This Makes It All Worth It - A Followup

Earlier today I wrote about an email I received from Abraham (not his real name) and how he is starting to look to atheism. He said that it was partly due to deep thinking and partly due to things I said here on HDC. We had a very nice exchange of emails and he agreed to let me share them, which I did earlier today in This Makes It All Worth It

Well! Abraham read the emails I sent to him, and my elaboration on here (see above link) and said the following a bit ago:

Saw the post on the blog, and I appreciated it, and the comments. In terms of reading, not much so far. I did go to Wikipedia and looked up "atheism", and with your comment, it helped me greatly. I am now ready to say that I am, in fact, an atheist, and hope to be able to defend my knowing that God does not exist more in time (I did read your post on Dawkins Spectrum of Theistic Probablilty). I hope to learn more in time. I really am not that much into podcasts, but am willing to look at essays.

I told him he is now on the A-Team and that he will soon get to learn our secret handshake. :P

I had offered to share the podcasts with him that I feel have been so helpful to me. I also asked him which books he's read on the subject.

So hey, I need your help! Let's compile a list for new atheists. I'd like to put books, essays and anything else on there that you've found helpful in your godless travels. Believe it or not, I have read very little of the classic stuff on atheism/religion/etc.

What would you recommend to Abraham? Which one or 2 sources did you find most informative and helpful once you were comfortable calling yourself an atheist (or the label of your choice)? Remember, he's come over to the Dark Side now, so we don't have to convince him. Now it's about information, insight, and being able to defend his lack of belief in gods. Please leave comments with the books, essays or resources you recommend and briefly how you felt they were helpful to you. Thanks very much! :)

An Evening With Heathens

Sunday evening my group, Morgantown Atheists, had an evening at the local UU church to talk about heaven and hell around the world throughout time. We had a good turnout, including a Christian and a WVU professor of history, both of whom had never been there before. We all thought it was rather funny that the heater had been turned on in the church sometime before, so it was 99°. At least it was a dry heat. So we were sort of practicing in case we were wrong.

One of our regular members, Jason, brought his wife, Alise, who is a Christian. I actually met Alise in the blogosphere when she wrote that excellent article awhile ago called Surviving a Conversation With An Atheist, about what stereotypical assumptions not to make when you talk to one of us. So it was really neat to meet her in person then go out to dinner afterward with everyone and talk a bit more.

Unfortunately we didn't do much more than scratch the surface of what Alise believes, but my main goal was to make sure she was welcome and that she had an opportunity to at least share what her church teaches. (I should also note, Alise is extremely well spoken and seemed perfectly capable of handling her own!) But sometime over coffee I'd love to know more about what Alise believes herself, which she says is "complicated".

Anyway, she sent me a message this morning saying that she had blogged about her evening out with us heathens and it was so well-written I wanted to share it with you. Here it is, in its entirety:

Heaven and Hell with Atheists
by Alise Write

I've been meaning to attend a meeting of the local atheist group with Jason for a while now, but I've been unable to make it work due to conflicting schedules. When he told me that the group was going to be discussing heaven and hell this week and in light of some of the reading I've been doing recently, I thought it would be interesting to go and see what these folks had to say (the 99 degree temperature in the church where we met was cause for much mirth throughout the evening!).

Yet Another Experiment

Last December if you had asked me about my friends, I would have told you they were all nonbelievers of some persuasion or another. But back then I ran into a fellow blogger who is a devout Catholic. Roxane wrote about me and I felt obliged to write back. Instead of getting into a "blog war" we decided to take our conversation privately to email and have been writing each other back and forth ever since.

Now I would call her a friend. Do I understand her worldview? Does it make sense to me? No, it really doesn't. But she seems like a good person, kind and compassionate. With Roxane, I've been learning to see that there are religious people who aren't like the media stereotypes that make me apoplectic with impotent indignation.

Interestingly, in this same time period I've also come to see several family members that are also moderately religious to seriously devout in a new light. I've engaged them as well, and it has really expanded my perspective of people who are so diametrically opposed to how I view the world. It's been eye-0pening to say the least.

Last week Roxane got a crazy idea that she and I should co-write a blog. Nothing intense, just a weekly joint post. She thought I'd say no, but I surprised her and said yes immediately. So we started AtheistCatholic.com and today was our first post.

In the past couple of days I've told a few of my friends about what I'm doing. I've gotten mixed responses. Some people said I'm wasting my time. Others thought it was a good idea. First I should probably explain the goal of this new experiment. Because that is most definitely what it is. It might not work out, but I'm willing to give it a good ol' college try.

We want to share some of our discussion publicly, and have people join our conversation, mainly about our worldviews. It's not a place for debate or attacking the opposing team. It's more about coming to hopefully understand each other, and maybe even learn more about ourselves in the process. I've done that with Roxane already so I want to share that insight and hopefully get even more from the interactions we have over there.

One more thing. I am not being an accommodationist here. This isn't about compromising and bending over backward to the religious worldview. As you know, I have very strong opinions about naturalism/atheism and religion. But, this is about people getting along, being friends despite opposite viewpoints, and learning about others and ourselves.

If you're interested in joining the conversation, head over there and say hi. Just please be courteous. This is about building bridges, not isolating ourselves.

Thought Experiment 7

Here's another question for you. I really would love your answers:

Do you think the world will be a better or worse place 100 years from now?

That's a good question. Of course, no one knows. Anything can happen in an instant. Just look at Japan for example. Of course they live on 4 fault lines, and it wasn't a surprise that a big quake hit them, but how big it was, how it affected them, couldn't be anticipated properly.

I guess this question is more about the answerer than the asker. What kind of person am I?

Optimistic? Do I foresee a utopian society where everyone is happy and healthy like onboard the Starship Enterprise? Where basically everyone has all of their needs met, has satisfying work, has great healthcare, and has an exciting life?

Or Pessimistic? Is it going to be a dark, grim, distopian society where there are a few Haves and many more Have-nots? Where health is only for the Haves, as is good food, clean water, and justice. Where most of society is basically enslaved to the few Haves, and the lives of the Have-Nots are miserable and horrid.

Or, perhaps I am Pragmatic (ooh yes, that's me!) where I think things will probably be pretty much the same as they are now. Yes, that's how I see it. Although really it can go any direction, and I'm quite aware of that. But I think that there will still be some people with all the power and all the money, and most of us will be getting by here in the US. Other countries like China and India will probably change so drastically with their budding economies that no one can predict what they will be like.

Thought Experiment 4

Let's do another Thought Experiment. I am skipping around in the book to find interesting ones. So this is only the second that I've done. If you have any that you'd like to share, please do so! Just email me.

Question 4

If you could spend one year in perfect happiness but afterward would remember nothing of the experience, would you do so? If not, why not?

Which is more important, actual experiences or the memories that remain after those experiences are over?

My Answer

So here's my first answer. I would say no, I wouldn't want to be blissfully happy for a year if I couldn't remember afterward. Because then I will have lost a year of my life.

But, if while I was blissfully happy other people would be around me and remember that time, then that's different. Because then I'm sure the goodness that would come of me being so happy would manifest in their lives in a myriad of ways and that would be totally worth it. Maybe I'd be so happy I'd invent something wonderful or come up with a world changing idea! If that were the case, then yes, I'd definitely do it!

So I guess it would just mean my life is basically a year shorter. But if there were positive benefits for others or the world in general then most definitely, yes! :)

I think actual experiences are important, but how you remember them is too. Memories are extremely malleable and changeable, so after things happen, the memory becomes all that is left. Except of course, the results of the actual experiences are also a huge factor, which is what I was saying, it's the only thing that would make it worth my while.

What about you? Would you do it? Why or why not?

From The Book of Questions by Gregory Stock, Ph.D.

Thought Experiment "A"

Recently I found a little book on my bookshelf that I used to love. It's beat up and dogeared. It's called The Book of Questions by Gregory Stock, Ph.D. which came out in 1987. Basically it's full of thought experiments. I thought I'd pose them to you. I will put my initial answer and will eagerly look forward to your thoughts. If you think of any you'd like to have me ask everyone, email me.

So here's Question A, which is from me, not the book:

There is a guy in Britain, I think, who had ulcerative colitis.
There is interesting research into places in third world countries where people don't get this kind of thing, or allergies for that matter.

They have found that populations carry some sort of roundworm that lives in their guts there and it was thought that it conveys some sort of protection to the gut.

So this guy took a thousand roundworm eggs and swallowed them. He did it on his own but made sure his doctors knew it so they could monitor him. He had very quick and complete relief of his ulcerative colitis.

After awhile, maybe a year, he started getting symptoms again so he had his doctors test him and his roundworm population had decreased. So he took another 1500 eggs.

So here's the question. If you had ulcerative colitis (bloody diarrhea, horrible stomach pain, etc) would you swallow 1500 roundworm eggs?

If your child had it, would you have them swallow the roundworm eggs?

My answer:

I think if I were suffering, I'd do it, but I'd be totally creeped out and would probably feel like I could feel them in my gut moving around. It would be really hard for me. Eesh! Once I had relief, I think I'd pat my belly and thank them.

What about you? Would you ingest a specific type of parasite if it meant no allergies, or no painful colitis?

Exploring the Historicity of the Bible and Jesus

I think I met Nicholas Bruzzese on Facebook, but now I can't remember. Not that it matters as much as the fact that I now call him a friend. Awhile ago he and his friends down in Melbourne Australia started a podcast called The Skeptic's Testament. As you know, I have a thing for podcasts because I can do mundane tasks while learning about new things from interesting people.

And Nicholas and his friends are very interesting. They tackle the bible from a scholarly perspective and I always learn something from every episode.

One thing that seems to be a big controversy is the historicity of Jesus. Did he exist? Before I heard the Skeptic's Testament, I had met another biblical scholar who told me that the consensus among the people who study biblical history is that he did. But he never really explained.

I used to believe that Jesus didn't exist. I know a lot of atheists hold to this belief, and while I don't have the tools to prove them wrong, when it comes to issues that I am not an expert in (most things, actually) I look to see what the consensus is, as that's a pretty good starting point. What do most experts say? We all have to do this in different areas of our lives. That's the nature of being interdependent as social creatures. I defer to my husband when it comes to cars and mechanical things, I listen to my doctor (and maybe get a second opinion) because she knows more than me about the human body, etc. We get to stand on the shoulders of giants.

So after listening to all of the episodes of The Skeptic's Testament, I asked Nicholas if he would mind answering some questions about this issue that is so contentious among atheists, yet pretty much agreed upon by scholars. The following are my initial questions and Nicholas' answers. This is part 1 of 2.

Q: Please introduce yourself. What are your credentials in talking about the bible?

Even though I grew up a Christian attending Church with my grandma as a youngster, it wasn’t until my teens that I began to take religion seriously, which began my fundamental literal approach to the Bible. If nothing else all that Bible reading and apologetic research built endurance. I am half way through a formal degree in Divinity, so in other words I haven’t any credentials worth talking about. Some may find it strange, an atheist taking ministry courses which are a part of MDiv, the only two points I will make about this are many of these subjects are interesting in their own right and many would be utterly surprised at just how skeptical such a course can be. It is so rigid in its skepticism, the disconnect we see between pastor and parishioner on biblical fundamentals, such as ‘who are the authors of the four canonical Gospels’ becomes bewilderingly odd. So I hope to bridge the gap among atheists and Christians alike.

Q: In conversations and in listening to your podcast, I've learned that you agree with the critical scholarly consensus that Jesus existed. Can you explain?

Rules and Guidelines for Participating on HDC

Here's a bit of HDC maintenance I've been meaning to get to.

Note: With the addition of BuddyPress, the main rule is to be civil. These rules can change at any time to reflect how the site is being used.

While I love your comments here at Heaving Dead Cats, spam and trolling are no fun for anyone. To give as much freedom for comments as possible, we need some rules and guidelines:

1. Any comments or links which require a significant effort to determine if they may or may not be legitimate are subject to deletion.


2. If you want to promote your own blog, that's fine. Do so by posting a relevant comment. Promote yourself by participating.


3. No Ad Hominem attacks. If you have an argument with someone, discuss it civilly. If you attack the person and get nasty I will delete the comment. We are grownups here. There's no need to play dirty.
   
   
   
   1. If you consistently attack others in a nasty way, you'll be banned from future commenting.
   
   
   
   


4. Be polite. Do not feed trolls. Do not be a troll. Trolls are banned.


5. No spam of any kind. If it feels like spam to me, it goes in the trash.

These rules are subject to my interpretation and may change at any time. If you think you have not been fairly treated, email me your concern and I will take it under consideration.

A Delicate Situation

As you may know, I used to unquestioningly believe in the power of "energy". I became an atheist long before I became a skeptic. I still "knew" that there was an energy force in the universe, that we reincarnated after death, that there was justice in the form of karma, and that people could be healed by energy.

I never had any reason to doubt my beliefs. In fact, I had a lot of selective bias that showed I was pretty good at giving readings (I didn't know it but I was good at warm and cold readings), and I was very good at doing energy healings. People told me they felt better just talking to me. Now I know that just paying attention to people can be help someone feel better. I did reiki healing which is very comforting. I would pay a lot of attention to a person and really listen to them compassionately. The placebo effect did the rest.

Long before I discovered skepticism I heard something about the power of suggestion, so without knowing I was doing science (roughly) I tested out the claim that energy healing is all about just making people feel cared for and is no better than placebo. I "turned off" my healing hands (reiki) several times and people still thanked me and told me I gave them a wonderful healing.

That's when I started getting out of it all. I realized I was just doing therapy for people, and that it was psychological and not "magical" so I gracefully extricated myself from the spiritual community.

I had many friends in the spiritual community back then. Most of them stopped talking to me when I stopped giving readings and healings. One woman, we'll call her Barbara, kept asking me for readings. She would call me all the time, every few days, asking for advice. I am horrible at confrontation, so after trying to tell her I didn't do readings anymore, I broke out the cards and went ahead and tried to help her. I did my best, but I started to feel more and more uncomfortable as time went on.

The Afterlife and Sentient Rocks

Last night our local group of heathens and extended friends had our Winter Solstice/Festivus/FSM Holiday/Christmas/Hanukkah party. It was fun. The conversation was very interesting and incredibly diverse. Here are two topics I discussed.

I was talking to a Buddhist physicist who works for NASA part time. He started talking about how the earth and rocks have sentience. I disagreed, of course. He had this weird logic that was completely flawed. He said something about how humans are sentient, and we need the sun and the earth so they are sentient too. Um, what? And he works for NASA?

My friend Eric works for NASA. He went to his office christmas party where they prayed at the beginning "in jesus name".

This is fascinating and disturbing. I had this idea that people in places like NASA are rational and critical thinkers. But I guess you can be smart in one area and compartmentalize your beliefs and faith in the supernatural in another, and blithely eschew critical thinking. I think early and lifelong indoctrination is definitely a factor. It is disheartening, though.

~

One of my friends, Jim, is a grief counselor so he and I ended up talking about death and the afterlife. Cheery, huh?

We both agreed that as atheists, there is no fear of death. Being dead is natural. It's the end. For about 14 billion years before you were born you didn't exist. Now you do. Eventually (hopefully later rather than sooner, after a rewarding and wonderful life) you will die. We all die.

Where I have problems with death is the actual act of dying. I really don't want to suffer. I don't like pain. I don't want to lose all of my dignity. As Jim said, though, we are really working on that.

Anyway, if you're religious, you are led to believe that there is an afterlife. Well, some religions anyway. Apparently the jews don't hold to that notion. So if you're a muslim and you do good deeds like kill a bunch of innocent infidels you and 72 members of your family go to heaven where you get 72 virgins (see inside label for details).

If you're a christian, you get two choices (well, catholics get purgatory, too). You're going to hell unless you get saved and accept jesus as your savior (rules and restrictions may differ for your denomination. See insert). Then you get to go to heaven to worship god for all eternity.

Followup with Leah And The Case For Christ

I heard from Leah the other day! You might remember that she is my husband Butch's 18 year old cousin who asked me to watch The Case For Christ by Lee Strobel. (Initial post which started because of a Facebook exchange (discussed here)) and (Second post)

One of my friends recommended this article and podcast episode from Brian Dunning: Emergency Handbook: What to do when a friend loves woo. After reading this article I reflected on Leah, her beliefs, her lifestyle and her happiness. I had never had the intention of deconverting her, and I'm glad I replied honestly with facts to what she wanted me to watch. I think that it was a good way to handle it. But while I waited to see if Leah replied, I decided how I'd handle seeing her over the holidays. I didn't really expect to get an email reply after several days went by.

I decided to come up with one sentence to let her know that there was no pressure and we didn't have to talk about religion again if she didn't want to. I never came up with the best wording, but I was looking for a way to let her know it was water under the bridge, and that I wanted to focus on our relationship in a positive way, that was what is important to me, not our religious differences.

But she did reply. It wasn't what I expected. Somehow, she turned around what I was saying about the video to being questions I had about Christ, that I was seeking answers to. So she was seeing me as lost and confused while I see her as indoctrinated and, well, delusional. How interesting! So here is what she said:
~
Know that 1) regardless of if you were family or not, nothing you could say would change the fact that I love you. Being family is merely icing on the cake. 2) You are not at risk to "deconvert" me. I have had too much happen in my short life already to confirm what I believe to be true for you, or any one else, to ever take that away from me. The faith I have in Jesus Christ has never been stronger, and I am completely sold out and in love with Him. It would take a lot more than a lengthy email or two to even put a dent in my relationship with Christ.

The Moral Landscape: A First Look

I just started reading The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values by Sam Harris for my local book club. I'm not very far into it. So far I'm just getting an idea of where he's coming from and what he proposes to convince me of as I read along.

Before I started reading, I listened to Professor Massimo Pigliucci and Julia Galef talk about the book on their podcast, Rationally Speaking episode 20, from 18:29 to 27:30. Both of them find fault in Sam Harris’ logic and principles.

Massimo also wrote a blog post back in April titled, About Sam Harris’ claim that science can answer moral questions. This article is based on the TED Talk that Harris gave back in February.

Massimo is a former scientist and is now a philosopher, so he is well equipped to address this subject.

I thought I'd share it and ask you, have you read the book? What do you think? Can science answer moral questions?

The Poetry of Science: Richard Dawkins and Neil deGrasse Tyson

Here is a very special video treat. Over an hour of Richard Dawkins and Neil deGrasse Tyson talking to each other about their fields of science. They are two of my favorite living scientists. Enjoy!



Two of science's luminaries converse on the beauty of science. Neil deGrasse Tyson, astrophysicist and host of NOVA and evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins explore the wonders of the Cosmos and of Life, its origins, its inspirations, and why science is not just an option, it is the only reality we possess.

Thoughts on Arguing

I have been wondering about arguing lately. How we argue, how we get set in our world view and dig in like a donkey sits back on its hind legs and won't budge. The reason this has been in my mind is because I've been trying to learn about determinism. When I first heard about it in a podcast by the Reasonable Doubts guys, I resisted and thought, this is ridiculous! Of course I have free will! I feel like I do!

But after 4 hours of them explaining it, I felt like I was getting it. Then we had our Morgantown Atheists group have a meeting on determinism and free will. A professor from WVU came and talked about it and I got it even more. Now I've tried to explain it to my husband Butch and my friend Jeff, who are both extremely resistant and argue against it. Part of that is probably because I don't understand it enough to explain it well. But part of it is because the idea of determinism is huge. It rocks your world when you hear about it.

What I'm really trying to get at, though, is how we, as humans, seem to always fight for what is most comfortable and familiar to us. We always seem to resist new ideas. And something else, we always seem to pick the other side of an argument if we're up in the air. For instance, when I was explaining determinism to my friend Jeff, he objected heartily.

But then we were talking about this topic, about how people stick to their comfort zones, and he told me that he ended up explaining determinism to his son, and found himself defending it, while his son objected.

Isn't that interesting? Why do we do this? I'd love to see some research on this. I've heard of a few studies that might apply to this, but I can't recall them clearly enough to find them for you. If I can think of how to search for them, I'll add them here. If you know of any studies please let me know!

Also, do you find this is true for you and your friends and family? Or do you see it differently?

Is Being A Martyr A Good Thing?

I love my husband's cousin. She's 18, bright, full of life and has the whole world in front of her. We'll call her Leah. She wrote the following on Facebook yesterday:
'The tortured's love for the torturer. This is God's love. It conquers the world.'
I felt I had to keep my mouth shut. She's very religious, idealistic and young. Her mother is religious but in a quiet way. Her mother accepts Butch and I as atheists without open judgment and we never talk about religion out of respect for each other. The relationship is more important than fighting over differing world views. By default we have the same relationship with Leah, but lately she has started putting uncomfortable, self-sacrificing, mindless bible verses on Facebook. This is really hard to take. I want to say something but I want to be courteous of my relationship with her.

So on Heaving Dead Cats' Facebook page I put the following:
‎'The tortured's love for the torturer. This is God's love. It conquers the world.' (someone I know wrote that as their status update. What does it mean to you? If you were a religious person, would YOU find comfort in that?)
I got several responses. No one liked it. Barbara was kind enough to Google it, though, and commented with the quote in context:
"And then there is the love for the enemy- love for the one who does not love you but mocks, threatens, and inflicts pain. The tortured’s love for the torturer. This is God’s love. It conquers the world.’”

Leah eventually told me she read the quote in a book called Crazy Love by Francis Chan. "Crazy, relentless all-powerful, radical love." Eek. I feel queasy now. A self help book about how to fall in love with God.  I won't even go there with how insane it is to fall in love with an invisible, intangible nothingness. My love of coffee is more meaningful.

Celebrating Skepticism With More Podcasts

Awhile ago I shared some podcasts and radio shows that we thought you might enjoy. I have come across a few more that I want to share as well.

• Curiosity Aroused: Investigation, Exploration and the pursuit of truth. This show is built upon the idea that it's fun to seek out the answers to life's questions. This is a Skepchick/Rebecca Watson podcast. This is quite new, so there are only 3 episodes, but it's interesting and well done.


• Skeptics With A K: The podcast by the Merseyside Skeptics Society in the UK. This is entertaining, fun and informative. These guys are like SGU in the UK. They are the ones that did the Homeopathy 10²³ "overdose" event. It was brilliant.


• The Skeptics Testament: this is a fairly new podcast (since January of this year). I just found it and am not sure what to make of it, but I wanted to share it with you. It's a skeptical, critical look at the bible. But I can't figure out if they are atheists or christians. But they seem to know their stuff from what I can tell from the first 2 episodes, and it's informative.


• EDIT: I forgot about The Token Skeptic: a weekly look at superstition, paranormal belief and the science behind it all. The podcast covers a range of ideas and issues, stemming from psychology, philosophy and ethics, science, critical thinking, literacy and education.

If you try these out, let me know what you think! :)

Ideas About Atheist Groups

As you may know, I'm the co-cat herder (co-director) of Morgantown Atheists, a local group for unbelievers. I'm also the coordinator for Morgantown Coalition of Reason, an umbrella organization that encompasses Morgantown Atheists and other local groups so that we can work together in the name of Reason.

The funny thing is, I'm not really a people person. Like a lot of atheists (supposedly), I'm quite an outsider, as much of a hermit as I can get away with, in fact. I have never liked going out in crowds or socializing with large groups of people.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because I have realized something that I want to share with you. Even though I'm a curmudgeonly hermit-y atheist, I love going to the 3 atheist/freethinker meetings we have every month. That's 3 Sundays a month where I happily leave the house and go socialize with a small group of people. And I look forward to it. The one or 2 Sundays where we don't meet I miss it.

Even people like me benefit from social community and contact. The beauty of the atheist/freethinker community is that we are relatively like-minded. We have a foundation of common ground. But we are also quite different, of course, which is good because that makes things interesting. The added bonus of freethinkers, skeptics and atheists is that we seem relatively level-headed (overall - there are exceptions,  of course) and we argue and discuss matters with interest and fairness. No drama llama is invited! So it's actually fun and mentally stimulating.

I think we all need some type of community, which is one thing that religion has in its favor that being a lone atheist does not.

But this is easily remedied. I thought I'd share some thoughts on how to get involved with a secular group of like-minded people. If none exist in your area, you can start one up.

Tips For Finding A Local Atheist/Humanist/Freethinker/Skeptical Community

Don't Assume I'm A Sensitive Soul

I received this email from a woman the other day. After careful thought I replied to it and decided it was worth sharing.

Here is the email in its entirety:

Thank you for sharing “Wild Geese”. After Joe Biden used most of this poem as his reflection upon the anniversary of 9/11, I went in search of the poem. The two of Mary Oliver’s collections I own did not include it. I was happy to find it at your site and amazed, actually. Amazed and delighted, because a poem I find so “religious” is at the same time such a balm for you. I grew up Roman Catholic; I am now an Episcopal priest. I am convinced after 20 years that what most people throw away – the cats they heave – are indeed worth heaving. Sometimes we have to go deeper, below the interpretations of history, to find our own deeper truth.

Yes, a “barbarous” God exists in the pages of the Bible: What all-kind God and Father would will the death of a Beloved Son? How could God command Abraham to kill his son Isaac as a test of faith? Isn’t that sadistic? Yes, indeed. On the face of it. For us in the 21st century these stories are barbaric. They are foreign to our experience. They were not foreign to the persons for whom they were written when the “first fruits” in ancient societies were offered up to the deity – including in some cases, the first born child. In some places in later writings there seems to be a critique of these practices in the Bible itself. The question becomes, it seems to me, is it worth reinterpreting these stories for our own time, or do we jettison them and replace them with our own stories of sacrificial obedience and love? Yes, life does involve sacrifice – we give up our children constantly to the gods of war who exact a savage price. There are no rams in the thicket to take their place …

But the same source of barbarism comments on itself in texts of amazing love and mercy. We cannot hear these texts enough.

Podcasts and Internet Radio Stations You May Enjoy

Want to expand your mind and be entertained at the same time? Here are a list of podcasts and radio shows you can listen to online or on your iPod through iTunes. Most of these are scientific/ skeptical in nature, but I've thrown in 2 religious ones because they are both excellent.

My Favorites:

• SGU: The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe and a 5 minute weekly podcast at the same place; SGU 5x5: a weekly Science podcast produced by the New England Skeptical Society (NESS) in association with the James Randi Educational Foundation (JREF) : discussing the latest news and topics from the world of the paranormal, fringe science, and controversial claims from a scientific point of view.


• Scientific American's Science Talk (they have other podcasts here): Join host Steve Mirsky each week as he explores the latest developments in science & technology through interviews.


• Reasonable Doubts (Your Skeptical Guide to Religion): A special focus on counter-apologetics. They provide detailed counter-points to the fallacious logic and blatant misinformation used by religious apologists when attempting to discredit skepticism and provide rational arguments for their dogmas. They also defend the sufficiency of reason, science and naturalistic philosophies to provide a satisfactory and morally compelling understanding of the cosmos, human nature, art and culture. They try to do this all with fair-mindedness and humor. Winner of the Peoples Choice Podcast Award for best religious/inspirational podcast of 2009


• The Naked Scientists and another podcast, Ask the Naked Scientists: The Naked Scientists are a group of physicians and researchers from Cambridge University who use radio, live lectures, and the Internet to strip science down to its bare essentials, and promote it to the general public. Each week, listeners of all ages and backgrounds tune in on a Sunday evening to hear creator Dr. Chris Smith, together with his entertaining scientist sidekicks, interview renowned scientists and researchers from all over the world and take science questions on any subject live from the listening public.


• StarTalk with Neil DeGrasse Tyson: a radio show devoted to all things space and is hosted by renowned astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson.


• Mr. Deity (video, not podcast, but you can subscribe through iTunes): a webshow that looks at the every-day life of the creator and everything he must endure as he attempts to manage his creation.

My friend and fellow science lover Brent sent me a list of his favorites as well, which is actually what sparked this post:

Answering Paul's Questions

A person named Paul commented on HDC on GMNightmare's deconversion story and I thought they were interesting questions. Both Johnny and GMNightmare already gave long answers, also worth noting, instead of letting it get lost in comments. And I added my 2 cents on at the bottom. :)



Here is Paul's comment:

I have a couple of questions that I would like answered, and you seem like the type to answer questions. First of all, what are your thoughts on supernatural phenomena (weird stuff people claim happens, i.e., someone’s ear being cut off, and growing back on)? Is it all just a big hoax?

Secondly, I know that evolution details how the earth came to it’s present state, and the big bang, (do they still call it that?) started all that, but what could have caused the big bang? And how did whatever caused the big bang come into existence? As far as I know, science clearly states that nothing can be infinite, and all things have an end and a beginning. So, if nothing is infinite, than how did the universe get started? Wouldn’t something had to have caused time to exist first, something that wasn’t governed by time, and so couldn’t even be described by adjectives like infinite?

I just have these questions, and no one can really answer them, except with some lame thing like “It just goes on and on”. And what does happen when we die? I know our bodies clearly decompose, we can see that much easily.

But what about our consciousness? It seems to me that consciousness is somewhat of a mystery in and of itself. Scientists can make a body, and they can put blood and oxygen in it, but yet they can’t make it live? So, if a consciousness isn’t something like a body, something that decomposes, what happens when the consciousness dies? Does it really just cease to exist? I can’t even imagine not existing. It just seems so foreign, to not exist.

Lastly, I don’t really get the term “gnostic atheist”. From what I’ve read, gnostics claim to “know” something, that other people don’t. So, if you’re a gnostic atheist, does that just mean that you “know” hands down, that there is not, and has never been, any kind of god?

First, here is Johnny's reply:

I’m sure GMN will have a response; but I just feel the desire to chime in.