The religious are all a-twitter these days about "the New Atheism," usually referring to polemics by the likes of Dawkins, Harris, Hitchens et al. I doubt most atheists have read these books (why should they?) and while I'd like to think they have converted many of the faithful, I rather doubt that, too. They are not a cause but a sign of the times. The two most powerful forces stimulating the new and higher public status of non-belief are 9-11 and Creationism, both for the same reasons: they are graphic illustrations of the evils of religious fanaticism and delusion. Once a person starts to pull that little thread, things start to unravel all by themselves. The evidence is all around us.
Consider what is going on this week at the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion:
Supporters of intelligent design hold that the order and complexity of the universe is so great that science alone cannot explain it. The concept's critics see it as faith masquerading as science.An Oregon State physics graduate named Bobby Henderson stepped into the debate by sending a letter to the Kansas School Board. With tongue in cheek, he purported to speak for 10 million followers of a being called the Flying Spaghetti Monster -- and demanded equal time for their views.
The letter made the rounds on the Internet, prompting laughter from some and vilification from others. But it struck a chord and stuck around. In the great tradition of satire, its humor was in fact a clever and effective argument.
Between the lines, the point of the letter was this: There's no more scientific basis for intelligent design than there is for the idea an omniscient creature made of pasta created the universe. If intelligent design supporters could demand equal time in a science class, why not anyone else? The only reasonable solution is to put nothing into sciences classes but the best available science.
"I think we can all look forward to the time when these three theories are given equal time in our science classrooms across the country, and eventually the world; one third time for Intelligent Design, one third time for Flying Spaghetti Monsterism, and one third time for logical conjecture based on overwhelming observable evidence," Henderson sarcastically concluded.(CNN)
It's a joke and not a joke. The joke part is obvious. The not-a-joke part is that FSM isn't any more of a joke than lots of other nutty social movements like Mormonism, an FSM-like cult that doesn't even know it's a joke. Judaism, Christianity and Islam seem more solid because they have the patina of age, but turning them into jokes isn't hard. With just a slight change of diction (word choice, to those of you who forgot your Freshman Comp class), you can map the biblical story of Sodom and Gomorrah onto a juicily offensive but faithful version like this one, which I give you happily for your Sunday morning Bible Class:
Here is the website of The Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. Go anoint yourself with garlic and oil.
- Log in to post comments
On the other hand, the supporters of intelligent design do not offer any explanation of the order and complexity of the universe. That is, there is nothing which tells us why or how an intelligent designer would make a complex universe (rather than going for simplicity - or more complexity), or with one particular orderly arrangement, rather than any other.
On the issue of explaining the order and complexity of the universe, intelligent design is no better than anything else. Maybe worse than some.
No better, for example, than "I don't know". No better than "emanations". No better, for all that, than "pure chance".
Revere! That Professor's lecture has MADE MY DAY!!! The FSN website is great! Thank you!
O'Leary: And you made mine. Thanks back.
I guess that's not Denyse O'Leary, then.
Great bible lesson!!
Marvellous.
My own favourite (in the original ? spelling ;)), is http://bible.cc/judges/15-4.htm
God is great, g(can I have an even lower case)od is grrreat: http://bible.cc/judges/15-4.htm
I don't see what you think is so funny. I always give my virgin daughters out for sex to people that come around wanting sex with strangers at my house. Geesh!
I loved that lecture.
Those two male angel dudes in sexy short shorts were HOT!
Made a believer outta me!
Shouldn't "Jesus" be a jar of God's frozen sperm since it is an old testament story? He had not been tortured by Mel Gibson yet.
So who created the intelligent designer?
epifreek: A human.
Not a fan of these 'guest posts'.
Nothing personal, 'revere', but if your writing merited attention, it would attain its own corner of the interweb. It hasn't.
Revere:
In responce to MonoApe's comment.
I look forward to your Sunday Sermonettes. They are always well written and right on target.
On the other hand, I do disagree with some of your other posts. Some of them are a bit left-wing.
But they always get me to think!
If you ever run for president, I'd vote for you. I even think Kruger would vote for you.
Keep up the good work. You just might save the world.
DARWIN
Darwin: Thanks. Positive feedback is always appreciated (and needed).
No matter how much atheists tell you God does not exist, I know for sure that witches are real. The proof is as follows:in 1692 in Salem Mass., 150 witches were imprisoned and 20 were executed. If witches did not exist, they never would have killed 20. Obviously the jurors, after hearing all the evidence, decided the women were guilty. That proves witches are real.
And when I saw the movie The Wizard of Oz, I saw the wicked witch of the west flying on a broomstick.
So now I have no doubt, and you should not either.
Don't be lulled into intellectual bemusement by clever parodies of hideously tentacled Elder Gods. Nyarlathotep, the crawling chaos! We are all doomed, doomed!
Just for the record, there's all kind of stuff in this cartoon which is not in the Genesis 19 account and which seems to be added solely for the purpose of making said account look even more batshit insane. Which authors were not, BTW---rather, they had an agenda, which is to say justifying the Israelite's later occupation of Canaan---at the Canaanite's expense. In a way, this actually makes much of the account more venal, but also more comprehensible.
Granted that some folk just want a cartoon version of religion to argue against, but if we make knowingly bad arguments, how are skeptics to be distinguished from some of the professional liars in the pews?
Scott Hatfield,
I think that once you get to the part about Lot offering up his virgin daughters to be gang raped you've pretty much reached the pinnacle of bat shit craziness. Everything past that point is just bonus points. Unfortunately for the religious types, this example isn't the exception in the bible, it's sort of the rule. The whole book is pretty much just hacky, slashy, rapey, smitey from one cover to the other. That's why I find it so damn funny when christians call it "the good book".
I make no claims as to whether or not God exists. But I am sure there is a devil. Otherwise, how could Blackwater employees in Iraq fire on innocent civilians, shooting them in the back as they ran for safety, killing 17 and wounding 24? These Blackwater bastards came straight from Hell, and when they die, they are going there.
And Michael Mukasey, our new attorney general, has refused to declare waterboarding torture. All the filth and slime balls in our government that get paid to torture and kill are evil. Mukasey is the lowest kind of slime, and is also headed for hell.
If the bastards in our government order an attack on Iran,
they to are going to hell. Believe me, even if the devil is a fiction, our government leaders are the closest replicas of evil you can find on the planet.
/touched by his noodly appendage
^_^
Well, saying that the bible is just a hack and slash fiction from cover to cover makes me think that you may have skipped the second half of the book. Also the thing that a lot of people seem to forget is that the bible isn't a book.... yeah christians in general forget that. It is not a book, but a collection of documents. In fact, what would you think if it was divided into all the original documents? Having to read each volume sperately. The bible is put into a book form for easy referance, not to make it seem as the world's greatest novel... or longest... but it was written over a long period of time. Plus the first half of the book really doesn't matter. It is a bunch of history written down to understand the first four documents of the second half... which is evidently all good (which is where I was going with this.) The first four documents of the second half of the bible is supposed to show us that we do not have to worry about anything like all the people in the first half of the bible did. So I would say that is preety good for people who believe.
traumatized,
It appears you really have been traumatized.
Well, saying that the bible is just a hack and slash fiction from cover to cover makes me think that you may have skipped the second half of the book.
That would be the half in which crucifixion figures prominently.
How can any sane individual not realize that the God of the Bible is schizoprhenic? He spends a couple thousand years being Mr Artist, creating all these neet toys and fossiles (many of which we'll never see). Then he spends a couple thousand years as the world's nastiest jackoff, finally creating a son to be butchered by the local heathens... and he's all Mr Goody-Goody again.
And now, he's obviously slippled into a diabetic coma, since there's been no sign of him for the past 500 years or so. The sickly saccarine Christ years pushed him over the edge.
Lurchgs,
Please tell me why atheists are so pissed off at the concept God may exist? Why are you so angry about it? Please explain in a rational, calm, uninsulting way why you are an atheist.
Does that request make you angry?
Please note that shrimplate and benjamin do not appear to be angry. Does that also piss you off.
We are born, we live, and we die. It is just that simple. We are just like any other species on this planet.
Yes, we have the most developed brains, and as such we should use them to keep our planet safe from harm. Instead the vast majority of mankind believes in one supernatural being or another, an then insist upon foisting their belief systems on every one else. It is all a bit puerile.
Herman -
Your question was addressed to Lurchgs, but I couldn't resist butting in.
Obviously, I can only speak for myself, but I suspect many atheists would agree. I'm not pissed off at the idea that god exists. In a nutshell, the idea of god is superfluous. I can't get pissed off at the idea of god any more than I can get pissed off at the idea of Santa Claus.
But what does piss me off is when idiots like Dinesh D'souza put words in atheists' mouths - atheists are afraid of this or pissed off at that. Or others that claim atheists merely want an excuse to indulge their carnal cravings with impunity (unlike that paragon of sexual purity, the catholic church). Or any number of other straw man claims.
When religious apologists come up with a good argument, we'll listen.
herman: Most well-adjusted atheists aren't angry that god may exist, we simply recognize its extreme improbability and inability to adequately explain the existence of the universe. If we are ever angry, it is at the fact that people with irrational beliefs try to force them on others, and that religious disputes have cause enormous bloodshed today and in the past. Lurchs comment does not seem angry to me at all, he's just making fun of Christianity in a way that, to me anyway, comes across as playful. We atheists find this very entertaining. If anyone gets unnecessarily angry, its creationists (or agnostics, apparently) who feel we are not giving proper respect to a viewpoint that we, quite frankly, do not respect.
victoria, zachary smith, sirkus
I accept totally your position and I respect it. But to state God does not exist without giving a rational explanation as to why is absurd.
You have all merely stated God does not exist. But you have no logical argument to support your position. That is what is absurd.
And then if anyone expresses the belief that God exists, some atheists attack them with ridicule or dogma. Is that acceptable behavior in the 21st century?
If you say you are an atheist because religion is evil, that makes no sense. There is evil everywhere today on the planet, and much of it has nothing to do with religion.
As you know there are scientists, even quantum physicists, that believe in God. And many can give you a rational explanation of their position.
To ridicule the authors of chapters of the bible is stupid. They were writing 2000 or almost 3000 years ago. Do you expect them to have the same world view we have today? Will not those living 3000 years from now not ridicule us for our statements?
Please look at the book Process Theology by Alfred North Whitehead. He knew about quantum physics. He gives a modern version of religion that is more acceptable today.
It will not be so easy to ridicule what he says in that book. I know you will attack process theology, but please read it first before making a judgment.
To use science to try to justify that God does not exist is idiocy. There are limits to what can be observed. Science cannot observe ultimate reality. And you cannot prove God does not exist. If you tell me science allows you to know what ultimate reality is, I will laugh. What existed before the big bang? There is still knowledge that exists outside the realm of science. To deny that knowledge is illogical.
lurcgs,
If you want to ridicule a religion, forget about Christianity, since it is an easy target.
Try Buddhism. This religion has nothing to say about whether there is a God, but plenty to say about what ultimate reality may be. In a way, it is really a more modern day religion.
Once the Buddha was walking by a river. He saw a man trying to meditate in order to raise up his body and float across the river. The Buddha told him to forget it, and go take the boat across the river.
Herman:
One mistake you make is thinking that science attempts to disprove the existence of god. Science is in the business of providing reproducible data and testable, naturalistic explanantions for physical phenomena. Science does not rule out divine intervention a-priori, but since the whims of a god are unpredictable and unknowable, divine intervention is useless as a scientific tool.
That in itself does not rule out the existence of god. But science can shed light on the kind of god that might exist. For example, a god that fits a literal reading of the bible is extremely unlikely given what humans have learned about the age of the earth, the universe, radioactive decay processes, not to mention the "E" word (evolution of course). Just because we haven't worked out all the details in the origin of life or the universe does not mean we need invoke god.
Beyond science, we can ask questions about the nature of god. For example,a god that is intimately interested in our day-to-day troubles and intervenes to change the outcome of events is also very unlikely. After all, if god has it all worked out in advance, why listen to prayers? Can a human persuade god to change his (her) mind? I doubt it.
Is god a loving god? If so, why all the capricious death & tragedy caused by natural disasters & disease? Maybe god loves us but just lets things happen as they will - OK, I can buy that. But then what good is he? I guess it's a tough love thing.
Or maybe god is a cruel prick and just lets things happen as they may. Loving father or cruel prick - either way the world looks the same.
That's what I meant when I said god was superfluous. Some kinds of gods can be dismissed outright because of scientific knowledge (or you can choose to ignore physical reality as the fundies do). But beyond that, the nature of god is unknowable and the effects of god vs. no god in our daily lives are indistinguishable.
So you have a god about whom you can never know anything and who has no discernable effect on nature or our lives. To believe in a god requires more baggage than to not believe - and provides no benefit. Why bother?
Herman,
I'm an atheist because I have seen no evidence that there is or ever has been a god or gods. I used to believe in God, but after large amounts of time wasted in prayer and searching for him, I finally gave up that exercise and realized that I was searching for something that doesn't exist.
As commented by ZacharySmith, the existence of a god as per the Bible or indeed any religious text is extremely unlikely given what we have observed. I go even further by providing the logical reasoning requested by Herman supporting my claim that there is indeed no God at all. The common idea of a God is something that created all existence. A god that created all existence would, by the second law of thermodynamics, have to be at least as complex as existence itself. The only was for a local increase of information to occur in a system is at the expense of decreased information elsewhere (again by the second law). Which means that this God must have come into existence in a system which already contained information which he, by definition, could not have created. Thus this God did not create all existence and we have a contradiction.
I'm not an expert on thermodynamics or logic, so I doubt that what I have just said is completely air-tight, and I would appreciate anyone pointing out if and where I went wrong, but this is just one of the many reasons I do not believe in a God, (I can think of at least three more off the top of my head) and I think you will admit that there is some degree of truth to it.
You cannot find G_d with your intellect. You cannot earn his favor through good works. The fact that you spend so much time spewing such hatred is enough evidence to me that G_d exists because your hatred exists. Kudos to you!
Now I know why I never bother to come over to this neck of the woods. Don't bother replying...I won't be back to read 'em. You probably say "good riddance" but I will pray for you to trust in the unseen, which you have been trained to not see.
"Forgive them for they know not what they do"
Have a Happy Thanksgiving....but then again...who will you be thanking?
Can we PLEASE stop lauding Sam Harris and lumping him in the "New Atheists"? Yes, technically he's an atheist, but he's in love with Buddhism and thinks evidence may exist for psi phenomena and even reincarnation, for doorknob's sake!
standingfirm,
I cannot understand why atheists are so pissed off about religion, and hostile to anyone who believes in God. Why do so many of them use ridicule and insults?
Did their mom beat them when they were a child?
Perhaps they are afraid that when they die, they will encounter God, and he will kick their butts.
herman: I think we get that you don't understand it. Let's call it a wrap.
Revere,
All I know is a lot of atheists use ridicule, dogma, and insults.
Lets call it a wrap.
^ I believe this is known as "projection".