- Weekly Link Roundup
The Foyer • July 31, 2010
• Despite the good sense shown by the British Medical Association in lambasting homeopathy at their annual conference last month, the UK National Health Service has announced that it will still pay for water and sugar pills passed off as medicine.
• A court in Utah has thrown out the rape conviction of Mormon cult [...]
- Relics and Faith
The Observatory • July 30, 2010
Guest post by Peter Nothnagle
On June 30, someone stole a piece of the True Cross (you know the one I mean) that was enshrined in the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston. It had been kept in a small compartment in the base of a crucifix hanging on a wall in a chapel. Someone [...]
- Reengineering Human Nature: Dogmatism
The Loft • July 28, 2010
The Problem: Human beings are stubborn creatures, set in our ways, resistant to changing our minds once we've made a decision. Religious groups publish creeds which they believe must be taken on faith and should be maintained against all contrary evidence - and they consider the ability to do that a virtue, rather than a [...]
- The Bechdel Test for Religion
The Loft • July 26, 2010
If you're an informed observer of media, you may have heard of the so-called Bechdel test, popularized by cartoonist Alison Bechdel, that's used to judge the female-friendliness of movies and other media. For a movie to pass this test, it has to have:
(1) two or more female characters;
(2) who talk to each other;
(3) about something [...]
- Meet a Foundation Beyond Belief Member
The Garden • July 25, 2010
Editor's Note: Back in March, I wrote an essay encouraging atheists to join the Foundation Beyond Belief, a new charitable group doing good for human beings and the world in the name of freethought. I also offered to write a front-page post interviewing anyone who agreed to join the Foundation as a result of hearing [...]
- Two Responses to the Theist's Guide
The Foyer • July 24, 2010
Earlier this month, Greta Christina published a piece on AlterNet, based on my essay "The Theist's Guide to Converting Atheists", that listed things that would convince her of God's existence. She also repeated the challenge I posed to theists - prove that your beliefs are falsifiable by posting a corresponding list of things that would [...]
- The Iron Curtain of Censorship
The Rotunda • July 23, 2010
Well, it looks like we can add Russia to the list of countries where it's illegal to criticize religion:
Two Russian museum curators were found guilty of "inciting religious hatred" for displaying a painting of Jesus Christ with Mickey Mouse's head superimposed.
A Moscow court ordered the two men, Yuri Samodurov and Andrei Yerofeyev, to pay fines [...]
- The God of the Reptile Brain
The Loft • July 21, 2010
Evolution is a blind tinkerer, lacking the foresight of human engineers. Rarely, if ever, does it discard established designs and start over fresh, even when that would be more efficient. Instead, it builds on and around past adaptations, using the old as a foundation for the new. This is true throughout the biosphere, and it's [...]
- Selling Shame: How Christians Profit from Porn
The Rotunda • July 19, 2010
As everyone knows, porn is big business. To cite just one example, ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, recently approved the creation of an .xxx top-level domain. ICM Registry, a company that plans to sell the new domain names, says it already has more than 110,000 pre-reservations, and expects to make over [...]
- Creationists Flee from Criticism
The Observatory • July 18, 2010
A few weeks ago, I was alerted by a Google alert to a post, "Conversation With An Atheist", on the site Everyday Christian. Since I'm always interested to find Christians who want to converse with atheists, to see what they have to say about us and to us, I checked it out. It turned out [...]
- The End of the Road for the Humanist Symposium?
The Foyer • July 18, 2010
The 57th edition of the Humanist Symposium has been posted at Unequally Yoked (a great concept for a blog in its own right!). Go check it out, link to it if you see fit, and thank the host for all her fine work.
With that said, I have to say a few words about the future [...]
- Reengineering Human Nature: Pride
The Loft • July 16, 2010
The Problem: According to Christianity and other monotheistic religions, pride is the deadliest sin. Taking excessive pleasure in yourself and your own talents and accomplishments is the surest way to end up condemned. I personally don't agree with the extreme view that pride is the worst possible character flaw - when properly harnessed, it's an [...]
- Britain Defends the Enlightenment
The Rotunda • July 14, 2010
Despite the ongoing schism of the Anglican church, which I wrote about in my last post, I'm happy to see that there's still plenty of good sense and reason in the U.K. One outstanding example is this story from last month, where the British Medical Association voted to stop funding homeopathy in public hospitals. (UK [...]
- Anarchy in the U.K.: The Anglican Crackup Continues
The Rotunda • July 14, 2010
I've written before about the ongoing schism within the Episcopal church, but those posts only concerned the goings-on in America. Now that battle has spread across the Atlantic and into the heart of Anglicanism, and it's looking more and more likely that the church will be cloven in two at its roots. As reported by [...]
- New Book Review on Dangerous Intersection
The Foyer • July 13, 2010
I've posted a new book review on Dangerous Intersection, a review of Barbara Demick's superb book Nothing to Envy, a mesmerizing account of ordinary life in North Korea. There are some obvious parallels with fundamentalist religion that atheists and freethinkers will probably be interested in.
This is an open thread.
- Important Site Note
The Foyer • July 12, 2010
I'm aware that Daylight Atheism was unavailable for some time earlier today. I'm looking into the cause with my site host.
In the meantime, is anyone finding that they're getting mysteriously redirected to a site called b.scorecardresearch.com when trying to connect to Daylight Atheism? Several people have mentioned this to me in e-mail. If you're seeing [...]
- The Case for a Creator: Redefining Science
The Observatory • July 12, 2010
The Case for a Creator, Closing Thoughts
The theory of evolution not only explains and unifies a vast range of scientific observations, it's given rise to an enormous, fruitful research program by predicting where we should look in order to find all kinds of phenomena of interest. One of the most famous examples is how Charles [...]
- Find Me at the FFRF Convention
The Foyer • July 11, 2010
So, let it be known to all that I plan to attend the 2010 annual convention of the Freedom from Religion Foundation, which will be in Madison, Wisconsin the weekend of October 29-31. Ayaan Hirsi Ali will be the featured speaker, and since it's Halloween, I'm sure she'll have some scary stories to tell us [...]
- Some Sad News
The Foyer • July 10, 2010
I'm saddened to report the passing of David Randolph. He was 95 years old.
Mr. Randolph was a renowned conductor and choral director, a fixture in the New York music scene for decades. He was known for hosting a weekly classical music program on WNYC, for teaching music at several local universities, and for a critically [...]
- Reengineering Human Nature: Selfishness
The Loft • July 9, 2010
The Problem: Nearly all the world's religions teach that we should be generous to the poor and needy, and warn that greed and selfishness are destructive sins. "For the love of money is the root of all evil" (1 Timothy 6:10).
But this principle is rarely honored, even by the religious leaders who supposedly believe it. [...]
- Weekly Link Roundup: Net Drama Edition
The Foyer • July 8, 2010
The intertubes are exploding with drama this week! I'm still catching up on a backlog of reading material myself, but I thought I'd post about the more notable news items.
• First off, I just have to mention this because it's such delicious schadenfreude: Chris Mooney, atheist-basher extraordinaire, had a commenter earlier this year named Tom [...]
- Christianist Professor Calls for Religious McCarthyism
The Rotunda • July 8, 2010
Although I've learned not to expect much from the right-leaning Supreme Court, I've been pleasantly surprised by some of their recent decisions. First was Holy See v. John Doe, in which the court upheld a ruling that the Vatican isn't immune from lawsuits over its protection of pedophiles. The second was Christian Legal Society v. [...]
- An Abundance of Amusing Apocalypticism
The Loft • July 6, 2010
I don't know if it's the warm weather here in New York that's bringing out the crazies, but these past two weeks, I've encountered more than the usual number of street preachers handing out loony religious literature. Because I know you wicked, godless atheists need to hear the word of the Lord, I thought I'd [...]
- Words Worth Reading
The Rotunda • July 4, 2010
Editor's Note: Considering the date, I can't think of anything more appropriate to post today. I don't agree with the religious language added as window dressing, just as most people today would disavow the archaic sexist terminology or the unthinking racism against Native Americans. Still, it remains one of the finest pieces of political rhetoric [...]
- Building Bridges With Believers
The Garden • July 3, 2010
I have a confession to make: I'm one of the New Atheists.
You know the type. Our reflexive, unjustified hatred of all religious people is matched only by the venom of our arguments against them. The mere thought of religion of any kind makes us irrationally furious, like waving a red flag at a bull. We [...]
- The Case for a Creator: The Radical Fringe
The Observatory • July 2, 2010
The Case for a Creator, Closing Thoughts
It's been said that one of science's greatest virtues is that it's not dictated by a tyranny of the majority or guided by irrational human whims. After all, science is the search for the true nature of reality, and reality isn't decided by our preferences. No matter how many [...]
