In Ratione Speramus

Rising from the A.S.H.-es

2012-03-07T04:32:00.001-05:00

My goodness, has it really been over a year since this old blog was updated?

In other news: Brown Freethought underwent a change in management in May of 2011. A young, dashing, ambitious Secretary made his bid for power in the vacuum left by former president David Sheffield, who left us for graduate school in a faraway state.

This charming, intelligent master of self-aggrandizement pushed through several policy changes in his first week of office: First, the position of "benevolent dictator" would have its air-quotes removed from the group's official letterhead.

Second, the group would adopt a staunchly pro-secular stance in order to maximize its impact on Brunonia. This would not be a mere discussion group for haughty academics to mock religion in secrecy whilst casually sipping Johnnie Walker Black (a favorite of the late Christopher Hitchens). Oh no, there would be petitions, marches, t-shirts, book readings, post-rapture parties and a snazzy new organization logo!

Last, but certainly not least, the group would be forever known as Brown Atheists, Skeptics and Humanists — "B.A.S.H." for short.

In one short semester, group attendance at regular meetings increased by 400%. New blood was recruited from the incoming freshman class. Things have been going smoothly ever since. B.A.S.H. celebrated its first Darwin Day with a classy film screening. It has been keeping careful tabs on the Cranston HS Prayer Banner case, and several members will be attending the Reason Rally in in the D.C. area over Spring Break. It will be pushing for frequent "Ask an Atheist" tables in the mailroom lobby and on the main green (once the weather clears up). In short, the group has emerged from obscurity to become a real beacon of secular activism in a rapidly changing world.

We are the B.A.S.H. Resistance is V/I.

Hitch has cancer

2010-06-30T19:29:00.002-04:00

Smoking has apparently caught up with Christopher Hitchens. He's been on a book tour, promoting his new memoir Hitch-22. Today, Hitchens announced that he has esophageal cancel and is canceling further events.

I have been advised by my physician that I must undergo a course of chemotherapy on my esophagus. This advice seems persuasive to me. I regret having had to cancel so many engagements at such short notice.

Brown Freethought will be gathering at some point to sacrifice a goat so that the gods might heal our most-beloved horseman.

CLS v. Martinez

2010-06-28T21:21:00.000-04:00

Today was an important day. Last night Senator Robert Byrde and Martin Ginsburg died. Justice John Paul Stevens also retired after serving on the Supreme Court for a sixth of its existence.

There was, however, some happy news from the Supreme Court today. Martin's wife, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, attending today's final session of the term to give her majority opinion on Christian Legal Society v. Martinez.

The Christian Legal Society was denied official recognition at Hastings College of Law, which is part of the University of California, because of their policy limiting membership and offices to good Christians. They had to affirm their belief in Christian values like forswearing "unrepentant participation in or advocacy of a sexually immoral lifestyle" [1]. Read: no homos. Justices Ginsburg, Stevens, Kennedy, Breyer, and Sotomayor concluded that Hastings was not violating the rights of Christian students when the college refused to recognize and give money to a group that discriminates against queers and non-christians.

I'm mentioning this for two reasons. First, CFI submitted an amicus brief in the case (see the brief and CFI's comment on the decision). The second reason is that all groups at Brown must include the following statement in their constitution:

Eligibility to [the group] is open to all full-time undergraduate members of the Brown community and does not discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, age, national or ethnic origin, disability, status as a veteran, sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression, or sex. Majority Membership consists of full-time undergraduate students.

I pulled that quote right from our constitution. We, like every other group at Brown, are willing to accept members of all different beliefs and sexual orientations. We happily have attendees who are devout Christians and others that are unrepentant sodomites. It's good to see that groups in public institutions can be held to the same standard.

CFI and Paul Kurtz

2010-06-14T14:35:00.001-04:00

I haven't done a good job of blogging in the past few months. Writing an opinions column in the BDH directed my attention away from In Ratione Speramus. I'll try to write some things over the summer, but I first need to work on another monologue for the BadCast.

For the time being, I though I should post a link to this blog post about Paul Kurtz and the Center for Inquiry (CFI). Brown Freethought is affiliated with CFI - On Campus.

Paul Kurtz is one of the founders of the modern skeptical movement. He helped found the Council for Secular Humanism; CSICOP, now called the Committe for Skeptical Inquiry); CFI, which both of the previous groups are affiliated with; and Prometheus Books. He built up a mini empire of rationalism.

Until recently, Kurtz was the CEO and chairman of the board for CFI. Two years ago, Ron Lindsay became CEO and president with Kurtz remaining chairman of the board. Then, last year, Kurtz became chairman emeritus of the board and was replaced by Richard Schroeder in his former position. Finally, last month Kurtz gave the board his resignation as chairman emeritus.

I occasionally see an article about what's been happening. Some people think that Kurtz was unfairly pushed out by Lindsay or other members of CFI and some people think that Kurtz was no longer the person we needed to lead the organization. Based on what I've seen, I side with the latter camp. Kurtz has done many great things for rationalism, but it was time to move onto a new person. Over the years, Kurtz has grown soft. While CFI has supported events like Blasphemy Day, Kurtz has opposed them. Now that rationalism is gaining wider recognition, it is important that CFI maintains its edge.

I should also note that CFI has a major budget problem this year. For the past several years, an anonymous donor has been giving $800,000 a year to the organization. However, they have not heard from this donor recently so their already-large deficit has grown even larger. As the blog post says, they have so far only raised an extra $50,000. Anyone interested in donating should. I haven't done so directly, but I did recently renew my subscriptions to Free Inquiry and Skeptical Inquirer, both published by CFI affiliates. (Admittedly, I was going to renew those subscriptions anyway.)

[Update 16:08] After writing this post, I received an email from Richard Schroeder that dealt with this subject. No, it was not an email directed at this blog, it was sent out to all CFI members. Maybe this is why Russell Blackford wrote the blog post that I linked to above.

It contains a more complete descriptions of what happened in the past few years:

In implementing the reform process, the Board did not rely on its own intuition. Instead, it retained the services of Greyledge Consulting, a well-known consulting firm that has worked extensively with many organizations, including nonprofits. After a months-long review, Greyledge provided its report, which included the following observations and recommendations: in recent years, Paul Kurtz’s management had become erratic and arbitrary and staff morale was low, so clear, impartial personnel policies had to be announced and followed; the organization had expanded too rapidly into too many areas, and it needed to focus its work on areas essential to its mission; the Board of Directors had all too often acted as a “rubber stamp,” and it needed to take responsibility and exercise its legitimate oversight authority; an executive officer needed to be appointed promptly to take over day-to-day management, with this person having both academic credentials and some business experience and being a person who could work with Paul Kurtz. The Board of Directors accepted these recommendations and in June, 2008 implemented some of the proposed recommendations. One of the Board’s decisions was to appoint Dr. Ronald A. Lindsay as President & CEO. Greyledge had conducted extensive staff interviews and had determined that Dr. Lindsay was supported by many on the staff. Critically, he was also recommended by Paul Kurtz, who had known Ron Lindsay for over twenty-five years. The Board hoped that Paul’s friendship with Ron would help make for a smooth transition.

Well, it did not work out that way. Without getting into all the disputes that started within a few months of the June 2008 decision, suffice it to say that Paul resisted ceding any control of the organization; the Board had to intervene repeatedly to try to resolve Paul’s objections to Ron’s exercise of authority.

Paul’s unwillingness to cede any significant authority resulted in his stance at the June 2009 board meeting, at which he informed the Board that he did not want to remain Chair unless the CEO position was restructured, basically denuding it of any significant authority. The Board declined to restructure the CEO position and, pursuant to Paul’s ultimatum, voted to remove him as Chair.

Everybody Draw Mohammed Day — Mark your Calendars!

2010-05-12T00:32:00.004-04:00

If I haven't already contacted you through Facebook (all seven regular members of the Freethought group, anyway), I'd like to invite you all to an international celebration of free expression, secular activism and pissing the hell out of a bunch of religious nuts. I'm talking, of course, about Everybody Draw Mohammed/Muhammad Day: May 20th, 2010.

I won't bore you with the details, but from the Danish cartoons of just a few years ago to the controversial South Park episode of just a few weeks ago, muslims both radical and moderate have made their opinions abundantly clear: depicting the prophet Muhammad results in threats of violence and death. This is a breach of freedom of expression that the free world CANNOT TOLERATE. So, on the twentieth of May, we're going to get as many individuals as we can to draw Muhammad and post their pictures online. Since no one knows exactly what Muhammad looks like, he may be depicted in any way we see fit. If the leaders of our benevolent atheocracy will permit us, we may even post them here on the Freethought Blog.

Please, this is about more than being bitter or contrarian. Our values have been threatened. All I ask is that you tell all of your freethinking friends, draw something resembling your idea of the prophet Muhammad on the twentieth, and post it online for the world to see.

For support, join this group (over 19,000 strong): Everybody Draw Mohammed Day!

We will not be intimidated. We will not be coerced. We should all stand and fight.

Pew Study: 25% unaffiliated

2010-02-21T01:37:00.000-05:00

There's a secular trend toward secularism. Each study shows a greater proportion of the population is made of atheist, agnostics, and the unaffiliated. A recent Pew study of peopled aged 18 to 29 found that:

One in four American millennials — which it defined as those who were born after 1980 and came of age around the millennium -- are not affiliated with any faith tradition, Pew found. They characterize their religion as "atheist," "agnostic" or "nothing in particular."
That compares to fewer than one in five Generation Xers — Americans born from 1965 to 1980 — who were unaffiliated with a religion when they were in their late teens and early 20s.
Just 13 percent of American baby boomers — those born from 1946 to 1964 — were unaffiliated with any religious tradition when they were young adults, according to Pew.

I am pleased with the increases in atheists but I have mixed feelings about the growth in the "unaffiliated." I like that they are moving away from organized religion, but that does not mean that they are free of nonsense. They likely are switching to new-age beliefs various other "spiritual but not religious" things. This will mean that religions will have less influence, and no single form of woo will become dominant. However, it does mean there is more out there to deal with.

And now for a tangent: I don't like the term "millenials." Apparently, "generation kickass" was already in use for people born from 1870 to 1885. Though I must admit, it's better than "generation Y," which is derivative and uninspired. Here's a list of cultural generations of western society from Wikipedia: "Lost Generation • Interbellum Generation • Greatest Generation • Silent Generation • Baby Boom Generation • Generation X • Generation Y • Generation Z". Can you spot where someone stopped trying?

Family Guy: "Extra-Large Medium"

2010-02-15T12:10:00.000-05:00

List night was yet another reminder of why Family Guy is one of the best shows on television. Lois visits a psychic who tells her everything she wants to hear. When Brian sees how Lois has fallen into the psychic's trap, he demonstrates to her that even an idiot like Peter can duplicate anything that a psychic can do. But, much like real life, Peter mistakes his own trickery with actual psychic abilities and puts on a show of his amazing powers.

Brian has had some problems with woo in the past. He's had acupuncture and said some credulous things in the past, but overall he might be the best rationalist character on television. The only rival I can think of is House, but as far as I know, House never attended Brown.

Sez LOLcat, DethCat iz fail

2010-02-10T12:41:00.002-05:00

The Brown Daily Herald published my second column today: A skeptic's response to Oscar the Cat. I do have to admit that I'm disappointed that my suggested title, "Sez LOLcat, DethCat iz fail," was replaced with the one you see. If I had known that I would have suggested another title. The other week, the BDH published an entirely credulous article on Oscar the cat, who made headlines in 2007 for supposedly being able to predict the deaths of patients in a nursing home. Unfortunately, the Brown professor who brought this story to the world has failed to provide evidence for his claims. My column criticizes the BDH for running something so poorly researched and explaining why you should be skeptical that there is any real effect going on.

I had mixed feelings when House had an episode on a similar cat. I was glad that they offered a valid explanation for the cat's supposed abilities rather than saying that the animal has anything supernatural going on. However, as I say in the column, "Before even bothering to speculate on the cause of Oscar’s ability, we should first know whether the effect is real[.]" It is ridiculous to bother coming up with an explanation for something that doesn't need explaining.

In addition to the change in title, I am also very disappointed that my favorite sentence in the whole column was changed. I was discussing what happened in 2007, when a slew of articles were published around the world that bought into the claims about Oscar. My original sentence was, "At best, the article might contain some token skepticism in an attempt to show balance—the false proxy of objectivity." At the very least, the jab of balance got in there.

A Skeptical BDH

2010-01-28T15:31:00.001-05:00

Today's Brown Daily Herald has two skeptical pieces in it. The first is my own opinions column: Don't Hesitate to Vaccinate!. Due to length restrictions I decided to focus more on why people, especially college students, should get vaccines rather than the anti-vaccination movement. I did get to mention them but not in great detail:

But there is a growing problem of organized movements that campaign against vaccination. The anti-vaccination movement focuses on trying to link vaccines to autism. They claim that vaccines for diseases like measles, mumps and rubella and ingredients like thimerosal, a preservative in some vaccines, cause autism. The evidence says otherwise. Study after study has shown no link between vaccines and autism.

Originally, I had a bit more about them—although still very cursory. Ultimately, I decided more good would be done by advocating directly for vaccines instead of criticizing Jenny McCarthy (even if it might be fun).

This is how humans wiped smallpox off the face of the globe. We vaccinated and vaccinated until the virus was isolated from the remaining people it could infect. The last natural case was contracted in 1977. This is also how our species is trying to wipe out other diseases. Polio is the next on the list, and only remains endemic in four countries: Nigeria, India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan. Other diseases like Measles have been eradicated from the United States.

But there is a growing problem of organized movements that campaign against vaccination. Efforts to eradicate polio have been hampered by clerics in Nigeria who claimed that the polio vaccine was an attempt by the West to spread HIV and sterilize children. The World Health Organization planned to eradicate polio five years ago but thanks in part to the efforts of those clerics and other anti-vaccination campaigns the remaining countries, polio still exists and infects children.

The West also has an anti-vaccination problem. Of course, in America these sorts of things are no longer organized by clerics, we prefer celebrities. Jenny McCarthy went from Playboy model to purveyor of medical advice. Instead of HIV and sterility, the anti-vaccination movement in the United States focuses on trying to link vaccines to autism. They claim that vaccines like for the MMR vaccines (for measles, mumps, and rubella) and components like thimerosal, a preservative in some vaccines, cause autism. The evidence says otherwise. Study after study has shown no link between vaccines and autism. Although there is no evidence that thimerosal can cause autism, it was removed from childhood vaccines to allay any fears. A decade later, autism rates have not been affected. The movement bills itself as promoting safety, but it really is just promoting disease and death. Due to a decrease in vaccination, cases of measles are on the rise after endemic measles was declared eliminated in the United States in 2000.

You can expect to see more skeptical columns this semester. I plan to write about the quack remedies that the bookstore sells, local food, organic food, creationists in the corporation, and whatever else I can think of that relates to Brown. If you have any suggestions, feel free to send them to me. Thanks to our very own Michael who is my editor.

There is also an article today about Ken Miller and The Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. Prof. Miller has been elected a fellow of the center for his work defending biology from the efforts of creationists.

A Surprisingly Accurate Graph

2010-01-17T12:46:00.003-05:00

I have a post comparing the rationalist and LGBT communities in the works—by which I mean that I wrote some on the train home but have yet to do anything with it since. Instead I will continue what is becoming my tradition of linking to web comics instead of providing new content.

I've Got a Lot of Problems with You People!

2009-12-23T09:37:00.000-05:00

It's December 23 again and that means Festivus is here once more. Put up your Festivus poles, air your grievances, and perform the feats of strength.

A Festivus for the rest of us!

Joseph and Mary in Time for Christmas

2009-12-18T00:00:00.001-05:00

Sorry, but I lied to you. I don't think I'll finish a substantial post until after the weekend when I finish my final final. I'm too busy studying.

Just kidding. No studying. Instead I've been watching all of Doctor Who and learning a new method for the Rubik's cube. Before I leave Brown on Sunday I will have watched all of the new run of Doctor Who in about a week. Last weekend, the day after I started my Doctor Who marathon, I competed in Brown Cubing Day, becoming the 5519th best cuber in the world! I'm now trying to work my way down to a somewhat more respectable time (well, more respectable for speed cubing, my best was still 53.61 seconds). There have been a lot of interesting things this month that we've missed. Most recently, James Randi dropped the ball on anthropogenic global warming and then partially recovering.

By the way, I originally intended to write a post about the stolen emails of climate scientists from the CRU, but I don't think I'll waste my time. Sean Carroll's post on Cosmic Variance expresses my sentiment very nicely. Essentially, this was a theft of private information in an attempt to discredit perfectly reputable science ahead of the talks in Copenhagen. Despite what climate change deniers are say, the emails show no grand conspiracy, no creation of fraudulent data, and no suppression of data. Essentially the climate change deniers are misinterpreting what the scientists wrote to put a malicious twist on benign things. And yes, denier is the right term for people who are promoting such a demonstrably false interpretation of the stolen emails. I might be willing to give the few climate scientists who disagree with anthropogenic global warming the benefit of the doubt, but those who are not involved in the scientific process and go against the piles of evidence and the scientific consensus are no more deserving of the descriptor "skeptic" than any of the other deniers (Holocaust deniers, evolution deniers/creationists, &c.).

This post ended up being longer than I wanted it to be—I need to get back to Doctor Who. But I have finally gotten to what I originally wanted to show you. From BBC News comes a New Zealand billboard of Joseph and Mary put up by a local church for Christmas. Yes, it was actually put up by a honest-to-FSM church.

Homeopathic Webcomic

2009-12-16T13:22:00.001-05:00

I'm afraid I've been busy these past two weeks. I'll try to finish one of the posts that I've started and put it up in the next day or two. For now, enjoy this comic from LukeSurl.com". Make sure to mouse over it to read the wonderful title text.

Blogs and Podcasts

2009-12-04T20:57:00.001-05:00

I became interested in the rationalist movement during my senior year of high school. That fall, Richard Dawkins (peace be upon him) published The God Delusion. It wasn't until the publication of that wonderful book that I saw other people attacking religion just as I always wanted to. Previously I was somewhat conflicted. I wanted to challenge these beliefs and almost always did, but I had been told that religion wasn't something that you should confront people on. Obviously, I decided to go with my first instinct.

That spring, I started listening to podcasts, which introduced me to the world of skepticism. I already knew about the Center for Inquiry (CFI) so I naturally chose Point of Inquiry as one of the first podcasts to which I subscribed. If it weren't for listening to that podcast, Brown Freethought might not exist. CFI - On Campus was often mentioned during episodes so I tried finding a rationalist group at Brown but had no luck. So naturally I decided to start one.

Here's are a list of the blogs, podcasts, and comics that I regularly (or at one point regularly) read, listen to, and view. Many of them are great resources for keeping up to date on atheism, skepticism, and science.

Blogs

Pharyngula: The best blog out there. It's a science blog by the biologist PZ Myers, who does not suffer fools well.
Cosmic Variance: This physics blog normally sticks to physics but occasionally there will be some rationalist topic discussed by one of the bloggers. It's worth reading for the physics alone.
Bad Astronomy: An excellent blog on astronomy and skepticism.
Skeptical Software Tools: The author doesn't post regularly but the content is invaluable. As the name suggests, it's a great resource for useful technologies for skepticism.
The Rogues Gallery: The blog of The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe<.
Skepticblog: The blog of the "Skeptologists", a prospective show on skepticism. A number of the authors are well-known skeptics.
Christopher Hitchens articles: This is a compilation of Hitchens's articles from Slate, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, and Newsweek that I made with Yahoo pipes. Please tell me if Hitchens write regular articles on other sites so I can include them.
RichardDawkins.net: Need I say more?
Quantum Diaries: A particle physics blog. It's been very exciting to read recently with the LHC colliding particles for the first time.
The Physics arXiv Blog: This highlights some articles on the arXiv, the main physics preprint server.
Why Evolution is True: Another biology blog. Jerry Coyne did a wonderful job this summer criticizing accommodationists
FiveThirtyEight: The best political site. I can always count of a good statistical analysis of what's going on. They correctly predicted the results in 49 states for the 2008 presidential election.
The Conscience of a Liberal: Paul Krugman's blog on economics and policy.

Comics

xkcd: Fabulous.
Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal: Irreverent.
Piled Higher and Deeper (PhD Comics): What I have to look forward to in a couple years.

Podcasts

The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe: This is my favorite podcast. It's what brought me into the skeptical movement.
Quackcast: All of your answers to pseudoscientific medical questions delivered with "evidence based ridicule." My only complaint is that new episodes don't come out often enough.
Skeptoid: A short, 10ish minute podcast that give overviews of different pseudoscientific phenomena.
Point of Inquiry: The podcast of the Center for Inquiry. The host, DJ Grothe, was the head of CFI - On Campus, which Brown Freethought is a member of.
Astronomy Cast: A facts based journey through the Universe.
Are We Alone?: The podcast of the SETI Institute. They have regular shows on skeptical topics.

Of Brights and Scarlet Letters

2009-11-30T23:17:00.001-05:00

Since I’ve become so very popular for espousing my (questionably militant) atheist views, I thought I might write a short post about a couple of social movements that I’ve come across in my quest for a personally satisfying anti-religion.

The first would be the Brights movement, founded in 2003 by Paul Geisert and Mynga Futrell, members of the American Humanist Association. Their general idea was to create a universal name for people who hold in a purely naturalist worldview. In much the same way that the word “homosexual” holds a neutral or negative connotation in the minds of the general public, words or terms associated with nontheistic beliefs may be considered neutral (e.g. “agnostic”, “humanist” or “freethinker”) to downright negative (e.g. “atheist” or “skeptic”). The term “gay”, however, was historically a positive word that became adopted as a euphemism for homosexual. Geisert and Futrell chose to adopt a similar term to describe nontheists: “Bright”.

Since its coinage, the term has been met with support from a wide range of atheists, including Richard Dawkins himself. Its positive connotation has been bolstered by its symbolic, pseudo-spiritual connection to the Enlightenment, an age that embodied so many of the traits that the modern movement represents.

To be fair, the term “bright” has also been the target of criticism from both sides of the religion debate. Upon hearing about the Brights movement, Christopher Hitchens expressed a deep concern that the term sounded “conceited”. In my not-so-humble opinion, “bright” inspires a well-deserved elevation of morale. If I were concerned about pride preceding a fall, I would have stayed in parochial school.

Other critics have made the point that “bright” necessarily implies that Brights are more intelligent than believers. This would be true if Brights were arrogant enough to call religious believers “dull”. As the philosopher Daniel Dennett quipped, “Those who are not gays are not necessarily glum; they're straight. Those who are not brights are not necessarily dim.” Dennett has suggested that theists be called “super” — short for “supernatural” — a term that has been officially endorsed by Geisert and Futrell.

The other notable social movement that I came across is the Out campaign, started by Richard Dawkins as an initiative to promote the positive image of atheism and Freethought in the public. The campaign draws inspiration from the Gay Rights movement and the idea of “coming out” to one’s family and friends. If anyone has heard of the Rational Response Squad’s “Blasphemy Challenge”, this is essentially a similar idea on a more personal level. Recruits are called to reach out, speak out, keep (religion) out, and stand out in an effort to raise public awareness of atheism. In an ironic twist, the Out movement has adopted a scarlet, stylized capital ‘A’ as its insignia (for “Atheism”, I suppose).

These are, of course, only two movements in a changing social climate. Whether or not you identify as a Bright or wear a scarlet letter on your clothing, there is a revolution going on, and we’re all a part of it.

http://outcampaign.org
http://www.the-brights.net

Manifestos and Freethought

2009-11-30T12:20:00.008-05:00

Humanist Manifesto II
Humanist Manifesto III

This is my first post weighing in on In Ratione Speramus; I'll try to be concise as I make sense of what I've read.

Although he drops the issue of atheists' capacity to carry out moral reasoning (to focus on their ability to live fulfilled lives and initiate collective action), I like Michael Fitzpatrick's Good Without God and the responses it generated. I think Michael's column duplicated here is the first concrete stab at what I personally find to be the most interesting and compelling duty of Brown Freethought - our job to provide a careful, constructive, and positive articulation of humanism in the Brown community. We considered this important when we founded the group two years ago and should remember to continue doing so. Our sustained focus on promoting critical inquiry and the scientific method is ultimately grounded, I think, in our shared ethical concerns that should be made clear and explicit.

Anish Mitra's response to Michael raised issue with the atheist movement's need to evangelize. Atheism, he observes, is a logical (or empirical) conclusion an individual comes to accept after he has satisfied himself of its reasonableness. As a bare proposition alone it holds little internal moral import and Mitra consequently puzzles over some atheists' "undying need to tell you about why they feel the way they do. . ." He doesn't think we can explain this away by our advocacy of science. He also claims we're digging ourselves into hypocrisy by harping through slogan-based media on the immanent reality of the godless world we've discovered. Why bother? Mitra doesn't spend his spare time declaring the non-existence of unicorns.

Michael responded that we have incentive for establishing a social presence because there are "common principles" guiding our interest... this is true! And Mitra is well-justified in his failure to preach Unicorns Are Dead, but unicorns have never held a fraction of the political and psychological importance of gods or been prominent in our assessment of human destiny and metaphysical reality. What I think is pertinent is unpacking these shared principles of ours - it is sloppy and dangerous to assume prima facie that the ethics of the academy or values we've adopted in the maintenance of science are a sufficient basis for thinking about the moral impetus behind socially involved atheism.

I'm not suggesting we all become ethicists or philosophers, but if we think contemporary humanism emerges from a rational dialogue about history, materialism, and human nature then we should do what we can to share this. When a believer claims that ethical order is entailed by divine order this sets up debate in their terms and it isn't obvious to many people that there are non-theistic alternatives. I've included links to the second and third humanist manifestos for the purpose of instigating more discussion of humanism even if we find these versions of it inadequate. We've stated our interest in supporting civil freedoms that are denied in irrational religious practices, but there's more to the story than just negating religion and keeping what we find ourselves with after.

Michael Shermer Beware

2009-11-23T00:05:00.005-05:00

Another excellent xkcd.

Rorty on teaching fundamentalists

2009-11-18T19:56:00.003-05:00

“It seems to me that the regulative idea that we heirs of the Enlightenment, we Socratists, most frequently use to criticize the conduct of various conversational partners is that of ‘needing education in order to outgrow their primitive fear, hatreds, and superstitions’ ... It is a concept which I, like most Americans who teach humanities or social science in colleges and universities, invoke when we try to arrange things so that students who enter as bigoted, homophobic, religious fundamentalists will leave college with views more like our own ... The fundamentalist parents of our fundamentalist students think that the entire ‘American liberal establishment’ is engaged in a conspiracy. The parents have a point. Their point is that we liberal teachers no more feel in a symmetrical communication situation when we talk with bigots than do kindergarten teachers talking with their students ... When we American college teachers encounter religious fundamentalists, we do not consider the possibility of reformulating our own practices of justification so as to give more weight to the authority of the Christian scriptures. Instead, we do our best to convince these students of the benefits of secularization. We assign first-person accounts of growing up homosexual to our homophobic students for the same reasons that German schoolteachers in the postwar period assigned The Diary of Anne Frank... You have to be educated in order to be ... a participant in our conversation ... So we are going to go right on trying to discredit you in the eyes of your children, trying to strip your fundamentalist religious community of dignity, trying to make your views seem silly rather than discussable. We are not so inclusivist as to tolerate intolerance such as yours ... I don’t see anything herrschaftsfrei [domination free] about my handling of my fundamentalist students. Rather, I think those students are lucky to find themselves under the benevolent Herrschaft [domination] of people like me, and to have escaped the grip of their frightening, vicious, dangerous parents ... I am just as provincial and contextualist as the Nazi teachers who made their students read Der Stürmer; the only difference is that I serve a better cause.”

– ‘Universality and Truth,’ in Robert B. Brandom (ed.), Rorty and his Critics (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000), pp. 21-2.

Clarification: "Good without God"

2009-11-16T23:15:00.006-05:00

So, anyone who reads the Brown Daily Herald will have probably noticed that my 11/10 column "Good without God" got a well-deserved* critique from Anish Mitra '10. The full text of his column can be found here:

Anish Mitra '10: Good without God? A response

What I was more interested in was sharing a little response that attempts to clarify most of his objections; feel free to dissect this in a comment.

Shortly after my “Good without God” column was run, I discussed it with a religious friend of mine. Her first impression seemed to echo Mitra's point exactly: “Are you trying to turn atheism into some kind of religion?”

Not really. We are trying to form organizations, but of a distinct flavor from that of a religion. What we lack is tradition and practice: holy books, sacraments, prayers. But we do have common principles. Our principles guide our interests. It’s entirely reasonable to seek out others who share common interests. The difference is that our group doesn’t seek to dictate the beliefs and thoughts of its members in the same way that a religion would.

He makes a very good point about the tactics of the Big Apple Coalition of Reason’s methods for promoting their cause: it is recruitment. But recruitment hardly defines a religion: the army recruits. The Red Cross recruits. Political parties recruit. Any group of people working towards a common goal must at some point recruit new members. (For comparison, consider the reasons why religions recruit: to increase tithe revenue; to convince impressionable young men and women to strap on vests of explosives and step on crowded buses; because they honestly think that they’re “saving souls”, etc.)

Granted, this does suggest that atheist organizations like the Coalition of Reason set out to accomplish some goals. Atheists in general should have ideological goals, which include broadening the public’s understanding of science, fighting for increased social freedoms, and the strengthened separation of church and state.

While I agree that religious individuals, from historic titans like Isaac Newton to contemporary intellectuals like Ken Miller, have made great strides in the advancement of scientific knowledge. However, religious dogma has been science’s single greatest obstacle for the past thousand years. It was religious hubris that FALSELY placed the Earth at the center of the solar system. It was the story of creation that caused the FALSE belief that the world is only six thousand years old. It was religious ignorance that gave rise to the FALSE belief that mental disease was caused by demonic possession. Even today, it is religious obstinance that stands in the way of stem-cell research. This stands opposed to our principles, and we have decided that we are not going to stand idly by while superstition holds a greater sway over public policy than reason.

At this point, it makes very little sense to try to equate an atheist organization to a religion. We aren’t recruiting for selfish reasons. It is perfectly reasonable for us to seek out others with similar interests and principles. And if religions have the ability to sway public opinions and dictate public policy, then we should at least have the same sort of opportunity to voice our concerns: not as individuals, not as constituents, but as a group.

Don’t get me wrong; I very much agree with Mitra that atheism should be the conclusion of one’s personal reasoning, and I wish I hadn’t glossed over that fact in my column. But just as those who choose to believe in God join a church, synagogue or mosque, those who choose otherwise deserve the right to associate with like-minded individuals.

*I say "well-deserved" in reference to my shameless mockery of another columnist's religious frustration a couple months ago, a sarcastic piece of which I am far too proud for my own good.

Bad Faith Awards

2009-11-16T13:39:00.000-05:00

It's time, yet again, for the annual Bad Fairth Awards. The New Humanist holds this online poll to give the person who has "made the most outstanding contribution to the cause of unreason" in the past year a little something for their efforts. Last year, Sarah Palin swept the vote and the year before, Dinesh D'Souza claimed this prestigious prize. This year, the short list of contenders features everything from creationists, to chiropractors, apologists, and a pope (guess which one):

Adnan Oktar, aka Harun Yahya 99 (7%)
Anjem Choudary 73 (5%)
Anthony Bush 22 (1%)
British Chiropractic Association 209 (16%)
Cardinal Cormac Murphy O'Connor 68 (5%)
Dermot Aherne 90 (7%)
Damian Thompson 67 (5%)
Pope Benedict XVI 418 (33%)
Terry Eagleton & Karen Armstrong 67 (5%)
Tony Blair 132 (10%)

Feeding Christians to the Lions

2009-11-10T23:21:00.002-05:00

I find debate barbaric. Its goal is to convince as many people as possible to believe some proposition. This isn't bad in itself. Rather, it's the format of the debate that I dislike. Humans, the imperfect beings that we are, respond better to good rhetoric and presentation than substantive argument. Debate substitutes persuasion for accuracy and thoroughness. I can't think of a more fitting word than barbaric to describe such disregard for the truth and rigor.

However, just because something is barbaric, doesn't mean it can't be entertaining to watch. Debate, in my opinion, is best looked at like the Roman games. Yes, killing dozens of people in a day for sport is barbaric, but the Romans found it very entertaining. This debate should be thought of along the same lines.

The motion is that the Catholic Church is a force for good in the world. Archbishop John Onaiyekan and Ann Widdencombe speak for the motion while Stephen Fry and Christopher Hitchens speak against it. This debate doesn't really resemble a gladiatorial battle so much as the mid-day events where criminals (e.g., Christians) were executed by being fed to wild animals (e.g., lions).

Good without God

2009-11-10T15:03:00.003-05:00

Since I have yet to contribute anything to this blog, I figured my latest opinions column would be appropriate.

Michael Fitzpatrick '12: Good without God

If you plan on visiting New York City over the Thanksgiving holiday break, I insist that you ride the subway at least once. While you’re at it, take a good look at the ads — you may read something thought-provoking.

For the next four weeks, an advertising campaign coordinated by the Big Apple Coalition of Reason — an umbrella organization that includes several atheist, secular and humanist societies based in New York — will run in a dozen different Manhattan subway stations. In honor of the Oct. 27 release of Greg Epstein’s book, “Good without God,” the ads bear the message, “A million New Yorkers are good without God. Are you?”

Well, are you? That’s an excellent question!

Unfortunately, “good” is a very ambiguous term. Not having read Epstein’s book myself, I am at a loss to understand the intended meaning of the phrase “good without God.” At first glance, two possibilities seem equally plausible: “good” may either mean “morally sound” or simply “content.”

Debating the virtuous interpretation is, quite frankly, a waste of time. Atheists are perfectly capable of making moral decisions. On the other hand, the satisfaction interpretation deserves a closer examination.

To say that a person is happy without God is a confusing claim for some religious people, because God represents the ultimate source of all happiness, meaning and pleasure in their worldview. At Brown, this perspective is mitigated by the open mindset encouraged by an academic setting, but the real world is not always so forgiving. In many religious traditions, atheists are almost certainly damned for all eternity, and some theistic blowhards out there still relish the notion of endless suffering for nonbelievers. By their logic, all atheists should be perpetually miserable.

And yet, a million New Yorkers — and a fair chunk of Brown students — are good without God. The prospect of damnation doesn’t discourage us. In fact, the possibility of losing this existential coin flip is a good reason to smile. With or without God, atheists have no reason to hope for something better. With or without God, life is still worth living. No matter what, we will make the best of the one lifetime we have.

Alternatively, take the message from a more derisive British atheist campaign that displayed the following ad on buses in London this past January: “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”

Putting aside the feel-good arguments, there is one other interpretation of the aforementioned question. This construal is not an invitation to reflect on faith or question theology; rather, it is a rallying cry — a clarion call to those millions of people who find themselves, by choice or circumstance, without a God.

As you might expect, I commend the efforts of the Coalition of Reason to raise public awareness of the various atheist, secular and humanist societies in New York. Even in large cities like New York, atheists and other secular humanists still represent a minority, but a growing minority nonetheless. And like all minorities, they will seek a community. Even atheists need social cohesion.

Out of all atheists, former believers more fully understand the grim reality of apostasy; especially in situations where one’s family or friends are predominantly religious, atheism can be a very lonely state of mind. Religions are essentially groups of people united by common beliefs. Because of this, rejecting the religion of one’s family and friends often leads to a loss of belonging, a feeling of disconnection from one’s community.

What atheists — especially young atheists — need to know is that we are also unified by common beliefs: namely, a dedication to science, freedom of thought and a firm trust in humanity. A billboard ad campaign coordinated by the Dallas-Fort Worth Coalition of Reason this past March summed up this idea fittingly: “Don’t believe in God? You are not alone.”

Granted, these ad campaigns are all public displays. They will impact the daily routines of believers and nonbelievers alike. Most religious people will probably shrug off the message, but a few may find the ads offensive. This is, of course, the calculated risk of promoting a controversial point of view. However, it is my sincerest hope that religious groups take advantage of the ad campaign to foster friendly discussion between atheists and theists rather than protest the Coalition of Reason’s freedom of expression.

For their efforts, the Big Apple Coalition of Reason’s ad campaign and others like it are figurative successes, regardless of how many young atheists they manage to recruit. They send a firm message to the members of their local secular communities: We don’t need to hide for fear of rejection. We don’t need to feel like we are alone in the world. We can live comfortably with our choice of values and know that others share them. Michael Fitzpatrick ’12 is great without God. He can be contacted at michael_fitzpatrick at brown.edu.

The Queen of the Homeopaths

2009-11-08T13:15:00.002-05:00

This video has been going around the skeptical blogosphere in the past few weeks. However, it wasn't until yesterday that I worked up the fortitude to watch it the whole way through. The speaker, Dr. Werner seems to have heard about a lot of pop physics but doesn't have a clue about the actual science.

I don't know where to begin.

Dr. Werner is not just a homeopath, she's a behavioral optometrist as well. I had never heard of behavioral optometry before I watched this video. To quote answers.com, "Rather than simply prescribe lenses to compensate for eyesight weaknesses, behavioral optometrists attempt to train the patient to see better across a range of different circumstances." Wow! At least it's more plausible than homeopathy, but I'd like to see how they can reshape my eye through behavior alone so that I can see clearly without the use of glasses. And that is one of the more sane things that behavioral optometrists do. Like plenty of other pseudoscientific forms of medicine, behavioral optometrists believe that the majority of illness can be cured by using their techniques on a single region of the body. For chiropractors, it's the spine; for reflexologists, it's the feet; and for behavioral optometrists, along with iridologists, it's the eye.

Now for some science. Dr. Werner begins by talking about Einstein's relation of energy to mass: E = mc². The one thing I have to give her credit for is that when she first states this equation, it is correct. But from there things go down hill very quickly:

The whole universal mass can be consolidated down into the size of bowling ball. That's all there is in the whole world—in the Universe. So how much mass are you? [response from audience] That's right, an infinitesimal amount. So if you took that formula, E = mc², you can almost cross out mass, so the formula ends up being energy equals the speed of light.

Yes, you could get all of the matter in the observable universe down into a size smaller than a bowling ball. Of course, you could not get the rest of the matter in the Universe, which is safely expanding away from you faster than the speed of light. The matter unlucky enough to be within your reach, would get piled onto a big lump somewhere in space. Before too long, that lump would become dense enough to form a black hole, collapsing the matter into a size much smaller than a bowling ball. Dump in everything else you can find and all the mass will remain concentrated in an region smaller than the head of a pin. (Any angels reckless enough to dance on this, would be immediately destroyed and incorporated with the rest of the matter.)

So, does this mean that I have an infinitesimal amount of mass? No! It doesn't matter if my volume is on the order of a cubic meter of a cubic attometer, I will still have the same mass. The only change would be my density. But what would happen if follow along with her and let the mass go to zero? The equation clearly shows that E = mc² = 0c² = 0. The energy vanishes when the mass does. Only when the mass goes to unity (m = 1) will the energy equal the speed of light squared (not the speed of light as Dr. Werner claims).

Actually, even if the mass was set to unity, the energy would not be the speed of light squared because that is not an energy. It is a speed squared, something entirely different from what energy is. Units are very important, we measure energy in terms of Joules, not speeds squared. A Joule, the SI unit for energy, is equal to kg m²s^-2 while the speed of light squared is in m²s^-2. The energy would be one kilogram times the speed of light squared when the mass is set to unity—including the kilogram is essential. Looking at the equation in terms of units shows why what Dr. Werner is doing is ridiculous. The equation relates mass to energy, the speed of light is a constant and only appears as a conversion factor. If we use natural units where c = 1, then we get: E = m—energy equals mass. The only reason why the speed of light is there is because a Joule, the SI unit of energy, is not equal to a kilogram, the SI unit of mass. This actually stems from the fact that a meter does not measure the equivalent amount of a second. If they did, then you would be in natural units and Einstein's equation would just reduce to an identity between energy and mass. When we use human-scale units like SI, we need to include the constant c into equations to convert between units. The equation has nothing to do with light.

There is plenty else wrong here. For one, Stephen Hawkings isn't a real person (cf. The Crackpot Index). Stephen Hawking on the other hand is a general relativist not a string theorist. Hawking recently stepped down from the Lucasian Chair at Cambridge, which now belongs to Michael Green, one of the actual founders of String Theory. The rest of the physics in Dr. Werner's talk does not improve. One of the things that you quickly learn is that the pseudoscientists are able to spew out nonsense much more quickly than we can debunk it, so I'll leave it at that.

Scary Quotes

2009-11-05T14:26:00.002-05:00

There are a lot of crazy people out there—especially on the internet. You get plenty of nuts spouting off about one thing or another on forums, blogs, and personal Web sites. Some sites, like Time Cube (one of the classics, a must read), do seem to have actual crazy people on them. But most of what you find out there is just horribly misguided individuals, so I generally feel fine about laughing at what I see and the authors that write them.

Fundies Say the Darndest Things! is an amazing repository of the most outrageous quotes by fundamentalists from across the internet. They have some stunning statements. They now also have sections for conspiracy theorists and racists. Some of what you find on there is hilarious, while some is scary or infuriating (RSTDT mostly falls under this category, the others tend to span the categories better). Below, is a taste of some of what you'll find in their archives:

FSTDT Quote #61678:

That's the beauty of Heaven… we can leave our brains behind.

FSTDT Quote #65081:

if evolution was real humans, and animals alike would not need reproductive organs.

CSTDT Quote #63373:

If the sun’s light could reach "so-called" Mars as the photos from NASA depict, then our night skies would not be dark.

If the Earth was truly spherical then when the earth would spin on its axis away from the sun, the earth's skies would still remain lit-up. Think of it in this matter, when you walk into a room lit-up by a lamp, upon facing the lamp you have the light directly before you, and if you turned your back against the lamp the light would be no longer before you but the surrounding spaces of that room would still be lit-up, same would apply for the space earth is in.

Now many come-back replies will be; “there’s nothing to reflect the sun’s light between earth and Mars to light up our night skies?” But its not the reflection of anything that manages to get the sun’s light to reach us here on Earth in the first place.

Use the room and lamp example again; there could be shiny reflective objects in the room, say a ninja sword, or an over & under shotgun above the fireplace but its not these objects reflections that are illuminating the surrounding space of the room, it’s the lamp (Sun).

…

Planets don't EXIST, if the sun's light could reach ten's of millions of miles passed Earth reaching Mars no-body would be getting any rest at night, there would still be light, and there would be no GOD

RSTDT Quote #61207:

A large portion of what is called public education is devoted to instilling guilt in White children. This is done in part by lying about their ancestors in order to make them ashamed of their race.

White schoolchildren in America are taught that their evil, racist ancestors committed genocide against noble 'Native Americans.' But as the facts in these videos show, Whites were the first humans in the Americans, arriving thousands of years before Asians showed up after the last Ice Age. In fact, those invading Asians committed genocide against the Whites!

The truth about the peopling of the Americas is history the jews setting the national K-12 education agenda in the Department of Education in Washington, D.C., will do anything to hide. So watch these videos and learn the truth for the first time. Even better, watch them with your children…

Obviously, the last person never read the Book of Mormon. Everyone knows that the murderous non-whites (Lamanites) came from the Levant just like the Nephites, not from Asia.

The Power of the EU Court of Human Rights Compells You…

2009-11-03T22:55:00.002-05:00

Luckily for the United States, its government is nowhere near as wrapped up with religion as Italy's is. Sure, we have plenty of loons controlling things over here, but at least we have some separation of religion from government. It is no surprise that Italy, home of the Roman Catholic Church, is a religious country. One of the most religious ones in Europe. From long before Italy became a single country, till long after the fascists were removed from power, Italy has mixed religion and government.

Since the 1920s, Italian law has required crucifixes to be hung inside schools. Now, the European Court of Human Rights has ruled that this violates the freedom of religion of the children and their parents' rights. Even better, the court ruled that the law restricted the "right of children to believe or not to believe. [emphasis mine]"

The conservative politicians and Catholic clerics have been up in arms about loosing their ability to shove their religion down the throats of children. In defense of their gruesome symbol, feature a man (or god or man or the son of a god that is the god but also a man) being tortured and killed for all to see, Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said that "The crucifix has always been a sign of God's love, unity and hospitality to all humanity.… It is unpleasant that it is considered a sign of division, exclusion or a restriction of freedom."

Really? I wonder why someone might consider a Catholic crucifix divisive or that its use in schools imposes a restriction on the freedoms of students and parents. Perhaps it's because it symbolizes Christianity (or more specifically, Catholicism). You'll find no stars of David, crescents, or happy humanists on their walls. Just their one, preferred symbol of their one, preferred religion.

I'm even less impressed by the claim that a representation of a torture device shows their god's love. Worse, the Catholic crucifixes tend to have a dying man on them. At the very least, the other forms of Christianity tend sanitize their symbol. Sure, they god might have performed the sacrifice to cleanse humanity of sin, but one is tempted to think that there are some ways that don't excite Mel Gibson as much. Maybe he could have stopped humans from gaining sin by using his omnipotent powers or forgiven them without accepting a human/divine sacrifice.