Is God just a delusion?

 There is a new book discussion being held by the Purdue Reading Group. They will be discussing The God Delusion.

Is God just a delusion? Is it the duty of "enlightened" minds to deny
any existence of a heavenly being? Are you lost in the desert, looking
for answers? Then meet us across from Oasis in the Union to discuss
Dawkins' book "The God Delusion."

When: Noon on Tuesday, February 16
Where: Study room across from Oasis in the Purdue Memorial Union
What: The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
Who: Anybody who has an open mind and is searching for answers.

The discussion group has a website and a facebook page. On the facebook page the major points will be posted after each meeting to allow those of us who cannot attend to participate in the discussion. The readings for each meeting will also be posted on the website. I wish I could attend this one but I am in class from 9:30-2:45 straight (no breaks) on Tuesdays. However, I will most likely still follow along on the facebook page and post about it here. I guess I will finally have to break down and buy the book as I cannot stand reading books online and I insist on owning every book I read, which drives my wife crazy. Too bad atheist groups do not give away free copies of The God Delusion like churches give away copies of the Bible.

Send an Atheist to Church

The local Non-Theists Society is doing a charity event called “Send an Atheist to Church”. On Feb. 18 and 19 they will be in the Union with some different Christian denominations (I do not know which ones). They will be taking donations that will go towards the Food Finders Food Bank of Tippecanoe County. With each donation they will ask to which denomination the donation should be associated with. This is to figure out how many non-theists will be attending each church, the more money that is donated on behalf of a specific church, the more non-theists who will attend that church’s services. Afterwards each person who attended a particular church service will write a short piece on their experience. I look forward to reading them. I will most likely stop by and donate on behalf of the LDS Church to see if anyone will attend our services.

Pat Robertson is a True Christian: So saith Dawkins

By now everyone has heard about the earthquake in Haiti. Some are estimating that the death toll may reach 200,000. Whenever a natural disaster of this magnitude occurs one can always count on Pat Robertson to give his, usually illogical, opinion as to why the event occurred. By now his comments on the earthquake in Haiti have been heard by most everyone as they made national news. In case you have not heard exactly what he said, here it is in all its inane glory.

They were under the heel of the French. You know, Napoleon III, or whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, we will serve you if you'll get us free from the French. True story. And so, the devil said, okay it's a deal [...] ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after the other.

His comments have drawn well deserved criticism and condemnation from many groups and people, including other Christians. But, it seems, those Christians condemning Robertson’s bigotry are not in fact “true” Christians, at least according to Richard Dawkins.

Dawkins is not really the friendliest person when it comes to interactions with religion and religious believers. His work on religion generally follows the pattern of painting with the widest brush available and can be insulting even at the best of times (except when it comes to Biology which he is surprisingly good at). But this time his attempt at criticizing religion (and I emphasize attempt) has crossed from the realm of “Extremist Overgeneralization”, to the point where his criticisms become useless, to being “So Stupid, It’s Funny” in his most recent article, Haiti and the hypocrisy of Christian theology.

Needless to say, milder-mannered faith-heads* are falling over themselves to disown Pat Robertson, just as they disowned those other pastors, evangelists, missionaries and mullahs at the time of the earlier disasters.
What hypocrisy.
Loathsome as Robertson's views undoubtedly are, he is the Christian who stands squarely in the Christian tradition.
It is the obnoxious Pat Robertson who is the true Christian here.

According to Dawkins, Pat Robertson’s recent comments represent someone who is a “true Christian”. It is not the millions upon millions of people who claim the title of Christian and simply go about their lives trying to live them the best they can without interfering with other people’s lives, but the minority of extremists Christians who preach hatred and bigotry that are the “true Christians”. It is not the people who send thousands of pounds of needed supplies, teams of doctors, and provide much needed shelter, for Haitians who are currently suffering, but the people who claim Haiti somehow deserved the tragedy that befell the nation who are the “true Christians”.

I am not sure I have ever seen someone trying so hard to validate their bigotry. In his flailing Dawkins attempts to marginalize non-extremist Christians (you know, the majority of all Christians) in what I can only guess is an attempt to make his criticisms seem somehow valid as opposed to the overgeneralizations that they truly are the majority of the time. And his flailing does not stop there, it continues in the article.

Where was God in Noah's flood? He was systematically drowning the entire world, animal as well as human, as punishment for 'sin'. Where was God when Sodom and Gomorrah were consumed with fire and brimstone? He was deliberately barbecuing the citizenry, lock stock and barrel, as punishment for 'sin'.

I hope no one tells him about all us Christians who do not take the Bible to be infallible and completely literal. It may cause his little imaginary world he has built around Christians to come tumbling down. Although I find it hard to believe that Dawkins has yet to encounter non-literalists as they have existed for over a thousand years. Any serious study in Christian theology should reveal religious scholars have warned against interpreting scripture too literally since at least the time of Augustine of Hippo (4th Century)†. I realize this advice has not always been taken but trying to imply that it never existed is simply disingenuous.




*Faith-heads, seriously? Where did he pick this term up, an elementary school playground?
†De Genesi ad literam 1:19–20, Chapt. 19 [408] and 2:9

St. Cloud Secular Student Alliance

The Secular Student Alliance is a student atheist group at St. Cloud University in Minnesota. They are a new chapter who is just getting started on their campus.

SSA’s goal is to work as an umbrella organization for students who are without religion. SSA works with atheists, agnostics, humanists and other non religious students.

“The official mission statement is to create a sense of community for every loosely related irreligious group,” Maddox said.
SSA is a non political group. Maddox said members included every aspect of the political spectrum including liberals and conservatives. SSA does take a political stance for separation of church and state, however.
SSA has been tabling in Atwood to promote their group. They have also sponsored a social event which included playing “Apples to Apples” with the Campus Crusade for Christ, ping pong and a movie night.
“The metaphor I would use is we’re trying to say hello to the campus,” Maddox said.
SSA has a committee that works with Campus Crusade for Christ.

What really struck me as interesting is the last bit about the group having a specific committee for working with Campus Crusade for Christ. I think that is a great idea to foster better communication and dialogue between the two groups. I wonder if our local Non-Theists Society has such a group. It would be neat if they did.

 Thanks to Friendly Atheist for original article.

Blog-whoring for Jesus

If you have not heard, the Thomas Society and the Students for Free Thought at Ohio State will be building houses in New Orleans this spring break. Naturally both the groups need to raise the funding required to pay for things such as gas, food, and various expenses. To help with this they decided to hold a live video blogging event which The Amazing Atheist agreed to host. They had quite a few guests including some big names from the atheist community.

What do we have planned for this event? Oh, all kinds of atheist/christian goodness. First, we will have the PZ/preacher event. Then, we will have giveaways such as a signed edition of Ray Comfort’s debacle and a promised signed copy of my novel. Not to mention the special guests like Hemant Mehta, atheist vidbloggers like ZOMgitscriss, and Keith Jensen, the atheist comedian from the Coexist comedy tour.*

Unfortunately I missed most of the live blogging but I did catch part of the discussion with Hemant Mehta. The parts I saw seemed to be a relaxed conversation between friends that was also kind of humorous at points. As for the part with PZ, Thomas gave a short description of how he was planning on the discussion to go and it sounds like it was supposed to be fairly similar. Basically, it was not structured to be some kind of heated debate or argument. This was supposed to be a discussion with the main intention of raising money for a humanitarian trip. I say this because apparently comments made by some Christians, in the chat room during the discussion, suggested some people expected differently.

So, I did this little interview with PZ Myers and I think people had unrealistic expectations. I think people wanted to see a knock down drag out fight.

First, that was never my plan. As this was an interview, I wasn’t out to lead PZ into a trap or make him look like an idiot. Some people even wrote that I should tell PZ he is going to hell.

Or, I got this comment a lot, “This preacher is a nice guy, but he obviously doesn’t know his faith.”

Rolling eyes.

Sometimes, I think people really do enjoy rolling in the crap.

However, it was not only Christians who expected a “knock down drag out fight”. It seems many atheists expected it as well, judging from the nearly 100 comments on PZ’s blog about the event. Here are a few examples:

· Yeah, PZ doesn't look as clear but he sure speaks more clearly. The pastor stutters and doesn't make any kind of sense. Another nice guy who doesn't know how to think straight. Sad really.

· The pastor certainly was fuzzy/fluffy in his thinking. And he has no idea of real evidence...

· "Theology is self-correcting, like science."- I hurt my side laughing at that statement.

· Couldn't watch all the way to the end. The pastor just keep ranting on and on. He said he didn't agree with the "God of the Gaps" idea, however, when PZ asked what compelled him to Christianity, he basically pulled out that argument and was ranting on about nothing.

· I really enjoyed the interview. The pastor seems like a nice guy, but never could give a passable defense of Christianity. His tap dancing around the obvious was amusing.

· Ah, after I left the tone concern strategy came into play !
That will soon be all that believers have left to defend their bigotry and superstitions.
So expect more of it...:-)

· Ugh, he was way more fuzzier than PZ despite the connection when it came to the discussions. I figured he would have to be for a guy that seems so understanding and accepting despite holding on to Christianity. It makes me tired just to think of the mental gymnastics going on in his head to make everything fit.

· I might have guessed - a glibertarian arsehole. Well fuck off then.

Posters were even asking for what would amount to a full defense of Christianity from Thomas. After declining to do so there, as the comment section on another person’s blog was hardly the place for such a discussion, he was ridiculed from people claiming he did not want to be “laughed out of the room” followed by claims of attempted “blogwhoring”.

The Thomas Society - blogwhoring for Jesus since 1994!

And those comments are not all. There are still more at PZ’s blog along with an equal amount at Thomas’ blog. All this over a discussion meant to generate funding for a charity trip. Here is a response from Thomas expressing his surprise over the veracity of the comments he received.

I’m trying hard not to post a blistering rant this morning. It seems like people are more pissed that I didn’t confirm their little fantasy that all Christians are people hating morons, so they have to find something wrong. What did they find wrong? That I actually agreed with PZ that some pastors are in it for the money and that science is a good thing. Horrors. Shrug. Oh well.

This whole fiasco made me wonder, we hear atheists ranting about the evils and bigotry of religious followers all the time. Now of those who do so, how many are actually interested in holding a friendly, two-way, discussion with believers? And I am not talking about the larger names in atheism, as it seems those who appeared in this event are, at the least, capable of doing so. I am talking about your every day atheist who participates in the religious debate dialogue. Just how many of them are willing to step back from the constant arguments and insult exchanging and have a relaxed discussion with someone of opposite belief? Perhaps both sides could then come to the realization that the other side is comprised of actual people.



*PZ and the Preacher: Saturday Night!!!

I am a Skeptic

On the site I wrote about in my last post, Mormon Scholars Testify, I found a very interesting testimony written by Ron Hellings from Montana State University who works in theoretical physics. I love his first sentence,

I am a skeptic.

It seems today that many atheists all but lay complete claim to the term skeptic*. A very large number of atheistic organizations include “skeptic”, or some variation, in their name and many atheist blogs talk about skepticism on a regular basis. But what you almost never see or hear is someone saying that it is possible to be a skeptic and religious. I think this is partially responsible to an underlying implication that in order to be skeptical of something, one must either reject it or remain neutral towards it. Thus, the implication is that when directed towards religion, to be a "skeptic" one must, to some degree or another, reject religion. I am not saying that this idea is advocated directly and intentionally, but it definitely is implied in many instances.

His testimony is very worth reading and I suggest it even to atheists as a way to understand why some of us believe.





*Here is an example of the internal debate over if being a skeptic requires being an atheist.

Mormon Scholars Testify

It is always frustrating when anti-theists claim that religion, in general, is a hindrance to education, reasoning, and learning (See this post for an example). Mormon Scholars Testify is an interesting new site, started by Daniel C. Peterson, Scott Gordon, and Tanya Spackman, that helps dispels this mantra of "religion = lower intelligence".

One of the unique characteristics of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is its emphasis on education and scholarship. Studies have shown that among Latter-day Saints (Mormons), higher levels of education are strongly correlated with higher church attendance, and higher levels of devotion. (see footnote)
In LDS scripture, Mormons are encouraged to study and learn. In the book Doctrine and Covenants, a book considered to be a collection of modern day revelation from God, it says:
D & C 109: 7 And as all have not faith, seek ye diligently and teach one another words of wisdom; yea, seek ye out of the best books words of wisdom, seek learning even by study and also by faith;
This website gives LDS scholars the opportunity to express their views and feelings about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. There are some who may feel that people of education and learning can’t be religious. It is hoped that these testimonies will help dispel that myth, educate, and give insights into the thoughts and feelings of LDS scholars.
Each page will have the testimony of the scholar and at the bottom of the page you will be able to read the credentials of the scholar. We hope you enjoy reading these testimonies.
———-
• Stan L. Albrecht, Tim B. Heaton, “Secularization, Higher Education, and Religiosity,” Review of Religious Research 26/1, Special Issue Co-Sponsored by the Society for the Sociological Study of Mormon Life and the Family and Demographic Institute of Brigham Young University (September 1984): 437-58. Link to off site article
• James T. Duke, ed., Latter-day Saint Social Life (Provo, Utah: Religious Studies Center, 1998), 287

Hopefully we will be getting some people from Purdue up soon. I know of at least one person who is more than qualified.

Atheism

In the past century, nothing has been the catalyst of more grief, hatred, war, and crime than atheism. Atheism allows a person to hate, kill, torture, or steal, while allowing him to recuse himself of all blame. Atheism causes people to break the laws of ethics and morality for they have no God to answer to. The only morals they posses, if any, are those they pick and choose for themselves.

Atheism dulls the mind and weakens the senses. It makes "I felt like it" seem like a reasonable answer to anything at all, squelching questions of why, and how, and when. It gives rise to the reasoning such as Social Darwinism that states giving aid to the poor, workers rights, universal education, and welfare should be avoided as they interfere with the natural order of social competition*.

Atheism spreads like disease through societies, rarely coexisting with pre-existing mythologies, rather preferring to conquer or be conquered. Atheism is anything but tolerant.

Theists are not afraid to point out that which is true: atheism is ridiculous. Mental delusion and atheism are synonymous, and none is better than another. Atheism is malicious, malevolent, and unworthy of respect.

You probably knew that already.

We're respectful of the American People's individual rights to practice as they see fit (equal to our rights to do the same), but this does not mean we have to respect the decision. If you choose to ignore faith and reason in order to deny a higher power, you've made a ridiculous decision and we're not going to pretend it's "just another way of looking at things".

We challenge the ethics of the professional liars who claim to speak for atheists to bilk other people into giving away their faith in exchange for mere pleasures of the flesh and immorality. We also challenge the ethics of the politicians who use government to further their atheist agenda, and vice versa. We will not let anyone's atheism infiltrate our schools, our government, or our pockets, at least not without a good fight.

Atheism, the antagonist of religion, is the only "ism" that claims a monopoly on intelligence and rational thinking. Atheism is the complete lack of what makes human beings special, the ability to believe there is something more. In atheism the only thing one can look forward to is the finality of death and the realization that they are meaningless specks in this universe that could not care less about their existence. The only real contribution they could achieve in death is to leave their rotting corpse out in an open field in hopes that some equally poor and meaningless wandering animal may gain one more meal before it too succumbs to the inevitable of being wiped from all existence as if the universe cared. After all, feeding their bodies to wild animals would be the greatest contribution an atheist could ever hope to give to the world. And judging from the screams of world climatologists it would be better if atheists did this sooner rather than later.




Well if you have made it this far and are still reading you can relax now and know that I am not being serious. The article above was originally from American Atheists and directed towards religion. I took it and altered the wording sufficiently to make it refer to atheism while still conveying basically the same, illogical, point. I originally posted this on a religious debate forum as a kind of social experiment. The original article had come up in a thread and, after being pointed out that it was nothing more than polemic bigotry by a couple posters, was defended by atheists who claimed it was perfectly legitimate “criticism”. A few even claimed that those who found the article to be offensive were nothing but self martyrs. I decided to post a variant of the article, directed towards atheism, in a totally different thread, as if I were a troll, to see what would happen. As one would expect I got a string of responses from atheists who were *gasp* offended. I decided not to intervene in the frenzy and waited till another poster figured it out and let the cat out of the bag. Some people were relieved I was not serious, some tried to save face, and others were a little impressed with the experiment.

Ultimately, the main point I was going for became clearly visible for many to see. It is much easier to see bigotry and hatred when it is directed directly at you. And further, it can be extremely difficult to spot such behavior when it is directed towards a group whom you already disagree with (confirmation bias).

*You can read more on this from Kenneth Miller's Finding Darwin's God, pg. 174-5. I did a series of posts on his book you can view here.

No Gods Solstice Sign

This holiday season the Freedom from Religion Foundation will be, again, placing a sign upon the Illinois Capitol Hill. They originally placed the sign in 2008 as a response to a Nativity scene.

The Foundation put up its first solstice display in 2008 in Springfield in response to the state's decision to allow a religious group to plant a nativity display in the Capitol. The state granted the Foundation's permit application.
"We don't think religion, or irreligion, belongs in state capitols," noted Dan Barker, Foundation co-president and author of the book, "Godless: How an Evangelical Preacher Became One of America's Leading Atheists."
"But if a state is going to permit a nativity display and create a public forum, then we want to be sure that the views of the 15 percent of the U.S. population who is not religious are also represented."

First let’s start with their reasoning for putting up the sign, shown above. There is nothing wrong with thinking that religious displays should not be placed on government property. However, if they are going to be allowed, and all different views are welcome as they most obviously are in this case, what is the problem? The main point that is usually brought up in these cases is discrimination and the government forcing one particular religion. In this instance, that is not happening. The government is allowing multiple views to be represented, not just one. I fail to see how one could construe one religion gaining favor or preference when dissenting views are also allowed to be expressed.

Second, there is the exact wording of the sign itself. My main response is, “And people wonder why atheists have a reputation for being ass holes?”. When there are groups like the FFRF claiming to represent all atheists, as they do in the quote above, the general reactions are bound to be negative. For example here is one atheist’s reaction to the sign,

To me it is obviously offensive and targets religion and I think takes advantage of freedom of speech. Basically it is a "low blow" and feels like they are going to the same level of religious fundamentalists and I think we can rise above childish things like that and put something intelligent out there.

There is also the blatant lie that their sign claims to represent all atheists in the United States.

we want to be sure that the views of the 15 percent of the U.S. population who is not religious are also represented.

They do not represent the views of the non-religious in the US. They represent some of the views of the non-religious; there is a very large difference. Frankly, if they did represent all of the atheists I would be severely disturbed and slightly scared for my safety if 15% of the population held me in an equal amount of contempt as the FFRF appears to.

It is also extremely ironic, and a little hypocritical, that the FFRF would mention the Winter Solstice in their hope for “reason to prevail” this season. For in their condemnation of a modern religious celebration, Christmas, they reference an event that is, historically, even more mired in religion and religious symbolism than Christmas is today in its present state.

I wonder what the FFRF thought the reaction would be to their sign. Any religious person who reads it is going to find it purposefully insulting and the only ones who are going to fully agree with it are the militant anti-theists, basically preaching to the choir. Do they honestly think being insulting is going to cause religious groups in the future to refrain from putting up displays? If they do I would place that right at the level of second grade bully tactics. The reactionary character of their sign also intrigues me. One group is allowed to place a religious display so the FFRF must respond, and the response must be negative and insulting. It is like a child who is initially offered a toy and turns it down, yet proceeds to throw a tantrum should their sibling be allowed to play with it.

And one last note:
There is no such thing as “Freedom from Religion”. There is “Freedom of Religion”. The two are completely different as one mandates an infringement upon a person’s individual rights while the other does not. An atheist is no more free from my religion as I am free from their atheism. Stating a person is to be free from religion is equivalent to stating a person is to be free from being offended. This is ironic considering if the freedom to never be offended actually did exist than the FFRF certainly would not.

Tis The Season

The holidays are here again. The stores are packed with shoppers, lights and decorations adore homes and buildings, I ritualistically listen to my Celtic Christmas CD, and atheists feel the need to let the ignorant masses know the “true” meaning of Christmas, wait, what?

It always surprises me the number of atheist posters, bloggers, organizations, and groups who feel an incessant urge to announce the true origins of Christmas to Christians. The exact reasons for wanting to do so seem to vary but there are three main ones I have seen.

First is an apparent hopefulness that some Christians will become “enlightened” and deconvert. This reason is nothing but wishful, and ideological, thinking that usually falls under the Assumption of Peculiarity. They think they have found some kind of damming evidence and are just dying to let others know about it thinking that we, Christians, will read it and go “Oh my, my entire faith must be a sham!”. The reality tends to be closer to “oh look, another atheist ‘exposing’ the origins of Christmas” followed by either a soft chuckle of amusement or sigh of annoyance.

Some claim they bring up the origins of Christmas as a response to the War on Christmas controversy. They are annoyed by people who clamor about the War on Christmas so they, in turn, bringing up the roots of Christmas as their way of retaliating. Basically it is two wrongs make a right. Not much explaining needed here.

Finally, a reason I have seen it brought up has to do with sayings such as “Jesus is the reason for the season”. They argue that Jesus cannot be the reason as the holiday had different origins.  So what? The meaning people had for a particular holiday centuries ago has no bearing upon what meaning people give to it today. This argument I find particularly hypocritical considering that many atheists celebrate Christmas as well despite not believing in either the God associated with it today, or the gods/pagan celebrations associated with it from long ago. If they can celebrate the holiday without adhering to its origins I see no reason other people can not as well.