Dead Ryks Underground

Stability and Change

2010-11-01T10:18:00.000-07:00

I am adjusting to life at home again. After my trip to Hawaii I am home without work for two months. My first few days have been bewildering, not because things have changed but because they have not. The same issues and difficulties I had before leaving still remain, the routines, both good and bad are exactly the same. It seems from my perspective that so much has happened and I have lived so much, yet at home it has been stasis.

I should be comforted that in my abscence my wife kept things running so well and without disruption, but instead I am put off and feeling uncomfortable. Not that I am displeased or ungrateful, to the contrary am very happy, just...as I said bewildered. I feel this way whenever I return home, but ususally I am only gone for less than a week, this time it was nearly a month and it strikes me harder when that happens. I think it is because I have changed. On the road my life is a flurry of work accompanied by recreation and pleasure. At home everything is slower, I have many chores but they are not loming things with pressure and deadlines. Likewise there are pleasures and recreation, but they are the mild and quiet sort that one enjoys with the family not the wild and loud things that one enjoys with friends, when the responsibilities of home are set aside.

When traveling it seems that the only stability I have sometimes is McDonalds. That is a never ending constant. Sure it varies a little here and there. In Anchorage for example they serve Big Macs with quarter pounder patties and call them McKinley Macs, In Honolulu you can get Spam and Saimin noodles, but for the most part they are much the same and I take comfort in that. Not that I go there often, in fact I try my best to avoid it, but still when I go it makes me feel somehow grounded.

At home everything is stable, which is not always a good thing, my wife does a good job of maintaining things in my abscence, but not at fixing things. It is as if all of the troubles wait for me to return and solve them, or not depending on the troubles and my ability.

This time is a particularly intense transition. I have gone from, living in the tropics where the sun is shining, the ocean is warm, happy hour starts at eleven in the morning and the nightclubs don't close until four AM. I have returned to cold and rain, broken cars, and bills that need paying. Away the company takes care of my lodging,transportation, meals, and even some of my recreation. At home it is up to me to care for all of this.

I am not saying I am unhappy to be home, I missed my family and have had pure joy, playing with the kids, taking them trick or treating, attending their parent teacher conferences this morning, and just being a family man again. It is not unhappiness that troubles me it is adjustment. It is approaching eleven o clock right now and part of me is thinking about calling friends and going for lunch and cocktails. Of course I am not. I am instead taking a moment to blog, in between paying bills online, repairing my wifes van and taking my daughter to ballet and my son to wrestling. This is all to the good but very strange feeling. After Christmas, unless I am called to other work I will be back on the road, first to Seattle then all around. There is even talk I may join some friends working in Minnesota though I have not yet been asked to. When that happens I will go through this same adjustment in reverse, I will be just as bewildered, and I will be feeling that empty ache when I am not driving the kids to activities and helping with the household chores.

It is my hope as it is every year that I will soon be able to take the family travelling and share these experiences with them first hand, rather than through phone calls, stories and photos. Unfortunately my life currently suffers from the familiar old dillema of either having the time but not the money, or the money and not the time. I do try though and one of these days I will find myself ahead of the game, and we will once again enjoy a true family vacation. For now though, we have the pleasures of hearth and home, Thanksgiving is around the corner then Christmas. There are to be dance recitals, concerts, school carnivals, and wrestling meets. All things that, mundane as they are, I love far more than exotic locals and wild nightlife. At heart I am a family man and it is the family which calls and fulfills me, yet it is if my life is schitzophrenic and it is always difficult to transition between the two versions of me.

Almost Home from the Islands

2010-10-26T13:15:00.000-07:00

It has been a wonderful trip, but I am excited to be home. I miss my keiki, that and I am running out of money. It has been an action packed and fun filled three weeks in Hawaii. I barely noticed that I am here for work. My co-workers and I get our work done quickly and then it is off to the beach or the bars or whatever. It also helps that of the twenty one days we are spending here only nine are scheduled for work. The rest are either travel days or days off.

Our first night was just an overnight in Honolulu after flying over from the mainland. We went to Waikiki beach and revisited some of our old hangouts from last year, I even ran into a few people who remembered me, which was nice. The next day we flew to the island of Kuaii for our first work destination. The company put us up in a lovely resort right on the beach. The day we arrived I spent swimming and snorkeling and drinking Mai Tais by the pool. The next day I went sightseeing and visited Wimea canyon and several waterfalls, followed by a great dinner of fresh mahi.

The next day we flew to our next work destination on the Hilo side of the big island. I can't say to much about Hilo because we were only there for an evening before having to work. One highlight however was a little burger and plate lunch joint called Vernas, if you visit I highly reccomend it, everything looked good and my co-workers were all thrilled with what they ordered. I had a gravy double cheeseburger. I did not know what it was when I ordered it, I just saw the words "gravy double cheeseburger" and had to have it. It is exactly what the name says, two burger patties dipped in brown gravy, put on a bun and smothered in cheese. It is so insanely good I will be making them at home in the future.

After working the next day we drove to the Kona side of the Island for a few days. Kona is so fun. A block from our hotel is what we call the strip. It is a single street full of resteraunts and bars of every description. We traveled from one to the other, having a drink at this place or a snack at the other. Dancing and listening to music, and just generally having a good time. On our last day before flying to Mauii we went driving just for fun and ended up on a gorgeous black sand beach. I did the tourist thing and took all sorts of pictures. Then we went to the airport for our flight to Mauii.

Mauii is my favorite Island to visit, people are very friendly and everything is beautiful. Some friends of mine and I rented a car, rather than rely on one of the company drivers and got ourselves all over the island. We drank in Lahaina and checked out all of the tourist shops. Ate fresh cut pineapples and papaya. Then we went to Mackenna beach which was our favorite from last year. It was later in the year this trip and the waves weren't the huge majestic things they were on our first visit, but still respectable. I used up a genies worth of wishes that day, without knowing I had them. Had I known I probably would have wished better. First, while playing in the water and trying to body surf, I said "I wish we would get some big ones, six footers maybe." Sure enough the waves started getting bigger and shortly we were riding nice waves. Then I said " This sure would be great if we had a boogie board. Shortly after my friend Norma who had gone walking, came back with a boogie board, saying "look what I found." After riding waves all day, and picking up a nasty burn, we headed back and I said, "I'm starving, I wish I had something to eat." Just then we go around the corner into the parking lot and, behold there was a truck selling burgers, tacos and shave ice. So there went my three wishes, they made for a perfect day, but you know if I had known I had wishes coming....

After Mauii it was back to Oahu for the rest of our stay. Honolulu is a non stop party. Beaches all day, then drinking in our favorite Karaoke bar until the wee hours of the morning, then off to the nightclubs to dance until they close at four AM, at which time we go back to the hotel to wake up and do it all over after a couple hours sleep. I have made time to see some sights I visited Hanama bay and hiked Diamond Head, I have been to beaches all over the Island, except North Shore which I am going to today.

Tommorow we have one more job and then we fly home Thursday night. I will miss these islands, they are beautiful and fun, but I will be glad to be home with my family, and my beautiful city. It has been great but it is time to tell Hawaii goodbye, until next year anyway.

Aloah Bruddas

2010-10-09T23:51:00.000-07:00

Aloha
It has been an amazing day, My Ducks moved up to #2 in the na\tion and I am off for three weeks in Hawaii, on the company tab no less. As I said, amazing. I will update soon.

An Atheist believes nothing created everything!

2010-08-04T20:46:00.000-07:00

Ray Comfort, the televangelist and cult leader that I refer to on here fairly often, made a knew variant of his argument from ridicule, that atheists must believe nothing created everything, and that makes us stupid. This is the current version.

Still, there are some who deny their God-given common sense and believe the unscientific thought that nothing created everything. Atheists can't have their cake and eat it too. Either something made everything, or nothing made it.

Here is my response
Well yes Ray I am perfectly agreable to the idea that nothing created everything, I just don't follow why you think it is unscientific. "Invisible magic dude that nothing created, made it" is a bit unscientific, but my understanding is based on pretty solid science and logic, so let us begin disecting your premise and why I find it true.

You Say

An Atheist

This I can say is true if you are reffering to me specifically, as to other atheists I can not say. They could believe the universe was licked out of a block of ice by a giant cow and still be atheists as long as they don't think a God did it. By the way that would be just as reasonable as the Christian creation myth.

Believes
I am cool with believes as the appropriate term in this instance. I would prefer "understands" but believe works just fine.

Nothing
Here is a sticky part as I don't believe that nothing exists. If something can be referred to it exists, if only as a concept, so not even "nothing" can actualy be nothing it is something, a concept, a word, and an idea. However outside of the realm of language and concepts there is no true nothing known to exist. We can however refer to a void in which there is no matter, energy, or even quantum particles. I do not know if such a thing existed but if it did it would not be nothing it would be something, a void. So for purpose of discussion I will take nothing as a reference to a void. However as a something even a void has properties, and according to quantum physics these properties may well be creative ones.

Created
The process physics refers to as quantum vaccum friction is one in which in the partial voids possible in the universe as we know, virtual quantum particles are spontaneously created. (some say these particles are actually teleported from elsewhere, and if this is shown to be true that would make my hypothesis much more complicated but I am for this purpose going with the premise that they are created.) If this happens in limited partial voids it seems a certainty that in a universal void, a massive creation of particles would occur, say in a sudden expansion of space including matter and energy. There are mathematical equations that reinforce the idea that a void is inherently unstable and would in fact respond in such a manner. While "creation" may not be the appropriate word for this, it is usually called a singularity, creation works well enough.

Everything
This is perfectly fine with the caveat that we really have no idea what everything actually is, there are certainly a great many things we don't know about this vast universe you call "everything".

Now in truth my case here isn't really even a hypothesis, just conjecture based on my understanding of some studies I have read. I am not a physicist, although I do have a good education in physics and math, and I am certainly not a quantum physicist so I am not going to say my "hypothesis" is an accurate accounting for the big bang. I will say that this account does not conflict with the science or math, it may or may not be well supported by them but I am pretty confident there is no conflict.

Ray Comfort calls the idea of "nothing created everything" unscientific and an intellectual embarrasment. I call it pretty damn reasonable. Much moreso than his contention that invisible magic man did it. Now there are Christians who, not being whackdoodle cultists, have versions of creationism which are better reasoned and less kooky than the Comfortian one and their theories are worth listening to, however I have yet to see one that is based on anything more than speculation so I feel that responding with speculation of my own is a fairly acceptable response. If however actual observable evidence of Gods or "Divine Creation" were presented I would have to respond with something better than this.

I Must Always Remind Myself

2010-05-23T16:34:00.000-07:00

I must always remind myself that the majority of those who post at Ray Comforts blog and others like it are not Christians. At least they are not like any Christians I have met in the real world. I need to remind myself of this to avoid becoming bigoted against Christians. I know that there are those who despite their belief in gods are rational, intelligent and moral people. I know this because I know them. I may not understand why they believe what they do but I can respect them as good friends and good neighbors.

The folks at Comforts swamp, Rapture Ready, Debunking Atheism and other such places give an entirely different impression. They are hateful, lying, degenerates. I say degenerates because by their own admission without belief in their mythology they would be robbing, and raping children and committing murder all of the time. They even describe themselves as evil and wicked. They claim that Atheists must be degenerates because we do not follow the dictates of Christian mythology so we must be raping and murdering and doing all of the things they would want to do if they weren't afraid of hellfire.

I say lying because that is what they do. They lie, they distort and misrepresent peoples statements. They continue to do so after repeatedly being shown exactly how they have taken statements out of context or repeated a lie someone else has told. Ray Comfort, for those who don't know, is a smarmy televangelist and cult leader who is the chief liar of the bunch. Nothing he says is truth and when called on his lies he dodges or changes the subject or simply deletes responses that make him look bad.

I say hateful because they are. They throw around mockery and false accusations. They make generalisations about Atheists and non Christians. They engage in the most atrocious bigotry that if it were directed at blacks or Jews it would be reviled by every decent person on the planet. Yet they get away with it because they do it in the name of their religion and the more sensible and decent Christians are either unaware or look the other way. Not that Christians outside the cult all approve, to the contrary, many Christian denominations widely decry Comfort as a heretic, but not because of his bigotry, it is his doctrine that draws their ire. His works based salvation and slavish literalism is what gets him shunned. This is fine and probably appropriate, but I would also like to see him called out for his lies and bigotry.

That is why, as I have said, I must always remain aware that these creatures are not representative of Christianity in general. Rather they are more akin to other cultists of any faith. They are the fringe loonies. The ignorant wingnuts. The mad bombers that the mainstream members of all faiths be it Islam, Hindu, Buddhism, or Christianity, would very much like to see go away.

Nature with my son

2010-05-17T15:28:00.000-07:00

I finally got an actual weekend off after being away from home for over a month with only one day home. My wife was away at girl scout camp with my daughter so it was just the boy and I for the weekend and we made the most of it. We started off Friday after school with a trip to the park to visit the new goslings and feed the geese. Afterwards we took a long walk on the back trails down the river. The Willamette river is just perfect this time of year. Everything is just a wash of green and blue. The riot of different greens from all of the trees, the blue of the sky, and the river swirling shades of both cascading over the rocks. We spent the whole afternoon hiking and talking before going home to make "guy food" in this case bacon cheeseburgers.

Saturday we went with some friends to play disc golf in the park. We played several rounds and my son played right along with us. We give him a substantial handicap but even considering that he played very well. Saturday night is usually the night when my friends come over to play cards and bullshit. We dealt my son in and included him in the conversation and he was absolutely thrilled to be one of the guys.

Sunday was the Wildflower Festival at the arboretum and my son and I went together for the day. It was a great day. There was great food, good music, wine tasting from the local vinyards, and of course the wildflowers which are magnificent. We went hiking on the many nature trails. I let my son lead and he kept taking every trail upwards and after about an hour we had climbed all the way to the top of Mt. Pisgah. Exhausted but triumphant we stopped to survey the fields around us and revel in our victory before making the trip down. Downward I let him lead as well and before to long we were well and truly lost. Well not exactly, I knew where we were and had a pretty good idea how to get back but I let him struggle with it. He decided to use his tracking skills to find the way and started following horse prints. He actually did a good job and got us on a trail I knew would get us back but I also knew it was very long walk. Eventually I suggested we follow the stream down cross country and he loved the idea. We went off helter skelter downhill through the woods and fields, jumping and laughing the whole way until we made it right back down to the festival grounds.

We stayed another hour or so listening to the bands and making friends before going home to meet my wife and daughter.

The most interesting part of our trip was my sons curiosity. The whole weekend he had millions of questions. He wanted to know where rocks come from so I explained erosion and how rivers change course and everything else I could think of about geology. He wanted to know why some berries were poisonous, so I explained about natural selection and survival. Question after question I answered with the best science I had, simplifying it only so far as absolutely neccessary and he soaked it all up like a sponge.

I wonder if this is what religious people do with their children. Do they walk in the woods answering questions with "God did this" or "God wanted it this way" I imagine they do. I honestly don't know. My best Christian friend is without children and the other Christians I associate with don't really talk about child raising at least not from a religious perspective. I was not raised with religion myself, so have no personal experience.

I would think that they would want to but I am not sure how effective it would be with my son. He would not be satisfied with "Goddidit". Even if he believed in a God he would be asking things like "how did God do it" or "Why did God do it". He is only seven but already his brain looks past the surface and as he gets older I hope this continues and I see him probing deeper and deeper. I hear from many Christians of my acquaintance and in articles and reports that a big problem Christianity is suffering is that children are falling away from the faith after adulthood. That when going to college or when moving from home they abandon Christianity either formally as atheists or in everything but name keeping a token Christianity to please their parents. Could this be because my child is not unique in wanting deeper and better answers than the Bible and the church are capable of providing.

Note: Sorry I have still not posted Alaska pictures, my wife has still not located our memory card reader. I bought another one but it turned out it won't work with my camera. I promise they will be forthcoming.

60000 years of history

2010-05-06T13:39:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I visited the Mendenhall Glacier in Juneau Alaska and was impressed not only by the natural beauty, but the sense of age and history. The glacier is a remnant of the last ice age when glaciers advanced accross the globe carving out entire landscapes. The last ice age ended roughly 10000 years ago and began as many as 60000. Somewhat older than creationists would have you believe the entire earth is. I enjoyed seeing firsthand evidence that creationists, at least the young earth variety are wrong.

Primarily though my interest was in the sheer beauty of the glacier and the landscape it sculpted. The water was full of ice floes, the glacier was tall and shining in the sun, beautifully contrasted by the surrounding green forested mountains. There was also a towering and mighty waterfall. My companions and I drank at the base of it and tasted the sweetest water of our lives.

It had been my hope to trek all the way up to the glacier but it was a three hour hike and my friends weren't interested particularly in the light rain which accompanied us. We did however approach the base and marvel up at the huge expanse of blue ice.

Today I am in the town of Ketchikan it is my last stop before returning home. I have enjoyed my working vacation in this remarkable place, but I miss my family and am eager to be home.

An Abundance of Eagles

2010-05-02T10:51:00.001-07:00

At home I live near a wetlands preserve, we often take walks there and picnic nearby. It is home to several nesting bald eagles, which I see one or two of on a fairly regular basis. I had thought I was blessed to be near such amazing animals, but I have come to realize that what I thought was wealth is just a pittance. I am in Kodiak Alaska today and one of the first sights to greet me were Eagles filling the sky like gulls. Several bald eagles and as many or more golden eagles, circling above the harbor, landing in the trees and on rooftops, I even took a photo of two bald eagles and a golden standing in the road like crows. I was in awe, soon I am going to go back out just to watch them and walk along the bay.

My hotel is right on the water which thrills me, I love the ocean and this is the first time since being in Alaska I have had the opportunity to visit it. Now finally I get to see the North end of my ocean. I have now visited the south in Hawaii the north here in Alaska and many points in between. It makes me feel connected somehow with the ocean that I have loved since I was just little.

Alaska really is a paradise for nature lovers, I have done some hiking already, and soon I will be going to Juneau. My colleagues who have made this trip before said there are many great hikes there, including a glacier all very near the hotel. I will be sure to report about it when I am done.

Thoughts on science

2010-05-01T00:42:00.000-07:00

I am in Anchorage at the moment and was not in the mood for sightseeing or partying so I spend a quiet evening playing cards with friends. My collegues are fellow atheists and science buffs. We ended up having a discussion about Sephen Hawkings new series on the discovery channel. This was interesting because there has been some talk recently about proffessor Hawkings on Ray Comforts creationist blog. Ray has been mocking Dr. Hawkings for speculating that aliens probably exist. This seems perfectly reasonable to me what with septillions of potential planets it would be incredibly unlikely that there would be only life on one. To creationists however the idea is very threatening.

My friends and I were generally positive about the shows but we had one of the same complaints as the creationists. It was far too much speculation. Now Stephen Hawkings is speculating based on vast knowledge and intelligence but he was speculating and made that very clear. We all agreed that we would have preferred more hard science and math. Of course for most viewers that would have made for dry television which is probably why they didn't do it. Cool hypothesis with flashy graphics are more likely to draw ratings.

I think that is part of the problem with creationists. They are a lot like TV viewers they don't care about facts or Data they want it simple and dumbed down. Of course there are a few creationists with degrees in biology but they are few and far between and most of the most ardent supporters are preachers and other lay folk without even a basic scientific education. I find this strange. I am not a biologist but I have a good scientific background and a few years of college biology. I wouldn't even begin to try to defend the theory of evolution if I did not have a clear understanding of what it said and why. People who oppose it on internet forums however know nothing at all except for sound bites, regurgitated talking points, and obvious quote mines. Myself and many people far more qualified give patient explanations of why they are mistaken in their scientific knowledge and get in return inanities like "So you think nothing created everything" or "You can't prove God didn't do it" not only are both statements logical fallacies they have nothing to do with biology.

I have talked before about a good Christian friend of mine who is both a believer and has a great deal of scientific knowledge. His belief is that the theory of evolution, just like the theory of gravity is the best explanation for observed evidence and acurately reflect the physical world. He acknowledges that the theory of evolution and big bang cosmology both contradict his religion. He is not concerned and is not engaging in cognative dissonance. He believes he can understand the world through science and faith through scripture but can not know the mind and power of his god in this life. He believes that any discrepencies reflect his inability to understand the power of God not a weakness of either God or science. He believes that in the afterlife he will either know because his deity will tell him or it won't matter to him because it won't be relevant in heaven. I don't share his belief or even find it reasonable but I respect that he holds it with honesty and conviction. His attitude shows that one does not need creationism and other denialistic excuses to be a Christian. So I must ask why do creationists exist. I think it is because developing both a knowledge of science and a consistent philosophy require both dedication and intelligence. I think many of those drawn to creationist cults like Way of the Master do not possess either. There are surely exceptions. My most frequent commenter Tracy seems to be a creationist and has expressed empathy with Comforts cult yet nothing about how she describes her faith seems dependant on creationism or justification. That is one reason I enjoy talking to her. As with my friend I see no reason to share her beliefs but since she can hold them without lies and distortions I can respect that. If more Christians relied on faith instead of creationism and other man made constructs they would not need to be threatened by real science even if it seems to contradict their faith.

Visit to the North Pole

2010-04-30T00:09:00.000-07:00

Well not the actual north pole but North Pole Alaska. It is just a little town but it is very cook. They have Santas House which is really just a huge gift shop but there are reindeer and a sleigh and all sorts of Christmasy things. I played dorky tourist and took pictures of everything and bought presents for my wife and kids. I also sent post cards from there to my children so they would have the North Pole postmark. Also there is an actual "North Pole" at this park in town. Apparently in the 50's a pole was made to mark the top of the earth. At some point it was lost in route and ended up in a junkyard, to be discovered tears later. Eventually on the bicentenial it was erected in North Pole Alaska. I got this great picture of two of my lady friends pole dancing on it.

Also this week I visited a wildlife conservation park with moose, bears, wolves, buffalo, musk ox, bald eagles and all sorts of other wildlife. I also went for a trip to hike Portage Glacier but it was not accesable due to heavy snow. Stil we took pictures and played in the snow so all in all a good trip.

I can't get over the beauty of this state. I still maintain as I have in earlier posts that my home in Oregon is the prettiest place in the world but still I have fallen in love with Alaska. The mountains are everpresent and gorgeous. The wildlife is abundant, and everything looks and smells wonderful.

Today I am in Fairbanks tommorow I fly back to Anchorage for the weekend then I am off to Kodiak. I will post again soon.

Sore Knees and Beauty Queens

2010-04-24T13:04:00.000-07:00

I just finished a 5K heart run to benefit the heart association. My company joined the team for the Alaska Childrens Heart Center and we all participated. It was a lot of fun and for a good cause. Our team also took first in the open team category. There were prize drawings, bands, great harvest bakery was giving away bread. It was just a great day all around. Best of all I got my picture taken with Miss Alaska and Miss Teen Alaska. There is a memento to go in a frame. Sadly I don't have my menory card reader with me or I would be posting pictures. When I get home I think I will make a gallery of the trip and post them all at once.

What For Beauty?

2010-04-23T14:03:00.000-07:00

One argument that I have heard in favor of believing religion is the "argument from aesthetics". In short it is simply that the universe is beautiful, and random chance could not make beauty. Ignoring for the moment that physics, at least beyond the quantum level, does not propose the possibility of random chance, the argument is still weak. It assumes that beauty is an objective property of things and we simply have the ability to percieve it. This is obviously false. Beauty is purely subjective, personally I see beauty in things like crumbling buildings and wilted flowers that other people find ugly. Beauty is more likely a product of human nature, slightly different for everyone but with enough commonalities that most can agree. An object does not have a property of beauty we simply percieve it as beautiful or not.

The question now is why do we percieve beauty? What evolutionary purpose if any does a conception of beauty hold? In some cases it is obvious. Flowers and green fields are good signs of a rich area and we would naturaly be drawn to them. Symmetrical features are signs of health and potential for good mates. Streams and lakes are appealing because humans need to live near water. All of these make sense but other things less so. Currently I am surrounded by great icy peaks, a few months ago I was in a barren desert like area. I found both places gorgeous. Why?

I think it is due to our intelligence, emotions and love of symbols, all of which are evolutionary traits. An icy mountain range is dangerous and awe inspiring, this activates emotions in us, as symbol lovers those emotions inspire memories and association with symbols and stories. These peaks inspire in us a desire for accomplishment, they challenge us and give us a sense of romance therefore we find them beauitiful. The same can be true of a crumbling old building, the decay associates not only with visions of what the structure would have been like when whole but also a sense of melencholy and grief over it's fallen state. These feelings inspire a perception of beauty.

It seems that beauty is not a property of the world but a property of man. It is our nature to see beauty. There is no created beauty, icy peaks are nothing but rocks and frozen water. It is my aesthetic sensibilities that make them beautiful.

On that note I am surrounded by beauty here on my visit to Alaska. Yesterday, in the middle of the day in April it began snowing madly. I was simply in a parking lot, yet when the snow came it was transformed into a glorious wonderland. Right outside my hotel is a ring of snow covered mountains there are streams and flood plains every time I take a drive. Mighty stands of trees abound. I revel in this beauty, but I need not assign any magical creator to them. In fact the truth that they arise through millions of years of precise and inevitable natural processes enhances the majesty of them. Soil erosion, vulcanism, and evolution strike me as far more awesome and majestic than some magical creator. In truth belief in a creator strikes me as a limited and unimagitive way of looking at the world. Something that tries to encapsulate the majesty of our univers in a small and primitive myth, unworthy of the world assigned to its creation.

YES! There is snow.

2010-04-18T02:36:00.000-07:00

I just landed in Anchorage Alaska, I will be working and playing here for about a week before moving on to Fairbanks, Kodiak and other cities. I will be in Alaska for a little over three weeks. I was so happy that there was snow on the ground when we got off the plane. Not much but some, I had heard that it had all melted off and it would have been sad for my first experience in this state to be snow free.

I am in a lovely suite, It is an extended stay so there is a kitchen and a seperate bedroom. I just got all moved in and it is very comfortable. I work tomorrow night but I have all day to explore and then have the next day off as well before working again.

The flight was a little dissapointing. I love to fly, no matter how many times I do it I get exc ited and filled with wonder just like a little kid. This was my first night flight and I was hoping it would be impressive. I had imagined a great field of stars once we were over the ocean and above the clouds, but the light in the cabin made it hard to see. City lights were very pretty though, leaving Portland and entering Anchorage I could see the lights stretch on seemingly forever.

I had a co=worker who was terribly afraid to fly and we were talking at length about the possibility of crashing. She was somewhat taken aback that I was completely unafraid of dying. I explained to her that death was nothing, why be worried, if you don't exist anymore what is to be afraid of. She is a Christian lady and it struck me as strange once again that Christians fear death. It seems very common among those I know. I would think that if I believed I had a paradise waiting I would be positively eager to die, and certainly not scared. That doesn't seem to be the case however. Fear of death seems to be ingrained into the Christian religion, in many ways it seems to be the entire point of the faith.

As an atheist on the other hand death is literaly nothing. Certainly I regret the prospect of dying, leaving things unfinished, the sadness of my loved ones, but for myself it doesn't bother me at all. As Epicurus said, If you exist then death has not come and for the dead they no longer exist and death can not harm them. So death hurts niether the living nor the dead.

I will be posting regularly while I am here, that should be a change for those of you who have been paying attention. I have been very lazy about blogging for a while. Family and business have been monopolizing my time. Now however I am on a bussmans holiday to a beautiful part of the world and hopefuly will be waxing philosophic for the duration.

Night at the Symphony

2010-03-03T12:02:00.000-08:00

Last night was a very special performance. My ten year old daughter had her first concert with the youth symphony. My wife is a viola player and my daughter has been playing as well for about a year. It was her idea to play. My hopelessly sleepyheaded little girl asked to wake up an hour early three days a week to go take strings class before school in the mornings. My notoriously lazy little angel has devoted countless hours to practicing a difficult instrument. I am very proud.

The performance was very good. Nothing overly complicated, the key piece was a selection of variations on twinkle twinkle little star. However the kids performed it very well and some of the variations were somewhat intricate.

I am always pleased when my children acomplish something but even moreso when they surprise me. I know my girl is smart and talented but I am not joking when I say she is a bit lazy and I would have sworn she was at her limit with the activities she was already committed to. She exceded my expectations. She decided she wanted this, applied herself, made sacrifices and succeded. Now if she will do the same with her math homework I will be really impressed.

According to Ray Comfort I am now an adulterer. Fortunately my wife just thinks I am cute.

2010-02-23T18:23:00.001-08:00

Last night I was out at a bar in Seattle relaxing with some co-workers. I was introduced to an absolutely beatiful young lady who said she was 23. We struck up a conversation and it shortly became clear that she was attracted to me. I was flattered and continued to chat with her, turning on the charm a little bit. Soon she was sliding closer to me, resting her hand on her face and looking at me adoringly. I was thrilled that at 41 I still have game. I even imagined how nice it would be to take her up on her advances. More out of ego than any actual desire to have sex with her. My co-worker another lovely young woman started trying to intervene, mentioning my wife and family and finally just out and out saying "He's married!" My admirer was not deterred in the slightest. Eventually my friend said she wanted me to walk her back to the hotel, and being a gentelman I agreed. When we left she said to me "What were you doing, she was so ready to sleep with you?" I responded that I knew that but I wouldn't have done anything. She said she didn't know that and had to look out for my wife.

I just told my wife this story and she laughed and told me to thank my friend for her. Now Ray Comfort and other preachers qualify what I did as commiting adultery in my heart. Now as an atheist that means nothing to me. Neither fundementalist preachers nor imaginary gods have opinions that matter to me. The only one who's opinion on the subject matters is my wife and she just finds my flirtatious ways adorable. I think she is as proud that beautiful young women want me as I am. Of course it helps that she knows I would never commit real adultery with anyone.

Merry XMas

2009-12-26T19:57:00.000-08:00

I am back to work after a two month lay off. I am in Seattle this time for a few weeks. My hotel is right underneath the Space Needle. I have been in the Seattle area many times in the last few years but this is the first time in ages I have actually spent any time in Seattle so I intend to have fun. It was nice being off over the holidays. My wife was working so I got to take care of all of the family things. Taking the kids to school and their activities. I cooked meals, assisted with homework and helped out with their dance school and at the karate studio. My seven year old son has taken up wrestling and I was able to help coach him and the other younger kids and take him to tournaments. I even baked sweet potato pies for his tap company bake sale. For a man who works on the road most of the year these fatherly times were precious to me. However it had it's downside, even with my wife working our income was very low and we had to scrape to put together a nice Christmas celebration. I wasn't concerned about buying presents, my kids are not materialistic and although they like getting things the "loot" is not what they care about.

We do have our Christmas traditions however and they are not inexpensive and some we had to skip. Usually we go to see the Nutcracker performed by the local ballet company and attend several other holiday events which we were unable to do this year and these things were missed. Some things however had to be kept, it was tempting to just do a turkey or ham instead of paying a fortune for our Christmas goose but I resisted the temptation. My daughter and I have been making a goose since she was four and I couldn't miss out on that. It came out beautifuly, golden brown and crispy with moist, dark meat and a wonderful stuffing, rich with herbs and studded with chestnuts and cranberries. The wine is also traditional but was almost to expensive, Since my wife and I started celebrating Christmas together I have always served Gewürztraminer for Christmas dinner. It is not an inexpensive wine ever but most years I can shop around and fine good bottles for 10-12 dollars but this year it was going for 18-20. Fortunately I am persistent and after searching pretty much everywhere in town I found an excellent one from a vinyard just a few miles from home at a price I could afford. I also had fun looking so that was an added bonus. In the end our celebration was everything I could hope for.

One great moment was when my wife and I opened our gifts to one another. We had not planned to buy each other gifts at all, intending to spend our money on the children and of course the bills but at the end we decided to get each other a little something. Actually my wife had already bought my presents but I didn't know that yet. Anyway I suggested to her that I needed new pajamas and a new set of stereo headphones. She didn't give me any hints so I just bought what I thought she would like. The night before Christmas my wife said "I should have got us new pillows for Chrismas mine are all worn out, I really need to get something I can sleep on." When I opened my gifts I found new pajamas and headphones that she bought a month before I told her I needed them and she opened the expensive memory foam pillow I had picked out for her. That brought home to me how close we really are, that we just know each others wants and needs without being told. We did well with our children as well, they both asked Santa for new bikes, which is fortunate because we already had them stored in my moms garage.

The best part is the family time, getting together with parents and siblings and nieces and nephews, Sharing joy and love with each other as we sometimes forget to do during more mundane times of the year. Christmas really is as the song says the most wonderful time of the year. Even though as an atheist I am not celebrating the birth of Christ, as someone raised in America the traditions and pagentry of the holiday are an essential part of my life and family. I know there are some atheists who choose not to celebrate Christmas and some Christians who say we shouldn't but the holiday to me transcends its Christian signifigance. Just as Christians have appropriated it from its pagan origins and turned it to their needs I celebrate it in honor of what it means to me.

Thanksgiving traditions

2009-11-28T09:25:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving is a huge event at my home, as I am sure it is at many peoples. It is rich in tradition and signifigance for us and holds many of my fondest memories. This is not unusual in America. Thanksgiving holds that place for many of us, the reason I think it is noteworthy to blog about is because of my Atheism. I have seen on many forums that atheists shouldn't celebrate thanksgiving because it is all about thanking god. One Christian even calls atheism the "sin of ingratitude." I have heard others make similar claims regarding atheists. I think it is useful to explain why a nominally religious holiday is important to a secular person such as I.

The concept of Thanksgiving is not uniquely American or uniquely Christian. The harvest festival in all of its forms transcends culture and time. It is ancient and appears all around the world. It is however clearly religious. It is always about thanking God, the Gods, or the Goddess for the bounty of the harvest. In the American version it is also about thanking the Christian god for all manner of things not related to agriculture. In theory it shouldn't be relevant to an atheist.

Thankfulness and gratitude are important to atheists, at least those I know. Very much so. I am thankful to my employer for giving me useful work and a livelihood. I am thankfull to my friends and family for their love and support. I am thankful to my wife for many, many, things. I am thankful to my government, corrupt and broken though it is, for providing an economy that allows me, even in times of struggle and worry, to provide a table groaning with good food for the people I love. I am a man bursting with gratitude. I simply feel gratitude to real people for real things, rather than crediting an imaginary being with anything.

The thing I enjoy most about the holiday is preparing the feast. I come from a family where love is shown by cooking. It is a matter of fact that if you love someone you fix them food, it goes back to my childhood. At our home it has always been my daughter and I that make the holiday meals, this year my son joined us as well. My wife bakes the breads and pies but the bird belongs to me. My girl and I have been doing it together since she was four and it is a pivotal part of our relationship. Starting in October we begin planning the menue and buying this that and the other that we will need. We spend days before making stock and prepping herbs, and shopping for produce. This year times are a bit lean and we planned a simple dressing without some of the more expensive additions that we sometimes include. We had a bit of a windfall however. we had purchased some Crimini mushrooms to use and were going to leave it at that. Oregon is a mushroom pickers state and at the last minute we recieved a gift of Chantrells, Morells and Shitake which we gleefully added to the mix. We also recieved a basket of bright bell peppers and a beautiful fennel bulb complete with stalks and fronds. It is great to be surrounded by organic gardens and farms.

The meal turned out to be extrordinary. We have turkey cooking down to a science and always have a juicy bird but this one I think was better than most. It was tender and flavorful and just perfect. Everything seemed just a cut above. I think the hardships and worry we have had this year have made us more appreciative of the bounty that we still possess.

Yesterday was a local event which is called the Festival of Trees. It is where local merchants and philanthropists provide extravegantly decorated Christmas trees, wreaths and gift baskets which are auctioned off for charity. This year it is to support a hospice for end of life care. This is a favorite holiday event of my wifes, and this year my sons dance company was performing on one of the entertainment stages. Everything is beautiful and there is great food and the event smells and looks purely of Christmas. My son was extrordinary, this is his first year in the tap company and also the first year dancing on stage without his friend and usual dance partner who did not join. It is funny because she is the reason he tap dances in the first place. He took his first class at four and at the end of the year he said he didn't want to tap anymore. I said fine but when enrollement came up this little girl said "Mic, pleae take tap with me please" being his fathers son and a sucker for the ladies he agreed and he has every year since, just for her. Finally he has come to enjoy it for its own sake and is very good. When the performing company asked him to join he said yes even though his friend wasn't going to. He did say that he doesn't like dancing without her as much though.

I fell in love with one of the trees there and was tempted to bid on it. This is normally the time of year when I can afford that sort of thing. It was luxurious with gold balls, red velvet ribbons, holly and little toy cardinals all over it. I was sold on it before I saw that it also came with presents beneath, includin a video camera and a seven day vacation to mauii with airfare, hotel, spending money, and resteraunt vouchers. Qhen I looked at the bids it was already over a thousand which would have put me out of the running even on a good year. Still it was a very pretty tree.

I hope everyone reading this had a wonderful Thanksgiving and I hope you have a Merry Christmas as well.

Ray and Kurt find a worthy debate forum

2009-11-15T11:50:00.000-08:00

See more at Atheist Cartoons

Liars for Jesus

2009-11-14T09:20:00.000-08:00

Bodie Hodge one of the creotard superstars at Answers in Genesis posted this self righteous screed about lying. Essentially he is saying that the people who lied to protect the Jews in Nazi Germany were sinning against God and it would have been better to tell the truth and let the Jews be murdered than sin by lying.

Apparently he forgot to check with the actual Bible.

In Joshua we see that this sort of lie is perfectly fine with the dictates of the Christian deity.

Joshua 2:4-6
And the woman [Rahab] took the two men and hid them and said thus: There came men unto me, but I wist not whence they were; and it came to pass about the time of shutting of the gate, when it was dark that the men went out; whither the men went I wot not; pursue after them quickly, for ye shall overtake them. But she had brought them up to the roof of the house and hid them with the stalks of flax.

James supports this by saying
James 2:25
Was not Rahab, the harlot, justified by works, when she had received the messengers, and had sent them out another way?.

Seems pretty clear right? Of course in another article the creotard addresses this. Claiming that

"The first thing that needs to be pointed out is that nowhere in this verse is any inclination of Rahab being praised for lying about the spies. Also in Hebrews 11:31, Rahab’s faith was praised for receiving the spies in peace. But again, there was no praise for lying. Rahab was not righteous for lying but for her other deeds:"

This of course ignores the fact that (A)Rahab did lie and lying was implicitly part of the action for which she was praised, and (B) If Rahab had not lied the spie would have been killed and she could not have helped them or done anything praiseworthy, and (C) Why would James have used the word Justified in his statement or even mentioned it at all if he was not condoning her actions.

This Bodie character is one of the many Christians who don't care what the Bible actually says only how they can twist and mangle it to support whatever premise they wants it to support. Having studied the Bible in great detail I can say it is not subtle or mysterious requiring great interpretation as the founders of Catholocism would have you believe. As the early protestants noticed it is a very straightforward document. While I see it as a collection of myths and legends, I also see that it says exactly what it means. Interpretation is a device used to manipulate the text into a tool for controlling the followers of the religion, not to enlighten or educate. People like Bodie don't care about their god, they regard themselves as god and want everyone to follow their own version of divine command.

Bodie continues by trotting out the ninth commandment:
"Lying is a breach of the Ninth Commandment and is never condoned by God, regardless of who does the lying or what the circumstances might be. There is no such thing as a “righteous lie.”"

This is another dishonest mangling of the Bible. The ninth commandment states:
"Neither shall you bear false witness against your neighbor" this is from the first ten commandments written by God which Moses broke.
Or
You shall not bear false witness against thy neighbor in the second set written by Moses.

Who did Rahab bear false witness against? No one. She lied in order to save lives but she didn't lie against anyone. She lied about the direction two men traveled. This is surely a lie but by what mangling of language is it a false witness against someone. She is not bearing false witness against the people she lies about she is lying for their benefit, and the people she is against are not the ones she is bearing false witness about.

Other scriptures such as Exodus 23:1,Leviticus 6:2-4,Proverbs 24:28, and Luke 3:14 all address deception but all in the context of bearing false witness or making false oaths. None adequately address the actions of Rahab or the actions of those who helped the Jews avoid Nazi death camps.

There are some verses such as Revelation 21:8 and Revelation 21:27 which broadly condemn lying yet considering the words of James does it follow that Christians should abet every murderer and sadist simply to avoid deceiving them. I am sure there are many Christians who like Bodie are so self centered that they would place their personal purity above the lives of even millions. I am glad I am not one of them.

Here is morality according to me an atheist. If it were true that lying would net me eternal damnation in some magical bad place and if a group of people were fleeing murderers and I needed to lie to save them I would do so without hesitation. How could it be moral for me to put my own self interest in avoiding damnation above my duty to protect my fellow man from harm. If a man were robbing a bank I was in and was going to execute some hostages should I stay hidden behind a desk where I am safe? or should I rush out and try to stop him even at the cost of my own life? I say the second. According to Bodie a good Christian should pick the first. If a madman tells me I can pick someone to be tortured but if I refuse he will torture me, do I condemn my neighbor to death by torture? or do I man up and say take me? I choose the second, however according to Bodie Christian doctrine says take the first.

So in summary there is no good case that lying to protect the Jews from the Nazis was a sin according to his mythology, and further even if it were, only a vile and disgusting creature would condemn others out of his selfish need to protect his own purity.

My son and his music.

2009-11-11T11:24:00.000-08:00

My seven year old son was singing the other day in the car, I thought he was singing this.

Now I never really cared for this sort of music in high school but I thought it was cool that he knew it and started singing along. After a few minutes I realized he was actually singing the Chorus to this.

Now this is an excellent rap I enjoy it and as my son dances hip hop it makes sense that he would have heard it. However it is not particularly appropriate for a first grader to be singing. Even worse I don't even really care to explain to him why it is a problem. Admittedly it isn't as bad as you would get from the chorus, but it is a song about spending money on strippers. So I used a ploy that worked when he was a baby. If he was playing with something that for whatever reason I didn't want him to have, like my keys, I would give him a toy he would like better. Now my boy likes hip hop but he loves punk and metal so I found him a copy of this.

Problem solved. If the song had actually been about oral sex which is what I thought after I heard him singing the chorus I would have probably taken a little stronger stance to discourage him but as it is this has worked out perfectly. I also discovered an awesome new band. I listened to the rest of their catalogue on YouTube and they are incredible. I am going to have to download some from ITunes for my collection.

The Heresy of Ray Comfort

2009-11-08T12:26:00.000-08:00

Having taken an extended break from arguing with creationists, Ray comfort in particular, I have recently been drawn back in to such discussion. Refuting Comforts unsubstantiated and ridiculous assertions about science and atheists is childishly easy. I would however expect that on his turf, the Christian religion, he would be more competent. Sadly this is not the case. His most recent blog post about the book of Luke so badly represents what is indicated by the Christian myths that it is almost painful to read. He goes about constantly talking about the need to repent and obey, yet the Christ figure claims that salvation is a free gift and only belief in Christ is required for eternal salvation.

Here is that most recent post and my response to it which has also been posted at The SMRT forum

61 But they said to her, "There is no one among your relatives who is called by this name." 62 So they made signs to his father—what he would have him called. 63 And he asked for a writing tablet, and wrote, saying, "His name is John." So they all marveled. 64 Immediately his mouth was opened and his tongue loosed, and he spoke, praising God. 65 Then fear came on all who dwelt around them; and all these sayings were discussed throughout all the hill country of Judea.

If you remember, Zacharius refused to believe what God said to him through His angel. He therefore deemed God to be a liar. That is the insult of unbelief, and he was punished by God for his sin by being struck dumb. However, the moment he became obedient to God by naming his son John, God did a personal miracle for him. His mouth was opened and his tongue was loosed.

Disobedience comes naturally to all human beings--anyone who has kids can tell you that. We don’t have to teach our children to be selfish, to lie, to be greedy, or to be rebellious. We are born rebels. Yet, despite the multitude of sins that we each have, God will do a miracle for us the moment we obey Him. Speaking of Jesus, the Bible says "though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered. And having been perfected, He became the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him..." (Hebrews 5:8-9).

Jesus is the "author" of eternal salvation. That means He grants everlasting life to anyone who obeys Him. Why should you obey Him? What has He done for you? He gave you eyes to see His incredible creation, ears to enjoy music and the sounds of the birds He created. He gave you the ability to love, to laugh, to sing, to think. He lavished His kindness upon you by giving you the gift of live itself. Have you thanked God for your life, and asked what He would have you do? The moment you obey the gospel you will no longer be dumb. God will open your mouth and you will speak of His kindness and praise Him for His goodness, much to the distain of a proud and rebellious world:

"I will bless the Lord at all times; His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul shall make its boast in the Lord; the humble shall hear of it and be glad" (Psalm 34:1-2).

Ray

Since the scripture claims that one must simply believe in Jesus in order to receive eternal life where is this talk about obeying him coming from. That sounds like a works based doctrine which is contrary to the words of your savior.

While it would be reasonable to suggest that those who believe would obey, it does not follow that one must obey or repent in order to believe. It seems you are reading things in to the book of Luke which run contrary to the words of Jesus Christ himself.

Even if the book of Luke does mean what you are claiming, that only means that Dr. Luke was teaching a doctrine contrary to the words of Christ who I would imagine is the actual authority according to your faith. Wasn't there a name given for those who claim things in the name of Jesus that he never said? I believe it was false prophet.

Now since I see the whole Gospel as just a silly collection of stories it doesn't affect me if you wish to distort it. However since you purport to believe in these stories one would think you would wish to be honest about what they actually say.

Another interesting flaw in the reasoning of Ray Comfort is (along with many other fundamentalists) is his interpretation of Romans one, which is believed to indicate that all atheists Do in fact believe in the Christian deity but choose to reject it. However according to Christ all that is required for salvation is belief. This indicates that either (a)Atheists who according to Paul really do believe are every bit as much saved as "True Christians" and it is only those who believe in other "false" deities who are in danger of hell. (This would explain why Idolatry was seen as worth mentioning in the decalogue but atheism was not considered important enough to worry about. It would also absolve some of the evil attributed to the Christian deity for burning those who have never heard of the Christian myths) OR (b) That interpretation of Romans is incorrect.

However if (b) is true it refutes the common apologetic that atheists do believe and have no excuse. However this interpretation of Romans is frequently used to counter the claims by atheists that it is an evil doctrine that the Christian myth figure punishes those who do not believe when it could have provided them with belief. This either means that atheists are saved by virtue of their presupposed belief or the Christian deity is an evil one.

In any case the obvious conclusion is that all of the doctrines of Christianity are simply a flawed and contradictory collection of old myths.

Proud Daddy

2009-11-05T23:28:00.000-08:00

My seven year old son had his first ever wrestling tournament tonight. He has been on the team for a bit over a month and tonight was the opening tournament of the season. He did very well taking second in his weight class. It was a nail biter. He won his first match on a pin, his second match went to points and he came out behind. He actually beat himself, he had his opponent in pin position and instead of waiting for the ref to call the fall he just let go. His opponent got points for the escape and a reversal putting him ahead. In the end it came down to the results of a match he wasn't even in. The way the scoring worked out if one guy in the match won then my son would have gotten first but the other boy won so my son took second.

At any rate all of the kids were just amazing, both our guys and the other teams. I have been helping coach and I was so proud of all the kids on our team. After my sons second match I had all of the coaches from the other schools coming up and telling me how impressed they were with my son, and congratulating him. One coach told me the match that my son lost was the best match of the whole night.

The proudest moment for both of us was when our head coach congratulated Mic and told him how he helped the team(which consists of grades k-8) You could see the pride in my sons eyes and the way he stood a little straighter and poked his chest out a little farther. Being part of the team is something very special to him. Afterwords the coach told me that he was expecting that the way my son wrestles he will be going to nationals this year. Coach is confident he will be taking the team and he says that Mic will definitely be part of that.

It was a great experience for him. He is so focused and invested in this thing it amazes me. I don't push things on my kids. I expect them to have activities and participate in different things. I also count on them to do their best at whatever they are involved in, but I don't pick which activities they are going to do, they pick them(I make suggestions of course and this was one of them but honestly I was kind of hoping for football). This is what he chose and all of the hard work and dedication he has shown is also his choice, that is what truly makes me proud.

Shout out to da Witches

2009-10-31T15:18:00.000-07:00

My favorite columnist Vin Suprynowicz has an excellent column about the history of persecution against witches. It is pretty educational and fun.

Hay Ride

2009-10-25T20:04:00.001-07:00

Today we went to the orchard for our pre Halloween outing. There is a local orchard near our home that has hay rides, pumpkins, apple cobbler and ice cream, cider all at no charge just for coming out. My wife and I have been going with our children since my oldest was just a baby. Usually we visit several times just to buy vegetables and fruit but this year with my traveling so much this was our first time out.

It has become so much a part of our family traditions that the farm seems almost like our own. The kids know that every year there will be puppies to hold and play with, yummy food, a hay maze to play in with lots of other kids. My wife and I shop for vegetables and enjoy the excellent cider. We carefully select the perfect pumpkins for our Jack-O-Lanterns and our pies. The hay ride is always the same driver, she has been doing it for a dozen years since before my daughter was born. She travels a long way just to do the hay rides each year. She has two big beautiful draft horses, who are real working animals. When they are not delighting children she has them plowing, hauling and pulling stumps on an organic farm of her own.

This year the farmer and his grandson joined us on the hay ride and we chatted and talked about the orchard and farm. One woman who had brought her grandchildren had been coming to the farm for forty years, before moving away. She had come back from the other side of the state just for a visit. Many like us had been coming our childrens whole lives and there were some who were coming for their first year and loving it. This one little family farm and orchard has touched the lives of so many people. It is this place and other family owned businesses that show me what community is all about.

Yes I will go to Wal-Mart or some other chain store to save money when I need to, but I always remember that there is more to consider than price. Service, quality, integrity, and community are all also considerations. I make a point of patronizing local businesses that have served me well whenever possible. I get my vegetables from my favorite farm. I buy my computers from the same shop I have been using for fifteen years. When I can afford it I buy my wines from a local vineyard, my seafood from the neighborhood fishmonger and meat from a local butcher. I can't always afford to do this and when I must I shop for the lowest price, however I know that if I do not support these local businesses when I can they will cease to exist and that would be a loss I would hate to suffer.

I would encourage everyone to explore your community owned farms and shops and see if there are some worthy of your business. If your community is anything like mine you may find that for a few extra dollars you can enrich rich your life many times over.

Political Schmoozery

2009-10-25T00:48:00.000-07:00

I went to a local political event this evening. It is one of those dress up and spend money to help the cause sort of things. This one was a liberal themed one and was benefitting mostly liberal causes and drawing a mostly liberal crowd. There was Entertainment, speakers, a silent auction and all of the usual trappings of this sort of thing.

Although I am active in local politics it is not the sort of thing I would normally attend. As a Libertarian I find that there are few causes that I wish to support. There are a few such as PFLAG and the food bank that are worth contributing to but that is about it. There are others who's goals I support but who's methods I disagree with. Some wish oppressive regulation to achieve a goal that could be accomplished through boycotts and education. Most want or are already receiving tax dollars when they should be privately funded. Anyway I prefer to contribute quietly to those causes I support and stay away from the public fund raisers.

I attended this one not for political reasons but because my daughter was performing. She was dancing and Taiko drumming with a group from her school and My wife and I went to watch her. That part was fun, and I did enjoy the social event as well, largely because of my seven year old son. We walked the silent auction tables and talked about what he would like to bid on. He has a little money and I told him he could make bids, but he wisely decided to hold on to his savings. We ate snacks and free ice cream provided by some local shops. We greeted our mayor and a state senator. My son was far more enthusiastic about the whole thing than I was and that made it fun. My wife was mostly concerned with my daughters performance, although she spent some time socializing with friends from the community and checking out the auction. After her performance my daughter joined us and we spent some time looking at all of the tables and exhibits.

It was a nice family night and hopefully educational for the kids. It did however remind me how out of the mainstream I am politically. I can't connect with either liberals or conservatives. The former are too in favor of oppressive government control and regulation of our lives and the latter are too in favor of oppressive laws and government control of our lives. It seems that there are few people in this "Land of the free" that actually want freedom.

I can understand that, freedom is hard. To be free you have to be strong and willing to care for yourself. You have to have ethics and responsibility. Also freedom requires that you respect the freedom of others. You have to accept that other people will do things you don't like or live in ways you find immoral. Some people can't handle that and I understand. However just because I understand it doesn't mean I respect it. I will always support freedom even to my detriment. As Benjamin Franklin said "He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security." That is what keeps me voting Libertarian despite having my candidates lose. That is what keeps me opposing both the social oppression of the liberals and the moral oppression of the conservatives. The fact that Liberty is far more important and worthy of support than material security or moral bigotry.

WooooHooo!!!!!!!

2009-10-22T21:02:00.000-07:00

I just finished off my work season and am going to be on vacation for a couple months until I get started again. Honestly this is just a temporary job until my regular work as an AC tech gets busy again, but it has been a blast. I have travelled all over the Northwest and Hawaii. I missed Alaska but if I am still working here after the new year I will get that trip as well.

Tonight is our big wrap up and we are staying in this excellent resort called Great Wolf Lodge in Washington. It is this huge luxury hotel filled with restaraunts, arcades, bars, a spa the works. My roommate and I have a huge suite with all the perks. Best of all the place has a massive water park.

I just spent two hours riding water slides with my crew. We are a young crew mostly. There are a few of us old guys and ladies but for the most part they are all early twenties, and I tend to run around with the younger crowd. There are several slides the two best are one called the funnel. It has a very steep drop leading into a huge tube that you go up and down the sides like a half pipe and then shoot out the other end, The other is longer and has more turns but isn't as steep. However we took five people in a raft to get the weight up and just flew through it. The water park just closed and I am going to go meet up with some people to hang out and eexplore the place. I am responsible for getting about twelve people home so I get to pick the leave time and we are going to spend the day here tommorow.

This job has been about the most fun I have had working. It has it's headaches as well but it is great. If it paid what I am used to I would probably make a career out of it but I can't afford it. It would take years to get up to the wage I really need to support my family. I wish I had discovered it years ago when I could have devoted the time to work up. I am going to be off work for a while and hopefully will find another construction job, but building is way down in my area and I am unwilling to relocate so I may get another season of this.

Anyway I have some work to take care of and people to talk to but I haven't posted anything in a while and I thought this was something fun to write about.

The case for God

2009-10-04T14:43:00.000-07:00

War on Christmas

2009-09-27T10:46:00.000-07:00

Finally the AFA is starting to make it's yearly rumblings about "the war on Christmas". Usually it starts around August and I was beginning to get worried. I suppose that was silly of me, but it was a matter of some concern. Fundies whining about being "persecuted" has become as much a part of Christmas as presents and snowmen. I don't think I can get in the holiday spirit anymore unless I hear some wingnuts crying because they can't put their nativity idols in the courthouse or sing songs advocating their superstition in public school classrooms.

I feel much better now that some Christmas traditions don't die out.

I really do wonder where this war on Christmas thing comes from. I have never seen it. Yes public buildings don't display religious icons and idols. That is a first ammendment issue the same is true for hymns and incantations. I am not sure why that is a problem. The people who want to sing Christmas hymns in school probably wouldn't want their children chanting incantations to please the spirits at solstice time, or fasting for Ramadan. You would think they would be pleased at the government for not putting religion in schools. Likewise they would probably not wish an altar with solstice candles and grain offerings on display in the courthouse.

As for private business the big concern seems to be people saying "happy holidays" instead of "merry Christmas." Again I fail to see the problem. Christians are supposed to reject idolatry, and putting so much reverence on a ritual greeting seems very idolatrous to me. It is actually amusing that the idol worshipers I know who do place reverence on ritual phrases do not get upset when store clerks fail to offer them a "blessed be".

Anyway when I was growing up "happy holidays" was always a traditional Christmas greeting. It meant merry Christmas and happy new year together. No Christians objected. Now however people also use the phrase to extend these good wishes for Hanukkah, Ramadan and Solstice as well it is suddenly a problem. Myself I don't care if Christians want to whine and bitch and boycott. It doesn't harm me and like I said it has become so common that it just wouldn't seem like Christmas without it.

Is Ono Bruddah.

2009-09-20T11:44:00.000-07:00

Try this for breakfast.

Syrup:
Make a simple syrup with 1/2 cup water and 1/2 cup sugar cook on medium till it reduces by half.

Add a can of coconut milk, whisk smooth and reduce to the texture of pancake syrup.

Add a pinch of salt and a teaspoon of vanilla.

Hotcakes:
sift 1/2 cup flour, 3 1/2 tsp baking soda,1 tsp salt, 2tsp brown sugar.

Make a well and add an egg, 3tbsp melted butter and about a cup of light coconut milk. Whisk until smooth adding seltzer water as needed.

Cook cakes on medium high griddle, top with macadamia nuts before flipping.

Bananas:
Saute some sliced bananas in butter until soft sweet and a lilobit carmelized

Top a stack of cakes with bananas and syrup, maybe put some bacon and egg on the side. Serves four or five people.

Must be in the genes.

2009-09-18T11:19:00.000-07:00

Here is an excerpt from the last will and testament of my ancestor John McTurk Gibson dated the 30th of April 1891. It seems atheism is not new to that branch of the family.

Last Will and Testament of John McT. Gibson

Realizing that "Life's fleeting dreams," will soon be over, and that my probation here is fast drawing to a close, and being as yet of sound mind, and capable of attending to my own business, I hereby declare this to be my last will and testament.

When dead I want no ostentatious, display of unnecessary, costly funeral extravagance, but everything conducted in as plain a manner, as is consistent with decency and decorum, and above all, I want no Preachers Pow Wowing round me dead or alive. I have always regarded this whole "Tribe of Levi" with loathing and disgust, fanned and intensified with their fanaticism, ignorance, intolerance and hypocrisy, and when the end comes, I want them to take a backseat while I take my departure in peace.

In fairness this could just be a rejection of religion instead of a statement of atheism however philosophically it is a view I respect either way. I know my grandfather, Johns grandson had no use for religion either, I recall him referring to it as foolishness. My great aunt, his sister also shows no particular religious devotion. Sadly I had no opportunity to know my great grandfather, from what I have heard he was an extraordinary man.

John McTurk Gibson, I have found, was in addition to being an explorer something of an accomplished poet. Writing, at times, under the pen name John Blunt.

Here is one of his poems regarding a young lady who's name was redacted. It reminds me of some of my writing, pretentious and overworded but still nicely put together and captivating. I find myself liking my grandfathers,grandfather more and more as I learn about him.

Lines

(Addressed To Miss C______ O______)

See, yonder sits enthroned on high,
The waning moon in the cloudless sky,
Clad in robes of the purest white,
Ruling supreme, o'er the silent night.

On wings of hyht, she skims along
Attended by a countless throng
As lesser orbs, that sparkling shine,
Mov'd by Creation, springs divine.

The limpid waves refract their beams
Wanton winds play o'er the streams;
Silence deep, in the village reigns;
Moonlight sleeps on the verdant plains.

Fragrance breathes in the passing gale,
Echo waits for the joyful tale,
Of heart-knit lovers 'mong the trees,
To tell it in the circling breeze.

Then let us down by Lugar stray
Through meads among the tedded hay,
Then nature's blessings round are spread,
And drooping flowers their fragrance shed.

We there, shall hear the cooing dove,
And raise our thoughts to things above
The sordid views of worldly men,
And breathe our love in every glen.

Here is a poem I once wrote regarding a young lady.

MIDNIGHT
I once knew a girl of midnight eyes
A myriad twinkling stars
Darkened lake reflecting moonlight
A wildfire wreathed in smoke
She was a lightning summer nighttime
Trapped in human form

Once I loved this child of midnight
And such fierce joy I've known
But as all who love the nighttime
I woke and was alone

Now I must find a new love
With eyes cut from morning sky
With cool and dawning brilliance
And gentle healing light
Who will warm away my memories
Of lovely lost midnight.

Admittedly they are very distinct and I am sure that in part I am projecting when I see similarities between my poetry and my ancestors,but in reading his body of work I do feel it is familiar, having a certain boldness and drama that I also try to achieve.

I am having a great deal of fun with this discovery, my mother as well she is actually trying to go farther back and find information on his parents in Scotland, I am however perfectly content to spend my time getting to know this interesting and entertaining man.

Ancestry

2009-09-15T13:25:00.000-07:00

This picture is of an ancestor of mine, John McTurk Gibson. He is a moderately well known pioneer who traveled to California from Iowa during the gold rush in the 1850's on both the California and Oregon trails. His Journal of Western Travel is a frequently cited reference on the conditions of that journey.

I just learned about John a few days ago. My mother, while looking up some information on our family came upon the name and thought that since there aren't an abundance of McTurk Gibsons he may well be a relative. She asked her Aunt about it and sure enough he is a great-great-great something grandfather. He is also considered, at least according to my great aunt to be something of a rascal and ne'er do well in family lore. This of course attracted me instantly and I began researching him. I found his Journal on line and have put the link above. He is a clever and interesting writer and I think I would have liked him. I also found his portrait and it is just eerie. Although I lack the monstrous white beard I otherwise resemble him very much. My wife and mother noted it before I did, but after they pointed it out it was almost as if it were a charcoal drawing of me.

I am going to continue reading his journals and attempt to find and collect other mentions and references to this ancestor of mine. For now though I just had to post a little bit about it on this blog, I will probably revisit this topic in time.

Best Video Game Evah

2009-09-12T02:29:00.000-07:00

A new Dark Matter Vid that I just had to put up.

Poor silly little Republican girl.

2009-09-10T18:58:00.000-07:00

I just got a call that said "Political Call" on my caller ID. I gleefully answered the phone expecting the pleasure of bursting some staffers bubble. The nice thing about being a Libertarian is that both parties offer me things to argue against. On the other end of the phone was a girl sounding about fourteen but probably a year or two older. "Hi I am so an so from the Republican something something committee" (I am not redacting she just wasn't a very clear speaker) I said "HI, what can I do for you today?" She started with "Do you consider yourself Republican, Democrat or Independent" I said "Libertarian" She said "Wow like Libertarian uhhm ok" "Well" she said "We are looking for support in opposing the liberal agenda" "Sounds like my cup of tea" I said (yes I do talk like that sometimes) "Which portions of the liberal agenda are we opposing?"

Her: Well uhhm like higher taxes and taking control of our money

Me: Yes I certainly oppose that, of course both parties are into doing that, your party likes to hide it in deficit spending instead of direct extortion but we get screwed the same in the end."

Her: Uhhhm ok well we want to stop that and have less government control

Me: Excellent what intrusive laws will we be repealing?

Her: Excuse me

Me What particular things are we going to be working on removing government control over.

Her uhhm we do the pro life.

Me: Oh no I am very pro choice, I want less government control not more.

Her: (To her credit she dropped the pro life thing instead of trying to argue. Killed my fun but pretty smart) We are like pro military.

Me: Oh yes me too, we need to get them home and stop fighting foreign wars. We need to fix the focus of our military away from ever doing anything outside of our borders.

Her: UH yeah well uhmm we oppose the socialized health care.

Me: Really, I hadn't heard. (a little over the top on the sarcasm I admit) Well I can agree there, we definitely need a better solution than anything the government is offering, something market driven. I can back you up on this issue, are you looking for someone to write letters to congressmen or newspapers?

Her: Uhh no we are looking for donations to fund our work.

Me:...........Ha Ha Oh sorry I didn't know this was a money call, I give to Libertarian causes.

Her. OH ok G'nite.

She was far from the worst political caller I have ever had, but it was obvious she had zero knowledge of the issues she was trying to oppose. None. Even if I were into furthering the Repugnican agenda I wouldn't have given any money to someone who couldn't even detail what they were trying to accomplish. I have to give the Dems credit for at least one thing, they get the smarter fangirls.

Almost back to the real world.

2009-08-25T20:56:00.000-07:00

I am having a lovely time right now. I am at a resort in Kaapaa Kuai. It is gorgeous, the company has pulled out all of the stops for our last two nights on the islands. Until now the accomodations have been budget. Not bad or anything but not luxurious. This however is off the hook. Spacious rooms, pools with pool bars, saunas, amazing gardens and a private beach. I spent today just swimming in the surf and lounging by the pool. I really want to stay forever. OK not really I am glad to be going home to the wife and kids but I am going to miss Hawaii.

I am already plotting how I am going to bring them here for vacation. Maybe next April when the humpbacks are here, bring my little girl to swim with me in the sea, my son to explore the volcanoes and lava caves, and my wife to romance in the warm tropical nights. I so badly want to share all of the adventures and experiences I have had here with them.

I am going to miss so many of the things that have become staples of my life while I have been here. Lions blend coffee, Rice with every breakfast (although that is something I will start doing at home.) Plate lunches, the fresh fruit, being able to buy liquor at Seven Eleven which is like a dream of my youth come true, it is so satisfying to be able to buy a Slurpee and a little bottle of rum to put in it. Swimming in the ocean before breakfast, convenience store musubu, (musubu is a dish something like sushi, rice rolled in nori but without the vinegar and spam or teriaki chicken instead of fish, it is so good and is in every convenience store like breakfast burritos are around my home.) I am going to miss poke, I had never had poke before and am now an adict. I am a big raw fish eater anyway sushi, sashimi and carpachio, but they pale before poke. It is the king of fish dishes. Tonight I had Ahi/Wasabi poke and fresh papaya for dinner, with lemon squeezed over both and a little ice cold white wine. Absolutely nuts and under ten bucks

I am going to miss the birds flying in every building because nowhere bothers with doors, I am going to miss the peacefull tranquility of the nights which exists even in the middle of crowded Waikiki.

I have one more day of work tomorrow and one more night here then I fly home. I will be glad to see the family and share my pictures and stories, and remind my wife how much I love her, sadly I only have two days to catch up before I am off again for a week in eastern Washington. After that however I have a week off, I will be home in time for my sons birthday and then have ten days before I travel again. To Idaho this time I think.

City Mouse/Country Mouse

2009-08-22T10:22:00.000-07:00

I have always thought of Hawaii as being a single place. Intellectually I knew that it had regions and variations just like everywhere else, but emotionally I thought it was just one homogenous paradise. I have learned otherwise, each island and even diffferent parts of each island has its own character, also it is a personal distinction as well because the things I experienced on those islands has influenced my opinion.

The Big Island is very much a paradise, it is guiet and relaxing especially the Hilo side. Even the tourist areas on the Kona side seemed laid back and mellow. It is the kind of place where you want to sip Mai Tais and listen to Reggae. Mauii is also pastoral but higher energy. It is such a beautiful place, the prettiest island I have seen so far and it seems to call out to me to surf and hike and swim and experience. Now I am in Oahu and it is very urban. City with the capital C. Here in Honolulu it is a tourist city like Vegas and it is full of energy, bars, shops, dance clubs,resteraunts, theme parks, museums, malls, strippers, hookers, drug dealers and all of the other trappings of a tourist economy. By day the beaches are crowded but fun, by night it is an open party.

It is also expensive. My first week here I was wondering why people said Hawaii was expensive. I was eating great food and doing as I pleased for next to nothing, easily staying under my per diem. Now I know what they are talking about Waikiki beach is one pricey outing after another. There are good deals if you look and placs where you can haggle, but still not affordable overall, at least if you are looking for adventure.

To show you what I mean about the difference between city and country Hawaii here are two pictures the first is a beach in Mauii the second is Waikiki beach in Honolulu.

These two pictures sum how I feel about the two different experiences. Of course other people may have entirely different observations.

Aloha!

2009-08-16T16:29:00.000-07:00

I am sorry for not having posted lately. I have been both busy and without internet access. The hotels my company has set me up in while nice enough do not have free Wi-Fi and access is on the order of twelve bucks a day. I am finally in Honolulu and in a hotel with free internet so I will be posting when I can.

The picture above is of a place called Huggos on the Rocks. My co workers and I went on a bit of a pub crawl in Kona and this was one of the places we ended up in. I watched a Luau at the King Kamehameha hotel and swam in the Hawaiian end of the Pacific for the first time. I also found some excellent live blues.

This trip was my first time flying over the ocean and it was also the largest jet I have ever been on. I love to fly and every time I do I am impressed with the ability of this little tube with wings to hold itself aloft. Intellectually I understand it very well but I am still awestruck. I find that I do have the capacity for faith. When I fly I never worry that the plane will crash or that something will not work. I have complete faith in the technology and its implementation. Not that I think it can not fail, just that knowing how it works and seeing it work fills me with confidence. Were I ignorant of physics or engineering I could see myself being afraid of flying. Were I from a primitive culture that had never seen such things I could see myself cowering in fear of this terrible thing and the mysterious magic that made it fly. It seems that I can easily put faith in something I can see and describe. It is only those things that can not be seen or described that defy my ability to have faith.

After leaving the big island we travelled to Mauii. We did a few days work and then had a few days off. Yesterday a group of co-workers and I went out seeking adventure and adventure is what we found. First we took a snorkeling cruise to the Molokini crater. It was insanely fun. The seas were calm and the weather amazing. The crew provided us with an excellent lunch and an open bar making it a happy sail in and of itself, but the best part was the snorkeling. The reef was full of brightly colored fish yellow tang, parrot fish and many others. I was chasing a parrot fish about when a large shape caught my eye. I turned and saw a large knifelike fish swimming back and forth about ten feet down. I looked closer and realized I was swimming with a shark. A whitetip, they are not known to be aggressive towards humans but I was still impressed with its appearence of grace and power. After snorkeling we returned to Mauii and on the way we saw a gian sea turtle off the bow of the ship. I was too slow to get a picture, sadly.

Then we went to big beach right at high tide. At first we just played in the surf getting tossed around but after a time we got more seriouse. One of my team has done some surfing and she taught us how to paddle in to the crest of the wave and body surf in. THAT WAS AMAZING. Sooon we were perfecting our skills and riding high. One wave a very big one caught me up and I was right on the crest. Having taken a beating on a few other big waves I thought I would protect my limbs and tuck into a ball. DON"T EVER DO THIS! The wave sent me spinning exactly as if I were a beach ball and tossed me shoulder first into the beach very hard. I got up holding my bruised ribs and saw some perfectly stereotypical Japanese tourists pointing at me and taking pictures.

We decided that now we wanted some nightlife. After returning to the hotel for changes and showers the ladies decided they wanted to Kareoke. We asked the lady at the hotel and got directions to what was supposed to be a good place but when we arrived they had a band that evening. We set out exploring to find another. Shortly after we saw a little bar in an overpark with a big sign advertising Kareoke night. "Yeah!" we thought and went in. It took me all of two seconds to realize we had found ourselves in a hostess bar, and not a discrete gentelmans club either but basically a house of prostitution. My co workers being all in their early twenties were not so astute. The girls figured it out first after noticing all of the unattached women who were not pleased to see them. The guys were obliviouse until the girls explained it to them. I bought our girls some drinks because they weren't allowed to stay if they weren't drinking and then put my very limited Japanese language skills to work explaining that we really just wanted to sing. This was not very welcome news to the hostesses and one made it very clear that for twenty dollars I could have oral sex in the back room. I politely declined but that made us even less welcome and we were starting to think we should leave. Fortunately our songs cued up. I won us some goodwill and applause with a pretty decent and over the top rendition of heartbreak hotel. When I was finished we had gone from unwelcome to tolerated. The rest of the team took their turns and we were having a good time but the clincher, that made friends of our hostesses was when one of the women on my team took the mike. She had the voice of a goddesss. It was as if the simple little kareoke tune sprang to life and grew wings. The whole club including the other patrons were struck dumb and enraptured. When the song ended the applause was overwhelming and we were no longer ignorant gaijin intruders but welcome guests.

Yesterday was one of the best days of my life. adventure, friendship, beauty and comedy all in one wonderful day. Each island has brought new sorts of experiences and I still have two weeks and two islands to go. I can't wait to see what else awaits me.

Justice?

2009-08-05T21:28:00.000-07:00

Lately I have been engaging in several discussions about why the Christian god is evil and offends my sense of morality. The Yahwheh of the old testament is an easy mark, clearly a wicked, petty, tantrum throwing, weasel. However it is harder to explain what is wrong with the new testament with its message of forgiveness and salvation. On the surface it seems nice enough. I have talked about it before many times but few Christians seem to get the point I am trying to make about why salvation through grace is an evil doctrine.

Dark Matter has a new video which may explain it better than words can. This is how Christian justice appears to many of us who do not practice the religion. Despite all of the apologetics and scripture quoting I have been subjected to I have yet to hear anything that contradicts this portrayal.

Calling all Pagans, Wiccans, and Shinto.

2009-07-30T19:24:00.000-07:00

I have recently been trying to make myself believe in God. Partly as a thought experiment and also out of respect for my Christian friend Tracy who was honest and respectful enough to acknowledge that, at least for her, faith is a choice. In This discussion she says that yes she could choose to believe in another god or no god. I was very touched and moved by this and have been trying to believe in her deity very much. I have been reading the bible(sometething I often do anyway), Praying for the first time in my life, reasoning with god, trying, and failing to set aside all of my rational objections and just believe. I Have Failed.

I know at least one pagan reads this blog and I am going to contact her personally and invite her for discussion, but if there are members of other faiths who wish to discuss their religion with me you are welcome to do so. I would also like to hear you discuss it with some of the Christians who read here. I think if nothing else it could be a wonderful cultural exchange.

I am not saying I want any religion. Regarding Christianity, I would be very willing to believe if I could but that doesn't mean I would worship. As to others I don't know, I am familiar with many religions but not intimately so with all of them. Perhaps there is one that could inspire belief or even worship. Of course as my pagan reader pointed out, maybe it is simply my destiny to be an atheist.

Choosing to Believe

2009-07-24T13:29:00.000-07:00

I have been discussing belief lately with an internet acquaintance who gave me some interesting things to think about. It is her position that I could choose to believe in a god. That my desire for evidence is simply an obstacle and that I need to simply set that aside and choose to believe. I had thought to counter this by suggesting that she would be unable to do the same with a god other than her own. I expected the usual silence in response but, instead was impressed and delighted to recieve an honest answer. She replied:

"Yes, I am saying that I could abandon my faith in Christ and CHOOSE to beleive that allah is the true god. Or any other god for that matter. I could CHOOSE to agree with you and decide that God doesn't exist and rule off my "relationship with Jesus" as a delsuion."

I was amazed, and very respectful of her and so I complied with her request and made a sincere effort to believe in a god, first the Christian one and then expanded it to include any deity or pantheon. I failed, but not for lack of trying, I opened myself to believe in any revelation or invitation and when that failed I sought to convince myself by discarding my objections both philosophical and scientific and simply saying "OK your real come to me" that also failed, I tried formal prayer the Jesus come into my heart and be my savior, forgive my sins etc that I learned in my brief exposure to Sunday school some decades ago. I got nothing, so I meditated and focused and just told myself to believe that there must be a god. I couldn't even get to the point of Deism.

What I did discover is that my objection is neither scientific nor philosophical, both science and philosophy absolutely support the lack of gods but they are not the cause of my unbelief. My unbelief is deeper than that, it is an inability to do as my associate does and set aside doubt and objection, an incapacity to compel belief in myself. This lack could be the true distinction between theist and atheist.

I reccomend reading the discussion on her blog it is interesting but if you don't, here is the question I posed to her in my last reply, and I would open it up for discussion to anyone who may be interested. Of course as rarely as I have been updating lately there may be no one interested ;).

Here it is.
"If you are choosing your belief and deliberately putting aside any doubts and uncertainties. How do you know the difference between truth and belief? Since as you said you could choose to believe in Zeus or Allah and you are capable of setting aside doubts, wouldn't such belief be as real and compelling as belief in Christ if that is what you chose? So how would you, in the absence of evidence know that Christ was
more true? It can not be because creation is evidence because many mythos have creation stories. Some don't have clearly false claims like the Christian mythos does, so wouldn't it make more sense to choose to believe in one of those?

It can also not be because of a personal knowledge of Christ because as you said such things are a choice and it seems if you chose belief in Vishnu or Isis you would expeience the same personal relationship. I personally know a Shinto who feels the presence of Kami, and several Native Americans who feel the power of ancestors or spirits during drumming and dancing ceremonies.

In the end even if you choose to believe you need some criteria by which you choose what you will choose to believe. What is that criteria? If I were going to force myself to believe I would find something that doesn't offend my moral sensibilities such as Deism or an animistic pantheism such as Shinto, Druidism, or Native American religion, all of which I find have more value and are more compatible with reality than Christianity.

So to sum if belief is a choice that I can make, and I can manage it, by what criteria should I decide to believe Christianity over another belief system? Also by what evidence do you support this criteria, and is that evidence objective or simply something else you have chosen to believe in.

I hope this doesn't sound mocking, that is not my intent, these are the sort of questions most Christians tend to dance around and since you seem sincere in answering I am asking with equal sincerity."

God answers some questions.

2009-07-19T19:06:00.000-07:00

NSFW

Thanks for the vids to Dark Matter

Maybe this is the Problem..

2009-07-18T07:59:00.000-07:00

See more at Atheist Cartoons

Making sense out of parables..

2009-07-16T20:09:00.000-07:00

This is just about the best take on the fig tree parable yet.

The Worshippers Box.

2009-07-10T17:21:00.000-07:00

I have been talking a bit with Christians on various blogs and such and have noticed certain differences in the way they think and the way I do. I don't say this so much to insult them but more to point out that the atheist/theist divide may be as much about barriers to communication as it is about knowledge and education.

One thing I have noticed is the definition of evidence. To a worshiper, faith comes first. So from the perspective of faith, anything that might support their worship is evidence no matter how vague. That is why, many of them will with complete sincerity point to a few, short references to early Christians and their practices as proof that their man god was real. They also take a, clearly forged passage added to the works of the scholar Josephus as proof of the existence of Christ. To a believer this is sensible and they see non believers like myself as being stubborn fools for not recognizing it. To me however all of the references put together, including the gospels, at the very best prove that there was a man named Yeshua, who led a cult. He was executed for heresy, his followers founded a very successful religion and eventually wrote a bunch of stories about him that they may or may not have believed to be true. There are no historical witnesses who actually document miracles and resurrections. There were many scholars and commentators at the time who very likely would have commented on a man raising the dead, curing plague victims and the blind, performing powerful magic and rising from the dead himself. This video gives a list of such scholars that failed to notice these supposed miracles and also gives a case against the sources who do. It is not definitive but certainly useful and interesting.

The other trait I have seen that distinguishes the believers mindset from the non believer is that the believer sees the world as being about worship. I have seen many Christians have an incredibly difficult time believing that someone doesn't worship something. Even if you can convince them that you don't secretly believe in their god and just pretend not to because you love to sin, they will still act as though you worship someone. Charles Darwin is a favorite. Christians love to call us evolutionists and act as though we worship Darwin. They go to great lengths to impunge his character, calling him a fascist and anything else they want because they want to "destroy our faith." I read a very long multi thread discussion where this one, obviously fanatical, minister had claimed that Darwin was a social pariah and womanizer. After much biographical evidence refuted that he began claiming that the ships logs of the HMS Beagle had the captain recording that Darwin was a habitual hash smoker. Eventually a great deal of research, culminated in proving he was a liar and that there was no such reference, he then claimed Richard Dawkins had hidden away those portions of the log books. You get the idea. Anyway even though we had fun disputing him, chastising him for bearing false witness and generally showing him to be a loon and a liar, we didn't need to. If Darwin were all of those things...so what? It wouldn't change his theory, it wouldn't change all of the work that had been done since, it wouldn't make his work less important. I have also been accused of worshiping professor Dawkins, and of course Satan. I think the confirmed Christian really believes such tactics will work. Not necessarily because he is stupid but because it is how he views the world working.

I think atheists often have the same problem. We in general, like evidence. I know I have a very difficult time understanding how I can present, iron clad conclusive proof of something, and have the Christian I am discussing counter with some absurd and barely comprehensible psuedo science, or even more likely a bible verse. Again I think this is not because they are necessarily less intelligent, but because evidence means different things to them. To them an insignificantly small possibility that science could be wrong about their belief, through the speed of light slowing down or radio carbon dating not working or whatever is proof that such must be the case, because it supports their religion, which they have faith is true. Likewise even the most flawless and solid case that contradicts their religion, must be false because they have faith that their stories are true so it must be the evidence that is wrong.

Evidence does get through to some believers, but I think only those who already have questions anyway. That is why I feel that the best way to truly reach out and show believers a better way is to lead by example. Live as an outspoken and public atheist. Show that you are moral and honest. Live a good life and show that faith is not necessary for virtue or happiness. I think this will create more doubts than a million pieces of evidence. If you want a person to abandon a lifestyle, it would be helpful to offer a better one.

TRADITION.

2009-07-05T09:18:00.000-07:00

My family has a tradition regarding Independence day. Ever since my oldest was born, we have made a trip, just the three of us(four after my son was born) to the city of Newport, which is a fishing and tourist town on the northern Oregon coast. Sometimes others will join us, friends, parents, in laws, whoever but the trip is ours.

We set out early it is a hundred mile drive and we want a whole day. On the drive, like almost all our drives, we talk constantly. I find out all of the little details of my kids lives and friendships and interests, I tell stories, in this case all about why we celebrate on the fourth of July. We admire the view and talk about the sites. The trip over the coast range to Newport is very much worth admiring. I have said before that Oregon is the most beautiful place on earth and this is one of those drives that demonstrate that.

When we arrive it is activity time. The fireworks show over the bay is the premise for going and we don't miss that but the rest of the day is about adventures. Some new some old.
First we went to the Marine science center. Newport has a great commercial aquarium and we visit sometimes but the science center is just as fun, only asks donations and is somewhat educational. I also like that the "exhibits" all relate to work that the scientists are actually involved in. Much of this is about invasive species which is a very big deal in Oregon. We watched videos, played games watched storm patterns on a big interactive fiber optic globe. We looked at beautiful fish and other marine life. My kids drove a diving craft simulator. We touched urchins, starfish, oysters and anenomese. My son petted and eel. We looked at fossils of whale bones and teeth and learned about whale eating habits. The kids didn't want to leave and we went through more than once.

Then We visited the Yaquina Bay lighthouse, it is a restored structure that only operated as a lighthouse for a few years back in the 1870's. It is (other than electricity and such) a pretty faithful restoration. Each room has period furniture and appliances showing how the people of the time lived and cooked and worked. There is also a ghost story associated with the lighthouse. It is said that in the days when the lighthouse was abandoned and locked up a group of children somehow got the key and entered the house on a dare. They explored the house and left except for a young boy and girl who stayed behind the others. The girl told the boy she had lost her handkerchief and he should go out the front and lock up and she would come out through the kitchen. A few minutes after the boy left he heard screaming and went back in but found nothing but a bloody handkerchief. Since then people claim that they have seen the girls ghost haunting the lighthouse. I have no belief in ghosts, nor do my kids but we love ghost stories and playing pretend so we scoured that house searching for the ghost but no luck.

Next we went to play on the beach. Now for those who haven't been there the beaches of Northern Oregon are not like the beaches of Hawaii or Southern California or the Gulf. Our ocean is cold, not a little cold but painfully cold. My daughter and I couldn't care less. We were out crashing in the waves within five minutes. It wasn't a nice day either, cold wind, and mist were our companions out in the surf. It was glorious. One thing we do is walk out as far as we can and still have her chest out of the water, so that a it looks like the whole world is nothing but waves and sky, we wait for a wave to come in that would bury us and then try to run from it, usually failing completely. When she was very little we played this with her on my shoulders, now we play it hand in hand. I almost dread the day she is big enough to face the ocean without me.

My son on the other hand is no fan of cold water, he prefers exploring the rocks and combing the beach with my wife. They hunt agates, shells and fossils on the beach. After a while my daughter an I joined them in the search. We found some beauties. Several nice agates and two excellent fossils. I found a sand polished rock containing a fossilized mussel or other shellfish and my wife found one that had a fossil of some spiral shelled snail like thing in it. Over the next week or so my wife will be busily trying to identify them. Then followed some sand castle building and rock climing and seaweed fights and just general beach mayhem. The beach was mostly deserted. There was one family barbecuing near the rocks and a couple in the distance flying kites but otherwise just us.

After that we explored the historic bayfront a lot of this is just tourist stuff(which we like as much as any other tourists) but there are a number of wonderful old buildings mixed in with the docks and fisheries. Finally it was time for the fireworks. Sometimes we go out on the bay in a fishing boat to watch but this time we were on the dock. It took forever to get started, an hour later than usual and we considered leaving a few times but we stuck it out and it was worth it. Best show in years. If you have seen a fireworks show and I am sure everyone has you know how at the end they launch a lot of them in rapid series to give a big finally and get the oohs and ahhs. They did that three times. Of course my daughter who freaks out over anything that booms was behaving as if it were the end of the world, but even she peaked out to watch the spectacle. There was a fog out on the bay and the fireworks reflecting between that and the clouds made it look as if the sky were on fire.

Then we tucked our sleepy offspring into the car and had a quiet drive home, gently talking about our day until the kids went to sleep, then talking to each other in the easy way that married people talk when they already know what the other is going to say.

It was a great day, but at always there is a bit of sadness mixed in with the joy and pride as I see my children grow another year, becoming more independent and opinionated, I know the day will come when they are off at college and then married with their own family and traditions and I won't have a little boy to chase ghosts with or a little mermaid princess to dance in the waves with her daddy. My philosophy is all about reveling in the present, but sometimes the future sticks its ugly nose in. However every year brings new pleasures from parenting as well, new games, new conversations, new adventures, and come what may we are storing up memories that we can never lose.

A poem for my little girl, who grows less little each day.

2009-07-03T21:22:00.000-07:00

Upon sun dappled lawn in spring
light distilled in green gives birth
of majestic treasure as to a king
Ivory and gold of noble worth

Broided chains grace slim neck
and bracelets slender arms do clad
golden tresses richly decked
as a silver laugh make a father glad

My commandments to me.

2009-07-03T09:43:00.000-07:00

Having been lately discussing sin and conscience with a nice Christian lady and also morality with a commenter on another thread I took it upon myself to spell out what exactly my conscience was. It took the form of Ten commandments. Unlike a certain other group of Ten commandments I only require that they be followed by myself, although I recommend them to everyone. This is what I have come to consider the secret of happiness. It is a combination of philosophy and morality that requires no religion but is superior to any that exist.

First. Be happy with what you have, remember that what you have now is what you only once dreamed of. A happy life needs few possessions and true happiness comes from security, friendship and simple pleasures.

Second. do not fear death, while you exist death has not come and when death comes you will no longer exist so what is to fear? Since the eternity prior to your existing is not terrible or menacing why fear the eternity after you exist no longer?

Third. pride is the highest virtue, pride motivates us to be honorable and to avoid bringing shame upon ourselves, pride rewards effort and accomplishment even when those accomplishments offer no tangible payment, pride informs self worth and strengthens us to resist oppression and degradation. Pride condemns us for weakness and encourages our strength.

Fourth. No person has greater intrinsic worth than any other, an assault that deprives another of liberty and security is the same as if it were directed at me. No one is entitled to special favor or accommodation nor is anyone deserving of special harm or disdain. Each must distinguish ones self and defines ones character through actions and example, not circumstance of birth

Fifth. dishonesty is an act of weakness. The strong have no need of it. In the face of oppression it could be needful to deceive in order to preserve life and liberty, but it is still weakness that made the deception necessary. We should strive to live in strength and security so that deception is no part of our lives. Deception also leads to distrust which hampers friendship, and friendship is essential to happiness.

Sixth. Violence, outside of competition and sport is never acceptable unless it is required to preserve life or liberty and then only the minimum necessary to the task must be employed. Killing is not acceptable unless there are no other means which are effective.

Seventh. No person may be denied any personal liberty, save where such liberty would take away from the health, security or liberty of another.

Eighth. No one is entitled to any material thing that they have not been freely given, or earned in payment for goods or services, or built through honest labor.

Ninth. Friendship is essential to happiness and security, to be a good friend is the greatest of skills and to have a good friend the greatest of accomplishments.

Tenth. Life exists now, the past is prologue the future not yet written. While thought for the future is essential for security, Joy can only happen in the present. Take simple pleasures, eat so that you are satisfied, drink so that you are merry, appreciate beauty, love well and often, cherish each moment, savor each sensation, and fear neither death nor gods.

Absolute morality,and other fairy tales.

2009-06-30T20:28:00.000-07:00

I have been hearing a lot of the word absolute lately, to the point that when I hear the word and it does not refer to Vodka I assume the person is trying to sell me some snake oil. The first is when someone says absolute truth, I know they are setting up something, recently that something is some variation on the transcendental argument. However this is pure nonsense. Absolute is an invalid premise regarding truth in a discussion of logic, because it implies that there are degrees of truth which is in violation of the law of the excluded middle. Another proof that absolute is a fallacious qualifier would be as follows. Define a proposition as P that proposition is true if P=T if P is not equal to T then the proposition is false. If we add the qualifier absolute to the value of true we end up with P=T+A since P is only true if it equals T then for P to be true the value of A must be zero. So a proposition can only be absolutely true if the qualifier absolutely has no value in which case it is unnecessary. If on the other hand the qualifier absolute has meaning then A has a value greater than zero and P=T+A is false because P does not equal T. So an Absolute truth is either simply true or it is false.

The one I am currently debunking is absolute morality. I find this to be the worst offender because it is always a wind up for some apologetics where anyone who doesn't believe in whatever god is being peddled must rape and eat children. The problem again is the concept of absolute but also the description of morality as laws. Morality is no such thing, there is no one transcendental morality, what there are are systems or codes. There is also no absolute right or wrong. These are fine for a casual discussion and we all know what is in general meant, but for the purposes of logical proof the correct terminology would be consistent or inconsistent.

The moralists argument would go something like this, Do you believe in absolute moral laws. If you say yes they go on to make a case that some magical sky fairy or another has to be responsible for them. If you say no and that morals are subjective they will say something to the effect of "so if society decided that it were acceptable to rape and eat children then it would be right to do that?" some get more personal and say "since you don't believe in absolute moral laws then if you wanted to rape and eat children then there would be nothing wrong with that." Most people will try to explain that morality is a survival based system and that society does not in general condone that, and most try to explain that even if society said it was acceptable they would still find it wrong. However the apologist will start hammering away about "what absolute standard do you use to say it is wrong?" and such.

This is clearly skewed and dishonest but also hard to refute. It can be done with patience and a cool head but it is quite tough. The problem is that the apologist has framed the discussion by setting prejudicial terms. In an appropriate discussion one would say that they subscribe to a moral system or code(from here on I will say code) and that they are also bound by the moral system of their society(I will use system for societal morals). I could say that raping and eating children is inconsistent with both my moral code and the moral system of my society. If the question were asked "if society said that it was OK to rape and eat children then why would that be wrong" it would be a simple matter to state that in that case raping and eating children would be consistent with the moral system of society but still inconsistent with my personal moral code and I would not engage in it. It would also be perfectly acceptable to state that since my personal moral code takes precedence over the system of my society I would be compelled to oppose such behavior even at risk to myself. I would then ask if such behavior would become consistent with their moral code if it were sanctioned by society. They may respond, if they are clever, with "if your personal moral code takes precedence over societies system then why would you follow societies system at all." Since we have terms defined accurately it is easy to say, If my actions are inconsistent with societies moral system then there will be social consequences for violating those standards also depending on the actions there may be legal punishments as well, therefore the moral system of society enforces itself and I will only violate it if my personal code requires it to a degree that I am willing to accept the consequences. Also since the moral system of society is enforced through social pressure it reflects a consensus among the the personal codes of the members of that society, making situations where society condones an action that the majority find immoral to be uncommon. The moral system of a society typically reflects the moral codes of its members. Obviously there are exceptions, it is not uncommon for political or religious powers to be strong enough to enforce a system which does not reflect the moral codes of the citizenry. This is why it is important to first look to ones personal moral code, because the personal codes are what foster resistance and change, when enough people stand up for their personal codes then the system of society will change to reflect that either through accommodation, politics or revolution.

Regardless of what many people would wish morality is relative, it does change and adapt, and it is a human creation. There are certainly some constants, since we have evolved as social animals our instincts will lead us to favor behaviors which facilitate group survival. These behavioral preferences are reflected in our codes of morality. However these codes and systems still take a wide variety of forms. Those who argue against "moral relativism" are arguing against human nature. They may be able to make a case that it would be better if there were an absolute standard of morality, but they can not make a case that such a standard exists. Saying that we should believe in a deity because it would be better if one existed is in no way an argument as to whether it actually does exist or not.

A night at the museum, actually an afternoon.

2009-06-29T09:02:00.000-07:00

I took the family to the art museum at our university yesterday. Actually they took me, my kids were performing in something called the Sunday of sound which is part of something called the world harmony project. At any rate after they finished with their singing, dancing and drumming I was not going to just go home and waste a chance to explore with the wife and kids.

The first gallery we visited was the one my children were performing in, the exhibit was called. ON THE ROAD Two Visions of the Tokaido. It featured wood block printings by two different artists, Hiroshige and Sekino. The prints all featured scenes from along the Tokaido which is a trade road between Tokyo and Kyoto. All of the prints were lovely and I had a great time watching my childrens reactions and explaining how wood block prints were made. My son was his usual inquisitive self, pointing out all of his favorites and asking endless questions, my daughter on the other hand was quiet and introspective. I did not get much response from her until we proceeded to the Chinese art exhibits. She was fascinated by the Treasure Wall which featured an assortment of pottery and sculpture from the time of the Quianlong Emperor. The treasures were definitely worthy of her interest. Exquisitely carved jade, meticulously detailed glazes on the pottery, beautiful Cobalt blue glass. I fell in love with it as much as she did. My son really liked the dragon sculptures, and a pair of wedding cups with lion carved handles.

After that there followed exhibits from many cultures including modern works. My favorite gallery however is the Russian religious Icons. The paintings of the haloed Jesus are perfectly executed and serene. I enjoy all sorts of religious art but I think it is only the Russians who truly make Christ beautiful. Seeing these wonderful paintings and sculptures reflecting a variety of religions and cultures, filled me with a great sense of contentment. Despite all of the harm and corruption that has been committed in the name of the gods man creates, a wealth of sublime beauty has come from it as well. It is times like this that I can almost feel why the believers want to believe so badly. It is hard to look at such subtle skill and realize that it is the work of mortal men and women, the work does inspire a feeling of transcendence. However it seems to me even more satisfying to see this as testimony to the greatness of our species rather than attribute it to the mythological figures being depicted.

Epicurus

2009-06-28T00:38:00.000-07:00

I have been asked before about my philosophical influences and there are many, however the greatest of philosophers in my estimation is Epicurus, I have always tried to live according to Epicurian philosophy even before I knew what it was. The pursuit of justice and simple pleasures, security and freedom from pain as a natural good, the trust that knowledge can be gained through the senses, the realization that we need not fear death, these are all truths upon which I have based my life. The more I have read of Epicurus the more I have adopted it in my life.

While Epicurus is often associated with eating, and drinking and other pleasures, Epicurus was not completely a hedonist, to the contrary he believed that since fulfilling desire led to happiness and not doing so led to suffering then there were two strategies to follow either fulfill desires or eliminate them. He preferred the latter. It was his contention that desire should be pared down to a minimum that can be easily fulfilled. So yes good food and drink and other simple pleasures are very much in line with Epicurian philosophy, greed for these things is not. Any desire which becomes burdensome to fulfill needs to be eliminated. This is actually very similar to the second truth of Buddhism and Epicurus in some ways reflected a Buddhist like asceticism. It is of course pleasant to enjoy luxuries when available but to be come dependent or accustomed to such things leads to suffering when they can not be had and therefore that is to be avoided.

Epicurus also believed that happiness depended on having many virtues courage, moderation, knowledge, justice. However unlike other philosophers he saw these things as a means to an end rather than an end in and of themselves. They are valuable for the happiness that they help create and maintain. Even knowledge is seen as a means to an end, science is useful so that we can explain natural phenomena and eliminate the fear of gods, and philosophy is useful to dispel the fear of death.

Justice and friendship are also key to Epicurian philosophy, Epicurus is the first philosopher to give a well developed contractual definition of justice. At it's essence justice can be described as an agreement to not harm or be harmed. All laws should proceed from that basis. This lines up perfectly with my Libertarian ideas of the role of law. Epicurus deviates from pure utilitarianism regarding friendship proclaiming that a wise man would be willing to die for a friend. However in general his attitude is still that friendship is valuable because it is among the best ways to gain happiness.

Epicurus also reflects well upon my view of death, one shared by many atheists. He sums up the insignificance of death in the following ways.

1. Death is annihilation.
2. The living have not yet been annihilated (otherwise they wouldn't be alive).
3. Death does not affect the living. (from 1 and 2)
4. So, death is not bad for the living. (from 3)
5. For something to be bad for somebody, that person has to exist, at least.
6. The dead do not exist. (from 1)
7. Therefore, death is not bad for the dead. (from 5 and 6)
8. Therefore death is bad for neither the living nor the dead. (from 4 and 7)

He also said:
Anyone who fears death should consider the time before he was born. The past infinity of pre-natal non-existence is like the future infinity of post-mortem non-existence; it is as though nature has put up a mirror to let us see what our future non-existence will be like. But we do not consider not having existed for an eternity before our births to be a terrible thing; therefore, neither should we think not existing for an eternity after our deaths to be evil.

He regarded the fear of death and the fear of gods to be the greatest obstacles to happiness. This is also the position taken by many modern atheists.

Below I have included a number of quotes from Epicurus, this is hardly a complete representation of his work but it is a good sampling and will hopefully whet your appetite for further study of this great philosopher.

The greater the difficulty, the more the glory in surmounting it.
Epicurus

A free life cannot acquire many possessions, because this is not easy to do without servility to mobs or monarchs.
Epicurus

Death does not concern us, because as long as we exist, death is not here. And when it does come, we no longer exist.
Epicurus

Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not; remember that what you now have was once among the things you only hoped for.
Epicurus

I have never wished to cater to the crowd; for what I know they do not approve, and what they approve I do not know.
Epicurus

I never desired to please the rabble. What pleased them, I did not learn; and what I knew was far removed from their understanding.
Epicurus

I would rather be first in a little Iberian village than second in Rome.
Epicurus

If God listened to the prayers of men, all men would quickly have perished: for they are forever praying for evil against one another.
Epicurus

If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.
Epicurus

It is better for you to be free of fear lying upon a pallet, than to have a golden couch and a rich table and be full of trouble.
Epicurus

It is folly for a man to pray to the gods for that which he has the power to obtain by himself.
Epicurus

It is impossible to live a pleasant life without living wisely and well and justly. And it is impossible to live wisely and well and justly without living a pleasant life.
Epicurus

It is not so much our friends' help that helps us, as the confidence of their help.
Epicurus

It is possible to provide security against other ills, but as far as death is concerned, we men live in a city without walls.
Epicurus

Justice... is a kind of compact not to harm or be harmed.
Epicurus

Misfortune seldom intrudes upon the wise man; his greatest and highest interests are directed by reason throughout the course of life.
Epicurus

Not what we have But what we enjoy, constitutes our abundance.
Epicurus

Nothing is enough for the man to whom enough is too little.
Epicurus

Of all the things which wisdom provides to make us entirely happy, much the greatest is the possession of friendship.
Epicurus

Riches do not exhilarate us so much with their possession as they torment us with their loss.
Epicurus

Appreciating the glory of nature.

2009-06-22T14:14:00.000-07:00

Today I find myself in Missoula Montana, on a business trip. I have to say the trip here was absolutely stunning. From the highway a person finds themselves confronted with one magnificent vista after another. Coming as I do from the most beautiful place on earth I had thought I was somewhat jaded about the beauty of nature. Northern California all along the coast down to the Bay area is magnificent, but I still found it no competition for Oregon. Washington particularly around the Sound is glorious, but I still prefer Oregon, Idaho, British Columbia, Nevada, all have amazing scenery but I was still faithful to my home as the pinnacle of what nature has to offer. I had not yet been to Montana. I would not go so far as to say Montana is more beautiful than my beloved Oregon, but I can't honestly say it isn't either. Oregon has a nicer climate and of course an ocean which are major advantages, but I do love mountains, and Montana is aptly named in that regard.

A very nice Christian lady recently invited me to appreciate the beauty of nature, and then try to not believe in God. I found this amusing because I have always felt the opposite. If I could think of the best way to convince someone that there is no God, it would be to show them the beautiiful things that inspire awe in me. Expansive mountain vistas, crystal clear streams tumbling over rocks, trees as tall as the sky, deep mountain lakes, rolling desert hills, the crash of the ocean on the rocks, the infinite expanse of the heavens. All of the Gods, myths and superstitions that people fill their lives with, are so small and petty by comparison.

How could a simple little tribal god like Yahwheh with his petty envy, and murderous temper tantrums and archaic taboos be the creator of such majesty. Religious people bandy about terms like omnipotent with no thought to what it implies. They apply the authorship of all the awesome complexity and power of the universe, to a character with less personal virtue, subtelty or intelligence than the average human.

Such a crude and vulgar entity is beneath even the most flawed of mankind, yet it is elevated to the status of all powerful and all knowing. If people would truly open their minds to the real wonder of the universe, they would see existence is greater than we are, and greater than the fantasies we construct to explain it.

I often hear the refrain that this or that law of physics or scientific theory could be wrong. I say, "so what?" Even if it is wrong, it is an act of learning. Through study we grow and advance and catch glimmers of the truth of the universe. Even if we are wrong nine times out of ten, every time we are right we gain a treasure more valuable than we could ever gain from the comforting and simple fiction of religion. Even if we are never correct, just the proccess of seeking is far more courageous and rewarding than, hiding behind the crude tribal myths of our ancestors.

Atheists are everywhere!

2009-06-19T16:40:00.000-07:00

I really like my new job. It was not my preference, I am currently laid off from my normal work as a technician for an air conditioning contractor working construction, however it does have its perks. I travel constantly and am only home weekends. This is a mixed blessing. On the upside I get to stay in nice hotels and live on a per deim, I also get three weeks of bussmans holiday in Hawaii later this summer. Of course the downside is I miss my family intensely when I am gone.

However what I really like is the abundance of atheists. On my first trip, I got to know twelve people I was traveling with. Of them seven were atheists, three were agnostic, one was Buddhist and only one was Christian. This is a very comfortable ratio. On my most recent trip I was traveling with only two others and we were chatting away. The topic turned to religion. This is a little tense because I will never deny my atheism, but I am new to the company, and these were both management types. My fears were set at ease when one of the gentlemen said something to the effect of "well that about covers the whole range of religious possibilities." the other responded, "at least as far as Christian mythology goes anyway." Greatly relieved, I responded that "I know I am in good company when I hear the words Christian mythology" the rest of the trip was a pleasure with talk turning to all sorts of subjects. I found my coworkers fun and knowledgeable in many areas.

Since then I have only encountered three more Christians, only one of whom is evangelical. I have to say this is a nice change from my last job where nearly everyone followed some brand of cross kissing. I still have to say I prefer work boots and tools over slacks and tie, eventually I will get back to construction, however for now it is great fun traveling and socializing with a group of primarily non theists and heavily non Christians.

I have no idea why this particular job attracts non Christians so much. It is a bit quirky, a lot of travel, high pressure, odd schedules, a certain individuality and self motivation are necessary to do well. Perhaps these qualities in a job appeal more to rationalists. It could also be that it is a young crew. The vast majority are in their early twenties. Most of those who are older are forty or older. I have seen the statistics that sho young people being less religious than their elders. One study by a Christian survey company showed that less than one half of one percent of eighteen to twenty three year olds have what they call a biblical worldview. If this is the case I have high hopes for the future

Continued contemplation in the park. Thoughts about the rose garden.

2009-06-13T16:43:00.000-07:00

I have always been saddened when I hear believers in the various christianities proclaim that the atheist "worldview" is sterile and without meaning. It is tragic that there exist a large group of people so desolate and void of self worth that they can not find some meaning in this wondrous life without having it provided for them by an imaginary god figure.

Today, as is my habit on brilliant and sun filled days, took my family for a walk in the park. Today our destination of choice was a small playground a few miles from our house. On the way is the rose garden. A magical place of lawns and mazes, arches and gazebos and a stunning array of all sorts of roses. My wife and children and I set to exploring. It was wonderful as usual, rich in perfume, blessed with hidden tunnels and of course ladybugs which are my six year olds favorite.

As we explored I noticed a small change from previous years. While still hardy and beautiful, many of the roses were weighted with dead blossoms, there were also vines less well shaped than before and bushes hanging in to paths that were once pristine. I commented on this to my wife who noted that the gardener who had taken care of them for as long as I can recall, had retired the previous season. She is friends with his wife and had mentioned his retirement before and I had forgotten.

This is what got me to thinking about meaning in life. One man tending a garden, had singlehandedly elevated the level of beauty in the world. His labors created joy for thousands of visitors and wonder for their children. This was simply by performing his job. In addition he is also a husband, father and grandfather. He has friends and interests. How could anyone call such a life meaningless.

This gardener is just one person in a city of a hundred thousand in a nation of millions in a world of billions. Every single one of these billions has the capacity to build meaning in their lives. Even the poor and oppressed can find meaning and purpose. We who live in a free and prosperous society are unlimited in how we can seek after meaning. It is my hope that when we as a society finally put religious superstition behind us, it will become the goal of humanity to liberate everyone to seek the meaning they wish to impart to their lives. I hope we will create a world where people have honest and meaningful work instead of grinding poverty. Where people will have the health and strength to pursue their dreams instead of hunger and disease. Where speaking ones mind and striving for purpose will be greeted with acceptance and admiration instead of oppression and cruelty. That would be a far greater accomplishment for our species than groveling before altars and glorifying non existent gods.

My favorite Christian apologist refutes evolution, describes Christian sex ed and sings a song for Ziggy

2009-06-09T23:21:00.000-07:00

Unholy Trinity

2009-06-05T18:12:00.000-07:00

See more at Atheist Cartoons

Theater review Momotaro

2009-06-03T21:25:00.000-07:00

Sorry I have been lax about posting, I am doing a lot of traveling for work and am at the mercy of both work schedules and hotel WiFi. Prior to leaving on my current adventure into the desert of eastern Oregon I watched a Japanese language production of the fable of Momotaro the peach boy.

In this version of the tale a lonely elderly couple lived by a stream,while the grandmother was washing the laundry she saw something floating by. She fetched it in with a bamboo pole and found that it was a giant peach. She called out to the grandfather who was nearby harvesting grass. He came running with his great knife and was amazed by the peach. They decide to share the peach, however when the old man splits the peach they find, instead of a peach pit, a baby boy.

The old couple takes fine care of their young son and he grows to be a fine athlete and excells in all things. One day a group of oni (ogres) attack the nearby viliage and steal away the princess. Momotaro decides to go to the island of the evil oni and rescue her, and also bring home the legendary riches of the oni.

His parents send him off with the old mans grass knife and a bag of the old womans best dumplings. Along the way Momotaro encounters a dog, a monkey, and a parrot. All of them beg for dumplings and in the end agree to acompany him to the island to fight the oni. They finally reach the island and after a great battle the oni chieftan surrenders and Momotaro returns with the princess and the best treasures of the oni.

This classic fable was excellently performed by my sons kindergarden class. My son was the old grandfather. He really wanted to play the dog, but he soldiered on and gave an excellent performance. The production also included a very nice celebration dance and several singings of the Momotaro song.

Momotarō-san no uta (Momotarō's Song) 桃太郎さんの歌

Momotarō-san, momotarō-san (Momotarō, Momotarō) 桃太郎さん、桃太郎さん

Okoshi ni tsuketa kibidango (Those millet dumplings on your waist) お腰につけたきびだんご

Hitotsu watashi ni kudasai na? (Won't you give me one?) 一つ私に下さいな！

Agemashou, agemashou (I'll give you one, I'll give you one) あげましょう、あげましょう

Ima kara oni no seibatsu ni (From now, on a quest to conquer the ogres) 今から鬼の征伐に

Tsuite kuru nara agemashou (If you come with me, I'll give one to you) ついてくるならあげましょう
Momotarō-san no uta (Momotarō's Song) 桃太郎さんの歌

Momotarō-san, momotarō-san (Momotarō, Momotarō) 桃太郎さん、桃太郎さん

Okoshi ni tsuketa kibidango (Those millet dumplings on your waist) お腰につけたきびだんご

Hitotsu watashi ni kudasai na? (Won't you give me one?) 一つ私に下さいな！

Agemashou, agemashou (I'll give you one, I'll give you one) あげましょう、あげましょう

Ima kara oni no seibatsu ni (From now, on a quest to conquer the ogres) 今から鬼の征伐に

Tsuite kuru nara agemashou (If you come with me, I'll give one to you) ついてくるならあげましょう

Murder for Jesus

2009-05-31T17:54:00.000-07:00

It is nice of the Christians to wait until I have posted about how evil their religion is before doing something to prove me right. Whoever the terrorist is who murdered Dr. Tiller will undoubtedly be a Christian and he will say he was doing it for the "babies" and you know what? A lot of Christians are going to think he is a hero. Even the ones who don't will, because it is what their religion requires, accept that he has repented and Jeebus will welcome him in to heaven. This is exactly what I was talking about. Well not exactly, according to this report Tiller was also a Christian so he is just as likely to be in heaven according to Christian myth as his killer is. Although I bet we will here many Christians claiming Dr. Tiller is going to hell. However the murdering dirt ball, who killed him will get to be a hero, then pray to Jeebus and get a clean conscience out of it. While Dr, Tillers family grieves. I am sure they are in no mood to forgive this piece of shit.

I just recently read a reply from some Christian hag who said. "Maybe Christianity was used to justify bad things a long time ago but just name someone in the last hundred years that has used Christianity to justify killing people." After I decided laughing at her stupidity was a better response than punching my monitor, I opened up a tab to Google. I then got a list of abortion clinic murders and posted it with the message "How about these for starters." I didn't get a response back which is unfortunate because next I was going to start posting Irish terrorists from both sides.

I never knew Dr. Tiller. Despite being pro choice I can't say that I have to many positive feelings about his profession, I have no idea what sort of man he was, but today I mourn him. I extend heartfelt sympathy to his family and regret the loss of yet another victim of religious fanaticism. Rest in peace Dr. Tiller.

I also have hopes for his killer. May he resist arrest and be painfully killed before he has a chance to spew his insane and idiotic martyr speech in a courtroom.

Proof that religion is evil normally makes me happy but not when someone dies because of it, which sadly is all too common.

Sorry no good acronym, here I refute the Cosmological argument.

2009-05-29T22:20:00.000-07:00

I have already written about the Ontological and Transcendental arguments for God. The last of the three arguments for Christianity which I want to address is the Cosmological argument. It is the supposition that the universe itself is proof of the existence of God. It hinges on two precepts. The first is infinite regress. This is the belief that the universe can not have existed eternally because if it had an infinite number of things would have had to happen before now therefore now would never arrive. Christians tend to ignore the fact that infinite regress would apply also to a God or any other "first cause" they in fact say that because their God is "outside of time and space" that he is the only possible first cause. They conspicuously neglect to explain how something can be outside time and space. I will demonstrate how infinite egress is meaningless and the universe can be eternal without suffering infinite regress or being "outside time and space"

The second premise is that if there were ever a state of nothingness then there would still be nothing because nothing can not cause something. I will demonstrate the irrelevance of this by demonstrating that there was always something. I also postulate a reasonable possibility of how that something caused everything else. This last is speculation I am not a quantum physicist, I can follow along with basic quantum mechanics but can not describe original complex functions. However my speculation is within the realm of what quantum mechanics indicates is possible. Although it is beyond any hypothesis that I know of, so please don't read more into it than it being a reasonable speculation. It is at any rate incidental to my main argument and serves only to demonstrate that a non sentient first cause is possible.

Neither infinite regress or the origin of energy are valid dilemma. The first is refuted in trivial fashion by the nature of causality. The latter is potentially explained through principals of quantum physics.

As to infinite regress. Causality requires multiple identities, if there is only one identity then no causation is possible. This is a principal of logic. A thing may only be itself therefore multiple things are required for causality to occur.

In the existence of space, which has been determined as an identity. It has structure and obeys rules, therefore it is something. It is eternal and immaterial, but it is something. Space alone would not allow causality as it is a single identity. Space alone would allow for nothing to happen yet space would exist. Non contradiction confirms that "no things" can not be "an infinite number of things" therefore in the absence of causality infinite regress can not apply.

The second problem, where did energy originate is also do to the nature of space as something. The principal of quantum vacuum friction, shows that particles can come in to existence uncaused. This is evident even in the limited "nothingness" possible under current conditions. Theoretically a similar phenomena could have created that which is commonly referred to as the singularity.

This is not a problem of something coming from nothing. Space is determined to be something. It is no a matter of a material something being brought into existence by an eternal immaterial something.

The cosmological argument claims that only an eternal immaterial entity could cause the universe. I agree. The cosmological argument claims that the eternal immaterial something is a god. However that has not been demonstrated. The "cosmological argument in no way substantiates such a premise. Space is also shown to be an eternal, immaterial entity. It is also a candidate for first cause, it unlike a god does not have to be "transcendent" because unlike a god it is not subject to infinite regress. One possible counter to this would be to claim that a god is a singular identity as well. This is unlikely because a god is a complex and powerful entity and lacks the simplicity to not allow causality. However since theists tend to define their gods however they wish I will concede the point.

However this still removes the god concept as the only possible first cause. It refutes the claim that the existence of the universe proves god, and reduces God to simply one possible hypothesis, which is where it belongs. Then we can weigh the evidence, on one hand space which we know exists, we can witness its behavior, science can measure and evaluate it. On the other hand we have God which can not be seen tested or evaluated and must be believed on faith alone. It also is derived from old legends who's claims conflict with all known science.

There are some who will still say "God did it" but they can not use the cosmological argument to back it up.

Worshipers of an evil god.

2009-05-28T19:58:00.000-07:00

There is a simple truth. The god described by Christian mythology is evil. The documentation of this is overwhelming. Accepting human sacrifice Judges 11:29-39. Ordering genocide 1 Samuel 15:2-3. The sacking of Amelek is just one example of the many peoples the Christian deity is said to have ordered his people to exterminate. Ordering the capture and rape of little girls Numbers 31:15-18. Forcing people to commit cannibalism Leviticus 26:16, Leviticus 26:29, Deuteronomy 28:53, Deuteronomy 28:57, Isaiah 9:19-20, Jeremiah 19:9, Ezekiel 5:10 among others. Commanding parents to abuse and murder their children and even sell them as slaves Proverbs 23:13-14, Leviticus 20:9, Exodus 21:7.

On the subject of slavery the Christian god figure was very fond of that as well Exodus 21:2, Exodus 21:7, Exodus 21:20-21, Leviticus 25:39, Leviticus 25:44-46, Ephesians 6:5, Colossians 3:22, 1 Timothy 6:1, Titus 2:9-10, 1 Peter 2:18. These passages lay out clear instructions on buying, selling and beating your slaves. It also exhorts the slaves to be obedient and not rebel. These verses were used by Christians to support keeping African slaves in the United States.

This alone should be enough to display the vile nature of the myth that Christianity calls good and just. It is not however the greatest evil. That is reserved for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. This variant of the ancient harvest god myth has been perverted by Christianity to make a mockery of justice. In the Christian version of this myth, the corn god was sacrificed as atonement for the sins of mankind. On the surface this seems nice enough, get out of hell free card just accept Jesus. The problem is no one thinks about what it means. It means that Christianity denies morality in exchange for worshiping its god. It is no longer important to be good and just. There is no punishment for evil, the punishment is for those who aren't saved, who don't accept or trust Christ or however they say it. Some Christians will claim that the punishment is for sin and Jesus forgives them. This is just semantics because they have to admit that "all humans are sinful" and there is no way to the father except through Christ so the result is the same.

It doesn't matter what you do, if you suck up to their deity you are spared if you don't you are tortured. That is why Christianity is evil. It destroys morality for those who believe it. Older religions believed in works and justice. They may have been no more real but they had value. People were given the choice of reward for good or punishment for evil. Christianity gives reward for being a Christian and punishment for not being one. Christians can be as wicked and sinful as they like, and many are. It doesn't matter because "Jesus Saves".

That leads to scenarios' like this. A man abducts and rapes a young woman, to avoid any age of accountability dodges we will say she is thirteen. He brutally rapes and tortures her for days, before finally killing and eating her. Afterwards he feels bad about it and scared of punishment and worried about hell. He crosses the street to a church, repents his actions and "makes a decision for Christ" or whatever phraseology that particular cult uses. He then dies a true Christian. He is rewarded with eternal bliss in the presence of his god. His little victim however was a Jew, or Wiccan, or atheist. She is damned to hell and eternal torture because she was murdered and eaten before accepting Christ. That is the true evil of Christianity. The true evil of Christians is that they call this "perfect justice". They will dance and dodge and claim that doesn't happen and it is just made up, some will even say out of ignorance that "God doesn't do that" however it is the fact of their doctrine. It is not made up, it has happened. Stacy Moskowitz was a practicing Jew when she was murdered by David Berkowitz. David Berkowitz was the Son of Sam serial killer, he murdered several other people also. David was found guilty and now serves multiple life sentences in jail. While in jail, David has become a born-again Christian. According to the Christian myth Stacy is in Hell being tortured by demons and the serial killer who murdered her is assured a place in heaven. Christians call this good. Berkowitz is their brother in Christ, and Stacy is just a miserable sinner recieving the punishment she deserves.

Fortunately it is just a story. Those of us who reject it can be good and moral. We can live life knowing it has value and meaning outside of flattering some ancient storm god. We can live by the moral instincts nature has provided, the codes of ethics that humanity has cultivated over centuries, and the codes of law implemented by our respective governments. If we desire forgiveness for our wrongs, we can seek it from those we have wronged. That is true forgiveness, not the fake forgiveness that comes from praying to an imaginary god.

Thanks to Beamstalk for the information about David Berkowitz, I quoted him directly.

I needed this so bad I thought I would share.

2009-05-28T07:06:00.000-07:00

Whenever someone like Ray Comfort makes me start hating Christians, and wishing I owned a lion, I just watch a little Carlin. After that I simply pity them again.

Richard Dawkins has been stealing all of my arguments.

2009-05-27T13:11:00.000-07:00

No not really. The gentleman has two decades on me so he has a clear first claim to our mutual opinions. It is however a bit eerie. I just finished reading the God Delusion and from chapter one on, my most common response was "I've been saying that for years." Not so much in the area of science, Professor Dawkins clearly has the advantage on me there and I found his thoughts very enlightening. In the philosophical realm however it was like reading something I had written. The idea of Christianity as immoral even down to the scripture I use to support that premise. The reasoning behind why naturalism is a moral system are also very similar to mine. The ideas about comparative religion, also familiar. The list goes on.

This of course makes sense, I didn't form my ideas in a vacuum. I was reading Carl Sagan from a very young age, I have read the work of many prominent atheistic thinkers. So I am sure has Mr. Dawkins. In fact we share a mutual admiration for Douglas Adams, who I rank along with George Carlin as being one of the two greatest wits in history.

One area I do disagree with Richard Dawkins on is the origin of religion. Professor Dawkins believes it is a misplaced survival instinct. He speculates that making quick casual connections is necessary for survival, because reasoning out a dangerous situation logically is not quick enough to deal with, say a tiger attack. I agree that this is the instinct that religion relies on, I just doubt it is the source of religion. I doubt that humanity is the creator of religion at all. In an earlier post I make the argument that religion is a vestigial practice from our pre-human ancestor. I believe that like Mr. Dawkins said the ability to make casual connections evolved first because it is key to survival. I believe our pre-human ancestor had not yet developed the ability to make causal connections at all. They simply went by how things appeared to be and learned by trial and error only. To them religion wasn't a misplaced instinct it was the only instinct they had. Our primitive human ancestors who had developed logical reasoning also retained the survival based casual reasoning. They continued with the religious thinking that was passed down to them but have been continually replacing it with logical explanations whenever possible. In the last few thousand years logic has begun to first alter and then replace religion. In the last few hundred years logical thought has eliminated any relevance that religion may have. Now religion is just a vestigial practice that survives through tradition and indoctrination without fulfilling any useful function.

Of course Dr. Dawkins is the biologist so you may wish to defer to his opinion on the matter, but I am quite happy with mine.

I would like to close with giving "The God Delusion" every endorsement. It is an excellent book and I highly recommend it. I would say go read it but I was probably the last atheist on earth who hadn't so that is probably pointless.

The California Supreme court upholds Prop 8. It is time for a challenge to DOMA

2009-05-26T12:50:00.000-07:00

This is Pretty much what I expected Constitutionally it makes sense, even though it is morally repulsive. At least the court did protect existing same sex marriages which I believe is also constitutionally correct. Now the question will be is the Defense of Marriage Act Constitutional? Clearly it isn't from a legal perspective. There is no way that a law DOMA can overrule the full faith and credit clause of the Constitution. Unfortunately judges are chosen for playing ball with the government not Constitutional expertise so we will have to wait and see what happens. I am guessing that if Californian gay couples who have married out of state, mount a challenge to DOMA. The Ninth Circuit Court will overturn the Defense of Marriage act, but the Supreme Court will overturn the decision. This is however one of those cases where I very much hope I am wrong. DOMA is an assault on the Constitution, if it stands we have told congress that they can make laws that nullify our Constitutional protections. Once we do that all is lost. The amendment process is supposed to be the only way to alter the US Constitution. It is meant to be difficult. If we do away with that and let congress impose anything they want by simple majority, why have a constitution or Supreme Court at all?

Presenting SATAN the Simply Awesome Transcendental Argument for the Non existence of god.

2009-05-23T11:21:00.000-07:00

I posted this to Richard Dawkins forum where he asked for possible counters to the transcendental argument for the existence of God. I have been playing with this for a while. This is the simplest most straightforward one I could achieve. It declares that the presupposition of an interventionist God precludes any possibility of logic or reason.

Here it is.

If there were an omnipotent being in charge of the universe then natural laws and logical causality would be arbitrary and subject to its whims. In a universe so governed there would be no truth and no standards upon which logical thought could be based.

The only universe in which a logical chain of cause and effect is possible, is one in which the laws governing that universe are themselves the framework upon which the universe rests. This is precisely the universe described by non theistic science.

When one says that the universe is subject to a God, they deny that there is any possibility of knowledge, logic, or fact. Theistic people must assume that there are no truths or logic, and therefore they can not claim any knowledge without basing it upon the standards belonging to the atheistic perspective.

I would also add that even the attempts by theists to demonstrate the existence of their god are only possible using the concepts of truth and evidence which are only possible in the absence of God.

This becomes axiomatic. If there were a God then there would be no standard of logic upon which I could argue against it's existence. Since I do make such an argument there is no God.

Creationists do not actually like science, but I like Gods, or some of them anyway.

2009-05-22T23:40:00.000-07:00

I have a great fondness for Einsteins pantheistic God. I refer to it frequently in poetry and introspective writing. Like Einstein I see it in the beauty of nature because it is the beauty of nature. It is a wonderful metaphor. Useful for both artistic and explanatory purposes. It could in a sense even be real. If you define the universe as God, and acknowledge the universe exists then, it is true.

Unlike Hindu, Kabbalah, and Suffi, practitioners I see no reason to worship this God or assign it any qualities other than being a metaphor for the universe.

I also have a great affection for the Jeffersonian "natures God" which also could be true. I have many philosophical reasons to not believe in the deistic God however it is of no real consequence. It is also a useful metaphor and excellent for the purpose of speech making and art.

I have finally started reading Dawkins God Delusion and he actually gives some excellent arguments against Deism, which make perfect sense but are ultimately unnecessary.

The Deistic Idea of an impersonal, non revealing, non interventionist God is no enemy of science and reason. In it's purest form it is nothing more than an anthropomorphic description of the "first cause".

You won't find Deists crusading against science education or trying to impose the will of God on people. A few hundred years ago Deists filled the same role as atheists do today. They were the scientists, philosophers, revolutionaries, and free thinkers of their time.

They were proportionately more numerous than atheists are today, which is probably why so many advances in government and personal freedom happened in the 18th century.

It is the theistic Gods that are the enemy of reason and science. The Catholic Church can accommodate reason because the Pope can declare anything he wants as the will of God. However even they cringe when science begins shining light in to the gaps their God hides in. As Jefferson said "Priests...dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subversions of the duperies on which they live."

Theists, Christians in particular must oppose science. They can of course exploit the benefits derived from it, but they must lie about it, distort it, suppress it, condemn it, and in every way try to hide from the fact that it proves their God false.

A God can not claim dominion over what can be explained in its absence. As science is rapidly explaining everything that people once attributed to God. God is diminished.

Now he is little more than a shadow waving the carrot of salvation and the stick of Hell because those myths are the only powers remaining to him.

Theater Review. Shobe.

2009-05-21T23:29:00.001-07:00

This evening I watched a stage production of the Japanese fable Shobe, performed in Japanese. The performance was absolutely incredible. The acting was top notch, the Taiko drumming interlude was well done as were the vocal performances.

Shobe is the story of a young working man. He labors hard but is getting nowhere. He asks the spirits to grant him a good life. A spirit grants his request by telling him he will stumble on the road and he must pick up what he finds and carry it. Shobe does indeed stumble and finds a rice straw. Even though he thinks it is worthless he keeps it. Along the way a dragonfly begins buzzing around his head. He catches the dragonfly and ties it to his rice straw. Soon he encounters a woman and child, the child wants the dragonfly which Shobe gives her, the mother rewards him with a basket of oranges. He is pleased with the oranges and is about to eat them when he comes across a procession. Three maids approach him asking if he had some water for their princess who was dying of thirst. He had none but he gave them the basket of oranges which saved the princess. The princess thanks him and has her maids reward him with a bolt of fine silk. Further down the road Shobe is accosted by three Samurai who think the silk is too good for him. They threaten him and force him to trade the silk for a dying horse that they had with them. Shobe nurses the horse back to health and travels on. Soon he comes upon an old royal woman, who says she is traveling to her home but must travel quickly. Shobe offers her his horse. The woman accepts and asks Shobe to come to her house for a reward. Later when shobe comes to the womens fine home he is introduced to the womans daughter the princess. The princess tells her mother that Shobe is the man who saved her from thirst. The woman asks Shobe to marry the princess and become master of her estate. Shobe does and lives happily ever after.

A very nice story and very well performed by my daughters third grade class. My daughter was the princess.

It should be mandatory that people in charge of education should actually have one.

2009-05-21T17:38:00.000-07:00

This guy is an uneducated, incoherent, blathering fundytard moron. He can't even speak properly. Yet this mindless piece of crap is saying he is going to stand up to experts in science because They don't know what they're talking about. Aaaaagggghhh! We need to pass a federal law requiring the death penalty for stupid.

It is fun to see bigots get burned with their own crosses.

2009-05-20T16:46:00.000-07:00

This is one of those political issues that make me laugh. Prop 8. in California is being challenged on the grounds that it violates the Federal constitution. This is something I am not sure about. I could argue that it should violate the constitution but it is very unclear whether it does. However the Federal defense of marriage act is also being challenged and it does clearly violate the constitution. Not because of gay rights but because it uses a law i.e DOMA to overrule the clear wording of the Constitution i.e. the full faith and credit clause. This should be a legal no brainer. A law can not nullify the constitution, period. Only an constitutional amendment, ratified by the states can do that. Therefore DOMA can not survive a constitutional challenge. If the court actually respects their duty which is notoriously uncertain.

So if this challenge to Prop. 8 fails DOMA should still be overturned allowing out of state gay couples to have their marriages recognized in California. This could actually be Constitutional, CA could refuse to marry gay couples but have to honor gay marriages from out of state. If they do it will be a direct result of them passing the anti-gay amendment in California to start with. The law of unintended consequences will have claimed yet another victim.

Even if you don't care about gay rights you have to find the irony amusing.

Are your children fucking stupid? Who's fault is that?

2009-05-20T10:05:00.000-07:00

This guy seems to think it is Hollywoods fault. He makes some good points about role models and the influence of on screen behaviors and such. He also completely ignores the elephant in the room. The parents. If you are not your kids primary role model then that is the problem right there. If you let your child model the behaviors of TV and movie characters without your input then you are to blame. If you allow your kids more TV time than you give them time with you, you are to blame.

Blaming the media is a cop out.

I limit my kids exposure to TV, I subject their viewing choices to my approval. I devote the best part of my time to their upbringing and education. I correct bad behaviors. You know what? I have good kids. They get good grades, they have no discipline problems, they use clean language. That is due to my wife and I not Hollywood, also if they go bad that is also my fault not Hollywoods.

You would think this is a no brainer but people love to blame everyone else but themselves.

Hey Mr. Wanna buy my cookies?

2009-05-19T06:52:00.000-07:00

I love the Girl scouts. For one I love Tagalongs, possibly the most wicked confection ever sold door to door. Second I love actual Girl Scouts. My daughter is a Brownie and my wife is a leader. Apparently I also love the organization. I just read this rant against the Girl Scouts by World Nut Daily and found myself saying "wow that's great" a lot. Of course the fundytards disagree, they think it is bad that the GSA is being welcoming and diverse. They can't stand the fact that it is trying to encourage and empower girls. I am sure they are really ticked off that nowhere in the scout manual does it talk about how girls need to be obedient and submissive.

They are also apparently upset that the scouts quote some prominent lesbians as role models. Silly me I had no idea that thinking Billy Jean King is a great athalete automatically turns girls gay.

Anyway unlike their brown shirted male counterparts, the girl scouts welcome atheists, and teach their kids real values instead of religious indoctrination so lets have a big "Go Scouts" for them. Also support your local girl by buying lots of cookies when cookie season comes back around.

On the plus side, he wasn't raping little boys.

2009-05-18T08:59:00.000-07:00

This guy. decided celibacy wasn't working out for him so he got a girlfriend. Sounds reasonable to me. I mean breaking vows is a weak and cowardly thing to do but he didn't hurt anyone. Considering the well documented alternative, having an adult partner should be encouraged among priests who can't keep it in their pants.

Of course as you can imagine the church doesn't see it this way. A few hundred kids getting raped is really a small price to pay, in exchange for their inflexible dogma that priests can't get any. As long as it looks like people believe their lies the church doesn't care about actual people getting hurt at all. For example when this poor little girl was brutally and repeatedly raped. The church had no problem with her being raped. The rapist has probably already been forgiven and insured a place in heaven. The Church was instead pissed that she was given an abortion rather than being forced to die giving birth to the twins the rapist impregnated her with.

Just a few more examples of why humanity needs to outgrow this silly God myth. The sooner we close the book on this prehistoric crap the better off we will be.

If we've learned anything, it is not to fuck with Carl Sagan.

2009-05-17T00:11:00.000-07:00

OK this is very stupid, and I should be ashamed for laughing at it, but I'm not so there. See for yourselves.

You have got to appreciate moral clarity.

2009-05-15T09:06:00.000-07:00

I just love it when things like this and this come together. Someone gets on a moral high horse and then their own dirty laundry comes out. (Yes I know I am mixing metaphors). Didn't the Jesus story say something about taking the log out of your own eye before trying to pick the speck out of your brothers?

Images courtesy of Atheist Cartoons and TMZ

A Cartoon Just for Ray Comfort.

2009-05-14T23:21:00.000-07:00

See More at Atheist Cartoons

I love it when actual scientists tell me I was right all along.

2009-05-14T16:38:00.000-07:00

For years I have been answering those Christians who ask where morality comes from by answering "Game theory." I have said that since humans are social animals we would have cooperative instincts. That nature would select for the traits that best help insure group survival. I even suggested that game theory predicts that much of what humans call moral is simply the best strategy. I even once wrote a long winded exposition about how the prisoners dilemma accurately describes most social interactions. Now I am not so arrogant as to say this is my unique theory, I have heard it before from others, but still it is good to be vindicated. This atricle and this one show how game theory can predict the behavior patterns of ravens. Even predicting a behavior that had not been observed before and then having it verified by field researchers. I love being right.

I love this Cartoon

2009-05-13T10:18:00.001-07:00

See More at Atheist Cartoons

Refuting the transcendental argument for the existence of God. Part II. Setting your axioms.

2009-05-13T09:12:00.000-07:00

The first thing the presuppositionalist will do is question how do you know anything with out some absolute standard of logic, such as God. They will in fact wait patiently to refer to something as proven and then leap in, with how do you know? They will say the concept of proof depends on God and yadda yadda. Since this is a stupid question on their part it is tempting to dismiss it as a stupid question and try to explain your evidence. This is a mistake, they will continue to repeat how do you know? indefinitely unless challenged on it. Note that they will still continue to repeat it if challenged, but you can then point out how stupid they are. The best response is to pretend they have asked a serious but simple question and then answer it succinctly. This is my response. It is not original to me in any sense. These are well established axioms but they are effective. These particular axioms are my variation of a set I read on the Skeptical Studies blog. They are largely a simpler paraphrase of those. The presupp won't accept them of course. Their missionary philosophy prevents them from allowing any common ground with atheists. However you will now be able to respond to their "how do you know?" by refering back to these axioms.

Step 1. Perception exists. If I were presented evidence otherwise, I would have to perceive the evidence thereby proving the existence of perception.

Step 2. Consciousness exists, perception requires consciousness therefore consciousness not existing would contradict step 1. However since step 1. is axiomatic consciousness must exist. Also since perception and consciousness are established as discrete entities, solipsism is false because an entity apart from perception is proven to exist.

Step 3. Something exists, proof otherwise would contradict step 2 because step 2 shows that consciousness exists.

Step 4. Multiple things exist, Any disproof would lead to nonseparable identity, i.e. only one identity is. But my TV is black and my chair is not, as given by my sense perceptions. But this is a contradiction. Therefore multiple things must exist. Additionally as it has been established that perception and consciousness are distinct entities, this is further proof that multiple identities exist.

Step 5. Causation exists any proof otherwise would be the result of evidence causing a change in my consciousness, thereby proving causation exists.

Step 6. What our consciousness is aware of through perception is an exact representation of external reality. If this were false it would require that consciousness create perception which is not possible due to Step 1. and 2.

Steps 5 and 6 establish the validity of logic and perception respectively. Having established causation it is therefore possible for though and argumentation to exist. Since logic describes thought and argumentation logic can exist. Step 1 establishes perception as existing, step 6 establishes it as accurate. None of these steps require logic in order to exist, they are self evident. Logic is used to describe them but they are not established through argumentation, they are axiomatic.

It will then be possible to answer most of the presuppos arguments by simply referring to Steps 1-6. They will of course ignore these even if they understand them but will be completely unable to refute them. This will put them on the defensive. Their position can not be established defensively so you can pretty much hold them there forever. However doing so does not refute their position it only prevents them from establishing it, I will continue at a later time with an argument towards refuting their position.

I highly reccomend reading the original article at Skeptical Studies it is far more complete and accurate than these. I have dumbed these down for the benefit of the average TAG advocate. If you wish to get more complex and accurate, the debate at Skeptical Studies is an escellent resource.

Refuting the transcendental argument for the existence of God. Part I. Laying some groundwork.

2009-05-12T11:16:00.000-07:00

Having recently withdrawn from a discussion where the other party was clumsily attempting to set up the transcendental argument, I have made some observations on the subject. Hopefully this will be useful to anyone encountering this monstrosity. The person I was discussing with was clearly an amateur. I kept giving him easy openings and softballs but he just kept repeating nonsense. However I have seen people use the argument effectively so I thought I would post some tools for overcoming it. The first is that for the transcendental argument to get off the ground the person postulating it must set some definitions. They must for example claim that logic is Absolute, Immaterial and Universal. Their argument rests on logic being something that has to come from a perfect and divine source. They need for it to be not explainable as a result of natural processes. Fortunately this is easy to avoid. This is the reason I ended up withdrawing from the last discussion, I asked the person to address the validity of these terms, and presented the following argument. The presuppositionalist in question just ignored it entirely and tried to change the subject. These really do mess up the position taken by the transcendental argument.

First I address absolute.
Absolute is a qualifier which is applied to the property of true. This seems either non valid or false, depending on the intention. If it is simply an adjective describing the property of true there is no reason to do so, in logic there is either true or not true applying a qualifier in this regard is non valid. If you are using the qualifier to add an additional value to the property of true then the statement must be false.

Call true T and absolutely A. and a Statement S. S=T describes a true statement describing a statement as absolutely true would be S=T+A for this to be true A=0 if a has no value it is a non valid qualifier if A>0 then you have a contradiction T+A does not =T so you have a false statement.

To sum if A=0 then there is no reason to call something absolutely true, so therefore a statement can not be absolutely true it can only be true or false.

If A>0, for instance if if the term absolute adds meaning then an absolutely true statement is false because the qualifier absolute makes it non true. So again in this instance a statement is not absolutely true it is simply true.

Logic can not be absolutely true in any possible circumstance so it is simply true.

Now that I have addressed the question of absolute and demonstrated that it is either a useless qualifier or a false one. In addition to being contradictory it also violates the law of the excluded middle, by implying that there are degrees of truth, which is not possible. If something seems partially true then the question asked is insufficient. Probably because it is either not specific enough or improperly stated.

At this point I will address universal. This is another adjective used to set up the transcendental argument. One which I question the relevance of. At least it is not a logical contradiction like absolute. However it is without value in this context.

If it means the common usage as in it would apply in every appropriate situation. Then yes it is universal, however since that is a basic concept of logic I am not sure why the term would be added. If it means something beyond that, such as the laws of logic having meaning apart from intelligence then no, universal does not apply.

Logic is a symbolic representation of the function of thought. It is not an entity in it's own right. It describes an entity, thought. Since logical axioms are self evident and irrefutable and the laws of logic are based on axioms, it must be true that any intelligence in any possible world would be subject to them.

However absent intelligence they could not exist. This does not of course mean that without intelligence the universe would behave any differently. It would do what it does regardless. Light doesn't move at a certain speed because we have a theory that says it does. It moves at that speed because that is the nature of light. Gravity does not attract because we have laws of gravity describing how it works it attracts because that is the nature of gravity. Logic allows us to understand these things it doesn't create or guide them.

The absence of intelligence would simply mean that there would be no observers measuring and quantifying things therefore there would be nothing for logic to describe.

So I can say that universal is either a useless qualifier or a false one.

Now another adjective frequently referenced is "immaterial." This seems the most vague to me but probably the least fallacious. Again it depends on what is meant.

Thoughts and concepts are immaterial in the sense that they are functions of intelligence not matter so that is true enough, however since this is pretty much part of the definition of thought again the qualifier is unneeded.

However it means they transcend the material world then no. Concepts may be in a sense immaterial, but they are formed in a mind that is tied to the material. If there was no material there would be no thought. As I said regarding the term universal. Logic is a tool to describe thought and facilitate argumentation. Even though it is perfectly accurate it only applies to thought and argumentation. In the absence of thought logic has nothing to describe so it is irrelevant.

So again the qualifier is either pointless or false.

Therefore the laws of logic are not absolute, universal, or immaterial.

They are simply true. The law of the excluded middle prevents partial truth so absolute doesn't apply. Logic is a function of intelligence so universal doesn't apply. Consciousness is a function of the material therefore immaterial does not apply, even though as a general rule concepts are defined as not material they could not exist apart from matter and energy.

I've been Bombarded with scripture, Here are some quotes I actually like.

2009-05-12T09:05:00.000-07:00

God zero Ryk one, presenting Ryks Ontological argument for the Non existence of God. As I call it the great RONG.

2009-05-08T22:48:00.000-07:00

God is by definition perfect. To be perfect one must be that which nothing greater can be imagined, all existent entities fall short. This is due to a principal I call "plus a cookie" Even if I define myself as having every possible perfection, someone can honestly say they imagine someone with every possible perfection plus a cookie(or any other virtue, I like cookie) If I then say well I have every possible virtue plus two cookies, they can respond in kind until we reach some arbitrary limit when we get tired of adding cookies or die of old age. The only way to be perfect is to have infinite cookies(and every other virtue) however an existent being can not have infinite virtues.

It is impossible for many reasons for an existent being to have an infinite value of anything. Only in the purity of imagination is infinite perfection possible. Therefore only God who does not exist can be so perfect that nothing more perfect can be imagined.

For math geeks I will call real identities R and God P(for perfect) I will call virtue V. Now assign R a value of 1. Now if I add a virtue to R that will give R a value of R+1 or two. Someone can easily imagine a being with a value of three, four, or more. So R can not be perfect unless an infinite number of virtues are added. However infinity+1 is not a valid concept. The only value to which infinity can be added is zero.

Therefore R+V is only valid if V is a finite number. If V is finite then R is not perfect. However God being non existent has a value of 0 and therefore G+V can be accurate when V is an infinite value. Therefore only a non existent entity such as God is capable of perfection.

It is the perfection of non existence which allows God to be perfect. Existence is imperfect therefore for God to exist it could only be imperfect, If it is imperfect it can not be God. Therefore there is no possible way for God to exist.

Again for Math geeks I am calling this the formula, E(existence), P(properties), I(identity), G(God)

I=P+E if I< or = infinity.
If P= infinity E=0
I=G if P=infinity

Life part II. Is religion a relic of our pre human past.

2009-05-07T12:12:00.000-07:00

First I would like to make a few statements regarding my scientific qualifications. I have none. I am not ignorant of scientific theory and methodology. I would rightly claim that I am better educated than the average High School graduate on the subjects of physics, math, and biology. I may even be comparable to many undergraduate students but I am no expert nor am I trying to be. A friend that I correspond with who is an expert in biology, commented briefly on my last post in this series. She said essentially that while she enjoyed my intellectual exercise, my science was fanciful. Fanciful was her term and it is a wonderful choice. She could have said woefully ignorant and been just as accurate. However as is the case with most educated atheists she is a generous soul, and used the more flattering terminology.

I don't proclaim my ignorance in a self depreciating manner, far from it. I exult in my ignorance while at the same time trying to overcome it. On this blog I am not trying to be a scientist, I am contemplating life and sometimes using science as the focus of my contemplation. Science is peripheral, I could just as easily be contemplating the social dynamics of a Smurf village. As I am admittedly not a scientist and am in no way trying to establish any scientific premise or theory I have freed myself to indulge in conjecture. Essentially I am indulging in the same arrogant conceit that practitioners of religion engage in. However I wish to stress that I do this only for my own pleasure (and presumably that of my readers) in the pure joy of speculation. I assure you that if you tell me that I am talking out my ass I will not behead your family or threaten you with eternal damnation.

Now on to the topic of this post. Recently I was faced with the assertion that the existence of similar flood myths, among various cultures was not as I claimed proof that the Christian flood story was a myth. Rather the presence of these myths proved that there must have been a worldwide flood. I have heard very similar arguments before but was still somewhat taken aback by it. What a crude way of looking at history and humanity I thought.

In response I posited a counter claim, I said that rather than assuming all of the many scientific improbabilities associated with the occurrence of a worldwide deluge, we could instead attribute this to human nature. I claimed that since our species is presumed to have originated in a limited geographical area, commonalities among myths could be traced back to that beginning. For example let us assume that at some point an early wise man anticipated a flood. He knew that when clouds looked a certain way the rainy season was coming, he remembered past rainy seasons when flooding had been an issue, and he saw a pattern that led him to believe that this season there would be a flood. He tried to explain this, even going so far as to claim that the Gods had warned him of the flood. Perhaps he even believed it was the Gods who revealed this to him. He had a brilliant idea, he built a large raft which could carry his family, possessions and some of his livestock. When the flood came he loaded this raft and managed to save enough that in the aftermath of the flood he was much better off than his neighbors.

Over the generations of oral tradition this tale was told as a warning against not being prepared for the possibility of flood. As folklore often does the tale grew with the retelling and this wise man became a heroic figure of myth, like Paul Bunyan or John Henry. Many generations later the flood was magnified in to one that covered all the known world, and the people were only saved because the wise man loaded his giant ark with everything needed to rebuild civilization. The flood, as such natural disasters often were was attributed to divine wrath and the wise man who was spared was called favored by the Gods.

As the population of mankind grew and spread throughout the world this tale traveled with them. In some places it was lost but in others it carried on. The names and details adapted to the customs and religious beliefs of the various tribes but the narrative remained pure.

I enjoy this example and consider it true, but what if I have not gone back far enough. What if this and other religious narratives predates humanity all together. What if it comes from the culture of our most recent pre-human ancestor. Religion could itself be a vestigal instinct. A type of thinking that humans can use but which is secondary to logic. This would explain much. For example all human progress has been made by moving away from magic not towards it. Despite the instinct to say God did it, our primary response is to seek out what really did it. Our ancient ancestors believed that plagues were curses from the Gods or the acts of evil spirits. Now we know of germs and disregard such superstition even though it is foundational to the religions still practiced. A particularly devout Christian may well disregard the effectiveness or necessity of using antibiotics to treat infection, but only the most fanatical deny that bacteria cause the infection. They may claim that God causes bacteria to infect people but they acknowledge that it is the bacteria not a demon that is causing the harm.

Human knowledge and understanding has exploded thanks to logic and more recently scientific method. This explosion has been in some sense exponential because discovery feeds other discoveries. Human knowledge has multiplied many thousandfold in just a few hundred years. Why did not our pre-human ancestors experience such exponential growth. Presumably they possessed intelligence and surely considering the time span involved in speciation lived as long or longer than humanity has yet they never made it past simple tools.

What if logical thought is a capability that their brains had not yet evolved. Say they could make casual connections like if a pointy stick goes in to a pile of dirt and a tigers teeth goes in to an antelope perhaps a pointy stick can go in to an antelope. Some of these casual connections, like the stick could be true others could be false. For example a tribesman steals from the chief and that tribesman gets sick, perhaps stealing from the chief makes people sick or maybe the chief has the power to make people sick. Lacking the ability to make causal connections they could only learn through trial and error and could never develop a system of knowledge. It is from these pre-human ancestors that the original myths come from.

Humans having the capacity to make causal connections have ever since been unraveling the mysteries that these myths propose to explain. The myths remain because they still resonate with the part of our brain that enjoys casual connections but they are subordinate to the part that cares about causality. So myth is only accepted as an explanation for the things that science and logic have not yet explained. Thus the ever diminishing God of the Gaps.

In the interest of fairness I am giving some Christian apologists the chance to share their viewpoint.

2009-05-07T00:40:00.000-07:00

First Edward Current presents "The Atheist Delusion"

Now the Pastor of Landover Baptist Church in Freehold Iowa ministering to a crowd of Atheists.

Reverend Fred Phelps uses the occasion of George Carlins death to warn of the eternal cost of atheism.

Eminent Creation Scientist Kent Hovind lectures regarding the Evil Atheist Conspiracy.

And Finally a few words from Americas best Christian the lovely Betty Bowers, regarding the importance of prayer.

I think I've spotted the misunderstanding now.

2009-05-05T19:58:00.000-07:00

A few thoughts on Life the Universe and Everything. Part I. LIFE

2009-05-04T18:38:00.000-07:00

I have been giving thought on what it means to be alive. I don't mean in terms of what we should be doing or anything metaphysical like that but what is life? If I strip myself down to the very basics beyond which there is no me I am left with two distinct entities. Awareness and Identity. They are insepperable but distinct. A true duality.

Awareness tells me what I am. This is important because it does not automatically tell me what anything else is. It is distinct from perception. Perception after all is unaware of the outside world, reality is all supposition. My eyes do not see anything they change chemically in response to light, I am aware of these changes not whatever the light is bouncing off of. This may seem like semantics but it becomes relevant later. For know it is enough to say that awareness is personal it concerns what I am, even though perception relates to other identities.

Identity is a sense of self, it is the essence of what I am supposed to be. This includes personality, memory and conditioning but it is more than that it is a certainty against which awareness is measured.

Awareness changes constantly it is the what, Identity is the why. Thought is the gap between them. Thought does not exist as a thing it is a byproduct of the interaction between awareness and Identity. I believe this is not a human quality, but a function of life. Humans having the greatest awareness and identity (in theory) possess the greatest capacity for thought (again in theory) but our mind is no different in it's essence than the nucleus of a cell.

A cell has awareness. It reacts to its environment therefore it is aware of its environment. A cell also has Identity it knows what it is supposed to be. If a cell is aware that it has increased n temperature and its identity tells it that it is supposed to be cooler, it will make a decision and take action. Chemical processes will begin that cause it to shed excess heat. The same is true if it is aware that a chemical is inside its membrane and its identity tells it that chemical should not be there actions will be taken to expel the chemical. This is thought. This is will. I think it is the totality of thought, everything else is just a matter of scale and complexity.

I think this is also the nature of adaptation and the engine that drives evolution. Let us pretend, and remember I am using philosophy not biology, that mutation is not random or even coincidental but that it is self directed. Take as an example the first multi cellular organism. Take a cell that knows what it is, it can sense changes in its composition, it also knows what it is supposed to be, it's genetic blueprint. Let us make one assumption. Let us say that when this cell divides its awareness will become the new cells identity.

This cell has another cell pressed against it. This causes a huge amount of information to enter the cells awareness. The presence of this other cell causes changes of temperature, pressure and chemical composition to take place. The other cells waste intrudes upon the membrane of the first cell, enzymes pass through, many other things happen. Of course this happens to the other cell as well. Both cells respond to these changes by trying to return to their identity state. They produce enzymes to reduce the increased temperature, they try to excrete the excess waste and neutralize the foreign enzymes, it tries to expand to its original shape. It adapts to the presence of the other cell. Then poof division time, some cells would divide at different times than their intruding neighbor. These cells would find their identity tuned to a presence which is no longer there. Their awareness would tell them that they are lacking a source of heat and pressure and enzymes and a million other things. It would then begin to adapt ways to reproduce the conditions its identity says it should have. Perhaps by latching on to another cell in a parasitic fashion. However some of these pairs could divide at the same time. Their new identity would be perfectly suited to being pressed together. In fact their identity would be exactly that. Now instead of adapting to push the other cell away and restore itself to a single celled state it would adapt to maintain the two celled state. Anything that it became aware of that altered its identity would become a problem to be solved since both cells were doing this it would be synergistic.

The two cells are not identical remember they are merely linked. They may have adapted towards one another in very different ways. Cell one may have found that it needed to excrete excess waste to allow for the wastes it was absorbing from cell two. Cell two could have adapted to pass waste directly to cell one rather than passing it through other portions of its membrane. Over the life span of these cells they will have adapted to respond to conditions. Consuming nutrients, excreted waste, controlling temperature, all based on the identity they inherited when they were first replicated. Poof division time again, now all of the adaptations they have made become the identity of a new pair which is now further specialized for having a cell pressed up against it. The pair could also now be linked to fission at the same time. This refinement could continue indefinitely.

This sort of adaption through awareness could extend to all sorts of changes. A rapid change in environmental temperature. The cells awareness indicates it has become hotter, its identity tells it it is supposed to be cooler. It begins excreting heat to try and cool itself. Poof division time, the old cells awareness becomes the new cells identity. Now this temperature is not too hot it is just right or at least the cell thinks so however the cell doesn't function well at this temperature say it is unable to excrete waste as well. Unlike its predecessor it no longer is aware that it should cool down it thinks the temperature is perfect, so it begins producing excess enzymes to help it increase its ability to process waste. Poof division time the new cell is now well adapted to the new temperature and functions normally.

Of course this is simplistic. A cell is aware of vast information and requires a certain balance to function. Adapting could take hundreds or thousands of replications to normalize. Many cell lines would die without replicating. However this one assumption awareness and identity as the basis for consciousness turns adaptation from a process of random mutation to a clear and precisely guided mechanism. Perhaps that is what is encoded in the double helix, awareness and identity. Natural selection would still determine which organisms survived or not but evolution would be ongoing at the cellular level, we wouldn't see it happening because what is happening is what we have always seen happening. Every action a cell takes in response to its environment is evolution at work. Evolution is not the thing that creates or organizes life. It is life.

To be continued sometime.

Why the Skeleton?

2009-05-04T11:20:00.000-07:00

I was recently asked why I use the skeleton as an avatar. It began a long time ago with a different picture of a meditating skeleton which I can no longer locate. Originally it was simply a matter of liking the picture but it has evolved a meaning over time.

To me it is a reminder of why religion is useless. It seems all religions answer two basic needs. The fear of death and ignorance of nature. My meditating skeleton flips the bird at both. For one it shows a cavalier disregard for death, a willingness to see death as just another part of life devoid of any deeper meaning. Secondly the meditation shows a willingness to seek answers, a desire to wonder and contemplate beyond simply saying "God Did It". Obviously meditation is associated with religion, but it doesn't need to be. I try to reclaim contemplation from it's religious connotations just as I wish to reclaim death from its fearful ones.

Contemplating Contemplation

2009-05-01T14:27:00.000-07:00

I recently had an epiphany of sorts. I was in discussion with someone who made the interesting if unusual claim that if peoples life experiences influenced their religious leanings then those who contemplated life deeply would logically become Christians whereas those who only focused on daily life would not. I handily refuted such argument by pointing out that deep thinkers such as scientists, philosophers, and artists often reject superstition while simpleminded folk embrace it. Yes this was a bit insulting on my part but I am sometimes prone to that. His argument however did get me thinking about the role of contemplation in life, particularly my life.

I am greatly prone to contemplation, regardless of whether I am discussing physics, biology or a walk in the park I am always seeking the meaning behind it. My initial post to this blog, a half drunken ramble about a meal I prepared has proven defining for me. Contemplating that has as much value as anything else.

A virtual acquaintance of mine who may well be reading this has begun espousing a philosophy of love being the basis of all morality and anything other than love is contrary to morality. I don't precisely agree with this but it is as good as anything else. All that is required for truth to be found is contemplation itself. It doesn't matter if you begin with love, hate, science, fantasy, a walk in the park, the night sky, or a good dinner, as long as you contemplate. Truth isn't in the details it is in finding the meaning behind the details.

Stephen Hawkings is no doubt a brilliant astronomer but I believe he is also a brilliant philosopher. While he supplements his philosophy with evidence and mathematics his true brilliance is his ability to envision the meaning of things. This is equally true of Albert Einstein or Richard Dawkins or any other scientific mind.

Contemplation is not however the exclusive realm of the brilliant. A genius may find conclusions more swiftly and with less struggle than the simple minded but he will reach the same place. Anyone can contemplate reality. No expertise or instrumentation is needed beyond the human mind and the human senses. Look in to the night sky, observe the stars. Now think of the very human assumption that this expanse must have an end. Then compare this with the equally human assumption that it can not end. Now try to reconcile the two. All of the truths of physics will come spinning through your mind. You may lack the terminology or the calculation but you will be contemplating the same truths as Dr. Hawkings.

I have discovered a simple fact about myself. I don't want knowledge so much as meaning. I want to understand how I see things as much if not more than what things are. I have also discovered that the two are not incompatible. Seeking after meaning leads to seeking after knowledge and finding knowledge leads to finding meaning. Human beings are all both scientist and philosopher. We are creatures of contemplation. A Buddhist monk on a mountain, a hermit in a cave, a scientist in a lab, or a man talking about a walk in the park are all doing the same thing. Looking beyond what is and finding what it means.

Gods perfect justice.

2009-04-30T01:43:00.000-07:00

Speaking of conspiracies here is an oldie but a goodie.

2009-04-28T12:12:00.000-07:00

FROM: Vanetil P. Godsbane; Director, EAC Societal Subversion Department
TO: All Conspirators
RE: Update on EAC activities as of January 2001

Fellow atheists,

I am pleased to report that the 2000 fiscal year was our most successful yet. Not only has atheism taken tremendous strides all over the world, we are still in complete control of all media (including television, newspapers, radio and the Internet), all corporations, and all governments. Our latest fleet of mind-control satellites, employing the new high-frequency wave emitters that can penetrate tinfoil hats, is now in orbit and fully operational; our black-helicopter-riding paratrooper armies are ready to strike on command; and all our false puppet churches continue to make inroads in luring True Christians away from the flock. (If we have to go to Hell when we die just because we hate God and can't stand the thought of submitting to his judgment, then damn it, we're taking as many people with us as we can!) Our icy cold, multi-tentacled grip is rapidly tightening around the entire Earth, preparing for the time of the Rapture, when all True Christians will be whisked away into Heaven, leaving absolutely nothing between us and our goal of complete world domination!! Best of all, those God-believing theistic fools still don't have any idea that we control everything!!! Muahahahaha!!!!

In other news, I'd like to announce that Judy down in Marketing is expecting her baby within two weeks. I'm asking everyone to wish her well (but be careful not to pray - your official EAC Employees' Handbook is very clear on the penalty for that, as you all know). Remember, everyone, it's the little people like her that keep this whole organization running smoothly.

Now then, it is with pleasure that I bring you a summary of EAC activities throughout the past year. Be sure to congratulate our operatives in the field, who met or exceeded key goals in the following areas:

1. The EAC Department of Televangelism had a banner year, raking in millions of dollars' worth of donations from gullible believers and thus safely diverting it from being wasted on food for the hungry, cures for disease and other nauseatingly good causes. The cash they bring in, which makes up a large percentage of the EAC's operating budget, was used to launch three new mind-control satellites and complete work on the holy-symbol-seeking cruise missiles, as well as pay the salaries of our hardworking torturers counselors in the EAC Department of Forcible Indoctrination, who managed to "deconvert" several thousand fundamentalists in the last three months alone. And that's just with the donations from widows and orphans alone! Keep up the great work, guys!

(Some of our newer members may be shocked to hear that the televangelists are all our agents. Don't be. Have you ever watched one of those broadcasts and seen the ridiculously opulent splendor their studios are set up in, even though they claim to follow a book that advocates poverty? Haven't you heard about the way they indulge their every vice with money cheated out of hard-working, honest believers? You don't really think True Christians could be such hypocrites, do you? It takes atheists to reach such depths of depravity!)

2. The EAC Department of Time Travel, Temporal Restructuring Division, put in a lot of overtime with our new time machines to reshape history as our dastardly wills see fit. High praise goes out to all of them for all the work they did in the years following Noah's Flood to clean up the geological evidence, scrub the high-water marks off the pyramids and sort all the fossils back into their "proper" order. Thanks to you guys, the Department of Evolutionism is looking to experience some smashing successes in debates. Those creationists won't be able to stand against all our overwhelming "evidence" anymore! (On a regrettable side note: I'm not naming names, but one of you stepped on a trilobite during the Cambrian and left a footprint behind. You know who you are, and I hope you'll properly regret your mistake after the EAC Department of Forcible Indoctrination gets through with you.)

Also, guys, I admire your initiative in going back to Jesus' time and posing as the "Pharisees" in an attempt to stifle him. I really do. But when you couldn't shut him up, why'd you have to go the extra mile and get him crucified?? Please read the Old Testament prophecies more carefully before you do something like that again!

3. The EAC Department of False Puppet Churches, Jehovah's Witness Division, had a solid year, as always. By going door-to-door at the most inconvenient hours and annoying people by bombarding them with unwanted preaching, they helped to foster that festering dislike of religion so vital to our plans. And the pamphlets they give out? You might think they could sway people towards Christianity, but embedded in the text are hypnotic brainwashing patterns from the EAC Department of Mind Control!! Muahahahaha!!!

4. The EAC Department of Bible Revision has done some great work, almost seamlessly inserting new passages containing all-new atrocities, contradictions and absurdities into the latest edition of Scripture. (Of course, the fact that we control all the world's printing presses might have something to do with that, huh? ) Particular works of note include Jesus' irrational and bizarre cursing of the fig tree, some terrific new erotic poetry in Song of Solomon, and an entirely new chapter in Genesis that contains a creation story in a totally different order from the original! Keep up the good work, guys, and soon we may be able to drive the last few True Christians toward atheism. After all, as I know you're fond of saying down there, how could a book so riddled with errors and inconsistencies possibly be from God?

5. The EAC Department of Vote-Rigging turned in a stellar performance during the 2000 American presidential election. As you all know, installing George W. Bush in the office is our most devious plan yet! While he seems in every respect to be a True Christian, in reality he's doing exactly as we command him to do. Our crafty "faith-based initiatives" plan will soon be in full swing, giving taxpayer money to churches to subsidize their preaching and other religious activities. Make no mistake, after a few egregious violations are discovered, strict laws and auditing procedures will be enacted to ensure no more money is misspent, thereby entangling church and state in an inextricable mess. Soon, churches will be overwhelmed with paperwork and bureaucracy and subsumed into the government entirely! And as we all know, when church merges with state, the citizenry rapidly loses interest in it. Just look at the results of the similar plan we've already carried out in Sweden, where attendance in the state-sponsored church is plummeting through the floor. Soon America, one of the few last bastions of fundamentalism in the world, will be ours!

6. And last but not least, I'd like to toot my own department's horn a bit. The EAC Societal Subversion Department has done some amazing work in the American Bible Belt, managing to drive divorce rates there over 50% above the national average! I have to admit it wasn't easy, since True Christians are ordinarily almost invulnerable to the moral decay we've managed to insert into every other sector of society. Left to their own devices, they never beat their spouses, commit adultery or abandon their children. However, our operatives, posing as preachers, cunningly persuaded young people to fear and despise their own sexuality and jump into marriages they weren't ready for without any support or counseling, thereby ensuring our success. Unfortunately, theists in the community have noticed these results, if not realized the cause, and are calling for more church and more preaching to reverse it. Our actions will be scaled up accordingly to combat this worrisome trend.

Well, that about wraps up my report for this month. In closing, I'd like to extend my own special congratulations to our operatives in the so-called "ACLU," who have managed yet again to fight off the efforts to merge church and state. Way to go, guys! If left to their own devices, the fundamentalist Christians would establish a theocracy where the breaking of Biblical laws was punishable by death, and where would we be then?

Oh, yes - and for those of you who asked, the airlifting of our headquarters from Redmond to Babylon is almost complete. Soon the EAC Department of Mad Scientists will have the subcutaneous identification/tracking/commerce chips ready, bringing our top-secret Project Phoenix into its final stages.

Until next time, fellow conspirators, keep up the good work, and remember: Coranon silaria, ozoo mahoke.

-V.

Remember, the Evil Atheist Conspiracy doesn't exist. However, if they did, I might be able to pass some feedback along to them.

DISCLAIMER: You did not read the above, and this page does not exist. In the time it has taken you to read this, your computer is now fully under our control and your location has been triangulated. Black helicopters will be arriving at your house shortly.

All credit for this belongs to Ebon Musings

I loves me some good conspiracy theories.

2009-04-25T08:01:00.000-07:00

Nothing is more cathartic than a good Conspiracy Theory. Outrage at the government, fear over the economy, unhappiness with the way the country is being run, can all be eased with a great big tinfoil hat wearing, humdinger.

I'm not saying there is no truth behind this or other conspiracies. In fact this sort of thing often does have many kernels of fact behind it. The ridiculous part is the way it is built up in to a giant Illuminati driven drama. Saying our government is corrupt and politicians do a lot of self serving, dirty things that are bad for us, is completely true. Saying an ancient cabal of Freemasons and Templars are controlling our destiny is less convincing.

I don't believe in these grand conspiracies but I do respect the creators of them in one respect. They are diligent and dedicated. If there were reporters with half the dedication trying to uncover real corruption, this country would be in a lot better shape.

I have been thinking physics again. Ok philosophy dressed up as physics but still.

2009-04-24T15:27:00.000-07:00

This was the result of a conversation with Rebbecca from TX on Comforts Blog.

Rebbecca said:
"You can believe whatever you want, rational or irrational. You can say I believe that a little green man is responsible for the universe so I just demonstrated that it does not have to be God, but that does not make your option reasonable, probable, or possible."

My response:
You do realize that saying that a little green man is responsible for the universe is exactly the same as saying God is. Just sayin'.

As to infinite regression I have it, it was an epiphany but I have how space can be eternal without infinite regression. It does force me to rethink my cyclic universe theory but I can live with that.

Causation requires that identities exist. Without identities there can be no causation. Events are function of causation without causation there are no events. In the absence of identities there can be no causation therefore no events. Space/Time is existent as a non material identity. However it is a singular identity, causation requires that multiple entities exist. A single identity can not result in causation therefore no events. The law of non contradiction states that "no events" can not be "an infinite number of events", demonstrating that an infinite number of events did not happen prior to the beginning of the universe even though space time was existent.

Quantum vacuum friction which can produce particles in the absence of a cause, results in a particle being formed from space. Non material space produces a material sub atomic particle. Now there are multiple entities space/time and a particle. Causation now begins, events happen, and time becomes relevant.

Now that events have begun the interaction of space/time and the particle produce more quantum events, which produce more, in an exponential cascade, culminating in the entirety of the universe. This would be the initial singularity. That one first particle.

Therefore space/time is fully capable of being eternal because in the absence of causation, infinite regression does not apply. As I stated earlier space/time is a something, it is non material but not nothing, it can exist eternally and has the potential to create material entities from the non material.

Cool! Infinite regression handled. The question of what came before, handled. The problem of the first cause reasonably speculated. Laws of physics, not violated. Laws of logic looking pretty. That is a darn good five minutes of thinkin'.

Poor God can't stop screwing up.

2009-04-24T13:23:00.001-07:00

Spring has finally reached my gloomy home.

2009-04-21T00:12:00.000-07:00

I love spring in my city. Winter here is depressing, it is rainy and damp and the gray soaks up all of the other colors. For half of the year from late fall to early spring it is all gloom. The other half however is glorious.

From spring to fall I am surrounded by beauty. We are a town of trees and rivers and ponds and hills. Ok only one river but it winds it's way though town so that it is hard to be far from it. We have bike paths and foot paths and hiking trails and rocks to climb and parks of all sizes and varied purposes. My family tends to make the most of it.

Yesterday we took a "walk". Since we walk frequently just because, deliberately taking a walk means more than a quick stroll, it is an all day adventure. We have a river walk which covers most of the city and the midpoint is a few blocks from my house. We walked to the park where the trail starts and I immediately began to remember why I love my city so much. I tend to forget over the winter. Our entire street is overhung on both sides with elms, maples and poplars mixed in with all of the fir trees. There are roses, tulips, and magnolias filling the air with enough perfume to make you dizzy.

The park was crowded but it is that happy kind of spring crowded. Kids playing frisbee and riding the swings. Teens and adults sunbathing or playing soccer, dogs running, little ones feeding the geese and ducks. Happiness.

Our walk for the day took us out around a wetlands preserve. It used to be an old quarry, with several gaping gravel pits. It has been turned into ponds and marshes which serve as habitat for herons, coots, osprey, bullfrogs, pond turtles, the ubiquitous geese and ducks, even some bald eagles. There is wildlife everywhere. To one side you can see houses and apartment buildings, malls, and offices. On the other a wilderness teaming with life. I think the dissonance makes it more beautiful than if it were truly wild.

It was slow going. Every few minutes we stopped and looked at some animal or another. My son who is six caught a ladybug that he insisted needed to come home with us to live on our roses. At one point we spent fifteen minutes trying to find the log with the most turtles. It had thirteen, my wife was smart enough to bring binoculars. At another my son and I climbed down a little embankment to walk on the shore and play king of the mountain on a large boulder. My nine year old daughter who currently has a broken wrist joined us after I crawled back up to help her safely down. My wife preferred to stay up and watch us but eventually she was too tempted and came down as well.

Eventually we reached our goal, a trail let us out near a little shopping center where my wife needed to buy some supplies for her Girl Scout troop. That was the excuse for our walk. We just overlook the fact that it would only have been a ten minute drive. We bought her supplies and some frozen lemonades and headed back to the trail on the other side of the river for another two hour walk home.

No matter what my situation is, angry, bad, sad, frustrated, whatever. Taking a walk by the river, in the spring, with my family, fixes everything.

I Know I am repeating myself but.

2009-04-20T09:33:00.000-07:00

The newest topic on Comforts blog involving a fundy chick named Rebbecca telling all of the Atheists that they have to prove how the universe came to be or God wins by default. I'm paraphrasing but that is the gist of it. I actually want to answer her. Unlike some of them I don't think she is playing games, I think she is just too stupid to understand what is wrong with her argument. Of course Ray made a topic out of it because he is playing games. I rewrote my origin of the universe theory and presented it to her as clearly as I could in hopes that even if she won't admit it she might become slightly less stupid.

I am reposting it here because 1. It's my blog so I can and 2. because I have cleaned it up a lot and like it better. I am thinking of writing an Atheism for Dummies type book. Something that presents a lot of useful information geared for us non scientists. Plus plenty of my generally unpleasant observations about Christianity and other woo.

Here is part of my reply to Rebbecca.

Christianity makes a positive assertion, actually several, but one will do for discussion. This is "God exists" Atheists respond with "I don't believe that." This statement is the only thing that is true for Atheists. We, as a group, do not say "you are wrong" or "you are lying" or "God does not exist", we simply don't believe what you have asserted. Therefore the only thing we are obligated to prove is that we don't believe it.

Some atheists are also scientists and make assertions for which they are required to provide proof. That is however science not atheism.

If instead of saying "there is a God" you were to say "I believe there is a God" that would only be a statement of your belief and your only obligation would be to prove you believe it. I would accept as proof of that the simple fact that you say so. Likewise if instead of saying "I don't believe in God" I said "there is no God" then I would be obligated to prove God does not exist. That is not what I say.

I have said similar things before and when called on it I acknowledge that I was wrong. I have at times stated the Christian God is false and I will back that up with evidence. However such times as I have asserted that there are no Gods at all has either been an error or hyperbole and in both cases I will happily admit so if someone mentions it.

Contrary to what you might think Atheists can have beliefs about many things. Atheists are not a unified group and the only thing we share is the common lack of belief in Gods. Aside from that we have a variety of beliefs. Two types of Atheistic, and also Deistic, thought are scientific naturalism also called methodological naturalism, and Philosophical naturalism.

The first is the assumption that nothing can be believed unless it is backed by empirical evidence. A scientific naturalist is skeptical of everything for which there is no logical or scientific explanation. Not proof necessarily because proof is a rare thing to the scientific mind but evidence supported explanations. The second kind, philosophical naturalists, which I am, believe all sorts of things as long as they don't conflict with scientific evidence. For example if I wished or were convinced I could have belief in a God or Gods as long as no claims were made about them that could be shown incompatible with evidence. Deists for the most part share this worldview as do many Agnostics and Atheists such as myself.

Now as to the question about what I believe. Note this is a statement of belief, these things are well supported by science but they are not proven even by experts, which I am not. I state them as a belief.

I believe the universe is not a creation at all. For something to be a creation it must be known as a product of intelligence. The universe has not been shown to be such a thing.

As to it's origin I believe at the very least that "Space" has existed eternally. This in no way conflicts with the evidence available. It is not universally agreed upon but it has not been scientifically challenged. Space is something, science shows that space has structure, shape and obeys rules. Therefore while non material it is not nothing.

According to quantum mechanics in the absence of anything material space could experience a phenomena which is called quantum vacuum friction. This phenomena has been shown to spontaneously create particles. In an infinite universe of space devoid of anything material this phenomena could as Ray puts it have created everything from nothing. Of course it is not creating anything from actual nothing since space is something. What it would be doing is creating the material from the non material, which is exactly what most Christians claim about their God.

Could quantum vacuum friction be a manifestation of the power of God? Possibly, I would not ridicule someone who believed so as long as they did not claim to have proven it. In which case I would want evidence.

While I believe that this phenomena could have created everything I don't believe that it had to. Energy is also something which could have existed eternally. The first law of thermodynamics indicates that energy can neither be created or destroyed. The laws of thermodynamics are not stable in microscopic systems therefore can not be used to prove conclusively that energy has always existed but they provide a basis for such belief which has never been falsified.

The second law indicates that if energy has existed eternally and if the laws of thermodynamics apply on a universal scale, then such a universe would not have a stable state it would go through periods of fundamental shifts in its nature.

A simple and commonly understood such shift is the idea of a cyclic universe. Energy expands from a microscopic singularity, in accordance with the first law of thermodynamics it attempts to spread itself evenly throughout the universe. Since gravity is not bound by the laws of thermodynamics, this spread is not uniform and instead spreads in packets bound by gravity. These packets become galaxies, solar systems etc.

In some places gravity pulls the energy(and matter which can result from a change in the state of energy) together tightly enough to form "black holes" that energy other than Hawkings radiation can not escape from. However in most cases the energy continues to escape the counter force of gravity and expand as it will to fill empty space resulting in entropy.

Eventually in accordance with the second law all of the energy not contained in Black holes will have spread to a point of theoretical maximum entropy, i.e it is to diffuse too do any work. This state has been referred to as the "heat death" of the universe. However as Gravity remains as a source of work, this energy will be collected in to the black holes reversing the entropy. The black holes also absorb one another until all that remains is a single massive black hole which compresses itself past its maximum density threshold. At which point all of the stored energy is released explosively in a zero entropy state to begin the next cycle.

This second theory is also consistent with science.

My belief is that one or both of these are the case. Therefore there is no origin, and since no creative intelligence has been established there is no reason to accept that there was a creation event or creator.

Or to give the simple answer that Ray is commonly given. "There was never a time when there was nothing"

This is how it would sound in person.

2009-04-19T23:57:00.000-07:00

This is a video of actors doing dramatic readings of comments posted on fundamentalist message boards. It is funny and a little scary. I have read comments on many blogs and forums that I thought were insane. It is much worse hearing it spoken.

I would love to see this done with some of the posters from Atheist Central or better yet Landover Baptist.

For IamtheRabbit

2009-04-19T18:05:00.000-07:00

this is the Goth quote generator from the brunching shuttlecocks.

It had to start somewhere.

2009-04-19T02:47:00.000-07:00

This one is a bit long but... Damn I'm good.

2009-04-18T22:56:00.000-07:00

Someone presented this argument as proof of the existence of God.

(1) If there ever was a time when nothing at all existed, then there would be absolutely nothing today. It is an axiomatic truth that if nothing exists, then “nothing” will be the case -always, for nothing simply remains nothing - forever! Nothing plus nothing equals nothing. If there is absolutely nothing but nothing, there cannot ever be something. “Nothing” and “something” -applied to the same object, at the same time - are mutually exclusive terms.

(2) Since it is the case that something does now exist, one must logically conclude that something has existed always. Let us state the matter again: If nothing cannot produce something, and yet something exists, then it follows necessarily that something has existed always. The question then becomes this. What is the “something” that has been in existence always?

(3) In logic, the “law of the excluded middle” states that a thing either is, or it is not. A line either is straight, or it is not straight.

Let us apply this principle to the matter at hand. Something has existed forever. That “something” must be either material in nature, or non-material. If it can be demonstrated that the eternal “something” is not material in nature, then it must follow that the eternal “something” is non-material in nature.

Another term for the “non-material” would be “spirit.” The question now becomes — what does the available evidence reveal? Is it the case that “matter” has existed forever, or does the evidence argue that the eternal “something” is non-matter, i.e., spirit?

(4) The most reputable scientists in the world concede that “matter” is not eternal. In his book, Until the Sun Dies (New York: W.W. Norton, 1977), Dr. Robert Jastrow, founder of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, and himself a professed agnostic, describes his perception of the initial creation of the universe. He speaks of that moment when “the first particles of matter appear” (21), thus, prior to that moment, matter did not exist.

Subsequently, he declares emphatically that “modern science denies an eternal existence to the Universe?” (30). There is not a particle of evidence that the universe has existed forever. The very fact that scientists attempt to assign an “age” to the universe is revealing within itself.

(5) In view of the foregoing, namely that something has always existed, and yet that “something” is not of a material nature, the student of logic is irresistibly forced to the conclusion that the “something” that is eternal is non-material — which means it must be “spirit” in its essence. The Scriptures identify that spirit Being as God. “God is spirit?” (Jn. 4:24) — an uncreated, eternal Spirit Being.

I pwned this stupid premise with the following.

Your entire logical chain hinges on the assumption that something that exists eternally must be non material in nature. Therefore if a case can be made showing either that a material thing can exist eternally or that a non natural non material thing can not be shown to exist or a non material thing which is also natural can be shown to exist then your argument fails.

I will do all three.

The first. Can a material thing exist eternally.?

As any discussion of the origin if any of the universe are speculative in nature the words of any expert can not be held as authoritative in the absence of an evidence supported theory, mathematical proof, or at the very least clear consensus. None of these exist to support your premise.

While I am not criticizing the work of Dr. Robert Jastrow. I find no supporting references that indicate he is one of the most reputable scientists in the world.

There may be a case for matter being unable to have existed eternally but the same can not be applied to energy. It is plausible that energy has existed eternally and this has not been refuted.

The first law of thermodynamics states that

Energy can neither be created nor destroyed. It can only change forms.
In any process, the total energy of the universe remains the same.

While there is no proof that this would apply in the conditions of a singularity there is also no evidence that it would not. There is only evidence that it might not due to the instability of thermodynamics in microscopic systems.

If the first law is correct and it has not been proven incorrect even in the proposed circumstances. Then energy must have always existed and since energy and matter can transition from one to the other matter can have come from energy.

Contrary to what has been stated by some the second law does not refute the possibility of an eternally existing universe. The laws of thermodynamics do not reference gravity, therefore even in a state of maximum entropy gravity would remain as a source of work which could as an attractor entity reverse or reset entropy. I have previously posted as an example that if the universe had reached "heat death" the energy in an entropic state would be collected by black holes when these black holes had collected all available energy there would be no barrier to them attracting and absorbing other black holes until all had been consolidated in to a universal singularity which contains all of the universes energy at a zero entropy state. When such a singularity reaches its ultimate density threshold it would release this energy back in to the universe to begin accumulating entropy again.

The second. Has a non natural non material thing been shown to exist?

This is much shorter. No non natural non material thing has been demonstrated to exist.

The last: Is there a natural non material thing which has existed eternally and has the ability to create energy and or matter?

There is a natural non material thing that has existed eternally. Space. Space is non material but it is not nothing. It has been shown to have shape and structure and to conform to certain rules. This shows that it is not "nothing" it is something and it is non material.

If space is defined as something and there is an absence of anything material quantum vacuum friction could result. Quantum mechanics demonstrates that quantum vacuum friction can spontaneously create particles. Therefore Space itself is a natural non material thing which has existed eternally and has the potential to create matter or energy.

Therefore your argument fails all three proofs of its accuracy.

This one almost made me crap my pants.

2009-04-18T20:08:00.000-07:00

Teabagging

2009-04-17T14:35:00.000-07:00

At first I had big hopes for the "Tea Parties" I thought they were going to be like the Boston tea party. We would all rise up against the companies getting the bailouts, and trash their stuff. A grand gesture to our corrupt government that we were not going to take them stealing from us to pour money down the throats of their corporate masters.

Unfortunately it turned out to be just a stunt pulled by FOX news and a bunch of right wing douchebag organizations. No plan, no actions, just a handful of people standing around saying me too.

When this country ready to do something to fix itself I will join a real tea party, but I am not going to be a teabagger.

How dare they mess with Stewie.

2009-04-10T12:37:00.000-07:00

This Article is about a Bunch of FundyTards lobbying advertisers to pull out from Family Guy, because basically it is Dirty and Atheistic. As a dirty atheist I object and encourage everyone else to object also.

The bitching christofascists in question provide This form to send E-mail to the CEOs and VPs of Sprint-Nextel (Boost Mobile), Unilever (Axe), Brinker International (Chilis Grill), KIA (Spectra), Yum Brands (Taco Bell), Volkswagen, Southern Ford Dealers, Amscot and Pepsi (Mountain Dew) but it may be that they delete any that don't support them.

I am also going to send my own E-mails to the advertisers.

Nothing yet

2009-04-07T23:07:00.000-07:00

I hope to start blogging soon but for now I am just getting started, I am also a bit intoxicated. That is entirely due to the best part of a bottle of good wine that accompanied an amazing dinner. I butchered up a beef tenderloin and grilled it over charcoal with salt pepper and smoked paprika. I also had some skewers of shrimp, and some skewers of vegetables tomatoes, mushrooms, and pearl onions. I am sure I am the only one who cares about my dinner but as I said I am a bit drunk.

Anyway once I am in full possession of my faculties I will have something to put up on my blog.