It’s been a while, I know. Please enjoy this video, as a token of my sincerest apologies. Work has been trying to kill me!
It’s been a while, I know. Please enjoy this video, as a token of my sincerest apologies. Work has been trying to kill me!
Watch the video. Trust me.
Here’s a synopsis:
I have to say, he manages to say this in a much friendlier manner than I can. Evolution deniers really anger me.
Discover Magazine has posted a blog called “Why Science Can’t Replace Religion“.
It’s a foray into a common topic in the atheist world: is it really practical to abolish religion altogether?
Taken at face value, it is difficult for me to reach any conclusion aside from “no”. Aside from theories that religion has its origins in evolution, it is undeniably a salve for the weakness inherent to the human mind. If it disappeared, it seems likely that something equally irrational would take its place.
For my part, I seek to eliminate religious, spiritual and mystical impact on government, law and social morality. I feel this is still an impossible goal, but at least a more appropriate one, and one that could be more fully accomplished.
Anyway – check out the article. It’s a short read.
P.S. Again, my apologies for my relative silence. I am wading through an exceptionally busy period at my job. Once that clears up, I should be posting more often.
So, I love Mr. Deity, and I love this latest video. It’s no secret that LGBT rights are near and dear to my heart, and I feel strongly support of atheism in part because I know one can’t logically support bigotry.
Enjoy it, and check out his other videos!
What is the purpose of religion? By what virtue does it survive?
This (incredibly soft-spoken) video addresses one of the most common thoughts I’ve had about religion: it exists because we die, and as conscious beings, we have a very hard time comprehending an end to what we are.
And how do we respond to something we don’t understand? Fear.
The video considers one of the most fundamental conflicts of denying death via religion: other religions force you to question your own. When that happens, it causes anger, confusion, doubt – all of which lead to the kinds of atrocities we see committed by religion on a daily basis.
It’s a great watch, check it out!
Sorry for the recent lack of posts on the site – work’s been occupying all my time. Should be back on it this weekend!
You know, I had honestly never considered this. Aside even from the sheer number of creatures you’d have to get on a single boat (under the assumption that species don’t evolve and branch off), there’s also a lot of awkwardness to the logistics:
Anyway, this entire video is pretty hilarious. There’s a part 2, as well.
XKCD has started up an awesome new “comic” called “What If?”. The first post answers a question that we’ve all wondered at one point or another: What would happen if I threw a baseball at 90% of the speed of light?
It’s a hilarious read; informative, too. I’m confident I’ll be enjoying this new XKCD format.
This is an excellent summary / rant of why Chick-fil-a is wrong.
If you go outside at night, and it’s dark enough, you will see a seemingly endless number of twinkles in the sky. It’s easy for us to think that those twinkles have no relation to the sun. After all, the sun is a large, ever-present and hugely impactful part of our lives. We owe liquid water and most likely life on our planet itself, purely to its existence.
The truth is, the sun is just another twinkle when you look from any other position in the universe (the speed of light not withstanding). Furthermore, the sun isn’t even that interesting of a star. While it may be 110x the diameter of the Earth, it is more than 1,000x smaller than the largest stars we know of. It’s even too small to explode or form a black hole.
So, what does make our Sun special? It harbors us, and we, as Carl Sagan so eloquently put it, “are a way the universe can know itself”.
I encourage everyone to consider that our sun is one among approximately 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 stars in the universe. We should all seek to have an appreciation of it as a link to the cosmic scale. Aside from the Earth we live on, it is by far the most imposing and obvious component of the universe from our perspective.
It’s difficult not to marvel at the sheer scope of reality. Even acknowledging that the universe is incomprehensibly large, and that a quark is incomprehensibly small.. is incredibly humbling. Here’s a jumpstart for you: