Reflections from the Other Side

Quotable Me, Vol. 3

2012-03-09T08:51:00.002-08:00

Occasionally when I have a quick thought and either don't have the time or the inspiration to flesh it out into a blog post, I jot it down on my Twitter feed. Credit for a few of these goes to the sources I was reading or listening to at the time, which I sometimes condense down into a sentence or two. Here's some of the stuff I've posted over the past few months.

On Christianity:

Christians don't realize that each jump they make—from supernaturalism to theism to Christianity to fundamentalism—adds another layer of far-fetched assumptions.
"Not a true Christian" is meaningless from an outsider's perspective since Christianity has no clear, accepted, universal definition.
The idea that the earth is 6,000 years old causes serious problems for YECs, but the idea that the Flood was just 4,350 years ago is far worse.
I've come up with a fun game. I tell a lie, and others spend centuries trying to find a way in which it's true. I'll call it... apologetics.
Apologist (n.) – Someone whose livelihood depends on convincing you that genocide is actually a good thing when God does it.
I've found that many Christians judge how well others understand the Bible based solely on how much others agree with their interpretation.

On God, religion and atheism:

The rejection of this life in anticipation of a second one is the ultimate impediment to human progress.
Vagueness is among religion's most powerful tools. Believers can disagree on every point of doctrine yet still take solace in the same book.
Calling an unexplained phenomenon a miracle is not an explanation, but an admission of ignorance.
God-based morality isn't objective. It's still dependent on a particular person; that person just happens to be an omnipotent dictator.
Religion's most pervasive problem—and its greatest strategic advantage—is that for most people, it's "opt-out."
Some people try so hard to label atheism a religion due solely to atheists' passion... so can we call "labeling atheism a religion" a religion too?
If a god exists who punishes questioning and rewards blind faith, reason is the greatest curse he has ever conferred upon humanity.

On science and skepticism:

Acknowledging a gap in our knowledge is the first step toward filling it.
Once belief without sufficient evidence is permitted, everything is permitted.
As a family that has worked its way to riches is nobler than royalty, so is humanity's evolution nobler than special creation.
Denialists express parallel ignorance. Creationists: "Show me the transitional fossils!" Birthers: "Show me the birth certificate!"
Idea for countering bias: when you find an opposing argument that you don't know how to answer, add it to a list so you can't brush it off.
Three words that should never appear together: "required to believe."

Pretty soon I'll also post the fourth installment in my anthology of skeptical quotes from non-me sources.

Through the Pearly Gates (Part 2)

2012-03-05T08:27:00.011-08:00

I posted part one of the story yesterday. Here's the second one.

* * *

Gabriel stared at Stephen, sizing him up for almost a full minute. The eyes covering his wings appeared to follow suit. Stephen couldn't meet his gaze and instead turned away to look at the lavish furniture and décor. Everything in the house was fashioned from some precious material: sapphires, gold, silk, pearls. The smell of incense was heavy in the air.

"Uhm... wonderful place you've got here," Stephen offered.

"You have one just like it, you know."

"I do? Well, that's... that's nice, I guess. But, uh... how do I put this. What's it all for?"

Gabriel frowned. "I don't understand. Don't you find it beautiful?"

"Well, sure. But you can't just look at shiny trinkets until the end of time, can you?"

The angel shrugged his wings. "To each his own, I suppose. But now I must be getting back to worship our Lord and Master. It's been far too long already."

"Wait! I came here to ask about my daughter. I can't find her, and my wife is... well, there's something wrong with her. She doesn't remember things properly, and she's acting very strange. Stiff. Very happy, but in an oblivious sort of way. It's hard to explain. Can you help me?"

"Very well," said Gabriel. "What is your daughter's name?"

"Sophie. Sophie Lane."

Gabriel walked over to a corner of the room and began rifling through a massive tome identical to the one Stephen had seen at the pearly gates.

He turned and said simply, "Her name is not in my book."

"I... I don't understand. What does that mean?"

"She chose the Pit."

The room was spinning. "She... what?"

"Sophie never accepted our Lord and Master, so she was sent to the other place."

The words clanged dissonantly in Stephen's head. "But... she was so young."

The angel shifted his wings. "I'm sorry, but all who are old enough to reject our Master's gift are sent to the Pit. Is there something else I can help you with, or shall I go?"

The floodgate opened and the tears came streaming down. How could it be? Sophie had always been an inquisitive girl, always asking why, but Stephen had never imagined that she hadn't accepted the faith she was brought up in. He remembered those innocent round eyes, that carefree smile, and he collapsed in grief as he realized that he had lost her forever.

* * *

When Stephen opened his eyes, his surroundings had changed. He was in a room that appeared to be fashioned out of glass, but he decided that given the divine obsession with pointless riches, it was more likely to be diamond. Through three of the thick walls he could make out blurry gold hues of heaven, while the one in front of him had a surface that reminded him of his featureless white cubicle. A pang of loneliness snapped him back into the moment, and he would have collapsed to the floor in sorrow again if not for two powerful hands that grabbed his arms from either side.

"This is exactly what I was talking about, Raphael," said Gabriel. "There is to be no sorrow or crying in heaven, and those are all this man seems capable of."

"Not surprising," said Raphael, maintaining a firm grip on Stephen's right arm. "He ended his earthly life so he could reunite with his family. It would certainly be a disappointment to learn that your daughter chose the Pit and your wife chose erasure."

Stephen let the heat of his anger burn through his tears. "What did you do to my wife?"

"Calm yourself," said Raphael. "When your wife learned the fate of your daughter, she reacted in much the same way you did. We had no choice but to erase her memories of Sophie. But before we could do so, she begged and pleaded with us, told us she would never think of her daughter again. I judged this to be a lie, and our Lord will not tolerate the presence of such sins any more than He will allow sorrow. And so to avoid having to send her to the other place, we removed her rebellious nature as well."

"But that's ridiculous!" cried Stephen. "As long as people have free will, everyone is going to sin eventually!"

Gabriel gave him a small smile. "You have spoken correctly. With our heavenly bodies and our closeness to the Almighty, it becomes easier to avoid sin, and some of us devote ourselves to the Lord so completely that we maintain our autonomy for eons. But in the spiraling depths of eternity, some act of disobedience is inevitable. In the end, everyone faces erasure."

Stephen looked hard into the two blue eyes fixed in Gabriel's head. "Have you?"

The archangel's smile disappeared. "Enough of this. It's been hours since I bowed prostrate before our Master. Raphael, would you mind—"

"To hell with you and to hell with your god," Stephen bellowed. "I want my wife and daughter back!"

Two groups of eyes looked at one another, then at Stephen. Gabriel offered his diagnosis. "This one is beyond help. He is so consumed with evil that after erasure there would be nothing left."

Raphael nodded.

A large gash opened up in the blank wall in front of Stephen. He had expected it to reveal a cavern filled with angry red flames, licking at the legs of people chained to the walls. Instead he saw... nothing. Blackness blacker than soot, so all-encompassing that he imagined at any moment it would burst from the chasm and swallow him up.

He had expected a cacophony of tortured screams. Instead he heard... nothing. In fact, the silence was so intense that it seemed to absorb sound from the room he was standing in. And then he heard it: a single bone-chilling cry, from what sounded like a great distance, that echoed continually but never completely disappeared.

There was a push from behind, and Stephen knew it was the end. During his fall into the Pit, it occurred to him that the wailing he heard was so inhumanly shrill that it would be impossible to identify who the voice belonged to. It could have come from anyone—even Sophie. Had his sentence been total isolation, his memories of her might eventually have been eroded away by the relentless waves of time. But those helpless cries would never allow him to forget what he had lost.

As the pinhole of light in the ceiling began to close, Stephen heard the last coherent words he would hear for the rest of eternity:

"As you writhe in the darkness, always remember: God still loves you. That's why He gave you a choice."

Through the Pearly Gates (Part 1)

2012-03-04T10:42:00.004-08:00

Welcome home.

The following is a story I wrote about one man's experience in heaven. Christians make heaven out to be a place of eternal bliss, and I wanted to illustrate why the picture they paint glosses over some horrifying details. While my depiction will differ somewhat from how most believers understand heaven, it's all based (directly and indirectly) on the description provided in Revelation and elsewhere in the New Testament.

* * *

"Stephen Lane?"

"That's me." Stephen gazed up at a radiant winged figure who was standing behind the lectern, flipping leisurely through an impossibly large book. The angel paused dramatically.

"You're in. Welcome to heaven."

The gates of pearl swung open, letting out a light so brilliant that it was almost blinding. Stephen could hardly believe it. At last he would enter into the realm of the Almighty—and at last he would be reunited with his beloved wife and daughter. He walked along the sparkling path in wonder, surrounded by gold and jewels that would put even the most glorious earthly kings to shame. Every now and then he would pass a fellow saved soul. Each one was smiling serenely, as though they didn't have a care in the world and never would again. After a while he came to a clear river with massive trees planted on either side.

And there, under a tree with pomegranates that glistened like rubies, was his wife.

"Rebecca!"

How long it had been since Stephen had felt her warm embrace? It must have been... just over twelve years. He remembered because she had passed away when Sophie was only three. He had spent seven long years caring for their daughter on his own. Then she was hit by a pickup one rainy evening, and suddenly he was alone. He had spent another five years in isolation and misery, plodding to and from a featureless cubicle each day until he just couldn't bear it anymore. But now, now he would have the rest of eternity to share with his family.

"I'm so glad to see you, dear," said Rebecca. Her smile seemed to outshine even the divine brightness of their surroundings.

"And I, you," said Stephen. "So, where's our little girl? I can't wait to get us all back together again."

Rebecca tilted her head slightly. "I'm sorry, who?"

"Sophie. Our daughter. Where is she?"

"I don't know who you're talking about, honey. We never had any children, did we?"

Stephen just stared. "Look, this isn't a joke, Becky. I've waited five years to see her, and I didn't k—I mean want to see both of you. It's been so long, and I just need things to be how they used to."

"If you're looking for someone, you'd best go see one of the seven archangels."

Tears began to form in the corners of his eyes. "Why are you being like this, honey? Why won't you take me to her?"

"Don't do that, Stephen." Her tone was not angry or even stern, but merely flat. Seeing his confusion, she uttered, as if it had been seared into her mind:

"There shall be no more sorrow or crying here."

The words were so cold and lifeless that they could have come out of a machine.

"Wh... what?"

"Oh, I know!" said Rebecca, the music returning to her voice. "Let's go worship our Lord! No one could ever be anything but joyful in His presence!"

It was then that he noticed her forehead. It was marked with a word in Hebrew, יהוה, that he recognized as the unspoken name of God. From that single detail, he somehow knew that the woman in front of him would be of little help in finding Sophie.

"Come on, dear! I just know you'll feel better once you bow down before our Master! Besides, it's been over an hour since I last praised Him for His boundless love and glory."

"Becky... do you think you could point me to the nearest archangel? I need to find our dau—um, I need to find someone."

She sighed. "Suit yourself. I saw Gabriel leave from worship at the same time I did, so he's probably in his mansion right about now."

She pointed downstream to a golden house gleaming in the distance. And from there they parted ways.

* * *

Part 2 will be up tomorrow. [Update: Here it is.]

Errancy.org

2012-03-01T08:26:00.002-08:00

The Skeptic's Annotated Bible is a great resource for Bible contradictions, but as I've mentioned, it's a bit shallow, and it lumps all the problems together without letting any stand out. Errancy.org is a resource that addresses both those issues.

Two characteristics set this site apart. First, it categorizes Bible problems as either Weak, Minor or Serious. This allows readers to focus on those cases that have no plausible inerrantist explanation. You may not always agree with the author's assessment—I think he sometimes errs too much on the side of caution, and some problems are bigger than he thinks they are—but perusing the problems labelled "Serious" should make all but the most obstinate fundies think twice about their position. For instance, I have yet to see a single decent explanation for the failed prophecy that Tyre would be permanently destroyed.

Pictured: Biblical errancy in a nutshell.

The second great thing about the site is that it actually addresses the apologists' explanations for these conflicting passages head on. And that doesn't mean the author refutes them every time: sometimes he points out the obvious gaps in their reasoning, while in other cases he acknowledges that they could be right. It's a refreshingly honest approach—one that apologists themselves would never dream of taking—and in the end, it only makes the serious cases that much more serious.

True, the site does have drawbacks of its own: it only deals with a few dozen contradictions instead of the thousands supplied by the SAB, and the author is a layman rather than an expert in biblical studies. But all it takes is one irrefutable conflict to bring down inerrancy, and plenty of these issues come down to common sense and solid reasoning instead of a deep knowledge of ancient Greek.

Errancy.org isn't perfect, but like the SAB, it's a great starting part for learning about contradictions in the Bible. Their two strategies are completely different, but ultimately both lead to the same conclusion: the Bible is demonstrably not a book that's divinely free from error.

The God We Would Expect

2012-02-27T08:11:00.036-08:00

Our surprising God?

A couple of weeks ago I showed that if we assume the classical Christian God exists, we would expect him to create a very different universe than the one we actually live in. But then it occurred to me: why not try exactly the reverse? If we assume for the sake of argument that God exists, but then remove any prior assumptions we have about him, what would we expect him to be like based solely on what we know about the universe?

Let's find out.

What God Is
The universe as we know it is physical. Therefore, in the absence of any strong reasons to think otherwise, the immediate assumption is that God would be physical as well. It's probably not even meaningful to talk about a spiritual realm: to my knowledge, there's no real definition of what "spiritual" even means. Besides, if God was spiritual, then as I argued in the counterpart to this post, he would have no obvious reason not to make the universe spiritual as well.

If we don't start out by assuming Christianity, we would never in a million years expect God to somehow consist of a "Trinity"—of three "persons" composed of the same divine "substance." This convoluted idea of three entities that are somehow both distinct and unified may not even be coherent, let alone a reasonable prediction based only on our current knowledge. No, without good arguments to the contrary, we would expect God to be a single being—perhaps a very complex one, but certainly not one with some theologically sophisticated split personality.

While we're at it, we might as well dispense with the assumption that God is a "he," or even that "he" has a gender at all. Unless there's more than one of his kind, it would make little sense for him to have an identity as a male or a female. (Regardless, I'll still refer to him as "he" for the sake of clarity and convention.)

What God Wants
What might we expect God's goal to be in creating this universe? Contrary to what most religions of the world believe, we shouldn't necessarily assume that God particularly values humanity—or even life of any kind. If life was the goal, we would expect the universe to be teeming with it in every nook and cranny, yet Earth is the only planet we know of that has any. God seems to love dark matter and black holes more than any living creature, and of the little life that does exist, insects, plants and bacteria seem to be much higher on the divine priority list. Evolutionary biologist J.B.S. Haldane was on the right track when he observed that "the Creator would appear as endowed with a passion for stars, on the one hand, and for beetles on the other."

As I noted in the other post, we arose through a lengthy and inefficient process of cosmology and evolution. Why would God want to use such a roundabout process? Maybe we should think of him as a cosmic tinkerer, testing out various starting conditions for the formation of the universe—or even as a scientist running simulations. Philosopher Nick Bostrom's simulation argument addresses this directly, and it's probably the best argument for the existence of "God" that I've ever heard. Here's his own summary:

At least one of the following propositions is true: (1) the human species is very likely to go extinct before reaching a "post-human" stage; (2) any posthuman civilization is extremely unlikely to run a significant number of simulations of their evolutionary history (or variations thereof); (3) we are almost certainly living in a computer simulation. It follows that the belief that there is a significant chance that we will one day become posthumans who run ancestor-simulations is false, unless we are currently living in a simulation.

The idea is that if posthuman civilizations run a lot of detailed computer simulations involving sentient beings, it's far more likely than not that we're in one of those simulations. Both David Chalmers and Bostrom himself assign a 20% probability to this idea. While a simulator probably wouldn't meet the classical "omni" definition of God, they would certainly be one in the broad sense of a highly intelligent creator who wields virtually limitless power over their creation. So what would be the motivation of these demigods? Bostrom has some speculation on that as well:

[P]erhaps future historians would create a Matrix that mimicked the history of their own species. They might do this to find out more about their past, or to explore counterfactual historical scenarios. In the world of the Architect(s), Napoleon may have succeeded in conquering Europe, and our world might be a Matrix created to research what would have happened if Napoleon had been defeated. Or perhaps there will be future artists who create Matrices as an art form much like we create movies and operas. Or perhaps the tourist industry will create simulations of interesting historical epochs so that their contemporaries can go on themed holidays to some bygone age by entering into the simulation and interacting with its inhabitants.

As fanciful as this conjecture may seem, I think it's far more reasonable and grounded in real-world experience than any of the major religions.

Is God Good?
Given the massive amount of suffering in the world—both in human society and in nature—there's no reason to expect that God desires to minimize that suffering. In fact, philosopher Stephen Law has observed that given what we know about the world, we could argue the propositions "God is perfectly evil" and "God is perfectly good" with roughly equal effectiveness.

There are several setups that are more consistent with the amount of evil we observe. One possibility is ditheism: two gods who are equal in power, one good and one evil, battling for control. Or maybe there exists a single God who experiences wild mood swings, creating humanity on a good day and sending natural disasters to wreak havoc on a bad one. But these ideas seem needlessly complex, as a single God who's merely indifferent to our suffering explains our situation just as well. Another option is that God is in fact good, but lacks either the power or the knowledge needed to set things straight in our world.

The existence of countless conflicting religions can actually be construed as evidence that God is something of a sadist. If he's capable of revealing himself to us, he could easily resolve our disputes and unite the world's belief systems. Since we instead find the opposite, perhaps we can predict that God enjoys creating religions and setting them against each other to cause needless confusion and conflict. Granted, it's not the most parsimonious explanation for the inconsistent faiths of the world, but I think it's certainly more consistent with the data than what theists have come up with.

A Suprising God
So what have we learned about our hypothetical God from our observations of the world? Based only on the known facts, we might predict that God (if he existed) would be...

Physical, not spiritual
Unitary, not triune
Genderless, not male
Fond of dark matter and lower life forms
A cosmic experimenter
Indifferent to our suffering

The predictions are somewhat broader than last time around, perhaps because the very concept of God can be interpreted so broadly: from a vindictive monster to a loving father to a clinical tinkerer, or even a pantheon featuring all of the above. With enough tweaking we can get any number of deities to be consistent with our universe. Even so, some gods are clearly more likely than others, and the idea of God we get from viewing the world with an impartial eye is very different from the one we get when we're biased by Christian dogma.

A Look at Rick Santorum's Madness

2012-02-25T08:08:00.007-08:00

Rick Santorum probably isn't going to win the Republican nomination, and he definitely isn't going to win the presidency. But at the moment this poster child for the Religious Right enjoying co-front runner status along with Romney, and that's incredibly scary in itself. It means that hundreds of thousands of people either haven't heard the appalling statements he's made on everything from evolution to gay marriage, or they don't mind. You may have seen some of these before, but I wanted to round up some of his worst quotes for a closer look.

On Sexuality
Santorum has had an obsession with sexuality throughout his political career, and the words that come out of his mouth are often laced with bigotry that might have been better-suited to cultural attitudes a century ago. For example, on gay marriage:

"In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge include homosexuality. That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing." —Santorum

"When you marginalize faith in America, when you remove the pillar of God-given rights, then what's left is the French Revolution. What's left is a government that gives you rights. What's left are no unalienable rights. What's left is a government that will tell you who you are, what you'll do and when you'll do it. What's left, in France, became the guillotine." —Santorum

The comparison of gay marriage to pedophilia and bestiality is what earned Santorum the Google campaign to associate his name with a certain unpleasant substance. The comparison of repealing California's gay marriage ban to the violence of the French Revolution just earned him blank stares of disbelief. On sodomy laws, he's said:

"We have laws in states, like the one at the Supreme Court right now, that has sodomy laws and they were there for a purpose. Because, again, I would argue, they undermine the basic tenets of our society and the family. And if the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does." —Santorum

"The right to privacy is a right that was created in a law that set forth a (ban on) rights to limit individual passions. And I don't agree with that." —Santorum

This man wants to be the leader of the free world, and he doesn't believe you have the right to consensual sex within your own home. Unless you're a 16th-century Puritan, I don't think anything else needs to be said. Finally, on contraception and Don't Ask Don't Tell:

"One of the things I will talk about that no President has talked about before is I think the dangers of contraception in this country, the whole sexual libertine idea. Many in the Christian faith have said, 'Well, that's okay. Contraception's okay.' It's not okay because it's a license to do things in the sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be." —Santorum

"I would say any type of sexual activity has absolutely no place in the military. And the fact that they're making a point to include it as a provision within the military that we are going to recognize a group of people and give them a special privilege to—to—and removing "don't ask/don't tell" I think tries to inject social policy into the military. ... I would just say that, going forward, we would—we would reinstitute that policy, if Rick Santorum was president, period." —Santorum

Notice the stammer after he says removing DADT gives gay people a special privilege. It's as though he's sure they must get something he doesn't want them to get, but he's not quite sure what. The word he's looking for is "equality."

On Science
Virtually all the GOP candidates reject established science in some respects, but Santorum goes a bit further than most.

"One of the issues that I always got hammered for was the issue of evolution. I was the guy who actually put words in the No Child Left Behind Act ... I had an amendment, it’s a great story, I had this language, because what’s taught in our school system as a result of liberal academia, is evolution is an incontrovertible fact. ... I obviously don’t feel that way. I think there are a lot of problems with the theory of evolution, and do believe that it is used to promote to a worldview that is anti-theist, that is atheist." —Santorum

The added language he's referring to here is the Santorum Amendment, which advocated "teaching the controversy" and promoted intelligent design in public schools. On environmentalism:

"Speaker Gingrich has supported cap and trade for more than a dozen years. ... Who is he or who's Governor Romney to be able to go after President Obama? I've never supported even the hoax of global warming." —Santorum

"We were put on this Earth as creatures of God to have dominion over the Earth, to use it wisely and steward it wisely, but for our benefit not for the Earth's benefit." —Santorum

The second quote shows that Santorum's opposition to environmentalism stems directly from his religious beliefs. Specifically, he seems to be referring to God's command in Genesis 1 to "fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth." There can hardly be a better demonstration of the harm religion can cause in the realm of politics.

On Christianity
Wait, I spoke too soon. Santorum has also made some terrifying statements about Christianity itself.

"The idea that the Crusades and the fight of Christendom against Islam is somehow an aggression on our part is absolutely anti-historical. And that is what the perception is by the American left who hates Christendom." —Santorum

"This is not a political war at all. This is not a cultural war at all. This is a spiritual war. And the Father of Lies has his sights on what you would think the Father of Lies, Satan, would have his sights on: a good, decent, powerful, influential country, the United States of America." —Santorum

"[America] is given rights under the god, under god, not any god, the God of Abraham, Issac and Jacob, and that God that gave us rights also gave us a responsibility, and laws, by which our civil laws have to comport with. A higher law. God's law." —Santorum

A higher law. God's law.

If there was any sanity left in American politics, those words would be echoing in the heads of every single GOP primary voter. But apparently they aren't. Rick Santorum wants to establish a theocracy, and a frightening proportion of the nation either doesn't know or doesn't care. Some may even welcome it. And while Santorum will never be president of the United States, the public's attitude toward him illustrates just how far we still must progress as a country.

One Nation, Indivisible

2012-02-13T18:44:00.000-08:00

Today a Boston news site reported that a family in Acton, Massachusetts, has filed suit against the local school district to get them to remove the phrase "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance. Naturally, the reaction from most believers is extremely negative. The comments section of the article has been overwhelmed by the denizens of r/atheism, but here are a few of the comments from theists:

It's a bit like watching one of those terrible reality TV shows: it's utter drivel, yet its very foulness is what makes it so fascinating. Having read far too much of the comments section, I concluded that the arguments boil down to...

"If you don't like it, don't say it." – A totally backwards understanding of how religion is treated in this country. How about we add "hail Satan" to the pledge and see how you like that logic?
"The majority wants it." – The majority wants a lot of things. For much of our history the majority wanted slavery legalized. Fortunately, we have a Constitution that defends the rights of the minority.
"We've had it for a long time." – Appeal to tradition, and a false one at that: "Under God" was added in 1954 in a sensationalized, fearmongering response to the godless Soviets.
"This country was founded on Christian principles." – Genetic fallacy, and again, a false one at that.
"It's a waste of time/money." – Defeating a blatant and widespread violation of church-state separation, removing a phrase that marginalizes a huge segment of the population, and raising awareness that not everyone believes we're "under God" is an extremely worthwhile effort.
"You're infringing on our freedom of religion." – Seriously? Wow.

What most of the believers don't seem to realize is that it's not just non-religious atheists who aren't included in the pledge's current incarnation. "Under God" specifies a single sovereign deity. It marginalizes not only nonbelievers, but also many atheistic, pantheistic and polytheistic religions. Buddhists, for example, often don't believe in any sort of supreme being, and many Hindus believe in hundreds of deities without claiming one as supreme.

I did see one comment retorting that he'd never heard any of these religious people speak up to voice their discontent. This argument reveals an startling naiveness: did he ever consider that they might be afraid to speak up precisely because of the responses this issue gets from many monotheists?

Even if we completely ignore the fact that the pledge violates the Constitution and alienates both religious and nonreligious groups, there's another completely separate reason that "under God" should be removed: it's factually inaccurate. America is clearly and objectively not united by a belief in God, no matter how much some theists want it to be. I wonder how believers would feel about issue if they realized that we're essentially lying about being "one nation under God." If God exists, surely he'd rather that we own up to the fact that some of us don't believe. Instead of deceiving ourselves about our collective beliefs out of wishful thinking, we should focus on the values that truly make this country great: liberty and justice for all.

Update: Hemant Mehta over at Friendly Atheist has more details on the lawsuit. The family is using the Massachusetts Constitution's "equal protection" guarantee rather than church-state separation as their legal. According to a lawyer he talked to, this is a good route to take. Incredibly, a Christian group called The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty is counter-suing, because apparently the first suit discriminates against theists. Their sense of entitlement is staggering.

A Success Story Already?!

2012-02-12T08:39:00.000-08:00

I've only had my 30 Questions Project website up since Monday, but just three days later I got an email from the site's contact form. I was half-expecting someone to have written in berating me for criticizing their religion. Here's what I got instead, from a woman I'll call K.W.:

Hello Tim,

While I don't know if you'll even read this, I feel the need to tell you that your 30 questions really helped me. I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian home and though I've been questioning religion since I was 10, I never had the courage to really call myself an atheist. After reading your list of questions, I can't justify trying to cling to the remnants of the faith I was indoctrinated to have since childhood.

I just wanted to say thank you.

Here's my response back to her:

K.W.,

I'm so glad I could help! I've only had the site up for a few days now, and I wasn't expecting to get such positive feedback so quickly. It's really gratifying to know that this project has made a real difference to at least one person.

By the way, if you want to find people to talk with about this, chances are there's an atheist/skeptic organization in your area (Meetup is a good place to look). Either way, thanks so much for taking the time to write.

—Tim

And her response:

Thank you so much for that. You have no idea how much I appreciate it.

My intention with this project wasn't necessarily for it to have an effect on people right on the spot. Often times the tough questions will percolate in believers' minds for quite a while before they're willing to deal with them. To have gotten someone to question their faith, and made such an impact that they felt the need to tell me about it—all within just a few days of the project's launch—is more than I ever could have hoped for. Even if I don't help a single other person from here on out, I feel my efforts have been worth it just for this.

Introducing: The 30 Questions Project Website

2012-02-08T18:39:00.000-08:00

A few weeks ago I announced a project I've been working on: a concise, diverse, potent, accessible list of questions meant to challenge the beliefs of fundamentalist Christians. It started out with 40 questions, but after some feedback suggesting that this would be too daunting a trial for many Christians to undertake, I shortened it to 30 by taking out some questions and merging others together. It was a difficult, sometimes painful task, but I think the end result is stronger for it. So without further ado, here's the official 30 Questions Project website:

http://30questionsproject.weebly.com

I used a neat little website-creator called Weebly to make it, and while the result is a little generic-looking, it's hopefully polished-looking enough to give it an air of professionalism. I would've liked to get a unique URL, but I didn't want to pony up $30–40 a year for a resource that may or may not get long-term usage.

The layout is pretty simple: homepage, questions list, general objections answered, online and book resources, FAQ and an about/contact page. But while the framework is done and a fairly solid draft of the questions are in place, I'm still hungry for feedback of any and all kinds. Specifically:

Any typos, unclear wording, etc.?
Any place where the tone is wrong—too aggressive, etc.?
Any design/aesthetic criticism of the site?
Any questions that seem weak or redundant?
Any important topics or powerful questions I've missed?
Any important atheism/Christianity resources I should add?
Any other major objections that should be answered?
Any other questions that should be in the FAQ?

I'm pretty satisfied with how things have gone thus far, but one of the best ways to improve is by gaining outside perspectives. If you have anything to say on the above subjects—or any sort of feedback at all, positive or negative—I want your input!

The World We Would Expect

2012-02-06T08:47:00.000-08:00

Our surprising universe.

Christians tend to take it for granted that our universe is itself strong evidence for classical theism. But this belief is deeply misguided, as we can demonstrate with a simple thought experiment. If we start from scratch without any partiality toward the world we actually live in, what sort of world would we expect God to create? If we assume that God is a triune, omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent, omnipresent, timeless, eternal, unchanging, loving, just, personal, perfect creator, what can we predict about his creation?

No World At All?
Given God's perfection, we wouldn't really expect him to create a world at all. One wouldn't expect a perfect being to be lacking in any respect, so there would simply be no need to create anything. Theologians actually tend to agree on this point: they're quite insistent that God is completely self-sufficient and has no actual need of his creation.

So their ingenious solution is to point to another of God's attributes: love. Love requires an object, and although the three persons of the Trinity supposedly serve this purpose for one another, apologist Ralph Wagener asserts that God wanted his "abundant love" to "extend...beyond the trinity to others." In response, Horia Plugaru contends that "God was indeed motivated by need in creating the universe" because without fallible beings, God would be unable to maximize his love through the greatest form of loving act: self-sacrifice. This would mean that contra the claims of apologists, God would be in some sense imperfect.

Frankly, I'm not sure whether I buy either Wagener's defense or Plugaru's counter. But for the sake of argument, let's assume that God would create fallible beings and move on from there.

A World Made for Us
So then, what would a world made for us look like? First of all, since Christians believe that both God and humans are essentially spiritual, one would expect the world God creates to be spiritual as well. There's no particular reason to think that God would create a world composed of a fundamentally different kind of "stuff," a collection of physical particles that interact according to some seemingly arbitrary set of laws. A purely spiritual realm would be not only simpler, but also far superior in some aspects: for example, there would be no physical brains to cause irrational decisions and mental illness.

Furthermore, if God values humanity, there's no clear reason for him to create us using a long and inefficient process of galaxy formation and natural selection—in that sense, at least, the young earth creationists have it exactly right. And insofar as a spiritual realm would still have use for concepts like "space," one would also expect a world appropriate for our size—as opposed to the almost inconceivable vastness of the physical realm, most of which is completely beyond our reach or even our observation. It should also be a deeply livable place—as opposed to the one we subsist in, as land animals on a planet covered 70% by water, in a universe filled with dark matter, black holes and the vacuum of space.

Pictured at center right: us.

A World of Love
Since God is assumed to be perfectly good, the world should be completely free of unnecessary evil. We also shouldn't expect any flaws in God's personality, such as vanity, bloodlust or an out-of-control temper. If we're ever deserving of punishment, that punishment should fit the crime: no indiscriminate mass slaughters. And since God is meant to be perfectly just, humans should be treated equally: there's no excuse for divine endorsement of slavery, misogyny, homophobia or one particular favored group of people.

We should expect not only equal treatment, but equal and open access to the divine. There's a common but erroneous idea that if God revealed himself to us, it would somehow rob us of the ability to freely follow him. The obvious counterexample comes from none other than Satan himself, who, despite being quite intimately acquainted with God, supposedly led a third of the angels in rebellion against him. So in the world we would expect, God is easily detectable by all of his creation—and we would know exactly what (if anything) he wants from us.

What would we expect the nature of our relationship with God to be like? Apparently we're the objects of his perfect love, although what that entails isn't totally clear. One thing I would never predict from a perfect, transcendent and loving being, though, is a demand for burnt offerings and worship. Those practices lie squarely in the domain of the weak, petty, self-absorbed tribal gods created by ancient, barbaric societies. Would God expect us to reciprocate his love? Perhaps, but to punish us if we don't seems to miss the point of "perfect love" entirely.

God's sense of justice might well lead him to reward and punish us, but these judgments would have nothing to do with belief or requited love. There's also no reason to expect that God would use perfection as the standard by which he judges us. It would be much more reasonable for him to judge us based on whether our actions tend to help or harm others—within the scope of our limited abilities. Again, the punishment should fit the crime, and we wouldn't expect even the most evil crimes to be worthy of endless suffering. Nor is there a particular need for a system of discrete lives and afterlives: one continuous, ongoing phase of life should suffice. And even if we assume that our lives are eternal by default, we shouldn't assume that eternal life is mandatory. If after a few quadrillion years we grow weary of our existence, we'd be well within our rights to self-terminate.

Our Surprising World
Here, then, is what we can say about the world we might predict given only the traits of the classical Christian God to work off of. If we even expect such a God to create a world of fallible people at all, we would expect that world to be...

Spiritual and not physical
Young, with life formed via special creation
Of appropriate size and content
Free from all unnecessary evil

And we would expect God himself to...

Treat everyone equally
Make his existence and his expectations of us evident
Be free of character flaws
Not demand sacrifices, worship or love
Give us a single, optional life
Reward or punish us based on actions, not belief
Reward or punish in proportion with those actions

What a strange and surprising result! As it turns out, our predictions about the world don't correspond to reality, and our predictions about God don't correspond to what we find in the Bible.

How do we explain this massive disconnect between hypothesis and results? Well, it's possible that God has good reasons for not doing all the things we expect him to, reasons that are just too complicated for us to comprehend. But possible is not the same as probable, and the idea that this would be true for every single one of the above points is improbable in the extreme.

Another possibility, one that seems much more likely, is that our predictions were based on false premises. Either God just isn't there, or he isn't the loving, personal omnibeing that Christians claim him to be. When we take a step back and figure out what kind of world we would expect of God, it turns out to be so radically different from the one we live in that it strongly implies he—or at least this version of him—does not exist.

Tackling the Big Objections

2012-01-30T07:43:00.000-08:00

I'll be posting the second draft of my questions list within the next couple of days, but right now I'm working on an appendix responding to the most common objections I expect. Here are the two major responses I'm anticipating from Christians, along with my answers:

"My God can't be proved or disproved with evidence, but I have faith that he exists and I have faith in my religion."

Imagine that thousands of people are standing in a row several miles long, each belonging to a different religion. Each one has been given a list of questions that point strongly to the conclusion that their religion is false. They shout the sentence above in unison, each of them with a deep inner feeling that they must be right. They are using exactly the same reasoning you are—and yet, not only are they wrong, but according to your beliefs they are all destined for eternal punishment.

Perhaps you feel you can apply faith to faith itself. You cry, "I have faith that my faith alone is justified!"—and the entire row of people cries out along with you. Could it be any more apparent that "I have faith" is useless as a response to evidence?

"We mustn't question the morality of God. His ways are beyond our understanding."

We have no choice but to make judgments about God's morality: If we don't, then we're forced to accept a line of reasoning that can justify literally any moral state of affairs, no matter how despicable. If God was depicted in the Bible raping and torturing infants for his own enjoyment, one could still answer with "his ways are beyond our understanding." Even if Satan, posing as God, commanded the most evil acts imaginable, obedience could still be justified in exactly the same way.

Even if God's ways are beyond our understanding, all that can be reasonably expected of us is that we do the best we can with the limited knowledge and reasoning abilities we have—and based on what we have, the only acceptable response to the biblical God's sanctioning of slavery, misogyny and genocide is unabashed condemnation. It would be patently ridiculous for God to blame us for questioning his morality, if he was the one who gave us the capacity to reason while at the same time offering no explanation of his atrocities.

Do these responses seem reasonably effective? Is there some way I could improve upon them? Are there other common answers you would expect Christians to give? Let me know. I'm also thinking about adding answers to "Evidence against God is a test of faith" and "God giving us proof would remove our ability to freely choose him", so if you have any suggestions regarding those, I'm all ears.

40 Questions for Fundamentalist Christians

2012-01-26T18:46:00.000-08:00

Whew! The first draft in my 40 Questions Project is finally finished, and I must say I'm quite happy with it. Since it's fairly long, I've made it a publicly accessible Google doc rather than posting it here directly, but below is a "table of contents" of sorts:

Introspection
1. Demand for evidence
2. Comparison to other religions
3. Cultural and parental religious dependence
4. Investigation into other religions
5. Unreliability of faith
6. Unreliability of religious experiences
7. Falsifiability of Christianity
8. Falsifiability of God's intervention in the world
9. Lack of modern miracles
10. Falsifiability of God's positive perception
11. Falsifiability of prayer
Doctrine
12. Injustice of the atonement
13. Illogic of the atonement
14. Inefficiency of the atonement
15. Fate of the unborn
17. Incoherence of the trinity
18. God as tribal invention
19. Signs of Christianity
19. Pointlessness of prayer
20. Incoherence of the soul
21. Argument from scale
22. Argument from divine hiddenness
Errancy
23. Evolution
24. Age of the earth
25. Israel's exodus and conquest
26. Census of Quirinius
27. Destruction of Tyre
28. Jesus' delayed return
Morality
29. Euthyphro dilemma
30. Problem of human evil
31. Problem of natural evil
32. Problem of animal suffering
33. Problem of hell
34. Problem of divine miscommunication
35. God's sanctioning of slavery
36. God's sanctioning of misogyny
37. God's homophobia
38. God's killings
39. God forces the killing of unbelieving loved ones
40. Comparison to other religious morality

I certainly didn't have a problem coming up with forty—on the contrary, the most difficult task was deciding what to leave out. I also spent a lot of time carefully wording the questions so that they were fairly short and understandable while still posing a serious challenge. Some of these questions have very common responses, so I'll also be working on an appendix responding to "Frequent Answers."

Please leave feedback in the comments! Did any questions seem weak or redundant? Is there some great question I missed? Could anything have been worded better? Any other concerns? Let me know so I can revise.

Hitch and Fry Are Wizards

2012-01-22T21:41:00.000-08:00

This very well-known debate took place a couple of years ago, but I only got around to watching it today. If you've got 50 minutes to spare, it's well worth checking out. [Update: Apparently I watched the broadcast version of the debate which was edited for brevity. The full version is substantially longer.] Christopher Hitchens and Stephen Fry completely overwhelm their two opponents on the question of whether the Catholic Church is a force for good.

The first guy, Archbishop John Onaiyekan, says virtually nothing except that the church is big, well-organized and owns some AIDS-related charities. Hitchens rips into the church more in his first two minutes—rattling off the Crusades, child abuse, forced evangelism in South America, anti-Semitism and other horrors—than the opposition manages to defend in the entire debate.

The second church defender, Ann Widdecombe, does a little better than the first, but still whines about the focus on child rape scandals and discouragement of condoms without really addressing them. Fry attacks this attitude straight on when he says, "It's a bit like a burglar in court saying, 'You would bring up that burglary and that manslaughter. You never mention the fact I give my father a birthday present.'" He also makes an impassioned speech condemning the Church's own condemnation of homosexuality.

Another great moment from Fry is when he challenges Widdecombe on the Church's changing position on issues like slavery, saying: "And what is the point of the Catholic Church if it says, 'Oh, well we couldn't know better because nobody else did.' Then what are you for?"

The real highlight of the debate, though, was the result:

As a consequence of this debate, 774 minds were changed for the better. Naturally, it won't always be this easy—the two apologists were hopelessly inept, and it's often harder to convince people of religion's falsity than its negative impact—but even so, this should serve as an encouraging testament to the fact that debate really can make a difference.

The 40 Questions Project

2012-01-15T08:20:00.000-08:00

Over the past few weeks I've had a couple of friendly debates with my dad about the existence of God. My responses have been purely in terms of objections to arguments in favor of God's existence—not once have I gone on the offensive. My intention is not to beat them over the head with my unbelief, but since they're challenging my views, it only makes sense to challenge theirs as well. I'd like to make them think, to inform them of some of the more unsavory parts of their religion. It may seem strange to believers that atheists might want to change their views, but when beliefs have negative consequences, it's only natural to challenge them.

A while back I came up with a list of 10 questions for Christians. I've been thinking about expanding on them, so I've embarked on the 40 Questions Project to come up the best thought-provoking challenges to fundamentalist Christianity. The questions that I'm using will:

Address the beliefs of fundamentalist evangelical Christians
Be succinct, with no more than a couple of sentences of setup
Avoid provoking a flippant response (e.g. "But evolution is wrong.")
Give specific examples when necessary (e.g. for Bible contradictions)
Mix subtle self-reflection with direct challenges to belief
Be comprehensive, ranging from general problems with theism to issues with specific fundamentalist doctrines

I don't think I'll be breaking any new ground with this list of questions. My goal is just to combine the most difficult issues within Christianity into one concise, accessible package. It will bring together everything from the problem of evil to historical errors in the Bible. Here's one example of a question I'll be including in some form:

"If God asked you to kill your child in the same way he did with Abraham, would you?"

I realize that what I find challenging and thought-provoking, others may find trivial, so I plan to go through a couple of drafts after getting feedback from those around me. Depending on how the project turns out and how discussions are going with my parents, I may or may not present it to them directly. Either way, I hope this can serve as a resource both for myself and for my fellow nonbelievers.

If any of my readers have suggestions for questions that might be suitable for this project—ones that will really challenge Christians and make them think—I'd love to hear from you in the comments.

5 Things I Don't Believe About Believers

2012-01-09T18:27:00.000-08:00

My intention with this blog is not to attack religious people, but rather to criticize religion itself. As such, I think it would be a good idea to repudiate certain negative notions about believers. Many of these views are held only by a small minority of atheists, but even so, it's good to clear up such misconceptions. As a former Christian, I sympathize with the religious in some ways and know firsthand that the following blanket statements are untrue.

"Believers Are Stupid"
Let's get one thing out of the way first: it's true that IQ does correlate somewhat with religiosity. A 2008 study examined data from 137 countries to come up with the following graph comparing countries' average IQ to percentage of atheists:

There are a few points to note here, however. Despite the clear positive trend, a few countries on the far left rank higher in IQ than those on the far right, and a "best fit" line would appear to flatten out at around 20% unbelief. And see all those countries pressed up against the left margin? Those are mostly third world countries with low rates of education. As for the extremely high rates of belief in God, many sociologists see it as a coping mechanism to deal with their low quality of life.

It's not accurate to make the generalization that "religious people are stupid": the data shows that as a whole the religious are only slightly less intelligent (often for unrelated reasons), and the brightest believers (e.g. Francis Collins) are certainly just as smart as the brightest non-believers. In fact, I don't think religiosity relates directly to intelligence at all. Intelligent people can be religious because they compartmentalize—they don't apply their intelligence to their religion. Religion is in a psychological category all its own, one that's perceived as incompatible with skeptical inquiry. Many were raised to hold certain comforting beliefs, grew up in a culture that supports those beliefs, made friends with others who believe as they do. Often they've never been taught to question those core values—and if they do, greater intelligence can help them invent more elaborate explanations that allow them to continue believing.

"Believers Are Hateful"
The word "hateful" is tossed around a lot. Sometimes it's used accurately (toward the Westboro Baptist Church, for example), but the term is so powerful and intense that it can be tempting to apply it to one's opponents even when it's undeserved. Religious people in general certainly don't deserve to be described as "hateful"—nor even do many fundamentalists.

Growing up as a evangelical Christian, I didn't "hate" gay people. It was strange to me that people could think and behave in that way, and I considered their actions sinful. That's as far as it went, and I think the same can be said for most fundamentalists. To disapprove of one aspect of a person's identity and to be weirded out by their sexuality is not the same as hatred of that person. The old saying "love the sinner, hate the sin" may seem trite to nonbelievers, but it's a genuine sentiment that's just as valid as saying "love the believer, hate the belief." I think we should avoid devaluing the word "hateful" and reserve it for those who actually detest another human being.

"Believers Are Crazy"
It can also be tempting to say that religious people have a mental disorder. After all, they believe strange and outlandish things, often fervently and without any logical basis. The idea that one can communicate with an invisible person wherever one goes does bear a resemblance to schizophrenia.

But ultimately, they've merely had a particularly enticing set of false beliefs ingrained into their psyches from an early age. That's not enough to call religiosity a mental illness in any sense except as a provocative rhetorical device. That being said, there's certainly some gray area here. What about those who roll around on the ground speaking in tongues, or actually claim to see angels and hear God's voice audibly? At what point do enculturation, social pressure and self-deception become pathology? I'll leave that for the mental health professionals to decide.

"Believers Know They're Wrong"
This one pops up more rarely, but some people really do think that believers realize deep down that their beliefs are false. Even David Silverman, president of American Atheists, said on The O'Reilly Factor that "everybody knows religion's a scam."

It should really go without saying that this is absolutely not the case. Certainly, there are many people who harbor serious doubts but convince themselves to continue believing due to wishful thinking. But the majority of believers accept their respective doctrines without reservation. For many years, I was one of them. To suggest that religious people are atheists in denial is just as insulting as suggesting that the reverse is true of atheists (an idea that rears its head with frustrating regularity).

"Believers Can't Be Reasoned With"
This sentiment is often expressed in terms of a quote: "You can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into." As Matt Dillahunty of The Atheist Experience puts it, this is absolute "bull."

Is it difficult? Sure. Rare? Relatively speaking, yes. But it happens. Millions of atheists were raised as believers, but reached their own conclusions after either investigating on their own or being convinced by others. Once again, I'm one of them. According to this quote, I don't exist.

Maybe I'm being pedantic. Maybe most people interpret this as a general pattern rather than a hard-and-fast rule. But on more than one occasion I've heard it suggested that arguing with religious people is pointless, because none of them ever change their position. The idea that the faithful are immune to reason can be a serious obstacle to helping humanity move away from religion. Believers deserve more than dismissal from the non-believing community. Many of them are intellectually honest people who are willing to change their minds when they find that they can't defend their views. And even those who continue to believe may gain a deeper and more nuanced understanding of their own doctrines. Putting our most deeply cherished convictions under a microscope is hard for everyone. We owe it to believers to be there to help.

The Tree of Religion

2012-01-06T08:51:00.000-08:00

One interesting paradox that occurred to me recently is that religions like Christianity are highly dogmatic, and yet they are constantly changing and adapting to their environment. People generally accept the faith they were born into without seriously questioning it, but in Christianity alone there are over 30,000 distinct sects.

How can both of these facts be true at the same time? I think there are a couple of things to consider here. The first is that in a hugely popular religion such as Christianity, it works perfectly well for most people to believe everything they were taught without any real critical evaluation. There are 2.3 billion Christians in the world, so if only 5% of them significantly alter their beliefs, and only 0.01% of that 5% gain enough of a following to form a new sect, that would still be 11,500 new versions of Christianity in the current living population alone. All it takes is a few people who are willing to change their religious views, and we get endless variations on the same basic framework.

So what is it that drives this huge and ever-increasing level of religious diversity? One major factor is that societies and cultures change over time. A few hundred years ago, almost all Christians believed that God created the universe in the manner described in Genesis, and that homosexuality was an undeniable evil. Today these views are being steadily eroded as people realize that there is abundant evidence for evolution and that there's no reason to condemn gay people. This is not a new phenomenon, either: earlier this year I summarized Bart Ehrman's description of how early Christianity evolved. Jesus went from preacher to Messiah to God incarnate, Jews went from comrades to Jesus-killers, and the concepts of heaven, hell, souls and the Trinity arose.

Not only do cultures change, but Christianity is introduced to entirely new cultures as well. Missionaries purposely frame their doctrines in terms that the natives can identify with, and the natives often combine Christian beliefs with their existing ones rather than just replacing them. There's even a name for this process: syncretism. Vodun in west Africa, Rastafarianism in Jamaica, and the Unification Church in South Korea are just three examples of this.

The other crucial factor to consider is the remarkable vagueness of holy scriptures. Texts such as the Bible appear to offer great insights into the nature of the universe, yet they are so open to interpretation that readers can come away with any lesson they want. Contradictions and internal conflicts in doctrine, far from being fatal to religion, are in fact engines of religious diversity. Is God a vengeful being who is pouring out his wrath upon humanity, or a kind and nurturing one who is constantly blessing his beloved creations? It depends on which biblical stories you emphasize. Homosexuality is condemned? Not if you interpret every single passage that mentions it in just the right way. The Genesis account of creation is demonstrably wrong? No big deal. Just call it a metaphor and the problem instantly vanishes. The Bible and other religious books can be made to support any virtually any view with enough creative interpretation.

The question of what religious sects manage to survive is a simple matter of natural selection. Those ideas that can appeal to the contemporary culture are the ones that survive, while outdated ones are left in the dust. The Puritans were a significant faction in the early 1600s, but nowadays their name has become synonymous with self-righteous moralizing. In modern times, televangelists like Joel Osteen have become popular by preaching prosperity theology, which essentially says that God wants you to be rich. Early Christians would have been horrified at their line of thinking, but it fits America's consumerist culture like a glove. It's not truth that determines what religions become popular: it's suitability to the current environment.

This dovetails with another, related observation: truth converges, but religion diverges. When arriving at truth in areas like science, people independently reach the same conclusion. But religion is the opposite: it continually branches off of itself like an ever-expanding tree. There's no chance that religions will ever converge upon a single specific conclusion, because they thrive on faith, personal revelation and creative interpretation of scripture rather than evidence and logical argument. Religion is a flat-out terrible method of determining what's true.

These characteristics of religion—subjective, shaped by natural selection, endlessly diverging in every direction—do not in themselves show that religion is false. However, they're precisely the opposite of what we would expect to find if one or more divine beings were guiding everyone toward enlightenment. If the gods really want to lead humanity to a single transcendent truth, they're doing a remarkably bad job.

2011 in Review

2012-01-01T07:44:00.000-08:00

What a year it's been! In January I had left Christianity but was still wavering on the question of God, and just 12 months later I've been accepted by my immediate family and a group of school friends as an atheist. Along the way I read a few very enlightening books and made a few popular posts that I'm quite happy with. I've been slacking a little recently, but overall I accomplished much more with this blog than I ever expected to.

Here are my posts from November:

September & October in Review: An index of my 25 posts from Sept. and Oct. 2011
Atheist Ear Candy: A look at 6 podcasts that cover science, atheism & skepticism
The Ontological Argument Defeats Christianity: Just by replacing a few words
The Holy Sacrament... of Doom: Can communion cause illness, death & damnation?
Born from Above: A translation blunder shows the "born again" story in John is fake
Truly Big Ideas: Concepts like the afterlife are poorly conceived—& we can do better
The Suffering Servant: How we know Isaiah 53 doesn't predict Jesus' crucifixion
The Sorcerer and the Squid: A fable illustrating the flaws in saying "God did it"
Powerful Thoughts, Vol. 3: A third batch of quotes on God, religion, science & more
What Do You Mean By That?: Christians often uncritically accept vague buzzwords

And from December:

Keeping an Open Mind: What should convince one that God does or doesn't exist?
The Ultimatum: UCSD preacher says I must tell my parents I'm an atheist, or he will
Breaking the News: Preacher lets up on the ultimatum, I still tell them, things go well
The Debate Begins: Discussion with my dad about atheism, miracles & more
Infographic Interlude: 5 charts that effectively & efficiently criticize religion
Church Happenings: The egregious things I've heard pastors say while preaching
Advanced Redditing: More about reddit for atheists, skeptics and science lovers
'Tis the Season: Examining the myriad problems with Jesus' birth narratives

I probably won't be posting quite as much in 2012 as I did last year. One of my major objectives has now been accomplished: to help me prepare for revealing my unbelief to my family. That said, I'll certainly remain active, because there are plenty of topics I still want to explore.

'Tis the Season

2011-12-25T20:53:00.000-08:00

Ah, Christmas. A time to give celebrate friends and family, love and generosity... and uh... something else. What was it again? Oh, I know! It's the perfect time to reflect upon the birth of Jesus—specifically, the remarkable number of problems with his birth narratives. In fact, there are so many that I'll only be giving a brief overview rather than going through them in detail.

The Contradictions
To any unbiased observer reading Matthew 1:18-2:23 and Luke 1:26-2:40, it's patently obvious that they're two completely different, incompatible stories of Jesus' birth. Here's a summary of the two versions:

Leaving aside the fact that the stories differ on almost every point, there are basically two direct contradictions. First, Matthew strongly implies that Mary and Joseph's hometown was Bethlehem, while Luke states that it was Nazareth. I went into this problem in more detail in a previous post. Second, Luke has them going directly from Bethlehem to Nazareth, while Matthew has Jesus' family fleeing from Bethlehem to Egypt. Errancy.org has more on this.

The Prophecies
The birth narratives deal with quite a few alleged prophecies of Jesus. The first is Micah 5:2, which predicts that a savior would come from Bethlehem. Since Jesus was thought to have grown up in Nazareth, Matthew and Luke came up with different, conflicting ways to resolve this difficulty. But Micah 5:2 is referring to a tribe, not a town, and said savior was also supposed to defeat the Assyrians.

The birth narratives feature a virgin birth due to a misinterpretation of Isaiah 7:14, which appears to say someone will be born of a virgin. But the word translated "virgin" is more likely to mean "young woman," and the prophecy was already supposed to be fulfilled by Isaiah 8:3-4. The same verse also prophesies that "they shall call his name Immanuel," but there's no indication that Jesus was ever actually called by that name.

The gospel of Matthew is particularly big on attempting to fulfill prophecies. Matthew 2:23 says that Jesus' upbringing in Nazareth fulfills a prophecy saying "he shall be called a Nazarene," but no such prophecy appears anywhere in the Old Testament. Matthew 2:15 explains the flight to Egypt as a fulfillment of Hosea 11, which says, "Out of Egypt I called my Son." Yet looking at the original context, we instead see...

"When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my Son. As they called them, so they went from them; they sacrificed to the Baals, and burned incense to carved images."

Not only is it not a prophecy of Jesus, but it's not a prophecy at all.

Culture and History
I want to quickly cover a few more points. First, some argue that Herod's massacre of the Bethlehem newborns didn't happen because it wasn't recorded by the meticulous historian Josephus, who recorded myriad other atrocities of Herod. Apologists reply that Bethlehem was so small that this would have been a minor event that Josephus may not have felt was significant enough to write about. I don't have enough information to conclude who's right one way or the other.

Then there's the Census of Quirinius, which is a massive problem for inerrantists. Here's a summary from Richard Carrier:

The Gospel of Luke claims (2:1-2) that Jesus was born during a census that we know from the historian Josephus took place after Herod the Great died, and after his successor, Archelaus, was deposed. But Matthew claims (2:1-3) that Jesus was born when Herod the Great was still alive--possibly two years before he died (2:7-16). Other elements of their stories also contradict each other. Since Josephus precisely dates the census to 6 A.D. and Herod's death to 4 B.C., and the sequence is indisputable, Luke and Matthew contradict each other.

Finally, there's the Star of Bethlehem, which the Magi follow to Bethlehem. It's described as a real astronomical event—a star that rises in the east just as any star would—yet astronomers have not identified any event that matches its description, and it's unclear how a star could be situated directly above a particular building in a particular town. More importantly, the Magi's interpretation of the star is a form of astrology, which as Adam Lee points out is harshly condemned by the Bible. In fact, the very word "magos" literally means "astrologer." When the author of Matthew has a supposedly demonic power directing the Magi to worship Jesus, it's pretty clear that he's not on the same page as the rest of Christianity.

Conclusion
The birth narratives in Matthew and Luke are completely different and contain at least two major direct contradictions. At least four alleged prophecies either are not prophecies at all or are not fulfilled by Jesus. And there are multiple details that conflict with history or even Christianity itself. The birth narratives alone are more than enough to show that the Bible cannot be the inerrant word of God.

Advanced Redditing

2011-12-23T09:17:00.000-08:00

I spend way more time on reddit than I probably should—in fact, it's a small part of why I'm posting less at the moment than I have in months past. I wrote previously about r/atheism, the popular subreddit for nonbelievers. Again, while they do plenty of good—I got a massive outpouring of support during my recent "coming out atheist" drama, and they recently raised over $200,000 for Doctors Without Borders in just a few weeks—the content to be found there sometimes gets a bit shallow and repetitive. So here are a few other subreddits that are worthy of some attention from atheists, skeptics and lovers of science.

First, the r/atheism alternatives. While r/AtheistGems is updated only occasionally, it contains valuable nuggets in the form of well-reasoned arguments, YouTube videos and links to other resources. For example, this video of the recently late Christopher Hitchens has him eloquently tearing down the Ten Commandments and constructing them anew, while this thread has abundant links for engaging with Muslims. Then there's r/AtheismBot, which takes r/atheism and weeds out 85% of it (the Facebook posts, rage comics and other fluffy content), leaving the more serious stuff behind.

Another two topics worth looking at are r/freethought and r/skeptic. The former is much like r/atheism, but with a more mature tone and a broader focus that includes more science and politics in addition to religion. This discussion on the exaggerated importance of nationalism in society is a good example. The latter focuses mostly on various forms of pseudoscience including homeopathy, psychics and other products that exploit the credulity of the general public. r/philosophy is stimulating as well—most of it is outside my area of interest, but it can occasionally make me rethink some important issues.

One handy feature is the ability to combine subreddits into one larger multireddit. For example, r/DebateAnAtheist, r/DebateAChristian and r/DebateReligion combine quite well to form an all-purpose religious discussion. It creates a nice mix of conversations, some as challenges to atheists and others as challenges to Christians and other believers. For instance:

There are often more atheists in the conversation than theists, but every now and then I'll find a spark of real debate.

Finally there are the subreddits dedicated to science and education. r/science is a great place to find and discuss science-related news stories. What I particularly like is the fact that sensationalist headlines (a new "cure for cancer" is discovered practically every other week) are quickly picked apart by specialists in the comments section. In r/AskScience, anyone can ask their most pressing science-related questions and have them answered by experts in the field, whether it's how we know what the earth's core is made of or what the specs of a human brain would look like if it were a computer. Finally, in r/ExplainLikeImFive one can get answers to even basic questions explained in a welcoming atmosphere with easily understandable terms.

Reddit is such a vast and diverse place that it can be anything you want it to. It can be shallow entertainment, it can be depraved evil or crushing ignorance. But select the right parts of the site and it can be a genuinely educational and thought-provoking experience.

Church Happenings

2011-12-16T07:22:00.000-08:00

One of the perks of being out as an atheist is that I no longer have to attend church every Sunday. Although I didn't usually mention it here—that's what my Twitter account is for—there were always several moments where I couldn't help but cringe. I thought I'd mention a few such moments from weeks past.

Recently one pastor, Phillip, had taken to sharing stories about his atheist neighbors. (When he mentioned that they were atheists, a lady next to me went, "Whoa!"—as if he were describing his close encounter with a great white shark.) He portrayed them as deeply angry people who become enraged at any mention of Christianity. He joked that his neighbor's wizard Halloween costume looked a lot like Moses, and the neighbor was deeply offended. The congregation cheered in delight, as though celebrating some small victory over "the enemy." Even if Phillip's depiction was completely accurate, presenting it on its own was irresponsible: since most of these people know little about atheism, many will undoubtedly use these stories to make judgements about atheists as a whole. Thanks to situations like these, it's no wonder that we rank among the most disliked and distrusted minority groups in America.

Phillip also made references to aerial photos of Noah's Ark on Mt. Ararat and gilded chariot wheels found in the Red Sea from the Egyptians drowning during the Exodus. The former is a confirmed hoax, and the latter is highly suspect to say the least. The wheel claims originate from amateur archaeologist Ron Wyatt, who also claims to have found the Ark of the Covenant, the tablets of the Ten Commandments, and the original sites of Sodom, Gomorrah and the tower of Babel. Even the cripplingly biased creationist organization Answers in Genesis has called Wyatt's claims "fraudulent." Curiously, no evidence has been presented for the existence of the chariot wheel beyond a few blurry photos.

The pictured object looks suspiciously modern, and despite supposedly being made of gold, it doesn't seem to have been buried at all over what would amount to roughly 3,500 years. Meanwhile, the Egyptians themselves, who are known to archaeologists as meticulous record-keepers, made reference neither to owning 2 million Hebrew slaves nor to letting them escape, which would surely have been one of the most significant events in their multi-thousand-year history.

Pastor Mike is an even worse offender. A few months ago he demonstrated his deep understanding of evolution by calling it a "primordial jelly oozing monkey business theory." Another time, while reading Mark 16, he repeatedly went out of his way to emphasize how incredibly reliable the Bible is. Yet he didn't even mention what must undoubtedly have been the reason for this tangent: since Mark 16 is absent from the earliest manuscripts and fits poorly with the preceding text, it's widely regarded as a forgery. It's as though he wanted to reassure his congregants, but thought their faith was so fragile that he didn't dare even tell them that this opposing viewpoint exists at all.

Mike also mentioned that the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus wrote about Jesus. I wasn't particularly shocked when he didn't mention that scholars consider much or all of the Testimonium Flavianum to have been inserted later by Christians—that's to be expected from a fundamentalist preacher. My jaw only dropped when he said that Josephus became a Christian based on the evidence of Jesus, which to my knowledge not even conservative scholars believe. I don't think he was being intentionally deceptive, but it boggles my mind that a pastor can stand in front of a thousand people and demonstrate such ignorance of something so basic to early Christianity.

So it shouldn't be too surprising that I'm glad to be largely finished with church attendance. But then again, I won't mind coming back every now and then, if only to get a reminder of what I no longer have to endure.

Infographic Interlude

2011-12-11T14:14:00.000-08:00

When it comes to getting a point across, a single chart can sometimes be just as effective as a whole essay. Below are five examples that provide insightful criticism toward some aspect of religion.

Some fundamentalist Christians insist that laws in America have their basis in the Ten Commandments, and even that the ancient tablets should be placed in prominent positions in our nation's courthouses. Well, are American laws based on the Commandments? Absolutely not, and I made a handy chart to illustrate this:

In fact, not only does our justice system disregard most of these restrictions (and rightly so), but the first four commandments would violate the Establishment Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

The rest of these graphics are made by others. Here's one that deals a devastating blow to the concept of prayer as most Christians understand it:

The solutions to this are to assert that God changes his perfect plan to suit the whims of his followers, or to maintain that prayer is only meant to commune with God and reaffirm what he has already chosen to do. The former seems incompatible with God's omniscience—if that was a better course of action, he should already have planned on taking it—while the latter contradicts what Jesus himself said.

Here's a graphic that explains why it's laughable for the religious right to use the Bible in support of "traditional marriage" in the sense of a loving, monogamous, heterosexual relationship. The Bible is clearly not a useful guide to what types of marriage we should allow, given that it tolerates and even endorses varieties of marriage that we recognize as reprehensible today:

Another simple illustration. It seems awfully convenient that God's demonstrations of power become steadily less impressive the closer we get to modern times (and reliable recording devices):

Finally, here's a beautifully color-coded illustration of the correlations between religiosity and various measures of societal health and quality of life in all 50 states. The pattern is visible with just a glance:

Of course, this doesn't establish that religion causes social problems, but it's still a powerful counterexample to the fundamentalist idea that turning our back on God causes God to turn his back on us, leaving civilizations in chaos. Nonreligious people can and often do create healthy and well-functioning societies.

Whether they're data-rich or just convey ideas in an accessible format, visual demonstrations can get a point across with startling efficiency. Words are powerful tools, but sometimes people will give opposing views only a few seconds of open-mindedness before shutting them out. When interacting with believers, I think that a few easy-to-digest graphics can potentially go a long way.

The Debate Begins

2011-12-08T09:18:00.000-08:00

At the moment I work thirty hours a week in my dad's office, and as such I go to lunch with him quite often. This has now become the setting for what may turn out to be a long series of informal debates on God and Christianity. The first one was today, and although my dad was quite determined—he actually took a note card with him—the tone was friendly enough. We went through a whole flurry of topics ranging from prophecy to cosmology, so I have a feeling we'll be retreading the same ground in more detail later on.

The first thing we did was go back over the definitions of atheism and agnosticism. It's admittedly a somewhat difficult concept to grasp at first, as is the difference between "I believe there is no God" and "I lack belief in God." The distinction ultimately lies in the idea of burden of proof: it's the theist who's making a claim that something exists, and the atheist who's holding out for sufficient evidence of that claim. Eventually I explained it using a very simple analogy: Imagine a thermometer with a notch two-thirds of the way up labeled "God exists." For the atheist, the fluid in the thermometer (the evidence for the claim) has not reached that notch (the threshold for rational belief). That seemed to work well, so I'll probably be using that comparison in the future.

We also talked at length about miracles. He described an event a few decades ago in which, when driving at night, he changed lanes on a whim—just in time to avoid a parked car that he hadn't seen. He suggested (while not putting too much stock in it himself) that this could have been divine intervention. I pointed out that we tend to disproportionately remember extraordinary events, and introduced him to Littlewood's law—the idea that given the sheer number of small events that take place in our lives, we should expect "miracles" at a rate of roughly once a month. I didn't go into the general unreliability of memory; I'll save that for another time.

He also asked about spontaneous remission of cancer following prayer, to which I pointed out that such remission occasionally takes place whether or not people are praying. He'd heard about some crying Catholic statues as well. In response I brought up the Hindu milk miracle: In 1995, hundreds of believers in India and abroad witnessed statues of Ganesha "drink" milk that was fed to them with a spoon. Neither of us believe in a miracle that took place in modern times, with countless verifiable eyewitnesses and even video evidence, so it's only natural not to believe in lesser miracles either.

Another back-and-forth:

You may not be able to prove God, but you can't prove love exists, either, even if you can measure the chemicals.

—Love is by definition a feeling, so the very experience of love shows that it exists.

But couldn't the same be said of God?

—No, because God is supposed to be an autonomous agent who acts independently of our subjective experience.

There were a grab bag of other subjects. He asked about Old Testament prophecies predicting details of Jesus' life. I responded that some details were probably invented by the gospel writers after the fact, and some of the "prophecies" weren't even meant to be prophecies in the first place. He was under the impression that the eye couldn't have evolved, when in fact we have a detailed understanding of how it could have come about. He also found it absurd that matter could have created itself. I haven't studied the details, I said, but we don't really know what happened before the big bang. It may be that matter has always existed, or that it's not even useful to talk about a "before" in the traditional sense (like asking what's north of the North Pole).

The whole discussion was quite genial, and although I don't know that my dad got any nearer to my position, I think it was a success. He even said that in a strange way, these discussions brought us closer together, and that's more than I ever could have hoped for.

Breaking the News

2011-12-03T19:39:00.000-08:00

Man, life can get complicated, can't it? Here's the short version of what happened in the past 24 hours: I almost threw up, Neil finally let up on the ultimatum, and I still went ahead and came out to my parents as an atheist.

Like I said, life can get complicated.

Before I continue, I should say a few things about Neil. I think what he planned to do was very wrong. I think much of what he said to me was also very wrong. But from my continued messages with him, I can tell that he really was acting out of concern for my parents, however misguided the response may have been. He apologized for what he said to me, and he didn't force me to go through with telling my parents. Again, to be clear: My decision to tell my parents was mine alone. You can blame him for other things, but not for that.

Now then, on to what happened.

Yesterday, before Neil relented, I called my sister and asked her to come home from college (just a 10-minute drive) to be there for me when I told my parents. She readily agreed. I came home from work, went to tennis practice, watched Super 8 with my parents. I was crying a little, but I didn't let them see it. Twice that evening I nearly threw up from the stress. I stood retching over the toilet bowl but managed to restrain myself. My mom came in once and asked what was wrong.

I told her it was a long story.

This morning, about eight hours away from when I had planned to tell them, I got the message from Neil: I was safe. My emotions were shot. I was happy, shocked, relieved.

But there was another feeling mixed in there as well: something like dread. I realized that if I just let it go, I would have to experience all of this twice. I planned on breaking the news at some point no matter what, so if I continued to keep this a secret, I would have to go through these sickening pangs of anxiety all over again. And despite the potential consequences, I really, genuinely didn't like keeping this from them. I decided, what the hell, I've come this far. So I battled nerves and nausea for a few more hours, waiting for the right moment, and finally forced myself to through with it.

And...
It went really well. Certainly better than I expected. We keep models of the people close to us in our heads, and this past year I must have mentally simulated a hundred "coming out atheist" conversations with my parents, with results ranging from blissful acceptance to angry shouting matches. But since I've never been in any serious trouble with them or confessed any big, damaging secrets, I didn't really have a baseline that I could use to gauge how they would truly react. I hoped for the best but feared the worst—which, since I'm not financially independent, could have been pretty bad. Over the years I had heard my dad react to atheism with hostility and contempt, so what if he took the same approach towards me and my own conclusions? And my mom can be emotionally fragile even in relatively ordinary situations, so for all I knew she could have been mourning for days on end. But people are hard to predict, and I've never been happier in my life to have predicted wrong.

I sat them down at the kitchen table, and after several stops and starts, I told them that last year I had started questioning Christianity, that I had spent a long time reading and thinking carefully about my beliefs. Finally I told them outright that I didn't believe in God. There was no mention of Neil or anything besides my unbelief and how I came to it—I wanted the focus to be on my personal journey of faith and doubt, and I just didn't feel like overcomplicating things.

I could see tears well up in my mom's eyes, although my dad remained stoically calm. Since I hadn't mentioned the "A" word yet, that was naturally the first thing that came up. I transitioned, a bit awkwardly, into explaining the technical definitions of atheism (lack of belief in gods) and agnosticism (lack of knowledge about the existence of gods), and that I classify myself as an agnostic atheist. I don't know if it really sank in, but no conflict came of it, and that's good enough for me.

It was remarkable to see the dichotomy in their responses, their ways of lightly questioning my decision. My mom's emphasis was squarely on faith. She asked me if I had prayed about my loss of faith (I did, in the beginning). She told me that we shouldn't be proving or disproving God, but rather listening as he speaks to our hearts. My dad's approach was focused totally on logical argument. He actually produced rudimentary versions of both the cosmological argument and Pascal's wager, though he wasn't familiar with them in a formal, rigorous sense. There was a little back-and-forth on those subjects, but before things got too far I told him we should save it for another time.

They told me they would pray for me, which I said I appreciated—even though I don't think it'll accomplish anything, it's still a sign of affection. They recommended Lee Strobel's books, to which I said I'd already read one and part of another. They asked me to still come to church now and then, which I agreed to, though I told them it wasn't likely to change my mind. And that was that.

Of course, there's still a long road ahead. There will be some tense moments, some heated discussions, and quite possibly even some arguments, but I'll do my best not to let those turn into rifts that drive us apart. I'm truly glad not just that I managed to tell them, but that I was able to do it on my own terms.

The Ultimatum

2011-12-02T07:43:00.000-08:00

Note: This post has gotten really popular since someone posted it to Reddit and it hit the front page of r/atheism. I wasn't expecting such a massive response, but I really appreciate all the support. I should note up front that Neil has since apologized for the combative tone he took in this exchange, ~~although he's still set on making me go through with this~~. Also, this should go without saying, but please don't post threats or anything that vein; that's not helpful. Thanks so much. (Edit: Follow-up post here.)

Warning: drama ahead.

Neil is a Christian who preaches at university campuses, including UCSD. By sheer coincidence, he's also an old friend of my parents—not a particularly close one, but he posts on my mom's Facebook wall now and then. Several months ago, while I was still in college, he happened to find out that I was an atheist. I asked him not to tell my parents—this is a very personal decision that is mine alone to make—and he agreed. He then began asking at regular intervals whether I had told my parents yet, and finally a couple of days ago he decided to take matters into his own hands. He told me that if I didn't tell my parents within the next week, he would call and tell them himself.

Now, let me first say that I take no pleasure in keeping my unbelief a secret from my parents. I do so only because although I have a wonderful relationship with them, I have no idea how they will react, and given that I live under the same roof with them, things could get hostile if those reactions are especially bad. I think Neil's concern is sincere, but heavily misguided. He apparently believes he is entitled to destroy my freedom to reveal my unbelief on my own terms—essentially, to force me into coming out as an atheist.

Here is the conversation I've been having with him over the past day or so, starting with his initial notice:

Tim,

I have been bothered in my concious about not speaking to your mom and dad about your situation. I think you are really doing them a disservice. I am sure your parents love you and will listen to you with an open mind. To continue to live a lie is not a good thing for any of you.

I feel I must speak to them so I am giving you advanced notice of this. In about a week I will call them to discuss this situation with them because I care about them as my friends. We used to be close when I was in the R.E. business and I am very fond of both of them.

Please speak to them openly or I will have to. I hope you understand.

Is this you blog by the way? http://othersidereflections.blogspot.com/

Thanks, Neil

It was difficult to react calmly and politely in light of the friendly warning that he's about to potentially rip my life apart. Nonetheless, I think I managed it in my response:

Neil,

I'm sympathetic to your situation. I get that you don't like having to keep a secret.

But I feel you need to fully understand my situation as well. I have a great relationship with my parents, unstrained by any sort of ill feelings, and even in the best-case scenario things would get very awkward between us.

It's not like I enjoy keeping this a secret. I think all the time about how I'm going to tell them. I've even made tentative plans a couple of times, which I've later backed out of, but I was still fully expecting to tell them in the not-too-distant future.

This is a deeply personal matter, and when and how I tell them should be my choice to make. I would ask that you stay out of it. If you can't bring yourself to do so, then I guess I don't have any choice but to tell them before you call. If that's really what you're going to force me to do, I understand that you'd be acting out of concern, but that doesn't mean I wouldn't resent you for it.

And yes, that is my blog.

—Tim

Here's Neil's rather lengthy (and preachy) second message:

Tim,

Your response convinces me that this is the right thing for me to do. Of course you won't agree with that, but I must do what I think is best for you and your parents.

It is one thing for a young person to go to "Christian" school and see no real Christianity among the students and then to start to doubt their faith. That is a normal outcome and is understandable considering their is very little real faith exhibited in these so-called "Christian" schools. Many kids, tolerate it for awhile, and will pretend they still believe in Christ so they can keep the peace at home and still enjoy the blessings of family fellowship and the monetary blessings that go along with it. For a person to ask questions, and to really struggle with their faith under these circumstances is quite normal.

However, you have crossed over and now have become an evangelist for the other side. Sad to say, but that is reality and I don't apologize for my bluntness. You see, now you are no longer questioning your faith but now you are being used to destroy other's faith in Christ or at least to plant seeds of doubt in their hearts. This is not harmless skepticism but outright declared war against God and His people.

You have obviously made your choice about your faith but you still want to maintain your shroud of secrecy and enjoy the benefits of a good relationship with your parents and not reap any of the consequences of becoming an atheist. This is very selfish Tim. You may think you are sparing your parents from being upset by not being truthful with them but is this how your dad and mom raised you? Gary was always honest in his real estate dealings as I remember and I know he would not want his only son to be living a lie and not being truthful with him and your mom.

I know you do not fully understand the consequences of making such a decision to become a mocker of God and of His followers, but the consequences are severe indeed. It is one thing to question and eventually abandon one's faith. But you have gone way past that now and are bent on hurting others with your writings. This is not only wrong, but evil. You think you will find relief from your inner guilt by bashing Christianity and God but you won't find lasting peace in this. The Bible is very clear about this:

Galations 6:7 Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. 8 For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life.

I don't blame you at all for having doubts about Christianity. As I said to you previously, you were never born again, or born from above if that is the term you prefer, so it is impossible for you to really know God personally. Because you do not know God personally, you went searching, but you end up reading all this atheist garbage and your think it stimulates you and makes you believe these people are "intelligent" and "free thinkers". God calls them fools.

Why so? Because in their heart they know God is real but they bypass their heart and rely on logic. Logic that is not based upon real truth but upon man's truth and therefore you become deceived into thinking they are correct with their assumptions and accusations.

So you may find some relief from your inner turmoil for a time by throwing God and His Word under the bus. You obviously spend a whole lot of time reading what these fools think is real knowledge and now you have joined their ranks and are helping to hurt others who may be struggling with their faith.

From your blog:"Relax. Let it go. Realize that your mental acrobatics are futile, and accept that the Bible is not a reliable record of Jesus' life—or of most other things, for that matter. It may be upsetting at first, but once you've unchained yourself from this ancient book for a while, you'll probably feel a lot better. At least, I do."

Tim, you couldn't be more wrong. Billions of people over thousands of years have trusted the Holy Scriptures and found true faith in Christ and have experienced the life changing power of the gospel. I was a lost atheist/agnostic who was only living for money and the things of this world and in a moment, I was changed forever by the power of God's Spirit. Ask your dad and mom and they will tell you how my life changed dramatically.

The sad fact is you have already made your choice to mock God, His Word and His followers. You are on a slippery slope that will lead you to hell and for this reason alone it is necessary that I share this with your parents. Resent me if you like, but I must do what I think is best for all of you. I have nothing to gain by doing this but I feel obligated because of my respect for your dad and mom.

Sincerely, Neil

Since I realized I probably wouldn't get him to change his mind, my second response was short:

That was quite a change in tone, Neil. In a blink of an eye, you went from polite and concerned to essentially calling me a selfish fool and my actions evil. I would have liked to be friends with you, but that will be extremely difficult now that you've berated my unbelief and forced yourself into a very personal family matter.

You said you would give me a week. That's fine. I'll break the news before then.
—Tim

Here's his third message. Because I responded to some of his points individually, my response will be interlaced with his, in green.

Tim,

Yes the change in tone is because after reading your secret blog, I can see that you are in no way questioning your faith, as you led me to believe, but are instead dead set against God and now delight in mocking Him and His people.

What do you mean by this? I never said I was "questioning my faith." I told you outright that I was an atheist; how can I be "questioning my faith" if I have no faith? If by this you mean that I'm not willing to consider believing given the evidence, you're mistaken. I may use a bit of levity on my blog now and then, but that doesn't preclude being willing to entertain opposing viewpoints.

You say " I wanted to be your friend" but since I have met you, you have never asked me a single question at all but instead you were only concerned in me keeping your secret.

I'm a shy person by nature, Neil. Combine that with the fact that you've done virtually nothing but tell me I'm lost and confused and a sinner and asking me when I'm going to talk to my parents, and I don't think it's too surprising that I didn't go out of my way to chat about the weather with you. I would have liked to be friends with you at some point, but that point would have been well after those comments had ceased.

Time to come out of the closet and face the music Tim. You want to mock Christians and yet allow your parents to believe all is well?

The truth is Tim your spiritual understanding is very immature and your writings reflect that.

Exodus 21:20-21, Neil. By all means, tell me all about how my spiritual understanding isn't "mature" enough to grasp God's wisdom in allowing the Israelites to beat their slaves to the point of death.

For example, you talk about a study where prayer is tested to see if it helps people who are sick. They come to the conclusion it doesn't help at all and instead of questioning the results you accept and promote it as truth.

You totally discount the fact that people pray to their own "god" in many different ways. That some may be true believers while others are merely religious people who do not know the One, True God at all. You think God is going to allow Himself to be put in a test tube for their study? Please, think a little Tim.

Do you really think I haven't considered this argument? It's an unparsimonious, unfalsifiable cop-out. You could pray to an inanimate object and get identical results. In fact, you could claim that God was the very embodiment of evil and still justify those results by saying that the evil god is simply laughing at the frustrations of theists trying to prove he exists. You can make your deity consistent with any state of affairs, but that doesn't make your explanations even remotely probable.

God is an awesome mighty God and He will not bow to man in any way. I am saddened that you so easily have been deceived and that you have last what faith you had.

I still think your intentions are good, Neil, but as they say, the road to hell was paved with those. I'd like to maintain a civil level of discourse, but your insulting and condescending attitude is making that increasingly difficult.

By the way, I just talked to my sister about this, and she's agreed to be there for me when I tell them if I want her to. Here are her exact words when I told her what you had chosen to do:

"Isn't that blackmail or something?"

I hope that gives you something to think about.

His fourth message, in which he ignores all but a few words of my response:

Tim,

Blackmail? Just what am I gaining in return? I have nothing to gain but to know that I am doing my best to help you and your family.

I know you don't see it this way but that is the truth.

Arrogant? Condescending? Isn't it rather your atheistic beliefs that are supremely arrogant?

You belittle people who have faith in Christ yet you can't even explain away the very first verse in the Bible?

Where did all the matter originate from Tim? What rational reason can you give for the existence of the universe ?

And my final response:

Neil, blackmail is defined as "the use of threats or the manipulation of someone's feelings to force them to do something"—no personal gain required.

Other than that, I'm not getting into this, tempting though it is. Your questions have been answered by various atheists a hundred times over—whether those answers are to your satisfaction is not my concern. Apparently nothing I say will change your opinion on anything we've discussed, so I see no reason to continue.

I'll let you know when I've told my parents. It will be within the next 7 days.

I'm still not sure how I'm going to tell them. There's a perfectly fair chance that not too much will come of it other than some initial distress and later awkwardness, but those more serious potential consequences are looming in the back of my mind. I called my sister last night, and she's agreed to be there to support me if I want her to. And yes, she really did call this blackmail right out of the gate. I always knew she was a smart one.

Edit: I'm hoping to sit them down and talk with them tomorrow afternoon. My sister will be there if I need her.

Edit 2: This morning Neil told me (in the comments below) that he wouldn't force me to go through with telling my parents. I haven't decided for sure, but I'm thinking about doing it anyway. I've come this far, and I don't feel like going through all this emotional turmoil again.

Edit 3: The follow-up to this post is here.

Keeping an Open Mind

2011-12-01T10:42:00.000-08:00

This one may be a little too open.

The challenging task of the skeptic is to maintain a careful balance between rejecting claims with insufficient evidence, but accepting even the most extraordinary claims once the standard of evidence is met. In other words, to adhere to the age-old maxim:

Keep your mind open, but not so open that your brain falls out.

When I talked about my atheism with my sister, she was very accepting but rightly insisted that I continue to be open to opposing views. But things get tricky when applying this principle of openness to claims as extraordinary as "God exists" (or even more so, "Christianity is true"). It requires me to ask myself, "What evidence would convince me that God exists?"

When the reverse question is applied to theists, the results are telling to say the least. For most believers—sometimes even by their own admission—there is no possible state of affairs, no logical argument, nothing that would convince them to stop believing. Adam Lee of Ebon Musings challenged theists to describe some circumstance that would cause them to become atheists. In ten years, only six people have taken up his challenge, and their requirements for becoming atheists are usually vague, confused or completely unreasonable—for example, demanding proof that all miracle claims are false, when of course the burden is on theists to show that they're legitimate.

In the same essay, Adam outlines a number of circumstances that would cause him to believe in God or convert to a specific religion. Here's the basic summary:

Verified, specific prophecies that couldn't have been contrived.
Scientific knowledge in holy books that wasn't available at the time.
Miraculous occurrences, especially if brought about through prayer.
Any direct manifestation of the divine.
Aliens who believed in the exact same religion.

It's an interesting list of very specific possibilities, all of which would be well within the abilities of an omnipotent being. However, I can't help but think that this entire approach is problematic. If God came down from heaven in a flash of light and appeared before me, I sincerely hope that the first thing I would do is seek professional help. For the five criteria above, some combination of coincidence (in the case of the first three) and insanity seem like a better explanation than some uberbeing that defies everything we know about the universe. Extraterrestrials and Nick Bostrom's simulation hypothesis are other unlikely but viable possibilities.

This leaves me in a tough position. To say that nothing would convince me of the existence of God strikes me as incredibly close-minded. And of course, it would leave my lack of belief in gods unfalsifiable: if gods do exist, I would have no way of correcting my mistake.

Maybe the right approach is to say that the proposition "God exists" was once falsifiable, but is no longer. If I'd been born into a world in which spirits manifested themselves regularly, people constantly predicted the future with pinpoint accuracy, lightning crashed down from heaven to smite unbelievers on a daily basis, then God and the supernatural would be an ordinary part of life. But instead, I live in a world where things always behave according to physical laws, where every seemingly paranormal phenomenon that's thoroughly tested either disappears or turns out to be explainable by natural means, where visions and religious experiences have neurological origins. I didn't have to be born into a world where everything happens just as we would expect it to if no gods existed—but I was.

Maybe the hypothesis "God exists" has already been tested, and has been found to be so wildly inconsistent with the data as to be completely unsalvageable.

I don't know. I honestly don't want it to be. I don't want any conclusion to lie entirely beyond my grasp.

Still, while I'm not really sure what would convince me that God exists, there are likely to be some things out there that would. If I sought a psychiatrist who declared me sane, I could be imagining that as well, but at a certain point it would probably be simpler to assume my experiences were real rather than an increasingly elaborate hallucination. Then there are the unknowns: there may be some concept floating out there in the vast sea of ideaspace that could change my whole outlook towards how the world works, or some a priori argument with logic so straightforward that I would be compelled to accept it. I'm also far from perfectly rational, so there are probably some circumstances that would convince me even if they shouldn't. Finally, there's the fact that an omniscient, all-good God would know what evidence would be sufficient for me and could provide it just as he has for theists. One could say that it's his job to convince me, not mine.

In any case, I'll continue to be as open-minded as I can—but I'll always be ready to catch my brain if it starts to fall.

What Do You Mean By That?

2011-11-28T07:29:00.000-08:00

It's been said that the best way to fluster a religious person who's talking about their doctrines is to simply ask, "What do you mean by that?" In many cases there can only be two types of responses: either the believer will restate their point in a way that doesn't actually clarify the meaning... or, when pressed, they may be forced to admit that they don't really know what they mean. It's just something they've heard and read about, and took as truth simply because of its attachment to their belief system.

Take, for example, the idea that Jesus is "the Son of God." What do Christians mean by this? Did the Father have sex with a woman to create him? Well, no. Christians tend to see that as highly blasphemous. They maintain that Mary was impregnated by some supernatural means that's never actually explained, and was a virgin when she gave birth to Jesus. Okaaay... well, surely the Father created Jesus in some sense, right? Well, no. In fact, Christians are adamant that he was never created. According to the Nicene Creed, the Son was "begotten, not made" and has always existed alongside the Father.

It's not even clear that it makes sense to talk about the Son as inherently male. Sure, the Bible has Jesus temporarily incarnated as a man, but in general, God is supposed to be a perfect spiritual being who transcends such earthly concepts as gender. Or do Christians think Jesus is up in heaven right now as an actual male, sitting at the right hand of the Father complete with an immaterial, spiritual penis?

All right, fine. If Jesus wasn't the product of sex, and has always existed, and isn't male in any meaningful sense, maybe it's just a metaphor of some sort. Calling Jesus "the Son" could mean that he's in some way inferior or subordinate to the Father. Well, no. One might think so after looking at certain biblical passages, but according to the widely accepted Athanasian Creed, the three persons of the trinity are "co-equal" in power and authority. Jesus is supposed to be fully God in every respect. In what sense, then, can Jesus be considered the Son of God? That's for believers to determine.

There are dozens of these little sayings and points of doctrine that are accepted without any reflection from most Christians. What does it mean to say that Jesus is "the Word of God made flesh"? What does it mean for God to be "outside of time"? In what sense can Jesus be considered "fully God and fully human"? How can God be viewed as a single being when he exists in three distinct "persons"? If Jesus "paid our ransom" to set man free from sin, to whom was that ransom owed?

I doubt that it would even be possible to coherently answer all these questions. But even if it is, there's a deeper problem here: the vast majority of Christians don't even attempt to find those answers. In most cases, it doesn't even occur to them. They read or hear that Jesus is the Word, or that God exists outside of time, and they never think to ask what it might mean. Hundreds of millions of people are satisfied—even enraptured—with a religion held together by buzzwords. They thrive on what Eliezer Yudkowsky has called "mysterious answers to mysterious questions"—that is, non-answers that halt curiosity without furthering our understanding.

That's why the skeptical outlook is so important. In some cases, challenging people on their religious beliefs will only cause offense. But if we can teach people to habitually investigate extraordinary claims, many will apply that principle to their religion and start asking questions all on their own.

Powerful Thoughts, Vol. 3

2011-11-21T18:48:00.000-08:00

Welcome to the third installment in my anthology of quotes about atheism and related topics. Here are ones centered on God and religion:

"Two hands working can do more than a thousand clasped in prayer." –Anon
"Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?" –Douglas Adams
"If you believe what you like in the Gospels and reject what you don't like, it is not the Gospel you believe, but yourself." –St. Augustine
"Thank god gay people can't legally marry each other and destroy the sanctity of what Kim Kardashian did." –Alex Blagg
"Be thankful that you have a life, and forsake your vain and presumptuous desire for a second one." –Richard Dawkins
"It is better to leave God out of the moral debate and find good human reasons for supporting the approach we advocate." –Richard Holloway
"You don't get rich writing science fiction. If you want to get rich, you start a religion." –sci-fi author & Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard
"There is not enough love and goodness in the world for us to be permitted to give any of it away to imaginary things." –Friedrich Nietzsche
"Religion is the way we honour our ancestors' errors." –Mark M. Otoysao
"For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring." –Carl Sagan
"Religions are like fireflies: they require darkness in order to shine." –Arthur Schopenhauer
"No woman should accept any religion that assigns her a role that is at best secondary to men." –Sheila Tobias
"Religions are like politicians: they're easier to believe when they're vague." –from Reddit

And here are the ones centered around science and skepticism:

"We are all just a car crash or a slip away from being a different person." –neuropsychologist Paul Broks
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool." –Richard Feynman
"For every complex problem, there is a solution that is clear, simple, and wrong." –H. L. Mencken
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies." –Friedrich Nietzsche
"The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt." –Bertrand Russell
"Science is not perfect. It's often misused; it's only a tool, but it's the best tool we have. Self-correcting, ever-changing, applicable to everything; with this tool, we vanquish the impossible." –Carl Sagan
"[Humans] probably are to intelligence what the first replicator was to biology." –Anna Salomon
"If your philosophy is not unsettled daily then you are blind to all the universe has to offer." –Neil deGrasse Tyson
"The strength of a theory is not what it can explain, but what it can't." –Eliezer Yudkowsky
"Facts do not need to be unexplainable to be beautiful; truths are not less worth learning if someone else knows them." –Eliezer Yudkowsky
"If science is a religion, it is the religion that heals the sick and reveals the secrets of the stars." –Eliezer Yudkowsky

Finally, some outrageous quotes from fundamentalists:

"God has provided a more secure foundation for our faith than the shifting sands of evidence and argument." –Christian apologist William Lane Craig
"If somehow through my studies my reason were to turn against my faith, then so much the worse for my reason!" –Craig on his belief in Christianity
"Why are you reading those infidel websites anyway, when you know how destructive they are to your faith?" –Craig to a Christian expressing doubts
"How can you have judgment if you have no faith, and how can I trust you with power if you don't pray?" –Newt Gingrich in a recent GOP debate

As much as I enjoy the stimulating and provocative quotes from thinkers that are critical of religion, I find myself fascinated by the quotes from fundamentalists. Really, Newt Gingrich? Nonbelievers lack judgment and can't be trusted with power? Maybe you should try telling that straight to the faces of openly non-believing world leaders like Fredrik Reinfeldt (Sweden), Julia Gillard (Australia), Jens Stoltenberg (Norway) and Michelle Bachelet (Chile). I might expect this from ordinary religious extremists, but as of this writing, Gingrich is neck and neck with Mitt Romney as the highest-polling Republican presidential nominee. I'm not sure whether he truly believes what he said or merely wanted to appeal to voters, but either way it's appalling to hear this from someone who has a non-trivial chance at being our next president.

And then there are the three jaw-dropping quotes from William Lane Craig, considered by many to be the foremost Christian apologist on the planet. Coming from a man who claims to champion reason and evidence during his public debates, these views represent the absolute peak of intellectual dishonesty. To ignore logic, and to advise others to flee from opposing arguments, is simply beyond the pale. I can only imagine his outrage if atheists advised each other to take this approach. If Craig ever had a shred of my respect, he's certainly lost it now.

The Sorcerer and the Squid

2011-11-19T10:24:00.000-08:00

nce upon a time there was a sorcerer named Nobu, who travelled from town to town claiming to send messages to the gods... for a small fee. One day when he entered a remote fishing village, he discovered that everyone was dressed in black to mourn the death of a boy named Kenji, who was beloved by all the villagers. Kenji made friends easily, always offered to help the neighbors with their chores, and was shaping up to be the best fisherman in the village. But he had fallen ill a few weeks earlier, and while the local doctor had done the best he could, none of his treatments were effective. Kenji had been buried only that morning.

As the villagers crowded around the grave, Nobu put a consoling hand on the shoulder of Kenji's mother and announced, "I am a powerful sorcerer, and I shall intercede for you and ask the gods to restore this boy to life... for a small fee."

Excited murmurs rippled through the crowd. "You would do that for me? For us?" said the mother, a renewed stream of tears running down her face.

Nobu grinned a brown-toothed grin. "But of course. There is no guarantee that they will grant your request, but I will be happy to speak to them for you. Now, there's just the matter of my fee..."

"Wait!" said a girl pushing her way through the mass of people. Ai had been a close companion of Kenji's before his illness. When he returned in late morning from his fishing excursions, Ai would often be waiting for him at the dock. "How do we know this man has any special power? If only he can talk to the gods, how can we tell whether they're really talking back?"

"A very wise girl!" said Nobu. "I will prove to you that I can use my magic to communicate with the gods. You there! Fishermen! Did any of you catch any squid this morning?"

"Of course," said one.

"Then let me take one to demonstrate my power, for the gods are far more generous with squids than with men. If I cannot return it to life, I'll repay you for it tenfold and be on my way."

A few minutes later they gathered in a nearby house. A half-dead squid in a wooden bowl wriggled one tentacle feebly until a fisherman brusquely chopped off its head. With the crowd watching eagerly, the sorcerer placed his hands over the bowl and muttered an incantation. Then he reached into his satchel and took out a bottle of dark brown liquid. "O great gods of the ocean, hear my plea," he intoned. "Return this spirit to the land of the living."

As he poured the potion over the tentacles, the squid sprang to life, writhing and squirming so violently that it nearly fell out of the bowl. The crowd gasped, taking a collective step backwards. "You see?" said Nobu. "My power is strong."

This was proof enough for everyone. The gods must have heard Nobu's entreaty—how else could such a miracle occur? And so the next day everyone gathered at Kenji's grave. Nobu recited his incantations and poured his dark elixir over the freshly packed ground. "O great gods of the earth, return this spirit to the land of the living."

The villagers waited restlessly, but nothing happened. All the while Nobu's eyes were closed, his hands outstretched, his mouth moving silently. Finally he opened his eyes and addressed the crowd. "The gods in their wisdom have not seen fit to raise Kenji from the dead for now. But there is good news!" he said with a smile, his stained teeth glinting dully in the sun. "They have told me that they wish to prolong his absence to make you more fully appreciate him when he returns."

His audience mumbled approvingly. They were a bit disappointed, but then, who were they to question the judgment of the gods? For most, it was enough to know that Kenji would come back eventually. But not for Ai.

"Doesn't this seem a little convenient?" she asked the crowd. "Kenji is still dead and gone, Nobu leaves with a hefty reward, and everyone is satisfied with that?"

"Now, dear, we mustn't be ungrateful," said Kenji's mother. "This man has clearly spoken to the gods, and their wisdom is far beyond what we could ever hope to grasp."

"But what if that business with the squid was just a trick?" Ai insisted. "All he would have to do is create one illusion, and he could have us all convinced without any way of knowing if what he says is true!"

A fisherman grunted in objection. "Stop talking nonsense, Ai. What illusionist could possibly bring dead creatures to life? Do you think he had that squid dancing with invisible strings?"

"I don't know how he could have done it," said Ai. "But that doesn't mean that it was the work of the gods."

"Hmph. Unless you have some other explanation, what business do you have criticizing this man's sacred work?" Several other villagers murmured their agreement, then set about dividing the burden of Nobu's payment amongst themselves. Nobu's pack was filled with silver coins and enough fresh fish and other provisions to last a week.

Nobu smiled one last time. "I will visit your village again next year. Perhaps that will be long enough."

And so the next year, Nobu returned and (for another small fee) prayed to the gods on the villagers' behalf. When nothing happened, he returned the next year, and for many years after that. When the villagers tired of waiting, Nobu would find a new trick to perform, or pronounce the gods angry at their impatience. Meanwhile, Ai slowly grew frustrated at her village's credulity. When she was grown, she set out in search of another village to call home.

* * *

While this story was fiction, Nobu's trick is quite real—in fact, it's actually the centerpiece of a Japanese dish called odori-don, or "dancing squid rice bowl." We might better know the sorcerer's dark brown potion as soy sauce, which if poured over a freshly killed squid really will cause it to move around:

Yes, it really is dead, and the brain has nothing to do with the reaction: the same phenomenon can be observed with frog legs. It wouldn't be at all surprising if people once attributed these eerie occurrences to a magical force. When something that should be dead suddenly gets up and starts moving, it certainly looks as though its spirit has returned to its body. It also wouldn't be surprising to see people scoff at those who object to a supernatural explanation without providing a natural one: this is a classic argument from ignorance, or more specifically, the god of the gaps fallacy.

It was not until the mid-19th century that we would even begin to understand this phenomenon. In 1848, Emil du Bois-Reymond discovered the action potential: the rapid change in electrical charge that constitutes neural firing. In 1902, Julius Berstein hypothesized that this was caused by a change in the flow of ions across the cell membrane. Finally, in 1957 Danish chemist Jans Christian Skou discovered sodium-potassium pumps, which maintain a charge of about –70 millivolts by pumping sodium ions out and potassium ions in. When soy sauce is poured on the squid, sodium ions from the salt flow into its neurons, lessening the charge. When that charge reaches about –55 millivolts, it creates an action potential: the neurons fire, causing the squid's muscles to contract.

It took many brilliant scientists working in harmony arrive at this conclusion, and for most of human history this naturalistic explanation would be many centuries away. The villagers in this tale and their descendants—dozens of generations—could have lived and died before this complex biochemical mechanism was finally uncovered. This is why posing the supernatural as an explanation is misguided even if it seems that science will never be able to explain a phenomenon, and even if that phenomenon really looks supernatural. We don't need to have a naturalistic explanation to know that a vague and vacuous panacea, advanced without any positive evidence, is no explanation at all.

The Suffering Servant

2011-11-15T08:21:00.000-08:00

One of the most popular Old Testament passages that supposedly predicts the life and death of Jesus is the story of the suffering servant, found in Isaiah 52:13–53:12. Although Christians try to equate this servant with Jesus, this view holds no water upon closer inspection.

As it happens, this passage is actually the fourth of four "servant songs" that are found in the book of Isaiah. Most Jewish scholars believe that the the servant referred to in each of the four songs represents the nation of Israel. This makes sense, because the Bible refers to Israel as God's servant numerous times, both in Isaiah and elsewhere. In fact, just a few chapters earlier in the third servant song, God explicitly says that the servant in question is Israel:

"And He said to me, 'You are My servant, O Israel, in whom I will be glorified.' " (Isaiah 49:3)

As far as I'm concerned, that should really be the end of the discussion. This article describes in detail how Isaiah 53 applies to Israel—I don't necessarily agree with all of it, but it's certainly worth a look. However, Christians insist on making things more complicated than they are. Here's a summary of the main parallels that Christians see between the fourth servant song and Jesus' situation:

"He is despised and rejected by men" (v. 3)
"He was wounded for our transgressions" (v. 5)
"He was afflicted, yet He opened not His mouth" (v. 7)
"He had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth" (v. 9)
"They made his grave with the wicked—but with the rich at his death" (v. 9)

This passage seems fairly impressive at first glance, but let's look at it more carefully. First, does the Bible really say that Jesus was "despised and rejected by men"? Quite the contrary: the gospels repeatedly make reference to Jesus' immense popularity; it's only a small group of Jewish leaders that plots to kill him. This verse would have applied to Jesus far better had it said, "He is loved and admired by men."

At this point it's important to understand who Jewish scholars understand to be speaking in this passage: the rulers of nations rivaling Israel. Now in verse 5, the NET Bible says that the Hebrew word min would be better translated as "because of" rather than "for," as it carries a connotation of causality. This subtly changes the meaning: instead of suffering on behalf of others' sin like the vicarious atonement attributed to Jesus, the servant is merely suffering as a result of that sin. In other words, Israel is suffering as a result of the sins of rival nations.

What about verse 7? Did Jesus really not say anything while being accused and punished? If one looks only at, say, Matthew 27:12-14, one might think so. But several other verses show that this is clearly incorrect: not only did Jesus supposedly say seven different things while on the cross, but he also talks extensively with his accusers. If the goal of Isaiah 53 was to predict the circumstances of Jesus' life, it's an undeniable failure. And speaking of inaccuracies, Isaiah 53:10 says the servant "shall see his seed; he shall prolong his days"—Jesus had no children and lived to the ripe old age of 33. Apologists respond by interpreting this metaphorically, but why do so here and not for the other verses, unless one is starting with the assumption that the passage refers to Jesus?

What about verse 9? Did Jesus really never lie or do anything violent? Actually, the gospel accounts have Jesus killing a fig tree, as well as overturning the money changers' tables and driving them out with a whip. Sure, he didn't exactly murder anyone, but these were still violent acts. As for lying, look at John 7:1-10: Jesus tells his brothers he isn't going to a feast, then secretly goes anyway. (While Jesus ostensibly says "I am not yet going up to this feast," the NU-Text comprising the oldest and most reliable manuscripts omits the "yet," suggesting that some scribe likely realized Jesus' lie and tried to cover it up.) And in John 18:19-21 Jesus tells the high priest that he always spoke openly about his doctrines and said nothing in secret, yet throughout the gospels Jesus repeatedly keeps his exalted status, his imminent death, his miracles and the meanings of his parables a secret from the public.

And does Jesus' burial in the tomb of the wealthy Joseph of Arimathea fulfill the latter half of verse 9? First we should note that Jesus wasn't buried with other rich people; he was buried in a tomb provided by a rich man. All too often people excitedly overlook such details when they think they've found a fulfillment. More importantly, I've been assuming that the gospels provide accurate historical accounts of Jesus. But we already know that they altered details of Jesus' life to fulfill prophecy: I've written previously about a contradiction that resulted when the writers of Matthew and Luke concocted different birth narratives to fit a prophecy in Micah 5:2. Since the New Testament writers believed Isaiah 53 to be a messianic prophecy (based on their repeated references to it), it's quite likely that Joseph of Arimathea is a character invented for the express purpose of fulfilling that prophecy.

Finally, there are a few other relevant mistranslations in Isaiah 53 which demonstrate that Israel is the servant and not Jesus. In verse 8, which includes, "for the transgressions of my people he was stricken," the Hebrew word lamo is actually a plural pronoun. So the verse should read, "for the transgressions of my [the Gentile kings'] people they [the Israelites] were stricken." And in verse 9, the word translated "death" is a plural noun. The servant has multiple deaths, indicating that he represents multiple people (i.e. the Israelites).

At this point it should be clear not only that the fourth servant song doesn't refer to Jesus, but that it couldn't possibly do so. The servant is explicitly said to be Israel in the third servant song, the plural is used in reference to him multiple times, and several details run completely counter to the gospel accounts of Jesus' life. It's not too surprising that this passage seems to refer to Jesus at first glance; given a sufficient amount of ambiguous text, bits and pieces can be found and twisted to support virtually any view. But after nearly 2,000 years of feeble argument, it's high time for Christians to concede that this is not a prediction of the life and death of Jesus.

Truly Big Ideas

2011-11-12T08:23:00.002-08:00

"So you don't believe in anything?"

All too often, that's the reaction that atheists get when they say they don't believe in God, or spiritual beings, or the afterlife. How (theists ask) do we go on living without believing that an almighty yet loving omni-being is always at our side? Aren't our spirits crushed at the notion that there's no guardian angel watching over us? Why bother to get up in the morning without the prospect of an eternal trip to Disneyland tacked onto the end of our lives? These are the sorts of "big ideas" that provide comfort to Christians—such great comfort, in fact, that they wonder how anyone can function without them.

But when it comes to creating big ideas, Christianity cheats by slapping the descriptor "infinite" onto its god and its afterlife. This forces people to assign them infinite importance, so that the rewards that reality promises can't hope to compete. Yet Christianity's infinitely wise and powerful creator, its promise of an infinitely lengthy stay within the confines of its pearly gates... these concepts ring hollow upon closer inspection. They turn out to be hopelessly shortsighted: mired in the culture they were thought up in and rife with unintended consequences. If we really stop to think critically about God and the afterlife, we may find that they aren't so comforting after all.

I talk about God a lot, so I'll take heaven as my example. The most vivid description we find in the Bible is in the final chapters of Revelation, but the cultural presumptions of the author are evident. Heaven is supposedly surrounded by walls, and "its gates shall not be shut at all by day (there shall be no night there)." Walled cities were common in ancient times, but if everyone who isn't in heaven is in hell, why does it need walls and gates at all? Who are they trying to keep out? Then there's the fact that the author seems bent on cramming heaven with as much gold and as many precious stones as possible—sapphires, emeralds, you name it. Each gate is made out of one giant pearl. I'm sure that sounds like heaven to an impoverished man exiled on the barren isle of Patmos, but that sort of garish decor would lose its novelty in just a few years. (He also says that "the city was pure gold, like clear glass...and the street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass." Not sure how that one's supposed to work.)

The author cheerfully reports that "there shall be no more death, no sorrow, no crying...no more pain," which sounds nice enough. But wait... no sorrow? What about remembering those who are suffering in hell? Is God going to make us incapable of sorrow? Is he going to remove our memories of those we lived with—friends, parents, children, spouses? My memories of those I've spent time with are a crucial part of my identity, and taking them away is in a very real sense taking away a part of me. The author also portrays heaven as a place of constant, eternal worship. I challenge even the most ardent Christian to tell me sincerely that endlessly praising God is really their idea of a good time. Finally, he says that heaven will be a place free from sin. But what if a few billion years down the road I happen to tell a white lie to one of my fellow worshippers? Sin seems inevitable... unless we've somehow been made incapable of it. How could God prevent sin without removing my free will to sin?

And so heaven, which sounds so lovely on the surface, turns out to be a place where people are made into artificially happy, groveling, sinless robots. Once the veneer of peace and joy is stripped away, it's revealed as just another totalitarian dystopia. Christianity's "big ideas" on the afterlife fall flat. In his article "31 Laws of Fun," philosopher and futurist Eliezer Yudkowsky outlines what a real utopia might look like: it should be a place of liberty and autonomy, of novelty and challenge, of excitement and discovery. It should mess with our environment before taking the huge risk of messing with our core identities. Our experience should be a social one, emotionally involved, continually improving, filled with pleasant surprises, and not overshadowed by superior beings. Heaven fails on almost all of his criteria.

So can we do better here in reality? Can humans provide a more interesting and genuine paradise than the early Christians dreamed up? I think so. How likely we are to create a utopian future is debatable, but it's certainly possible. Sufficient advances in genetics, artificial intelligence, energy production, nanotechnology and space travel could mold our world beyond anything most people have imagined. Such fanciful notions as matrioshka brains, mind uploading and friendly AI could one day become a reality. There's a very good chance that we'll never reach our goal of a future utopia, but what's exciting is that we have the opportunity to try. It starts with education. If we can teach ourselves to think rationally and value the long-term welfare of humanity, many of the obstacles we now face will eventually fade away. A carefully measured combination of science, ethics and critical thinking would pave the way for big ideas that we can truly look forward to.

Born from Above

2011-11-09T08:21:00.001-08:00

Born-again Christians generally insist that the Bible is completely accurate, including its accounts of Jesus' life. But as Bart Ehrman explains in his book Jesus, Interrupted, the origin of the very term "born again" shows this belief to be false.

This term originates from a passage in John 3, where Jesus tells a Pharisee named Nicodemus that people can't enter heaven without first being born anothen—that is, born from above. However, in addition to "from above," the Greek word anothen can also mean "again," and this is the sense in which Nicodemus understands Jesus' words. The fact that Nicodemus mistakenly thinks that Jesus means "born again" explains his response:

"How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?"

Had Nicodemus realized that Jesus meant people must be "born from above," he wouldn't have responded this way. He would have understood that Jesus meant a spiritual rebirth rather than a physical one. So what's the problem? Why is this misunderstanding such a big deal? Simple: anothen is a Greek word, but Jesus and Nicodemus would have been speaking Aramaic. The "again/from above" double meaning doesn't exist in Aramaic, so the sequence of events described in John simply would not have happened.

Could it be that Jesus actually said "born again" in Aramaic, and the writer of John just happened to use a word that also meant "from above"? Nope. The other three times he uses anothen—including once just a few verses later—the "from above" meaning is unambiguous. And Thayer's Lexicon says the word is "often used of things which come from heaven, or from God as dwelling in heaven," which suits this context too perfectly to be a coincidence. So if this conversation took place, Jesus would have used an Aramaic equivalent of "born from above."

So how did Nicodemus manage to misinterpret his words so spectacularly? Well, he didn't. The author of John fabricated the story, not realizing that the double meaning would be impossible in Jesus' native tongue. According to the NET Bible, "the author uses the technique of the 'misunderstood question' often to bring out a particularly important point: Jesus says something which is misunderstood by...someone else, which then gives Jesus the opportunity to explain more fully and in more detail what he really meant."

To resolve this problem, apologists must argue not only that this well-educated Pharisee was an idiot who couldn't understand that being "born from above" would be a spiritual birth and not a physical reemergence from the womb, but that the translation into Greek created the "again/from above" double meaning purely by chance. I have an alternative for them: stop struggling. Relax. Let it go. Realize that your mental acrobatics are futile, and accept that the Bible is not a reliable record of Jesus' life—or of most other things, for that matter. It may be upsetting at first, but once you've unchained yourself from this ancient book for a while, you'll probably feel a lot better. At least, I do.

The Holy Sacrament... of Doom

2011-11-07T09:12:00.000-08:00

Communion is the Christian practice of eating a small wafer and a sip of wine or grape juice, which represent the body and blood of Jesus—or which literally are his body and blood, according to Catholic and Orthodox traditions. The ritual is meant as a way of remembering Jesus' sacrifice, although unbelievers often view the idea of eating flesh and drinking blood as bizarre and morbid, metaphorical or not. The church I go to with my parents (since I'm not out as an atheist) holds communion on the first Sunday of each month.

It's scarier than it looks. You'll see.

The pastor at this church takes a particular interest in a certain biblical passage addressing communion:

"Therefore whoever eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For he who eats and drinks in an unworthy manner eats and drinks judgment to himself, not discerning the Lord’s body. For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep." (1 Corinthians 11:27-30)

He emphasized the bolded part above, proclaiming that those who take communion insincerely "eat and drink damnation unto their own soul." As I began to doubt Christianity but continued to take communion, this terrified me. Judgment? Damnation? Did that mean that if I was wrong and Christianity was true, I would go to hell automatically for taking communion while not believing?

On the first Sunday of each month, a private drama played out in one second-row seat of that church. I couldn't just decline the ritual; that would probably be taken by my parents as a sign of doubt. But I also couldn't brush off communion as meaningless, since I still retained that overwhelming fear of eternal torment. So instead I tried to temporarily psych myself into a state of belief for long enough to scarf down the cracker and grape juice. After a while I realized that wasn't going to work, so at one point—I'm not making this up—I surreptitiously pocketed the cracker and poured the sip of grape juice on my hands during the preceding prayer, then pretended to eat and drink. Luckily no one noticed that I smelled like grapes for the remainder of the sermon.

These are the sorts of crazy things that a real fear of hell can make someone do. I still take communion, but it doesn't hold any meaning for me (although last time I was grateful for the grape juice since my throat was a little parched). If this passage means what the pastor implied it does, that only highlights the unbelievable pettiness of a being who would send someone into endless suffering for drinking some juice out of a plastic cup.

By the way, for some reason my pastor never mentioned the final sentence quoted above: "For this reason many are weak and sick among you, and many sleep [i.e. die]." Hmm, so taking communion unworthily causes illness and death? That's a very testable claim. Maybe we should try it out. I would bravely put life and limb on the line to volunteer for the unbelieving experimental group. Seriously, though, this idea is as silly and demonstrably false as the Scientologist belief that learning about OT III (the Xenu story) before one is ready could cause pneumonia. Cases like this make me reluctant to treat Christianity as though it's worthy of serious discussion.

The Ontological Argument Defeats Christianity

2011-11-05T17:39:00.000-07:00

The ontological argument for the existence of God is infamous for two reasons. One is that almost no one finds it very convincing, including theists. The other is that it's surprisingly difficult to pinpoint exactly what's wrong with it. There are dozens of formulations, but here's one that's optimized for clarity and brevity:

God is a being than which nothing greater can be conceived.

It's greater to exist in reality than only as an idea.

Assume God exists only as an idea. In that case, we can conceive of an even greater being—one that exists in reality—which we can then call God.

Therefore, God must exist in reality.

It's quite a bewildering argument, and I won't concern myself with refutations for now. I just want to show that if this type of argument was sound, Christianity would be false. The easiest way to illustrate this is to repeat the same line of logic with a few words replaced:

SuperSatan (SS) is a being than which nothing worse can be conceived.

It's worse for SS to exist in reality than only as an idea.

Assume SS exists only as an idea. In that case, we can conceive of an even worse being—one that exists in reality—which we can then call SS.

Therefore, SS must exist in reality.

Satan is supposed to be a pretty bad guy, but he's not a maximally evil being, one than which none worse can be conceived. He doesn't have infinite power or knowledge; he's just a fallen angel who's jealous of God's spot on the throne. (In fact, Satan does relatively little in the Bible to qualify for the vilification he receives within Christianity. Just compare God's kill count in the Bible to Satan's to see what I mean.)

Enter my new character: SuperSatan. He's the worst guy imaginable, which includes being all-powerful, all-knowing, and infinitely malevolent. Naturally, it would be worse for SS to exist in reality than as an idea: after all, he can do a lot more damage if he's real than if he's a product of my imagination. The thing is, there's nothing like SS within Christianity. God's power is supposed to be on a level all its own, but if SS were real, he would certainly be giving God a run for his money.

Thus, either Christianity as practiced by pretty much all Christians is false, or the ontological argument is flawed. (Or both, but that's another issue.) If Christians want to continue believing, they can't very well use this argument as a proof of the existence of God.

Atheist Ear Candy

2011-11-03T08:19:00.000-07:00

In situations where I'm caught without anything else to do, like driving to work or walking to a club meeting, I like to listen to one of several skepticism-related podcasts. I want to give a quick summary of them here.

Not to be confused with a
certain other guide.

The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe is hosted by a panel of skeptics (Steven, Bob and Jay Novella, Rebecca Watson and Evan Bernstein) who discuss primarily science-related topics. Each week they talk about new scientific advances, and developments in the realm of superstition and pseudoscience. Their "Science or Fiction" segment has the panel guessing which of three surprising scientific findings is a fake created by Steven. They also often interview a guest skeptic—sometimes prominent ones like Eugenie Scott or James Randi.

The Atheist Experience and The Non-Prophets are produced by the Atheist Community of Austin, and while the cast varies, Matt Dillahunty is the linchpin of both shows. They discuss current events and issues related to atheism and religion, and also conduct the occasional interview of a non-believer. The Atheist Experience prominently features viewer calls from Christians and atheists alike. While Matt and the others can sometimes be a bit aggressive when addressing callers, they're always logical and reasonably civil. Their attitude is understandable given the repetitive (and sometimes borderline Poe-like) arguments that the religious callers tend to offer.

The Thinking Atheist is hosted by Seth, an atheist and former Christian radio broadcaster who has the commanding voice to match. Each show is dedicated to a different atheism- or religion-related topic such as cults, creationism or raising a freethinking child. Seth discusses them on his own in a thoughtful opening segment, then later invites listeners to call in. He's quite polite and reasonable, and the callers generally don't get too obnoxious either. The tone of the show is more intimate and relaxed due to the one-man format, which can be a nice break from the others.

Conversations from the Pale Blue Dot is a philosophy podcast in which atheist and rationalist Luke Muehlhauser interviews a prominent thinker, often in a field related to philosophy of religion. The series includes such topics as the resurrection of Jesus, the neuroscience of free will, Alvin Plantinga's reformed epistemology, desire utilitarianism, the explanatory power of theism, and overcoming bias. There's some pretty heavy-duty thinking required for this one and it can get a bit dry at times, but it challenges me in a way the other podcasts don't.

I'm a sucker for pretty logos.

Radiolab is a unique little show that I've just started listening to. Each episode is dedicated to a scientific or philosophical subject like the self, the placebo effect, time, evolution or artificial intelligence. Commentary by hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich is integrated seamlessly with interviews and recordings of experts on the topic at hand, as well as some soothing ambient music. It may be cliché to say this podcast makes learning fun, but that's really the greatest compliment I can bestow. It consistently pursues deep truths while maintaining an offbeat yet accessible feel.

These podcasts are a great source of relaxing entertainment. I don't always have other atheists and skeptics around to talk to, so it's nice to be able to tune in and hear some familiar people discussing the things I care about. It's just one more way that technology allows free expression and a broadening of the marketplace of ideas.

September & October in Review

2011-11-01T07:13:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe that the year is almost over already, but here we are in November. As I've done four times now, I've made an index and summary of my posts from the last two months. Here are my posts from September:

July & August in Review: An index of my 22 posts from July and August 2011
The Problem of Poorly Communicated Salvation: God could make clearer criteria
Powerful Thoughts, Vol. 2: Another group of quotes on religion, science & more
Deflating the Supernatural: Examining an extraordinary and unsupported claim
Letter to a Christian Nation: Nothing new, but still a deft critique of religion
A Time for Remembrance: The root cause of 9/11: violent, dogmatic belief
The Death of the Soul: Philosophy, bio. & neuroscience demolish this dated idea
My Pro-Christian Bias: I'm still investigating it long after I'd reject other religions
Homophobia in the Bible: Being gay is called immoral & worthy of death and hell
How to Destroy Naturalism in 4 Easy Steps: Witnesses, records, evidence, tests
Quotable Me, Vol. 2: More of my thoughts on Christianity, religion and skepticism
God Doesn't Care About Free Will: Based on the Bible and the observable world
The Secret's Out: My sister discovers I'm an atheist; things turn out okay

And from October:

The Worst of YouTube: 3 videos that showcase Christianity at its most obnoxious
The Best of YouTube: 3 videos that both inform and encourage skepticism
Those Pesky Craters: Why they're totally incompatible w/ young earth creationism
The Bible for Skeptics: Verses backing skepticism imply unbelief is reasonable
Yahwism: An Anachronistic Curiosity: Summarizing Christianity like an outsider
Talking It Out: Discussing the implications of my atheism with my sister
Men Like Trees Walking: In one Markan passage, Jesus makes an odd mistake
Against Omphalos: Why "God only made the universe look old" is a bad idea
Jesus in an Alternate Universe: What if he valued skepticism over faith?
A Tale of Three Centurions: The gospels' centurion story is rife w/ contradictions
Judgment Day 2: Judge Harder: Aftermath of Camping's latest failed prediction
Detecting Intelligent Design: 4 examples show that it's harder than it looks

Several pieces of good news from these past couple of months. First, I managed to write a few pretty substantive essays, like these three. I also saw a huge uptick in traffic when John Loftus linked to my essay Why Believers Think Prayer Works from his Debunking Christianity blog. And finally, my sister found out quite accidentally that I'm an atheist, and I was pleasantly surprised at her accepting attitude.

Unfortunately I haven't had time to get very far with the two books I've been reading. I hope to dig into them more deeply before 2011 is out.

Detecting Intelligent Design

2011-10-27T14:37:00.000-07:00

One major assumption behind the intelligent design movement is that we can tell what objects are a product of design just by examining them. Obviously this is true for something like a watch—which is exactly the reason that William Paley used it in his famous watchmaker analogy. But we don't know that a watch is designed because it's complex or "specified." We know it's designed because we know that humans make watches and we have no evidence that they could form by a natural process.

Intuitively, though, we tend to think we'll always know design when we see it. For instance, the ridges on this stone pottery found in British Columbia clearly indicates that it was spun on a lathe, and holes have been drilled through the center:

Clearly, this pottery must have come from an ancient civilization... except it's not pottery, and these objects are naturally-occurring. They're carbonate concretions formed through a complex geological process, although objects like these really were misinterpreted as artifacts by pseudoscientific writer Graham Hancock.

Okay, so we're zero-for-one. Next is a charming, picturesque ring of mushrooms planted as decoration in a city park...

...by which I mean, a fairy ring created as a natural result of an interconnected underground network of mycelia. Cultures of the past came up with many fanciful explanations for this phenomenon—generally involving the intervention of fairies, elves or some other intelligent agent.

All right, let's try this again. What about these cement pylons? This group of carefully shaped hexagonal bricks could serve not only as a protection from the erosion produced by incoming waves, but also as a staircase up to the shore.

Nope. These are basalt columns in the Giant's Causeway, caused by the rapid cooling of thick lava flows. Curses, foiled again.

Okay, here's the last one. This has got to be intelligently made, right? I mean, just look at those clean right angles. These are obviously the remnants of an ancient building, or some type of crop irrigation system:

...Or maybe it's tessellated pavement on the coast of Tasmania, created by a rare combination of stress cracks and erosion facilitated by the accumulation of salt crystals. Dammit, this design detection business is harder than it looks.

Of course the creationi—er, intelligent design supporters—may retort that these phenomena are simple compared to the incredible complexity of biological systems. But what I've provided here is just a proof of concept, showing that phenomena that appear to be thoughtfully designed for a specific purpose can undeniably be the result of natural forces. The crucial thing to remember is that life has a complexity-building mechanism that blows the ones displayed here out of the water: natural selection.

Judgment Day 2: Judge Harder

2011-10-22T09:31:00.000-07:00

How could you not trust
a face like this?

Well folks, it looks like this is the end. In mere hours, our beloved Yahweh will send a global catastrophe the likes of which the world has never seen. Then Jesus will come down through the clouds to the sweet sound of trumpets, ushering his elect into hea—what's that? This was all supposed to happen yesterday? Never mind then, it looks like Harold Camping was wrong. Again.

Interestingly, though, things were a lot quieter and more timid this time around. This was probably in part because the group believes that no more souls could be saved after May 21st, so there was no need to continue the advertising blitz. But even among the faithful, the outlook was more cautious. Twitter's stream of incoherent rambling and irrelevant Bible verses, overwhelming three months ago, had slowed to a relative trickle. Prominent Camping follower Robert Fitzpatrick said he would spend his final day at home instead of preaching in Times Square. And most remarkably, Camping himself hedged his bets by using the word "probably" to describe his predicted apocalypse date, whereas before he had refused to even entertain the possibility of being wrong.

Naturally, though, the Campingites aren't ready to give up just because of a little thing like being proven wrong a fourth time (previously in 1988 and 1994 as well). They've already concocted an explanation that pushes the date back to this evening. And then there's this bit of ingenious cognitive dissonance resolution:

"And, even if the end of the world for some unknown or unsuspected reason does not come this year due to the frailties of our human understanding, that does not disprove everything we have taught; nor would it disprove the date of October 21, 2011, but it would simply mean that, in the Lord's providence, we were not granted a clear understanding of the nature of the happenings on October 21, but NOT THE DATE; the date has already been most assuredly proven[.]"

Even if they're wrong, they're right. It's fascinating stuff. If there's anything that following this story has taught me, is that there's no fact too obvious for the human mind to deny. I'll update this post if there are any further developments in the next few days.

Update: Camping released an audio message, maintaining that God is in control and will bring judgment day when he damn well pleases. He apologized for saying that no one could be saved after May 21, but not for wasting millions on advertising and gravely misleading thousands of people. According to The Christian Post, he doesn't think that the date can be known and has effectively retired as the head of Family Radio. The organization also issued repeated radio messages asking for more money to alleviate financial difficulties. They've driven their credibility into the ground, yet I'd still be surprised if their followers don't pay up.

A Tale of Three Centurions

2011-10-21T09:36:00.000-07:00

Or maybe it's just one.
Or is it two?

In the previous post I reimagined the tale of Jesus healing the centurion's servant. However, before I set out to write my own version I had to think carefully about which gospel account I wanted to use as my reference. Why? Because the accounts contain details that are outright contradictory.

Reading Matthew 8:5-13, one finds that the events are fairly straightforward: the centurion walks up to Jesus and begs him to heal the servant, and Jesus, impressed with the man's faith, happily complies. There's absolutely no suggestion that things might have been any different. But the same story in Luke has some very noticeable changes:

"So when he [the centurion] heard about Jesus, he sent elders of the Jews to Him, pleading with Him to come and heal his servant. ...Then Jesus went with them. And when He was already not far from the house, the centurion sent friends to Him, saying to Him, 'Lord, do not trouble Yourself, for I am not worthy that You should enter under my roof.' " (v. 3, 5)

Whatever happened to the centurion? He doesn't interact with Jesus at any point, instead choosing to send not one but two waves of intermediaries: first "elders of the Jews" and later "friends." It should be plain to anyone that these two stories cannot be accurately describing one set of events.

As always, the apologists make some creative attempts to rescue these irreconcilable passages. In this case, the reply is that in ancient times, subordinates were considered to be mere extensions of those in power, so sending a representative was virtually the same as being there. I don't buy it: the centurion sends his own friends rather than some lowly underlings, and I doubt that people of any era would so casually misattribute a series of interactions this extended and complex. But it's moot even if the apologists are right, because they completely ignore the other big inconsistency: Matthew has Jesus healing the servant on the spot, while in Luke he first walks almost all the way to the centurion's house.

By the way, I have to touch on this priceless remark from Jim Estabrook at Apologetics Press:

"One must also admit that it is possible Matthew and Luke wrote about two separate accounts."

After indignantly arguing for two lengthy paragraphs that the two accounts are absolutely consistent, he spins on a dime and insists that it's possible that they refer to completely different events. Sure, Jim. It's possible that there were two faith-filled centurions who desperately wanted Jesus to heal their sick servants, and who were too humble to let Jesus enter their houses, and who used the exact same metaphor about the commanding of soldiers. It's possible. But to actually use this as a serious argument merely underscores how crude, how intellectually desolate, how pitifully detached from reality your apologetics truly are.

Speaking of separate accounts, I still haven't addressed the third version of the centurion story: John's. This time, though, there are some radical differences between the accounts: Jesus is in Cana instead of Capernaum, the centurion is instead called a nobleman, the servant has become a son, and the "nobleman" doesn't display the impressive faith that he does in the other versions. So why call them the same story at all? Well, look at the similarities:

A powerful man approaches Jesus begging for help.
Someone this man cares about is at home with a grave illness.
The ill person and/or the encounter with Jesus is in Capernaum.
Jesus heals just by saying the word rather than visiting the home.
The ill person is specifically said to be cured "that same hour."

This is far too big a coincidence for John's account to be separate, but it's also far too different to even try to reconcile with the others. Anyone who isn't consumed with religious bias can see what's going on here. Stories about Jesus were passed along through oral tradition, changing dramatically along the way. The author of John had heard a substantially different version of the centurion story than the authors of Matthew and Luke, and each author may have tweaked the details to suit their own purposes. The takeaway point is that the gospel accounts of Jesus' deeds are not consistent, they are not factual, and they certainly bear no mark of divine guidance.

Jesus in an Alternate Universe

2011-10-19T10:09:00.000-07:00

A few months ago I wrote an alternate version of the story of Abraham nearly sacrificing Isaac, one that values reasonable skepticism over faith. Below is the story of the healing of the centurion's servant, which I've reimagined in a similar way.

As Jesus entered the town of Capernaum, a centurion came up to him and pleaded, "Lord, my servant is lying at home in bed with a grave illness."

"I'm sorry to hear that, but I'm not a doctor. What do you want me to do about it?" asked Jesus.

"Ahahah! A holy prophet of God and a comedian!" the centurion exclaimed. "Well, I suppose I could ask you to come to my house and heal him, but to be honest I don't think I'm even worthy of you entering under my roof. But I believe in you, Lord. I know your power is so great that all you have to do is give the word, and my servant will be healed. I have a bit of authority myself—all I have to do is bark an order to my soldiers and they'll carry it out immediately. I'm sure that you can do the same."

Jesus was shocked. "My good sir! I have to tell you, I've never seen faith like yours before in my life! Not in Israel or anywhere else."

"Oh, thank you! What a great honor it is to hear you say that."

"Er... what? Why on earth would that be an honor?"

"Why, Lord!" the centurion exclaimed. "Just last week the local potter told me that his niece said, that her neighbor said, that you said that just having faith the size of a mustard seed would let one move mountains! I may not have that much faith, but I hope I have enough to ask you this one favor."

Jesus sighed. "I see people have been twisting my words again. What I said was that it makes no difference whether your faith is the size of a mustard seed or a mountain: what matters is your actions. Honestly, why would anyone think that believing something really hard is enough to accomplish anything? And without any good reason to believe it, no less?"

"Oh, but I do have good reasons! I've heard all the stories about you. Why, just the other day my wife told me that her brother told her that—"

"Wait just a minute!" Jesus interrupted. "You think I can do miracles just because someone told you they heard that I could? What kind of reason is that?"

"So... you can't do miracles?"

"That's beside the point. What I'm saying is that you can't just believe everything you hear, especially about something as amazing as healing the sick or turning water into wine."

"You can water into wine?" said the centurion excitedly.

"Oh for goodness' sake. Stop yammering and pay attention! Even if I seemed to turn water into wine right in front of you, that still shouldn't be enough to convince you that I actually did it. There are men who make good money profiting from gullibility like yours, men who can make things appear to happen when they really didn't."

The centurion stared, eyes wide with a mixture of solemnity and confusion. "They must be very powerful sorcerers indeed."

"Are you even listening to me? All right, forget it. Sir, please go find a doctor for your servant as quickly as possible. I have to go now."

With that, Jesus continued to walk towards the center of Capernaum. The centurion, stunned for a moment, blinked and followed after him, shouting, "Lord, wait! If you won't heal my servant, could you at least direct me to those sorcerers you mentioned?"

Against Omphalos

2011-10-17T11:09:00.000-07:00

The Omphalos hypothesis is that although the earth and universe are young (6,000 years old is the usual claim among young earth creationists, or YECs), God created it with the appearance of age. That is, he carefully constructed life on earth, the ground beneath our feet, the stars in the sky, and everything else so that it would look billions of years old. The name comes from the Greek word for "navel," based on the implication that Adam was created with a navel even though he didn't need one. Although Omphalos isn't a very common position even among fundamentalists, there really are people who believe that dinosaur bones were planted by God to fool the scientists and other heathens.

So, is Omphalos a reasonable hypothesis? I will argue here that it is not.

What Omphalos Concedes
Before we begin, it's important to note what supporters of Omphalos must concede: that there is strong evidence for an old earth. This is crucial, because it means YECs who support Omphalos acknowledge that they seem to be wrong. Everything from asteroids to ice cores to DNA points to them being incorrect: they're supposedly right only by theological technicality. Once this is admitted, the only thing standing in the way of a true old earth view is demonstrating Omphalos' many flaws. Some supporters may then retreat back to a YEC view, but this only betrays an obstinate need to preserve their beliefs whatever the cost.

Is It a Good Explanation?
There are three reasons that we should be highly suspicious of Omphalos right out of the gate. First, an Omphalos-style universe would be identical to a truly old universe. Therefore, Omphalos is unfalsifiable: it can't be disproven, so if it's wrong we would have absolutely no way of knowing it. Intellectually honest people should want to know whether they're right or wrong, and Omphalos doesn't allow for this.

The second point is almost too obvious: there's just no evidence that Omphalos is true. The only reason some Christians advocate it is so they can continue believing what they've always believed. They can't point to anything in the physical world to support Omphalos. Nor does it have any theological basis: there's nothing like this claimed anywhere in the Bible, and (as we'll see later) there's no reason for a good God to act in this way.

The third reason is based on Occam’s razor. The old earth hypothesis explains the evidence at least as well as Omphalos, but the latter requires a huge additional assumption: that it only appears old because an omnipotent deity carefully designed it that way. Thus, the "old universe" hypothesis is the better explanation.

Is the Deception Justified?
Most Christians realize intuitively that Omphalos implies deception on God’s part, and therefore reject it. It's true that God would be knowingly causing people to believe something untrue, but could he somehow be justified in doing so? I'll examine a few ways that this might be the case, and then show why they're flawed.

The first argument was used by Philip Henry Gosse in his 1857 book Omphalos, in which the hypothesis was first formally proposed. He claimed that because God created a world with mature plants, animals and humans, he could have also created the rest of the world in a "mature" form. But there's a huge difference between creating mature beings that can care for themselves and elaborately faking the evidence found in craters, fossils, tree rings and countless other sources. The former is for the clear purpose of creating a functioning world, while the latter is blatant deception carried out for no apparent reason.

Second, maybe God set things up this way to test our faith, to see if we can ignore the misleading physical evidence and find the spiritual truth. But there's no good reason to trust personal revelation over empirical evidence. We know from studying the brain and human behavior that we're highly fallible and prone to everything from poor reasoning to hallucinations. In contrast, the scientific method is a massively successful truth-finding tool—and that tool points us to an old universe. If God wants to test our faith, he can do so without resorting to deception: for example, by seeing how we react in times of trouble, or asking us to do something difficult like missionary work.

If Christians still aren't convinced, they should imagine being raised in a non-religious home and brought up with the perfectly sensible old-earth conclusion. If they were later faced with the Omphalos hypothesis, which would be more reasonable to accept? The naturalistic explanation supported by a large body of evidence, or one that says a divine being has gone to great lengths to deceive them by creating fake evidence, in the hopes that they'll somehow see through the deception? Clearly the former. So would God be justified in sending them to an eternity in hell for believing a mountain of evidence over a mere gut feeling? Clearly not.

The elaborate deception that Omphalos implies also opens up the possibility that God is deceiving us about other things as well. For instance, maybe this is all a test—but in reverse. Maybe God will send those who accept the evidence to heaven, and send those who believe dogmatically in the unfounded claims of an ancient text to hell. While this is unlikely, it's still more reasonable than the traditional Omphalos hypothesis since it gives proper weight to empirical evidence.

Finally, once Omphalos proponents have run out of options, they may appeal to omniscience and claim that God could have a good reason for his deception that we just can't comprehend. Like Omphalos itself, the appeal to omniscience is a terrible explanation: it's unfalsifiable, has no supporting evidence and violates Occam's razor. Plus, we can only hope to understand God’s motives using our human reasoning, and based on this reasoning deception would seem malevolent. To believe otherwise is to rely on blind and unquestioning faith, which would be dangerous if God did turn out to be malevolent.

Conclusion
As I've shown, the Omphalos hypothesis is inconsistent with a good God because it would require elaborate, unjustifiable deception that would result in eternal punishment for millions of people. I have also shown that even if Omphalos didn’t require such deception, it would still be highly suspect due to its lack of falsifiability, evidence and parsimony. Therefore, Omphalos is an unreasonable hypothesis and a poor explanation of the natural world. Once we realize that the evidence clearly points to evolution and an old universe, we should embrace it instead of grasping desperately at far-fetched alternatives.

Men Like Trees Walking

2011-10-15T13:03:00.000-07:00

Read the following little-known story about one of Jesus' miracles and see if you notice anything odd:

"Then He came to Bethsaida; and they brought a blind man to Him, and begged Him to touch him. So He took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the town. And when He had spit on his eyes and put His hands on him, He asked him if he saw anything.

And he looked up and said, 'I see men like trees, walking.'

Then He put His hands on his eyes again and made him look up. And he was restored and saw everyone clearly. Then He sent him away to his house, saying, 'Neither go into the town, nor tell anyone in the town.' " (Mark 8:22-26)

Jesus spits on the man's eyes, which only partially restores his sight, and then he lays hands on him again, which finally heals him completely. Jesus heals dozens of people in the gospels, but this is the only case where he fails on the first try. Why should the perfect Son of God need two tries to heal a man? I have no idea—and as it turns out, I'm not the only one.

A useful visualization.

Matthew, Mark and Luke are collectively called the "synoptic gospels," and they contain much of the same material, sometimes even word for word. This is because the writers of Matthew and Luke both used material from Mark. In fact, only 3% of the content in the gospel of Mark is not used in either Matthew or Luke—and this passage is part of that tiny percentage.

For the few passages in Mark that contain completely unique content, the reason for their omission from Matthew and Luke is often quite evident. In one, Mark 3:20-21, those around Jesus think he's out of his mind—a rather embarrassing detail that the later authors would be eager to get rid of. The reason for removing the Parable of the Growing Seed is less clear; perhaps they thought its message was more muddled than that of the similar yet better-crafted Parable of the Sower. Finally there's the "Long Ending" of Mark, which is widely thought to be a forgery that was added later.

So it's no big surprise, then, that both of the later synoptic authors made a deliberate decision to remove the "blind man of Bethsaida" story from their gospels, while using all of the material surrounding it. They realized that this passage is totally inconsistent with the power that Jesus displays in the other gospel tales. Jesus making mistakes wasn't a big deal for the earliest Christians, who saw him merely as a messianic prophet. But as Jesus became increasingly exalted in Christianity (see my Jesus, Interrupted posts for more on that), the gospel writers were compelled to modify their stories accordingly. So went the very human process of editing a very human book.

Talking It Out

2011-10-12T11:38:00.000-07:00

Two weeks ago my sister found out that I was an atheist. Things went better than expected, but I didn't talk to her face to face about it until yesterday. I walked to the UCSD campus, and we had an awkward but perfectly amicable discussion about my situation over lunch.

We didn't talk at all about my actual reasons for rejecting Christianity and becoming an atheist, because I didn't want things to get too heated. She did say she was surprised that I hadn't simply declared myself agnostic, which I cleared up pretty easily by explaining the technical definitions of atheism and agnosticism. Atheism relates to belief, while agnosticism relates to knowledge. Most atheists (myself included) don't claim to know that no gods exist, and thus would be classified as agnostic atheists.

My sister said that while she was sad that I had left the faith, she wasn't going to condemn me for it. She respects the atheist position, and acknowledged that there are a lot of dumb Christians out there, but said she didn't like people that call Christians in general stupid. I told her I agree: intelligence isn't really something that factors into religious belief one way or another, because people tend to keep their intellectual pursuits separate from their religion. She was also surprised and dismayed to learn that a couple of people have already tried to tell me I was never really a Christian—as if they could know better than I do what goes on in my own head.

Mostly, though, we talked about how I plan to tell my parents that I've stopped believing. Both of them would certainly be very upset. My mom would probably get pretty emotional, while my dad could get angry and defensive if we started getting into specifics. We discussed several potential options: a slow phase-out starting with a decision to stop attending church, an indirect solution like a bedside letter, or a more forthright across-the-table talk. In any case, she agreed to be there for the big reveal if need be.

Overall I think it went very well. My sister was very kind and understanding, although I'm a bit concerned that she might be less supportive if she knew that my attitude toward Christianity was one of strong distaste rather than mere disbelief. For now, the important thing is that our relationship isn't at all strained or defined by our beliefs or lack thereof. We can still talk and laugh about that annoying professor or the latest episode of that hilarious TV show without our differences getting in the way.

Yahwism: An Anachronistic Curiosity

2011-10-10T12:42:00.000-07:00

Here's how people might summarize Christianity if it were an obscure and unfamiliar religion with no influence on its surrounding culture.

In our modern and enlightened world, an unusual but interesting group of religious sects still thrives in surprisingly large numbers. Research into this arcane order has revealed that its members appear to worship a heavily modified version of an ancient Near Eastern tribal war god known as YHWH (pronounced "Yahweh"). While followers of Yahweh will henceforth be referred to as "Yahwists," they are also sometimes called "Christians" or "Trinitarians," for reasons that will become clear shortly.

Yahwists believe that Yahweh is a perfectly benevolent, all-powerful, all-knowing entity who is timeless, unchanging and eternal. While Yahwists ostensibly worship a single god, they also claim that Yahweh exists in three distinct "persons"—the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit—collectively known as the Trinity. Because these persons have discrete personalities and functions, many researchers have classified Yahwism as a polytheistic religion involving the worship of three gods, despite vehement insistence from Yahwists that these beings are somehow one and the same.

In the Yahwist creation myth, Yahweh creates the universe and life on earth in six days. This includes the first two humans: the man is fashioned from dust, and the woman from a rib of the man. After a talking snake (sometimes said to be the embodiment of the powerful evil spirit Satan) convinces them to disobey Yahweh, the human race becomes cursed with an inherent tendency towards evil, or "sin." Once humanity has flourished, he judges the humanity's evil to be so great that he destroys almost all life in a worldwide flood.

Later, after the earth has been repopulated, Yahweh selects a tribal nation called the Israelites (or later "Jews") to be his "chosen people," and aids them in conquering and killing the neighboring tribes who worship other, competing gods. He also creates a strict system of laws that seem primitive by today's standards: homosexuality is punished with death, while the keeping and beating of slaves is merely regulated. After the Jews lose favor with Yahweh and fall into the captivity of rival nations, Jewish prophets predict that an anointed one (or "Messiah") will conquer their enemies and establish a new reign of peace and prosperity.

Yahwists believe that this Messiah is a Jewish carpenter-turned-preacher named Yeshua bar Yosef (often referred to as "Jesus Christ"). Yeshua claims to be both Yahweh's Son and Yahweh himself (see the "Trinity" explanation above). Although he is crucified by the Roman Empire, he then comes back from the dead and ascends into the sky. This act of death and resurrection is seen as a blood sacrifice that atones for all human sin. (Further research is needed to clarify this process, as Yahweh is seemingly obligated to sacrifice himself in order to appease himself.) Many Yahwists expect that Yeshua will soon descend from the clouds to take them up with him, ushering in the apocalypse and the final judgment of the world.

According to many Yahwists, one's place in the afterlife is determined by one's belief in the deity of Yeshua and acceptance of his act of vicarious atonement. Upon death, those who believe are said to have been "born again" and "washed in the blood of the Lamb," and will enter heaven, a state of endless, blissful Yahweh-worship. Those who do not will enter hell, an underworld where they will experience eternal suffering. Moral actions do not factor into this fate: Yahwists believe that their god considers any human who doesn't follow his laws perfectly to be unambiguously evil.

The above summary represents but one Yahwist view; the hundreds of individual sects disagree about nearly every conceivable issue. Most of these doctrines originate from the Yahwist holy book, called ta biblia or simply "the Bible." Interestingly, while adherents of Yahwism believe the Bible to be a vital source of divine authority, relatively few take the time to read it. Yahwists use a combination of prosyletizing and child inculcation to propagate their beliefs, while heaven and hell create a high-pressure reward and punishment system to motivate conversion and deter deconversion.

Yahwism as a whole is not considered a major, direct source of harm to society at this time. However, some extremists sects discriminate significantly against other groups, and have attempted to subvert scientific research and enact their moral views into law. As with other religious orders, Yahwism's emphasis on faith and personal revelation over reason and empirical evidence could also have a negative influence on the population at large.

The Bible for Skeptics

2011-10-08T17:51:00.000-07:00

Many unbelievers think that the Bible is universally opposed to the use of evidence when it comes to religious matters. However, there are a few exceptions. Below I'll summarize three instances where biblical passages actually allow or even endorse the use of skepticism and empirical support.

In 1 Kings 18, Elijah conducts an experiment to determine whether Yahweh or Baal is the true God:

"And Elijah came to all the people, and said, 'How long will you falter between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him. ...Therefore let them give us two bulls; and let them choose one bull for themselves, cut it in pieces, and lay it on the wood, but put no fire under it; and I will prepare the other bull, and lay it on the wood, but put no fire under it. Then you call on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the Lord; and the God who answers by fire, He is God.' " (1 Kings 18:20-24)

When nothing happens to Baal's altar, Elijah mocks Baal for his inaction. Then Yahweh sends down fire from heaven to consume the offering to affirm his status as supreme being. Finally, Baal's followers are captured and executed. I just love happy endings, don't you?

Then there are the tests that Gideon conducts to ensure that God will fight for them in Judges 6–7:

"So Gideon said to God, 'If You will save Israel by my hand as You have said— look, I shall put a fleece of wool on the threshing floor; if there is dew on the fleece only, and it is dry on all the ground, then I shall know that You will save Israel by my hand, as You have said.' And it was so. When he rose early the next morning and squeezed the fleece together, he wrung the dew out of the fleece, a bowlful of water. Then Gideon said to God, 'Do not be angry with me, but let me speak just once more: Let me test, I pray, just once more with the fleece; let it now be dry only on the fleece, but on all the ground let there be dew.' And God did so that night." (Judges 6:36-40)

I have to admire Gideon's diligence here. One test isn't enough to convince him that God is on his side; he requires two. The evidence is weak by modern standards, but in that superstition-addled culture this would have been a rare moment of clarity. Gideon goes on to defeat the Midianites and execute its two princes. (I'm beginning to sense a pattern with the endings of these Old Testament stories.)

Finally we have the standard for prophecy that God offers in Deuteronomy 18. How do we determine who is a real prophet and who is a fraud?:

"But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die. And if you say in your heart, 'How shall we know the word which the Lord has not spoken?'— when a prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, if the thing does not happen or come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken; the prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you shall not be afraid of him." (Deuteronomy 18:20-22)

The standard that God gives via Moses is simple and 100% evidence-based. If the prophecy doesn't come true, the prophet is not of God—no exceptions. The false prophet must then be executed. (That's three for three!)

So what have we learned here? The message of these passages is pretty clear, though it may not be one that the writers originally intended: when it comes to god-related claims, what really matters is the evidence. If you call on your god to do something and nothing happens, that god is a false one worthy only of mockery. If you think your god wants you to do something, ask him to communicate in a substantive, verifiable way to confirm it. And if someone claims to be a divine prophet, they had better have a perfect track record of successful predictions to show for it.

How, then, could anyone fault atheists for their unbelief? If we test God and his representatives and they fail to measure up, our response is exactly the one that the Bible itself endorses—well, minus the capital punishment. It's perfectly acceptable to ask for an impressive, objective, physical demonstration of God's power. It's perfectly reasonable not to put stock in the prophets of the Bible when their prophecies fail. And it's perfectly fine to disbelieve in God (and based on Elijah's response, even mock him) since he makes no demonstrable impact on the world.

Now, one can also point to countless instances where the Bible takes exactly the opposite view: that faith without evidence is a virtue, and skepticism toward extraordinary claims is a vice. One verse decrees that we should completely trust God over our own understanding. Another even specifically says not to test God. It's not surprising that one can find both stances; all this demonstrates is that the Bible is not a particularly consistent or unified book. What I've shown here is that the Bible does endorse a skeptical viewpoint in a few isolated cases—and that's enough to show that God fails to meet his own standard of evidence.

Those Pesky Craters

2011-10-06T11:37:00.000-07:00

Young earth creationists have a pretty serious problem. They're burdened with the task of explaining how all of this...

Yes, those are all craters on the moon.

...happened in just 6,000 years. We see craters like these on most solid bodies in our solar system, but for the sake of simplicity let's focus just on lunar craters for now. These craters demonstrate that our world is old in two ways. First, there's the evidence from sheer numbers. There are an estimated 300,000 craters larger than 1 kilometer on the near side of the moon alone—and the far side actually has significantly more. Based on the rate of such impacts, they must have taken place over hundreds of millions of years.

Then there's the evidence from big craters. The largest confirmed crater in the solar system is the massive South Pole–Aitken Basin, which is shown in dark blue on the right of the picture above. It measures an astonishing 2500 km (1600 mi) across. That's equal to the distance from San Diego to Memphis, from Dallas to Boston, or from Paris to Moscow. Had an impact of this caliber occurred while humans were alive, its effects would surely have been visible from earth, so why is there no mention of it in the historical record?

In addition, some craters on earth are also quite large, although tectonic activity makes them harder to find. The Chicxulub crater on the coast of Mexico is over 180 km (110 mi) across, and may have been responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs. This impact would have resulted in worldwide earthquakes, wildfires, volcanic eruptions and kilometers-high tsunamis, filled the atmosphere with thick dust and broiled the planet’s surface. And that's not even the biggest crater. The largest one known, the Vredefort crater in South Africa (at right), is nearly 300 km (180 mi) across, so its effects would probably have been significantly worse. If impacts like these all occurred in the last few thousand years, isn't it strange that we have no human record for any of them?

There's not much YECs can do to effectively respond to these facts. Here's how Henry Morris, the father of modern creationism, tried to explain lunar craters in his book The Remarkable Birth of Planet Earth:

"[T]he possibility is at least open that the fractures and scars on the moon and Mars, the shattered remnants of an erstwhile planet that became the asteroids, the peculiar rings of Saturn, the meteorite swarms, and other such features that somehow seem alien to a "very good" universe as God must have created it may have been acquired later. Perhaps they reflect some kind of heavenly catastrophe associated either with Satan's primeval rebellion or his continuing battle against Michael and his angels."

That's right, folks. The man largely responsible responsible for popularizing creationism in 20th century America believed that craters on the moon may have been caused by an outer space battle between angels and demons.

Nowadays, YECs make the (only slightly less silly) claim that these impacts, while caused by real asteroids, were made during Creation Week, the Fall or the Flood. What they always conveniently fail to mention, however, is why. They could argue that the impacts on earth might be some form of divine punishment. But what possible reason could God have for hurling asteroids at the moon and even distant planets? Such actions would not have affected us in any way.

The truth is that most believers in a young earth never even consider the implications of phenomena as simple and obvious as impact craters. The few that do can only offer explanations that are both ridiculous and inadequate, letting their faith fill in the rest.

The Best of YouTube

2011-10-03T19:20:00.000-07:00

Now that I've looked at some of the worst that YouTube has to offer, it's time to look at some of the best: religion and skepticism videos that I find highly useful, entertaining or informative. I'll share three of them today, which are aided by great production values and well-edited content. Let's start with a video debunking irreducible complexity:

QualiaSoup produces some of the most clear and information-rich videos on YouTube, and this one is no exception. In under eleven minutes, he summarizes creationist quote mining, explains the evolution of three systems (eyes, beetle spray and flagella) that may seem too complex to have evolved, outlines the problems with design arguments that use man-made objects as metaphors, lists the mechanisms by which irreducibly complex systems can evolve, and explains why intelligent design has no place in our school system. People who go into this video thinking that irreducible complexity is valid would have to be seriously biased to continue in that belief at the end.

Tim Minchin's 9.5-minute rant on pseudoscience and skepticism really is a blast. He skewers all sorts of weird clichés offered up by the credulous, all in the guise of a clever, funny, free-flowing beat poem. My favorite part comes at 7:30, when the intensity of his rant suddenly clears and he asks, "Isn't this enough?", accompanied by a gorgeous depiction of our solar system and other galaxies. It really is sad that people can be so focused on what almost certainly isn't there that they fail to appreciate what is.

And finally, there's this simple yet effective video from The Thinking Atheist:

The topic of this video is quite straightforward: it covers the basics of Christianity, from the perspective of a mother explaining them to her newborn child. Yet somehow this novel viewpoint clarifies and focuses our understanding. It makes even more evident the absurdity of calling a baby inherently evil and corrupt due to circumstances beyond their control. Those saucer eyes watching closely as the mother explains that God will never directly reveal himself, as she explains the imperative to make other believe as they do, and to praise God until the end of time. It would be funny if it weren't happening in millions of families all over the world. And then there's the second "welcome to this world" at the end of the video at the end to bring it full circle. Gives me goosebumps every time.

So as we've seen, YouTube has plenty of horrendous stuff, but like any medium it can be used to impart good ideas as well as bad ones.

The Worst of YouTube

2011-10-01T07:27:00.000-07:00

I only occasionally frequent YouTube, but every so often I come across something religion-related that truly frustrates, shocks, or demonstrates the harm that religion can cause. Below are three such videos. I'll start with Richard Dawkins' interview with creationist Wendy Wright:

This is just part one of seven, but I imagine most people don't make it much further simply because the exchange is so frustrating. Wright is calmly oblivious for the duration of the interview, willfully ignoring Dawkins' points with a smile plastered permanently on her face. There's a point where Dawkins tries to anticipate her mention of Haeckel's embryos, but she says that, no, what she was really going to talk about were those drawings of fetuses in the textbooks. The woman isn't even well-versed enough to recognize her own talking points. It goes to show that with some people, there's just no point trying to have a conversation. They'll just smile and nod, then Gish Gallop over to next topic.

The next video, thankfully, isn't so much irritating as it is hilarious:

This is David Barton, a man best known for trying to revise America's history to show that it was meant to be a "Christian nation." He's been enthusiastically endorsed by conservative politicians like Newt Gingrich, Bobby Jindal, Michelle Bachmann and Mike Huckabee, as well as libertarian pundit Glenn Beck. And here we see this influential idiot declaring that God hated the brickmakers of Babel because they were damned dirty socialists. Let's count the levels on which his reasoning is laughable:

He's assuming the truth of an obviously fictional event.

Creating similar bricks does not make people look and act the same.

Socialism has nothing to do with everyone looking and acting the same.

Nothing in Christianity implies that God particularly dislikes socialism.

An impartial reading of the text reveals that God dislikes the construction because it shows the people are a legitimate threat to his sovereignty.

There's a freaking brick wall right behind him.

Finally, an appalling example of religion being injected into a public school:

This is possibly the most blatant breach of church-state separation I've ever seen. Christian musician B-SHOC all but acknowledges that he's breaking the law by evangelizing at a public school, and seems to positively relish this fact. I have a feeling he might view this sort of child indoctrination differently if it were a group of Muslims that had come in and convinced students to convert to Islam. The Freedom From Religion Foundation has notified the district's superintendent, so I can only hope that those involved (including the school's principal, who helped set up the event) will face the proper consequences.

That's enough shocking stupidity for one day. Next time I'll cover some of the useful, quality content that YouTube has to offer.

The Secret's Out

2011-09-28T11:47:00.000-07:00

I've been an atheist officially for a few months now, but I've been keeping the fact that I'm no longer a Christian from my parents and sister for well over a year. Only a small group of people are aware of my unbelief. So imagine my surprise when I got this message from my sister on Facebook:

Yo. Brother. Why'd you join the rational thought @ ucsd club..? O.o It's pretty much an atheist club...

Someone added me to the Rational Thought @ UCSD group on Facebook a few days ago. I couldn't find any references to it on my personal page, so I assumed that no harm would be done. I don't know what the tip-off was exactly, but apparently I was wrong. After I read her message, I decided I had no choice but to tell her the truth.

[Sister's name],

I'm sorry. I've been wanting to tell you, mom and dad for a while, but I haven't been able to work up the courage to do it. I've been studying Christianity for a long time now, and after a while I just wasn't able to believe anymore. Given everything I know right now, atheism is the best stance for me to take. I'd like to ask that you not tell anyone for the time being, mom and dad included. It's important to me that I'm the one to tell them.

I want you to know that I love you, and that I'm still the same person you know and love, regardless of what I believe or don't believe.

If you'd like to talk more about this, I would be glad to set up a time and place to meet.

Love,
Tim

I don't know that I've ever been more anxious about anything in my life, but maybe I should consider this a blessing in disguise. Had she not found out, who knows how long I would have had to live while keeping this secret hidden. I guess I'll just have to see how things go. I'll update this post later once she responds.

Update: Here's her response:

Okay... I wont tell them. I love you too, and not any less, of course. ♥
im willing to talk if you want, but im fine with whatever you want/feel comfortable with.

Clearly I have the best sister ever.

God Doesn't Care About Free Will

2011-09-27T12:03:00.000-07:00

One of the most common notions within Christian apologetics is that God places enormous value on human free will. The free will defense is used as an attempted solution to the problem of evil: it's argued that God has no choice but to allow the possibility of evil if he wants us to make real choices. It's also used as an attempted explanation for why God doesn't show himself to the world: doing so would supposedly rob of us of our ability to freely choose to believe in him. Those two defenses have serious problems of their own, but here I'll argue that the very premise that God treasures free will is flawed, both due to the nature of our world and according to Christian doctrines themselves.

Free Will in the Bible
Looking to the scriptures in support of the idea that God values free will is not just fruitless, but counterproductive. Exodus says that God repeatedly hardens the hearts of Pharaoh and the Egyptians so he could exalt himself by showing off his power. 2 Thessalonians says that God will send sinful people "a strong delusion" so that they will be damned. Romans and Ephesians say that God predestines certain people to be saved or condemned for his own glorification. This doesn't sound like a God who values free will. It sounds like a God who uses people as playthings.

There are a few other ways that God limits free will in the Bible. I don't accept the apologist's idea that God revealing himself to us removes our free will to believe. However, if we do accept this, then a serious problem arises: in the Bible, God unleashes a barrage of miraculous phenomena even in the presence of unbelievers. For example, in 1 Kings Elijah calls on Yahweh to send down a pillar of fire, consuming an offering in the presence of hundreds of Baal- and Asherah-worshippers.

God also kills an awful lot of innocent children in the Old Testament—well before they would be mentally capable of choosing to follow him. In the tenth plague of the Exodus story, God strikes every Egyptian firstborn dead on the spot. The flood story is even more egregious: he systematically kills every human on earth except Noah's family, children included. And this doesn't even begin to cover the problem...

Free Will in Reality
...Because if humans gain souls and personhood at conception as many Christians claim, then over 70% of us die before we're even born. That's billions upon billions of people who never got the chance to choose or reject God. If he does care about free will, his incompetence in preserving it is nothing short of breathtaking.

If we define our ability to make informed, unbiased decisions as part of what constitutes free will, then the structure of our world impairs our free will at every turn. Our religion and worldview are determined to a large degree by our parents and surrounding culture. Someone growing up in Saudi Arabia, for instance, will almost inevitably become a Muslim. They will seldom choose Christianity because it's not a readily available option. Even if they encounter a Christian missionary, they're still likely to reject this new faith, because central tenets such as the Trinity doctrine will be completely alien to them.

Our brains also obstruct our attempts to make free choices. Cognitive biases over which we have limited control alter our perceptions, memories and thought patterns. Brain damage is even worse. Disorders like frontotemporal dementia can reconfigure your personality and rewrite your belief system, while akinetic mutism can erase your will to move, speak or even think.

If God cared about free will, he could easily have structured the world to solve these problems. We don't need to have high rates of miscarriage, exclusivist societies or immensely fallible brains. If God is omnipotent, he could easily have prevented these hindrances. It doesn't matter whether these phenomena are the result of sin entering the world at the Fall of Man: God could still remove these effects with a snap of his fingers if he wanted to. Since he hasn't, he either doesn't value free will or values some other factors (Fetal death? In/outgroups? Mental bias?) even more.

Free Will in the Afterlife
Finally, let's shuffle off our mortal coils for a moment and consider what would happen to believers once they enter heaven. Supposedly Christians who choose to follow Jesus are rewarded with an eternity free from evil and full of bliss in the presence of God.

So, then, are Christians in heaven capable of sinning or choosing to leave the presence of God? If they are, then their presence in heaven is not guaranteed, but contingent on their continued compliance with God's standard of perfect obedience. (It does no good to say that they have free will, but won't want to use it in this way: if Satan and his followers did, then why not others?) If they aren't, then they have lost their free will: their only path is steadfast servility. They are automatons, machines frozen in a permanent state of ecstatic worship.

Conclusion
Neither Christian doctrine nor the observable world supports the notion that God cares about free will. God supposedly hardens people's hearts, predestines them to an eternal fate, reveals himself to unbelievers, kills innocent children and demands complete submission in heaven. Meanwhile, fetuses die by the billions, people take on the religion of their parents and culture, and their fallible brains impair or even destroy their ability to make free choices. Christians should either explain why God permits and perpetuates these phenomena, or stop using free will as a defense against the problems of evil and insufficient evidence.

Quotable Me, Vol. 2

2011-09-24T09:37:00.000-07:00

A few months ago I compiled some of the short observations I've made on my Twitter account, @OtherSideReflec. This is the second installment. Again, much of the credit for these ideas should go to the many brilliant freethinkers I've been fortunate enough to learn from over the past year or two.

Here are some comments on Christianity:

Of all the tricks Christianity has pulled, the greatest is to convince people that a loving God can punish us eternally simply for unbelief.
Some Bible translations (e.g. NIV) purposely bury contradictions and atrocities. Imagine the outrage if atheists designed a translation to worsen them.
The Bible says nothing about gay marriage. If Christians want to base their argument on the Bible, they should be arguing to outlaw homosexuality entirely.
If a Christian explains away a passage as metaphor, just ask, "A metaphor for what?" It's kind of pointless if no one actually knows what it means.
One of the weirdest claims about the Bible is that it's a "unified" book. Read Leviticus, Psalms, Mark and Revelation. Then try saying that.
God's reasoning: "I'll give humans dozens of cognitive biases, then send them to hell if they don't believe based on a warm fuzzy feeling. It's perfect!"
Jesus' crucifixion demonstrates his loving self-sacrifice in the same morbid and incoherent way as a madman presenting us with the gift of his own severed limb.
Discoveries the Bible could have predicted: atoms, sanitation, relativity, the brain's function, evolution, heliocentrism, electricity, America, exoplanets, Newton's laws, tectonic plates, vaccines, DNA, radioactivity, Antarctic fauna...

On religion, God and atheism:

"Islam is a religion of peace!" No, a subset of Muslims are people of peace, in direct defiance of their holy book.
Science and religion are quite compatible. All religion has to do is yield to science on every subject where science has something to say.
God's traits remind me of two kids arguing over action figures. "Mine has infinite power!" "Well mine knows everything, and he's outside time!"
If a prophecy is only recognized after its "fulfillment," it either wasn't a prophecy at all or was far too vague to be impressive.
Following divine command theory has the same moral value as obeying someone who has a gun to your head.
People who only do good because God says to don't have morality, but rather a superficially accurate simulation of it.
It's ironic that the words in the Pledge of Allegiance between "one nation" and "indivisible" are themselves divisive.
Liberal religion's relationship to extremism: "All that's needed for evil to triumph is that good men do nothing."
Sending inherently sinful humans to hell for not being perfect is about as fair as sending a goldfish to hell because it can't do calculus.

And on skepticism:

Reports that the Washington Monument was tilted after August's earthquake are a perfect example of how expectations warp our perceptions.
Literally any belief, when shown to be false, can be preserved with sufficient rationalization.
I suspect the Dunning–Kruger effect extends to cognitive biases as well: people bad at avoiding bias likely think they're above average.
For some reason, even the most fearsome supernatural entities cower in the face of controlled laboratory conditions.

I like the Twitter format quite a bit. The 140-character limit does get a little cramped, but it's still an ideal place to jot down any thoughts that I don't feel compelled to flesh out into a full blog post, as well as to post links to atheism- and science-related news stories. It even helped lead to the arrest (and hopefully rehabilitation) of Dennis Markuze, a notorious spammer who constantly made graphic death threats against many atheist bloggers. Who says Twitter is a waste of time?