The Secular-Man Blog (An Oasis of Clear Thinking)

Jesus died for Your Sins

2007-10-13T01:57:00.000-07:00

Sacrifice based on apparent sins of others, is perhaps the most disgusting of all the monotheistic concepts. The idea that an individual would sacrifice his life for someone Else's sin. Indeed, I have already commented in another post why sin is a meaningless man invented concept.But if we take sin to just mean doing something bad or harmful.... But of course it doesn't just mean that; it means

Christian style 'Taliban'

2007-08-02T10:32:00.000-07:00

The major monotheism's seem to be peaking at this moment in history. But I just think it is a glitch in the trend. It is rather like a 'saw tooth' line on a graph. There are dips and peaks, but the overall trend is upward towards more secular societies. Much of Europe is largely secular and religion is a 'dying breed'.In recent polls, Sweden was shown to be around 80% secular, even the UK was

Here Come the 'Faith-Heads'

2007-08-01T13:16:00.000-07:00

What is faith anyway? - To hold a position based on faith... Is really saying that one holds a position devoid of evidence. But of course that is the nature of religion. Religion without faith, would be a very odd kind of religion. Indeed, to the religious mystic, it is somehow more noble to hold a position purely on faith, than it is to present evidence for one's position. The trouble with

Socialism Leads to Sacrifice of the Individual

2007-07-31T13:11:00.000-07:00

Socialism fails because it is based around a collective ideology and it leads to the sacrifice of the individual to the State. The socialist mentality is based round the premise that there is no such thing as an individual, but rather, each human being is meshed into a unit and that unit should function as a whole. The individual is essentially left out of the equation and sacrificed in favor of

Astrology and Relationships

2007-07-30T06:07:00.000-07:00

Astrology not only doesn't have the ability to solve problems in relationships, it cannot. To build a relationship and then attempt to sustain it, built around Dark Age practices, says little for common sense. But then, if mankind as a whole lived by common sense, we wouldn't still believe in monotheistic religions either.The idea that the faint celestial forces from outer-space, can impact and

Plato's Shadowy Cave

2007-07-30T03:53:00.000-07:00

Plato believed that we all live in a shadowy cave and can only see the shadowy reflections of reality, but not reality itself. He believed in aspects of physical objects in a literal sense; of them actually possessing an entity of form, which one could move toward understanding through intellectual discourse. The closer one came to identifying the form, the close one gets to reality. But in

The Atkins Diet Good or Bad?

2007-07-30T00:14:00.000-07:00

The Atkins Diet is targeted around a balance of carbohydrates and proteins. The Atkins diet, was developed, based on the premise, that the majority of overweight individuals are so, because they are living on high carbohydrate fast food diets. they eat too much sugar... Basically they are filling their bodies with fast food and are becoming carbohydrate junkies.The correct balance of proteins and

The Purpose of Life?

2007-07-29T15:39:00.000-07:00

There is no purpose to life, other than the purpose we give it. What this really means is that 'nature is blind' and indifferent and knows nothing of joy, happiness, love or suffering.The purpose of life is simply the purposes that we apply to the life we have. We create purposes through what we do. Not only does the universe care nothing about purpose, it has no purpose other than being. It is

New Age Science Equals Baloney

2007-07-28T09:30:00.000-07:00

Go into any book store and the shelves are filled with New Age Science books. But of course, in reality, there is no science to be had. The New Age movement actually contradicts every aspect of the scientific method. Science relies on inductive and deductive reasoning and conclusions are arrived at through principled procedures of investigation and identification, of objectively knowable

The Idiocy of Intelligent Design

2007-07-27T03:42:00.000-07:00

The 'new' Creationists, have changed the label but it is the same 'act'. Creationism has been clothed in the label of Intelligent Design. In reality there is no difference between Intelligent Design and Creationism. The Intelligent Design movement was started by the Discovery Institute, which was founded by ex-lawyer Phillip E. Johnson.Phillip E.Johnson, in defending Intelligent Design, does not

Christopher Hitchens the Anti-Theist

2007-07-26T08:35:00.000-07:00

What is the difference between an anti-theist and an atheist? ...Christopher Hitchens seems to be responsible for popularizing the term - 'anti-theist'.Hitchens, never shying away from controversial topics, is a freelance journalist and writer for publications, such as Vanity Fair and Slate and author of books such as 'The Trials of Henry Kissinger', 'Why Orwell Matters', 'Thomas Jefferson:

Religious Exploitation of a Child (Marjoe Gortner)

2007-07-25T07:58:00.000-07:00

Who is Marjoe Gortner? - Marjoe is an American born, former evangelical and childhood preacher and was ordained when he was just 4 years old. The name Marjoe, is a coupling of the names Mary and Joseph. If you wanted to do a serious study into child abuse, through religious exploitation, then you could do little better, than to start by looking into the childhood of Marjoe Gortner.Marjoe seemed

Is Atheism a more Moral Position than Theism

2007-07-24T02:05:00.000-07:00

Christopher Hitchens, freelance journalist and writer for magazines like Slate and Vanity Fair and author of the book, 'God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything' - made the point that: 'children do not have to be taught the Golden Rule' (treat others as you want to be treated). Now, children may need a friendly reminder, now and again, but for the most part, the Golden Rule is innate in

Who is James Randi?

2007-07-22T05:38:00.000-07:00

James Randi is a stage magician, illusionist and well known skeptic of the paranormal. He has spent over 30 years of his life debunking paranormal and supernatural claims, that mystics often hold-up as real phenomena within physical reality. They claim to have powers such as Crystal Healing, Mind Reading, The ability to move and bend objects, water divining, spiritual healing, Tarot Card reading,

Can God be Disproved?

2007-07-22T02:27:00.000-07:00

Well, just think about that question for one second. 'Can God be disproved?' ...It starts with an affirmation in the positive, as if God already exists to be disproved. Read it again and you will get my meaning.If I said , 'can flying pigs be disproved?' - one can see the point I'm making, the question starts with an assumption in the positive, that flying pigs exist to be disproved, which is a

I Believe in "God"

2007-07-21T09:17:00.000-07:00

There is of course, the belief in the monotheistic God(s)... of which Judaism, Christianity, Islam - et al, are all prime examples, of where such beliefs are held.Such Gods, are of course, based on a supernatural speculation, of a 'force' existing outside of nature. Moreover, there are those of more literal 'mind-sets', that seem to believe in such a God; as a man-like being, sitting on a

What is Militant Atheism?

2007-07-21T05:46:00.000-07:00

Militant atheism draws up connotations in the minds of theists, with words like: strident, aggressive, belligerent... and atheism is even called a fundamentalist position by theists. You often here theists say, 'the atheists are being just as extreme as the extremists'.I'm wondering, when was the last time someone saw an atheist suicide bomber or indeed, a less extreme theist, trying to

Making a Case for Atheism

2007-07-19T08:15:00.000-07:00

A theist by his or her very 'unnatural' nature, holds onto the concept of God and often all the mystical 'excess baggage' that comes with their religion, such as Heaven and Hell, belief in miracles, belief in the virgin birth, water turning into wine, Jesus walking on water, the parting of the Red Seas etc - they hold onto these beliefs, without even thinking that they have to make a case for

Christian Fundamentalism

2007-07-19T04:48:00.000-07:00

Christian fundamentalism, is really no different to any form of fundamentalism. All fundamentalism really means is 'absolute truth' of one's position, whether that position is supported by evidence or not. Fundamentalism is the equivalence of literalism, one is a fundamentalist, because they hold a literal interpretation on any given issue and that literal interpretation, can and often does trump

Atheism and Freedom

2007-07-19T02:34:00.000-07:00

Atheism offers freedom in a particular respect. It offers freedom of the mind from religious indoctrination. Religion by its very nature, stultifies the mind and leaves one in a none thinking stupor. It does so, because it inculcates the mind with mysticism and such mysticism, befuddles clear thinking and distorts one's ability to fully grasp objective reality.Of course one may fairly argue, that

My Thoughts on Religion and Mysticism in General

2007-07-17T11:40:00.001-07:00

I make absolutely no bones about criticizing the worst aspects of religion or indeed, any other spuriously held beliefs.I have personally been an atheist for as long as I can remember, well at least from the age that I grasped the meaning of the word. Indeed, even as a young child I never bought into the God concept. I guess I would clarify my position thus: I do not believe in God for the same

The Intellectual Dishonesty of Agnosticism

2007-07-16T11:35:00.000-07:00

As an atheist, I find the agnostics position to be the flimsiest of all positions. While I am of course in total opposition to the theistic position, at least the theist has the courage of his or her convictions, to decide one way or the other. The agnostic reminds me of a political liberal in politics, who is never quite sure on anyone issue and spends much of the time 'fence-sitting'.The

Victor J. Stenger and the Failed Hypothesis

2007-07-16T07:11:00.000-07:00

I based the ideas in this article, on the book written by the physicist Victor J. Stenger, 'God the Failed Hypothesis'. The book is subtitled 'How Science Shows That God Does Not Exist'. This is also a modification of a debated thread within an article on this blog entitled: "Atheism or Religion?"What you cannot do is prove 'God doesn't exist' as an axiomatic certainty. But what Stenger does and

Atheism or Religion?

2007-07-15T09:21:00.000-07:00

The claim that neither religion or atheism is right, is on its surface, a fair pronouncement, that somehow you can weigh one logically against the other and each is equally preferable. But when you dig a bit, you realize it is a hollow claim. It is a claim that presupposes an equal footing, between religion and atheism. Therefore, one cannot disprove the religious position and thus, one has to

The Axe that Theists Grind

2007-07-15T06:25:00.000-07:00

One of the many erroneous claims made for atheism, is that it is just another religion. Those that make this claim, are usually theists and they are theists with an 'axe to grind'. Writers such as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Dan Dennett, Victor J. Stenger, Sam Harris - et al, are shifting the conversation, on the taboos of what is politically correct to say about religion and what is