gdp's Comments

Atheist Revolution : My Calling

Tue, 31 Jul 2012 14:52:25 +0000

I was *just* having a conversation about this with a labmate yesterday. As grad students we spend a lot of time thinking about how to find the "right path" for ourselves, and my friend uses words like "calling" and "discernment" to describe it. I told her that I thought we were talking about the same feelings, but I wasn't comfortable assigning some kind of outside agent to it ("If you say you have a calling, you're implying that someone or something is doing the calling.") She was totally cool with that and we found neutral ground for us to vent about looming postdoc/more permanent job searches. I wonder if she thinks I *am* being called by God, and just don't realize it ...

Atheist Revolution : Christian Email: Believe or You Will Be Tortured Forever

Tue, 10 Apr 2012 12:55:12 +0000

Heh. "I dont condemn or judge you for what you believe. Nor do I think harshly toward the way that you believe ..." but my god sure does! And he says you're going to burn in hell unless you love him! Sigh. At least the author seems to be trying to be nice...

Atheist Revolution : Do You Support Religious Businesses?

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 18:33:51 +0000

There's a difference between companies that happen to be owned by religious people, and companies whose mission and identity is centrally religious. I don't care about the former (if I boycotted those, I'd hardly be able to buy anything anywhere) but I do my best to avoid the latter (like Chick-fil-A and Hobby Lobby). My perception based on the radio ads I hear is that (evangelical, at least) Christians want to patronize stores run by Christians, and implicitly that means avoiding any stores not run by Christians whenever possible. This isn't the kind of attitude I take. Of course to some extent by supporting a business you support the leisure and charitable giving activities of the owner and whoever else makes money when that business prospers. But I can't examine the private spending habits of every business owner, that would be nuts. I can feasibly avoid the companies that explicitly make evangelizing part of their business plan and the companies that make a big deal out of spending a portion of their profits on "ex-gay" ministry or indoctrination of children. My recent post In love with God?

Atheist Revolution : Jerry Coyne on Science and Religion

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 17:24:45 +0000

Can you explain a bit about what "their accommodationist approach" involves? I guess I always saw it as more of a focus on the science classroom environment and outcomes there ... but I don't actually know many details about it. The NCSE is one of the groups I often mention to family members who ask me for Christmas present ideas (donate to [charity x] instead of buying me a present) ... if there's a better group to support instead, I'd certainly want to. My recent post I’m “hung up on” what’s true

Atheist Revolution : Only 38% of Americans Think Some God is Behind Natural Disasters

Fri, 9 Dec 2011 23:00:02 +0000

Interesting survey. I'm inclined to think, though, that this isn't a commentary on Americans' suprisingly-more-reasonable-than-expected beliefs as it is about how people tend not to think through to all the logical consequences of the beliefs they hold. The Pew article also said, "a majority (56%) say God is in control of everything that happens in the world." How can that not include natural disasters? Do ~20% of Americans believe that God sends huge earthquakes, tsunamis, etc. just whimsically, not as a "sign" as such? More likely, I think they just didn't really think about it. My recent post There’s no one like you

Atheist Revolution : Only 38% of Americans Think Some God is Behind Natural Disasters

Fri, 9 Dec 2011 22:54:26 +0000

It's of Americans, not of the whole world. Also, that's rather grotesque, don't you think? ... Stupid people don't deserve to be "mulched". Everyone has the right to their own stupid opinions, and everyone is stupid about some things even if we strive to be stupid about as few things as possible. I don't want to put anyone in charge of writing "comprehensive examinations" to decide who deserves to be murdered and who gets to survive. What we need is smart people to be in charge of making most of the decisions that affect most of the people. We need to structure things so that the bad decisions of stupid people only mess up their own lives.

http://tuckersdoppelganger.blogspot.com/ : Spiritual but not religious

Thu, 8 Dec 2011 21:34:21 +0000

I've heard "celebrant" as a general term used to encompass priests, pastors, ministers, rabbis, imams, justices of the peace, whoever might lead a "celebratory" life occasion. It's not exclusive of religious people, but rather inclusive enough to also refer to atheists who do the paperwork so that they can preside over their friends' wedding.

Frequently Unasked Questions : We're Bringing Slavery Back!

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 19:34:38 +0000

Yeah, I'm with the other commenters -- if you get pay and benefits, and you have a union to advocate for better working conditions, etc. ... that's employment. Slavery is about owning another person as property. Does your couch complain to its local union rep if you put your sneaker-clad feet up on it? No, it's just an object. We do have laws about how you can treat your pets, etc. so I guess there isn't a perfectly bright line. But I think it's safe to say that getting paid a million dollars a year to work for someone else is not what the vast majority of people mean when they talk about "slavery" or "property ownership."

Frequently Unasked Questions : Debt: Don't Ever Believe Them!

Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:11:57 +0000

Heh. Good point. I suppose it depends on whether his father taught him to question things and think about them from an objective standpoint, or whether he just pointed out things he thought were stupid and said, "That's stupid, son." Thinking critically is a skill, and it doesn't make much sense to say that you were "brainwashed into thinking critically." It sounds to me like Matt's experience has been more along these lines.

Frequently Unasked Questions : Debt: Don't Ever Believe Them!

Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:07:13 +0000

Nice post. One question - is there something I'm missing about buying furniture (or anything else) with a credit card? I use my credit card all the time, because it's a lot more convenient than carrying cash, but I don't spend more money than I have and I always pay it off in full. People certainly do treat credit cards like free money, but I think the problem's in the attitude, not the credit card itself.

Frequently Unasked Questions : Exposing Your Faith Is Like Exposing Your...

Thu, 11 Aug 2011 15:24:18 +0000

I'm not talking about "proof" or "disproof" as much as I'm talking about "evidence in favor of" and "evidence against." There's almost nothing we can prove with 100% certainty about the real world. At the same time, I'm not interested in supposing things with no basis whatsoever. I haven't seen electrons, but I've seen lots of things that the existence of something with the properties of an electron would facilitate, and for which we presently have no other better explanation. I do my best to form my beliefs by considering this kind of stuff -- by figuring out what is most likely to be true about reality, based on what we have observed so far. This is why I find it difficult -- or should I say, silly -- to talk about "asking God directly" whether he exists. If I don't believe he exists yet, why would I talk to him? I'll happily say whatever words you want me to say that you think your god would notice, but "in my heart" I won't really think that he'll answer, and that's usually cited as the reason why such "prayers" are unsuccessful. Suppose that nobody else had ever met my husband. I'd never met his family, or any of his friends from before we met. Suppose I'd had people over to visit my home, and it was always while "my husband was out of town." My friends noticed no evidence of my husband living here at all -- none of his clothes in the closet, none of his books on the shelves, none of his favorite foods in the kitchen. They confront me and say, "We're not sure your husband really exists. He might be a hallucination, a dream you're having." If I were to later turn to my husband and say, "Honey, do you exist?" what could his answer possibly tell me in relation to my friends' concerns? His answer might be part of that hallucination. I think I have a relationship with him ... but in this situation, I would have to come to terms with the likelihood that I was mistaken. I've actually thought a great deal about what might convince me that a god or gods really existed. For example, I wrote about what I think people who claim to talk to God could do to demonstrate that they're right. Plenty of atheists can give you a list of things that they'd consider to be reasonable evidence for a religion, enough to change their assessment about what's most likely to be true. Is there any evidence that would convince me of the Christian god? That depends largely on how you define that god ... and with tens of thousands of Christian denominations each with their own opinions, I'm not going to pretend to know which one you mean ahead of time. But I have read the Bible and read scholarly discussions of its text, and I feel reasonably confident concluding that it's not an authoritative document. (I wrote a series of posts about my reasons for this, beginning here.) I doubt that there's any experience I could have that would change my mind on those issues at this point, because there's such a preponderance of evidence on the one side already. That doesn't preclude my being convinced of some other god.

Frequently Unasked Questions : Exposing Your Faith Is Like Exposing Your...

Wed, 10 Aug 2011 17:56:37 +0000

Nice post. You definitely get "open mind props" from me; I really appreciate that you spend time mulling over this stuff and that you share your thoughts on it with the world. It's exactly this kind of attitude that motivates me to read all the religious books and blogs that I do, listen to the radio sermons, and so on ... I want to understand what makes so many people believe what they believe. If they're on to something, I want to know it too. (And if such a huge force in the world as religion is mistaken, as I presently suspect, I want to really understand how and why, and how best to explain that mistake to the people who are making it.) If I'm reading you right, you're offering three examples/ways in which you feel you've had a personal encounter with your god. One: a friend of yours who you're "pretty sure" had AIDS prayed, and then turned out not to have AIDS later. Two: your sister-in-law was killed. Three: you talk to God and listen to what he says back to you, though you do the vast majority (?) of the talking. I don't really want to go through and "debunk" what you've said here, and I'm sure you know what I would say for the most part anyway. Really, I just want to ask you one question: is there any experience you could have that you would see as evidence that your god did not exist? I mean, someone gets cured of AIDS -- yay God! Someone gets killed out of nowhere -- God again! These seem like very different experiences to me, and it's very surprising that you would extract the same belief from both. You do say, "With every miracle you can always wonder if there’s a rational explanation. And with every tragedy you can subtract a point on God’s scorecard." Maybe we should just "ask God directly" as you say, but then you do list both these examples as part of the basis for your belief, so clearly it's more to you than just God's voice booming out, "Matt, I Am Here."

Frequently Unasked Questions : Exposing Your Faith Is Like Exposing Your...

Wed, 10 Aug 2011 17:24:26 +0000

Heh. Yeah, it's an old joke. Actually, it makes me think back to my days of taking Latin in middle and high school (weird, but bear with me) -- in our translation exercises we learned that the ancient Romans would exclaim, "Mehercule!" which is something like, "By Hercules!" when they were taken aback by something. I don't think that they generally believed that the legend of Hercules was factually true, though. I admit I was sort of hoping for this picture ... http://s-ak.buzzfed.com/static/imagebuzz/web03/20... ;)

Frequently Unasked Questions : Prophecy: I Wanna Believe

Tue, 9 Aug 2011 15:52:53 +0000

Which God do you want him to face?

Frequently Unasked Questions : Prophecy: I Wanna Believe

Tue, 9 Aug 2011 15:51:16 +0000

I don't hold a supernatural being responsible for anything, because as you say, I don't believe in one. I only point this out because it seems strange to me that so many people praise an all-powerful supernatural being when they find their lost car keys, but don't give a second thought to the implications of ebola or earthquakes for the nature of that all-powerful supernatural being. Do you think that people have been bad enough to deserve entire cities being washed into the ocean by violent waves, or to deserve plagues that wipe out a third of the population? Do you think that nature being "dangerous and unpredictable" is something that your god could not have foreseen and/or could not have intervened to stop? This is bigger than this post topic, I know, and I don't mean to derail the conversation entirely. :) Just food for thought. I look forward to any of your future musings, whether on these ideas or anything else.

Frequently Unasked Questions : Prophecy: I Wanna Believe

Mon, 8 Aug 2011 13:05:51 +0000

I noticed that the last line of this post hit home for you, so I was wondering about your reaction to the next-to-last bit. Matt wrote about how he wants to believe that God ... is willing to randomly, in the middle of his crazy schedule of dropping natural disasters on innocent people everywhere, stop and say something nice to my friend. Do you think that's "totally cool"? I would have a hard time being pleased by the idea of a god I believed in behaving in this way, but you guys seem pretty nonchalant about it. It seems to me to be a lot easier to handle belief in a god who doesn't always intervene to stop massive-scale human suffering if that god isn't simultaneously actively intervening in people's lives in mundane ways (helping them find their car keys, giving them a little boost of confidence, etc.).

Frequently Unasked Questions : Prophecy: I Wanna Believe

Mon, 8 Aug 2011 12:59:40 +0000

As one of the "folks who scoff at supernatural direction" (I guess), I don't think I'd be chiding you for wanting to be guided by the random words of a stranger. Displacing responsibility from yourself can be comforting. I sometimes wish that I could rely on someone to just tell me what would make me happy, what would be "right" for my life, and so on. I just don't think that that someone really exists. What I would be asking you is why you think the random words of a stranger are actually a message from God. I'm honestly troubled by things you've written here like, "I don’t think the concept of prophecy is Spiderman-like fiction, Santa Clause-like folklore, or Paul Bunyan-like legend. At least I hope not. The idea of an occasional telegram from heaven makes me feel warm, like I belong, like I matter." Whether something makes you feel warm fuzzies inside does not actually distinguish between fact and fiction. I have no doubt that you would like to live in a world where prophecy is possible. I would like to live in a world where I've already finished my graduate work and have my PhD safely in hand. I think you'd agree that wanting it doesn't make it so. You talk about people who "pretend [they're] using God’s voice," people who adopt a funny voice and spout nice platitudes that help others feel better. You talk about staging and manipulation. You don't say anything about how prophecy might actually reveal supernatural truths, except to repeat that you like the idea of such a thing being possible. I know this might sound really bizarre here, but ... when did "belief" cease to have anything to do with the facts of reality?

Ars Moriendi : A Poem (PG-13)

Mon, 25 Jul 2011 18:04:49 +0000

I had some high school teachers who would have loved this. :) Fond memories... I can't figure out how much of a punchline you meant that to be ... but to take it seriously for a moment, I have definitely had this experience multiple times. Seeing something really beautiful and poetic, knowing that there's a good poem in there somewhere, and knowing that I can't get it out. Any thoughts on a title?

Atheist Revolution : Before You Dismiss Breivik as Crazy...

Sun, 24 Jul 2011 22:05:53 +0000

It's possible to be very confused and wrong, but still not be insane.

Atheist Revolution : Before You Dismiss Breivik as Crazy...

Sun, 24 Jul 2011 22:02:23 +0000

Clinically, the difference between "delusional disorder" and "schizophrenia" has to do with whether the deluded thinking is "bizarre" or not. "Bizarre" is defined within cultural norms and assumptions, and even "non-bizarre delusions" are things that are seen by most as extremely unlikely even if they are within the realm of physical possibility. If you hold a false belief that most of the people around you hold too, there's nothing insane about it. (It actually poses real problems for attempts to treat children of schizophrenics, etc., because they might actually be totally sane but still end up sharing some of their parent's beliefs ... and it's not exactly crazy to look to your parents for insight about how the world works.)