Copland III

Oh noes! I’ve been tagged by Homo Economicus! Oh well. Here goes…

Can you remember the day you officially became an atheist?

No.

Can you remember the day you officially became an agnostic?

Are you teasing me?

How about the last time you spoke or prayed to God with actual thought that someone was listening?

I don’t think I ever really thought someone was listening to my prayers. It always felt like I was improvising god’s answers as I went along.

Here is a good one: Were you agnostic towards ghosts, even after you became an atheist?

I never really believed in ghosts either.

Do you want to be wrong?

Not particularly. If I want a way to cheat death, I’ll achieve it using truly realistic means, not by bowing to a schizophrenic overlord.

I’d better tag somebody else for this now. Here goes then – to anyone from Proud Atheists, consider yourselves tagged.

Something I don’t ‘get’ about theism is how they explain away the lack of proof for a god’s existence by telling us that we must have faith – in books written millennia ago.

If we are to put our faith in a book, we could put it in any book – and maybe even one with more verifiable authorship than the Bible, Koran, Upanishads, et cetera. For example, I could claim my beliefs are based around The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the Scripture divinely inspired in the Prophet Douglas’s mind. It teaches in the ways of hitch-hiking, towel-carrying, and how to free oneself from the evil Vogons and their satanic poetry.

Of course, basing one’s belief system on a work of fiction would be nothing hort of clinically insane, as there is no evidence to suggest the Earth was destroyed in the 1980s by fat, slug-like creatures with bad breath and bad poetic skills. We also have no evidence to suggest that Oxford was once inhabited by hobbits, or that a hundred thousand years ago, a race of mysterious human-like beings fired an array of ring-shaped superweapons to fumigate the galaxy from an alien parasite.

So why on earth should we have faith in any book, without undisputable proof to back it up?

Something a little more topical today: Conservafecesedia’s article on dark energy starts with:

Dark energy is one of two concepts (the other is dark matter) that Big Bang cosmologists and astrophysicists have invented to explain the most serious differences to date between astronomical observations of an expanding universe and their own expectations. It is “the most popular way to explain recent observations that the universe appears to be expanding at an accelerating rate”;^[1] Astronomers and cosmologists have been speculating on the nature of this dark energy for ten years.

Made up? This is complete nonsense. Dark energy (along with ‘dark matter’) is a placeholder term that’s used by particle physicists. Why? Well… we don’t know what they are. We may find out when the Large Hadron Collider gets switched on next week. However, the two concepts are far from invented – we can and HAVE inferred their presence. They almost certainly exist. And either way, in my opinion, it’s a more believable scenario than everything being held together by a giant sky fairy.

It gets better (or worse, depending on whether you find this comic or simply disturbing). What does Conservapedia’s article on the Big Bang say? Well, nothing. It redirects to “Big Bang theory“. Yes, apparently, it’s still a theory.

Young earth creationist scientists contest the Big Bang Theory stating that it is scientifically unsound.

Even discounting the fact that this is completely solid, K-12 level science, with more evidence than you can shake a stick at, look at who contests it. Young earth creationist scientists. Scientists? This is purile. Science is something that can be tested and repeated (which will be happening at CERN next week, albeit thousands of times smaller and much safer), not belief, based on a book written by bronze-age halfwits, which claims that some shiny beardy man living on a cloud farted out the earth in seven days – which cannot be tested, anyway.

Conservapedia has a story in its news list on the front page at the moment. It goes thus:

The candidate pretending to represent the working class, Barack Obama, is scheduled to attend a $30,800-ticket fundraiser at the home of the wealthy hard rocker “Jon Bon Jovi” on Friday.

Now, I don’t know about you, but what the fuck is wrong with Obama going to a CHARITY fundraiser? This really gets me angry – it’s a horribly cheap shot. I know people have been taking cheap shots at Sarah Palin’s sex and her daughter, but doesn’t the bible say ‘turn the other cheek’? I’m pretty sure it doesn’t say ‘turn the other cheek, unless you have an election to win.’

Do not test the LORD your God as you did at Massah. –Deuteronomy 6:16

Imagine you’re being offered the opportunity to buy a car. It’s at a reasonable price and the deal looks good, but there are some strings attached.

You can’t take the car out for a test drive. You aren’t allowed to touch the car without the owner’s permission – in fact, you’re not allowed to see the car before you buy it, let alone start it and test its ability. In this sort of situation, you’d imagine you’re being set up for a scam.

That is exactly what is being stated here – you can’t put god to the test, and therefore you cannot PROVE he exists. You wouldn’t buy a car, a house or a computer like this, so how on earth would we expect to find the meaning of life in it.

There are those who cry ‘you must have faith’. However, am I likely to have faith in a supernatural cloud-fairy who is, according to the same texts, a homophobic, racist, nationalistic, authoritarian mass-murderer?

Conservapedia has always been a fecal pool for racist, biased and twisted bollocks. But this particular article amuses me – it is the article on naturism. I’m linking to it via snurl (I am in no way going to contribute to these idiots’ PageRank).

Naturism, also known as nudism, is the idea that going without clothes is acceptable and beneficial for health and wellbeing.

Those who support naturism quote Genesis 2:25, “And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.”

However, the Bible clearly says that such behavior is not acceptable. Genesis 3:9-10 says, “And the LORD God called unto Adam, and said unto him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked; and I hid myself.”

Further, Leviticus 18 is far more explicit against naturism:

None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover their nakedness: I am the LORD.
The nakedness of thy father, or the nakedness of thy mother, shalt thou not uncover: she is thy mother; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness.
The nakedness of thy father’s wife shalt thou not uncover: it is thy father’s nakedness.
The nakedness of thy sister, the daughter of thy father, or daughter of thy mother, whether she be born at home, or born abroad, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover.
The nakedness of thy son’s daughter, or of thy daughter’s daughter, even their nakedness thou shalt not uncover: for theirs is thine own nakedness.
The nakedness of thy father’s wife’s daughter, begotten of thy father, she is thy sister, thou shalt not uncover her nakedness.
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s sister: she is thy father’s near kinswoman.
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy mother’s sister: for she is thy mother’s near kinswoman.
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy father’s brother, thou shalt not approach to his wife: she is thine aunt.
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy daughter in law: she is thy son’s wife; thou shalt not uncover her nakedness.
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of thy brother’s wife: it is thy brother’s nakedness.
Thou shalt not uncover the nakedness of a woman and her daughter, neither shalt thou take her son’s daughter, or her daughter’s daughter, to uncover her nakedness; for they are her near kinswomen: it is wickedness.
Neither shalt thou take a wife to her sister, to vex her, to uncover her nakedness, beside the other in her life time.
Also thou shalt not approach unto a woman to uncover her nakedness, as long as she is put apart for her uncleanness.

Quite amusingly, the Conservaprats have misquoted their own holy text. The ‘uncover one’s nakedness’ in the KJV sense actually equates to “have sex with”. Nothing to do with nudity at all, then.

And then we come to the talk page. Oh, dear. The’ve been discussong this issue with excellent verve, even getting basic bible cancepts wrong.

This article equivocates on the biblical concept of uncovering someone’s nakedness, which is KJV language for the total sex act and has little to do with public nudism. I don’t think there’s any way to salvage this article to make it acceptable in CP. Teresita 21:39, 7 April 2007 (EDT)

I agree. According to mainstream Christian theology Adam and Eve were without sin prior to their
disobedience regarding the Tree of Life.

They were also naked as well before the Tree of Life “original sin”. Therefore, according to Genesis at least, nudity in and of itself must not be sinful. That’s how I understand it at any rate. Sulgran 21:47, 7 April 2007 (EDT)

“Those who support naturism quote Genesis 2:25, ‘And they were both naked, the man and his wife, and were not ashamed.’” Surely there are also naturists who do not go déshabillé just because of Genesis? Perhaps even naturists who do not even believe Genesis?–All Fish Welcome 04:26, 18 April 2007 (EDT)

One of my father’s favourite phrases, when observing a beautiful natural phenomenon, such as a sunset or a magnificently carved landscape, is

Absolutely beautiful, isn’t it? (switches to sarcastic tone) There’s no God though.

The argument he tries to make is that conditions are so beautiful, perfect and orderly for humans that it must have been intelligently designed.

This is something of a naïve point of view. Firstly, randomness and disorder can be beautiful. Take lightning (in slow motion, as demonstrated by this YouTube video). The paths of the current at the beginning are totally random, yet magnificently beautiful.

But then we come to the ’sustainment’ argument. The universe is massive, and mostly uncharted. We know nothing of planetary oyotems beyond our own – there may be millions of systems incapable of hosting life for each one which does. Yet we only understand our own system, and therefore subconciously assume that we are the only solar system, and erroneously assume we are the only life forms in te universe.

Even then, even if we are alone in the universe, surely it it would be more precious if we are very lucky in our existence, rather than being created on a whim by a bearded man living on a cloud?