The Moral Atheist – Part 1
“Morals, they come from the Bible, even though you think you get all your morals from society and other people, it is all down to Bible providing the foundations to them. Without it you would be lost!”
This always ticks me off. Religious apologists always seem to believe that an atheist simply can’t be moral, it is simply impossible. Without a book saying what is good and bad we would simply be a bunch of sinning, stealing, raping, moral-less, society-wreaking sociopaths! What a terrible world this would be without the infallible word of the Bible! But our morals don’t come from the Bible, if they did the world would be a different place. And not for the better.
Let’s just look at a few passages from the Bible and consider just what they mean when we interpret them literally when considering morality.
Kill Homosexuals!
Leviticus 20:13 -
If a man lies with a male as those who lie with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination and they shall surely be put to death.”
Well, it seems like the Bible doesn’t even bother to try and hide this in any way. It isn’t a story so we can’t sit here and try to say that it is just a tale, not meant to be taken literally. Looking outside, I fail to see any homosexuals getting stoned (as prescribed by the Bible) or executed. Those who I know to be homosexual are still alive and either they are just faking it, or people are doing a very bad job at killing them. Though more likely, it could be that we know better. We know that killing someone because of their sexual orientation is simply wrong, the state would call it murder and throw you in jail for life! Christians are certainly not going around on mass murders of homosexuals, if they have, it’s all being done rather quietly. Oh and just to cover my ass, something from the new testament.
I Corinthians 6:9 -
“The unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God. So do not be deceived; neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, shall inherit the realm of God.”
Well, I hope that in both of these cases I have shown that the Bible clearly states that homosexuals are just bad. I have heard from a lot of Christians though that these passages need to be read in context, or are just simple mis-translations. Well, then I ask you, if these are just examples of mis-translations, I’d like to tell you that Mary was never a virgin, it too was a convenient mis-translation.
Women are Inferior
Judges 19:24-25 -
Look, here is my virgin daughter, and his concubine. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But as for this man, don’t do such an outrageous thing.” But the men would not listen to him. So the man took his concubine and sent her outside to them, and they raped her and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go.
I’m sure we have all read the tale before, a man takes in travellers (angels in the King James Bible, but not so in the NIV) to spend the night, men of the city come and demand to ‘know’ (in the biblical sense) the travellers. The man instead offers his virgin daughter to the men, who take her and rape her. Then, to just make things worse, at the end of the tale, his concubine is cut into 12 pieces and spread across the land. All this story shows is how women are simply perceived as objects, something to be bartered or traded with. The travellers, male, get off the hook! To continue:
I Corinthians 14:34-35 -
Women should remain silent in the churches. They are not allowed to speak, but must be in submission, as the law says. If they want to inquire about something, they should ask their own husbands at home; for it is disgraceful for a woman to speak in the church.
Again, the rules for ‘good order in worship’ make it quite clear that women are simply inferior, they are not allowed to ask question in church, yet the men can. This passage just re-iterates the sexism and negative attitudes towards women in the bible.
I Timothy 2:11-15 -
A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet. For Adam was formed first, then Eve. And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.
Well, again another passage that states how women need to be submissive. How they are meant to respect the man’s domination over her. It goes on to even explain why the woman is inferior, she was deceived, not the man. Finally, just to add insult to injury, the only way that a woman can be saved is through childbearing. To submit to being used as nothing more than an object to multiply. It goes on and on.
I would like to have taken some verses from Ecclesiasticus, which has some of the best quotes to show off the Bible. But alas, only Catholic bibles have kept the inferiority of women in it. Quite interesting to note how the Bible has evolved over the years as parts which society would generally frown upon or question are removed or defended as only a metaphor.
Slavery
Luke 12:47 -
The servant who knows the master’s will and does not get ready or does not do what the master wants will be beaten with many blows.
Exodus 21:2-6 -
If you buy a Hebrew servant, he is to serve you for six years. But in the seventh year, he shall go free, without paying anything. If he comes alone, he is to go free alone; but if he has a wife when he comes, she is to go with him. If his master gives him a wife and she bears him sons or daughters, the woman and her children shall belong to her master, and only the man shall go free.
But if the servant declares, ‘I love my master and my wife and children and do not want to go free,’ then his master must take him before the judges. He shall take him to the door or the doorpost and pierce his ear with an awl. Then he will be his servant for life.
Leviticus 25:44-46 -
Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
These passages all show just how slaves are to be treated. Even rules are clearly laid out on where slaves should come from, how long you can have them for before setting them free, how they are to be punished. The Bible clearly sees slaves as a perfectly acceptable commodity, they are objects, items, products. Things that can be bought, sold and inherited, just like property. It is all laid out rather clearly and in several books in both the old and new testament. It cannot be denied that this is all here as a metaphor, it was perfectly acceptable at the time to have a slave.
But of course, we know better know, wars were fought over slaves and there was a rather famous civil one, somewhere across the pond which was based on one side wanting the right to have slaves and the other feeling very strongly that it was wrong to have a slave. One could argue that times have changed, that we know better and yes we do, now. Compared to 300 years ago, having a slave was fine, but today having a slave is frowned upon, yet the Bible has always sat there unchanged. Society has adapted, yet the Bible has not. This would indicate that we have the ability to mould our own ethics and morals, to evolve them over time. This is something I will return to later.
End of Part 1
I would like to sit here and just ramble on and on. But a few examples are all that are needed. There are many, many more to be had and I would like to return to them one day in the future. But for now I just want to return to the idea of morality. It is obvious from the Bible that we do not get all our morals from it. How could we? If we followed the Bible unquestionably, homosexuals would be killed, women would be suppressed and slaves abundant. I would look onto that world and despair. But thankfully we don’t blindly follow the Bible.
Humanity has looked past the Bible, has seen it’s flaws and considered parts of it wrong and parts of it right. But in order to do this, we must have some method of being able to tell apart the bad moral teachings and the good ones. We must have a higher understanding of morality than the Bible provides us. You must do, by logic, in order to judge something to be right or wrong, you need to have a greater understanding and standard to compare to. In part 2, I want to look at how we get our morals without the help of the Bible.
Anti-Choice and Pro-Choice
So, I just want to take some time and post about pro-choice and anti-choice. I suppose the first thing to address is why I don’t call it pro-choice and pro-life, but instead call it by the more accurate term of pro-choice and anti-choice. While pro-choice and pro-life make both seem positive, pro-life is a misleading term. Pro-choice is correct as the whole debate on abortion is whether women should have the ability to choose. This group is for this ability to choose.
However, the reasoning behind pro-life is a little more sinister. Pro-life instantly seems like a rather happy joyus side to be on, saving those little foetuses from termination, preventing them from suffering and giving them a shot at LIFE. They are PRO-life, life is good, we love life!
However, what it fails to mention is the removal of choice and it instantly gives the impression that foetuses are life in the way we consider it. They are life and therefore should live and to abort them is murder; this is the logic here, but the fallacy is that foetuses are not life. They will (all things being normal) turn into life, they have the POTENTIAL for life, but they are not life yet. So all pro-life activists are actually are pro-potential-life. Those foetuses have the potential to be the next Beethoven or Shakespeare.
They could grow up and be the next Hitler, who knows! Trying to bet on the future of a foetus is just not compelling enough, what about all those sperm and eggs which had the potential to become a human? All those opportunities to mate and have offspring, each and every opportunity is wasted. Every use of contraception, of the pill, of the condom, is basically the same as murder under the logic of anti-choice. Ah, but sperm and eggs can’t feel pain, they can’t suffer.
Well, neither can foetuses, (not until about 20-26 weeks) they lack the nerves to transmit and experience pain, it is just biologically impossible at this early stage of development. So, suffering is not an excuse. Yet I can still hear the anti-choice activists yelling that it is still life! Yet adult human life must not come into this. As you may or may not be aware, several times have anti-choice activists physically attacked, verbally abused and threatened doctors working in abortion clinics. Last time I checked that doctor was alive too (unless he/she was murdered by some extremist), how can you say ‘pro-life,’ when you threaten and in some cases take it, from others.
While on the subject of pro-life, you are only considering the literal biological definition of it. What if a child was to be born with some incurable, debilitating disease, which would require round the clock care and continually be an outsider to mainstream society. Being sidelined because of a problem, which could be detected early on during pregnancy. That child would not have a life, not by our standards, being forced to live what wretched life he/she may have excluded from society. How horrible a life that may be! We have not even considered the damage that will be done to the parents either, what about their lives? The parents of this child would have to lose their lives, either by working hard to pay medical expenses or devoting time to looking after the child.
The same argument could be applied to couples who simply are not ready for a child. Perhaps they can’t provide the stable and loving environment a child needs. Perhaps they lack the finances needed to raise a child, or perhaps they simply are not mature enough. Either way, more damage and harm is done by the couple being forced to have the baby than to have it aborted.
Then there is the issue of rape, why should a women forcibly impregnated with a child she doesn’t want be forced to have it? A constant living reminder of the psychological trauma inflicted upon her that dreadful day. I’m not going to dwell on this issue any further, as I want to bring in the final piece.
Religion is what causes this mass hysteria of anti-choice. Being told that human life is special, that murder is the worst thing any one can do. I agree, murder is an atrocity, but abortions are not murder, plain and simple. Women being forced to keep children after they have been raped, yet again religion. Women are seen as nothing more than items, something men own and use, being raped is their fault (in the Muslim world anyway) and to abort the baby as a result is an even worse atrocity.
Finally, I just want to consider the point that as soon as the baby is born, who cares? Suddenly all this support in favour for human life disappears. Why can’t we all be so aggressively supportive for life during it, as opposed to only the beginning or the end? What makes it so damned important that once the baby is born, they just move onto the next unborn foetus, uncaring of what happens next to the child or parents. Finally why are you so bloody strongly against some couple who you have never even met from aborting a baby? At the end of the day it is their choice and their baby, they can decide if they are murderers or not by choosing to abort it. What business is it of yours?
I should point out that I am not suggesting we give mothers the choice of aborting 8 month, 3 week only unborn babys. I am refering to the current legal cut-off date, which provides plenty of time for parents to decide wehter to keep the baby or not. Anything more than this is simply a little too much and the risk would be there of actually murdering an unborn human.
Religulous, Rediculous
Well, I’ve finished watching Bill Mahers “Religulous,” and I have to say that I am not sure whether to be laughing or crying. While the film continually pokes fun at religion and makes jokes about it continually, this seems to over write the more serious tone of it and suddenly makes the documentary a lot less credible. While yes, it is classed as a comedy and a documentary, these two simply don’t really fit that well together and Religulous is a prime example of this.
There were plenty of great points throughout the film though, highlighting the evil of religion and exposing just how easy it is to start a new religion and very rapidly get accepted by society at large. The ridiculous viewpoints (Oh I see what you did there) are brought into the spotlight and are simply made fun of. However there does seem to be an overarching message in the film, that man has the ability to bring its own rapture through societies acceptance, tolerance and “respect,” towards religion. Despite the atrocities all done in the name of it.
I can see it now, any religious apologist will simply claim that those individuals were not truly Christian, or Muslim, or whatever. But how can you make such a claim? There is no list that says who is in a certain religion and who is not, it isn’t as if you have to go sign a contract stating you won’t blow up buildings or commit other various atrocities in the name of that religion. Just by simply stating that you are a member of that religion will do, perhaps you may need to go through some simple ritual, such as a baptism. But essentially it is very easy for anyone who is dedicated enough to become part of a religion and thus a representative of that religion.
People who do blow up buildings or abuse children through indoctrination and threats of hell are still members of that religion. Assuming that they just didn’t claim that their actions were a result of their religion when they had some ulterior motive. It is all just too convenient to out those who immediately do something that society perceives as evil and it just pisses me off that people think of terrorists as just extremists, when in actual fact they were acting well within the rules and guidelines put down by their holy book.
What I’m trying to get at here is that people need to realise that someone who blew up a subway train wasn’t an extremist, he was a (supposedly) a Muslim, not a Muslim extremist either, actually the term ‘more dedicated,’ in place of ‘extreme,’ would be more accurate. However this just brings us all the way back to the point that religion changes over time, that the world today is not that of 2000 years ago. So my question is this:
Why are we still taking orders from a 2000 or so year old book, when times have obviously changed?
Yes, I’ve realised just how tangental this all was…
So Why Is There No God Again? – Part 2
Pascals Wager (or Gambit)
Philosopher Blaise Pacal reasoned that the existence of God can’t be proven through reason and that the better approach would be for the individual to wager that God exists. Pascals wager looks at the results between two variables, the existence of God and whether the individual prays/believes in God. The results of these two variables are as follows:
- There is God, The individual believes in God:
- The individual gets to go to heaven and basically “wins,” in the sense that they live on forever in bliss and be near the God they preyed to and love.
- There is God, The individual does not believe in God:
- The individual goes to hell and basically “loses.” They suffer for all eternity for not believing in the existence of God and not praying to him/her/it.
- There is no God, The individual believes in God:
- They have not lost or gained anything, since they will be dead and no god will punish or reward them. A neutral result.
- There is no God, The individual does not believe in God:
- They have not lost or gained anything, since they will be dead and no god will punish or reward them. A neutral result.
It is then possible to reason from these 4 possible outcomes that the best option is to believe in God. As no matter if god does or does not exist, you either get a “win” or a “neutral” result. Amazingly this was used during the CU mission week as an actual reason for believing in God.
The Counter-Argument
Belief in god implies actual true heartfelt belief in the existence of god. You can’t just believe in god from a wager. Sure, I can belief in the Christian God, go to church, prey, etc. But that doesn’t mean I accept that god exists, just that I want to get into heaven and “win.” I’m sure any god would be pissed that I was just doing all that stuff to get into heaven then actually love and believe in the existence of that god.
The decision is based on greed (which is probably what makes religion highly attractive and one of the major reasons I doubt in the existence of God). The individual must want to get into heaven, they must be willing to sacrifice something now (such as time devoted to prayer and church/temple) in hope of getting something in the future. Simple human greed, so unless you believe in god without having to use pascals wager, then you may bypass this problem. But for the rest of us, forcing us to believe in god, that may be an issue.
So which god is the right god? The wager doesn’t take this into account, which god is the right one? Is it Allah? Jehovah? Baal? Who knows, that is the problem with this wager, it doesn’t take into account what if any of the other gods exist. Since most gods are jealous gods, belief in any god other than themselves usually pisses them off and sees you getting punished.
It also makes several dangerous assumptions:
- Heaven is infinitely better than hell
- Heaven is preferred to hell
- God wants you to believe in you, there may be an atheist god, who punishes those who do believe in a god.
- If there is no god, you have lost something in the process of believing in him through prayer and going to church. This is not taken into account.
All in all, Pascals Wager is a very weak argument for the existance of God and relies on greed than logical reasoning. This is probably why we very rarly see it being used as an argument anymore, it is too easy to take apart.
Expelled, No Intelligence Allowed – WTF Man?
Well, I’ve just finished watching Ben Steins, Expelled. It started off so well, it started off presenting such reasoned and rational arguments. But around 50 minutes in, it just fell apart. No matter how hard you try, Intelligent Design (ID) is Creationism, it may seem different on the face of it all, the small print is the same. While presented differently, either one needs god to somehow come into it from an external source. A source called religion.
Intelligent Design IS Creationism
Creationism essentially states that god made the universe and life on a whim. Just like that. Cos god felt like it and just did it. Easy, I think we have all read some kind of creationist story somewhere and so we all know what is meant by creationism. God used his infinite power to make the world and universe in some way or another.
Intelligent Design is a step away from this. It states that “certain features of the universe are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as Natural Selection.” This intelligent cause is basically god, seeing as the only entity really powerful enough to influence natural selection would be god. However, explaining things with god is simply foolish. Occam’s Razor would tear this down.
But let’s look at it from another perspective, looking at evolution by natural selection, I see how none of the evidence would lead directly to the idea of a supernatural being without religion being there in the first place. If there was no religion, no idea of this all powerful being called god, we would no be in this mess. The evidence that we have doesn’t all point to a supernatural being, it points to natural selection, evolution, speciation, common ancestry and gradualism. The only reason some think the evidence leads to a supernatural being, is because they have pre-conceived religious views. Bring me an atheist who believes in intelligent design. Bring me someone who started as an atheist (the neutral position remember) and came to the logical conclusion from the evidence presented that shows an intelligent being is present.
Of course, it may not be god, it could have come from aliens. Incredibly technologically advanced supernatural causes. However, this brings me back to my previous question, bring me an atheist who believes in intelligent design. You will not get one, you will not get anyone presenting an argument that the supernatural cause was aliens (if you do, we all both theists and atheist, religious and the non-religious). This supernatural cause is always god, this was well presented by Stein, not necessarily put explicitly, but it was implicit.
Just Another Way To Indoctrinate Children
This of course brings me back to this old chestnut. Since intelligent design is basically re-branded creationism, when you bring it into the classroom, you will be sure to remove this god element and be sure to say it is a ’supernatural intelligent cause.’ While the link is not explicit, children will easily see this link between this and god. Thanks to other pressures acting upon them to turn to religion and believe in god, it isn’t directly getting religion into the science classroom, but it is trying to do so indirectly.
If we did just present children with the evidence of evolution, you know, the fossil record, genetics, ‘mistakes,’ in the process of evolution etc. Then present them with the two ideas that either it is an entirely natural process, or that it is an entirely natural process, but an intelligent force was acting upon it, you will get them to conclude that evolution is an entirely natural process. Unless their minds are already tainted by other forms of indoctrination and religious influences. Bring me a pure agnostic (technically a weak atheist), someone who has never heard of this idea of god and give them the evidence, I guarantee they will see evolution as the right cause.
Part Of A Larger War
At the end of the day, getting intelligent design and thus religion and god into the science classroom is simply a single battle of a larger war. The war between science and religion. Whether you like it or not, it is vital that science class is there for purely reaching science. I do think alternative theories should be presented. As long as they are SCIENTIFIC in nature, which intelligent design is not. That is why it faces so much resistance by the scientific community, it is rooted in non-scientific belief.
In the early part of Expelled, Ben Stein looked into individuals who were ‘expelled’ (thus the name of the film) from the scientific community for bringing up the idea of intelligent design. A clever starting point. While perhaps they were expelled from the scientific community for being religious, there are plenty of scientists who are religious working away quite happily with the support of the establishment because their work is rooted in science. They use science to prove their ideas, they understand and apply the scientific method (the foundation of science, that without, there would simply be no use for science to exist) and are sure to leave their religious beliefs at the door.
Some have tried to claim that there simply is not enough evidence for evolution. There is mountains of it.
Mountains Of Evidence For Evolution By Natural Selection
The fossil record has some surprising areas very well filled up. While for man, there still exists some gaps, but these are being filled in. The issue is with the process of fossilization, in order to become a fossil, an animal must be covered by layers of sediment quickly. In water, this is not an issue, so fish and amphibians have a surprisingly large number of fossils for them. Mammals on the other hand die on land (since that is where they live), making it much less likely for them to become fossilised as they cannot be covered by sediment in time. This is why gaps still persist.
Darwin was never around when DNA was discovered. But genetics has proven to be a fantastic proof of evolution, it fits in perfectly with it. Showing how closely related out genes are to apes, but are less similar to that of a horse, or fish. They show us the random element (That is ELEMENT, combine this with gradualism and we can see how big changes and developments such as the eye can happen) that occurs giving rise to variation in a species essential to natural selection.
I could go on, but the evidence is there, stacks of it.
Missing Explanations
Just because science can’t explain how something happens now, doesn’t mean it might not in the future. That is the point of science, discovery. If we knew how everything worked, why would we bother with science? Take evolution, while we may not fully understand how the non-life became life, there are some pretty good theories involving self replicating molecules. But science has yet to provide a solid answer. That doesn’t mean we should throw our hands in the air and say, “it must have been an intelligent cause, a supernatural element!” It basically means we have yet to discover how it happened.
While I am on the subject of life and non-life. Perhaps having these two solid classifications is a bit too misleading. To say one moment you had life and the next seems highly unlikely. The definition of life is complex, it is too much for a single process to suddenly deliver it in one go. A series of steps, each one building on the definition of life, towards an actual single-celled organism. This could explain why there is a massive gap between the Earth forming and the first single celled organisms to come into being. Getting the initially building blocks, the foundation as it were is going to take a long time as there is a lot of chance. But as anyone who has done probability in maths will know that the more you do something, the more likely at least one of them will give a positive result, assuming the probability is greater than 0.
Gravity is another example of something we don’t fully understand, yet we do not assume an intelligent cause is involved. Yes we know masses are attracted to each other, but the actual thing that makes them attract to each other is still a mystery, gravitons are the current idea, but they are still only a hypothetical particle. We don’t assume that a supernatural element is responsible for it, there isn’t massive controversy over it. Even the Big Bang theory is not as hotly contested for as evolution by natural selection is. It seems to be this one theory which has struck a chord with intelligent designers.
Why Evolution Then?
Evolution is the thing we are fighting over because of the implications it could mean for religion. If we did just appear here by chance, then why should we praise god and go to church? If there was a way for religious institutions to instil the idea, however slim, that God was responsible for out being here, religion will still hold up. Intelligent Design is this stepping stone, to get the idea of god isolated from religion, to bring it into the realm of science and so to always have that idea god has had a hand in things, though indirectly.
If science succeeds in proving how we got here without a god, that is it, game over for religions. Religions need to keep the idea alive that god had somehow helped the creation of humans. By trying to get ID recognised as science, this would be a victory.
Closing Remarks
I’m going to keep this short. Intelligent Design is just an attempt to make god seem like it could go hand in hand with science. Why? Because science is the greatest threat to dis-proving the existance of god. The church knows it, all religions around the world know it and have decided to poison the one thing currently untouched by religion. The one sanctuary left. Defeat science and religion has won. This means now is the time to fight back, now is the time for hostility, not as a pre-empative strike, but as a reaction. Intellignet Design must be kept out of the science classroom and science needs to put back in its rightful place again, out of the hands of religion.
Atheist < Not Believing in God?
Concerning the above video, while probably just an isolated case or even simply a parody, it still highlights what actually happens in the real world. I know of individuals who have had the bravery to come out as atheists and faced with angry family members giving such ludicrous statements as:
“I thought we brought you up better then that!”
“Not believing in God I can take, BUT AN ATHEIST!”
I’m sure many of us have their own stories to tell and their own experiences of coming out. But in some parts of the world, coming out as an atheist is going to be met with hostility, even violence and in the extreme cases, death. While that is not the case in a lot of the world, even here in secular Britain do we face hostility.
Shockingly enough, the first statement above actually came from my own father. I was surprised. No. Insulted, when I got this response, not only because I expected my own father to be more open to my beliefs, but how he thought the correct way of bringing me up would have seen me believing in God. Well, no fret though, you did raise me correctly father, I learned how to be sceptical of the world and question evidence presented towards me. Vital skills that without, I would never had the ability to think for myself and conclude there is no god.
The second statement comes from a family member of fratheist. This just highlights what is my major point, people do not understand what an atheist truly is thanks to their tainted views from organised religion. That’s right, religion purposely tries to make atheists look like terrible people you don’t want to get involved with. While not that shocking, what is shocking is how individuals outside of the church, not true religious nuts, but just regular (what I like to call) Homer Simpson believers.
When I say a Homer Simpson Believer, I’m sure anyone who watches The Simpsons knows what I mean. Homer loathes going to church on Sunday (it’s a chore) and thinks that just because he gives up his Sunday morning each week, this will absolve him of sin and get him into heaven. People who just believe in god because of convention, greed (as they just want to go to heaven) and even ignorance. But back to my point.
Atheists are not bad people. Just because atheist is the technical term for someone who has no belief in the existance of god. It is that simple, it is a word. By having these preconceived views about what an atheist is, usually tainted by religion, is essentially no better then racism, sexism, and any other ‘-ism’ you want. So this brings me to the title of this blog post, atheists are still ridiculously misunderstood. But like racism, it will be dealt with, all of humanity will move on and accept differences. We are pretty much already here, but like racism, certain areas it will always remain predominant. Just look at the deep south of America as one example, or at least at the stereotypes you may hear and you will see what I mean. There will always be opposition, there will always be the ignorant, but we live in the 21st century.
Grow up and shake off these predefined and tainted notions that you may have of atheists and learn the truth.
Darwin Week – Why Do We Still Need To Argue For It?
This week the Warwick Atheist Society is putting on a series of events celebrating Charles Darwins 200th birthday. It should be a time of celebration, perhaps not so much of the man, but of his theory which so perfectly fits all life together. Yet it saddens me when I see stupid things like this:
Happy Birthday Darwin
Now while this is just an isolated example and there are probably other reasons for why this is. It is more likely people will bother to say that he is wrong than bother saying he is right. However, this just highlights the bigger issue at hand. Why is evolution such a highly contested issue? It is unbelievable that we still have to argue and defend the theory of evolution by natural selection so strongly. It is just a theory though, it is meant to be debated.
Not really, Gravity is just a theory, yet there is so much evidence in support for it, it is now the law of gravity. Same with evolution, there is so much evidence in support for it that the only evidence against it is from sources such as the Bible. Without creationist dribble from various holy texts, we would never have come to the conclusion that a supernatural force called God made all the animals and plants on Earth. The logical conclusion of evolution would have been reached, all available evidence supports it.
Yet here I am, arguing for something which seems so obvious to me and not just me, to a huge number of scientists world-wide. Yet 40% of Americas (DOWN 5% from 20 years ago) only accept that humans evolved from earlier species of animals, the numbers don’t really improve elsewhere in the world. It is amazing to see such ignorance and it is easy to blame the schools. Intelligent Design (ID) should be taught in schools, but only in RE class and only then as something to show what other people in the world believe. It should not be shown as fact in any way. Yet, IDers have tried to get ID into the science classroom.
I’m sure we have all heard of attempts to get ID into the science classroom and how the issue got so severe mock religions have been started to highlight the sheer madness of letting ID into school. Science class is for teaching science, for teaching the scientific method and to teach theories which the evidence all points to. It is maddening to see attempts being made at getting ridiculous, unscientific and biased viewpoints being taught to children. Ladies and Gentlemen I give you indoctrination in the classroom, insulting isn’t it?
So as much as I would like to say Happy Birthday to Darwin, I can’t. This day will always be marked by the ignorance and alterior motives of foolish religious groups attempting to indoctrinate children with more religious pressures in the school environment. Why the hell are we still arguing over this and not about gravity?
A Retort! – Christian Bus Campaing
While, I’m loving the “No God,” atheist bus advertising. It was only inevitable that a retort was on its way in the form of un-original and sheer obnoxious counter-campaign. It seems that we have a little competition. Have a look what the Daily Mail are saying:
“Christian groups are launching their own advertisements to run across the side of London buses following an atheist campaign.”
Un-original and wrong.
Source : Daily Mail
Now, lets get this straight, at least the BHA had the decency to say there probably is no God (seeing as all Atheists are actually only 99.99% sure there is no God) and that simply sparked enough complaints to the advertising agency. But now when they claim, that there is a God without providing any proof, that is no only insulting, it is actually against the Advertising Standards Agency’s guidelines and should be investigated. I quote from The British Code of Advertising, Sales Promotion and Direct Marketing:
General Rules, Principles
“2.1 All marketing communications would be legal, decent, honest and truthful”
Source: ASA
It also goes on to say about what ‘truthful,’ actually is, explaining that you cannot purposely mislead or ignore facts and evidence that contradicts the advert. It is not a well understood fact that there is god. However, you would think with the previous campaigns that have been run by various groups claiming the existence of God would have seen the issue resolved. But yet again, religion is in that special region where it gets special treatment it does not deserve.
The case involving the atheist bus campaign was dismissed as they used the word ‘probably,’ that highlights the fact that there may be a god and a willingness to not offend. So surly the Christian bus campaign could have at least, “there probably is a God.” While other adverts claim something, such as cars claiming to be low mileage, there has to be some proof, some research that indisputably backs this claim up. Indisputable proof that there is a God does not exist, in fact many Christians I have spoken to claim there can never be indisputable, 100% proof of the existence of God as that would remove free will and the choice of deciding to love God. Which apparently he gave us.
So, cut the crap, if you are going to advertise your view, you have to provide evidence to back up your claim. Without it, you are breaking regulations and should, technically, be punished. Lets remove religion from its special place and bring it under scuitiny like everything else in this world.
Review – Tomb Raider: Underworld
So, here we are again with the next Tomb Raider game, yet another copy of the previous thousand with graphical updates and a few gameplay tweaks. Wheeeeeeeee! Well, actually, I wouldn’t shoot down Tomb Raider so quickly, what you need to understand is that not everyone has played all the Tomb Raider games, in fact, there are some who have never played one at all and Tomb Raider: Underworld may actually be the first one they are considering buying.
Of course it would be very easy for me to sit here and say how Tomb Raider is a dead horse being beaten just a little too much and should be left to die, but I actually think that there may be some life in this new game. While the idea may be getting stale, the gameplay is still rather rigid, the controls are a bit naff. Shall we consider this from the perspective of someone wh0 has never played a TR game before then?
LittleBigPlanet, Will It Last?
LittleBigPlanet, as you may know, is probably one of the best exclusive titles to the PS3 and easily deserving of GOTY. It is a brilliant concept and has been executed wonderfully. A fantastic game that, even without the user generated content, can provide hours of fun. But of course, the real focus and core of the game is with the user generated content and the level editor.
LBP has only been released for a few months, that may not be long enough for people to play through the main game and unlock all the content (you get more content to make levels with as you play through the main single-player game). Also, as the game has only been released for a short while, there may not be that many sales yet (though it has sold over 1 million units). So user-generated content is not fantastic, there are a few good levels and a few levels which brilliant ideas, such as a simple calculator (which is impressive considering the limited ways to make ‘logic’ circuits in the game).
However, will there be any more good maps and will the game last more than a few months? It only took me about a week of play to unlock 95% of the content and a little longer to get those final, well hidden, prize bubbles. The trophies are designed to take time to complete, especially the gold ones, Play, Create and Share. But the real key to the longevity of this game will be the user generated content, the additional releases and updates.
There most certainly will be a constant flow of user-generated content, which should in general get better and better as time goes by. What will usually happen is that a few key level designers will contribute content almost religiously and will approach a very high level of quality. Other people will just get the vital experience needed to make moderately good maps. As the game is purchased by more and more people as the price lowers, there will constantly be new to replace the old. That’s the idea anyway. What may happen is a new game will grab the attentions of the LBP players and they will slowly leave the game, until it reaches a critical point where suddenly nothing new is being provided and everyone else leaves the game.
To counter this, the developers, Media Molecule are releasing several updates, so there is a continual stream of new, developer made content. Which means that there should always be something new in the game. Of course these packs cost additional money but it’s a small price to pay. Character packs are a common sight, with several currently available and recently released is the Metal Gear Solid pack. Providing a whole wealth of new levels and characters, along side new trophies and content for user generated levels.
I do have one major problem. I hate the editor. It is unintuitive, it has complex controls and it takes a while to get used to. It is not very flexible and since the physics interacts with everything when you place it, this can cause more problems than it solves. However, some people must be getting the hang of it because of the good quality levels that are being produced. This poorly designed editor may become a real issue to new players and will certainly deter people from trying to make maps, but of course it could just be me not being able to get used to such a simple editor after years of experience with more advanced ones.
So perhaps LBP will stay the course, perhaps not. But that is the risk when you rely on user generated content is that the community could just suddenly up and leave, destroying the main reason why the game is so good. While the single-player is good enough on it’s own, it isn’t really worth full price, only with the community does it become worth it. Heck, LBP is nothing without the community around it, when that dissapears so will the game, but that shouldn’t be for a while anyway.
