Wednesday, December 21, 2011
An Atheist Guide to Christmas (& Tips for Theists on Dealing With Us)
I have "celebrated" Christmas since as long as I can remember. Like many American children it was more of an indoctrination opposed to real religious understanding. It was the same way with my parents (but they received more theological instruction than my sister and I). I was eventually explained to what Christmas is all about; the celebration of the birth of the Christian faith's messiah. Now I have a more thorough understanding of the Christmas season (while Jesus' birthday is not known specifically, likely sometime in late spring by celestial and other "landmark" descriptors, the December date was chosen to ease the conversion of pagans and other non-Christians by replacing the traditional winter solstice with Jesus' birthday).
Being left to determine my own theological views (special thanks to Mom & Dad) as opposed to being indoctrinated at a young age, I settled on skeptical non-belief (not that all children are forced into religious belief, but most today are taught religion and do not "find it" on their own). This very much affects my "celebration" during the holiday season (and I prefer the use of "holiday" as many faiths celebrate this time of year, and I have a break from work).
So, how does one who openly rejects the divinity of Jesus celebrate Christmas? In the simplest of terms, I don't celebrate Christmas. To associate with a phrase I hear often this time of year, there is no "Christ" in my Christmas. To say that I don't celebrate Christmas is true. But, that being said, I do support the sentiments of the season: peace, love, generosity to mankind. Many atheists take the same perspective. While I don't just wait around to be a good husband, son, & brother, I do take every opportunity to show my family & friends I care. And Christmas is a good time to do that. The year is ending, others are celebrating, it's good time to reflect with the people you care about on the previous year and what is to come.
So, a guide for Atheists:
1) Don't be a dick - there is no better way to reinforce the stereotype that atheists are evil, douche-bags than to shit on other people's beliefs/holidays. If they know you, they likely already know about your non-beliefs. 9 times out of 10, they are just trying to be nice. Deal with it. Note: asserting government facilities & public lands are NOT acceptable places for religious displays is fine, because they aren't, again state your case and don't be a dick.
2) Celebrate what you want - don't get forced into celebrating something you don't support. This is to keep you from getting into a uncomfortable situation. I had a work meeting that started as a "Christmas card signing for the troops" a few weeks back. Admittedly, I felt ambushed and confronted by this. "Everyone sign the cards and wish a Merry Christmas to our guys overseas." I had several problems with this; first, I felt like I was being forced to participate in something I didn't believe in (that being Christmas, also it was apparently "assumed" I was Christian); second, we were ignoring our non-christian service men and women (which frustrated me greatly). A co-worker was even arrogant enough to say, "But even the non-Christians celebrate Christmas." Incorrect. That was the first time my non-beliefs ever made me feel uncomfortable at work. The best course of action is to remove yourself; think of an excuse, or just get out. Sticking around will just complicate things. Respecting beliefs goes both ways, if someone doesn't respect yours, just leave.
3) Enjoy yourself - kick back and take it all in. This time of year is fun. If you go in with a good attitude of being kind and generous you may have fun. This year, I made the goal of trying to enjoy the season, and it worked. Sure, I still get worked up by the religiosity of it all, but let it slide. It's a time to spend with friends and family. Eat some food, give some gifts, immerse yourself and you'll find it's worth the time.
A guide for Theists (on dealing with us): Believe it or not, the odds are you have atheist friends. And this is OK. Atheists are still fairly closeted in many parts of the country; primarily for fear of, you guessed it, discrimination. I myself have a fear of being treated differently or shunned for my non-belief.
1) Don't do anything differently - this is your religious holiday. Don't change anything for atheists you know. If you are having a Christmas party, call it that. We really don't care, we will be there to enjoy the company of our friends (again, we still are social animals, invite us anyway).
2) Don't ask us to come to church with you - we are uninterested with this activity, and the time of year has no effect on our disinterest. Most atheist HAVE, in fact, been to church. Most of us many times. It didn't affect us then, and it won't now. No, your [preacher, minister, priest, what-have-you] is not special and their message is no different. We're very happy you like your local religious leader and love your belief system, we love our system too. Just let us be.
3) Don't ask if we are offended - we really don't get offended by seasonal buffoonery you engage in, some of it is funny though. I also enjoy seasonal shenanigans. The only times we get offended is when people make assumptions about out non-belief: "atheists are terrible, immoral people." No, being an atheist doesn't make a man bad just like being a Christian doesn't make a man good.
4) Finally, don't be weary of atheists - we wont bite, really. Save the belief system, we are just like you. We probably like you if we talk to you. The fact that you don't know that some of your friends are atheists should be proof enough of our benign nature. If you have questions about atheists, non-theists, or other secular-folk, just ask. Sure, we absolutely disagree on stuff, but it's OK.
Maybe this will clear things up for folks. The last thing anyone wants is more conflict around this time of year. I plan on enjoying the holiday season, and I hope everyone, regardless of their beliefs or lack-there-of, enjoys it too.
To all, Happy Holidays!
Wednesday, November 9, 2011
In Defense of Joe Paterno: A Penn Stater's Lament
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
The "Debunk" - Episode II, God vs. Science
Subject: FW: God vs. Science
My first is that I conjecture this never happened, or happened very differently. I could see it as a type of "feel good tale" for the faithful.
An atheist professor of philosophy speaks to his class on the problem science has with God, The Almighty. He asks one of his new students to stand and.....
Professor of philosophy? This story is already bogus. You don't debate science with a philosophy teacher. But I like how he's immediately called out as an atheist without any support.
Prof: So you believe in God?
Student: Absolutely, sir.
Prof : Is God good?
Student: Sure.
Prof: Is God all-powerful?
Student : Yes.
Prof: My brother died of cancer even though he prayed to God to heal him. Most of us would attempt to help others who are ill. But God didn't. How is this God good then? Hmm?
(Student is silent.)
The above exchange sets the tone for the whole email. Notice the evil atheist grilling the good Christian student about God.
Prof: You can't answer, can you? Let's start again, young fella. Is God good?
Student: Yes.
Prof: Is Satan good?
Student : No.
Prof: Where does Satan come from?
Student: From...God.. ..
Prof: That's right. Tell me son, is there evil in this world?
Student: Yes.
Prof: Evil is everywhere, isn't it? And God did make everything. Correct?
Student: Yes.
Prof: So who created evil?
(Student does not answer.)
Prof: Is there sickness? Immorality? Hatred? Ugliness? All these terrible things exist in the world, don't they?
Student: Yes, sir.
Prof: So, who created them?
(Student has no answer.)
You are supposed to be clued into the assertion that a Christian god created all those things.This part of the exchange is a common philosophical denial of the existence of an all-loving, all knowing deity (but does not deny the existence of said deity). Which, as far as philosophy goes, is a valid argument and should be discussed as part of philosophy with theological scholars. But has nothing at all to do with science.
Prof: Science says you have 5 senses you use to identify and observe the world around you. Tell me, son...Have you ever seen God?
Student: No, sir.
Prof: Tell us if you have ever heard your God?
Student: No, sir.
Prof: Have you ever felt your God, tasted your God, smelt your God? Have you ever had any sensory perception of God for that matter?
Student: No, sir. I'm afraid I haven't.
Prof: Yet you still believe in Him?
Student: Yes.
Prof: According to empirical, testable, demonstrable protocol, science says your GOD doesn't exist. What do you say to that, son?
Student: Nothing. I only have my faith.
Prof: Yes. Faith. And that is the problem science has.
This is a common thing that annoys the HELL out of me (and why I don't think this debate ever really took place). Religion is, by definition, supernatural; not of the natural world. Science is, by definition, the study of the natural world. And, finally, by definition, science cannot prove or disprove something that leave no trace on the natural world. No one who understands science would say that.
Student: Professor, is there such a thing as heat?
Prof: Yes.
Student: And is there such a thing as cold?
Prof: Yes.
Student: No sir. There isn't.
(The lecture theatre becomes very quiet with this turn of events.)
Student : Sir, you can have lots of heat, even more heat, superheat, mega heat, white heat, a little heat or no heat. But we don't have anything called cold. We can hit 458 degrees below zero which is no heat, but we can't go any further after that. There is no such thing as cold . Cold is only a word we use to describe the absence of heat . We cannot measure cold. Heat is energy . Cold is not the opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it (There is pin-drop silence in the lecture theatre.)
This is why you don't debate science with a philosophy teacher. Any science teacher, or anyone with a BS for that matter, knows that "cold" is as the student says it is. And of course heat is just energy, blah, blah, blah, I could go on. Also, the "shocked" nature of the lecture hall amuses me as well. For reference, -458 F is 0 K (absolute zero).
Student: What about darkness, Professor? Is there such a thing as darkness?
Prof: Yes. What is night if there isn't darkness? seriously???
Student : You're wrong again, sir. Darkness is the absence of something. You can have low light, normal light, bright light, flashing light....But if you have no light constantly, you have nothing and it's called darkness, isn't it? In reality, darkness isn't. If it were you would be able to make darkness darker, wouldn't you?
This "darkness" definition is a little annoying (it doesn't really matter for this though). We define dark as something that does not interact with, or lacks emission/reflection of optical light. Optical light being the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum (400 - 700 nm) that we can detect with our eyes. But in fairness, when something is "radio dark" it doesn't emit any radio waves. So the definition works for the EM spectrum, but not really "the absence of something."
Prof: So what is the point you are making, young man?
Student: Sir, my point is your philosophical premise is flawed.
Prof: Flawed? Can you explain how?
Yes, please explain. The philosophical premise that God cannot be, at the same time, the creator of evil and all-loving, is actually valid. And the perceived "scientific" premise that God does not exist is just wrong. So, since he says the philosophical premise is flawed we'll concentrate on that.
Student: Sir, you are working on the premise of duality. You argue there is life and then there is death, a good God and a bad God. You are viewing the concept of God as something finite, something we can measure. Sir, science can't even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood, either one.To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing. Death is not the opposite of life: just the absence of it.
Honestly, I get somewhat confused about the point of all of this about here. My philosophy is amateur (at best), but I'll take a whack at what seems to be going on. Duality in western philosophy is the internal conflict between 2 sides (good/evil, right/wrong). Life and death are not dualities, but states, I could even agree on a high level that death could be the absence of life for argument's sake. But it's not duality. Good vs. bad? Absolutely. So I guess what the student is hinting at, based on the previous assertions of light/dark and hot/cold, is that either good is the absence of evil or vice versa. To which I say, philosophically, is bullshit. Dark is the absence of light b/c you measure no light, cold is the absence of heat because you measure no heat (science argument); but is good the absence of evil or evil the absence of good? Time for a philosophical thought experiment:
You find a wallet on the ground. For argument's sake, we'll say there are 3 options from this point.
1) Return the wallet as found
2) Return the wallet, but after you took the cash out
3) Keep the whole wallet
One could say that 1 is complete good, 2 is partial good, and 3 is no good. Or depending on your stance, 1 is no evil, 2 is partial evil, and 3 is total evil. This disrupts the argument about hot/cold and light/dark. According to the student, from best I can tell, you don't measure dark or light, ergo you don't measure good or evil (depending on what scale you use). I argue that you can measure good vs. evil, and you can have both. These are not the same thing.
The student then goes on to tackle the "because you don't see it, it can't exist" argument, which doesn't really work because his example is easily testable. Sure a thought is some chemical/electrical interaction in the brain which I don't understand (I would say neurologist have a pretty good idea, but there is a lot we don't understand about the brain), but then the student says we have no complete understanding of electricity and magnetism. We absolutely have complete understanding of E&M. Just ask Maxwell. We don't always see it, but we can measure and predict it's effects with ridiculous precision.
Student: Now tell me, Professor. Do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?
I'll answer for him; no, he's a philosophy professor. And to drive the point home, even if he were a biology professor he would tell you that we did not evolve from a monkey, but that at some point in time we and modern day apes (not monkeys) had a common ancestor. Of course I only differentiate us from apes for the sake of understanding as we are still apes.
Prof: If you are referring to the natural evolutionary process, yes, of course, I do.
Student: Have you ever observed evolution with your own eyes, sir?
(The Professor shakes his head with a smile, beginning to realize where the argument is going.)
Student: Since no one has ever observed the process of evolution at work and cannot even prove that this process is an on-going endeavor, are you not teaching your opinion, sir? Are you not a scientist but a preacher? (The class is in uproar.)
BUZZ - wrong, game over. Evolution has been observed. Numerous instances have been observed. And, better yet, we understand this process so well, that it makes predictions (which are correct). Plus, we can even observe previous evolution by looking at the stuff that died before us. This information is friggin' everywhere. I hear this argument a lot; that science is a religion also. No, not at all.
Student: Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the Professor's brain?
(The class breaks out into laughter.)
Hahahaha - let's say our teacher is brainless. Classic. Calling the elitist learned professor dumb because he's educated.
Student : Is there anyone here who has ever heard the Professor's brain, felt it, touched or smelt it? No one appears to have done so. So, according to the established rules of empirical, stable, demonstrable protocol, science says that you have no brain,sir. With all due respect, sir, how do we then trust your lectures, sir? (The room is silent. The professor stares at the student, his face unfathomable.)
This is becoming utter horse shit. The difference between a god and a brain (reference my mini-rant above about the natural and supernatural) is that we can use science to show there is a brain in the professor's head. And, being something I assert that never happened, the professor has no response while an actual professor (even of philosophy) would be able to argue that he did indeed have a brain because he breathes, thinks, talks, and that we have seen brains in every other breathing, thinking, talking specimen so it's reasonable to say that he does.
Prof: I guess you'll have to take them on faith, son.
Well, you don't actually, but cue the defeated intellectual.
Student: That is it sir.... The link between man & God is FAITH . That is all that keeps things moving & alive.Tuesday, December 28, 2010
The "Debunk" - Episode I, Cash for Clunkers
"Subject: Democrats Cash for Clunkers Program
A vehicle at 15 mpg and 12,000 miles per year uses 800 gallons a year of gasoline.
A vehicle at 25 mpg and 12,000 miles per year uses 480 gallons a year.
So, the average clunker transaction will reduce US gasoline consumption by 320 gallons per year.
They claim 700,000 vehicles exchanged in the Cash for Clunkers program – so that's 224 million gallons / year.
That equates to a bit over 5 million barrels of oil.
5 million barrels of oil is about ¼ of one day's US consumption.
And, 5 million barrels of oil costs about $350 million dollars at $75/bbl.
So, we all contributed to spending $3 billion to save $350 million.
How good a deal was that ???"A vehicle at 15 mpg and 12,000 miles per year uses 800 gallons a year of gasoline.
12 000 / 15 = 800 gallons, fine with me.
A vehicle at 25 mpg and 12,000 miles per year uses 480 gallons a year.
12 000 / 25 = 480, this is already looking pretty good.
So, the average clunker transaction will reduce US gasoline consumption by 320 gallons per year.
800 - 480 = 320, nice. And that's per program participant. So when gas costs $2.50/gal that's a savings of $800/year.
They claim 700,000 vehicles exchanged in the Cash for Clunkers program – so that's 224 million gallons / year.
And 320 x 700 000 = 224 000 000 gallons saved. Just FYI, that's a lot of gas.
That equates to a bit over 5 million barrels of oil.
There is a non-negligible math error here, 224 000 000 / 42 = 5 333 333.33 barrels of oil, as there are 42 US gallons per barrel. That equates to a difference of 6.249%, which while you're working in absolutes as this emailer does, turns out to be significant later.
5 million barrels of oil is about ¼ of one day's US consumption.
According to the US Energy Administration, the US uses 18 771 000 barrels/day. So that is 28.4% of our daily consumption saved per year. But for arguments sake, sure, I can agree that it's about 25% of our daily consumption. This is really a statistic showing exactly how much gas we use.
18 771 000 x 365 = 6 851 415 000 (That's almost 7 billion barrels/year, ~ 290 billion gallons)
So the 5 333 333 barrels we save each year is only 0.07% less than our annual usage. But this email is about money, so we'll stick to that.
Fig. 1 - US Oil Consumption, US Energy Information Administration (http://www.eia.doe.gov/)
And, 5 million barrels of oil costs about $350 million dollars at $75/bbl.
5 000 000 x 75 = 375 000 000 (Error of 6.6%, and if you're keeping track, that's a compound error of more than 12% already). We've already established that its actually 5 333 333 barrels, and $75/barrel is a ridiculously conservative price for petrol. When I originally read this email it was about $79, and today its quoted at $91 on the stock market. So I'll do some easy math here:
5 333 333 x 75 = 399 999 975 (for simplicity, that's $400 million), or an error of 12.5% to their own math.
5 333 333 x 79 = 421 333 307, or an error of 17.8% (!) for the 2009 math. I won't do the 2010 ($90/barrel) calculation, since this was done for 2009, but that number will make itself apparent again later.
So, we all contributed to spending $3 billion to save $350 million.
This is where things get stupid and short-sighted. Using that logic, this does seem like a bum deal and exactly the conclusion the original author of the email wanted you to reach. "What? We spent $3 billion to save $350 million? Stupid Obama!" When in reality we are looking at a yearly savings of $420 million dollars. While that still seems like a drop in the bucket compared with $3 billion, the "long term" is not taken into account here. Saving $420 million dollars/year is a lot. That means we will make back that $3 billion in savings over the next 7.14 years, and every year after that the $420 million becomes flat savings.
How good a deal was that ???