Oxygen Plunge Left Ancient Fish Gasping for Air "'This plunge in global oxygen levels would have been a strong selection pressure on lungfish and other animals, including the tetrapods - the fish-like ancestors of land animals,' said John Long, a palaeontologist at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles and one of the study's authors."
Were you ever a member of the Catholic Church? Do what this blogger did!If you were once a member of the Catholic Church, and you no longer go to services, they still count you as a member unless you send a notice of apostasy like this person did. Included are several great reasons to make this move for those of you who are considering (or just curious).
Random Link! (Just because they aren't neatly classified into a category doesn't mean they aren't post-worthy!)
Take the Video Viewer Challenge! See if YOU can sit through this painful video for the full two minutes! Then let "illuminatitv" know just what you think about his/her argument (and the terribly repetitive background track)! A highlight of what you have to look forward to: "According to the Declaration of Independence, our rights come from God alone. So if you want to cut God out of politics, you have to cut out rights altogether." Have fun!
___________________________________________________________________________________ Video of the week!
"Faith is believing something you know ain't so." -Mark Twain
Notice the subtle change in the latter...we happen to like it more. Like I said, we'll have three days of votes between these two, the highest total at the end gets the win. After that vote, we'll immediately start a vote on the colors. Here's the options the officers are proposing:
Evergreen shirt -- white print
Purple shirt -- white print
Purple shirt -- gold print
Orange shirt -- navy blue print
Please sounds off on your general thoughts on these. If you can get other ideas in before Wednesday, we can edit this list. Happy voting!
Welcome to the first installment of what I hope becomes a weekly feature on UNIFreethought.com. Since the start of the year, the UNIFI officers have discussed how nice it would be to have a sort of Q&A section of the blog. When you're presented with an absurd argument (for instance, archeological evidence suggest a global flood did occur), we thought it would be great to have an easy place to look to find the evidence against it (polar ice caps!). This extends to a number of other arguments as well: "Atheism and agnostic are mutually exclusive," "The Bible is full of scientific predictions that turned out to be true" and "The Second Law of Thermodynamics disproves evolution" are all arguments to be addressed as well.
So, that's where my idea for "Know Your Arguments" comes from. Every week, I want to take an argument you'll encounter when talking with fundamentalists and address where it breaks down. If you have any issue you'd like to see addressed, send it to me at Trevor@unifreethought.com.
Atheism is a belief system.
Atheism requires just as much faith as Christianity.
You can't know there isn't a God.
You have all heard these arguments before. It's the classic straw man argument against atheism. Opponents don't actually know what atheism is. Before I delve into these claims, a quick overview of atheism means.
The simplest ways to classify religious beliefs is on a gnostic-theism scale. Gnogsticism comes from the Greek word γνῶσις and refers to knowledge. Theism comes from the Greek word theos which means God. We use theism to show our beliefs. Combining these, we develop of scale of four potential religious views:
Gnostic Theist -- This person has knowledge of God (gnostic) and believes in that God (theist). Most of our country is gnostic theists. All Christians and Muslims fall into this category. Gnostic Atheist -- This person has knowledge of a God, presumably knowledge of the lack of one (gnostic), and doesn't believe in one. The misconception most people have is that we're all Gnostic Atheists. This is not the case. In fact, most people would argue this view is not intellectually defensible. Agnostic Theist -- This person is without knowledge of a God (agnostic), but believes in one. Usually we refer to this belief deism. If anyone ever says they reject religion but "believe in something higher," they're an agnostic theist. Agnostic Atheist -- This person has no knowledge of a God (agnostic) and doesn't believe in one (atheist). This is where probably 95% of UNIFI members fall.
Over the years, these beliefs have picked up different names. Dawkins dubbed Gnostic Atheism and "strong atheism" and Agnostic Atheists as "weak atheism." Positive and negative atheism have been used as well.
Note that with these definitions, agnostic atheism requires no faith whatsoever. It is impossible to prove a negative; we're just patiently waiting for Christians to affirm the positive.
Well, you can't disprove God. Your worldview is just different.
Without a doubt, you'll come to an argument resembling this soon after. If we can't disprove God, isn't it just as likely that God is real? No. This is where Bertrand Russell's famous teapot comes into play:
“If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.”
Not all outcomes are equally likely. Even though we can't disprove God, we can defend the absurdity of the idea.
But you're just as dogmatic as Christians! Atheism is a religion and Richard Dawkins and co are your gods!
The final argument I'll address is equating atheism as a religion. Opponents will argue evolution is our origin of life and Dawkins and others are our prophets. This analogy breaks down in a number of ways I'll address...
Not all atheists believe in evolution; many Christians do believe in evolution.
While many of us respect Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris, etc, it is only because of the content of their work. If one of them came out against vaccines, we would soundly denounce them. That flexibility doesn't exist with gods.
Dogma, by definition, is from a higher power and is unquestionable. Without a higher power and by promoting critical thought, we cannot have dogma.
There is no standard set of beliefs among atheists. All that we share is a lack of a belief. Compare Bill Maher to Richard Dawkins are you'll see very few beliefs in common.
Atheism is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby; Atheism is a religion like the "off" button is a channel.
So, with that ends my first installment of "Know Your Arguments." Let me know what you think of the idea.
Today's post may not deal directly with blasphemy, but don't let that fool you! This has potential implications for the protection of internet speech in Italy, which definitely includes blasphemy. Follow this link and this link for a full story. Here's the basic rundown: three Google execs were found guilty on Wednesday on privacy charges because they failed to censor a video of a child with Down's Syndrome being bullied.
The shock here is not necessarily that privacy charges are being filed in defense of the child, but that they are being filed against Google.
“'It attacks the very principles of freedom on which the internet is built,' Google lawyer Matt Sucherman wrote on Google’s blog. 'If that "safe harbor" principle is swept aside and sites like Blogger, YouTube and indeed every social network and any community bulletin board, are held responsible for vetting every single piece of content that is uploaded to them — every piece of text, every photo, every file, every video — then the web as we know it will cease to exist, and many of the economic, social, political and technological benefits it brings could disappear.'"
"Censoring of websites has become a hot issue in Italy in recent months, following a spate of hate sites against officials including Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.
The government briefly studied plans to black out internet hate sites after fan pages emerged praising an attack on the premier, but the idea was dropped after executives from Facebook, Google and Microsoft agreed to a shared code of conduct rather than legislation."
It would be dangerously naive to assume that blasphemous web sites would not be classified under the label of "hate sites." Among other things, we learn from our very own campus's reaction to Blasphemy Day last fall and Governor Culver's reaction to the slogan "Don't believe in God? You're not alone" that there are definitely people who are offended by the existence of atheists, some of whom would definitely classify blasphemy as hate speech.
When a discussion arises about the origins of the universe or the evolution of ancient species, one side will have an edge in the argument and one will not: he who brings evidence to the table will have more clout behind his points. How does a person with no evidence ultimately conclude the disagreement? "You weren't there, so you can't say what happened."
This THURSDAYS WITH SETH post will bitch-slap this argument across Chinatown, if you will. You could also settle for the lesser-known Poland Town if necessary, but only on Wednesdays. But before we dive into the "YOU WEREN'T THERE" argument, we'll first need to discuss...
INTELLECTUAL DISHONESTY!
We use this phrase a lot, but what does it mean? Basically, intellectual dishonesty is when someone applies one intellectual standard to a body of knowledge but discards that same standard when it contradicts their own claims.
Do you use statistics to convince someone that increased police spending is not reducing crime rates? If so, do you also use statistics to justify your opposition to sex education? My guess would be: probably not. Statistically speaking, teen pregnancies and abortions have been steadily declining over the past 20 years due to increased contraceptive use. Why do you use statistics to back up one claim but discard them when they go against one of your other claims? You are committing intellectual dishonesty.
Here is another example. Environmentalist groups will often employ economists to do cost-benefit studies to determine the damage that would be done to the environment if, say, a dam were built. If the cost-benefit study is in their favor, they use it to petition the government. If, on the other hand, the government has conducted a cost-benefit study and it goes against the goals of the environmentalists, they will often dispute the study by claiming that a price cannot be put on the Earth. Again, this is intellectually dishonest. If you use a certain standard of proof for your arguments, that standard cannot be discarded when it is used against you.
YOU WEREN'T THERE!
When someone employs this argument to dispute a claim about the past, it is usually a last-ditch effort to put a stop to the bludgeoning of his frail mental state by the powers of reason and logic. After having point after point destroyed by evidence, science, and good old common sense, a person who denies past events will ultimately fall back on the "YOU WEREN'T THERE, SO YOU DON'T KNOW" claim.
Oh, really?
As soon as you mutter that phrase, you bind yourself to a standard of evidence. In a nutshell, you have said that one not being present at an event causes one to be unable to make any claims about that event. Let's take that standard and apply it to another evidence-based event and see if it holds up. If you want to save yourself some reading, I'll just tell you that it doesn't. Remember, we're striving for intellectual honesty here.
At this point in the discussion, you can spin the argument onto its head and then punch it in the sack by presenting the following scenario:
Let's say you find out that your friend was murdered, and nobody saw the crime. Don't worry; it's not real. This is just hypothetical. So the police arrive on the scene and dust for fingerprints. They find them everywhere, and all of the fingerprints point to one person in particular who you knew had a grudge against your friend. In addition, DNA evidence is found at the scene which also shows that this person was there. A few days later, a gun is found in the suspect's house, hidden away. The ammunition used in the murder fits with the gun. The suspect has no alibi. When the police take him in, he confesses. He says, "Yes, I did it. And I'd do it again!"
You now have two options. A.) Accept the confession and the evidence. This person is guilty, and the evidence supports his confession. B.) Refuse to accept the evidence and the confession on the premise that you weren't there to see the murder. Yes, the evidence overwhelming points toward this one suspect, and he did in fact admit that he did it, but really, how can you trust the guy? He could be lying. And further, how do you know the police didn't mess up the fingerprints? What if the DNA tests went wrong and it was a fluke? What if someone took his weapon and used it and then framed him? What if that grudge between him and your friend was really not a grudge at all, and you had just interpreted it wrong? They could have been best pals, for all you know! This whole thing might just be a set up. It seems more likely to you that the police and everyone involved in the case, your friend included, are involved in some kind of intricate conspiracy to trick you into thinking that your friend was murdered. Honestly, it's anyone's guess as to what happened. You will never know. In the meantime, just let the suspect go free. After all, you weren't there!
Is the picture clear?
If you spit in the face of overwhelming evidence for one thing, you have to treat all overwhelming evidence the same way. If you decide to, for instance, assume that all of the overwhelming evidence supporting the theory of evolution is false, part of a conspiracy, or simply not good enough, then you must treat all evidence the same way in all situations. If you don't, you are being dishonest. The world doesn't change the way it operates based on your whims and feelings; it has natural laws. Whether you accept the evidence or not, they are still there, working all the time. People leave fingerprints. Organisms evolve. These things happen, and we have evidence.
Some people would say that we can never "know," which may be true (or is it? we can never know). But even if we don't know, we can be pretty damned sure. I'm pretty sure that if I drop my cell phone from ten feet in the air, it will hit the concrete and break. I will admit that there is about a one in fourteen quintillion chance that it could, instead of falling to the ground, fly into the sky, turn into a popsicle, and shoot a laser beam into the moon and destroy it. But that chance is so infinitely small that I can confidently say that I "know" that it won't happen.
The "YOU WEREN'T THERE" argument is nothing more than an admission that you refuse to accept the evidence in play, no matter how good it is. A refusal to accept overwhelming evidence is an admission that your argument has no merit.
In my opinion, it's a pretty weird and interesting thing to contemplate: there are people who literally still think the world is flat! You can read about it in this article from guardian.co.uk (I'll quote short bits here, follow the link for the full story). What is interesting is that Daniel Shenton, the leader of the Flat Earth Society, does not consider himself to be scientifically backward (as the author points out, he takes no issue with evolution or even global climate change); he sees it as a difference in the burden of proof (see yesterday's post by Mandy Paris), or more accurately how great a burden science must shoulder:
"Look at what special effects are capable of: you can produce any photograph, any video. I don't think there is solid proof. I'm not intentionally being stubborn about it, but I feel our senses tell us these things, and it would take an extraordinarily level of evidence to counteract those. How many people have actually investigated it? Have you?"
I don't want to leave you with the impression that we take this seriously (and neither did the author of the guardian article):
"Shenton's critics, it should be pointed out, can fall back on spherical trigonometry and astronomical observations that date right back to Aristotle in 330BC. In fact, the idea of a flat Earth was widespread only until about the fourth century BC, when the Ancient Greeks first proposed it was a sphere."
The reason I posted this is to encourage a bit of critical thought from our members, and to point out that skepticism (which is of course something I wholeheartedly support) can only lead to valid results and conclusions if one is to remain open-minded to the possibility of what one is skeptical of. I am skeptical of the existence of a creator god, but where do we go from there?
Suppose a god appears before you and tells you to worship it. How could you know that your senses are not tricking you? You could not. If you argue on the basis of mere probability, this should not be enough evidence to convince you of this god's existence; it is much more likely that you are being fooled somehow. But if we say that no amount of evidence could ever convince us, are we combining skepticism with closed-mindedness? Is this ever justified? I truly do not have an answer to this question, I just want you to think about it.
This post will be pretty basic and short but it's still something I really wanted to write about.
Humans are not inherently religious. When I say "inherent", I mean that humans are not born with the knowledge of a higher power. That's not to say that religion isn't a reoccurring concept in our species, but we learn to believe in a higher power from our family, our location (you probably wouldn't be Muslim if you were born in
Uruguay), from passed down legends and folklore, and out of a necessity to answer some unanswerable questions.
As I'm sure many nonreligious people can testify then, it can be frustrating and incredible-- especially if you grew up not being religious-- when others demand evidence that there is no higher power. "Then how did we get here?" "How do you explain _____?" "What evidence do you have...?", etc.
Most of us understand the concept of the "burden of proof". Without delving too far into the legal process, a basic definition according to Princeton is "the duty of proving a disputed charge". If you make a claim, it is your responsibility to prove that claim. In matters of religion, then, the person making the claim that there is a God has the burden of proof because humans do not have inherent knowledge of a higher power.
As a nonreligious person in a country with a high population of religious people, I do find it unbalanced and unfair that because my beliefs aren't in the majority that they are treated as flawed and need to be proven without a shred of scientific wiggle room.
Religion is a claim. Before you ask somebody who does not believe in God about the origins of life and for an explanation of how everything came to be, understand that they owe you nothing until they make a claim that they know. It is absolutely okay to say you are only human and make no deceleration of knowledge about where we came from -- that is not defeatism or a sign of weakness in your beliefs. On the contrary, it is bulletproof.
All joking to the side, I think this is an important question; what is "out of context" (historical or otherwise) when it comes to the Bible? Why do Christians never worry about whether "love your neighbor" is in context? Thanks for the idea, John Bailey:
Hey, everybody! I'll be taking over LFTS for Cody, so there are going to be some minor changes. If you would like to submit links, you can email us at Contact@unifreethought.com and I'll get them posted the next Sunday! This week I'm breaking up the links into Science and Religion with a news reminder and a video or two tacked on the end, so hold on to your hat!
Science Links:
RNA replication and evolution at the Scripps Research Institute: Scientists at Scripps are researching the hypothesis that DNA originally came about through RNA replication. The RNA that they are replicating is not alive in any real sense, but is able to replicate itself and adapt to its environment through mutations.
Religion Links: This week I'm going to focus on some member-generated material. Some of these are classic!
"No Gods, no masters"I'm sure you've all read Trevor's opinion article from this week, but here it is just in case. It's sparked some interesting discussion on the website and facebook.
News: A reminder of this weeks' lineup of events! More details here!
"Critical Magic" with Zachary Paige -- Wednesday at 3:30 in the CME
Should Lesbians and Gay Be Allowed to Marry?" -- Wednesday at 4:15 in the SEC 246
UNIFI Supper -- Wednesday at 6:00 in the Rialto
Faith Forum -- Wednesday at 8:00 in the Hemisphere Lounge of the Maucker Union
"The Politics of Jesus" -- Thursday at 7:00 in the CME
Also, you can expect a video blog update later in the week (we're shooting for Saturday) from Seth, Stef, and me, so look for that! Remember that if you want to make a post for us, just write it up and email it to us! In the meantime, I'll leave you with a couple of comedy videos:
Last week, I announced UNIFI would be counting on our readers to design our next t-shirt. I created a spreadsheet and invited everyone to contribute quotes for the back of the shirts. We got an astonishing 35 replies, all of them fantastic. At the officers meeting today, we shrunk the list down to eight that we felt comfortable printing. Now it's your turn to vote.
“Men speak. That is their role in the church. The women have a different role. They are to help and encourage others. It’s not a matter of equality as much as just each gender has a different job.”
Mark Driscoll doing...something?
I logged onto Facebook the other day to be welcomed by this gem. I had been discussing the merits of taking the Bible literally when “Eve” dropped this bomb. I was floored – utterly floored and speechless. How does one respond to blatant, self-loathing sexism? This discussion, and a few others I’ll mention later, got me thinking about equality and religion’s fight against it. My intention isn’t to bash religion, but rather, those holding misogynistic views under the guise of religious doctrine. Many don’t even seem to realize they’re doing it.
This problem is far from isolated. The past decade we’ve seen the rise of a rebranded fundamentalist Christianity, spearheaded by leaders such as Mark Driscoll. Described by the New York Times as having the “coolest style and foulest mouth of any preacher you’ve ever seen,” Driscoll grew his Seattle congregation to more than 7,600 weekly visitors. His “Act 29” project has begun planting similar churches throughout the country. Despite his “hip” style, Driscoll’s views border on patriarchy. Modern Christianity, he says, has been taken over by “chicks and some chickified dudes with limp wrists.” Jesus has been turned into “a Richard Simmons, hippie, queer Christ.”
Driscoll is an advocate of 1 Timothy 2:12 which states “I do not permit a woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she must be silent.” Women in his church cannot hold leadership roles and are required to submit to their husbands.
Terrifyingly enough, his views are spreading. Even in Cedar Falls, at least one local church is a part of the Acts 29 movement. In a recent sermon, their pastor spoke of how men are the head of a household and women aren’t to take leadership roles in the church. God created different roles for the sexes, claimed the pastor.
“Women have lost the battle of trying to get their way with their husbands.” Women need to accept their role, he concludes.
It is, of course, absurd to not acknowledge the differences between the sexes. Last year, MastersofHealthCare.com compiled a list of the “10 Big Differences between Men’s and Women’s Brains” from a collection of psychological journals, books and government entities. (Although the site itself is suspect, the studies it cites are not). Women communicate more effectively, men process better in the left hemisphere of their brains; women handle stress better, men have stronger spatial abilities.
However, the important qualifier on all of these is “on average.” There are, no doubt, women who are great at math and parallel parking but are terrible at communication. Likewise some men – this author included – can’t parallel park to save their lives.
While we can speak about the typical man and woman, it is patently sexist to shove all men and women into respective boxes.
Oftentimes this sexism appears innocent enough. The local pastor from the church I mentioned earlier has this to say when discussing the roles of men and women:
“[M]en are lazy, indulgent, and do not care to take care of a woman…Women are self starters due many times to the laziness of men…Men in general have a low view of women, and this is shown by their desire to pay money for cheap sex and live-ins without commitment and a taker lifestyle. Commit! Have children!”
This is great, right? NO! Not all men are lazy, indulgent and don’t care of women. Not all women are self-starters. Not all men have a low view of women and want cheap sex. Some women don’t want commitment and not all women want children. This is obviously, blatantly sexist – yet this man of God clearly though he was anything but.
When the women’s suffrage movement first took off, it embraced the slogan “No Gods and No Masters.” Women called for independence; they wanted the final say over their own bodies and minds. Yet, here we are, a century later with a teenage girl who won’t speak in her own church. Oh how far we have come.
Hello, all! I found this amusing little article on Reddit, and thought I would share it for Blasphemy Friday. Elton John is a pretty cool guy, and I couldn't help but to laugh when he described Jesus as "a compassionate, super-intelligent gay man." While I would tend to disagree to some extent, the pairing of Jesus with homosexuality is priceless (and delightfully blasphemous).
More priceless was the reaction of William Donahue, the head of The Catholic League: “Jesus was certainly compassionate, but to say he was 'super-intelligent' is to compare the son of God to a successful game-show contestant...More seriously, to call Jesus gay is to label him a sexual deviant."
Way to blaspheme, Elton, your quote will be featured as our "Freethought of the Day" for today (you look pretty happy about that).
Next week is going to be huge. There's a laundry list of activities going around campus that you should attend.
"Critical Magic" with Zachary Paige -- Wednesday at 3:30 in the CME
Zach is the President of the Philosophy Club and a magician. He's going to do some magic and mentalism, debunk it, and talk about its relation to philosophy.
"Should Lesbians and Gay Be Allowed to Marry?" -- Wednesday at 4:15 in the SEC 246
Our friend Matt Reisetter of the Iowa Family Policy Center is back again this year to argue against gay marriage. This year, we have Brad Clark of One Iowa on our side. There will be plenty of time for Q&A. Come ready. Last year we got Reisetter to admit choices shouldn't be protected (his view against gay marriage)...unless it's your choice of religion. Hypocrisy at its finest.
UNIFI Supper -- Wednesday at 6:00 in the Rialto
How convenient! You'll be famished from a day's worth of activities and it's just in time for UNIFI Supper! If you live on campus, start coming to this weekly event. Next week is the perfect time to start.
Faith Forum -- Wednesday at 8:00 in the Hemisphere Lounge of the Maucker Union
"The Politics of Jesus" -- Thursday at 7:00 in the CME
The CME is bringing in guest speakerRev. Dr. Obery Hendricks, Jr. for this talk, based off his book by the same title. His premise is that Jesus was a revolutionary civil rights leader whose work has been corrupted. At one point in his book, he argues he understands Jesus better than one of the disciples. We better be ready for Q&A.
I'm planning to attend all of these events. Let me know if you'd like to join in.
Whether we like it or not, words have power. They can move us, confuse us, inspire us, and sedate us. Some orators, like Martin Luther King, Jr., have a certain cadence and tone that can bring millions to their feet and into action. Others, such as some professors I've had, have the power to put an entire room full of people to sleep instantly before finishing a single sentence. And we have the Glenn Becks of the world who masterfully manipulate definitions and words to suit their ends. Language is indeed powerful, and it has the potential to bring great change and good to the world. But language can also be abused. I'm not talking about profanity -- I'm talking about language that is used to manipulate the thoughts of others. I want to dedicate this and the next few Thursdays with Seth blog posts to dive into a discussion about the properties of language that cause us problems we should be avoiding.
This post in particular is dedicated to exploring the meaning behind the words we use -- definitions. Of course, I can only begin to scratch the surface of the tip of the iceberg in such a short post, but perhaps the discussion can continue in the comments.
Definitions and Talking Past Each Other
When I say "theory of evolution," both the words "theory" and "evolution" carry a strong meaning in my vocabulary. A theory, in the scientific sense, is a framework of ideas supported by a large number of facts. In order for something to be a theory, according to my understanding of the word, it must also be falsifiable. Further, when I say "evolution," I recognize this to mean the variation of life forms on earth through various selective processes (natural, sexual, etc) over a long period of time. Putting these two ideas together, a meaningful picture emerges: The Theory of Evolution.
When I engage someone in a discussion about the merits of the theory of evolution, I will use these terms and many like them to make my case. But it is worth noting that when someone hears these words, they will interpret them differently than I do.
Someone without a scientific background and/or with a religious upbringing will have very different definitions of both of the key words in "Theory of Evolution." For instance, a "theory" to a non-scientist is essentially an educated guess. It doesn't need support or evidence -- it's a hunch. You could have a theory that if it rains on Friday, it will be sunny the next Friday. This definition of a theory is not the same as mine by any means.
Similarly, this same person could interpret "evolution" to mean a number of things. It could simply mean "change," "change over time," or even "creation of the universe." Some of these definitions are similar to mine, and some are drastically different.
Definitions of words can also change depending on where, how, when, and why they are used -- their context. Words used in one context could have a completely different definition that, when applied to another context, simply don't work. Just look at the example of "theory" in the scientific community versus "theory" in laymen's terms.
Why is it that the religious and the nonreligious seem to have so many unresolvable disputes? Could it be that our disputes are indeed unresolvable, or could it be that we aren't even speaking the same language? If to you, "Morality" is a set of rules handed down to mankind by a deity, and to me, "Morality" is the idea of treating others the way you would like to be treated, then how can we even begin to fathom having a discussion on morality? How can we talk about science or evolution or even life in general?
We can't. We don't end up having a discussion after all. Without common definitions for key terms, both parties would come away from the discussion with the same effect as if each had stood back to back and shouted into space for an hour. We can't listen if we don't understand; we talk past each other. We talk around each other. We even talk at each other... but we certainly don't talk to each other.
What do I propose, then? Before starting a discussion on an important issue of any kind, a reflection on definitions is paramount. Only after laying out a common interpretation of the foundational words to be discussed can a meaningful discussion take place.
I'm disappointed today. I'm disappointed in myself for not making this issue a huge deal on the blog, and I'm disappointed in Rick Warren and the leaders of the American religious community for not speaking out against this. This is a big deal. This needs to be recognized as a big deal. Here is the article I'm referring to. I'll copy/paste some of the most important details, but you should read the full article anyway.
So here are the important points of this post:
The political climate in Uganda is at present extremely homophobic.
Under current law, homosexuality is punishable by up to 14 years in prison.
Under a proposed bill brought forth in October, men who contract AIDS would be executed.
Stop. Read that again. Executed. Think about that. This is not just something that some college kid is writing to get hits on the UNIFI blog. This is real. People want to be able to execute AIDS patients in Uganda. Additionally, failure to report homosexual activity would be punishable by jail time.
There are leading church officials in America who are not taking a stand on this issue
Let's put aside the accusation that some of these church officials contributed to the homophobic ideals of the culture of Uganda. Without even taking these allegations into account, you would expect more moderate Christian leaders to speak out against this. They aren't:
"It is not my personal calling..."
"In a statement to Newsweek, Warren said: 'The fundamental dignity of every person, our right to be free, and the freedom to make moral choices are gifts endowed by God, our creator. However, it is not my personal calling as a pastor in America to comment or interfere in the political process of other nations.'
I'm not so sure about that. It may not be Warren's personal calling to comment on 'political process.' But is neutrality really an option for one of the world's most powerful Christian leaders when state genocide of a minority is proposed in the name of Christianity?
If we decide that genocide is too political for interference, then what good is moral leadership?"
To any church leader who may be reading this post: Put aside your goddamned theology for one second and think about this: your lack of action may lead to the deaths of thousands. We all understand that in your idea of a perfect world, there would be no homosexuality. Fine. But that does not give anyone warrant to kill others based on this "imperfection." If I were in Rick Warren's shoes, and had the influence he does, I would make it painfully clear that I do not ever condone actions such as these. Any moral human being would do the same. You can voice your disapproval with Pastor Rick's lack of action by email here.
In order to familiarize our readers with some of the more classical arguments for the existence of a god, I'm going to start doing some counter-apologetics posts. This is the first of these, devoted to the weirdest argument out there for the existence of god: the Ontological Argument. It's a kind of puzzling argument at first. Even Bertrand Russell was once said to have been convinced by it for a time:
Quite a suggestive picture of Bertrand Russell, no?
"For two or three years...I was a Hegelian. I remember the exact moment during my fourth year [in 1894] when I became one. I had gone out to buy a tin of tobacco, and was going back with it along Trinity Lane, when I suddenly threw it up in the air and exclaimed: "Great God in Boots! -- the ontological argument is sound!""
In a nutshell, here is the Ontological Argument (source here):
"The ontological argument can be stated in this way: “God is the greatest being imaginable. One of the aspects of perfection or greatness is existence. Thus, God exists.” Or put another way—“The fact that God can be conceived means that he must exist.”
This argument for God’s existence was developed by the twelfth century theologian and philosopher, Anselm. It is based on Anselm’s declaration that God is “that which nothing greater can be conceived.”" (emphasis mine)
So here is the rudimentary layout of the argument (bear with me, I'm not great at this formal logic stuff):
P1: God is defined as a being which possesses all attributes of perfection
P2: Existence is an attribute of perfection
C1: God exists
But here's the problem with the Ontological Argument: Existence is not contingent upon perfection, perfection is contingent upon existence! Something must first exist in order to be either perfect or imperfect. If it does not exist, it cannot be perfect. If it does exist, its perfection can be judged from there.
Basically, the Ontological Argument is arguing from the definition of god that god must exist. But defining something into existence does not work with any other concept, so why should it work with god?
Let's say I define the concept Oompa Loompa as a small creature much like a human with orange skin and a squeaky voice. Now let's say I define Zoompa Goompa as a small creature that exists, and is much like a human with orange skin and a squeaky voice. Clearly, Zoompa Goompas are no more existent than Oompa Loompas. (No, people with really bad spray-tans do not count!)
So there you have it, the Ontological Argument for the existence of god. There's not much to it, really.
Don't worry, not every Monday will be miscellaneous, it's just that I have some cool stuff to talk about and opportunities to share, and I wanted to do it all today! The theme here is PWNING NOOBS (I know that "miscellaneous" implies that there is no theme, but I like alliteration)!
Exhibit A: Coming soon to the BLOG!
Seth, Stef and I are introducing a new feature starting next week! We don't have a catchy title yet, but it's basically going to be a weekly officer video upload, and we'll have a new topic every week! So if you don't feel like pwning your very own noob, you can pwn vicariously through the three of us! Our first topic for next week will be prayer, because that's the topic for the first Faith Forum (which is gonna rock your socks off, you can check out the tab up there^^). If you have a topic you want us to talk about (Problem of Evil, any theological argument, Noah's Ark, intelligent design, etc), send us an email at unifreethought@gmail.com and we will do the pwning for you!
Exhibit B: Oh yeah, did I mention FAITH FORUM?!
Faith Forum is an event that we've been working on recently in collaboration with a couple of students from Navs. The first one will be a week from Wednesday. It's going to be like Grab ABrew, only less formal; it will consist entirely of small group conversations, without the open mic. It should be a good time, and a good chance to hone our arguments while learning a little more about the arguments from the "other side." Remember, the rule for Grab a Brew applies here as well: be respectful of the person with whom you are discussing, even if you do not respect their belief. Do this because we respect human dignity (or if you're entirely selfish, do it because if you piss everyone off, we'll have no one to have these fun discussions with). Either way, respect is the rule.
Exhibit C: PWN your own NOOBS!
So you want to get more involved with UNIFI, maybe you're even thinking of applying for an officer position next year. A great way to get a foot in the door is to submit some bloggage! Think about it, the more we know your ideas, the more we know whether you're the best candidate to lead UNIFI in the future. And you don't have to limit it to your "coming out" story (although those are cool too); pick a topic and let loose! Think Occam's Razor is the coolest thing ever? Let us post it! Think Pascal was full of it? Let us post it! Write up a facebook note tagging UNI Freethought, or send an email to Unifreethought@gmail.com and we will toss it up on the blog! Yeah!
Exhibit D (last one, I promise): Example of pwnage
So you're thinking of submitting something to the blog, but you don't know if it's good enough. Send it in! From what we have seen on Facebook, we have a bunch of members that are really great at critical thinking and reasoning! To let you know that you don't have to be Matt Dillahunty in order to get your PWNAGE on, here's an example of a video I posted on the youtubes last year (NOTE: this is the only video I'm really proud of, I think I sound like an ass in the others. If you visit my channel, don't judge). Check it out!
UNIFI is out of t-shirts! Actually, that's a lie. We have like two left -- you should buy them. Regardless, we need a new shirt design. This time, however, we're leaving the design process to you. If this part goes well, you might even get to pick the colors too. First things first, we need a quote for the back. Our original UNIFI shirt was our traditional:
"Question with boldness even the existence of a God" –Thomas Jefferson
With our new batch of shirts, we switched it up to:
Now it's your turn. Submit your ideas by comment, e-mail, phone, text, whatever. We'll pick the best and let you vote on the winner. Anyway, I'll keep this short so you don't skip over John Bailey's blogging the Bible. Good luck!
Alright, this one will be a quickie. I'm gonna gloss over some very interesting biblical scholarship as we try to get to some more of the really interesting stuff in the remainder of Genesis. I would like to do a little extra discussion of how the God character is shaping up by this point at a later date. I may just wait until Exodus when God finally tells them his name. This is a very important event, and a little exposition about the history of the god of Israel will be in order.
So Jacob and Laban have been acting like bad roommates, tricking each other back and forth. Let's see what eventually happens with these two lovebirds, then finally get around to some more killing.
Chapter 31
1-18
So Laban's sons notice that Jacob has become wealthy at the expense of their father. Jacob hears this, and oh would you just look at the time? Conveniently, God now tells Jacob to return to the land of his ancestors. Perfect timing, huh? So he packs up and gets ready to just sneak out without telling his uncle.
19-51
Before leaving, Rachel steals her father's household gods. What? Yeah. Stole all the gods. According to the annotations, "[These] may have been figures representing ancestral deities. Possession of them ensured leadership of the family and legitimated property claims." So note two things here. #1 The ancestors of the Israelites, again, were not monotheistic. And God didn't seem to care too much. #2 Rachel is also a douchebag.
Eventually Laban found out that Jacob had high-tailed it, and with some of his kinsmen, took off after Jacob. He eventually caught Jacob, and was like, "WTF, man?" For some reason, he complained about Jacob absconding with his daughters, but weren't they Jacob's wives now? In the context of the times, Jacob owned them at this point. Whatevs. So he asked, "…why did you steal my gods?" Jacob claimed that he secretly left because he was afraid that Laban would take his daughters back by force. Pshyeah, right. Jacob then made the promise to summarily execute anyone who was caught with Laban's stolen gods. Rachel hadn't told Jacob that she harvested them from her dad's house. Whoops!
So Laban went looking around, then finally came to Rachel's tent. She had taken the household gods, put them in the camel's saddle, and was sitting on it. She apologized that she could not rise in his presence because she was on the rag. She knew that no man would come near her while she was menstruating. Wow. Brilliant. So she got away with it. Let's note here that God is perfectly OK with petty theft.
So after pleading his case and what not, Laban proposes they make a pact not to fuck with each other. They piled up some rocks in a heap and make a pillar. They basically make this a Mason-Dixon line between them. To paraphrase the agreement they made, I shall use the words of Lil' Jon: "Don't start no shit, won't be no shit."
Chapter 32
1-21
So now comes the point where Jacob is gonna hafta pass near the lands of his brother, Esau. Understandably, he's scared as hell. He completely screwed his brother over, after all. He sends some messengers to tell Esau that he's coming with all his flocks and slaves. They come back with some interesting news. Esau is coming to meet him…with 400 men. At this point Jacob shits himself. He comes up with a plan to split all his people into two companies. Then he begs God to not let his brother kill him. Then he comes up with another plan to send several waves of livestock each attended by a different servant, to appease Esau. Full panic mode here.
22-32
That night he sent his wives, maids, and his children and all his possessions across the river and when he was alone on the other side...a man wrestled with him until daybreak! Huh? Yeah. Just like that. No exposition, no explanation. I wouldn't know what to think if some guy just started wrestling with me out of nowhere. I'd assume he was trying to KILL ME. In which case, bring it. Apparently, Jacob is so strong this guy can't take him. So he dislocates Jacob's hip. Owwwww!!
Then he says, "Hey, let me get a move on because the sun's coming up."
Jacob says, "I will not let you go, unless you bless me." Yes. THAT'S what Jacob said. Not, "Hey, why the fuck did you just wrestle with me all night?!" not "You just tried to kill me, you asshole!" …but "Not until you bless me." Which is exactly what I would say after wrestling with an unknown assailant for hours on end. The only way to think about this story without your head exploding is to assume that at some point during the contest, Jacob realized he was wrestling with a divine being.
God asks his name (what, he didn't already know?), and after he says, "Jacob," God renames him. His name is now Israel because he has fought with God and with humans and has prevailed. Curiously, this name change doesn't take fully. When Abram's name is changed, the text refers to him by his new name for the rest of the Bible. Jacob is still mostly called Jacob after this. But obviously, Jacob is the direct patriarch of the 12 tribes of Israel, so it's all symbolic and what not.
So note that if God is about to smite you, all you have to do is call Jacob to work God over. That'll straighten him out.
Chapter 33
Jacob finally comes face to face with Esau. He keeps his family all split up and behind him, so that they may have a chance to escape. To Jacob's surprise, Esau embraced him and they wept together. For the whole conversation he refers to Esau as, "my lord." What a suck up. Tricked him out of his birthright, and stole his deathbed blessing that basically give him lordship over Esau, but he defers to Esau here. Douchebag. And a disingenuous douchebag at that.
Esau accepts a gift of livestock after refusing several times, and proposes that they walk together to his lands. But Jacob says that he's got a bunch of slow ass children and nursing flocks with him. "You go right ahead to Seir and I'll catch up with you!"
Jacob didn't go to Seir. Douche.
Of course, he was probably wise. Esau might have been biding his time to kill him. Jacob instead went to the city of Shechem, where our final story for today will unfold.
Chapter 34
When the prince of the city-state, Shechem, saw Jacob's daughter Rachel, he took her and raped her. So we finally meet someone who's a bigger douche than the heroes of the Bible. And get this; he then pleads with his father, Hamor, to procure the girl as his wife. So Hamor goes to Jacob to ask if Dinah can be Shechem's wife. Jacob and her brothers were enraged, understandably.
Hamor proposes that they set as high a marriage price as they like and his whole clan can live in their land. It is implied that he intended to impoverish the Israelites by assimilation. So Jacob and his sons were like, "Sure… if you'll agree to be circumcised as the custom of our people demands before we can give you our daughter."
So Hamor agreed, and promptly had all the males circumcised. So Simeon and Levi, Dinah's older full brothers attacked while all the men were still in pain and killed every man in the city. Jacob's other sons came afterwards and plundered the entire city. Jacob frets that they have now screwed him over in the land of Canaan. Their reply was, "Should our sister be treated like a whore?"
Ok, I get it. If any of you out there had a loved one who was raped, you would be ready to kill someone. We have codified laws to deal with such behavior today, but at this time and place, rule of law was comparatively nonexistent. I just would have expected God to mete out justice in such a way that the other men in the city who had nothing to do with Shechem's actions didn't have to be killed, too. Is that too much to ask?
Apparently so. Because it gets worse.
That's gonna do it for now. Next time we have a couple of extremely boring chapters to skip before we get to Joseph and his amazing Technicolor dreamcoat! The next 2 or 3 entries will finish up Genesis as it sets the stage for the all-important story of the Exodus. We got some really heavy subject matter to cover there, but don't ignore these last chapters of Genesis!
By Liam Fox for Palibandaily.com, original article with author's cited references can be found here.
"Just about every sane, kind and rational person admires the “COEXIST” campaign and the mutual peace and tolerance that it represents. It’s such a beautiful notion.
I recall the first time I saw the black and white photo of Bono Vox with the inscribed blindfold. What a great visual. What a wonderful aspiration. People can have their beliefs and practice the tenets of their faith without threat of discrimination, oppression or intolerance. Mutual respect and acceptance. We simply need to accept each other’s religions and allow each other the freedom to follow one’s own traditions, teachings and doctrines, and everything will be OK. We’re not prejudiced or bigoted. We are bigger than that and more enlightened to boot. People should be given the respect and dignity to make their own personal choices without being subject to the interference and intolerance of others. It is possible. It must be. We can all learn to get along. Right?
This all sounds so good and reasonable, it must be right. Tolerance is the key. All we need to do is accept each other with an open and understanding mind. After all, it is religion. Religious tolerance is good. It’s wrong to insult religion. It is, by its very nature, sacrosanct. That’s what we’ve all been taught since our youngest memories. You may not agree with religion but it’s considered pretty much hands off for any real criticism. You can laugh behind their backs, but publicly, tolerance is the way of an enlightened and democratic society. It is ignorant and shameful to speak badly of any religion. It’s completely politically incorrect in just about anyone’s opinion, even many atheists or secular humanists. Everyone has a right to believe what they want and worship in their own way. That preferential status seems to be an unassailable right of religion. You can’t dick with religion! It is, after all, religion.
There is so much beautiful art, intriguing history with heroic characters, and edifying drama intertwined with religion. There are the stories that we use to teach our children lessons about caring and sharing and helping. Heroes, for social justice and human rights, have been adherents, proponents, and even clerics of religion. Having a problem with religion is like having a hate on for the Easter bunny. It’s simply not cool. There are community holidays that have been incorporated into family and community traditions that represent so much more than their religious pretext. Christmas is a family holiday, a time to display generosity and gratitude, a vacation and a celebration of the end of the year. It’s not simply the Christian celebration of the birth of their messiah. The cultural face of religion is intrinsically connected to these other social and cultural values, and provides the lexicon for the articulation of these values, and therefore is attributed the cause or source of these values. Religion gets most of the credit for all the good that happens in our world.
How could it be wrong to share these expressions and values of family and community between cultures? The differences that make us unique and exotic to each other can, and should, be enjoyed and celebrated. How can it be wrong to love curry with my fish and chips or eat sushi while enjoying some fantastic baseball in Japan? It’s not. That’s not the problem. Food, sports, music, language, art and theatre don’t come with rules that must be imposed on others. Those wonderful little charms are unique to religion and the political systems they insist on.
Religions don’t bring that same spirit of tolerance and understanding to the table. They insist on it but they will not reciprocate. They can’t. It is against their very doctrine and dogma. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, in particular, are political systems as much as they are theologies. They come with prescriptions, not only for their adherents, but for society at large. Tolerance can only be a one way street. Their doctrine, being divine, cannot be open to compromise or negotiation. They share many of the same bigotries and prejudices against women, foreigners, homosexuals and any who don’t agree with their beliefs and superstitions. Regardless of the good people want to see from religion, or have been trained to see and expect from religion, the truth is that the fundamental structure of religion is authoritarian, uncompromising and not open to negotiation. God’s laws and prescriptions cannot be edited, abridged or altered. God’s laws and teachings cannot be subject to the laws of man, society, or the state, and, most definitely, not compromised with another religion’s equally divine prescriptions and demands.
Religion comes with absolute laws that have absolute authority. Neither man, society, state, nor any other religion has the power, authority or right to circumvent any divine dictates. This makes coexistence and religious tolerance more than simply a challenge. By being incapable of the same tolerance that they demand, religions have rendered religious tolerance impossible.
Religions, even when not a theocracy with complete dictatorial power, insist on their icons being displayed in government and public buildings. They insist on government sanction and support for their rituals and practices. They petition government if they feel that their rules are not being followed by every member of society. They expect society to create and enforce draconian laws that mirror those of their “holy” scriptures. They insist that their biases, bigotries and prejudices be reflected in state legislation, education curricula, business practices, economic models, foreign policy and even family law. In the spirit of being tolerated, religions will insist on exclusive rights to public space and property in order to practice their rituals and then demand additional special treatment under state laws, taxation and commercial zoning codes. Religions either receive complete carte blanche or they scream, cry, complain, sue, rebel and take up arms against those who would dare stand in the way of their God’s will.
Iran and Saudi Arabia are Islamic theocracies ruled by sharia law. I’m sure we are all familiar with these countries and the brutal oppression and human rights violations perpetrated by these regimes. This is the goal and only acceptable form of government for the Islamic religion. Europe, in the spirit of tolerance and coexistence, opened its arms to Islam believing that it was necessary to do so in order to respect the values of multiculturalism and, by extension, religious tolerance. Islam has exploited that tolerance and reciprocated with nothing but demands for the Islamisation and Islamification of European countries while simultaneously calling for the destruction of those countries and their current forms of government and economy, as well as social and democratic freedoms. (1)(2)(3)(4)
America is currently dealing with a dangerous increase in fundamentalist religious conservatives that give up little to Islam in the way of desire to control and impose doctrine and theology on an entire society. Non-believers, homosexuals and women all face open discrimination while the education curriculum, media and government are under constant onslaught by religious zealots demanding that the entire country, and its constitution, bend to its misinterpretation and self serving application. While the Christians seem to have progressed from their days of crusades and inquisitions, their goals for complete societal conformity remain the same. Many of America’s even more acutely religiously impaired seem to hearken for those good old days of Christian Crusade, a la ‘Deus Vult’, with a healthy serving of ‘The Question’. (5)(6)(7)
Religious tolerance doesn’t just pose the question of which religion can or should be tolerated, and by whom, but whether or not religion should be tolerated as part of public discourse, period. Religions disavow all that they demand, and define tolerance and acceptance from an immature and egocentric perspective that requires them to gain all that they demand at the expense of others. The only thing religion brings to the table, from which it demands tolerance, is intolerance. Know this, America: The founding fathers engineered the separation of church and state not to protect America from Islam, but to protect America against Christianity, Judaism, Mormonism, Islam and all other politically insistent theologies. When a belief system requires that others be forced, or coerced, to adhere to its tenets, it is no longer a personal choice and intimate expression of belief, but a fascist political system. When a belief system puts its doctrine above a democratic legislature, it is seditious. When a belief system dictates a foreign policy motivated by religious prophecy of the end of the world, it is unabashed lunacy.(8)(9)
To coexist is but a beautiful dream with an eye-catching media campaign championed by a personal favorite, and world renowned, poet, singer and humanitarian. It’s disheartening, and more than a little depressing, to be contrary to something that once filled me with a sense of hope and confidence for human progress and sustainable development. Religious coexistence has been proved impossible by none other than the intolerance of religion itself. While there is no proof of a god, of this, there is no shortage of evidence. Religious tolerance is a religious trick to gain the tolerance of society while religion continues its self-serving and destructive agenda, unabated. Lets not be fooled any longer. Any religious tenet, goal or agenda, that requires anything of anyone that is not an adherent to that sect, church, cult, denomination etc., is no longer acceptable and should be treated as we would any other organization with an agenda to discriminate against or disenfranchise any segment of our society.
Perhaps one day we will evolve to the point that we can peacefully ‘coexist’, but not until we evolve beyond the insanity and dysfunctionality of religion. In the meantime, if we simply want to survive, we need to stop tolerating religion and its destructive and divisive impact. Religion needs to be removed from any position of social and political influence and no longer accepted as part of public discourse. The “COEXIST” logo needs to be rethought and redesigned to include symbols of cultural and human diversity that are not as imperialistic, oppressive, uncompromising and intolerant as the symbols of archaic and authoritarian religions now employed. To coexist may be possible, but it will not be through or with religion. If we are truly going to achieve peaceful coexistence, it will have to be without, or despite, religion."
WELCOME! To the fifteenth edition of Thursdays with Seth! This week, I have no idea what's going on. Darwin Week was a blast, and we at UNIFI managed to pull in roughly 4 billion fantastic speakers and 47 trillion audience members, 46 trillion of which came to PZ Myers's talk. We also had a nice dinner with Dr. Myers, and a few of us ate alligator bites and breaded catfish, as one would expect. We laughed, we cried, but ultimately, we shoved chunks of alligator into our mouths and chewed them. FIRMLY!
WHAT DO YOU WANT GOD TO DO... CHANGE HIS PLAN?
Let me try to wrap my mind around this. If you believe that God is all-powerful, all-knowing, and purely benevolent, then you must also accept that God has the power to prevent bad things from happening to people. And even though he is purely benevolent and has this power, he apparently decides that the best moral thing to do is to sit back and scratch his omnipresent ball sack while people on Earth have heart attacks, die of natural disasters, are murdered, and so forth.
So then, even though God lets all of this stuff happen, you have decided to take it upon yourself to ask this dickbag to change his plan and start fixing stuff that he could have prevented in the first place? We saw this when the earthquake hit Haiti. Everyone was suddenly up in arms, flailing about, spouting religious platitudes and asking God to fix the devastation in Haiti. Here's a news flash -- if God exists, he chose to let the earthquake hit. Who the hell are YOU to ask him to change his plan?
As George Carlin says:
"Pray for anything you want. But what about the divine plan? Remember that? A long time ago, God made a divine plan; he gave it a lot of thought, decided it was a good plan, put it into practice. And for billions and billions of years, the divine plan has been doing just fine. Now you come along and pray for something. Well suppose the thing you want isn't in God's divine plan? What do you want him to do, change his plan? Just for you? Doesn't that seem a little arrogant? It's a divine plan! What's the use of being God if every run-down schmuck with a two-dollar prayer book can come along and fuck up your plan?"
"And here's something else, another problem you might have. Suppose your prayers aren't answered. What do you say? 'Well, it's God's will. Thy will be done.' Fine, but if it's God's will and he's going to do what he wants to anyway, why the fuck bother praying in the first place? Seems like a big waste of time to me!"
Here's another question about prayer. Why is it that when anything bad happens, not only do people start frantically praying for it to go away, they feel the need to announce the fact that they're praying about it? Look at the Facebook statuses of religious nuts during any disaster, and you'll see a Jesus-centric pissing contest on who is praying the hardest to have the invisible sky daddy magically solve some problem on the opposite side of the world.
"Janelle is praying for those who are being crushed by debris in Haiti! God bless! I love Jesus! Can't wait for prayer group tonight! God is my best friend! I love unicorns! ;D"
Thanks for the help, Janelle. While you do that, I'll donate money to the Red Cross.
WHAT THE HELL? How do Christians know that their version of God isn't actually just Satan tricking them into cheering for the wrong team? Just saying. That guy is wiley.
GOOGTWIT! Google seems to have just crammed Twitter down my throat. Except it's not Twitter; it's a Google incarnation of Twitter called "Google Buzz." I have taken to calling it Googtwit, because for some reason the word conjures up an image of a cross-eyed fairy flinging dried pumpkin seeds into people's eyes. Fairies are assholes.
So here's the deal with Googtwit. When you go to your Googmail inbox, Googtwit is hanging out right there by your other main buttons. When you click on your Googtwit button, it takes you to a page that looks like Twitter, but it's Goog. Googtwit. Then, you post random, pointless crap that other people then read and respond to with other random, pointless crap. It's just one more random, pointless crap trough for all of us to wallow in.
That said, if anyone wants to follow me on Googtwit, my email is coster.seth@gmail.com! TEE HEE!
EVOLUTION...ISM!
Here's quick, dirty, sexy, and vague description of evolution. Since many people seem to misunderstand what the hell evolutionary theory says, does, is, or smells like, I have taken it upon myself to bury the explanation halfway down my Thursdays with Seth post, right under my ramblings on Googtwit, to provide maximum exposure. This, in a nutshell, is what evolutionary theory is.
The theory of evolution is an explanation of what organisms do. When they reproduce over a long period of time and through many generations, the environment (weather, chemical composition, other organisms, etc) pushes them to adapt in certain ways. Those that don't adapt don't live to reproduce. However, this locks animals into a biological arms race, where those that also don't keep up with the evolution of their predators will not live to reproduce. This is why, for instance, we have cheetahs that can run 14 trillion nanometers per second. If their prey were slow, those delicious, cheesy, oblong, crunchy junk food morsels wouldn't have to run so damn fast to catch their food. But as the prey evolves to run faster, so does the cheetah, and eventually, we will have cheetahs that can teleport using magic (AND SCIENCE)!
I made that last bit up, but you get the idea. It's a simple concept, and we see it everywhere. It is the foundation of modern biology. Our understanding of evolution is a big reason why many of us have the opportunity to even be alive right now.
Here are a few things that evolution is not:
A BELIEF. You can't "believe" in evolution in the same way that you can't "believe" in gravity. Whether you admit that it is true or not, it doesn't give a shit. It just keeps happening. If you wish gravity weren't pulling you down, it's still going to pull you down. The same thing applies to evolution. So you can't just choose to believe or not believe in it. It's more of an acceptance versus denial thing.
A MORAL CODE. The theory of evolution does not compel us to do anything. It is a statement about how the world works. We see how these things are happening, we record what we see, we study it, we do experiments, and we continue to record and observe. It has nothing to do with morals or right or wrong or whether or not it makes you comfortable. This is how things work.
A RELIGION. I have been hearing the word "Darwinism" and "Evolutionism" thrown around lately as if they were some kind of belief system to which one can prescribe. Again, this is not the case. Simply put, evolutionary theory is a statement about what organisms do. That's all.
A CREATION THEORY. Evolution does not deal with the Big Bang. It does not deal with the formation of the Earth, and it also does not deal with the origins of life. It is a cumulative understanding of what life forms do once they are here.
SUPERNATURAL SCIENCE! QUE PASA? Does science ignore supernatural claims about the working of the world? In short, yes, but perhaps not for the reasons you'd think. Here is why.
First, all explanations we have about the world work just fine without injecting magic, douchebag fairies, unicorns, leprechauns, ghosts, chi, souls, elephant men with four arms, chiropractors, spirits, UFOs, or Jesus into the explanation. If these magical pansies are influencing our world, they are doing it in such a negligible way that it can't be measured, felt, seen, sensed, or experienced in any way by the human senses or by any instruments we have developed. But that's not even the main reason we don't use supernatural explanations in science!
When we think that something supernatural is at work, the logical thing to do is to examine the issue and try to figure out how that supernatural thing works. But here's the paradox: once we understand something supernatural and the processes that underlie it, it's not supernatural anymore. It's natural. While we used to think disease to be caused by demons, we developed the technology to analyze it further and discovered germs and bacteria. We had a supernatural explanation, but as we learned more, the explanation became natural.
This is the trend. When we are ignorant or lack understanding of something, we use supernatural explanations. And every single time we have done this, a natural explanation replaces it once we are smart enough. So far, supernatural explanations for observed phenomena have a batting average of zero. So in short, science does indeed focus on the natural world -- because we learn from our mistakes.
ACQUIRED TASTE!
I haven't acquired the taste for beer. To me, it tastes like a monkey has urinated onto its own foot, dipped it in pistachios, and then shoved it into my mouth. Perhaps I just need to drink it more!
If your student group is having their posters or fliers torn down from the kiosks and bulletin boards around campus UNIFI is collecting reports to bring to the university's attention.
Freethought of the Day
Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration--courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and, above all, love of the truth.
Prayer Won’t Help When You Live with HIV
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Positively Aware is an HIV treatment education journal. I’ve never read it,
but given their latest cover, which asks “Can faith help sustain us when
living...
Our illness is their profit
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Have you ever walked around an 19th century (or earlier) graveyard? It
gives you a depressing snapshot of the old reality: so many young women
dead in ch...
What Nonbelievers Believe
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An interesting article: What Nonbelievers Believe It highlights 7 areas:
Everything since the Big Bang can be explained naturally - this makes
complete sen...
Old Whine in New Bottles
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]The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has launched a campaign against
what it calls a concerted attack on religious liberty. Not in Pakistan or
Iraq, bu...
