June 2013
9 posts
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“We continue in our children, and in our works and in the memories of others; we continue in our dust and ash.”
—Iain Banks (1954-2013), The Crow Road (1992)
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We are atheists. We are moral. We are reasonable. We are thoughtful, intelligent, compassionate, happy, fulfilled and well-informed.
And as long as religion insists on fixing human beings who are not broken, we will respond with the evidence that we are not the problem.
” —Seth Andrews, The Thinking Atheist, “Why Can’t You Leave Religion Alone?”
“[W]e are creatures of time and chance. How wonderful is that? Out of all the innumerable possibilities in the history of life on Earth, a string of circumstances billions of years long transpired in such a way as to allow the origin of our species (and also accounts for the loss of all our human relatives along the way). And this unintended state of nature makes a humble bee pollinating a flower, a sunrise, the division of a cell, the jagged outline of a mountain in twilight, the petrified record of the dinosaurs, and everything else in existence all the more spectacular.”
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Brian Switek, “Evolution is Wonderful”
May 2013
31 posts
You might be a “militant” atheist if …
• You tell people you’re an atheist
• You deny that atheism leads to immorality
• You compare theism to belief in astrology, psychics, or bigfoot
• You object to religious privilege & Christian privilege
• You don’t “go along to get along”
• You reject faith as a means for acquiring knowledge
• You argue that religion is a source of political & social problems
• You encourage atheists to organize, work together
Source: about.com
Well, yes × 8!
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Intelligent, reasonable, and well-informed people can be wrong. They can be profoundly wrong. They can be stubbornly wrong. They can be deeply attached to wrong ideas, with contorted and absurd rationalizations for their wrongness. They can be wrong about big, important things. In fact, I would argue that this is universally true: every intelligent, reasonable, and well-informed person is bone-headedly wrong about something. Being an intelligent, reasonable, and well-informed person doesn’t mean every opinion or idea or belief you have is intelligent, reasonable, and well-informed. You can be an intelligent, reasonable, and well-informed person, and still have dumb, unreasonable, ill-informed ideas.
And yes, I think Christianity is one of these. I think all religion is one of these.
” —Greta Christina, “From the Mailbag: ‘Reasonable, intelligent, and well-informed’”
“We’ll make progress by considering all the hypotheses, and working hard to bring them into confrontation with the data. Use philosophical considerations all you want to inspire you to come up with new and better ideas; but it’s reality that ultimately judges them.”
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Sean Carroll, “Time, Born Again”
Course | Special Relativity →
youtube.com
Leonard Susskind, Felix Bloch Professor of Theoretical Physics at Stanford University, and Director of the Stanford Institute for Theoretical Physics
“Although it’s highly unsettling and confronting for believers to have their faith mocked, that is not a reason to have a special standard for established religions that we would never conscience for any secular group, political party or new religious movement. And while some may argue that it’s arrogant to presume other people’s beliefs are misguided, I think it’s disastrous to concede that people should never have their beliefs challenged. It’s also hugely condescending to assume that other people are so fragile that they can’t handle an opposing view. To say that Muslims, Christians or Hindus can’t cope with subtle or blunt refutations of their beliefs, is a calumny against humanity and people’s innate talent for thinking.”
—Jamie Freestone, “My Final Contribution to Woroni”
“Belief in supernatural beings, miracles and the fantastical tales told in ancient scriptures is, at least, irrational and, at worst, pathological. The more earnest the belief, therefore, the less sane is it likely to be in its application to the real world. At the extreme, it not only prompts but also – from their own perspective – justifies believers in what they do. Unnatural lifestyles, self-harm, ritualistic repetitive behaviours, fantasy beliefs and the like – all of them the norm for religiously committed folk – might be harmless to others in most cases, but when they become annexed to hostility to others outside the faith, or to apostates within it, the result is dangerous.”
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A. C. Grayling, “Dogma will always lead to murder. In the end, scepticism is the only answer”, The Independent, Friday 24 May 2013
“Humanism is a philosophy of joyous service for the greater good of all humanity, of application of new ideas of scientific progress for the benefit of all.”
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Linus Pauling (1901-1994)
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To the query, “Do most astronomers believe in God, based on the available evidence?” the astronomer Dave Rothstein replies that, in his opinion, “modern science leaves plenty of room for the existence of God … places where people who do believe in God can fit their beliefs in the scientific framework without creating any contradictions.” [ … ]
How much less velveteen is the response to the reader asking whether astronomers believe in astrology. “No, astronomers do not believe in astrology,” snarls Dave Kornreich. “It is considered to be a ludicrous scam. There is no evidence that it works, and plenty of evidence to the contrary.”
” —Natalie Angier, “My God Problem”
h/t WEIT
The Phlogiston Theory is not equivalent to the Aquatic Ape Hypothesis →
thonyc.wordpress.com
… The Peuerbachian geocentric model in use as Copernicus published his De revolutionibus was actually simpler than Copernicus’ heliocentric model. …
… The important point is that the phlogiston theory as developed by Stahl readily explained the known facts of combustion. …
By Thony Christie
“If a man is offered a fact which goes against his instincts, he will scrutinize it closely, and unless the evidence is overwhelming, he will refuse to believe it. If, on the other hand, he is offered something which affords a reason for acting in accordance with his instincts, he will accept it even on the slenderest evidence. The origin of myths is explained in this way.”
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Bertrand Russell, Proposed Roads To Freedom (1918)
“The first task [to deal with what religious apologists say in defending themselves] remains, because, to put the matter graphically, contesting religion is like engaging with a boxing match with jelly: it is a shifting, unclear, amorphous target, which every blow displaces into a new shape. This is in large part because the religious themselves often do not have a clear idea, or much agreement among themselves, about what is meant by ‘religion’, ‘god’, ‘faith’ and associated concepts.”
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A. C. Grayling, The God Argument (2013), p. 4
“I’m willing to go on the record and state with complete finality that no god exists. That’s not because I have complete knowledge of everything in the universe, but because the believers are utterly incapable of telling me exactly what their god is — it seems to be quantum jello, oscillating at an impossibly high frequency with an amplitude that spans galaxies.”
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PZ Myers, “Schrödinger’s Theist”
“If you can light the spark of curiosity in a child, they will very often learn without any further assistance. Children are natural learners. It’s a real achievement to put that particular ability out or to stifle it. […] but in place of nurturing curiosity, [our education system creates] a culture of compliance.”
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Sir Ken Robinson in TED talk How to Escape Education’s Death Valley. Watch the entire talk here.
(via teachthemhowtothink)
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The kinds of questions I think about — origin of the universe, fundamental laws of physics, that kind of thing — for the most part have no direct impact on how ordinary people live their lives. No jet packs are forthcoming, as the saying goes. But there is one exception to this, so obvious that it goes unnoticed: belief in God. Due to the efforts of many smart people over the course of many years, scholars who are experts in the fundamental nature of reality have by a wide majority concluded that God does not exist. We have better explanations for how things work. The shift in perspective from theism to atheism is arguably the single most important bit of progress in fundamental ontology over the last five hundred years. And it matters to people … a lot.
Or at least, it would matter, if we made it more widely known. It’s the one piece of scientific/philosophical knowledge that could really change people’s lives. So in my view, we have a responsibility to get the word out — to not be wishy-washy on the question of religion as a way of knowing, but to be clear and direct and loud about how reality really works. And when we blur the lines between science and religion, or seem to contribute to their blurring or even just not minding very much when other people blur them, we do the world a grave disservice. Religious belief exerts a significant influence over how the world is currently run — not just through extremists, but through the well-meaning liberal believers who very naturally think of religion as a source of wisdom and moral guidance, and who define the middle ground for sociopolitical discourse in our society. Understanding the fundamental nature of reality is a necessary starting point for productive conversations about morality, justice, and meaning. If we think we know something about that fundamental nature — something that disagrees profoundly with the conventional wisdom — we need to share it as widely and unambiguously as possible.
” —Sean Carroll, “On Templeton”
h/t Pharyngula
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“Many orthodox people speak as though it were the business of sceptics to disprove received dogmas rather than of dogmatists to prove them. This is, of course, a mistake. 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.”
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Bertrand Russell, “Is There a God?” (1952)
“When I come to my own beliefs, I find myself quite unable to discern any purpose in the universe, and still more unable to wish to discern one. Those who imagine that the course of cosmic evolution is slowly leading up to some consummation pleasing to the Creator, are logically committed (though they usually fail to realize this) to the view that the Creator is not omnipotent or, if He were omnipotent, He could decree the end without troubling about means. I do not myself perceive any consummation toward which the universe is tending. According to the physicists, energy will be gradually more evenly distributed and as it becomes more evenly distributed it will become more useless. Gradually everything that we find interesting or pleasant, such as life and light, will disappear — so, at least, they assure us. The cosmos is like a theatre in which just once a play is performed, but, after the curtain falls, the theatre is left cold and empty until it sinks in ruins. I do not mean to assert with any positiveness that this is the case. That would be to assume more knowledge than we possess. I say only that it is what is probable on present evidence. I will not assert dogmatically that there is no cosmic purpose, but I will say that there is no shred of evidence in favor of there being one.”
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Bertrand Russell, “Is There a God?” (1952)
Bertrand Russell On God (TV interview)
- Q: Why are you not a Christian?
- Russell: Because I see no evidence whatever for any of the Christian dogmas. I’ve examined all the stock arguments in favour of the existence of God, and none of them seem to me to be logically valid.
- Q: Do you think there’s a practical reason for having a religious belief, for many people?
- Russell: Well, there can’t be a practical reason for believing what isn’t true. That’s quite... at least, I rule it out as impossible. Either the thing is true, or it isn’t. If it is true, you should believe it, and if it isn’t, you shouldn’t. And if you can’t find out whether it’s true or whether it isn’t, you should suspend judgment. But you can’t... it seems to me a fundamental dishonesty and a fundamental treachery to intellectual integrity to hold a belief because you think it’s useful, and not because you think it’s true.
- Q: I was thinking of those people who find that some kind of religious code helps them to live their lives. It gives them a very strict set of rules, the rights and the wrongs.
- Russell: Yes, but those rules are generally quite mistaken. A great many of them do more harm than good. And they would probably be able to find a rational morality that they could live by if they dropped this irrational traditional taboo morality that comes down from savage ages.
- Q: But are we, perhaps the ordinary person perhaps isn’t strong enough to find this own personal ethic. They have to have something imposed upon them from outside.
- Russell: Oh, I don’t think that’s true, and what is imposed on you from outside is of no value whatever. It doesn’t count.
- Q: Well, you were brought up, of course, as a Christian. When did you first decide that you did not want to remain a believer in the Christian ethic?
- Russell: I never decided that I didn’t want to remain a believer. I decided... between the ages of 15 and 18, I spent almost all my spare time thinking about Christian dogmas, and trying to find out whether there was any reason to believe them. And by the time I was 18, I’d discarded the last of them.
- Q: Do you think that that gave you an extra strength in your life?
- Russell: Oh, I don’t... no, I should’t have said so, neither extra strength nor the opposite. I mean, I was just engaged in the pursuit of knowledge.
- Q: As you approach the end of life, do you have any fear of some kind of afterlife, or do you feel that that is just...
- Russell: Oh, no, I think that’s nonsense.
- Q: There is no afterlife?
- Russell: None whatever.
- Q: Do you have any fear of something that is common amongst atheists and agnostics, who have been atheists or agnostics all their lives, who are converted just before they die, to a form of religion?
- Russell: Well, you know, it doesn’t happen nearly as often as religious people think it does. Because religious people, most of them, think that it’s a virtuous act to tell lies about the death beds of agnostics and such. As a matter of fact, it doesn’t happen very often.
April 2013
21 posts
“I think in a world where blind belief, misconceptions, cognitive dissonance, and a general disregard for evidence and pragmatism are rampant, we desperately need people who are willing to be contentious in order to promote truth. The problems human societies face are too grave to subtly and politely tiptoe around people’s delusions.”
—Nash Turley, “The Unbelievers” – a review of Richard Dawkins’s and Lawrence Krauss’s film, The Unbelievers
“There is no reason that the universe should be designed for our convenience.”
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John D. Barrow, 1994
Dumbo (1941)
Has anyone else come to the conclusion that this is an atheist movie?
The Christianity of Hitler revealed in his speeches and proclamations →
nobeliefs.com
Compiled by Jim Walker
Originated: 27 Feb. 1997
Additions: 03 Jun. 2006
Through subterfuge and concealment, many of today’s Church leaders and faithful Christians have camouflaged the Christianity of Adolf Hitler and have attempted to mark him an atheist, a pagan cult worshipper, or a false Christian. However, from the earliest formation of the Nazi party and throughout the period of conquest and growth, Hitler expressed his Christian support to the German citizenry and soldiers. In the 1920s, Hitler’s German Workers’ Party (pre Nazi term) adopted a “Programme” with twenty-five points (the Nazi version of a constitution). In point twenty-four, their intent clearly demonstrates, from the very beginning, their stand in favor of a “positive” Christianity:
24. We demand liberty for all religious denominations in the State, so far as they are not a danger to it and do not militate against the morality and moral sense of the German race. The Party, as such, stands for positive Christianity, but does not bind itself in the matter of creed to any particular confession. It combats the Jewish-materialist spirit within and without us, and is convinced that our nation can achieve permanent health from within only on the principle: the common interest before self-interest.
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“Fundamentalists do what they perceive as good deeds in order to fulfill God’s will and to earn salvation; atheists do them simply because it is the right thing to do. Is this also not our most elementary experience of morality? When I do a good deed, I do so not with an eye toward gaining God’s favor; I do it because if I did not, I could not look at myself in the mirror. A moral deed is by definition its own reward.”
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Slavoj Žižek, “Atheism is a legacy worth fighting for”, The New York Times, 13 March 2006
h/t WEIT
“I think very often, religion drills a God-shaped hole where one wasn’t before, so that it might claim to fill it.”
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Alex Gabriel, Facebook
