Philosophy
Einstein Quotes on Ethics & Morality: Humans, not Gods, Define Morality
An important principle of most theistic religions is that morality originates with their god: there is no morality apart from their god and, in particular, apart from obedience to their god. This leads many to say non-believers cannot behave morally and/or cannot be moral. Albert Einstein denied that morality required or [...]
17Aug2010 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Absence of Evidence Is Evidence of Absence
Even the most pious believer has to admit that there is no scientific evidence for God or anything else supernatural. If there were, it would be in the textbooks along with the evidence for electricity, gravity, neutrinos, and DNA. This doesn’t bother most believers because they have heard many times that [...]
17Aug2010 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Logical fallacies and the concept of a soul
When attempting to form a logical argument, it’s vital to be aware of the various logical fallacies people often use. These fallacies are essentially arguments that may sound good and reasonable, but are, in fact, very flawed ways of thinking and arguing. Christian apologetics are often full of many different fallacies, including an article recently [...]
23Jun2010 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Can Atheists Have a Code of Sexual Morality? | Psychology Today
With the publication of recent books about atheism, the simultaneous attempts to blur the separation of church and state promised in our Constitution, and Americans’ unending obsession with matters sexual, the question arises:
Can atheists have a code of sexual morality?
This question is at once hilarious, insulting, pathetic, and revealing. It only makes sense if you [...]
What is Freedom From Religion? Freedom of Religion Requires Freedom From Religion
Conservatives insist that the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion, not freedom from religion, and argue against strict separation of church and state. Too often, though, conservatives seem to have a flawed understanding of what freedom from religion really entails and fail to realize that freedom from religion is crucial to religious liberty in general.
It is [...]
Last Thursdayism - SkepticWiki
Last Thursdayism
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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 [...]
Believing in Transformation | Psychology Today
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 [...]
God is the Creator & Sustainer of Existence
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 [...]
Should We Respect Religion? Does Religion Deserve Respect?
By Austin Cline, About.com
An increasing source of conflict in the world today is centered around religious believers’ demands for respect. Muslims demand “respect” that would forbid criticism, satire, or mocking of their religion. Christians demand “respect” that would amount to something very similar. Nonbelievers are caught in a bind when it’s not clear what “respect” [...]
How scientists really feel about God
WASHINGTON - Scientists hate God. Or find God very disturbing. In fact, modern science has found no evidence of God and so it’s stupid anymore to think God exists.
The above statements are often presented as conventional wisdom, but are they true?
A new collection of short essays, discussed here Thursday at an event at the American [...]
Science Allows us to Say God Does Not Exist
A popular objection to atheists’ arguments and critiques of theism is to insist that one’s preferred god cannot be disproven — indeed, that science itself is unable to prove that God does not exist. This position depends upon a mistaken understanding of the nature of science and how science operates. In a very real and [...]
25Jan2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Do People of all Cultures Believe in Free Will?
Imagine a universe in which everything that happens is completely caused by whatever happened before. So the things that happened at the very beginning of the universe caused the things that happened next, which caused the things that happened after that… right up until the present day. Now imagine that human decision making [...]
25Jan2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Douglas Adams Speaks
This was originally billed as a debate only because I was a bit anxious coming here. I didn’t think I was going to have time to prepare anything and also, in a room full of such luminaries, I thought ‘what could I, as an amateur, possibly have to say’? So I thought I would settle [...]
11Jan2009 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Are the Odds Against the Origin of Life Too Great to Accept?
The following material examines arguments officially and formally refuted in Richard Carrier, “The Argument from Biogenesis: Probabilities against a Natural Origin of Life,” Biology & Philosophy 19.5 (November, 2004), pp. 739-64. Note the clarification added to Addendum C regarding the definition of self-replication. In addition, new and important breakthroughs are continuing. For example, see: Graciela [...]
Reality and Its Rivals: Putting Epistemology First
Being epistemically responsible – not taking appearances at face value and seeking external confirmation for belief – inevitably pushes us toward intersubjectivity and science. This in turn increases the plausibility of the claim that there’s nothing over and above the natural world, what science shows to exist.
About the most crucial distinction we can make as [...]
18Dec2008 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Jonestown and ‘confirmation bias’
From Jonestown to tribalism to presidential politics, individuals seek the like-minded.
On this day 30 years ago in the jungles of Guyana, Jim Jones, leader of the Peoples Temple cult, ordered the mass suicide or murder of more than 900 of his own followers by inducing them to imbibe cyanide-laced punch or by lethal injection. He [...]
What is Naturalism?
Naturalism, in essence, is simply the idea that human beings are completely included in the natural world: there’s nothing supernatural about us. Naturalism is based [...]
5Dec2008 | Admin | 1 comment | Continued
Empircism and Naturalism
Glen Davidson
posted 11/13/08 @ 12:17 PM CST
Ever since Kant it has been recognized that empiricism is not anything that gives us “Truth,” or at least we cannot know that it does. We know this without having to bring evolution into it. Yet we do have ways of understanding the world that are consistent and reliable, [...]
A Question of Faith
Like Wolpe’s book, Maher’s movie raises questions about faith; unlike Wolpe, Maher isn’t interested in answers. “Religulous” is a profane, condescending, and often funny rant against religion — Christianity especially, but also Judaism, Mormonism, and Islam. Maher’s mocking documentary promotes the idea that only oddballs, cranks, and nincompoops can take religion seriously. That’s a fairly [...]
24Nov2008 | Admin | 1 comment | Continued
Atheism, a positive pillar
Anti-atheism might have found its ugliest public expression during an episode in the Illinois Legislature this spring. As atheist activist Rob Sherman attempted to testify against a $1 million state grant to a church, Rep. Monique Davis railed, “This is the Land of Lincoln where people believe in God, where people believe in protecting their [...]
22Nov2008 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Morality, Religion and Atheism
Many Americans doubt the morality of atheists. According to a 2007 Gallup poll, a majority of Americans say that they would not vote for an otherwise qualified atheist as president, meaning a nonbeliever would have a harder time getting elected than a Muslim, a homosexual, or a Jew. Many would go further and agree with [...]
10Nov2008 | Admin | 0 comments | Continued
Do Atheists Pose a Threat to Morality?
Atheism is said to pose a major threat to morality. Some theists claim that disbelief leads to moral relativism and undermines a major factor motivating prosocial behavior. Recent research can help us see what is true and false about these anxieties.
These issues have special resonance in the United States. A new survey by the Pew [...]
Psychology of Supernaturalism; why humans are so screwed up
Psychology of the Supernatural
Sometime during the upper Paleolithic era 50,000 to 100,000 years ago, humans experienced cognitive changes that created the ability to use our modern symbolic language.
These cognitive changes were only possible because a virtual space had been created in the minds of archaic humans.
The need for greater impulse control (niceness) in archaic [...]
C.S. Lewis and Naturalism
Can Naturalism Explain Reason, Nature, and Morality?:
By Austin Cline, About.com
C.S. Lewis wanted to explain nature on the basis of his supernatural god; as a consequence, naturalistic explanations for nature represented a major threat — just as it does for contemporary apologists. Lewis argued against naturalism in a variety of contexts. It plays an important role [...]
Theology, Apologetics, and Religious Philosophy
Same Questions & Topics, Different Motives
By Austin Cline, About.com
Both theology and the philosophy of religion have played important roles in Western culture, but not everyone understands the important differences between them. The motives behind theology and the philosophy of religion are very different, but the questions they ask and the topics they address are often [...]
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A Chameleon Sky
The sands of time are running out for the central star of this the Hourglass Nebula. With its nuclear fuel exhausted, this brief, spectacular, closing phase of a sun-like star's life occurs as its outer layers are ejected and its core becomes a cooling, fading white dwarf. In 1995, astronomers used the Hubble Space Telescope to make a series of images of planetary nebulae, including the one above. Here, delicate rings of colorful glowing gas (nitrogen-red, hydrogen-green, and oxygen-blue) outline the tenuous walls of the 'hourglass.' The unprecedented sharpness of Hubble's images revealed surprising details of the nebula ejection process and may resolve the outstanding mystery of the variety of complex shapes and symmetries of planetary nebulae. Image Credit: NASA, WFPC2, HST, R. Sahai and J. Trauger (JPL)
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