretty well researched historically. What I mean by this is that she had a really good grasp of the history she used as a back drop for her vampire characters. In other words, Anne Rice is no dummy. She is an intellectual. This is reflected in her recent statement that Christianity is anti-science. Don’t get me wrong though, she isn’t an intellectual on the same level of Richard Dawkins or Sam Harris, but within the literary world, she generally values knowledge and reason.

Now the task is to get her to move further in that direction.

Filed under: atheism, culture war, ex-athest, Personal | No Comments »

Last week, Interview with the Vampire author Anne Rice made news when she publicly left Christianity… but remained “committed to Christ.” Pretty soon after her announcement, I wrote an Examiner article on the subject. I even started to follow Anne Rice’s facebook page. I was surprised at how approachable she was for someone of her level of fame. The following is a very brief conversation we had on facebook:

Anne Rice:

My faith in Christ is central to my life. My conversion from a pessimistic atheist lost in a world I didn’t understand, to an optimistic believer in a universe created and sustained by a loving God is crucial to me. But following Christ does not mean following His followers. Christ is infinitely more important than Christianity and always will be, no matter what Christianity is, has been, or might become.

Me:

I’m an optimistic atheist and live a very happy life without the need for deities and vicarious blood sacrifices. Not all atheists are pessimistic. Just follow reason Anne. You don’t need superstitions or to believe in anything without sufficient reason (i.e. faith). The universe is a wondrous place without the magic of bronze-aged myths.

Anne Rice:

Staks, I understand. There are many optimistic atheists. I wasn’t one of them. But I brooded constantly on history and suffering. And of course when I came to Christ, I did not really know anything about Christian pessimism. And still don’t embrace it, of course. But I am sure you are right. There are many happy atheists.

I will be writing a longer and more thought provoking letter to Anne Rice shortly. Let me know what you think of this first exchange.

Filed under: conversation, de-conversion, facebook, Progressive Christians, Vague Higher Power | 1 Comment »

During the presidential primary, I was one of a few progressives warning everyone that Obama was a moderate at best. One campaigner told even told me that he thought Obama was the next Robert Kennedy. Sadly that seems unlikely.

On just about every issue Obama has let down his progressive base and continues to try to get Republicans to like him. The thought that we will be stuck with Obama for six more years is scary, but the scarier part is that the Republicans may get Sarah Palin or some other wack-job in office because Obama has lost his base.

For the good of the country, we can’t let Obama go unchallenged in his re-election campaign. It is time for the progressives in the country to run someone against Obama during the primary. If for no other reason it could light a fire under Obama’s ass and get him to actually do stuff.

While I love Kucinch, his image has been tarnished beyond repair. Kucinich might be able to make Senator, but I don’t think he could beat Obama in a primary even with Obama’s low approval rating and he certainly wouldn’t be able to beat the Republicans in the general election. The best chance we have to beat Obama in the Primary and to win in the general election is Congressman Alan Grayson.

Grayson, is a strong progressive in a right wing congressional district. Despite the fact that every Republican talking head is gunning for him and he lives in a strong Republican district, he seems to be in little danger of losing his seat. It seems that Grayson has discovered the formula for political success… guts.

To help persuade Grayson to run in a primary against Obama, I have started a facebook group. The way these things work is that we need at least a million people to join this group so that the media takes notice. Grayson will probably only run if he sees that there are large numbers of people who want him to run. So please join this group and spread the word.

EAVB_DYSMKLFUYY

Filed under: facebook, healthcare, Hope, Obama, Political Activism, Politics | 3 Comments »

I am pretty well established vocal atheist. On the scale of atheism, I am often lumped in with Dawkins, Hitchens, and Harris as a “New Atheist” or “militant atheist.” I prefer to see myself more as a “bad cop” of atheism. So imagine my surprise when I found out that on at least one issue I am a friendlier atheist than popular atheist blogger Hemant Mehta, better known as “The Friendly Atheist.”

I will admit that I am not generally a fan of his blog, although I do check it out from time to time. I tend to be more of a PZ Myers fan. Still, in my book we are all on the same side and we should all do our best to help each other out.

Late last night, I found out that former Catholic, turned atheist, turned Catholic Anne Rice has once again left Christianity. I quickly wrote up an Examiner article about this. I loved most of Rice’s Vampire series and to this date still consider her vampire mythology to be the standard for all vampire stories (Twilight stacks up poorly compared to Interview).

While Rice hasn’t broken completely from the Christian mythology, she has made a giant leap in a very public way. De-conversion is a journey and rarely happens overnight. Still, Hemant Mehta was not so friendly about Rice’s announcement.

On his blog, he criticized Rice for falling into the “follower of Christ” camp. While there is a place for this criticism, I think the more important message is that Christianity is being called out for being immoral. Even many atheists who commented on Hemant’s blog think he was a little mean and off base with this one.

For me, it is a chance to say that on this issue I am friendlier than the Friendly Atheist. 😉

Filed under: atheism, Current Events, de-conversion, People of Reason | 4 Comments »

Last weekend was the Philadelphia Coalition of Reason’s annual Unity Picnic. This year however, when I was putting together the Examiner article to promote the event I learned a few things. I learned that the local Humanist group was pretty much doing all the work and that the rest of the coalition was really doing much at all. Some groups didn’t even publicize the event. For all practical purposes PhillyCoR was practically dead.

The thing is that Sam Singleton Atheist Evangelist was scheduled to perform at the picnic but due to a climbing accident, his manager and wife was hospitalized a week earlier. As a result, the Sam Singleton tour had to be pushed back and a few weeks. He had contacted me about trying to put together an alternative event since he wouldn’t be able to make the picnic.

With PhillyCoR practically dead, there was no way to put together an alternative event. So I tried to put PhillyCoR back together. As a result, I am pretty much the new coordinator of PhillyCoR. It isn’t a position that I necessarily want, but it is a position that needs to be done.

I have always talked about the importance of atheist groups working together and this is a necessary consequence of that philosophy. The way I see it, we are fighting a culture war and atheist groups need to work together if we are to spread the ideas of reason, critical thinking, and science.

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Filed under: atheism, culture war, humanism, People of Reason, Personal | 5 Comments »

I love it when Christians try to use logic to show why God can’t do something or why God must do something a certain way. Don’t these Christians realize that they have created a character that is too perfect for their own good? I keep hearing the voice of Doc Brown from Back to the Future in my head, but instead of telling Marty that he isn’t thinking forth dimensionally, these Christians aren’t thinking omnisciently.

According to a Christian (or any theist for that matter), God is all-powerful. He created the laws of logic (see my argument against Presupposition Theology). In fact, most Christians maintain a belief in miracles and in prayer. Both of these beliefs require God to bend and/or break the laws of physics and sometimes logic. So if God can break these laws for a miracle, why can’t he do it where it counts?

Let me give you an example. When I asked a Christian about the Problem of Evil, her answer was that God created evil/suffering/Hell so that we could choose to love him. Her argument was that without evil, people would be forced to love God and that wouldn’t really be love. It wouldn’t be a real relationship.

That type of argument might cut the mustard if God were an alien (okay, not even then), but as it is God is alleged to be all-powerful. God can redefine the laws of logic so that we could choose a relationship with him without the evil/suffering/eternal torture. God is too powerful for Christians to satisfactorily address the Problem of Evil.

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Last week, while on my vacation I heard about something which must make the Religious Right go even more insane then they are already. I heard about the latest technique in women’s breast augmentation… using Stem Cells!

During the Bush administration the Religious Right pushed to limit Stem Cell Research. Their view on this was two fold. First, embryonic stem cell research is worse than abortion. Second, it is a slippery slop to playing God. I guess they didn’t realize that Stem Cells could also be used for breast implants. If they had, they would have had a third objection.

Basically, cosmetic surgeons can liposuction some fat out of a woman’s ass, thigh, or other body part (surprisingly not the brain) and using their own stem cells, can move that fat into the breasts. While these are adult stem cells rather than embryonic, I am sure the Religious Right will still be mental about it.

I should point out that studies have been done that show that women who get breast implants do it because they believe that guys want them to have bigger breasts. Those same studies show that guys don’t request and don’t really care if women have larger breasts. It is basically a self-image issue.

Still, there is nothing wrong with getting cosmetic implants (for women or men). If these implants are safer, then I am all for them. That being said, I don’t think women should feel the need to have them unless it is what they want.

Filed under: culture war, Religion, science | No Comments »

Let me tell you a true story. A long time ago in a galaxy far far away, there were star wars. First there was a massive clone war and then there was a rebellion against a galactic empire. Just because I have no evidence for this, doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen. I derived this knowledge from faith, which is an alternative means of knowledge from science which requires objective evidence. But it is equally valid, right?

Let me tell you another one. I won the deed to the Brooklyn Bridge last night in a poker game. The problem is that I live in Pennsylvania and have no desire to move to New York right now so I need to sell it really cheap. I’ll sell it to you for a fraction of what it’s worth. I’ll sell it to you for $5000. It is worth 5 million. This is the truth, why won’t you buy it? Oh, you want evidence? Just take my truth on faith. That is a different kind of knowledge, right?

The fact is that faith isn’t a different way of deriving truth it is just a way to claim truth. Anyone can claim truth, but being able to show truth requires evidence. Just because there is no evidence don’t mean that something isn’t true. But we can’t call it knowledge. We can only claim knowledge when we have sufficient valid evidence and can objectively show that something actually is true.

Religious people don’t believe anything on faith alone except for their particular religious claims. Isn’t that interesting? Why are religious people just as skeptical about other people’s religions and about matters involving money and the world we live in, but when it comes to their own religion, faith suddenly becomes an alternative and equally valid way of deriving truth? The real truth here is that religion is just as much of a scam as my deed to the Brooklyn Bridge.

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Filed under: Alternative Worldview, culture war, faith, god of the gaps, Religion, science, truth | 1 Comment »

It used to be that only fundamentalists would tell me that science was a religion, but these days even some moderate religious people are using this type of poor reasoning. Their view is that science claims to have the only method for understanding the world. In other words, science claims to have a monopoly on the truth just like fundamentalist religions do.

Yes, science is the only reliable method for understanding the world. No other method can reliably tell us about the world. The major difference however is that science can prove its claims objectively. This is why every person in the world uses science and relies on science despite any rhetoric they might implore.

God didn’t create the internet. No one has faith that when they turn on a light switch that it will go on. We don’t pray over our meals to cook them. Science is the only method which we can accurately rely on to get the job done. In short, science works. It works consistently, repeatable, and objectively.

The day religious people stop using the scientific method and all advances that science has produced is the day I will concede that science might be a religion and that science might take things on faith. When religious people can pray into existence anything even remotely as cool as the internet is the day I might be willing to accept that science isn’t the only reliable method for understanding the world.

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Filed under: anti-intellectualism, Atheism NOT Religion, culture war, Religion, science, truth | 3 Comments »

Over the weekend, I was putting together an Examiner article on the upcoming PhillyCoR Picnic. This is an event that I have been promoting for months so I was very excited to be writing the article. However, I noticed that the PhillyCoR website was down and so I contacted the PhillyCoR president to find out what was up. It turns out that the PhillyCoR is falling apart. The Picnic is being organized mainly by the Philly Humanist Society (one of the eight groups) with almost no support from the other organizations.

To make matters worse, just after I published the Examiner article, I found out that the Picnic’s special guess (who I have also been promoting for months) may not be able to make it. Rosco’s wife and campaign manager Cari fell out of a 60 foot tree and is in the hospital. They were supposed to leave Montana this Tuesday for Philly to perform the Sam Singleton, Atheist Evangelist show at Sunday’s Picnic and two additional shows.

Cari is doing well, but is banged up pretty badly and I don’t know if she will be up for the trip. The Philly shows were going to be part of a larger tour around the nation. One really distressing part of the whole thing is that they don’t have any health insurance because Atheist comedy shows don’t make a whole lot of money.

This gets me thinking about politics. While I was one of the few people well aware that Obama was not a progressive during the campaign, even I am surprised at how much he has continued the Bush policies and has done little to nothing to fix the problems facing this nation. During his great Health Care reform speech, he said that this was the last time America would have to deal with this issue and that we were going to do it right once and for all. What a joke.

If Obama had done it right, Rosco and Cari wouldn’t be without health care. In fact, part of the current problem is that even those who do have health care are not entirely sure that our medical expenses are actually covered. As it stands now (after HealthCare reform) we still have to pay the Health Insurance companies, but they don’t have to actually perform the services for which we are paying them. There are loopholes all over the place and Health Insurance companies have tons of lawyers who are looking for as many as they can find.

Sometimes I get discouraged. During the Bush administration, people told me that they were going to move to Canada and I discouraged them. I reminded them that America was the last battlefield and if we left, the Religious Right would take control and use America’s nuclear arsenal against the rest of the world. We won the last election, but it doesn’t seem like a victory. While it is true that we would be in far worse shape if the Republicans won, I am still so discouraged and disheartened that Obama seems unwilling to do much of anything except make great speeches.

He said that he didn’t want to play the game better, but wanted to change the game. But the fact is that Obama is just playing the game. What good is fighting hard to gain a political victory if that victory is hollow and meaningless?

I must admit that over the weekend, my wife and I actually had a serious conversation about perhaps moving to Canada. This health care issue is really motivating us to consider what I once thought was unthinkable. We actually went on the internet and started researching houses and areas to get an idea of costs. We definitely can’t afford to move anytime soon, but we are thinking of taking a vacation trip to scout out the possibilities.

Sometimes I get discouraged.

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Filed under: church/state, culture war, healthcare, Obama, Politics | 5 Comments »

Dangerous Talk is now 95% back up and running. Over the last few months the site has been continually hacked. Basically, the hackers have been inserting spam links hidden at the top of the website. The links can only be seen when Java has been disabled.

At first, a few readers informed me of the problem and I had to reinstall some of the theme components of the site and tweak the code. As it had started to happen more and more, I began checking the site every week or so. Basically, on Friday I got tired to having to do all this and figured I could just update the software and maybe stop this problem altogether.

That ended up being a much bigger problem than the original hacking problem. At one point on Friday I was actually freaking out a bit. By Saturday the site had been restored to the point that readers shouldn’t have noticed any difference in the site. But from my standpoint, I basically was locked out.

Now I have full access and most of the site is working great. I still don’t know if any of this will stop the hacking, but I am hoping.

I want to thank all my readers for your patience and for your continued support. I will be taking the rest of this week off from blogging to get the remaining 5% of the site back to where it should be and to work on other Dangerous Talk projects. Please feel free to go through the Category section and check out some of the older blog articles that you might have missed. Also, I hope you will check out my Examiner page as I will be writing a few more articles there this week.

Once again, I want to thank all the readers and supporters out there because you are all Dangerous Talker and you all mean the world to me.

-Staks

Filed under: Personal | 1 Comment »

Yesterday I had a twitter conversation with a Christian over something I talked about in one of my Examiner articles. The interesting thing is that it wasn’t even the main point of the article and there is already another article in the “Atheism 101” series which addresses the issue in more detail. In any case, I thought I would discuss the issue.

The article focuses on the “No True Scotsman” fallacy however this particular Christian decided not to address that issue at all. Instead, he focused on the part of the article where I talked about how if the Bible was a written by a perfect deity to be a perfect guide for humanity, then it fails. The fact that reasonable people can get diametrically opposed views from a holy book alleged to be written by a perfect being is logically inconsistent.

The Christian makes two interesting claims. The first is that even though the Bible is “difficult” to understand it does not invalidate the claim that it was written (or inspired by) a perfect being. Again my claim is that if it was written by a perfect being as a guide for humanity then that being would be able to communicate his message perfectly and it would be crystal clear to everyone.

To claim that the Bible is “difficult” to understand is an extreme understatement. The fact is that somewhat reasonable people can and do get diametrically opposed interpretations from this book. Dr. Seuss’s “The Lorax” is not nearly as “difficult” to understand. That book was written to have a message too and that message is crystal clear to any reasonable or even somewhat reasonable person. It is one thing for a book to be difficult to understand, but for a book to be open to such diametrically opposed interpretations really says something about the author. Claiming that the author is perfect at this point just seems silly.

If I were reading a guide to plumbing and I interpreted it in a diametrically opposed way as my neighbor, we would both have to acknowledge that the author didn’t convey his or her instructions clearly. But if the author was God and claimed to be perfect, then this poorly written guide would be strong evidence to the contrary.

The second point that this Christian made (ironically after he accused me of making the Red Herring fallacy among others) was that scientists disagree on interpreting data all the time. The analogy that he is trying to make here is that just because people get diametrically opposed interpretations from the Bible shouldn’t invalidate the Bible. But there is a very distinct and important difference here. The Bible is alleged to be perfect and written (or inspired) by a perfect being. Scientists may get different interpretations from the same data, but they are not perfect. That is why when this type of thing happens in science, scientists have to design new experiments and/or studies so that they can be repeatable with some degree of accuracy. If an experiment or study yielded diametrically opposed results, then the experiment or study was faulty and needs to be re-examined, fixed, and/or re-done completely.

That is the real difference between religion and science. Science tries to get it right and keeps trying while religion claims to have it right regardless of the results. This makes religion a poor guide to life. Claiming to have the answer isn’t the same as actually having the answer. Science tests its results and is not afraid to re-test them over and over again. Science encourages critics and criticism while religion just asserts their answer without regard to the evidence or the facts.

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Filed under: Biblical Scholarship, conversation, Religion, the bible | No Comments »

Yesterday, I received an interesting e-mail from an atheist in Pakistan. He is in a day to day struggle to keep his mouth shut out of a very real and legitimate fear that should a hint of his disbelief get out, he will probably be killed.

Such a serious situation prompted me to turn to my liberal Muslim friend from the scary streets of Chicago for advice. My Muslim friend has traveled to that very same city in Pakistan and there is a branch of his liberal Muslim Mosque there that might be able to help (although I worry that they might try to convert him to liberal Islam rather than trying to help in some other way).

This got me thinking about just how important the internet is to the rise of atheism. I have never met either of these two individuals personally and yet through the internet I can communicate with both of them. My new atheist friend in Pakistan relies on the internet to keep his mind thinking and to help save his sanity from having to hide his disbelief. My Muslim friend may or may not be able to help but at least it is through the power of internet developed by science which holds the key to solving this problem.

The internet is so dangerous to the Muslim world that Pakistan is seriously considering blocking facebook and other websites which could be used to criticize and/or question their religion. I think it is really important to form a strong atheist community on the internet and for atheists around the world to help each other. Whether it is simply promoting reason and reasonable ideas or whether is it reaching out to isolated atheists in overly religious nations or states, we need to help each other.

Religions have form communities which help out their members. Many atheists miss those types of communities even though they tend to be dogmatic. Through the internet we can form a new kind of community which serves some of the same functions of local Church communities without the dogmatism. An internet community is even stronger than local communities because we are non-localized. But we should start building local communities too.

The hard part for most atheists is building and being part of a community since the only thing really binding us together is a lack of belief. However, most modern atheists have also rallied behind common principles of rationalism, humanism, science, and to a lesser extent progressivism. We can build our internet and local communities around these things.

Filed under: culture war, free speech, humanism, islam, People of Reason | 1 Comment »

I hope everyone had a happy 4th of July weekend. I celebrated my independence from gods by taking the family on vacation to Carl Sagan’s old stomping groups in Ithaca New York. There we took the Sagan Planet Walk and Paced the Space.

We walked from the Sun marker to the marker of the Earth (probably about 50 to 100 feet) in the scaled down solar system (one-fifth billions of the actual size). When I walked back over to the Sun marker, I read that in this scaled model, our neighboring star Alpha Centauri would be located somewhere in Hawaii. So while our solar system is scaled down to ¾ of a mile, the next nearest star would be nearly 5000 miles away.

I can almost hear Carl Sagan’s voice informing me about the vast emptiness of space and how humbling it is, reminding us that the Universe was not created for us, but rather we are simply a part of a great big Universe so immense that our nearest neighbor would take multiple lifetimes to reach.

Religious people often talk about how God made the Universe for human beings. But a glance through a telescope shows just how ridiculous such beliefs really are. Why would a God create our closest star (aside from the Sun) so far out of our reach? What does that tell us about the vastness of the rest of the Galaxy or even the vastness of the entire Universe as we know it through science?

Filed under: Argument by Design, Disproving God, education, god, humanism, People of Reason, science | 3 Comments »

In case you were not aware, July is Global Atheist Blasphemy Month. While the details are explained in the Examiner article, the gist of the occasion is for atheists to claim blasphemy. Instead of being offended by all the usual suspects that religious people are offended by, this month is our turn to be offended by their symbols.

Even though the group that started this is advocating a form of censorship, I think it is better to avoid pretending to be like the religious people on this one. Instead, I think we should play the blasphemy card in a more humanistic way. This month, I don’t think we should hide our atheism from the world at all. We should go out of our way to wear atheism on our sleeves so to speak. When someone says “God bless you” we should not just inform them that we don’t believe in a god, but also let them know that saying such a think is rude and even blasphemous.

This month we should actually get offended by religious symbolism and we should let people know that we are offended. I am not advocating reporting the symbolism as hate like the facebook group is doing, but we should make those who plaster religious symbolism all over the place that it is offensive, rude, and inconsiderate.

Many religious people may not even realize that they are being inconsiderate. Others know it all too well and just don’t give a damn. For those people, we have to expose their hate for what it is. We should let the rest of the world see just how hateful some religious people actually are.

Here is a great video that I saw which show just what it is like to have a bit of role reversal with religious people:

Filed under: atheism, Blasphemy, culture war, Religion | 3 Comments »

Christians have a saying taken from John 3:16 of the Bible, “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” Atheists have a saying too although I don’t think it is in any book yet, “God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him will believeth in anything.”

I was in the religion section of a bookstore today and there was actually a book about how Jesus told the founding fathers about a secret code. This was not meant to be a fictional book either. In fact, not counting the obvious fiction of the Christian narrative there are a lot of books that have divergently ridiculous narratives.

It seems that if someone is willing to swallow the obvious fiction of the Bible, they seem to be susceptible to other wacky narratives. There are Bible codes, secret knowledge imparted to important people, space Jesus, claims of alien angels, demons, etc. The wackiness doesn’t end with God.

I bet there is some good money in books of this kind. I am almost tempted to write something wacky based on the Bible and call it non-fiction. Any ideas? The crazier the better.

Filed under: delusion | 6 Comments »

I have a 16 month old child and the other day we were at his library program and they were singing a song about bedtime routines. Part of the routine in the song was to say your prayers. As someone who grew up in a moderately Jewish home, I am curious, how early do Christians teach their children to pray?

I can’t really remember how old I was when my parents pushed religion on me. I know I was going to Hebrew school classes by the time I was 3 or 4. But it occurs to me that most people have religion forced on them when they are much younger. How old does a child have to be to confess his sins to a Catholic priest so that the child might avoid eternal torture in Hell? Is does God have a grace period so that if you sin before a certain age it doesn’t count?

Children and religion just sees like a bad idea. Children often believe in the tooth fairy, Santa Claus, the boogieman, etc. how hard is it really to indoctrinate them about God and Jesus? When a priest or other religious leader convinces a grown and competent adult their ridiculous story, that is one thing, but going after kids who have no bullshit immune system seems very wrong to me.

I don’t think it is necessarily child abuse on the same level as actual child abuse, but it does seem pretty close. In some ways, it is probably even more damaging to the child than a beating would be. The guilt and other psychological damage may never be healed.

Filed under: Catholics, culture war, Mainstream Christians, prayer, Religious Manipulation, sin | 2 Comments »

The other day I got an e-mail from my father that I found interesting. It was a link to a video which talked about how God blessed us with perfect eyes to see such beautiful colors. The video mostly featured a series of images first in black and white and then in color to show how great the human eye is. I should note that my father is not all that religious any more and probably just enjoyed the visuals.

Of course, this type of argument is laughable. For starters, the human eye doesn’t see very much. So little of the electromagnetic spectrum makes up visible light to humans that one really needs to ask not why God has blessed us with color, but rather why God has cursed us by practically blinding us. Of course the reality is that God didn’t bless us or curse us. The human eye wasn’t designed by an intelligent designer with a plan, but rather was designed by the process of natural selection.

Second, the Intelligent Designer fails again when we look at the internal aspects of the human eye. God really fucked it up for humans. For some reason our optic nerves block much of the light from reaching our photoreceptors. The fact is that there are animals in the world whose photoreceptors are not blocked by their optic nerves. So it certainly seems like God designed the snail’s eyes better than the eyes of humans. Maybe snails have souls and humans don’t.

The real problem is that it is too easy for some ignorant Christian to throw up some black and white photos and contrast them to color photos and claim that humans are number one without having the slightest idea of what is out there or what he or she is talking about. People like my father like looking at the “eye candy” and some people might even get suckered in with that and fall victim to the ridiculousness of the argument being quietly put forth.

The Christian cloaks his or her self in being uplifting when they are really just been ignorant and/or dishonest. In some cases, they are using people’s sense of awe and love of beauty as a way to push their product and sucker people. We can still experience the awe of color and the beauty of the world as we see it and still admit that human vision is far from number one. In fact, through the magic of science humans can now see much better than our flawed human eyes normally allow.

Microscopes and telescopes allow us to see things both big and small. Glasses and contacts correct people’s flawed vision and other scientific instruments even allow us to observe much more or the electromagnetic spectrum than our “God” given eyes possible could. Isn’t science wonderful? The collection plate in located in the side bar in the form of a contribute button. Thanks!

Filed under: Argument by Design, evolution | 4 Comments »

On Saturday, I was at the mall and walked past a Chick-Fil-A. Most people are aware that Chick-Fil-A is very religious right. Because of this, my rule of thumb is that I will never buy anything from Chick-Fil-A, but I will take their free samples. In fact, I will go out of my way to take multiple free samples because I know it costs them money. Every penny counts. Saturday, their free samples were pieces of their new Spicy Chicken sandwich.

I admit that I was a little nervous about trying this sample because I have a low tolerance for spicy food and I refuse to buy a drink from Chick-Fil-A. I might have had to suffer for a few minutes while I found a more respectable food establishment to buy a drink from. As it turns out, I didn’t need to.

I guess that the new product people of Chick-Fil-A are so frightened of Hell, that they are afraid to make a chicken sandwich spicy hot as it might remind them of Satan. The Spicy Chicken was not spicy at all. If it was really spicy, I would probably be writing today’s blog jokingly accusing them of being in league with Satan rather then jokingly accusing them of being afraid of Satan. It just goes to show you that if you really want a spicy chicken sandwich, Church’s Chicken might be a better choice. Despite the name, they actually aren’t religious.

Filed under: culture war, hell | 3 Comments »

I have often talked about how we choose what offends us and how we could just as easily choose not to be offended. However, some things have a reasonable expectation of being offensive. The Crucifix should have a reasonable expectation of being offensive and it offends me.

When I say that something has a reasonable expectation of being offensive, I am referring to something that a reasonable person could find offensive. For example, an individual may find a particular song offensive because it might remind him or her of an unpleasant experience. This is their choice but there is no reasonable expectation that such a song would be offensive. On the other hand, the Nazi swastika is a symbol which represents racial purity and a reminder of the brutal murder of over 6 million people. It is still a choice to be offended by such a symbol, but there is a reasonable expectation that most reasonable people would be offended by such a symbol.

The crucifix is a torture device. It represents cruel torture. To a Christian, it represents the cruel torture of Jesus and their belief that the torture of Jesus was a sacrifice for their immortal soul so that they will not be tortured for all eternity in Hell. This is of course the core of the Christian belief system.

It is understandable why someone who claims to be Christian will display a crucifix it is also understandable why someone who believes in racial purity would display the swastika. I am not equating the two belief systems but I am pointing out that to the represented of each system of belief these symbols are not offensive. It is to the non-represented that the symbol becomes offensive. In other words, whether a symbol has a reasonable expectation of being offensive is not up to the represented, but rather it is up to the unrepresented.

For example, the American flag is also a symbol which represents those who live in America and to most Americans it also represents liberty and justice for everyone. If one is not represented by the American flag, then they get to be the ones who decide whether or not it has a reasonable expectation of being offensive. During the Bush (Jr.) Presidency, some people in other countries were offended by the American flag and had good reason for being so. Today, fewer non-American are offended by the American flag. The reasonable expectation of offensiveness is less.

For a non-Christian, the crucifix represents a torture device. It also represents the core message of Christianity which is that all non-Christians will be tortured for all eternity by a loving deity. It is also a reminder of all the cruelty done and being done in the name of the Christian God. So while there is no reasonable expectation of offensiveness within the community of believers, Christians should realize that there is a reasonable expectation of offensiveness outside of their community.

If Christians want to be considerate to non-Christians, then they ought not to display their offensive symbol. To do other wise would be at best poor manners. It could also be interpreted as a hostile act of aggression.

Filed under: culture war, morality, Offensiveness, People of Reason, Religion | 1 Comment »

Last week, I got into an interesting conversation with a fellow atheist about de-converting Christians. My new atheist friend expressed the opinion that he thought moderate Christians were easier to de-convert and I expressed the opinion that I thought fundamentalists were easier to de-convert.

I am not actually sure that either of us could prove our position, but I do think we each had some interesting arguments to draw on. His main argument was that moderates were already more reasonable people and already value reason most of the time. So it is just getting them to think reasonably about religion that is the issue. Logically, this makes perfect sense but in practice, I have to disagree.

My view is that moderates just don’t care. I think both fundamentalists and moderates use reason (although fundamentalists don’t value reason as much) so in both cases it is merely getting the Christian to apply their reasoning to religion. The thing is that fundamentalists take their religion very seriously. They are heavily invested in their particular and literal interpretation of the Bible while moderates are quick to play the “metaphor” card for every unreasonable Biblical verse that is pointed out to them.

The moderate will just brush off criticism and stick with their view that Jesus was a hippy regardless of the evidence to the contrary. Because the fundamentalist is so heavily invested, they will actually put the time and energy into trying to defend their unreasonable position. But doing so, they start the de-conversion journey of self-discovery. Their fundamental passion becomes the tool of their de-conversion… in my opinion.

This isn’t to say we shouldn’t try to de-convert and educate moderates about their own religion. We should, it is just that in my view fundamentalists are easier to de-convert. This argument is actually more of an interesting academic exercise between two atheists since I really don’t think it matters whether or not I am correct or my friend is correct. What are your experiences, stories, or logical arguments on this topic?

Filed under: atheism, conversation, de-conversion, Religion | 2 Comments »

Since well known atheists like Richard Dawkins and others have been vocal in their criticism of religion there has been a backlash by a few other atheists like Greg Epstein. Some atheists have been inspired by the “four horsemen” while other have decided to take a different approach. That’s fine, not all atheists have to agree but for some reason some atheists have actually taken the position of defending Christianity.

I understand that some atheists think we can work with liberal Christians against the religious right. But when atheists go out if their way to defend Christianity and act as Christian apologists, that just seems perverse. Currently, the most famous of these atheist Christian Apologists is S.E. Cupp. Most people suspect that she is probably religious right tactic rather than someone who personally doesn’t believe in a deity. On the other hand, I have talked to a (small) number of atheists just like S.E. Cupp, but without the beauty and the book deals.

Part of this type of anti-atheist atheism comes from a resentment of Dawkins and/or a resentment of the growing atheist/humanist community. These apologists see any atheist who is critical of religion as a “Dawkins clone” and yet many of us have been critical of religion long before “The God Delusion” was published.

Christianity preaches that people ought to believe in certain facts about the world on insufficient reasoning. Faith is the virtue and (poor) reasoning is a mere justification for those who aren’t virtuous enough to believe on faith alone. It boggles my mind that any atheist would defend such a world view. What is more mind boggling is that these atheists admit that the Christian world view is wrong and yet they will defend that view rather than promoting critical thinking and a legitimate search for real testable answers to life’s questions.

This should not be confused as supporting and defending someone’s right to believe in wrong and even unreasonable positions. That is not what I am talking about here. I am talking about the ideas themselves.

It is like defending the proposition that 1 + 1 = 3 and then saying that you really know that it is 2, but that the previous proposition shouldn’t be marked wrong just because it actually is wrong.

Filed under: anti-intellectualism, atheism, culture war, Religion | 4 Comments »

It is a pet peeve of mine when fellow people of reason call themselves, “Evolutionists.” I get it when fundy Christians call people that, but when people of reason use that label on themselves, I get annoyed. They should fucking know better!

Creationists use that label on others because they are trying to lower the science of evolution to that of religion (which they seem to realize is actually quite poor). Their claim is that evolution is a mere belief just like their mere belief in God, Jesus, etc. All beliefs are equal and therefore their belief in the literal Genesis is just as valid as the scientific view in evolution.

The thing is that all beliefs are not equal. Some beliefs have evidence and some don’t. Evolution has mountains of evidence while creationism has zero. This is where the creationist usually points out that evolution is “just a theory.” To the creationist, the terms “theory” and “belief” are interchangeable. This is why I like to creationists that I am a gravity-ist. I believe in the theory of gravity.

The thing about labels is that while one can have more than one belief, the label one uses generally represents the strongest belief and one which dominates ones life the most. So by calling someone an “evolutionist” they are making a judgment that evolution is the strongest belief that a particular person of reason has and that it is the belief which dominates our life.

As a person of reason, all scientific theories of such weight play equal dominance in my life. I hold the theory of evolution in the same level of certainty that I hold the theory of gravity. Both play equal dominance in my life although a case could be made that my “belief” in gravity actually places more dominance in my life. So if creationists are going to label be based on the scientific theories that I believe in, than it would make more sense to call me a gravity-ist than an evolutionist… although, creationists aren’t trying to disprove gravity… yet.

Filed under: culture war, education, evolution, Religion, science | No Comments »

Christians have an answer for everything. If you ask a fundamentalist Christian why they believe their religion as opposed to some other religion, they have a standard dogmatic response. They will tell you that all other religions tell you how to reach God, but in Christianity, God reached out to man in the form of Jesus Christ.

This answer of course doesn’t make much sense. It simply is a difference in doctrine and I am not even certain that it is an accurate difference. But it does seem odd that we can look at a map of the world, pick a country, and guess with reasonable accuracy what someone from that country’s religious beliefs are based merely on their geography. Obviously, there is a correlation between religions and geography. This is obviously because the various Gods have marked their territories, lol. Seriously, it is probably because religion is a product of culture and indoctrination. Sure there will be people who go against the culture or who are influenced by someone else’s culture, but for the most part the correlation holds.

Most religions are based around magical thinking in some way. Religious people hate when their beliefs are described as magical, but they tend to have no problem describing other religions as magical despite the similarities to their own. It is precisely because of these similarities that Christians have to find something to distinguish their beliefs from that of other beliefs.

This is why they came up with the idea that other religions seek God but in Christianity, God seeks man. This distinction is purely arbitrary. They could have just as easily said that other religions claim that God is a singular entity, but Christianity preaches God as a trinity. The point is that it really is an arbitrary doctrinal difference. They might as well be saying that other religions don’t view Jesus as God.

The fact is that any religion can find some kind of doctrinal difference to separate themselves from other religions. What gives the one doctrinal difference that Christians have carved out any more validity than the doctrinal differences that other religious people use to justify their religion?

Filed under: God reach man | 1 Comment »

Today, I am continuing this series with an e-mail using the carpet bombing strategy on the Christians for a change. My bet is that most Christians won’t even attempt to address these issues and will simply reply with a “Jesus loves you” or a “I’m praying for you” type of response.

Dear Christian,
I am an atheist because Christians have not made the case for their deity of choice. Arguments like the First Cause, the Argument by Design, etc. are poor arguments and don’t even attempt to prove your deity, just a deity. Your deity (as described in the Bible) is quite simply ridiculous to me.

For starters, that deity has evolved from the Canaanite pantheon of deities by taking successful characteristics from other deities in that region of the world. Even the Bible has changed over time to reflect the ever changing political landscape. If you don’t believe this, then tell me where in the Bible does it say that slavery is immoral. The fact is that during the civil war, the southern pro-slave Christians had the Biblical high ground and yet today every Christian insists that the Bible stands firm against slavery.

The Bible also is far from inerrant. Even some of the so called historical narratives in the Bible were in fact not historical. The Jews were never slaves in Egypt and there was never an Exodus. The Tower of Babel was never built much less destroyed. But that story does talk about how Heaven in up in the sky. Interesting, isn’t it?

The so called prophecies in the Old Testament are nothing of the sort. They are a mix of verses taken out of context with the intent to call people to immediate action. Rabbi Michael Skobac debunks these so called prophecies in a series of videos on youtube. Oh, and the Miracles? Please, Sri Sathya Sai Baba performs many of the same miracles on youtube for all to see. Besides, doesn’t the Bible also say that Satan can do miracles too?

You may have had some sort of emotional personal experience which you feel is particularly compelling, but such experiences are usually don’t prove your particular deity and tend to be vague. You probably haven’t really tried to explain your experience through natural means, but rather have probably jumped to the religious conclusion.

Ultimately, your religious beliefs will rest on faith alone. The thing about faith is that it can justify any religious belief or any belief at all. The Muslim, the Hindu, and even the Scientologist all have the same faith-based arguments. All these religions are asking people to believe on insufficient evidence some pretty extraordinary claims. Faith is really the only thing one can use to get someone to believe in the ridiculous.

Oh, and don’t you think that the God of the Bible is a pretty immoral being? He defines morality as his whim in a pretty relativistic way. If God decided that rape was now moral, I don’t think it would be the case. He is always smiting people for some pretty petty things like working on Saturdays, being gay, and eating shell fish. And Jesus goes around telling people to hate their families and to cut off their hands and pluck out their eyes or they’ll go to Hell to be tortured for all eternity. I think he just needs to get laid. What do you think?
In Reason,
Your Friendly Neighborhood Atheist

Filed under: conversation, culture war, discussion, ignorance, Preaching, Religion | No Comments »