Six Years

Uneventfully, last week marked the sixth anniversary of when I started this blog. Since then,  a lot has happened.

• The Boston Bombers killed 4 and maimed scores in another “faith based initiative”, were discovered, one was killed and the other captured, and (finally) read his Miranda rights.
• Congress failed to pass a weakened version of a bill designed to require people to get background checks when they buy a gun, despite overwhelming popular support.
• A fertilizer plant in Texas, that had not been inspected in decades, blew up, killing scores (we think – it’s so bad, it’s hard to count the bodies).
• Related to the last one, Texas legislators that voted against federal support for Hurricane Sandy relief came begging for federal support for West, Texas.
• Anonymous hacked The Facebook page of the Westboro Baptist Church, and have been running it quite successfully, and humorously, since then.
• Ricin-laced letters were apparently sent to President Obama and another US Senator.
• Multiple countries are legalizing same-sex marriage. New Zealand and, it looks like, France are the latest.
• A Pennsylvania couple, previously convicted of allowing their child to die by refusing medical care in favor of the power of prayer, apparently did it again.
• The poor are still getting poorer; the rich, richer.

All in one week!

Why I’m An Atheist (In 200 Words Exactly)

• Because I was BORN an atheist. Two people I loved unthinkingly indoctrinated me into believing in something that didn’t exist. Key word – “unthinkingly”. The state of my knowledge at birth was the correct one.
• Because religion, super-naturalism, has never explained anything. From the very beginning of civilization to the present, whenever religion has tried to explain  previously mystifying natural phenomena (from lightning through mental illness to the size of the universe) it has always gotten it wrong. Always. It has not been right yet, and the odds are it will never be right, if we ever get to the point in human knowledge where we know everything.
• Because religion is an inherently anti-human phenomenon. I’m a human, not a spirit. Religion explains spirits. There are no spirits, and there’s never been any evidence of spirits. As a human, there is a natural, logical way to treat other humans, and it does not involve burning them at the stake, making them believe what I believe at the point of a blade, or flying airplanes into buildings. Religion is cruel and inhuman, in almost all aspects of its justifying rationalizations.
• Because I don’t need religion to be a good person.

The End

What’s It All About, This Christmas?

I’ve been drawn into an interesting discussion on a few other blogs. It started the other day while watching the TODAY show as I dressed for work. Matt Lauer had his panel of “experts” addressing controversial topics of the day, and one of them involved “outsourcing” Christmas obligations, like shopping, card sending etc, and the propriety of doing so. In the course of the conversation, Nancy Snyderman said she didn’t like the religious element of Christmas, in effect, it’s what ruins it for her. It was a short exchange, not well fleshed out, but it was clear there was a disagreement between Star Jones, who felt “Jesus is the Reason for the Season” while Snyderman did not.

The Real Problem With Atheism

A friend sent this link to an article on HuffPo to me this week. I took me awhile to read it, then a little longer to reply to my friend. I thought that since my reply was lengthy, and I havent posted anything in awhile, I’d reproduce my response.

Read the article first, then my reply.

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Abortion, Again

I was lying in bed this morning, listening to the Morning Joe Show on MSNBC on the tellie, trying to go back to sleep after my wife woke me up with…well, the TV. I had a pillow over my head trying to muffle the sound, when I heard him say that there was a new, surprising statistic that came out recently about abortion. I cracked a little space between my ears and the pillow.

I’m Not An Atheist

Well, technically, that’s not true. What I’m trying to say is that atheism is just one small component of what I am, what describes my worldview, my personal philosophy, my attitude towards life and how I now choose to live it.  A better word, one more encompassing, though a bit verbose, would be ASUPERNATURALIST. I don’t believe in the idea, the concept of the supernatural.

Why?

Atheism WILL Supplant Religion…

…eventually.

Actually, a better way of stating that would be that eventually there will be no religion. When that happens, while technically we’ll all be atheists, we won’t need to differentiate between theist and atheist, so there will be no Atheism either. Here’s why:

Photo Essay

Evidence for the proposition “There is no god”.

Hutu Death camp survivor - Rwanda 1994

Just Ruminating

I haven’t written any posts in awhile, partly because I have been having a long debate with someone on another blog post, in the comments, about the conflict between Religion and Science, which has gravitated, as usual, to the existence of god. This is as it should be. It is where atheist/theist debates should properly end up. One can talk about the merits of religion, or the efficacy of religious belief, or the overwhelming preponderance of theists in the world, but ultimately none of it means anything in the debate until you’ve resolved the TRUTH of religion – i.e. does god exist. If he does, then there should be significant consensus, if not universal and unanimous acceptance, of that one truth. It should be obvious. The fact that there isn’t even something close to human consensus gives the lie to the proposition.

A Religion Double Hit

Not one, but two, front page articles from today’s local paper highlight the personal failings of those ruled by their religion. And those two stories seem to predominate the online discussion on the paper’s website.