Religulous

So, I saw it, in a cool little theater in Raleigh. HA! If you'd seen it you'd understand why that's funny. Anyone else seen it? I imagine it won't get as much serious discussion as Expelled since this movie wasn't trying to appear scientific or having some definite aim. But if anyone wants to talk about it I've got a fickle internet connection.

Oh No!

Oh Ye of Little Faith

Some work of noble note, may yet be done, - Not unbecoming men that strove with Gods

My ex-wife wrote in her blog, "IF I love Him I WILL keep His commandments." Obviously we're assuming there's something real to love here, so putting that aside - This is true. Likewise IF you truly believe something, you WILL live your life by it.

I got in a tuff with a "Mormon" in my class over this. I say "Mormon" because he's been excommunicated but he still claims to believe every word of it, he just doesn't live by it. I said this is impossible. If you truly believe you're going to be punished for your misdeeds, you won't do them. IF there's a cop walking around with you, you WON'T steal. The same as, if I really DON'T believe there's a door in front of me, I WON'T bother to open it before I try and go thru it.

But that's not what this post is about. This post is about dreams, and it goes something like this. IF I really want something, I WILL pursue it.

That's where if bites though. If I really want it. If I REALLY want it. And if I REALLY want it, why the hell am I not pursueing it?

Or does it just get choked under our obligations? Under these pressures that society, and pride, and the boogeyman put on us. "We work jobs we hate, so that we can buy shit we don't need."

So either I don't want it, or I'm letting it get choked. I'm hoping it's the second one, cause I'm just flapping in the wind if my dreams are something I really don't want. Just another check mark on the checklist the boogeyman handed to me some time in my youth. Cause he's got a stack that says "Baseball Player" and "Astronaut", and he's handing them out like candy at the park, to unsuspecting younglings that don't know yet about abortions and laziness and bipolar disorder. But for most people it must be something some best friend actually handed to them, or some TV show, or some girl that likes men in suits and fancy cars. Cause really what they wanted more was a family, or a cushy job, or some time alone on the couch.

So I'm reading The Gunslinger again, and it's one of those stay up past your bedtime books. One of those fuck-society I-don't-need-friends books. And I underlined something in the introduction. "Let it rip regardless of what anybody tells you, that's my idea; sit down and smoke that baby." He's talking about writing despite being young, about taking on big ideas when the older and wiser might shake their head and say you don't know the first thing about what you're talking about.

When did I stop thinking that? I said to myself, laying in bed, early. I used to write everything I could think of. When did I start being scared and when did I start not caring? When did I start choking and when did I start listening to the chicks that go after big cars? Since when did I let the warning labels and the has-beens tell me what to do? Since when did I stop saying my dreams are what make life worth living, and the only thing that will make me happy?

The answer is, of course, is never. I stopped believing it, and I stopped living it.

"If you don't claim your humanity you will become a statistic. You have been warned."

So I invite you, dear reader, to join me. I will give this three weeks. Three weeks. Apparently it takes 21 days to establish a pattern. For these three weeks I will write 1000 words a day, and see if I can't stop by the end of it. I have a calender on my wall and I'll check off the days, starting tonight. Today is the 9th (or a few days later for you maybe). By the end of April I'll have 21 days behind me. At the close of this month I will have chased my dream, truly and immediately, for at least three weeks. If the handwriting on your checklist is your own, and not the boogeyman's, or some ex's, I offer this opportunity for you to join me, to stop choking and come up for air. It's not too hard, it's only a blip in your life.

We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Schism

"Amherst, New York (March 3, 2008)—The most detailed estimates to date of Americans' religious affiliations reports that a significant portion of U.S. citizens claim "none of the above," placing the unaffiliated second only to Roman Catholics in number. Monday's release of the 35,000-respondent U.S. Religious Landscape Survey from the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life shows that 16.1 percent of Americans have no particular religion at all, while 23.9 percent identify themselves as Catholic. The next largest "belief group" is Evangelical Baptist at 10.8 percent. All other denominational groupings show in the single digits or less."

Here's my question to anyone that might be reading this, and I'm not trying to spark a debate on this topic, just want to see what your reaction is. I won't even respond to any comments left unless you ask me to. But what do you think of this result? Is is surprising? Where do you think the country is going and what do you think about that? Is America really a Christian nation? Are faith and religiosity necessary for a moral or free society, as Mitt Romney would have us believe?

Full article here.

Australian Genius

Episcopal

Finally finished The Island of the Day Before, but I'm going to sit on it a day or two before I "review" it.

I'm on to the Book of Mormon now, which I'm giving myself more time for, obviously. I'll probably have smaller reviews of each book within, and then an overall review, since it was all written by the same guy anyway. Oops! I mean...written by many different people...thousands of years ago...not in the mid 1800s....Yup!

Swindlers, Crooks, and Liars

Check it out.

Let's Get Rediculous

Most of this is taken from the pastor of the biggest church by where I grew up and apparently"Dr." Dobson agrees with his crackpot ideas, that not only make up statutes he implies are in his religion, which are not (It's not that part though, that's a big deal, as with the vagueries it's possible to make the texts say pretty much anything you want and be right), but he claims to "beyond a doubt" know what the Judeo Christian god thinks about people and countries today. It's such incredible nonsense that reminds me of Herbal Essences coming out with racey new commercials to keep people interested in the product, but the sad thing is, some people's faith will be bolstered by this - including, I'm sure, many people I grew up with that know John Macarthur personally.

Turning

Randy's response (In the comments section).

The Bell

Another response in the comments of this post.

Backlash

I wrote a response to Randy's statements, but I won't frighten the rest of you with it here, or it's length. I'm posting it in the comments of this entry, if you'd like to read it.

Nothing Quite Like

A new stack of books.










Or the professor next to some licorice tea.

Bear With Me

Okay this is long and pretty out of place in the "comments" section. But it's still a response to the comments in the post previous this:

I know this discussion feels like beating a dead horse, but there's a true disagreement between us, isn't there? So either I'm just not getting something or you're not getting something, or maybe we're both not getting something. But conversation is the best way to sort this out, where we're both able to give our sides in hopes of establishing our position as true. Because only one of our sides can be true, and learning truth is very important isn't it? So allowme, please, to beat this dead horse a little longer (longer with big red).

Regarding the issue of "falling in love." I agree with you that "falling in love" with another person may be a perfectly understandable, legitimate act. Science is still in the process of understanding the mind, but maybe there really is, say, a pattern of chemicals in our own brain that somehow matches with the other persons or something like that, something that's very real and can catalogue this emotional act we call, "falling in love." When you extend this to the spiritual realm, there's a couple problems though. The first I see is this: when was the last time you heard a chemist say, "You need to respect my beliefs about chemistry. They were revealed to me through something like falling in love." Or a doctor say, "Please respect my beliefs about how I practice medicine. They aren't verified by experiment, but if you'd gone thru what I've gone thru, you'd see what I mean." We don't respect conclusions people come to just by sitting in their own mind, we evaluate reasons.

The second problem I see springboards off this: These "spiritual," if I may lump them into that category, experiences may be useful in describing the human experience - how we observe the world - but they are not useful in explaining the true nature of the world, if not coupled with empirical evidence. Our sensory perception is fallible, and our emotional perception is exponentially more fallible. Take a look at this for a demonstration on the fallibility of just our eyes. People have imaginary friends that they think are to more or less a degree real, depending on their particular mental state - but make no mistake, many people's mental and emotional experience is just as authentic as your "falling in love," yet it's toward Allah or Sathya Sai Baba. Let me here quote Sam Harris again (in speaking about spiritual experiences): "What atheists don’t tend to do is make unjustified (and unjustifiable) claims about the nature of reality on the basis of such experiences. There is no question that some Christians have transformed their lives for the better by reading the Bible and praying to Jesus. What does this prove? It proves that certain disciplines of attention and codes of conduct can have a profound effect upon the human mind. Do the positive experiences of Christians suggest that Jesus is the sole savior of humanity? Not even remotely — because Hindus, Buddhists, Muslims and even atheists regularly have similar experiences.

There is, in fact, not a Christian on this Earth who can be certain that Jesus even wore a beard, much less that he was born of a virgin or rose from the dead. These are just not the sort of claims that spiritual experience can authenticate."

So just to reiterate what he's saying: yes those "falling in love" experiences are useful in telling us things about our own mind - but are not useful in telling us things about the world. So however great your reasons for falling in love are, and however big your emotions are - they are slightly more than useless in telling us whether a statement like "God exists" or "Jesus ascended bodily into heaven" are true.

And Julie, I apologize if I was unclear. My question wasn't "why would someone choose to seek out God." I think I understand that to some degree, as I did it myself for about 20 years. My question, instead was HOW is it possible to determine which God or "religion" is true, if you've forsaken reason in your "leap of faith." As long as we're defining leap of faith in the Kierkegaardian way as a deciding to believe something without empircal evidence that it's true. My question, really, is this: In looking at all these religions, as you did, when it comes down to it, you're looking at a set of propositions which, basically, are not convincing in their own right. All of these are religions that REQUIRE you to stop thinking about logic and reason, and just DECIDE that one of them is true, right? That's what I understand when someone says "faith comes first." Obviously they're not convincing from a logical point of view, or you wouldn't NEED faith to come first - it would be just as convincing as 2+2=4 or believing there's really a chair underneath you. So, if there is a road of logic that leads to a chasm. On the other side of the chasm you see Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Jehovahs witnesses, and leading away from all of those is their own road of "logic (the logic of the Bible that God reveals to you AFTER your leap of faith)," how do you decide which one to jump to?, if you "logic" map likewise has a blank spot there?

I think it's also important to point out is the false dilemma I think people push themselves into during these encounters. As you said, "I became knowledgable on J.W., Mormons, evolution, Christianity and New Age." As though, if you found all but New Age to not make sense, you would default to New Age...or none of them make sense except evolution, so you default to evolution. We have to give ourselves the license to say "I don't know." There is so much confusion, I think, in people thinking that poking holes in evolution makes the doctrine of creationism and christianity on iota more likely. It doesn't. If evolution is false (which the evidence points heavily to it not being false, but that's not this argument), it is a perfectly respectable position for an atheist to simply be an atheist - not knowing how the life around us came to be. We need not believe ANYTHING on insufficient evidence. We would, in most cases do well to side with the position that is most likely - has the most evidence on its side - but if I, for some strange reason, had to say I'd die rather than say that the big bang theory may be overturned in the future, I'd plead ignorance rather than arrogance.

And just one more thing, Julie, regarding yours. I don't understand why you would, at the same time both attempt to undermine the foundation of science, in saying that it requires faith, while using science to try and legitimize the Bible. You've admonished me twice now on how much the bible and science have in common. In fact, right now, with the uncertainty principle in quantum theory as well as more "recent" discoveries like "action at a distance," if science bolsters any one faith system it's new age or eastern philosophy, hands down. You can point to some things in the Bible like the the water cycle in Job or the circulation of the atmosphere in Ecclesiasties, but when we come to parts like Leviticus 11:6 "And the hare, because he cheweth the cud, but divideth not the hoof; he is unclean unto you." (hares don't chew the cud) Or Job 9:6, "Which shaketh the earth out of her place, and the pillars thereof tremble." (the earth does not stand on pillars, though many ancient cultures said similar things) Or 1 Kings 7:23 - "He made the Sea of cast metal, circular in shape, measuring ten cubits from rim to rim and five cubits high. It took a line of thirty cubits to measure around it." (Notice anything wrong? In this verse, pi=3), people will say that many of these verses in the bible are "figurative" or "the bible isn't a science book" or that there was somehow a miracle that made the animals bred in front of the striped sticks turn out all stripey. This makes the argument very convenient - either it's science, or a miracle, and therefore everything, both benign and strange, in the Bible, is easily accounted for. I'd just like to point out that Harry Potter is a true story as well, as long as everything in it is science, a miracle, figurative language, or just "rounding off." You can choose a few a FEW verses in the bible that support science. This website catalogues some. Many of them literally made me laugh out loud in how far they're stretching. "Jeremiah 33:22 “As the host of heaven cannot be numbered, nor the sand of the sea measured, so will I multiply the descendants of David My servant and the Levites who minister to Me.” Yes, the bible says there are a lot of stars. I don't think it's surprising that a culture that hadn't discovered Zero yet couldn't count them all. Is this really a convincing argument that it was inspired by God?

The question comes down to, what is more likely? Is it more likely that this book is the literal truth which the only true God revealed to people 2-6 thousand years ago in which he developed a system where he would forever after reveal himself to people only in a falling in love type experience and those peoples acceptance of that experience, and the acceptance of several empirical truth statements (jesus was born of a virgin, enoch went into heaven in a fiery chariot) that are joined to it, would determine the salvation or damnation of these people for eternity? - or, is it more likely that this book is the mythology of a group or "race" of people, similar to the mythologies of the people around them, joined with turn of the millenium writings on doctrine, similar to philosophy written by others around that time, about a cult with a central figure that performed miracles and made claims, similar to claims and miracles made before that time, during that time, and all throughout history? Is it more likely that Christianity is unique in its non-empirically supported claims, or like every other group that has developed non-empirically supported religious claims? Should we accept any of these claims because of ancient mythology and mountain top experience? I think you know my answer.

Quietly into the Dark

Andrew Sullivan is a homosexual Roman Catholic that is a regular blogger for TIME, a regular guest on political commentary type shows, and lecturer at universities.

Sam Harris is a graduate with a degree in philosophy from Stanford, and also a contributor to all the mediums above, as well as being the author of The End of Faith, and Letter to a Christian Nation.

This is a very good debate between them.

I am 98% sure nobody reading this will read that, but if you do, I'd love to talk about it with you.

These are 2 pictures of me at applebees last night, in 2 similar poses.

Beware

This will be pretty offensive, to some of you - which is fitting considering it's a 20 minute speech about freedom of speech given in Canada in reaction to a proposed bill to limit hate speech. It's pretty powerful stuff.

Apparently this guys a drunk and maybe a druggie, which is how the people that are commenting on this video are criticizing him. But what he says has to stand on it's own whether it's said by Buddha, or Charles Manson, and I think it does.

In Response

I apologize for any offense I might have caused by my statement about Christianity and decision making. Of course I figured I'd get backlash considering I don't know anyone that reads this that isn't Christian - but I think the problem is that I may have been unclear. I will grant that members of the 44% can have good policies for the environment or toward progress. This must be true, as long as all presidents aren't lying to us because, unless I'm mistaken, every president in at least the last 100 years have been "avowed" christians, and yet we've had progress. That being said I still hold that a true belief, not a hope, a belief that Jesus will in fact return in the next 50 or so years is not compatible with coming to good, lasting solutions for present or future problems. I would argue that when someone attests to truly hold such a belief as that, and yet does propose constructive solutions, this is because of a disconnect in belief or them being in fact less sure of this idea than they're claiming.

For one, according to a literal reading of Revelation, the world has to break down and slip into chaos in so many areas in order for Jesus's return to happen. I can only speak for myself, but I do in fact remember telling someone several years ago, when a suicide bomber drove a boat full of bombs into a US Ship anchored...somewhere in the Middle East...that yes it's sad, but in a way it's exciting because it is setting up for the end times and Jesus's return, with everything going on over there in the "sand box." At that time I would have considered myself a fundamentalist, not quite an extremist. Among fundamentalists at the very least I really don't think I was alone in this sentiment. So to some people the collapse of civilization is in fact cause for celebration. These people are on the fringe, of course, but I don't think that everyday Christians can help but see at least some silver lining in similar, especially Middle-eastern, events. At the very least, I don't think we want these fringe individuals making world decisions - or environmental decisions for that matter, seeing as the worst for those of us on earth, could very well be the best to get Jesus back here.

Secondly, if you are truly positive that Jesus will return in the next 50 years(which is the situation of 22 of the 44%, the other 22 being "reasonably convinced") what motivation could you possibly have for fixing the world's problems? If I knew my house was being bulldozed next week, my vaccum would be one of the first things I'd pack. I may make provisional solutions - but ozone depletion, overfishing, oil spills, global warming - there will be no my children's children's children to suffer from these things anyway. So I will grant that it is a generalization for me to say that none should have a say in the future, and I will again reiterate that I don't think any of you who are reading this truly believe Jesus will - not may or I hope he will - come in the next 50 years. I'm guessing this is the case with many people (otherwise what could their reason possibly be for wanting to improve anything if it's all gonna burn inside 50 years anyway). So people in that 44% could make decent decisions regarding the future - However, that is due to being unsecure in the belief of Jesus's imminent return, not because of a possible harmony between the belief and good decision making.

Regarding atheists: I think it's important to learn more than propaganda regarding what atheists really think. This is a good general article about what atheists position regarding a lot of the things I see brought up. Obviously it doesn't represent ALL atheists points of view but it's fairly representative. In regards to an atheist getting elected (I'm responding specifically to my dad's comment now), at this point that seems almost impossible. So no worries.

The Recourse

In my time out, I also rented 2 movies. An Inconvenient Truth, and Lady in the Water. I haven't watched Lady in the Water, but I did finish watching AIT just a bit ago. It does seem really important, and despite critics it's hard to see any sort of ulterior motive in wanting to make a film like this. The only thing I could think of would be political motives on the part of Al Gore, but that seems to not be very likely considering he pushed this platform before, during, and after he was in office. It seems like people are pushing this not to make money, I don't see how you really would, but maybe because they really think it's true. The Earth will fix itself, I don't think that's the issue - the issue is that there's no guarantee mankind will be around to see the fixing. That may be hard for a Christian to believe. Polls say 22% of Americans are convinced Jesus will return in their lifetime, and another 22% are reasonably sure. That's 44% of America that should not be influencing our future, and the decisions now that will affect our future. This is not a point of view that lends itself to developing lasting solutions in this world. I can remember, years ago, talking to my Uncle Ted about how enviromental issues aren't a big deal because, as I said, "It's all gonna burn in the end." I admit that this is not a very sophisticated point of view, nor is it the point of view I'm sure most of you have. But it is the logical conclusion of biblical fundamentalism. Especially coupled with the fact that Christians (as well as Muslims, Jews, Hindus) believe that God is in full control of what happens on earth - leads me to be frightened that it's impossible for a proclaimed atheist to get elected, and at the fact that our current president is a literalist that conducts prayer meetings and bible studies throughout the whitehouse. There's no indication that Jesus is coming, there is no indication that God is in control of anything, there is no indication there is anything acting on our lives and on this earth except for nature and us, and it's time our politics and policies began reflecting that.