Arkansas and 5 Other States Still in the Dark Ages.

I think it's really funny when Christians cry out that they're being persecuted. Christians can hold public office in any state in America. There are no laws against god-believers in the public service. Too bad the same cannot be said for atheists in Arkansas and a handful of other states:

"Arkansas is one of half a dozen states that still exclude non-believers from public office. Article 19 Section 1 of the 1874 Arkansas Constitution states that "No person who denies the being of a God shall hold any office in the civil departments of this State, nor be competent to testify as a witness in any court."

If you don't believe in God, you are legally barred from public office, and you're not even legally allowed to testify in court. I'm literally appalled that such a law exists, despite the fact that such laws were deemed unconstitutional by the American Supreme Court in the 1960s.

So next time you hear a Christian spouting their persecution complex, remind them that at least they're not legally second-class citizens in half a dozen states.

EDIT: Seems this has also been covered by P.Z; might want to head over there for a more comprehensice writeup.

Because we atheists are the petty, immoral ones, right?

In what can only be called a display of true Christian values, our lovely bunch of freethinkers on campus have just been hit with a bit of a shock: the large poster for our University of Alberta Atheists and Agnostics group has been vandalized.

Sprawled across the canvas in what appears to be Sharpie, some "tolerant" person has written "God loves you!" and "Jesus is coming!", and added a couple of hearts and crosses to top it all off. Admittedly, it's not as harsh as something like "Burn in hell, atheist scum", but nevertheless, this is a blatant display of the hypocrisy in the Christian community: they talk about love and peace and tolerance, and in the same breath someone vandalizes a completely inoffensive poster of their opposition.

Perhaps it was simply done by some random person "for teh lulz". Perhaps not. Undoubtedly, the Christian groups on campus will dismiss this as an act by someone who isn't "a true Christian" (and frankly, I don't think any of the groups were involved - I'd like to think they have a bit more maturity than to resort to petty vandalism).

This is the first real act of disrespect (I hesitate to call it "hatred", since, for all we know, this could have been done by someone who really thought they were trying to save us from hell and were committing an act of "love") that our group has faced. Now that our group is becoming more vocal about different issues, I doubt it will be the last. Let's hope it's the worst.

EDIT: Looks like the bottom portion of the poster, containing our group email address and website address, was cut off as well. Not content with simply vandalizing our work, they took it upon themselves to censor and silence us as well. Incredibly sad and pathetic.

EDIT 2: Seems like PZ Meyers has caught wind of our issue. Pretty awesome. He reaches a much wider audience than our group can, and it's important that we show people what kind of intolerance religious thinking leads to.

This has got to stop. Seriously.

The alarmists crying out over the LHC "destroying the Earth" need to stop. Despite repeated attempts from the scientific community assuring the public that the Earth is not going to be destroyed, people still worry that it will be.

It wont. Seriously.

And even though there is nothing to worry about, we need to stop the antiscience crowd from getting the public all worked up. This is why:

"A TEENAGE girl in central India killed herself on Wednesday after being traumatised by media reports that a "Big Bang" experiment in Europe could bring about the end of the world, her father said.

The 16-year old girl from the state of Madhya Pradesh drank pesticide and was rushed to the hospital but later died, police said."

This is incredibly sad, not just at the needless loss of life, but also because someone died believing in the words of uneducated antiscience non-experts.

I don't know how many times I need to say it: irrational beliefs HURT PEOPLE.
Tragic events of this nature happen when people hold irrational beliefs, be it religion or antiscience sentiments.

Although, if you ask me, killing yourself because you think the world is going to be destroyed seems kinda, well, futile.

Creationist tries real hard, gives scholarly reference, epic failure ensues

One thing that really casts the shadow of doubt across the events depicted in the Old Testament has to do with the story of the Exodus. In case you're not familiar with the story, it goes something like this:

A guy named Moses was born into a Jewish family but his mom stuck him in a basket and floated him down the Nile (he's damn lucky the crocodiles didn't get him). He was found by the Pharaoh's daughter and subsequently raised as an Egyptian until one day he kills a dude and God tells him "SURPRISE YOU'RE A JEW LOL". Moses then attempts to get the Pharaoh to let all the Jews leave Egypt by sending a multitude of plagues to convince him. Once free, they took a trip across the Red Sea by foot and wandered in the desert for 40 years.

No there lies a big problem with this story. A very big historical problem. The Egyptians were incredibly good at keeping records. They recorded everything. And we have lots of those records from the time that the Exodus supposedly happened (somewhere between 1600. BCE and 1200 BCE). Unfortunately for the Moses story, there is no record of it at all.

None. No record of anyone named Moses being adopted son of a Pharaoh, no record of plagues (they most certainly would have some reference to the worst of the plagues, the death of all first born sons in the kingdom!), no record of a mass number of Jews packing up their stuff and leaving, no mention of the Red Sea splitting in half so they could walk across... There is no reference at all to any of the Exodus story in the Egyptian records. And I've never heard of any explanation for why the Egyptians seemed to be too absentminded to record any of these events.

Until today.

From a guy named Enforcer from (of all places) the World of Warcraft forums:

"Totally false. Egypt very much has ancient records of Israelites in Egypt. One example is on the stele (an upright slab or pillar with an inscription) of Merneptah, the son of Rameses II, who reigned as Pharoah in the first half of the 13th century BC/BCE. It was discovered in Thebes in 1896. This is very important historically, as it shows that the Israelites were indeed present in ancient Egypt in significant numbers.

But aside from the artifacts, historians also say you're wrong. http://www.jstor.org/pss/1452555 at the University of Pennsylvania - An estimated one million Jews were present in ancient Egypt.

Moses' existence is corraborated with books from other independent authors. You never heard of Isaiah and Corrinthians too I imagine, besides the books of Deuteronomy?"

Will you look at that! A JSTOR reference and everything! How cute. Too bad he misses the freaking point entirely.

First of all, no one argues that there were no Jews in Egypt. There were plenty of Jews there. What we are arguing is that the Jews that lived there didn't gather their belongings one night and leave the next morning. Egyptian stelae showing Jews lived in Egypt does not prove that it did occur. In fact, stelae dating to periods later than the supposed Exodus which tell of Jews in Egypt might disprove the story since all the Jews were supposed to have left by then (assuming the stelae did not depict historical references; the context is important).

The JSTOR reference doesn't help his case. Again, it proves that Jews lived in ancient Egypt, which no one doubts. What it does not show is evidence for the Exodus. This is further evidenced by the creationist's lack of rudimentary reading skills: the paper goes into detail about Jews during the Hellenistic-Roman (aka Ptolemaic) period, which lasted about 305-30BCE. The Exodus supposedly occurred during the time of the Pharaoh's, which ended in the early 11th century BCE. The time referenced in the paper is about 1000 years too late!

And finally, he closes with a classic "using the Bible to prove what's in the Bible" argument. Isaiah and Corinthians might have originally come from different authors, but they're both books in the Bible, and have been subjected to the same mistranslations, twisting and editing that the other books in the Bible have. If you want to use independent sources, you need to look outside of the Bible. Good luck though, because there's yet to be a single independent source which corroborates the story of the Exodus.

Science and religion: are they mutually exclusive?

The argument over whether or not science and religion are incompatible is almost as old as empirical science itself, and the debate rages on today. Recently, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) released a video response to the propaganda-ridden documentary film, Expelled. The video is below:

It features a slew of scientists, like Francis Collins, talking about how their faith and their science don't compete with each other, hearkening to Stephen J Gould's non-overlapping magisteria. Now, I know that the idea that religion and science are compatible has come up alot recently concerning the subject of evolution, and I know that "theistic evolution" seems to be gaining popularity (that is, more theists are accepting evolution, rather than evolutionists accepting theism). The argument goes that God created the world and gave the spark of life, and then used evolution to guide the development of organisms.

But if you ask me, this is blatant doublethink. The Bible gives special precedence to humans. We are supposedly God's chosen organism. After all, he supposedly created the whole universe just to have a place to put us so we could worship him. Now, suppose that you could roll back time and start everything over again. God gives the spark of life and pushes the START button on evolution. What would happen? There are two possibilities. First, due to the random nature of mutations and chance effects of environmental pressures, evolution would proceed differently than it had the first time around. After 4.5 billion years, it would be very likely that humans would not be the dominant, intelligent lifeform, if humans would evolve at all. If that was the case, then how could humans be the "chosen" organism if our development was never a guarantee? The second possibility is that evolution would proceed exactly as it had the first time, the same mutations being made, the same environmental pressures arising; in a sense, evolution would be guided by God's hand, and each chance occurrence was fated to happen. In this case, the rules of evolution - namely, random mutations being directed and chosen by the environment - are violated; there is no chance or randomness if they were always fated to occur. In other words, God would have effectively created humans, albeit through a lengthy and drawn out process. Whichever of the two possibilities would occur, the conclusion is seemingly the same: there are areas of Biblical religion and evolution that are incompatible. Acceptance of one means you cannot accept 100% of the other.

But let's put theistic evolution aside for a moment. The bigger question that remains to be answered is whether or not science as a whole is incompatible with religion. As stated before, the AAAS seems to take the stance that religion and science are two separate fields that answer different kinds of questions. They are compatible because they have nothing to do with each other. I disagree with this idea completely.

If you accept the Biblical, Abrahamic God, then you accept a god who has influence on our physical world. Even if God is supernatural, and supposedly outside the reach of science, if he has an effect on our natural world, then there has to be an entirely naturalistic mechanism by which this happens. Even the creation of the universe, a material, physical thing, would require a naturalistic explanation. Such mechanisms ARE within the realm of scientific inquiry. Science and religion, therefore, do overlap, do conflict. Unless, of course, you subscribe the the belief of a God that is utterly outside physical experience, and does not interact with the material world. Then, I ask, what is the point of such a God? The existence of such a God would have no practical difference than if he did not exist at all; belief would be pointless (and a waste of time with all the praying and worshipping).

Moreover, scientific investigation has time and time again shown many things in the Bible to be blatantly false; and if some parts of the Bible are false, how can we be sure that other parts of the Bible are not also false? How can one believe that any part of the Bible is true - literally or otherwise - if science has continually shown it to be flawed?

It seems to be that science and religion are mutually exclusive. You cannot be 100% scientific and 100% religious simultaneously. Full acceptance of one requires only partial acceptance of the other; and if you are only "partly" scientific then you're a bad scientist. Likewise, if you are only "partly" religious, you're a poor Christian/Muslim/Jew etc (or at least, you're cherry picking the parts you wish to believe in, with no clear criteria for your choice). I feel that any attempt to reconcile religion with science is merely an attempt at desperately holding on to something that makes you "comfortable" with life, something that makes you "happy".

Science is not about what makes you happy. It's about finding the truth. And when it comes to truth, religion has a habit of falling short.

Scientists are so ignorant!

EDIT: For some reason this entire post disappeared. I cant embed the video at work because the computers in the lab hate Youtube...I'll fix it when I get home
-cwgk

EDIT AGAIN: Alright, fixed :)



If I didn't know for a fact that Edward Current's videos were satire, then I would be compelled to think that this video was entirely serious. That's the sad reality of the anti-science being pushed by Evangelical Christians.

Check out Current's other videos if you like satire done well.

More sillyness from the crazies at WorldNetDaily

The crazies over at WorldNetDaily have sent their monkeys to their typewriters again and have produced an article not entirely unlike what you would expect from simians banging away at a keyboard. Columnist Dennis Prager has written up a list of the "deleterious consequences of secularism". Alot of them are simple rehashes of the same, tired, religious arguments we've all heard a million times over. Nevertheless, let's dissect them one by one, shall we?

1. Without God, there is no good and evil; there are only subjective opinions that we then label "good" and "evil." This does not mean that an atheist cannot be a good person. Nor does it mean that all those who believe in God are good; there are good atheists and there are bad believers in God. It simply means that unless there is a moral authority that transcends humans from which emanates an objective right and wrong, "right" and "wrong" no more objectively exist than do "beautiful" and "ugly."

Prager here has made one large, fatal, assumption: he assumes that "good" and "evil" can only be defined by God. In actuality, "good" and "evil" have been determined almost entirely by our societies and by simple facts of human nature. Stealing is "evil" because it puts innocent people at a disadvantage. Buying a homeless guy a sandwich is "good" because it helps someone live their life easier. These are not metaphysical concepts handed down by some sky God; rather they can simply be explained as artifacts of our human evolution. Humans everywhere, regardless of whether or not they live in a secular society, have morals because morals were necessary for our distant ancestors to survive. Living in a society conferred a distinct survival advantage, and those acts which helped such societies flourish are those which we deem "good". Likewise, acts which were detrimental to the functioning of society are those we deem "bad". Our morals are not inscribed on slabs of stone, handed down from the Mount. They are inscribed on us through the course of our evolution.

Furthermore, if our moral compass were given to us via God, then one would expect that there would be some sort of moral absolute. This is indeed not the case. While, for the most part, societies have the same morals - no killing, stealing, lying - many societies have slight variations. Why did the Vikings think it was morally acceptable to pillage helpless monks along the coasts of England, while at the same time, they had very harsh punishments for murder? If there was moral absolutism, then their actions should have been morally abhorrent to them. Pillaging was something that helped their society survive, and it is likely that this is a large contributing factor to the moral acceptance of their pillaging actions.

Not only this, but God is possibly one of the worst candidates for determining "good" and "evil". If he were the authority on such matters, then I suppose slaughtering children for laughing at baldness is "good", and wearing polyester is "evil". I'd trust the moral relativism of human societies over the moral absolutism of God anyday.

2. Without God, there is no objective meaning to life. We are all merely random creations of natural selection whose existence has no more intrinsic purpose or meaning than that of a pebble equally randomly produced.

Again, Prager is making an unwarranted assumption: who says there needs to be a "higher" purpose to life? What intrinsic purpose is there to the life of an ant or a gazelle? Humans have no more of a purpose than any other animal, and assuming that humans should have a higher purpose is unjustifiably anthropocentric. Is this to say humans have no purpose beyond passing on our genes? Hardly. Humans can have a higher purpose - but that purpose is not given by any God. You give yourself a purpose in life. My purpose in life is to do scientific research, to learn, explain, and help make the world a better place. Living in a secular society, or denying God does not subtract from having a "purpose". Quite to the contrary, it gives you the freedom to choose your own purpose in life.

3. Life is ultimately a tragic fare if there is no God. We live, we suffer, we die – some horrifically, many prematurely – and there is only oblivion afterward.

I fail to see how this is a detrimental effect from a secular society. Sure, it's depressing, but that's the nature of reality. Life is not always sugar coated fun and games. Believing in something simply because it makes you happy is a pretty lousy reason for believing. If I were to go to the doctor, and he were to tell me that I was diagnosed with cancer, what good would it do to say "No, I prefer to believe that I'm healthy. Having cancer would be such a tragic fare"? One cannot forsake truth simply for comfort. All other creatures on the planet face the same tragic fare of life, suffering and death, and they seem to accept that fate. What we as humans can do is strive to reduce the suffering in the interim.

4. Human beings need instruction manuals. This is as true for acting morally and wisely as it is for properly flying an airplane. One's heart is often no better a guide to what is right and wrong than it is to the right and wrong way to fly an airplane. The post-religious secular world claims to need no manual; the heart and reason are sufficient guides to leading a good life and to making a good world.

We do have instruction manuals. We call call these instruction manuals "laws". To say that secular society claims that no manual is needed to keep our behaviour on the right track is tantamount to claiming secularists crave for anarchy. This is entirely untrue. As outlined in Point 1 above, we need rules for a functioning society, regardless of where those rules are derived from.

5. If there is no God, the kindest and most innocent victims of torture and murder have no better a fate after death than do the most cruel torturers and mass murderers. Only if there is a good God do Mother Teresa and Adolf Hitler have different fates.

Again, this is simply the cruel nature of life. It might be comforting to think that good people will suffer a fate better than those who are evil, but it isn't reality. In fact, belief that doing good will get you into heaven when you die only cheapens acts of kindness; shouldn't one be kind out of the goodness of your heart and not because you want to belong to some kind of exclusive club when you die?

6. With the death of Judeo-Christian values in the West, many Westerners believe in little. That is why secular Western Europe has been unwilling and therefore unable to confront evil, whether it was Communism during the Cold War or Islamic totalitarians in its midst today.

This is one giant non sequiter. What does "believing in little" have to do with "confronting evil"? Western Europe has not confronted the "evils" of Islamic totalitarians today or communism during the Cold War not because they didn't believe in anything, but because they did believe in something: acceptance and tolerance of people who's views may disagree with ours. If "believing in something" is simply rightwing speak for "intolerance and discrimination", then Western Europe is better off "not believing".

7. Without God, people in the West often become less, not more, rational. It was largely the secular, not the religious, who believed in the utterly irrational doctrine of Marxism. It was largely the secular, not the religious, who believed that men's and women's natures are basically the same, that perceived differences between the sexes are all socially induced. Religious people in Judeo-Christian countries largely confine their irrational beliefs to religious beliefs (theology), while the secular, without religion to enable the non-rational to express itself, end up applying their irrational beliefs to society, where such irrationalities do immense harm.

And it was largely the religious, not the secular, that burned "witches" at the stake in Salem, that believed a woman could turn into a pillar of salt, that believed in slavery was entitled to them by God. If you want to compare the irrational beliefs of secular people to those of religious people, you'll find the scale dips mightily on the religious side. It is absurd to say a secular society would breed irrationality because we have ample evidence both historical and modern that shows religious belief to spawn irrational thoughts that extend beyond the realm of theology (one only needs to take a look at the 2012 doomsayers/Nefilim conspiracy theorists to see this!). A secular society would teach people critical thinking, how to be rational, so irrational thoughts wouldn't need a place to be expressed. It is in a religious society, where every aspect of life is guided by an irrational belief based on an irrational book about an irrational god that does immense harm.

8. If there is no God, the human being has no free will. He is a robot whose every action is dictated by genes and environment. Only if one posits human creation by a Creator that transcends genes and environment who implanted the ability to transcend genes and environment can humans have free will.

The topic of free will is one of deep, interesting philosophical discussions, the details of which are not of the essence in this post. But to say that free will is only possible if humans were created by a Creator is setting up a false dichotomy. It is entirely possible that free will (or the illusion of it) came about during our evolution. I am by no means an expert on this subject, so I will direct interested parties to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy page on Free Will.

9.If there is no God, humans and "other" animals are of equal value. Only if one posits that humans, not animals, are created in the image of God do humans have any greater intrinsic sanctity than baboons. This explains the movement among the secularized elite to equate humans and animals.

Again, who says that humans need to have "greater intrinsic sanctity" than baboons, or lions, or goats? I have yet to hear a rational argument (or even an irrational one) regarding why humans need to be "better" than mice or deer or cattle. And if we really must have a greater intrinsic value, might it not be our sentience, our higher cognitive functions, our ability to think and reason (at least for some of us) that gives us that value? Why look to God to give us a special place on Earth when it can be found in our very own humanity?
The reason the "secularized elite" wish to equate humans and animals is because humans ARE animals. Animals can be defined as "A multicellular organism of the kingdom Animalia, differing from plants in certain typical characteristics such as capacity for locomotion, nonphotosynthetic metabolism, pronounced response to stimuli, restricted growth, and fixed bodily structure." Do we not fit such a description perfectly?

10. Without God, there is little to inspire people to create inspiring art. That is why contemporary art galleries and museums are filled with "art" that celebrates the scatological, the ugly and the shocking. Compare this art to Michelangelo's art in the Sistine Chapel. The latter elevates the viewer – because Michelangelo believed in something higher than himself and higher than all men.

This is probably one of the most absurd claims Ive heard. Admittedly, the works of many of the greatest artists have been inspired by religion, but to say that without God, there would be no inspiration for great art is ridiculous. The contrary is evident when you consider the likes of Pablo Picasso. Unarguably one of the most influential artists of modern times, Picasso was an atheist. God inspired none of his works, yet his works were great. Frank Lloyd Wright, an architect who designed some of the most famous modern buildings, was also an atheist. It should be obvious that God is not a requirement for great art.

11. Without God, nothing is holy. This is definitional. Holiness emanates from a belief in the holy. This explains, for example, the far more widespread acceptance of public cursing in secular society than in religious society. To the religious, there is holy speech and profane speech. In much of secular society, the very notion of profane speech is mocked.

Yet again, who says there needs to be "holiness"? Prager seems to have a habit of saying a secular society would be without something, yet not showing how that something is needed to a proper, functioning society. Of course there would be nothing holy in a secular society! Its a secular society! Unless someone can show me how holiness is necessary, then I fail to see how this is a detrimental effect of secularization.

12. Without God, humanist hubris is almost inevitable. If there is nothing higher than man, no Supreme Being, man becomes the supreme being.

See above.

13. Without God, there are no inalienable human rights. Evolution confers no rights. Molecules confer no rights. Energy has no moral concerns. That is why America's founders wrote in the Declaration of Independence that we are endowed "by our Creator" with certain inalienable rights. Rights depend upon a moral source, a rights giver.

Another "moral" argument. Humans have human rights but they were not given to us by God. We have decided on our own inalienable human rights based on our own humanity, based on helping other humans, in the name of fairness and equality. Why does the United Nations, a secular organization which represents countries of all cultures and faiths spend so much time on human rights if such rights do not exist in the absence of God? It's because they are right we have decided amongst ourselves to ensure everyone on the planet gets treated fairly and equally. In a religious society, the situation would be quite to the contrary. In a religious society, not everyone is equal, and not everyone is fair. "Human rights" would only apply to a select few - those that subscribe to the religion of choice. One only has to look as far as gay marriage to see that religious society denies rights rather than bestows them.

14. "Without God," Dostoevsky famously wrote, "all is permitted." There has been plenty of evil committed by believers in God, but the widespread cruelties and the sheer number of innocents murdered by secular regimes – specifically Nazi, Fascist and Communist regimes – dwarfs the evil done in the name of religion.

Ah, it was only a matter of time until Prager whipped out a reductio ad hitlerum argument tied into a strawman argument. First of all, the Nazi regime was not a secular regime in the least. Gott Mit Uns was the national motto for crying out loud! Hitler was explicitly Christian, and anger over the idea that the Jews killed Jesus was one of the contributing factors to his plan of wiping out the Jews. There is a literal wealth of information identifying Hitler and the Nazi regime as religious that I wont bother to go into all the detail. Not to mention that fascist Italy had direct ties with the Vatican, and Mussolini was endorsed by the Pope himself.
Secondly, there has never - NEVER - been a case where innocents have been murdered in the name of secularism. I cannot deny that there have been atrocities committed in secular societies but the question is whether or not it was the secularism that lead to such atrocities; the answer is no. It was not secularism that caused the murder of innocents, but twisted political ideologies irrespective of secular beliefs. Did Stalin kill innocents because he was an atheist? No. He killed innocents because he was a power-crazy dictator. When it comes to atrocities and the murder of innocents, the Bible trumps all on nearly astronomical scales.

So really, none of Prager's 14 arguments holds up to any scrutiny. Many of them do not even explain how the effects Prager posits secularism leads to are detrimental to society. And many more are age old misconceptions on morality.

Then again, what else does one expect from WorldNetDaily?

Modern medicine? Pshaw!

FOXNews has a new article that reveals an absolutely apaling statistic: over half of Americans say they believe God can save patients from dying if doctors determined that medical treatments were futile. One third of those surveyed said that patients should have the right to demand such treatment - i.e. the right to demand to be prayed over rather than given medical treatment. And what's more disturbing is this quote:

"When asked to imagine their own relatives being gravely ill or injured, nearly 20 percent of doctors and other medical workers said God could reverse a hopeless outcome."

One fifth of America's medical personelle believe that God can save the lives of those with terminal illnesses.

These statistics disgust me for two main reasons.

Firstly, the belief that God can intervene when doctors cannot is the start of a slippery slope. I can understand that when a person is terminally ill, and there's nothing that doctors can do to save them, family members may be inclined to cling to whatever gives them hope that their loved one will pull through. It's human nature to want to hope such things, and it makes sense that people would look to God for that hope. However, if people really, actively believe that God can send down a miracle and save their loved one better than professional medical staff can, then what's to stop such people from not bothering to seek medical care to start with? If God is more of a powerfull healer than doctors, then why not prey for God to send down a miracle instead of seeing a doctor in the first place? Believing that divine intervention can save the lives of terminally ill patients can very well lead to a dependance on God rather than modern medicine for treatment. If such a trend were to develop, it would be quite a medical disaster. Already, we've seen cases - usually in evangelical families - were people have relied on God to heal their children rather than taking them to see doctors...with fatal results.

The second problem with this is that it greatly devalues the hard work medical personelle do to save a life. If a terminally ill lukemia patient makes a turn for the better, his cancer goes into remission, and it's chalked up to "divine intervention", then the hard working doctors that put so much effort into saving his life don't get the credit that they deserve. Even if the doctors have claimed further medical treatments to be futile, the work they did beforehand, the effort and resources they put into saving his life, becomes devalued. What worth do doctors have when God trumps their work?

I am also disturbed by the number of doctors who believe that God can intervene and save lives when they cannot. I would be very frightened if I were told by a doctor "Well there's not much I can do for you, but if you pray hard enough, God might heal you instead." I see this as going against the Hippocratic Oath. Doctors are supposed to do what they can for the good of their patients, and not to do any harm. A reliance on God to heal, whether medical treatment is futile or not, does more harm than it does good.

A Lesson in Logical Reasoning

One common tread I've noticed (and undoubtedly anyone with an iota of intelligence has also noticed) that runs though silly religous arguments is that for the most part, people do not know how to reason logically. Just take a quick look at Fundies Say The Darndest Things and you'll immeadetly realize that; pretty much every post is ladened with at least one type of fallacious reasoning.

However, by far the most common form of illogical reasoning is the type where someone equates two totally unrelated things as being the same, or where someone claims that two things which are similar in some superficial way as being the same thing. For example, take this gem:

"Imagine that you could listen to or talk face-to-face with satan about any subject that has to do with God.

Then bring to remembrance anything you've heard atheists say against God. (Or if you are an atheist, you know your own sentiments and thoughts).

Now, if you try, you will find that it is impossible to imagine satan expressing sentiments about God different than what atheists express. Satan certainly is not going to speak positively about God, and neither are atheists. So, what both think and verbalize is in complete harmony with one another.

Atheism is therefore a doctrine of demons, and in many, if not all cases, atheists are demon-possessed."

The reasoning behind this kind of claim goes something like this:
X is A
Y is also A
Therefore X is Y.
The problem with this kind of thinking should be pretty obvious. For example, swans are white (yes I know there are also black swans). A Boeing 747 is also white. Therefore swans are simply miniture Boeing 747s. Swans fly. Boeing 747s fly. Swans really must be Boeing 747s.

Obviously, this is not true.

This kind of reasoning only works if A, that characteristic which is shared by both subjects, X and Y is a defining characteristic of either X or Y. Let me explain.

If, for example, you said that birds were defined as "animals which have two feathery wings", then anything that has the characteristic of "having two feathery wings" would be classified as a bird. Now:
Birds have two feathery wings.
Swans have two feathery wings.
Swans are birds.
This works because of the use of a defining characteristic. Defining characteristics are such that anything with that characteristic falls into that classification; and anything that is NOT classifed as such CANNOT have that characteristic.

Confused?

"Two feathery wings" is a defining characteristic of birds. Anything with that characteristic (anything with two feathery wings) falls into that classification (is a bird). Anything that is not classified as such (anything that is not a bird, such as a gazelle, or a whale) CANNOT have that characteristic (they CANNOT have two feathery wings). This is what is meant by a defining characteristic.

Being white and flying is not a defining characteristic of Boeing 747s or swans, so this kind of reasoning fails in such a case.

Also note that this kind of reasoning only works when describing categories, such as "birds". This reasoning allows one to classify subjects but not to make assertions that one thing IS another thing. For example:
Swans have two feathery wings.
Geese have two feathery wings.
Therefore swans are geese.
This does not work; "geese" applies to a specific bird (or a handful of species) rather than to a broad "class" of birds.

When we look back at the reasoning given in the original fundie argument, we see it violates both of these rules. It does not pretain to defining characterists (anti-God sentiments surely are part of being an atheist, but are not a defining characteristic; it is entirely plausible that one can be "anti-God" but not be an atheist), and it does not apply to categories (neither "Satan" nor "atheist" are categories).

Alas, this kind of reasoning is rampant amongst fundies. A vast number of arguments can be countered based on the fallacy outlined above alone. Its a shame (and kinda funny) that so many people keep coming up with this kind of argument and expect it to stand up to scrutiny.

Couldn't Have Said it Better Myself

Here's a clip from Henry Rollins' show, where he discusses the evolution vs Intelligent Design 'debate'. Rollins has such a way with words.

I couldn't have said it any better myself.

Move over Godwin, here comes Gore

We skeptics are very familiar with Godwin's law. This law refers to the pratice of reductio ad hitlerum, or arguing that something is bad or wrong because Hitler/the Nazis did it/used it/approved of it. More specifically, it was coined in the 90's by lawyer Mike Godwin and states:

"As a Usenet discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."

In other words, argue online long enough, and someone will pull a reductio ad hitlerum. But now that climate change has become a major issue and climate change deniers are on the rise, a new law has been coined. This law is Gore's Law:

"As an online climate change debate grows longer, the probability that denier arguments will descend into attacks on Al Gore approaches one."

If this kind of thing becomes more common, will arguing reductio ad goreum become the trend?

So what was Darwin, a Priest of Ra?

Wouldn't you know it? Evolution is aparently a form of sun worship:

The Second Law of Thermodynamics was set in motion in Genesis 3 - after the Fall. Evolution, which is a form of sun worship, says that the sun provides the energy needed to keep life going on this planet. Yet, for some inexplicable reason, this supposedly life-sustaining aten cannot prevent death from occurring, nor can it bring the dead back alive.

No, the Second Law cannot prevent microevolution from occurring, but, sans divine intervention, will shut down the primary god that evolution worships.

Has it occurred to you that in Eternity Future there will be no need of the sun?

Evolution doesnt say that the sun is needed to sustain life on Earth. Basic freaking biology says that the sun is needed to sustain life on earth. And what does the sun not preventing death or reversing death have to do with anything? Those issues are entirely external to evolution.

Not to mention that this is another bastardization of the second law of thermodynamics. Entropy really isnt that hard to understand. Though, if most creationists can't seem to get their heads around a little basic biology, it shouldn't be surprising that they're totally lost when it comes to thermodynamics.

"Dr. Dino" should be in jail for more than tax offences.

I came across a quote from Kent Hovind today, taken from a transcript of a radio interview he did. I knew that Kent Hovind was a sleezy, amoral nutjob but I never knew he was this batshit crazy:

"If you read the rules God gave to have a perfect society, they are phenomenal. [...] Whenever somebody commits the following crimes they are to be executed, publicly. And whoever is the offended party gets to throw the first stone [...] There is just the relief when you get to throw the rock at the person who offended you, or harmed you, or raped you, or stole from you, or something. I think Man is designed to need that satisfaction, that relief of taking vengeance. I think that is way God - I think that is the way human nature is. "

Allow me to paraphrase: "It's human nature to extract revenge on people who offend us. God made us this way. It's only natural for us to publically execute people who commit crimes." So much for all this "turn the other cheek" stuff that Christians are supposed to believe in.

Looking a little deeper, I found this site: "Quacky Quotes of Hovind's Ethics". That guy has said some really messed up shit. Take his stance on women having independance:

"This guy comes home from work, "Hi Honey, what's for supper?" "Whatever you're fixing." You know, she just got back from one of those meetings, those femi-nazi meetings. He said, "Honey, the house is kind of a mess, have you been busy today?" She said, "If you don't like it you clean it up." This went on for ten minutes. And finally he said, "How would you like to not see me for a week?" She said, "That would be fine with me." And sure enough on the the seventh day her left eye started to open just a little bit."

If you wife doesn't serve your every whim, then beat her? Disgusting. There are lots of other qoutes on that page, discussing his view on the Middle East ('kill them all and make sure you use bullets dipped in pig's blood so they don't go to heaven'), prison overcrowding ('excute criminals to make more room') and premarital sex ('girl's wouldnt have prematiral sex if they were threatened with death by stoning').

And they call us atheists the immoral, evil ones.

So that explains it!

So THIS is why the dinosaurs went extinct!

"Well theoretically (relating to doctrine) the extinction of the dinosaurs (this may be arguable) happened due to the war that raged between Lucifer (Satan) when he rebelled and the third of the angels he took with him, and God and the angels of Heaven. Since Satan was cast down to earth (and became the God of this earth) he could have easily destroyed the dinosaurs himself, to spite God or for whatever other reasons. Or it could have happened during the war. That's one way of looking at it. It makes sense."

It all makes so much sense now! < /sarcasm >

Christians: Keep your tumors for God!

I've been thinking: are Christians against the idea of having tumors removed? Your first reaction to such a question would probably be "No, why should they be?", but if you put a bit of thought into it, any Christian who is against abortion should also be against having surgery for cancer.

First of all, there are alot of similarities between a developing fetus and a malginant tumor, both morphological and physiological. An embryo at the two, four, or sixteen cell stage or even as far developed as a blastocyst is, to be general, a rapidly dividing mass of cells. Such a description can also be applied to a tumor. In a developing embryo, stem cells divide and continue to divide, much like tumor cells. Here the only difference is that in a tumor, the cellular growth and division is completely uncontrolled, while in an embryo, growth and division is carried out in line with a complex developental program. Fetal cells eventually proliferate into specific cell types with their own specific destinies and limitations on growth and division. Nevertheless, the basic cells from which more specific tissue is derived from - the stem cells - are much like tumor cells in that they divide and divide and can continue to divide without any end in sight. Tumor cells can kind of be thought as stem cells on steroids. The fetus during the first trimester (the period where the vast majority of abortions are performed), then, can be seen as akin to a tumor following a strict script.

I can already anticipate an argument against my analogy that Pro-Lifers are likely to use: "There is a difference between tumors and embryos: Embryos are alive! Life begins at conception remember!". Well, this argument is pretty darn weak. If life begins at conception, if a single fertilized ovum is alive, then why are tumor cells not alive as well? One response might be the difference lies in the potential of a fertilized ovum to produce a new being. But again, this is a weak argument. What about the tumors that are caused by uncontrolled stem cell proliferation? In theory, one can use stem cells to create new tissues of whatever type; it may even be possible to recreate a fully formed being using stem cell technology (though, admittedly, with our current technology and knowledge, this is a bit of speculative fantasy). These tumors came from cells that have that potential. Why, then, do tumors not count as being alive? The answer is, if you consider life to begin at conception, then tumors are alive as well. Removing a tumor is just as much 'murder' as having an abortion.

This leads to another argument, though. Someone could easily make the claim that tumors are different still because they are dangerous and directly threaten lives. To those who wish to make such an argument, I should point you in the direction of ectopic pregnancies. An ectopic pregnancy is one where the developing fetus becomes implanted in tissue other than that of the wall of the uterus, often in the fallopian tubes. Such cases are very dangerous and unless the fetus is aborted, can be fatal. Pregnancies, like tumors, can threaten the life of a mother. Not all pregnancies, of course, are ectopic, but neither are all tumors dangerous; some are benign rather than malignant. So if it is ok to remove a tumor because it is life threatening, then why is it not ok to abort a fetus if it is life threatening? Many pro-life groups have such a staunch anti-abortion stance that they object to such life saving procedures. They claim that it's part of "God's plan" if the mother dies during childbirth. Then why is it not part of "God's plan" when someone gets cancer? Shouldn't they be against having tumors removed for fear of messing with his divine scheme?

Maybe I'm way off the mark here with my analogy between the developing fetus and tumors. I'd like to hear a good argument against it though, so if anyone has something to say, just leave a comment.

Frankly, I'm not surprised.

By now you've all heard about the nutjob who shot and killed two people at a Unitarian Universalist church in Tennessee. It's a absolute tragedy. Of course, the religious right deny that he was one of theirs; instead I've been reading quotes similar to this:

The gunman was not affiliated with the church. I suspect he has no idea about what a Unitarian church is....but just wanted to kill "Christians." The larger lesson here is that the world is becoming increasingly hostile to the church. Our church gets death threats all the time.....

Again, espousing the persecution-complex that is so common in Christians. I don't blame them for wanting to distance themselves from a psychotic killer, but it really disgusts me that they so readily turn such a tragedy into an excuse to cry about "intolerance" towards Christians.

I wonder what they have to say now that it's been confirmed that the killer wasn't targeting Christians. He knew very well what a Unitarian church is. From the Associated Press:

A four-page letter found in Adkisson's SUV indicated he picked the church for the attack because, the Knoxville police chief said, "he hated the liberal movement" of the congregation....Adkisson "stated that he had targeted the church because of its liberal teachings and his belief that all liberals should be killed because they were ruining the country," investigator Steve Still wrote.

The only people being targeted here were "liberals". This sicko slaughtered people in front of little children simply because they differed from his own world view. And what worries me is that he isnt the only religous wingnut that thinks liberals are scum and should be killed. Fortunately, he's one of the very few that would act upon those thoughts but the point remains the same. There is no persecution of Christians in the Western world. THEY are the ones doing the persecuting, the fighting, the killing.

God: Not a fan of that thermodynamics stuff.

Phil Plait over at Bad Astronomy has a nice post about how plate tectonics proves to be a major problem for creationists. I suggest you go read it since he can explain it alot better than I can. Here's the rundown, though, for those of you who like clicking as few links as possible:

Plate techtonics is a well known process (although, to be honest, it's really only been widely accepted since the 1960s). We know about it because we can directly observe it happening. We can also determine the actual rate of continental drift: it's a very very slow one (an inch or so a year). Based on geologic data that suggests the orientation of the plates in the past, we know that it has taken the plates millions of years to get where they are today. The problem for creationists lies with heat. As with most (all?) geologic processes, the movement of tectonic plates around the Earth releases heat. Since the plates move slowly, not alot of heat is given off by this process. However, Creationists claim that the Earth is a mere 6000 years old; what's more is that they explain away plate tectonics by claiming God made the plates move really really fast after the flood to get to their current positions. However, such an incredibly rapid motion would, accoring to the National Centre for Science Education, release enough heat to boil away the oceans and completely melt the Earth's crust!

Of course, I can already anticipate some wacky creationist counters to this. They would probably point out that God would just raise the boiling/melting points of the Earth and its oceans. The heat, then, wouldnt cause a problem. Well, except that raising the boiling/melting point means raising the environmental pressure (Pressue and temperature are both intimately entwined. 'Boiling point', for instance, is defined as the "temperature at which the vapor pressure of the liquid equals the environmental pressure surrounding the liquid"). In order to prevent catostrophic environmental changes from happening from the release of that much heat, the environmental pressure would have to such incredible levels that living creatures would find it very difficult to continue living. The only way to get around this would be for God to change the very laws of thermodynamics. And all for only a period of 40 days so the world could appear to be older than it actually is. That God guy - not a fan of thermodynamics.

Sleezy tactics by Alberta Right To Life

Two weekends ago, Jessica and I took a trip to Red Rock Coulee, a "natural area" (note: not national/provincial park, though there was a park attached to the "natural area") in southern Alberta, about 30 minutes southwest of Medicine Hat. Our reason for travelling was twofold; we wanted to take a mini-vacation for the weekend and she wanted to get some insects for her collection from an ecosystem unlike that of Edmonton. Red Rock Coulee was situtated near some badlands so it seemed like an ideal place to go.

On the way from our hotel in Medicine Hat to Red Rock Coulee, we passed by a trailer displaying a big advertisment by the Alberta Right To Life Group, seen below:

If you can't read it, it says "Abortion kills BABIES and hurts women!!", underneath which is a phone number (1-800-665-0570). The opposite side of the trailer declared "1 in 3 babies is killed by abortion!!", complete with a really crappy cartoon of two babies and one 'ghost' baby.

Wondering where they got their statistics, and to contest how abortion hurts women and "kills babies", Jessica called the phone number, expecting to get a small-town Pro-Life group. She didn't.

The lady who answered was an operator for the Canadian Crisis Pregnancy Hotline, out of Winnipeg. After talking things over with her, we found out that the Crisis Pregnancy Hotline has nothing to do Alberta Right To Life (or any anti-abortion groups), and had no idea that the group was using their phone number on anti-abortion propaganda. The hotline takes a neutral stand on the issue, being neither Pro-Life nor Pro-Choice (although, if you think about it, taking no stance on the issue is basically akin to letting people make their own decisions on abortion, which is what being Pro-Choice is all about).

This makes me wonder why Alberta Right To Life would put the number on their advertisment. One reason, which I think is likely, is that the sign is there to stir up an anti-abortion fever in small town Alberta. Residents would call the number thinking they will have a chance to vent their disgust to like-minded people at Alberta Right To Life, only to get connected to the Pregnancy Crisis Hotline and proceed to give them a tongue lashing about how they are evil, sinful baby killers for giving out information and help to women considering abortions.

Of course, this is just speculation on my part. There's no way to know for sure short of contacting the group themselves. I took a look on their website for contact info but couldn't find one for the Medicine Hat branch (the ones most likely to be behind the sign). I also found that the group has another website, Abortionbreastcancer.ca, that claims abortion is the major cause of breast cancer in women, and that there is a big cover-up conspiracy by doctors to supress this info (more on this bullshit in a later blog post...)

But the sign leads me to think that the group is sleezy for three reasons. First, they dont say where they got any of their statistics. The statistics we found on abortion rates didn't match theirs at all. Without any reference to where the stats came from, how are people going to determine whether or not the group is truthful or lying through their teeth? Most people will take the numbers as truth without even thinking to look them up, but they wouldnt be able to do it even if they wanted to. Secondly, the use of the Pregnancy Crisis Hotline's number (and without stating what the number is for) is sleezy. I doubt doing so is illegal, since the number is freely available to the public, but who knows how many people have called it thinking they are going to get Alberta Right To Life and end up yelling at some poor soul in Winnepeg? And third, the sign spreads blatent lies about abortion (how is it "killing babies" or "hurting women"? Again, no references). I don't know how a group goes about putting up signs like that. I dont think it's legal if it's on public ground (because the group has an obvious religous impetus). Perhaps it's private land? I'm not familiar enough with the Medicine Hat area to know. I'll keep searching for a contact for the Medicine Hat branch so I an question them about it...

Answers in Genesis tries to play with the big boys, fails epically.

One of the things that is often used to laugh at how silly Creationists and, more specifically, Intelligent Design, is, is that it makes no predictions, no testable hypotheses, and porponents lack published papers in scientific journals. Some time ago, Answers in Genesis tried to address these criticisms by starting their own journal (Sorry, AiG, but it doesnt count when you need to start your own journal to publish your own papers, and the peer-review process only works when people outside of your own little group review your science). Nevertheless, we all still chuckled because their papers were non-technical drivel with faulty reasoning and laughable conclusions. Now, the folks over at AiG have tried to remedy this by attempting real 'semi-technial' research. In their article, they compare the fitness of an antibiotic resistant strain of Serratia marcescens to a suseptible strain, in an attempt to discredit evolution of antibiotic resistance (and thus, micro- and macroevolution). But, as the folks over at The Panda's Thumb point out, they fail majorly.

The first problem with their research is breaking one of the golden rules of research: if you are examining a particular variable, everything else needs to remain constant. For example, if you are trying to determine if regular or supreme gasoline gives you a better fuel mileage, you have to compare the two types in the same car, or at least the same model of car. You cant put regular in a Civic, put supreme in a Prius and then declare that supreme is better because the Prius goes further. There is no way to determine if the difference was caused by the gasoline itself of if other factors that differ between the two cars were the cause. You'd have to do the experiment in the same (type of) car. Everything except the variable you are testing needs to remain the same. The same thing goes with working with bacteria. If you are going to compare two strains - one resistant to Ampicilin, the other not - then both strains need to be genetically identical sans the resistance gene. This is one of the most basic, common sense rules about research. Its also the first rule that Answers in Genesis breaks in their 'research'. They compared an S. marcescens Amp resistant strain (it's never explicitly stated where they obtained it, but they allude to Dr. Robert Williams at the Texas Medical Center who has aparently kept the strain going) to a "wild type" that they, get this, isolated from a random sample of pond water. They have no way (short of sequencing the entire genome of each strain) if both strains are genetically identical. One is resistant to ampicilin, the other isnt. But is that the only difference? Most likely not. How can they conclude with any certainty that any fitness difference between the two were because of the resistance gene? They can't. It's as simple as that. They cannot make such a conclusion because they used grossly improper research technique; their findings are absolutely worthless.

The second big problem with their research is that they dont understand what the heck "fitness" means. They define fitness as as ‘growth rate and colony “robustness” in minimal media’ (What the heck is a "robust" colony? That's a pretty subjective qualifier). Unfirtunatley, because of their lousy techniques mentioned above, they can't tell if a smaller colony is less fit (by their definition) because of the resistance gene or some other factor they did not controll. Not only that but the figure they use to describe the growth curves has no error bars, so you cannot tell how accurate their numbers are and whether or not the difference between the two strains is statistically significant (it likely isn't). They then go on to conclude that the resistant strain is "less fit" than the wild type. This makes little sense, considering 92% of Serratia marcescens infections in hospitals are antibiotic restistant (which they state in their own paper). If such strains were less fit then why are they more common than the wild type strain? Because hospitals use antibiotics and the resistance provides a reproductive (fitness) advantage. But because they use a lousy definitation of fitness, they conclude that resistant strains are less fit.

The third big problem is that they dont seem to know the difference between "compete" and "compare". What they did in their paper was compare the two strains. They plated one on minimal media and counted the colonies. Then they plated the second on minimal media and counted the colonies. They compared the numbers, etc. Nevertheless, they constantly refer to the bacteria "competing". There is a big difference. Let's imagine we have two cages, each with a mouse. You feed Mouse A ten pieces of cheese, and it eats all of them. You feed Mouse B ten pieces of cheese, and it eats all of them. Comparitively, both mouse seem the same. But put both mice together and feed them some cheese, and mouse A eats 90% of it, while mouse B only gets 10% of it. This is because Mouse A outcompetes Mouse B. This is not what AiG did. They compared the two strains. They didn't make them compete. So how could they conclude that the non-resistant strain of Serratia marcescens outcompetes the resistant strain? They can't.

And even if all this was forgiven, if they had used proper technique, they had made the strains compete, used a proper definition of fitness....their conclusions are still wrong. If they had bothered to look, this exact experiment had been done before (properly), and the authors concluded the exact opposite of what AiG found.

Nice try, Answers in Genesis, but you're not cut out for this kind of thing. Leave the research to the people who know how to do it. Leave the science to the scientists.

The big myth

I copied this from a forum post which was, in turn, copied from a [unnamed] website, so it's hard for me to give credit to whoever originally wrote this. But whoever you are, I salute you! I present: Jesus - the Myth behind the Man.

"We'll start thinking about Christian borrowing by asking a simple question:

By what criteria can we decide what ancient godman stories were new and original, and what ancient godman stories were myths built up from the religious ideas of their day?

Here's what I mean..

When Osiris is said to bring his believers eternal life in Egyptian Heaven, contemplating the unutterable, indescribable glory of God, we understand that as a myth.

When the sacred rites of Demeter at Eleusis are described as bringing believers happiness in their eternal life, we understand that as a myth.

In fact, when ancient writers tell us that in general ancient people believed in eternal life, with the good going to the Elysian Fields and the not so good going to Hades, we understand that as a myth.

When Vespatian's spittle healed a blind man, we understand that as a myth.

When Apollonius of Tyana raised a girl from death, we understand that as a myth.

When the Pythia , the priestess at the Oracle at Delphi, in Greece, prophesied, and over and over again for a thousand years, the prophecies came true, we understand that as a myth.

When Dionysus turned water into wine, we understand that as a myth. When Dionysus believers are filled with atay, the Spirit of God, we understand that as a myth.

When Romulus is described as the Son of God, born of a virgin, we understand that as a myth.

When Alexander the Great is described as the Son of God, born of a mortal woman, we understand that as a myth.

When Augustus is described as the Son of God, born of a mortal woman , we understand that as a myth.

When Dionysus is described as the Son of God, born of a mortal woman, we understand that as a myth.

When Scipio Africanus (Scipio Africanus, for Christ's sake) is described as the Son of God, born of a mortal woman, we understand that as a myth.

So how come when Jesus is described as the Son of God, born of a mortal woman, according to prophecy, turning water into wine, raising girls from the dead, and healing blind men with his spittle, and setting it up so His believers got eternal life in Heaven contemplating the unutterable, indescribable glory of God, and off to Hades—er, I mean Hell—for the bad folks...
how come that's not a myth?"

The answer is, of course, it is a myth. Just like every other godman, every other miracle worker, every other prophecy fullfiller, Jesus' life is a myth. Christians need to realize theyre worshiping the same myth as the ancient "heathens" they look down upon.