Monthly Archive for September, 2007Page 3 of 5
I've already looked into it a bit, and will continue to do so. If nothing can be done, I'll try to switch to some other software, or possibly even begin to hack my own. This will take some time, though.javascript:void(0)
For the moment, I apologize for the inconvenience. The "normal" version of PA (that is, browsing to planetatheism.com) still works.
I've already looked into it a bit, and will continue to do so. If nothing can be done, I'll try to switch to some other software, or possibly even begin to hack my own. This will take some time, though.javascript:void(0)
For the moment, I apologize for the inconvenience. The "normal" version of PA (that is, browsing to planetatheism.com) still works.
This week's slightly delayed (blame my Master's viva) cool atheist music comes from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, off their album One Hot Minute. Enjoy.

With all this talk of the new, 'militant' atheism, I've begun to worry that people will get the many different militant strands of religion confused. As such, I've devised this picture to enable you to tell the difference. So next time you're confronted by a rabid, frothing at the mouth, hate-speech spewing militant, just refer to this handy picture to tell exactly which brand of fundamentalist nut you're talking to.
No need for thanks, this has been a public service announcement.
UPDATE: Cat's Staff has suggested to me that the Dawkins picture with him wearing an 'Atheists for Jesus' picture would work better. I've decided Cat's Staff is right, so I've updated the picture. Thanks!
Today was the day when every good Pastafarian (and other pirate loving people) talks like a pirate. I, however, am a non-practicing Pastafarian, so I don’t generally observe these religious holidays (there was a pub crawl at Uni to celebrate, but I had to work instead).
But that should stop you getting in on the act! Even Flickr celebrated the day:

If you didn’t talk like a pirate today, you’ve only got 364 days until the next time you can “talk like a pirate and not be entirely insane”.
So, I’ve been wondering – when are all the atheist holidays and festivities?
You know, I'd take these 'Old Atheists' (if they're the opposite to the New Atheists I guess that must be what they're called, right?) a lot more seriously if they ever actually had any facts in their arguments.
Jonathan Haidt has evoked a number of criticisms of his depiction of moral psychology and, much more, of his criticism of New Atheism.Reactions to Haidt's article: on Edge by Michael Shermer, David Sloan Wilson, Sam Harris, and PZ Myers . Bulldust about atheism and morality . Haidt Hype . Misunderstanding the New Atheism . NewScientist "If morality is hard wired in the brain - What's the point of Religion?" .
I would tend to agree that atheists don't normally have anything to bring them together, a lack of belief isn't something that binds people together. But then, just because a group of people were born Christian or Jewish, does that give them any more of a reason to band together? Perhaps just cuz they hold meetings once a week?
I think that atheists actually tend to be of a mindset that we aren't as socially needy. To be an atheist most often requires a bit of independent thought to begin with, and there seems to be a genetic predisposition to a belief in a deity, so perhaps those things go together. Group-think & atheism do not mesh.
But, given a common enemy, atheists are joining together, and raising their voices louder, and hopefully we can continue to speak for everyone's rights to be free from religious oppression.
I would tend to agree that atheists don't normally have anything to bring them together, a lack of belief isn't something that binds people together. But then, just because a group of people were born Christian or Jewish, does that give them any more of a reason to band together? Perhaps just cuz they hold meetings once a week?
I think that atheists actually tend to be of a mindset that we aren't as socially needy. To be an atheist most often requires a bit of independent thought to begin with, and there seems to be a genetic predisposition to a belief in a deity, so perhaps those things go together. Group-think & atheism do not mesh.
But, given a common enemy, atheists are joining together, and raising their voices louder, and hopefully we can continue to speak for everyone's rights to be free from religious oppression.
In a recent online conversation, several members of the International Stoic Forum and myself had a wonderful conversation on the similarities and differences between Stoicism and Buddhism. I have collected and edited the conversation on my philosophy site for easy reading. I've also included some commentary and conclusions at the end. If you'd like to read the conversation, please click this link:Many thanks to all who participated!
In a recent online conversation, several members of the International Stoic Forum and myself had a wonderful conversation on the similarities and differences between Stoicism and Buddhism. I have collected and edited the conversation on my philosophy site for easy reading. I've also included some commentary and conclusions at the end. If you'd like to read the conversation, please click this link:Many thanks to all who participated!
I have recently been looking for a good website to direct people to, who have unfortunately been snickered into buying the conspiracy theories about 9/11. I had previously found a lot of good information out there debunking the ludicrous claims of the conspiracy theorists, but the site below seems to be a good single location where they have been collected together.As with cults or some religious people, reasons for being invested in these ideas are sometimes more personal and broad than the actual facts. Therefore, deprogramming someone from these ideas can be very challenging. Most of the 9/11 misinformation is intentionally being concocted by people who get off on it, as a power trip or to see how many people they can hoodwink into believing them. If you know someone suffering from their vile efforts, this site can be a good starting point:
If you know of other good sources debunking these conspiracy theories, please leave them in comments, thanks.
(note: links and long arguments for the conspiracy theories themselves will be deleted until or unless I see something new to convince me they aren't nonsense. I'd prefer that I and my websites not contribute to the spread of blatant disinformation and will treat such comments the same as a religious zealot's preaching).
I have recently been looking for a good website to direct people to, who have unfortunately been snickered into buying the conspiracy theories about 9/11. I had previously found a lot of good information out there debunking the ludicrous claims of the conspiracy theorists, but the site below seems to be a good single location where they have been collected together.As with cults or some religious people, reasons for being invested in these ideas are sometimes more personal and broad than the actual facts. Therefore, deprogramming someone from these ideas can be very challenging. Most of the 9/11 misinformation is intentionally being concocted by people who get off on it, as a power trip or to see how many people they can hoodwink into believing them. If you know someone suffering from their vile efforts, this site can be a good starting point:
If you know of other good sources debunking these conspiracy theories, please leave them in comments, thanks.
(note: links and long arguments for the conspiracy theories themselves will be deleted until or unless I see something new to convince me they aren't nonsense. I'd prefer that I and my websites not contribute to the spread of blatant disinformation and will treat such comments the same as a religious zealot's preaching).

In the primordial atmosphere, biopoiesis eventually generated the self-controlling, self-replicating assemblages of chemicals necessary for life. From the earliest minimal assemblages, ocean-bound life gradually evolved greater and great complexity. The earliest organisms derived energy from chemicals, and later organism evolved the ability to extract energy from the nearest star, the Sun. (Nature is full of complex and complicated systems, complex adaptive systems (CAS), which comprise a large number of mutually interacting and interwoven parts.)
Eventually, photosynthetic organisms developed the ability to generate oxygen. The toxicity of oxygen placed stresses on organisms yet presented the opportunity for evolution of greater complexity. Some organisms coped with oxygen-stress by enveloping other organisms that already possessed the metabolic machinery necessary to metabolize oxygen and/or to conduct photosynthesis. The regulatory path to multicellularity had begun.
Eventually organisms emerged from the sea and invaded the land. The planet experienced a number of catastrophic extinction events that pruned the numbers of species, opening new niches.
One such event resulted from the collision of an asteroid with Earth some 65 million years ago. The Chicxulub impact wiped out the dominant animals–dinosaurs–and permitted tiny mammals, including the primates, to prevail upon the land. Primates evolved from tiny insectivorous mammals and ultimately evolved into primates with a large brain/body ratio–our hominid ancestors. We share more than 98% of our DNA with chimpanzees, our closest relatives from which we split about 5 to 7 million years ago.
Homo sapiens had emerged by about 250,000 years ago. Humans have a propensity, which is presumably absent in other animals, for inventing supernatural deities to "explain" that which humans could not yet understand. Some religious superstitions were written down by their inventors with the attached claim of having been dictated by the purported deity.
Ultimately, some of the more intelligent members of our species began to undertake systematic, empirical investigations of the natural world. These investigations yielded the information above (though in much greater detail), supplanting the need for God of the Gaps explanations. Not all Homo are particularly sapient, so Homo religioso continued to cling to supernatural non-explanations, inventing elaborate justifications for their superstitions.
In ill-conceived attempts to justify emotion-laden superstitious beliefs, some Homo religioso employ fallacious illogic and distort the established facts of science in inane attempts to substantiate their "Special Creation" by an invented deity.
The failure of all such attempts merely further demonstrates the fact that atheism truly is the most rational position to take with regard to reality.
Even though I was never really a Christian (although I looked into it seriously for a year or so), I had always assumed that Jesus was, most likely, a real person. There’s a common argument1 which goes something like this:
“Either Jesus was crazy, or what he said must have been true. There’s no evidence he was crazy, therefore he must be the son of God”. Sure, there are plenty of other responses to this argument, but I think the two simplest ones are:
- Jesus was misquoted, or misconstrued
- Jesus never actually existed
I still maintain that if Jesus did actually exist, he would be quite unhappy about how his teachings have been butchered and interpreted today. So in some sense, I still believe the first option is quite likely. I had not, however (until recently) actually seriously considered the possibility that Jesus didn’t actually exist.
The bible talks about people we know existed, right? Various Kings and so forth? So, it’s fair to assume that Jesus also existed? Given that Jesus is such a central part of the Christian mythology, Christianity would fall if it could be demonstrated that Jesus was simply a myth, right (please, correct me if I’m wrong)? Well, this might just be true!
I first came across these two YouTube videos2 a while back, and it made me realise that, if true, it would be an amazing coincidence if he actually existed (of course, perhaps that was God’s plan to make Jesus even more difficult to believe, thus requiring more faith). Dionysus (one of the figures discussed in the videos) was supposedly born of a virgin, fathered by the king of heaven, turned water into wine, died and resurrected. Sound familiar? There are, apparently, many other mythical figures who have extraordinarily similar stories – all of which predate Jesus.
There seem to be many others out there who claim similar things, and while there is some criticism of some of these claims, there are, undoubtedly some parts of the Jesus story which were “borrowed” from earlier myths.
I plan to investigate this further, as I don’t believe it’s quite as clear as is suggested, but I wonder – how much of Jesus’ life has to be true for Christianity to remain?
- I think it might have originally been by C. S. Lewis, although I could be wrong
- Both videos are short clips from Zeitgeist – The Movie, available in its entirety via BitTorrent (legally!), streamed via Google Video, or for order on DVD
I am not quite finished with Julian. Life has gotten busy on me but I should have it finished by tomorrow, Monday at the latest. I could give you the excuse that my local Barnes & Noble didn’t have it and then I ordered it online (which is true) but I still should have have had it done. Like tobe at Load of Bright, I apologize to my fellow Non-believing literati. I already have a good idea of what I am going to write, and hope to have my review/essay up early this coming week.

Planet Atheism buttons
FAQ (includes joining info)
RSS feed
Email subscription

