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Critics of Cecil Bothwell cite N.C. bar to atheists | citizen-times.com | Asheville Citizen-Times


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By Jordan Schrader • December 8, 2009
ASHEVILLE — North Carolina’s constitution is clear: politicians who deny the existence of God are barred from holding office.
Opponents of Cecil Bothwell are seizing on that law to argue he should not be seated as a City Council member today, even though federal courts have ruled religious tests for [...]

10Dec2009 | Admin | 1 comment | Continued
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Are we better off without religion? | Sue Blackmore | guardian.co.uk


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Popular religious belief is caused by dysfunctional social conditions. This is the conclusion of the latest sociological research pdf conducted by Gregory Paul. Far from religion benefiting societies, as the “moral-creator socioeconomic hypothesis” would have it, popular religion is a psychological mechanism for coping with high levels of stress and anxiety – or so he [...]

9Dec2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Last Thursdayism - SkepticWiki


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Last Thursdayism
From SkepticWiki
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[edit] Definition
Last Thursdayism, also Last Tuesdayism and Last Wednesdayism, is the unfalsifiable belief that the whole of the universe was created Last Thursday with the apparent age of an ancient universe.
[edit] Discussion
The belief, much like the belief in the Invisible Pink Unicorn, is a parody of one of the many [...]

5Dec2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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White House Pushes Science and Math Education - NYTimes.com


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By KENNETH CHANG
Published: November 22, 2009
To improve science and mathematics education for American children, the White House is recruiting Elmo and Big Bird, video game programmers and thousands of scientists.
President Obama will announce a campaign Monday to enlist companies and nonprofit groups to spend money, time and volunteer effort to encourage students, especially in middle [...]

25Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Believing in Transformation | Psychology Today


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The human mind always seeks solutions to problems and occasionally finds itself in a complete stalemate. Death is one of them, the ultimate one. Human beings can’t imagine our own absence. The concept of nonexistence for an existent being is, at best, baffling, like endless space or other universes. Such puzzlement precedes enlightenment.
When confronted with [...]

25Nov2009 | Admin | 1 comment | Continued
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Joey Nelson: Atheists Have No One to Thank on Thanksgiving


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I read a lot of material written by religious theists — mostly Christians — about atheists and atheism. I see a lot of different myths, misconceptions, mistakes, and even outright lies. Too many to count, in fact. One characteristic which I see that is common to so many different myths and lies, though, is the [...]

25Nov2009 | Admin | 1 comment | Continued
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In defense of Atheism


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Over the past few months an organization called the United Coalition of Reason (United CoR) has begun putting up posters and billboards supporting atheism. They display very poignant statements like: “Good without God? 40 million Americans are.” Also: “Don’t believe in God? You are not alone.”
In many cases, billboards are vandalized with some words removed [...]

25Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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The Associated Press: Atheist student groups flower on college campuses


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AMES, Iowa — The sign sits propped on a wooden chair, inviting all comers: “Ask an Atheist.”
Whenever a student gets within a few feet, Anastasia Bodnar waves and smiles, trying to make a good first impression before eyes drift down to a word many Americans rank down there with “socialist.”
Bodnar is the happy face of [...]

25Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Row erupts over humanist poster in Belfast


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THE war of words between atheists and religious believers has entered a new chapter with the launch of Northern Ireland’s first ever humanist advertising campaign.
The British Humanist Association (BHA) yesterday unveiled a billboard with the slogan:
Please Don’t Label Me. Let Me Grow Up And Choose For Myself.
Located on one Belfast’s busiest routes, the poster is [...]

21Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Evolution to be compulsory subject in primary schools - Times Online


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Evolution is to become a compulsory subject for study in all state primary schools. The Government announced yesterday that Darwin’s theory of how life evolved through natural selection would be a legal requirement in science teaching from September 2011, although it will be left to schools to decide how this is done.
The move, which was [...]

21Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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The Atheist Blogger » 101 Atheist Quotes


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The following 101 quotes are some that I have stumbled upon on the web, or seen in books / popular culture. Each quote was either written by an atheist, or is about atheism / religion in general.
1. The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the [...]

21Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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European Court Bans Crucifixes in Italian Public Schools - International News | News of the World | Middle East News | Europe News - FOXNews.com


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STRASBOURG, France — Europe’s court of human rights ruled Tuesday the display of crucifixes in Italian public schools violates religious and education freedoms under the continent’s rights convention.
The ruling, which could force a Europe-wide review of the use of religious symbols in government-run schools, rejected arguments by Italy’s government that the crucifix was [...]

21Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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IBM’s Blue Gene Supercomputer Models a Cat’s Entire Brain | Popular Science


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IBM’s Blue Gene Supercomputer Models a Cat’s Entire Brain | Popular Science
Cats may retain an aura of mystery about their smug selves, but that could change with scientists using a supercomputer to simulate the the feline brain. That translates into 144 terabytes of working memory for the digital kitty mind.

19Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Godless Children and the Future of Atheism: Raising Godless Children - How Can Godless Parents Today Affect the Future of Atheism?


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Question:
What does raising children in a godless, irreligious environment mean for the future of atheism in America?
Response:
It’s a simple fact that the godless children being raised by atheists today are likely to be at the forefront of atheism in the future. What’s not so simple is what godless parents are going to do about this [...]

17Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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CBT = Existentialism? | Psychology Today


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I’ve recently come to the conclusion that cognitive behavioral therapy, the empirically-demonstrated gold standard for treating depression and a host of other problems, necessitates a belief in existentialism, a philosophy holding that we live in a meaningless universe.
How can happiness derive from appreciating the fundamental pointlessness of existence?
Existentialism (at least atheistic existentialism) does not argue [...]

17Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Why We Talk and Chimps Don’t | Psychology Today


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Why We Talk and Chimps Don’t
As much as I love science, I love science fiction more. Science tells us what is; science fiction tells us what might be. I recently read a unique and revealing science fiction story, “Immersion,” written by U-Cal-Irvine physics professor Gregory Benford. In his story, Benford invents the technophile’s brand of [...]

17Nov2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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BBC - Earth News - Chimps born to appreciate music


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BBC - Earth News - Chimps born to appreciate music
Chimpanzees are biologically programmed to appreciate pleasant music.
The discovery comes from experiments showing that an infant chimpanzee prefers to listen to consonant music over dissonant music.
That suggests the apes are born with an innate appreciation of pleasant sounds, say scientists in the journal Primates.
Until now, this [...]

30Jul2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Can robots ever be like humans?


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BBC NEWS | Programmes | Click | Can robots ever be like humans?
Simple tasks such as walking and picking up objects are part of everyday life for people, but such mundane tasks still present major challenges for today’s robots.
Researchers are using sensors, cameras and recognition to teach the machines to interact in a way that [...]

29May2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Christian Right Lobbies To Overturn Second Law Of Thermodynamics


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Christian Right Lobbies To Overturn Second Law Of Thermodynamics | The Onion - America’s Finest News Source
TOPEKA, KS–The second law of thermodynamics, a fundamental scientific principle stating that entropy increases over time as organized forms decay into greater states of randomness, has come under fire from conservative Christian groups, who are demanding that the law [...]

29May2009 | Admin | 1 comment | Continued
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Is Our Brain to Blame If We’re Not Sociable? | Newsweek Voices - Sharon Begley | Newsweek.com


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Is Our Brain to Blame If We’re Not Sociable? | Newsweek Voices - Sharon Begley | Newsweek.com
There must be something deep in the human soul that makes us blame fate, birth, our parents and all sorts of other things beyond our control for how we turn out, and scientists are no less guilty of this. [...]

29May2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Ancient termite spilled its guts in amber - Science- msnbc.com


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Ancient termite spilled its guts in amber - Science- msnbc.com
One hundred million years ago a termite was wounded and its abdomen split open. The resin of a pine tree slowly enveloped its body and the contents of its gut.
In what is now the Hukawng Valley in Myanmar, the resin fossilized and was buried until it [...]

28May2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Red Bull Faces German Ban Following Positive Cocaine Test


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Red Bull Faces German Ban Following Positive Cocaine Test - International News | News of the World | Middle East News | Europe News - FOXNews.com
BERLIN — Six German states have told retailers to stop selling Red Bull Cola energy drinks after a test found a trace amount of cocaine.
The bans started Friday after [...]

27May2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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God is the Creator & Sustainer of Existence


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God is the Creator & Sustainer of Existence
A very common attribute of gods in religious traditions around the world is that of creation — our universe, our world, and indeed our very selves often owe their existence to creative acts of the gods. In the Western traditions of philosophical theism, the existence of everything is [...]

26May2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Woman who sees Christ in snack may put it on eBay | The Reason Project


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Woman who sees Christ in snack may put it on eBay | The Reason Project
Preston Hollow resident Sara Bell recently stopped by this newspaper’s office with a unique discovery: a Cheeto that she thinks looks like Jesus.
Bell came across the strange snack a few weeks ago while she and her husband, Dan, were driving home [...]

26May2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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Does God Favor Sexual Predators?


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Does God Favor Sexual Predators? | Psychology Today Blogs
If you take a look at The New York Post, Fox News, and The Weekly Standard, you’ll get a pretty good sense of who Rupert Murdock is and what he cares about.
Now imagine one very powerful figure is the CEO of three competing companies, each with thousands [...]

26May2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
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  • STS-125 Crew Visits the Stock Exchange

     
    NASA astronauts Scott Altman and Mike Massimino of the STS-125 mission visit the New York Stock Exchange to support the release of Hubble 3D, the newest IMAX film, which documents the mission to repair the Hubble Space Telescope and features never-before-seen 3D flights through Hubble imagery such as the Orion Nebula. In honor of the occasion, Altman and Massimino ring 'The Closing Bell' ending the day's trading at the Exchange on Thursday, March 18, 2010. Image Credit: NYSE (Used by permission)
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