- The Language of God: Ultimate Meaning
The Library • August 31, 2010
The Language of God, Chapter 2
By B.J. Marshall
In this section, Collins poses the questions of whether the near-ubiquity of the search for the existence of a supernatural being represents "a universal but groundless human longing for something outside ourselves to give meaning to a meaningless life and to take away the sting of death" (p.35). [...]
- On the Uses of Ridicule
The Garden • August 30, 2010
I've told you all the story of how I became an atheist. But I've never written about what came before that: what made this a topic of interest for me, what first motivated me to think about these issues at all. Well, today I want to tell that part of the story.
This was around [...]
- Atheist Apps for Android
The Foyer • August 28, 2010
So, I've finally joined the 21st century by buying my first ever 3G smartphone, a Motorola Droid 2. I've been getting a lot of use out of it and I'm happy with the network coverage and connection speed so far. There's also the Android Market, which lists thousands of user-developed applications you can download, everything [...]
- Weekly Link Roundup
The Foyer • August 27, 2010
• President Obama signs a law to fight British libel tourism by barring such judgments from being enforced in the U.S.
• My esteemed guest author, Sarah Braasch, has an article in the latest issue of The Humanist on the French burqa ban.
• After a scary brush with mortality, everyone's favorite squid-loving atheist professor is back [...]
- The Ingratitude of American Theocrats
The Library • August 26, 2010
When America's founders ratified the Constitution, they created something that arguably had never existed in the world before: a republic where freedom of religion was explicitly enshrined in the charter, where toleration wasn't just the whim of a benevolent ruler but the immutable law of the land. As George Washington wrote in his famous letter [...]
- Ending Religious Discrimination in Adoption
The Rotunda • August 24, 2010
There's welcome news out of the U.K. this week: the government-established Charity Commission has ruled that the adoption agency Catholic Care must abide by anti-discrimination laws and therefore may not refuse to consider same-sex couples as prospective parents:
The Charity Commission... ruled that discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation is a "serious matter" because it [...]
- The Language of God: A Doubtful Belief
The Library • August 23, 2010
The Language of God, Chapter 2
By B.J. Marshall
Collins starts off this chapter noting that, if we've followed him this far, we've no doubt begun to form numerous objections. That's an understatement to be sure! He gives us some of his own: Isn't belief in God just a case of wishful thinking? Hasn't a great deal [...]
- Photo Sunday: Mandala
The Foyer • August 22, 2010
Street art, Manhattan, June 2010. Photo by the author. Camera details: Canon PowerShot SD1200 IS. Click for larger version.
- Why Atheists Should Be Feminists
The Garden • August 20, 2010
I've been writing since the beginning of Daylight Atheism about the unique ways that religion harms women. Although men have also suffered innumerable harms from religious beliefs, they're not singled out, treated as an underclass uniquely deserving of condemnation, the way that women are in almost every major religion's sacred texts. That's why I wrote [...]
- Strange and Curious Sects: Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh
The Library • August 18, 2010
When a new sect with strange and unfamiliar beliefs bursts onto the scene, it almost invariably meets with hostility (most of it from the old sects with strange and familiar beliefs). And depending on the nature of the newcomer, there are two common responses. It may stress its own virtue and righteousness all the more [...]
- What Does It Mean for Prayer to be Untestable?
The Observatory • August 16, 2010
People who are ignorant of science sometimes speak as if the scientific method was some esoteric, arcane method of problem-solving, applicable only to a few highly specialized areas of inquiry and having no relevance to everyday life. But nothing could be further from the truth. In reality, the scientific method is just a more sophisticated, [...]
- The Language of God: From Atheism to Belief
The Library • August 15, 2010
The Language of God, Chapter 1
By B.J. Marshall
The chapter begins with a description of Collins' experiences growing up. His parents shrugged off the business world and lived an agrarian life on huge tracts of land in the Shenandoah Valley. His father went on to teach at a women's college. Collins was homeschooled, and faith did [...]
- The Contributions of Freethinkers: Gene Roddenberry
The Loft • August 13, 2010
As a wedding present to ourselves, my wife and I bought the DVDs of the original Star Trek, and these past few months, we've been working our way through them. For myself, it was a test: I hadn't seen most of these episodes since my childhood, and I was curious to see if they held [...]
- Thoughts on a California Strategy
The Rotunda • August 11, 2010
As you've surely heard by now, Judge Vaughn Walker issued a ruling last week striking down California's Proposition 8 on equal-protection grounds. You might also have heard that Argentina has legalized same-sex marriage and that a Mexican court upheld a marriage-equality law in Mexico City, rejecting a challenge by the conservative Calderon government.
Of course, all [...]
- Under Green Leaves
The Garden • August 9, 2010
In an old essay on Ebon Musings, "Finding Beauty in the Mundane", I wrote in a contemplative mood:
Have you ever considered the trees? Though their kind of life is far grander, slower and more patient than ours, they are each individuals, as different as human beings are. They add beauty to the world, give peace [...]
- Photo Sunday: Red and White
The Foyer • August 8, 2010
Tulips, Central Park, June 2010. Photo by the author. Camera details: Canon PowerShot SD1200 IS. Click for larger version.
- The Language of God: And So It Begins
The Library • August 7, 2010
By B.J. Marshall
In The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief, Francis Collins presents what he believes to be the strongest arguments for theism: what he calls the "Moral Law," the origins of the universe, and life on earth. In a nutshell, Collins sees the ubiquity of morality to be the work of [...]
- Introducing a New Guest Author
The Foyer • August 7, 2010
Last month, I concluded my post series of chapter-by-chapter responses to Lee Strobel's The Case for a Creator. I'm happy with the way this project turned out, and I'd been wanting to do it again, but I wasn't sure if I had the stomach to tackle another apologetics book in such detail so soon.
Well, fortune [...]
- Ensuring Access to Abortion
The Rotunda • August 6, 2010
As a neutral observer of religion, one of the most striking characteristics I find is the rampant misogyny in nearly every religion in the world. Worldwide, women are denigrated as lesser beings, barred from positions of leadership, commanded to be subservient, and told that they're weaker or more sinful than men. Even in the relatively [...]
- How to Eradicate Militant Islam
The Rotunda • August 4, 2010
It's said that nothing is harder to kill than an idea. Trying to stamp out a deeply felt belief by force, especially a religious belief, not only makes its followers cling to it more tenaciously, it gives them an aura of martyrdom that makes the belief look even more attractive to outsiders. And when the [...]
- Strategically Supporting Religious Charities
The Garden • August 2, 2010
Are there any circumstances under which an atheist can support a religious group doing social work, even if doing so may advance a religious message we disagree with?
This is on my mind because of the post I wrote last month about the Foundation Beyond Belief supporting a Quaker charity, and because I just finished reading [...]
- Photo Sunday: Swallowtail
The Foyer • August 1, 2010
This weekend, I went for a walk at a nature center in the Hudson Valley. The weather was quintessential summer - warm, brilliantly sunny and clear - and the forest was alive with life: swarms of bees, butterflies and moths doing the daily work of pollination, dragonflies darting over the water, a symphony of birds [...]
