Monthly Archive for December, 2007Page 3 of 7

The Most Sincere Gift

Published
by
The Spiritual Atheist
on December 18, 2007
.
Currently Reading:
The Way of Zen
by Alan Watts



A Rare Jewel:
What is possible the most difficult thing in the world to do?
What is precious to us, though we often treat it cheaply?
What is it that we often ask or even demand of others, even though we have intention of accepting?

A sincere apology. Not the kind of apology that we tend to puke at each other as a matter of "keeping them quiet", but a truly sincere apology. The kind of apology made on a bent knee, and a tear in the eye.

When it is truly offered, without being asked for, it is a jewel of the heart that is being offered to us. Accept the gift as though it were as fragile as an egg, as valuable as a jewel, and as treasured and beloved as an infant.

Such apologies rekindle friendships, and end wars.
Such apologies are the secret of peace.


Cheers,
CET

"Much of the suffering in the world comes from the illusion that we are separate from one another." - Gautama Buddha


Are We All Faithful?

Published
by
DT Strain
on December 18, 2007
.
I'd like to use this post to respond to a comment I received from a theist regarding something I wrote. This comment refers to a general line of argument I have heard several times before, and it deserves addressing. It has to do with faith and we might call it the "everyone does it" argument (maybe there is a more technical name for this already). In any case, here is the form it recently took:
"I have yet to find anyone, religious or atheist, who doesn't operate on faith. Both are highly dogmatic, as evidenced by the strength of your value judgments, which can only come from a priori, non-empirical stance. We ALL operate on the basis that some things are true, yet without adequate proofs."
Before I can address this it is important to draw out and make plain all of the implications of the above statement. By saying that we "ALL" operate on the basis of some things without adequate proofs, the author is implying that empiricists are in the very same boat with all others. The author also implies there is no difference in the reasonableness and no distinction among varieties of belief or the sources from which they spring because ultimately, we all rely on faith. These are important implications and need to be put into words.

The author is correct in the last sentence of what he says. However, if we think closely about this, we can see that this is not a statement belonging to the faith-based side of the argument. This is a statement of empiricism. It is the empirical approach, which makes the profound realization that we "ALL operate on the basis of some things without adequate proofs". This is why the empirical approach is to say that we never know anything for certain, and must continually question and test our assumptions through a continuous pursuit of new evidence.

The faith-based position, on the other hand, says the opposite. When a believer says, "I believe in God", they are not claiming to "operate on the basis" of God existing "without adequate proof". To claim this is for the theist to put on empiricist clothes and seek to look like one of them for the sake of persuasion. In reality, the faithful mean something very different when they state their belief in God.

Rather, what the theist is saying is that "God is real" - he does in fact exist; not merely that they will "act as though God exists" for some pragmatic purpose. But it goes further than this. The theist claims to have knowledge of God's existence. This use of the word 'knowledge' is also very different than the empiricist's use of the word, for it is absolute. There is no such non-provision "knowledge" in the empiricist's lexicon. This faith-based 'knowledge' might come through some revelation or communion, through biblical teachings or experiences of events. All of these are very different than empirical methodology and miss the mark.

1) Revelation or communion:
This is a claim that knowledge (justified & true belief) can come to us through something other than our five senses. No such phenomenon has ever been shown to be true. Certainly empiricism is contrary to this belief.

2) Biblical teachings or events:
This is where someone claims to have 'figured out' that God exists by reading 'His word', or by observing something in nature, or by experiencing some unlikely event. Yet, if we are to examine the logic behind all of these claims, we find they violate core principles of empiricism.

So, it is the theist who believes that, contrary to "operating on the basis" of some things being true, he or she can "know" things with certainty, and without any (proved) causal connection between the object and the alleged knowledge in his or her head. This is why the faithful are not keen on their claims being tested and why they refer to changes in scientific theories over time as though it were a weakness rather than a strength. Arguments for faith and theism will commonly try to "wear empiricist clothes" but these are very different approaches to knowledge and one should be careful not to confuse them.

Yet, what if we look at empiricism itself, on its own merits? Doesn't empiricism rely on unproved axioms at some level?

At the base level of all knowledge, we ultimately can't know anything for certain, other than the fact that we, ourselves only, exist in some form or another. I might be a brain in a jar, or I might be some cosmic goo that's living a life of fantastic delusion. But at least I know there is something that is thinking about it because I'm the one doing the thinking. This was the essence of René Descartes' famous argument, "...I think, therefore I am".

No faith yet.

From there, we have to start making some assumptions. For one, we have to assume that what we can sense about ourselves and our surroundings are in some way connected to a reality of some type. It is true this is an assumption. However, how could we do anything unless we at least assume this?

Still, even this most fundamental of assumptions, for the empiricist, is but a pragmatic conceit. It is "operating on the basis of". And still, the true believer's claim that God exists exceeds even this foundational assumption in its certainty. Anything less would mean doubt, and men have been killed for less.

After this unavoidable 'foundational pragmatic assumption', we then get into matters of induction vs. deduction. Deduction is where we begin with known premises and end with a conclusion that follows from them. This form of logic is the most sound and, provided there is no faith within the premises, very few would argue faith is involved in these conclusions. That is, unless one wants to say that a computer or a robot can have 'faith'.

Induction is where things get trickier. With Inductive reasoning, we often move from the specific to the general, or from past experience to future prediction. For example, because the sun came up yesterday and all days previous, we will assume it will come up tomorrow. Because we have not been poisoned by carrots before, we will assume we can eat carrots in the future. Because all dogs we've seen have naturally had four legs, we will say that dogs, in general, have four legs. This is shakier than deduction because it is easy to go wrong. For example, if we had never seen a tree over 12 foot tall, we might induce that no trees are taller than 12 feet.

Yet, unfortunately, one will find that almost all thinking requires some form of induction. Even the strictest of deductive logic relies on some premises which result from induction, and even the belief that deductive logic is sound and will remain sound for all phenomena and all time is an act of induction.

In some of the very foundations of science, we inductively reason that physical laws apply universally, that they are internally consistent, that we can decipher them with logic and reason, and that knowing them gives us predictive power in computing future events. The very practice of science would not be possible without these inductions. This, no doubt, is to what the author of the comment above was referring.

The question we should examine is this: is induction equal to faith?

In other writings I have noted that 'faith' is used in many ways in our language, and it is important to delineate between them. I draw a distinction between 'faith' and 'confidence'. Often when we say, "I have faith in my friends" what we really mean is, "I have confidence in my friends". To test that out, imagine saying, "I have faith in that random stranger". We might let our friend hold our wallet but not the stranger. The difference here is that we have past experiences which give us a pattern by which we can make future predictions. Certainly the predictions are not infallible, since people and things can sometimes behave much differently than a past pattern suggests, and we cannot directly observe the future - but they would seem to be more reliable than taking random actions.

So, confidence is "belief because of the evidence." Meanwhile, the faith that people like myself criticize is "belief lacking evidence or possibly even despite the evidence" - a very big difference.

What induction is not is the reaching of a conclusion because of no evidence. Induction is also not the reaching of a conclusion based on things for which we have no reason to suspect are connected to our conclusion. This would completely rule out #1 above (revelation or communion). What's left would be #2, Biblical teachings or events.

Here we might be in the realm of induction. However, there is a range of quality and good sense between instances of induction. Not all induction is of the same quality (remember the good and bad examples mentioned above). Not only are faith and induction distinct, but the comment also implies that one induction is as good as the next. This is plainly not true.

It is at this point that we get into the basics of good skepticism. Carl Sagan said that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" and that seems to be sensible advice. If I notice that after many times I leave my trash can in the street, a neighbor moves it onto my lawn, then I can reasonably suspect that it would happen again. Here we have a rather ordinary claim, and it requires only ordinary evidence. However, if I notice that many times I bet on the horse races and wore green socks, that I won, it would not be reasonable to induce that green socks were causally linked to my winning. That is because such a claim would be extraordinary, and the simple correlation between the green socks and winning at a bet would not be of an extraordinary level to justify such a claim.

The claim that an invisible all-powerful personified entity created the universe and plays a role in it is so extraordinary, that a reasonable person would need some sort of absolutely extraordinary evidence before deducing or inducing such a thing. And, even if such a thing were done, the layer upon layer of further extraordinary claims leading to the specifics of Christianity or any particular religion would each be even more extraordinary than the last because of their increasing specificity. Even if this could count as some form of induction, it is clear that it is of far less reasonable nature than the inductions normally employed by scientific empiricists.

In the end, however, it is doubtful faith-based notions even qualify as any form of sound logic or reasoning. At their heart, they are superstition and ideology from a previous irrational era in human history, and ultimately incompatible with even the basic foundations of modern human rationality. But that won't stop the faithful from trying (earnestly and honestly in most cases) to find some way of equating that irrationality with modern thought. By imagining there is some comparison, it makes it easier not to look squarely at the fact that they have been trapped by a medieval (at best) perversion of reason that preys on our weaknesses and imperfections as thinking beings. In this way, people convince themselves there is some compatibility between what they want to believe, and what they know makes rational sense - it is a coping mechanism.

The employment of this coping mechanism stems from a more fundamental belief that life is somehow meaningless without god/s or the supernatural, or that not believing in such is somehow immoral. Both of these misconceptions are deeply ingrained in our culture and history. Until someone understands the true (and secular) basis of ethics, and until they really understand that a meaningful and happy life is possible without supernatural beliefs, they will continue to harbor that strong desire to believe such things, and a deep fear of disbelieving them. Those desires and fears will continue to trump their good sense - the same good sense they are perfectly capable of applying in all of the other mundane situations in their life. Thus, they will concoct all manner of rationalizations and self deceptions to maintain unfounded beliefs. One of those rationalizations, which I have discussed here, is the attempt to equate empirical reasoning with superstitious faith.

Are We All Faithful?

Published
by
DT Strain
on December 18, 2007
.
I'd like to use this post to respond to a comment I received from a theist regarding something I wrote. This comment refers to a general line of argument I have heard several times before, and it deserves addressing. It has to do with faith and we might call it the "everyone does it" argument (maybe there is a more technical name for this already). In any case, here is the form it recently took:
"I have yet to find anyone, religious or atheist, who doesn't operate on faith. Both are highly dogmatic, as evidenced by the strength of your value judgments, which can only come from a priori, non-empirical stance. We ALL operate on the basis that some things are true, yet without adequate proofs."
Before I can address this it is important to draw out and make plain all of the implications of the above statement. By saying that we "ALL" operate on the basis of some things without adequate proofs, the author is implying that empiricists are in the very same boat with all others. The author also implies there is no difference in the reasonableness and no distinction among varieties of belief or the sources from which they spring because ultimately, we all rely on faith. These are important implications and need to be put into words.

The author is correct in the last sentence of what he says. However, if we think closely about this, we can see that this is not a statement belonging to the faith-based side of the argument. This is a statement of empiricism. It is the empirical approach, which makes the profound realization that we "ALL operate on the basis of some things without adequate proofs". This is why the empirical approach is to say that we never know anything for certain, and must continually question and test our assumptions through a continuous pursuit of new evidence.

The faith-based position, on the other hand, says the opposite. When a believer says, "I believe in God", they are not claiming to "operate on the basis" of God existing "without adequate proof". To claim this is for the theist to put on empiricist clothes and seek to look like one of them for the sake of persuasion. In reality, the faithful mean something very different when they state their belief in God.

Rather, what the theist is saying is that "God is real" - he does in fact exist; not merely that they will "act as though God exists" for some pragmatic purpose. But it goes further than this. The theist claims to have knowledge of God's existence. This use of the word 'knowledge' is also very different than the empiricist's use of the word, for it is absolute. There is no such non-provision "knowledge" in the empiricist's lexicon. This faith-based 'knowledge' might come through some revelation or communion, through biblical teachings or experiences of events. All of these are very different than empirical methodology and miss the mark.

1) Revelation or communion:
This is a claim that knowledge (justified & true belief) can come to us through something other than our five senses. No such phenomenon has ever been shown to be true. Certainly empiricism is contrary to this belief.

2) Biblical teachings or events:
This is where someone claims to have 'figured out' that God exists by reading 'His word', or by observing something in nature, or by experiencing some unlikely event. Yet, if we are to examine the logic behind all of these claims, we find they violate core principles of empiricism.

So, it is the theist who believes that, contrary to "operating on the basis" of some things being true, he or she can "know" things with certainty, and without any (proved) causal connection between the object and the alleged knowledge in his or her head. This is why the faithful are not keen on their claims being tested and why they refer to changes in scientific theories over time as though it were a weakness rather than a strength. Arguments for faith and theism will commonly try to "wear empiricist clothes" but these are very different approaches to knowledge and one should be careful not to confuse them.

Yet, what if we look at empiricism itself, on its own merits? Doesn't empiricism rely on unproved axioms at some level?

At the base level of all knowledge, we ultimately can't know anything for certain, other than the fact that we, ourselves only, exist in some form or another. I might be a brain in a jar, or I might be some cosmic goo that's living a life of fantastic delusion. But at least I know there is something that is thinking about it because I'm the one doing the thinking. This was the essence of René Descartes' famous argument, "...I think, therefore I am".

No faith yet.

From there, we have to start making some assumptions. For one, we have to assume that what we can sense about ourselves and our surroundings are in some way connected to a reality of some type. It is true this is an assumption. However, how could we do anything unless we at least assume this?

Still, even this most fundamental of assumptions, for the empiricist, is but a pragmatic conceit. It is "operating on the basis of". And still, the true believer's claim that God exists exceeds even this foundational assumption in its certainty. Anything less would mean doubt, and men have been killed for less.

After this unavoidable 'foundational pragmatic assumption', we then get into matters of induction vs. deduction. Deduction is where we begin with known premises and end with a conclusion that follows from them. This form of logic is the most sound and, provided there is no faith within the premises, very few would argue faith is involved in these conclusions. That is, unless one wants to say that a computer or a robot can have 'faith'.

Induction is where things get trickier. With Inductive reasoning, we often move from the specific to the general, or from past experience to future prediction. For example, because the sun came up yesterday and all days previous, we will assume it will come up tomorrow. Because we have not been poisoned by carrots before, we will assume we can eat carrots in the future. Because all dogs we've seen have naturally had four legs, we will say that dogs, in general, have four legs. This is shakier than deduction because it is easy to go wrong. For example, if we had never seen a tree over 12 foot tall, we might induce that no trees are taller than 12 feet.

Yet, unfortunately, one will find that almost all thinking requires some form of induction. Even the strictest of deductive logic relies on some premises which result from induction, and even the belief that deductive logic is sound and will remain sound for all phenomena and all time is an act of induction.

In some of the very foundations of science, we inductively reason that physical laws apply universally, that they are internally consistent, that we can decipher them with logic and reason, and that knowing them gives us predictive power in computing future events. The very practice of science would not be possible without these inductions. This, no doubt, is to what the author of the comment above was referring.

The question we should examine is this: is induction equal to faith?

In other writings I have noted that 'faith' is used in many ways in our language, and it is important to delineate between them. I draw a distinction between 'faith' and 'confidence'. Often when we say, "I have faith in my friends" what we really mean is, "I have confidence in my friends". To test that out, imagine saying, "I have faith in that random stranger". We might let our friend hold our wallet but not the stranger. The difference here is that we have past experiences which give us a pattern by which we can make future predictions. Certainly the predictions are not infallible, since people and things can sometimes behave much differently than a past pattern suggests, and we cannot directly observe the future - but they would seem to be more reliable than taking random actions.

So, confidence is "belief because of the evidence." Meanwhile, the faith that people like myself criticize is "belief lacking evidence or possibly even despite the evidence" - a very big difference.

What induction is not is the reaching of a conclusion because of no evidence. Induction is also not the reaching of a conclusion based on things for which we have no reason to suspect are connected to our conclusion. This would completely rule out #1 above (revelation or communion). What's left would be #2, Biblical teachings or events.

Here we might be in the realm of induction. However, there is a range of quality and good sense between instances of induction. Not all induction is of the same quality (remember the good and bad examples mentioned above). Not only are faith and induction distinct, but the comment also implies that one induction is as good as the next. This is plainly not true.

It is at this point that we get into the basics of good skepticism. Carl Sagan said that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" and that seems to be sensible advice. If I notice that after many times I leave my trash can in the street, a neighbor moves it onto my lawn, then I can reasonably suspect that it would happen again. Here we have a rather ordinary claim, and it requires only ordinary evidence. However, if I notice that many times I bet on the horse races and wore green socks, that I won, it would not be reasonable to induce that green socks were causally linked to my winning. That is because such a claim would be extraordinary, and the simple correlation between the green socks and winning at a bet would not be of an extraordinary level to justify such a claim.

The claim that an invisible all-powerful personified entity created the universe and plays a role in it is so extraordinary, that a reasonable person would need some sort of absolutely extraordinary evidence before deducing or inducing such a thing. And, even if such a thing were done, the layer upon layer of further extraordinary claims leading to the specifics of Christianity or any particular religion would each be even more extraordinary than the last because of their increasing specificity. Even if this could count as some form of induction, it is clear that it is of far less reasonable nature than the inductions normally employed by scientific empiricists.

In the end, however, it is doubtful faith-based notions even qualify as any form of sound logic or reasoning. At their heart, they are superstition and ideology from a previous irrational era in human history, and ultimately incompatible with even the basic foundations of modern human rationality. But that won't stop the faithful from trying (earnestly and honestly in most cases) to find some way of equating that irrationality with modern thought. By imagining there is some comparison, it makes it easier not to look squarely at the fact that they have been trapped by a medieval (at best) perversion of reason that preys on our weaknesses and imperfections as thinking beings. In this way, people convince themselves there is some compatibility between what they want to believe, and what they know makes rational sense - it is a coping mechanism.

The employment of this coping mechanism stems from a more fundamental belief that life is somehow meaningless without god/s or the supernatural, or that not believing in such is somehow immoral. Both of these misconceptions are deeply ingrained in our culture and history. Until someone understands the true (and secular) basis of ethics, and until they really understand that a meaningful and happy life is possible without supernatural beliefs, they will continue to harbor that strong desire to believe such things, and a deep fear of disbelieving them. Those desires and fears will continue to trump their good sense - the same good sense they are perfectly capable of applying in all of the other mundane situations in their life. Thus, they will concoct all manner of rationalizations and self deceptions to maintain unfounded beliefs. One of those rationalizations, which I have discussed here, is the attempt to equate empirical reasoning with superstitious faith.

Voting For Stupid Primates

Published
by
drmomentum@gmail.com
on December 18, 2007
.

Christopher Hitchens wants you to know that it is perfectly reasonable to reject a presidential candidate because of his religious views. Article VI of the constitution discusses that there should be no religious test for office, a reaction to European monarchies which required people to do kooky things like affirm religious belief.

However, what Article VI does not do, and was never intended to do, is deny me the right to say, as loudly as I may choose, that I will on no account vote for a smirking hick like Mike Huckabee, who is an unusually stupid primate but who does not have the elementary intelligence to recognize the fact that this is what he is. My right to say and believe that is already guaranteed to me by the First Amendment. And the right of Huckabee to win the election and fill the White House with morons like himself is unaffected by my expression of an opinion.

Hitchens has never been shy, so far as I know, and so I wouldn’t expect to hear he felt much pressure to curtail his expression of opinion. But his point is important, that there is a difference between voters expressing their opinion and the government requiring a certain faith be observed. You should not hear complaining from atheists that there is a defacto test for religiosity in this country, because it is based on voter preference, not any official policy1.

But, aside from what’s official, what can I say about voter preference?

There is an expression: “It’s nothing personal.” What that expression means is to reassure the listener that some decision was not made on an unreasonable personal bias, but rather on facts that are outside of the personal. If you don’t invite Vice President Cheney to go quail hunting with you, you might say “it’s nothing personal” if you relish spending some time with the arch-Neocon, but you fear for the lives of the other participants, based on his past performance. It’s nothing personal, but you don’t invite anyone on your little trips if that person has a separate section of notches on his belt that correspond to humans. It’s not a prejudice against his personality, it’s a practical matter of a fear for your life, and perhaps the fear that your health insurance carrier will get wind of it and raise your premiums.

Okay, that’s a bad example, considering that it’s difficult to imagine wanting to spend time with the VP. I leave it as an exercise to the reader.

What I mean to say is that you can have reasonable arguments why someone shouldn’t be president, and then you can have prejudices.

“I just won’t vote for any Christian” is a prejudice that I have never noticed. Nonbelievers are voting for Christians all the time. This is why it’s so easy to dismiss crackpots who worry about anti-Christian boogeymen. Atheists get freedom of religion. They get freedom. People whose beliefs are not in the majority are keenly aware how far that freedom goes and where it ends. Well, that and the fact that atheists are still outnumbered.

We’re used to voting for Christians. But many of us (I’ll just speak for myself here, but feel free to join in) don’t want to vote for crackpots.

If you have goofy2 beliefs, you have the choice and right to keep them to yourself. You have the right to practice those beliefs without interference, insofar as you don’t break any other laws. And, heck, we love freedom of religion so much here that it’s OK even if you do break some of our other laws. Some people balk at the idea of religion being a private thing. OK, so shout it from the rooftops (within noise pollution laws, and between appropriate hours). But if you’re up on a rooftop telling me about your supernatural beliefs, what part of that is supposed to convince me that you’re fit to be president?

And if you’re running for president, and you want me to think that religion is in any way relevant, then you’re tempting people to judge you on religion. You’re begging them, even. You think it will help more than hurt. I have a lot to say about why I don’t respect that, but that’s for another time. We were talking more about the voter’s decision rather than the candidate’s campaign. And I will avoid, for this essay, just judging a person based on his religion as a knee-jerk reaction.

But why isn’t it relevant to examine someone’s specific beliefs just because there is a context of religious belief around them? Does it matter whether a belief is a Christian belief, or a Muslim belief? In some legal contexts it does, but that’s a matter of trying to prevent the government from infringing on an essential freedom recognized by the constitution. But some beliefs impact directly on a voter. And it would be completely nuts for some voters to ignore those beliefs, no matter what the context.

Mike Huckabee is increasingly becoming a great example for blog posts, if only I had time to write them all. It’s nothing personal, Mike, but you’re in the news a lot. I’ll pick on Romney later.

But, Mike, I noticed that you wrote some crazy stuff in a book, less than a decade ago:

Men who have rejected God and do not walk in faith are more often than not immoral, impure, and improvident (Gal. 5:19-21). They are prone to extreme and destructive behavior, indulging in perverse vices and dissipating sensuality (1 Cor. 6:9-10). And they—along with their families and loved ones—are thus driven over the brink of destruction (Prov. 23:21).

Huckabee clearly hasn’t watched Deliver Us From Evil (warning - link has sound). And also, I suspect that he hasn’t done research to back up his assertion that atheists are more often than not (that’s over 50% for you math-inclined people) immoral3. I’m assuming that by “impure” he means that we don’t wash behind our ears.

I’ll vote for Christians all day long. But I won’t vote for a Huckabee. It’s nothing personal. And clearly, it’s nothing to do with his religion. It’s that he’s a nutfudge. And I frankly don’t care whether he’s a nutfudge who drinks his own Kool-Aid or somebody else’s. He’s a nutfudge either way.

1 You’ll get a number of people telling you that the country is a Christian Nation, and these same people will also, out of the other side of their mouths, tell you it’s a free country. Well, they’ve clearly got to be wrong on at least one of those assertions. Hm?

2 I don’t mean the word goofy to be offensive. I mean it to indicate supernatural beliefs. I don’t want to say “weird” beliefs, because then people will just assume I mean majority beliefs are OK and they’ll think I’m picking on Mormons or Scientologists or some other group. I’m not. If you believe God personally toasts your bagel every morning, why should I laugh about that any more than or less than a belief that dinosaurs hung out with folks in the Bible? Certain beliefs are unverifiable.

3 I don’t know which interpretation is worse: that over 50% of atheists are immoral and impure, or that all nonbelievers are immoral more than 50% of the time in their lives. Sometimes, the principle of charity is a coin toss.

An Atheist’s Prayer

Published
by
Devout Atheist
on December 16, 2007
.

I think that to many of us, atheism represents a profound belief rather than a certainty. For me at least, both as a thinking person and a scientist, any such rigid conviction would be almost as abhorrent as religious dogmatism. We have to consider the possibility that any particular theory of the universe- ours included- is flawed, or even just plain false (string theory is a good candidate for the latter). As the astronomer Carl Sagan said, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." So we can’t be completely certain that the universe was neither created nor is ruled over by some kind of supernatural being. This means, unfortunately, that deists might, in spite of themselves, possibly be right about the existence of a god(s).

But if we atheists did get this wrong, there is surely no reason to conclude that any organized religion got it right. What are the odds that any particular superstitious club, in our very ordinary little dot of space, happened upon the correct description of this all-powerful ruler of the universe? Probably about equal to the infinitesimal odds given in Matthew 19:24 of a rich man getting into heaven. It seems far more likely that any such “god(s)” would bear little or no resemblance whatsoever to any gods envisioned by any religions past or present.

The prayer below, addressed “to whom it may concern”, explores the possibility that atheism/humanism might have gotten this one wrong:


An Atheist’s Prayer

Bless my family and me,

Whatever organizing force there may be in the World;

Whatever abiding spirit may have escaped the crushing randomness of the Universe;

Whatever God-like being, capable of ascribing meaning to life and the world,

I might have over-looked in the arrogant certainty of my atheism.

An Atheist’s Prayer

Published
by
Devout Atheist
on December 16, 2007
.

I think that to many of us, atheism represents a profound belief rather than a certainty. For me at least, both as a thinking person and a scientist, any such rigid conviction would be almost as abhorrent as religious dogmatism. We have to consider the possibility that any particular theory of the universe- ours included- is flawed, or even just plain false (string theory is a good candidate for the latter). As the astronomer Carl Sagan said, "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." So we can’t be completely certain that the universe was neither created nor is ruled over by some kind of supernatural being. This means, unfortunately, that deists might, in spite of themselves, possibly be right about the existence of a god(s).

But if we atheists did get this wrong, there is surely no reason to conclude that any organized religion got it right. What are the odds that any particular superstitious club, in our very ordinary little dot of space, happened upon the correct description of this all-powerful ruler of the universe? Probably about equal to the infinitesimal odds given in Matthew 19:24 of a rich man getting into heaven. It seems far more likely that any such “god(s)” would bear little or no resemblance whatsoever to any gods envisioned by any religions past or present.

The prayer below, addressed “to whom it may concern”, explores the possibility that atheism/humanism might have gotten this one wrong:


An Atheist’s Prayer

Bless my family and me,

Whatever organizing force there may be in the World;

Whatever abiding spirit may have escaped the crushing randomness of the Universe;

Whatever God-like being, capable of ascribing meaning to life and the world,

I might have over-looked in the arrogant certainty of my atheism.

Darkness

Published
by
Q
on December 16, 2007
.
"The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness."
Vladimir Nabokov

"You never see animals going through the absurd and often horrible fooleries of magic and religion. . . . Dogs do not ritually urinate in the hope of persuading heaven to do the same and send down rain. Asses do not bray a liturgy to cloudless skies. Nor do cats attempt, by abstinence from cat's meat, to wheedle the feline spirits into benevolence. Only man behaves with such gratuitous folly. It is the price he has to pay for being intelligent but not, as yet, quite intelligent enough."
Aldous Huxley

I find humans to be quite strange creatures. No other living organism on this planet is as intelligent, yet as gullible as them. To think that the same species that discovered the laws of nature, that created such beautiful music, that made such fascinating art, is the same species that came up with religion, racism, and sexism, is an idea that astonishes me.

Darkness

Published
by
Q
on December 16, 2007
.
"The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness."
Vladimir Nabokov

"You never see animals going through the absurd and often horrible fooleries of magic and religion. . . . Dogs do not ritually urinate in the hope of persuading heaven to do the same and send down rain. Asses do not bray a liturgy to cloudless skies. Nor do cats attempt, by abstinence from cat's meat, to wheedle the feline spirits into benevolence. Only man behaves with such gratuitous folly. It is the price he has to pay for being intelligent but not, as yet, quite intelligent enough."
Aldous Huxley

I find humans to be quite strange creatures. No other living organism on this planet is as intelligent, yet as gullible as them. To think that the same species that discovered the laws of nature, that created such beautiful music, that made such fascinating art, is the same species that came up with religion, racism, and sexism, is an idea that astonishes me.

I forgot how beautiful the Earth is…

Published
by
Juno Walker
on December 15, 2007
.

As someone with a naturalistic view of existence and the world, it surprises me to find how little I spend appreciating the actual world. Sure, you can philosophize until it comes out your ear holes, but what good is all that if you never take the time to see the world? And I don't just mean going outside for a walk or hiking on a local trail. I mean actually seeing more of the world than what's within an easy traveling distance.

Two weeks ago I had to fly out to Los Angeles from where I live in New Jersey. I suppose I was fortunate, because as we climbed to almost 40,000 ft we enjoyed clear skies for almost the entire flight. The first thing that struck me was how immense the Earth is. Sure, you can quote numbers and measures and statistics about the dimensions of the Earth, but until you are put in a place where you can experience its vastness - at least as much as possible - you don't get the same feelings of wonder and awe.

As we left the Northeast - which I've seen from a plane hundreds of times before - we flew over the bread basket of our country, the Great Plains. From that altitude, you can see areas that are sparsely populated, interspersed with the bricolage of tilled and farmed land - a patchwork quilt of muted, earthy colors. From this perspective you could also see the multiplicity of communal arrangements: from hamlet to village to town to city.

But the real interesting geography came into view as we left the Plains States for the Rocky Mountain States. First the long, sloping foothills come into view - a steady, calm overture gradually rising to a crescendo of the forbidding abruptness of a colossal mountain fortress, so massive that one is compelled to think it must conceal and guard the most precious treasure in its labyrinthine keep. My favorite mountain peak has to be the Grand Tetons of Wyoming:

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

Leaving the seemingly unbroken chain of rocky mountains threading their way up into the far north, we come upon a series of smaller massifs, with the distance between them growing larger and larger. Many of them have stopped short of thrusting above the timberline, and their sparsely forested peaks merge more gingerly into more densely forested foothills.

But soon the irregular fringe of forested expanse gives way to an interlude of the dimpled, the wrinkled, and the jagged, before giving way to the more desolate sweep of the deserts. We see variegated mesas, some small and discreet, others that stretch almost out of sight, leaving the impression of a gigantic, petrified wave frozen in place, eternally on the brink of tipping but never crashing down upon its uninhabited shore. Before long you are startled by the feathered fractals sporadically spread over the sandstone - rivers that have cut channels through the uniform, parched wasteland of earth, which the unflagging wind has brushed and softened.

One last gift before we enter the gates of civilization again is the Barringer meteorite crater in Arizona:

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

Again, one could be impressed by the measures and dimensions: nearly 4,000 feet wide and over 500 feet deep, it was created by a 150 foot-wide meteorite traveling at an approximate speed of 29,000 m.p.h.! Seeing it from 40,000 feet in the sky was impressive, but I can only imagine how impressive it would have been to stand at its rim; and how doubly impressive it would have been if I had seen it from a plane and stood at its rim...

While all these terrestrial and extraterrestrial phenomena bear the twin aspects of exhilaration and fear, the humanly-created possesses a similar grandeur. As we leave the vast blanket of desert and descend over the last few massifs before the vaster expanse of the open sea, we again encounter sprawling humanity filling every corner and cranny of the spacious valley. But it's not merely the virus-like fecundity of our species that astonishes, but the works of our minds and our hands - the freeways, tunnels, bridges, and skyscrapers. We are the most relentlessly and restlessly creative animal on earth, for good or ill.

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

But it seems to have fallen to our lot to attempt the increasingly mutually exclusive goals of both flourishing and sustaining life - all life.








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I forgot how beautiful the Earth is…

Published
by
Juno Walker
on December 15, 2007
.

As someone with a naturalistic view of existence and the world, it surprises me to find how little I spend appreciating the actual world. Sure, you can philosophize until it comes out your ear holes, but what good is all that if you never take the time to see the world? And I don't just mean going outside for a walk or hiking on a local trail. I mean actually seeing more of the world than what's within an easy traveling distance.

Two weeks ago I had to fly out to Los Angeles from where I live in New Jersey. I suppose I was fortunate, because as we climbed to almost 40,000 ft we enjoyed clear skies for almost the entire flight. The first thing that struck me was how immense the Earth is. Sure, you can quote numbers and measures and statistics about the dimensions of the Earth, but until you are put in a place where you can experience its vastness - at least as much as possible - you don't get the same feelings of wonder and awe.

As we left the Northeast - which I've seen from a plane hundreds of times before - we flew over the bread basket of our country, the Great Plains. From that altitude, you can see areas that are sparsely populated, interspersed with the bricolage of tilled and farmed land - a patchwork quilt of muted, earthy colors. From this perspective you could also see the multiplicity of communal arrangements: from hamlet to village to town to city.

But the real interesting geography came into view as we left the Plains States for the Rocky Mountain States. First the long, sloping foothills come into view - a steady, calm overture gradually rising to a crescendo of the forbidding abruptness of a colossal mountain fortress, so massive that one is compelled to think it must conceal and guard the most precious treasure in its labyrinthine keep. My favorite mountain peak has to be the Grand Tetons of Wyoming:

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

Leaving the seemingly unbroken chain of rocky mountains threading their way up into the far north, we come upon a series of smaller massifs, with the distance between them growing larger and larger. Many of them have stopped short of thrusting above the timberline, and their sparsely forested peaks merge more gingerly into more densely forested foothills.

But soon the irregular fringe of forested expanse gives way to an interlude of the dimpled, the wrinkled, and the jagged, before giving way to the more desolate sweep of the deserts. We see variegated mesas, some small and discreet, others that stretch almost out of sight, leaving the impression of a gigantic, petrified wave frozen in place, eternally on the brink of tipping but never crashing down upon its uninhabited shore. Before long you are startled by the feathered fractals sporadically spread over the sandstone - rivers that have cut channels through the uniform, parched wasteland of earth, which the unflagging wind has brushed and softened.

One last gift before we enter the gates of civilization again is the Barringer meteorite crater in Arizona:

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

Again, one could be impressed by the measures and dimensions: nearly 4,000 feet wide and over 500 feet deep, it was created by a 150 foot-wide meteorite traveling at an approximate speed of 29,000 m.p.h.! Seeing it from 40,000 feet in the sky was impressive, but I can only imagine how impressive it would have been to stand at its rim; and how doubly impressive it would have been if I had seen it from a plane and stood at its rim...

While all these terrestrial and extraterrestrial phenomena bear the twin aspects of exhilaration and fear, the humanly-created possesses a similar grandeur. As we leave the vast blanket of desert and descend over the last few massifs before the vaster expanse of the open sea, we again encounter sprawling humanity filling every corner and cranny of the spacious valley. But it's not merely the virus-like fecundity of our species that astonishes, but the works of our minds and our hands - the freeways, tunnels, bridges, and skyscrapers. We are the most relentlessly and restlessly creative animal on earth, for good or ill.

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket

But it seems to have fallen to our lot to attempt the increasingly mutually exclusive goals of both flourishing and sustaining life - all life.








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On Patriotism

Published
by
Toby Selwyn
on December 14, 2007
.

I am a proud Englishman. Or, at least, I used to be. Today, I’m just a proud human being. In my late teens and early twenties I was passionately patriotic, with a huge St George’s Cross flag hanging menacingly from my bedroom wall, and England cups, towels and key rings never far away. I followed the England football team fanatically, and took an active interest in any other sport where England competed. My younger brother is Welsh, and we used to mock each other mercilessly, albeit in a friendly manner.

Over the last year or so, my patriotism has waned to the point where there is almost none left. I’ve questioned it more and more and come to see it as rather pointless and empty. I’m proud to be English; why? It wasn’t a choice. And, even if it had been, so what? What does the fact that I was born in England actually mean? Does it make me better than people who weren’t born in England? Of course not. The planet is made up of land and water. Human beings have drawn lines to divide that land up. Those lines are certainly not random, but they are arbitrary when it comes to where they lie in the moments that you draw your first breaths.

So, what about England as a country and as a culture? Well, I’m certainly proud of some of the values we hold in England, such as freedom of expression. On the other hand, I’m ashamed that we are officially a Christian nation, and still function under the archaic monarchy system. I’m proud of some of the achievements by English men and women, and by England as a nation. In the past we have lead the way in industry and contributed richly to music, art, literature and sport. On the other hand, in our colonial adventures we have been the tyrant, spilling much blood and taking many lives.

Another thing, was that I always thought of myself as English rather than British, but the absurdity of this identification has dawned on me too. I’ve lived in Wales for the last 20 years, been raised here, educated here and worked here. I can’t really claim to be English rather than Welsh or British, looking at it rationally.

I consider myself British insofar as I live in Britain, and so what is in the British interest is inevitably in my interest. If I were to move abroad, I would see it exactly the same with whatever country I moved to. I find it much easier now to think of myself as a global citizen. There are aspects of England to be ashamed of and aspects to be proud of, and the same can be said of any other nation. The same can also be said of human beings. I think I may as well just consider myself human. As a human I am ashamed of the religious ignorance in Saudi Arabia, but I am supremely proud of the United States Constitution. I see very little to be gained from patriotism and much danger. The segregation and emphasis on arbitrary differences often simply fosters resentment and disdain, and it is a mindset that can be easily manipulated and exploited by charismatic speakers, who dress up racism as fair and rational.

Is it worth it? To me, the answer is an ever more resounding no.


He once was dead; now He is risen

Published
by
Juno Walker
on December 14, 2007
.

The greatest recent event - that "God is dead," that the belief in the Christian god has become unbelievable - is already beginning to cast its first shadows over Europe.

Are we perhaps still too much under the impression of the initial consequences of this event - and these initial consequences . . . are quite the opposite of what one might perhaps expect: They are not at all sad and gloomy but rather like a new and scarcely describable kind of light, happiness, relief, exhilaration, encouragement, dawn.

At long last the horizon appears free to us again, even if it should not be bright; at long last our ships may venture out again, venture out to face any danger; all the daring of the lover of knowledge is permitted again; the sea, our sea, lies open again . . .

Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science


Before I get into my discussion, I want to clarify a few things. First, Nietzsche wrote this in 1882, so this idea that "God is dead" is certainly not new. Second, when Nietzsche says that the Christian god is dead, he means it metaphorically; he means to say that the Christian value system - which up to that point enjoyed an unparalleled hegemony over Europe - was no longer tenable to many. Third - and in case any unread Religious Right party member, or member of the Moral Majority, find their way to this blog - the word "gay" in Nietzsche's lexicon meant "joyous" and not "homosexual." Of course, that shouldn't need to be said...

Despite what many people think of Nietzsche - that is, that he was a life-denying nihilist - he in fact argued for a heretofore unimagined affirmation of life, this life, and not some after-worldly life. I think this misunderstanding comes from not reading Nietzsche's works, and simply relying on what "they" say about him and his philosophy.

He viewed Christian morality as life-denying or life-negating (incidentally, he viewed Buddhism the same way). He believed Christianity taught hatred for the body, for the earth, for anything that was not directed toward the other-worldly paradise of Heaven. In this sense was Nietzsche an "immoralist." But perhaps here a word should be said about the difference between morality and religious culture.

Alonzo Fyfe of the Atheist Ethicist wrote an insightful post about this difference:

The view that I will present will divide religious prescriptions into two classes. One class is properly and correctly linked to ‘morality’. This is a class that transcends different religions and even non-religious belief. This is the class of prescriptions that can legitimately be forced upon others. The second class consists of those prescriptions that belong only to a particular religion. I am going to call this class ‘religious culture’. These are prescriptions that cannot be legitimately forced upon others.

Fyfe goes on to give some examples:

We can easily classify the prescriptions against murder, rape, child abuse, slavery, assault, theft, lying, ‘bearing false witness’, breaking promises or contracts, recklessness, negligence, and similar kinds of actions as prescriptions that the agent will have to take with him as he goes into society.

We can just as easily identify a set of prescriptions that an agent can leave behind – where the fact that one religion may require these types of actions while another does not is of little social consequence. These prescriptions include what to eat or drink, when to eat or drink, where to live (the concept of ‘homeland’), when to pray, how to pray, to whom one is to pray, which scripture to read, when to work (or not work), what to wear. These are the prescriptions that I will put in the category of ‘religious culture’. These are prescriptions that the members of a religion may not impose on others.

Bearing in mind the difference between morality and religious culture, we can return to Nietzsche for a moment. Nietzsche is notoriously difficult to understand and interpret, mainly because he didn't write as a systematic philosopher, and his writing style was more stylistic than stodgy and academic.

Although it's not possible to distill Nietzsche's thought into a single aphorism, perhaps the best we can do for our present purpose is University of Warwick philosophy professor Keith Ansell Pearson's description:

There is no longer any ‘true world’ to be faithful to and to aspire to, that is, no realm of pure being that would give us permanence, bliss, peace, unity, harmony, etc. Rather we are to affirm terrestrial life – becoming, change, multiplicity, plurality – as our only life and in all its complexity and difficulty.

Nietzsche thinks that through naturalism – what he calls the task of translating the human being back into nature – we will, in fact, enrich and potentially expand our conceptions of the possibilities of human existence. To do this he thinks we must be brave, honest, and patient: the free spirit must learn, he says, the value of keeping its energy and enthusiasm in bounds.

But it's not my aim in this post to dissect and present Nietzsche's philosophy. My goal in this post is to talk about how the Christian god (or equally the Muslim or Jewish god) has been "dying" for the past century or so, only to begin to be restored to good health in the past quarter of this century - at least in America.

The most consistent resuscitation attempts have been to sneak creationism/Intelligent Design into our public school systems; federal funding for faith-based programs; and the idea, even among Democrats, that only a "person of faith" - by which they mean a person of Christian or Jewish faith - can lead this country. But perhaps the most ambitious and, arguably, the most ominous attempt is the resolution that passed in the House of Representatives: "Recognizing the importance of Christmas and the Christian faith."

I say "ominous" because, as cited in the resolution itself, there are 225,000,000 Christians in this country. That's a lot of Christians, given the fact that our current population is approximately 300,000,000. I'm not sure who they include in their number, but let's assume that 75% of the 300 million are both Christian and members of our electorate. Recent polls have suggested that 90% of Americans are Christian, so I imagine 75% is conservative. I could certainly be wrong.

But if 90% of the population is Christian, and 75% are entitled to vote, and since politicians for national office must necessarily pander to constituencies in order to even get elected, what would happen if this were to become the basis for a Constitutional amendment? Everyone knows there are many people who would love to see a Constitutional amendment banning gay marriage (a prescription of "religious culture", as the Atheist Ethicist would note).

I mean, who doesn't love Christmas? I'm an atheist, and I love Christmastime. But I enjoy a secular Christmas. I enjoy the gathering of friends and family, the good food and drink, the snow - even the holiday songs (with a few exceptions). Only a true Scrooge could be against it. At least that's what would most likely prevail as "public opinion."

But our government's religious neutrality is exactly what has kept the peace within our country and what has allowed us to flourish. I imagine Christians are confident and emboldened when they hear that 90% of the country is Christian, and that the House of Representatives resolves to express "continued support for Christians in the United States and worldwide." These words, "continued support," are disquietingly vague. Just as Congress has abused the somewhat ambiguous "General Welfare" clause of the U.S. Constitution, a Christian Congress would almost certainly abuse a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution making Christianity the State religion, should it become law. Then the 1st Amendment would certainly be tragically superseded by the "Christian Nation" clause.

Perhaps we need to add this development to Naomi Wolf's article "Fascist America, in 10 easy steps," from her forthcoming book The End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot.









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He once was dead; now He is risen

Published
by
Juno Walker
on December 14, 2007
.

The greatest recent event - that "God is dead," that the belief in the Christian god has become unbelievable - is already beginning to cast its first shadows over Europe.

Are we perhaps still too much under the impression of the initial consequences of this event - and these initial consequences . . . are quite the opposite of what one might perhaps expect: They are not at all sad and gloomy but rather like a new and scarcely describable kind of light, happiness, relief, exhilaration, encouragement, dawn.

At long last the horizon appears free to us again, even if it should not be bright; at long last our ships may venture out again, venture out to face any danger; all the daring of the lover of knowledge is permitted again; the sea, our sea, lies open again . . .

Friedrich Nietzsche, The Gay Science


Before I get into my discussion, I want to clarify a few things. First, Nietzsche wrote this in 1882, so this idea that "God is dead" is certainly not new. Second, when Nietzsche says that the Christian god is dead, he means it metaphorically; he means to say that the Christian value system - which up to that point enjoyed an unparalleled hegemony over Europe - was no longer tenable to many. Third - and in case any unread Religious Right party member, or member of the Moral Majority, find their way to this blog - the word "gay" in Nietzsche's lexicon meant "joyous" and not "homosexual." Of course, that shouldn't need to be said...

Despite what many people think of Nietzsche - that is, that he was a life-denying nihilist - he in fact argued for a heretofore unimagined affirmation of life, this life, and not some after-worldly life. I think this misunderstanding comes from not reading Nietzsche's works, and simply relying on what "they" say about him and his philosophy.

He viewed Christian morality as life-denying or life-negating (incidentally, he viewed Buddhism the same way). He believed Christianity taught hatred for the body, for the earth, for anything that was not directed toward the other-worldly paradise of Heaven. In this sense was Nietzsche an "immoralist." But perhaps here a word should be said about the difference between morality and religious culture.

Alonzo Fyfe of the Atheist Ethicist wrote an insightful post about this difference:

The view that I will present will divide religious prescriptions into two classes. One class is properly and correctly linked to ‘morality’. This is a class that transcends different religions and even non-religious belief. This is the class of prescriptions that can legitimately be forced upon others. The second class consists of those prescriptions that belong only to a particular religion. I am going to call this class ‘religious culture’. These are prescriptions that cannot be legitimately forced upon others.

Fyfe goes on to give some examples:

We can easily classify the prescriptions against murder, rape, child abuse, slavery, assault, theft, lying, ‘bearing false witness’, breaking promises or contracts, recklessness, negligence, and similar kinds of actions as prescriptions that the agent will have to take with him as he goes into society.

We can just as easily identify a set of prescriptions that an agent can leave behind – where the fact that one religion may require these types of actions while another does not is of little social consequence. These prescriptions include what to eat or drink, when to eat or drink, where to live (the concept of ‘homeland’), when to pray, how to pray, to whom one is to pray, which scripture to read, when to work (or not work), what to wear. These are the prescriptions that I will put in the category of ‘religious culture’. These are prescriptions that the members of a religion may not impose on others.

Bearing in mind the difference between morality and religious culture, we can return to Nietzsche for a moment. Nietzsche is notoriously difficult to understand and interpret, mainly because he didn't write as a systematic philosopher, and his writing style was more stylistic than stodgy and academic.

Although it's not possible to distill Nietzsche's thought into a single aphorism, perhaps the best we can do for our present purpose is University of Warwick philosophy professor Keith Ansell Pearson's description:

There is no longer any ‘true world’ to be faithful to and to aspire to, that is, no realm of pure being that would give us permanence, bliss, peace, unity, harmony, etc. Rather we are to affirm terrestrial life – becoming, change, multiplicity, plurality – as our only life and in all its complexity and difficulty.

Nietzsche thinks that through naturalism – what he calls the task of translating the human being back into nature – we will, in fact, enrich and potentially expand our conceptions of the possibilities of human existence. To do this he thinks we must be brave, honest, and patient: the free spirit must learn, he says, the value of keeping its energy and enthusiasm in bounds.

But it's not my aim in this post to dissect and present Nietzsche's philosophy. My goal in this post is to talk about how the Christian god (or equally the Muslim or Jewish god) has been "dying" for the past century or so, only to begin to be restored to good health in the past quarter of this century - at least in America.

The most consistent resuscitation attempts have been to sneak creationism/Intelligent Design into our public school systems; federal funding for faith-based programs; and the idea, even among Democrats, that only a "person of faith" - by which they mean a person of Christian or Jewish faith - can lead this country. But perhaps the most ambitious and, arguably, the most ominous attempt is the resolution that passed in the House of Representatives: "Recognizing the importance of Christmas and the Christian faith."

I say "ominous" because, as cited in the resolution itself, there are 225,000,000 Christians in this country. That's a lot of Christians, given the fact that our current population is approximately 300,000,000. I'm not sure who they include in their number, but let's assume that 75% of the 300 million are both Christian and members of our electorate. Recent polls have suggested that 90% of Americans are Christian, so I imagine 75% is conservative. I could certainly be wrong.

But if 90% of the population is Christian, and 75% are entitled to vote, and since politicians for national office must necessarily pander to constituencies in order to even get elected, what would happen if this were to become the basis for a Constitutional amendment? Everyone knows there are many people who would love to see a Constitutional amendment banning gay marriage (a prescription of "religious culture", as the Atheist Ethicist would note).

I mean, who doesn't love Christmas? I'm an atheist, and I love Christmastime. But I enjoy a secular Christmas. I enjoy the gathering of friends and family, the good food and drink, the snow - even the holiday songs (with a few exceptions). Only a true Scrooge could be against it. At least that's what would most likely prevail as "public opinion."

But our government's religious neutrality is exactly what has kept the peace within our country and what has allowed us to flourish. I imagine Christians are confident and emboldened when they hear that 90% of the country is Christian, and that the House of Representatives resolves to express "continued support for Christians in the United States and worldwide." These words, "continued support," are disquietingly vague. Just as Congress has abused the somewhat ambiguous "General Welfare" clause of the U.S. Constitution, a Christian Congress would almost certainly abuse a proposed amendment to the U.S. Constitution making Christianity the State religion, should it become law. Then the 1st Amendment would certainly be tragically superseded by the "Christian Nation" clause.

Perhaps we need to add this development to Naomi Wolf's article "Fascist America, in 10 easy steps," from her forthcoming book The End of America: A Letter of Warning to a Young Patriot.









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Karma and Other Nonsense

Published
by
Dave McRitchie
on December 14, 2007
.
The inevitability of death, as well as the possibility that there is no afterlife, are difficult pills for most of us to swallow. As a result, we look for evidence, no matter how unsubstantiated,...

Karma and Other Nonsense

Published
by
Dave McRitchie
on December 14, 2007
.
The inevitability of death, as well as the possibility that there is no afterlife, are difficult pills for most of us to swallow. As a result, we look for evidence, no matter how unsubstantiated,...

The Deadly Face of Muslim Extremism

Published
by
Dave McRitchie
on December 14, 2007
.
Two courageous Muslims who have it right. Let's hope this serves as a wake-up call to the danger in our midst. Tarek Fatah and Farzana Hassan, National Post Wednesday, December 12, 2007 The tragic...