Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Atheist fundraising suggestion

Need funds for yourself or the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster? Here is a twisted idea for making a quick buck off “the rapture.” Unfortunately this idea will only work on May 21st of this year. You’ll need shabby clothes, a King James Bible, and your best “poker face.” The basic idea is to convince gullible people they aren’t being “raptured” due to their accumulated worldly possessions. This will only work on May 21st of this year because that is the date being hyped by a number of “Christian” websites and a billboard campaign. The shabby clothes are to give the appearance of being poor, so you will be the obvious and convenient recipient of all those burdensome possessions. The Bible will back you up if you know which verses to cite. Start with Matthew 19:24 “And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.” This will be even more effective if you have the red letter version of the Bible – the red letters highlight the words of Jesus himself! Now move up a few lines to Matthew 19:21 where you’ll find these words: “Jesus said unto him, If thou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven.” Make the case that your mark is not being “raptured” because of their worldly possessions. Do this while turning the pages to Mark 10:25. When you get there then point out that this camel thing is so important that God caused it to be included a second time for emphasis. “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.” Then back up a few lines just as before. This time to Mark 10:17 where Jesus is asked “What shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?” Then quickly skip to the following words in Mark 10:21 “go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven.”
If your mark has not broken out the titles, deeds and checkbook then continue! While keeping your best poker face, flip to Luke 18:25 where God has emphasized the point by including it a third time. “For it is easier for a camel to go through a needle’s eye, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.” Once again – extra credit for cheap theatrics – skip up a few lines – this time to Luke 18:18. There is the question posed to Jesus once again “what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” And in verse 18:22 the answer is repeated “sell all that thou hast, and distribute unto the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven.” If you can’t induce them to sign over all the worldly goods then maybe at least you can induce a crisis of faith as they realize they don’t really believe enough to put Jesus first in their heart. The book commands that Jesus be loved more than money. You can leave them with a final thought, this time the words of Jesus as recorded in Matthew 7:21 “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.”

Monday, March 28, 2011

Taxing “Christians” as an act of compassion

Let’s tax the “hell” out of “Christians!” We’d be doing them a favor – because doing so would literally tax the “Christians” out of “hell.” Here’s the lowdown on “hell” and “Christians” – according to their very own favorite book most of them are going to burn in “hell” for eternity. And who can stand idly by while that happens? Seems the “inerrant word of God” in their favorite book is quite insistent upon poverty being the way to “heaven.” It is a recurring theme with the following words of “Jesus” himself reiterated no less than three times. “And again I say to thee, a camel may more easily pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man through the gates of heaven.” This theme shows up repeatedly. In another passage a comparison is made with a merchant who finds a pearl of great value. The merchant then trades all his worldly goods for that single pearl of great value. Of course the pearl isn’t actually a pearl. The pearl instead represents everlasting life in “heaven.”
Unfortunately modern “Christians” have become extremely confused about this and have this bizarre idea that “God” is rewarding people for acts of charity and the like in this lifetime. The “inerrant word of God” promises rewards only in an alleged afterlife. But we could easily take care of the problem for all those confused “Christians.” We could tax the confused “Christians” into poverty. Being as poverty apparently removes a barrier to “Heaven” we’d be doing the “Christians” a huge favor. Plus we could then use the tax revenue to do all those good things suggested by the example of “Christ.” All that tax money would surely go a long way toward feeding the hungry, comforting the afflicted, and healing the sick. Who knows, “God” might even count the resulting good deeds in favor of the “Christians” on “Judgment Day” – although I imagine it would count for more if the “Christians” did it of their own free will.
Let’s tax the “hell” out of “Christians” because it looks like a win-win solution for everyone!

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

There is no god

There is no god and one may be quite secure in the knowledge of that fact. “Christians” and others infected with the evolving thought contagions of religion may say that it is impossible to disprove god. They are correct – to exactly the same extent and for exactly the same reasons that it is not possible to disprove that we are living like the people enslaved in the movie The Matrix.
If I assert that we are enslaved in pod towers to generate electricity for a machine society – just as is portrayed in the movie The Matrix, then it is impossible to disprove my assertion. This is because the machine society proposed in The Matrix is presumed to want to hide itself and is presumed to have the means to mask its existence. The gods proposed by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are similarly presumed to want to hide themselves and are presumed to have the means to mask their existence. Because the gods proposed are presumed to have the will and the means to mask their existence then it impossible to disprove their existence.
Adherents of Abrahamic gods aren’t usually too keen on competition – most likely because their religions have evolved toward those most likely to win in the competition for control of minds. Consequently adherents of Abrahamic gods are likely to try to disprove or at least discredit The Matrix assertion. Their attempts would be very instructive.
The most obvious line of attack is to discredit The Matrix assertion by pointing out the provenance of the mythology. Modern technology makes it simple to learn the provenance of The Matrix. We know The Matrix was written by Andy and Lana Wachowski. We know the story was not widely known before 1999. This line of attack is instructive because it is applies equally to religion. The historical and archaeological records reveal the evolution of religions. We know the approximate dates when certain stories first appear and when particular features were added to those stories.
A marginally more sophisticated line of attack might employ “Occam's razor.” There are several interpretations of “Occam's razor.” It is variously stated as “the simplest explanation is most likely the correct one” or “entities must not be multiplied without necessity.” Let’s see how it might be applied to discredit The Matrix assertion.
In The Matrix each person experienced the world just as we believe we do. They had jobs, homes, families and friends. But it was all just a virtual reality world piped into their heads through a cable connected near their cervical vertebrae. They each believed they moved through and interacted with a real world but in reality they lay motionless in a pod plugged into a worldwide virtual reality game. From the perspective of a denizen of The Matrix there is no evidence or need for the pods, the enslaving machine society, or the worldwide virtual reality game.  For denizens of The Matrix, the proposition of an elaborate pod structure and enslaving machine society is a multiplication of entities and immediately fails the test of “Occam's razor.”
But the assertion fails beyond that. What physics would make it worthwhile for the enslaving machine society to construct and maintain all those pods and all that inefficient human respiration? Why wouldn’t they just employ their energy source directly? There are any number of questions which might be asked regarding the illogical motives of the proposed enslaving machine society.
The gods proposed by religion fail the test of “Occam's razor” for similar reasons. The laws of evolution and physics are sufficient to explain the world around us. Therefore adding an additional layer with undetectable gods, undetectable angels, undetectable demons, and undetectable souls is simply multiplying entities without necessity.
But the proposition of god fails beyond that. Why would a perfect god capable of creating perfect creatures instead choose to create flawed (sinful) creatures which can never live up to his expectations? Why would he fashion irresistible temptations right into our bodies and then get all uppity when we give in to the temptations? After doing this how could this god imagine himself to be just and loving? If the proposed gods are so perfect then why do they have this need to be constantly told how great they are? That need would seem to reveal deep-seated problems with self esteem.
Conclusion: there is no god and we do not live in a world such as portrayed in The Matrix. A rational mind must be equally certain of the inveracity of god and the inveracity of the enslaving machines of The Matrix.

Monday, March 7, 2011

American Atheists Convention

This has been a rewarding and informative experience in the past. I've purchased my tickets and reserved a room. You should do the same!

Saturday, February 19, 2011

Sharia Law coming to America

All these morons griping about Sharia law being brought to America need to seriously get a grip. Sharia law is nothing more – and nothing less – than forcing one’s religion on others through the power of government. Any rational American can clearly see that we already have that. Religious people use the power of government to push abstinence-only curriculums. Religious people use the power of government to enforce second class citizenship on homosexuals. Religious people use the power of government to support religion through manipulation of the tax code. Religious people are sometimes thwarted, but there is a constant pressure to elevate the Decalogue to law-of-the-land. And we are never allowed a break from the constant shrill rhetoric coming from the “pro-life” movement – a movement which would make its religion the law-of-the-land in an instant if given the opportunity. Religious people are able to censor what we can read at the library and exert control through innumerable governmental bodies.
The complaints regarding Sharia law are hugely hypocritical because the real issue with Sharia is which delusional belief system can gain control of the government. Of course I would prefer a 100% rational government in which the “golden rule” was the cornerstone and the oppressive thought contagions of religion played no role. Being as fundamentalist Christianity is losing market share around the world while fundamentalist Islam is gaining market share it is a reasonable assumption that Sharia law will spread – because majority Islam electorates will vote for Theocracy as soon as they can. This is essentially the same as majority Christian electorates having voted for tax-exempt religion in America. If you don’t like Sharia law then be consistent and work against ALL religion in government.

A few words for “‘Doctor’ Laura”

Dr. Laura is right about one thing: Gays and Lesbians are biological errors. And as usual whenever a “conservative” chances upon a correct conclusion, that conclusion was generally reached by illogical means or by no means at all. The question Dr. Laura should have asked is “why doesn't nature seem to be able to correct all these biological errors?”

From a Darwinian perspective, same-sex attraction would seem to be self-limiting genetic defect. That is to say that a person who is attracted only to the same sex is not likely to pass along the genes for the same-sex attraction because passing along genes requires interaction with the opposite sex. This seems to work for most other creatures onboard spaceship Earth. Why not humans?

One of the major things that distinguish humans from all other inhabitants of planet Earth is religion. None of the other inhabitants have it. This difference prevents nature from correcting many “biological errors”, at least in the short term. It is not that difficult to comprehend, but you will need to understand several things first – things that may never appear in a textbook because religion will not tolerate them.

The first thing that you must understand is that the human gene pool is becoming degraded. One of the factors causing this is human technology. For example, a zebra with poor eyesight might fail to identify a predator before the predator identified the zebra as dinner. Dinner does not pass its genes on to the next generation. Therefore only the genes for the greatest visual acuity are likely to survive. In contrast the human with poor eyesight simply acquires a pair of glasses and goes on to reproduce anyway. This is just one example of human technology making exceptions to “natural selection”. However, technology is not the only human characteristic making exceptions to the laws of “natural selection.”

Religion also creates exceptions to “natural selection.” One reason for this is religion's demand for maximum reproduction of those having the religion. We won't go into the ugly details of why this should be – I'll just ask that you look at the evidence. The evidence of religious pressure to reproduce is all around: Look at the religious rules that limit sexual contact to procreation, strictures against abortion, strictures against birth-control, and all the rules that say we can't even touch our own bodies in non-approved ways. The purpose of all these rules is to ensure lots of procreative sex and lots of new brains to indoctrinate with the religion of the parents.

The trouble with religion's emphasis on procreation is that people with no biological drive to reproduce are forced into reproduction. Genes that would not have been passed on get propagated along with everything else. Unfortunately, gays and lesbians are not the only result. I think we are seeing more and more evidence of what I call genes for defective motherhood. We hear of more and more incidents where mothers are dropping newborns in the nearest dumpster, strapping their sons into lake-bound automobiles, and drugging and burning their sons in order to collect insurance money. A bear has more reliable and consistent maternal instincts because a bear that does not provide the best possible food and protection for her cubs is likely to find her genes filtered out of the gene pool. In contrast, the woman without good maternal instincts may have her child raised by the state or adoptive parents – her genes continue when she doesn't provide food and protection herself.

In short, human technology and religion allow or cause many exceptions to “natural selection.” The effect is proliferation of genes which are not biologically fit from a strictly Darwinian perspective. Once you comprehend all this, you should be able to see the truth in the following statement: The rise and spread of homosexuality is a completely natural and predictable consequence of the rise and spread of Judeo-Christian culture. As an Orthodox Jew, Dr. Laura would undoubtedly find this statement utterly offensive. And that, my friends, would be a very good thing. Then perhaps she could understand the hurt which she causes people when she says those people are nothing more than “biological errors”.

Doomsday Fertility Cults

What do you get when you cross a quantity of parenthood memeplex with the thought contagion of a holy judgment day? Answer: A doomsday fertility cult. Judaism is best understood as a quantity of parenthood memeplex – a collection of memes emphasizing maximum fertility. Messianic Judaism added doomsday memes. All the religions which branched from Messianic Judaism include memes for maximum fertility and a day of judgment. This reveals the fundamentally disordered “thinking” upon which both Christianity and Islam are based. As observed in Mormonism, Christianity and Islam are similarly obsessed with forcing maximum fertility – so that all the resulting progeny may then be accused of sin and toyed with in the ultimate kangaroo court. It is a mind game of extraordinary cruelty. Even the most Machiavellian thinkers must be appalled at the scale and depth of the deceit and duplicity. Imagine a mad professor in his lab – brilliant enough to create perfect creatures – but instead purposefully choosing to create flawed creatures which are predisposed to fail the diabolical experiments which the mad professor has devised for them. This is analogous to the story told in relevant religious texts. Take your pick of a deity - Elohim, Jehovah, or Allah. Each is reported to have created us – complete with sinful lusts for earthly pleasures and weak against the lure of loot or sparkling baubles. Each deity is then reported to get into a total snit when the hordes of hapless creations fail to correctly navigate the maze of existence with all its distracting cheeses, dead-end corridors, and booby traps. If Elohim, Jehovah, or Allah actually existed then they would surely have a lot of explaining to do!

So these deities – Elohim, Jehovah, and Allah – are imagined to need lots of lesser beings toward which the deity might feel smugly superior. They – or their earthly authors – must have some deep-seated insecurity or mental problems causing the need for many inferior beings to punish on “judgment day.”

Wednesday, February 9, 2011

Joe Camel and Friends

I found the accompanying image on the Internet. It was an illustration of the animals which were supposedly gathered for the ark in the familiar fairytale of Noah and the flood. Look closely and you’ll see Joe Camel. Joe Camel was created as part of a marketing campaign meant to hook children on an addictive habit. If one examines this image then certain similarities are apparent.

It has friendly looking animals and bright colors. But the similarity goes much deeper than that. The retail nicotine industry has a financial incentive to hook young people. The retail religion industry also has a financial interest in hooking young people. The retail nicotine industry sells an addictive product which has an overall detrimental effect on society. The retail religion industry peddles fairytales and hits of self righteousness. Like retail nicotine, those products have an overall detrimental effect on society. The cure for both would be amazingly similar – if laws required truth in advertizing then both the nicotine and religion industries would have a much tougher time marketing their wares.

Monday, January 31, 2011

Atheism is not a religion

If you think Atheism is a religion then I have a cure for your problem. First you will need to collect some supplies. You will need a large vacuum chamber, a hose and a vacuum pump. Connect ‘em all up. Now you need to plug in the vacuum pump and quickly climb into the vacuum chamber, taking care to close and seal the hatch behind you. Now this may sound a little dangerous, but as you well know, the absence of a thing is still that thing. Absence of religion is still religion and absence of air is still air. You’ll be able to breathe just fine! Run along now. The rest of us will wait until you come back.
Well, actually I’m not going to wait. I suspect those folks might be a while getting back. If you’re still here reading, then I assume you don’t need to be cured of the silly belief that Atheism is a religion. You must instead be interested in why I would write about something as obvious as the fact that Atheism is not a religion. As you might have guessed, the slick disinformation campaign operated by the religion industry aggravates me just a bit. I view the claim that Atheism is a religion as just another lie told to keep gullible people confused and protect the profitable business of religion. The difference between Atheism and religion is that Atheism doesn’t make up stuff to answer supposed questions. No fairytales. No mythology. No unicorns. Just the facts, Ma’am!

Publicity banner #4

A fellow counter-protester at the Catholic empire’s “West Coast March for Life” noted a grammatical error on one of the other publicity banners. Oops! Can’t have that – Atheists are supposed to be the intelligent ones. So reordering that banner with correct grammar. Because of all the positive comments on the three original banners I decided that while I was ordering anyway, that I would go ahead with this fourth design.

Hopefully the banners will get origin-of-religions.org under the noses of the religious fundamentalists, “creationists,” and those other delusional folks I see posting their irrational bibble babble across the Internet.

Monkeys in Government: Congressman Jack Kingston

Just saw Congressman Jack Kingston (R-GA) repeatedly deny that his ancestors included some in common with monkeys. He tried several gambits which are popular with “creationists.” One gambit was that if evolution took place over the millions of years claimed by the theory of evolution then there would be a lot more fossils. Jack thinks there should be more fossils. This demonstrates an utter lack of understanding of the natural sciences and the “big picture.” First of all the entire world economy is fueled by the fossil record. Every bit of coal and every drop of petroleum extracted from the planet was once part of a living plant or animal. There is a reason why coal and oil are called “fossil fuels.” The fossil record is huge. Now in fairness Jack was probably referring only to bones. But if one wishes to consider only bones then they must consider the odds against any particular specimen being preserved. The odds are overwhelmingly against it. Most carcasses are destroyed by scavengers. The relative few carcasses which get buried quickly enough to be preserved are then subject to destruction by massive recycling processes which constantly reshaped the continents. Land is uplifted at the edges of continents by the movements of tectonic plates which form the planet’s crust. Then erosion breaks down the resulting mountains and carries the sediment to the sea. These processes efficiently erase huge amounts of the geological record and any fossils contained therein. One must also consider that fossils which remain buried are also effectively out of reach of scientists. Fossils only become available to scientists when erosion removes most or all of the overlying layers. If erosion exposes fossils and scientists do not quickly find and recover the fossils then those fossils are lost to scientific cataloging and study. When one considers all these factors it is clear that the fossil record which we have collected is actually amazingly large and complete.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

$1000 Prize for Evidence Disproving Evolution

I had planned to wait until February 13th to announce this, but there is so much idiocy out there that I have decided to go ahead early. I will award $1000 to the first person presenting unambiguous evidence which supports “Creation Science” or “Intelligent Design Theory” or which disproves certain conclusions published at origin-of-religions.org or which disproves the Theory of Evolution. The governing rules will be posted at the origin-of-religions.org website. Here are the particulars. The $1000 will be presented to the first person who presents unambiguous evidence which
1) Disproves the modern understanding of the theory of evolution, or
2) Disproves certain conclusions published at origin-of-religions.org, namely that religions evolve according to rules similar to those driving evolution of computer viruses and the evolution of life, that the resulting religions have acted and continue to act as a significant selection pressure on the human gene pool, and that as one consequence of that selection pressure, the human gene pool has been skewed toward brains with a genetically mediated predisposition to harbor religion.
3) Proves “Intelligent Design Theory” (Prize award only for proving the original “Intelligent Design Theory” not my version as defined in the Essay “The Irony of the proof for Intelligent Design Theory,” because I’ve already “proven” that version!), or
4) Proves “Creation Science.”
Evidence presented must be “scientific” in nature, where “scientific” means some combination of repeatability, knowledge of provenance, or other characteristic of the evidence which proves its scientific validity. In particular, evidence is not “scientific” if it is self-referential or relies on “circular logic.” For example, “creationists” often advance the Christian Bible as evidence of “God” and “creation.” The “Christian Bible” is in fact nothing more than evidence of the syncretic evolution of religion. The history of the “Christian Bible” reveals multiple authors and unknown provenance of the various writings which have been bound together. Evidence presented must be presented publically and be subject to scientific scrutiny and inquiry. For example it took a very long time to prove the “Shroud of Turin” was a fraud perpetrated by charlatans centuries after the purported time frame of the alleged crucifixion. This delay in getting at the facts was because legitimate scientific scrutiny and testing was not allowed by the Catholic owners of the forgery.
An example of evidence disproving evolution would be fossils found “out of order” in the geological record. For instance if fossilized primate bones were found embedded in sedimentary rocks which also contained fossilized bones of Tyrannosaurus Rex. Even better would be any fossilized bones found in igneous rocks as that would basically disprove central tenets of geology along with biology. Of course I am very confident that such things will not be found (or easily forged).
Why? It is my aim to shame and educate. If successful then some “creationists” will be shamed into silence as they try and fail to claim the $1000. Hopefully one or more of these attempts can be elevated to public “spectacle” and thereby serve to educate people who might otherwise be taken in by the slick lies of “creationists” such as those seen in the “Creation Museum.”
Prize offer void in jurisdictions where it is unlawful or regulated.

Prayer is a Total Cop Out

The Christian prayer ritual is utterly ridiculous – it enables people to believe they've done something for the poor, hungry or afflicted and get a big hit of self righteousness without actually doing anything. They even get to close their eyes and rest whilst supposedly doing this noble act.

Venn Diagram for Religion, Stupidity, and Politics

Love this graphic from Saint Gasoline:

I imagine if there were room then the intersection of “Politics” and “Religion” would have included the Spanish Inquisition and the Government of Iran in addition to the Dark Ages.

Friday, January 28, 2011

Evolution vs. Vegas

Silly “creationists” simply aren’t smart enough to understand evolution. Evolution is like going to Las Vegas. The outcome appears random when the cards are shuffled or the dice are rolled. But somehow on average most people leave way more money in Vegas than they take home. This is because there are underlying rules which favor “the house.” Evolution is like that – there is an underlying rule which heavily favors whatever worked best in the last version and this drives life toward genetic combinations which are best at getting copied. On average “the house” wins and on average the best replicators either consume, starve, or crowd out less efficient replicators. This simple logic even applies to the evolution of religion. That is the central theme at origin-of-religions.org – please go have a read!

Related Education News

Recent news regarding science education in the U.S.: “Just 34 percent of fourth-graders, 30 percent of eighth-graders, and 21 percent of 12th-graders are performing at or above ‘proficient’ in the most recent snapshot from the National Assessment of Educational Progress.” This appalling news is very likely related to the fact that 13% of U.S. high school biology teachers actually push creationism in the classroom. And it certainly didn’t help that the full force of the Bush regime was brought to bear against science. This was done to give cover to pollution profiteers and thus feed the greed – apparently the other major religion in the U.S.

13% of U.S. Teachers Push "Creationism"

Just reading the appalling news that 13% of high school teachers in the United States push “creationism” and it variants in the classroom. No wonder we are falling behind other nations in science and technology. Filling the minds of young people with fairytales and mythology is grossly irresponsible. All these proselytes masquerading as “teachers” should be fined, fired, stripped of their teaching credentials and jailed! If an Atheist teacher pushed the cult of Pastafarianism in the classroom then I’m sure there would be serious repercussions for the teacher. Why do the big cults get all these special rights?

Thursday, January 27, 2011

Publicity banner #3

Here is the third banner – printed on a 3’ x 10’ piece of vinyl and suitable for carrying at parades and taking to protests. It made its debut at the Catholic empire’s “West Coast March for Life” on February 22nd.

This billboard is not insulting



Bill O’Reilly has accused David Silverman and American Atheists of “insulting” religion with this billboard. However, the truth is never insulting. To illustrate this point let us assume that Bill O’Reilly had the intelligence to be a doctor and had in fact earned his PhD in applied medicine. We will further assume that the erstwhile “Doctor” O’Reilly has a thriving medical practice. One day he enters an examining room and is confronted with the following scene. The man is sitting there nearly naked. “Doctor” O’Reilly is first taken aback by the voluminous folds of adipose tissue cascading across the examining table. As “Doctor” O’Reilly is recovering from the shock of seeing all that naked fat he smells something burning. It is at this moment that “Doctor” O’Reilly realizes the patient is smoking and is just now tapping the ashes of a cigarette into an empty beer can. Various wrappers lying near the morbidly obese patient suggest he has just consumed several “super size me” fast food meal combos. “Doctor” O’Reilly – always mindful of his patient’s feelings is now faced with a conundrum. He may choose to “insult” the patient by pointing out all the insalubrious habits which will soon kill the patient (and push healthcare costs higher for the rest of us). Or “Doctor” O’Reilly may “politely” ignore all the facts and through his silence give the patient a clean bill of health.

This is analogous to Atheists telling society that it is ill with religion. In fact humanity is about to O.D. on religion. “Christians” reading this will immediately take offense and start blubbering about “persecution” and all the usual tripe. This is their version of denial – just as the morbidly obese cigarette smoker will deny his addictions to nicotine and fattening foods. “Christians” and other persons infected with religion will try to point to all the good which comes from religion. Yet any humanist is evidence that “good” need not have any connection with religion. In fact it can be easily argued that the humanist is far more moral than the “Christian” – the humanist requires no promise of paradise or threat of eternal torment in lakes of fire before doing what is “right” and “good.”

Religion is bad for humanity and the planet upon which we live. First religion demands that we all be “fruitful and multiply.” This causes overpopulation. This problem pales in comparison to another evil of religion. The people most likely to fall prey to the treachery of religion are predisposed to belief in fairy tales. This propensity to believe in the unbelievable spills over to cause other irrational beliefs. If only more people carried guns then fewer people would die from guns. Drill! Baby! Drill! “Global Warming” is a hoax perpetrated by socialist and communists! If I strap dynamite to my body and kill some “infidels” in a suicide attack then I am guaranteed a place in paradise. If I give my church enough money then I can become a “fully functioning Thetan” or better yet become a god with my own planet to rule over after Judgment Day.

Because of these irrational beliefs people with religion procreate far more often than people without irrational beliefs – and that tilts the gene pool away from genes for rational minds in favor of genes for irrational minds. It is this selection pressure exerted by religion which dooms humanity.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Lying Christians #1

I was at the Catholic’s “West Coast March for Life” earlier today. I heard many lies. But I am going to focus on one. This lie was most often posed as a question. The most common form of the lie was something like this: “Why do you want to kill babies?” The presumption (and lie) is that anyone opposed to the Catholic empire imposing its will over everyone is in favor of killing babies (abortion). This is about as delusional as other propaganda issuing forth from the Catholic empire. The truth is that I and people like me are opposed to abortion. But we are different than Catholics because we believe in going after the causes of abortion and not the symptom of abortion. Women typically seek abortion for one of several reasons. One common reason is that some man conned her into a sexual liaison, probably telling her “forever” when he meant until he achieved gratification. The woman is then cast aside with no way to support herself, no health insurance, and no partner to help raise the child. Some women may have been sexually assaulted – by a stranger or by a trusted relative. If there were no rape, no incest, and no broken promises then that would greatly reduce the number of women seeking abortions. Another reason why women seek abortions is related to birth defects caused by all the toxins to which our society subjects women. These toxins cause spina bifida and other serious birth defects. If we as a society reduced the toxins and improved healthcare for women then another large percentage of abortions would be eliminated. So as usual “conservatives” mistake a symptom – in this case abortion – for a problem and then attempt to do something about the “problem” while irrationally ignoring the actual problem and its underlying causes. If Catholics really wanted to reduce abortions then Catholics would work to eliminate rape, to eliminate incest, to stop men from lying to women, to reduce toxins in the environment and to provide adequate healthcare for all women.

Saturday, January 22, 2011

Publicity banner #2

Here is the artwork submitted for printing as another 3’ x 10’ vinyl banner – suitable for carrying at parades and taking to protests. In fact these banners have arrived and made their debut at the counter protest march against the Catholic empire’s “West Coast March for Life” in San Francisco earlier today.

Friday, January 14, 2011

“Reverend” Fred Phelps – Closet homosexual?

Do not be surprised when the “Reverend” Fred Phelps has his very own “Ted Haggard” moment. There is some enlightening folk wisdom among homosexual men. One bit of this folk wisdom is that the less secure a man is in his own heterosexuality the less comfortable he will be with homosexuality. Men who are less comfortable with homosexuality compensate with open hostility toward homosexuals. “Reverend” Fred Phelps is obviously very hostile toward openly homosexual men. Homosexual men often refer to these openly hostile men as “three beer queers” or “six beer queers.” This represents an estimate of the amount of alcohol needed to lower inhibitions to the point where repressed homosexual desire gets the upper hand. Based on all the loud anti-gay rhetoric it is clear there is a lot of repressed homosexual desire out there. A logical extension of Darwin’s Theory of evolution even reveals the most likely reason why this is so. In short religion acts as a section pressure on the gene pool of humanity. Religion skews the gene pool to favor genes for brains which are most likely to be controlled by religion. One characteristic which favors control by a religion is a heightened sensitivity to guilt – and built in guilt triggers. If you are skeptical about this conclusion or want more details then spend some time at the origin-of-religions.org website.

Publicity banner #1

Here is the artwork submitted for printing as a 3’ x 10’ vinyl banner – suitable for carrying at parades and taking to protests.

Christian Hypocrisy in the news

Several weeks ago – before I started this blog – I read an article which described tensions between Beijing and the pretentious prelate of Rome. The presumptuous pontiff was apparently in a snit because China dared to appoint a bishop of its own choosing. The article quoted a Vatican communiqué regarding Beijing’s supposed transgression against the Catholic empire. “The persistent desire to control the most intimate area of citizens' lives, namely their conscience, and to interfere in the internal life of the Catholic church does no credit to China,” and then implied some sort of cowardice on the part of the sovereign nation of China. Did you notice the hypocrisy? It was truly bizarre to read that the Catholic empire had the nerve to complain about anyone wishing to “control the most intimate area of citizens’ lives.” Beijing doesn’t want to share that power with Rome – and Rome should know exactly how that feels because essentially they are in a snit over having to share power with Beijing. It is actually worse than that – the Vatican has surely plumbed new depths of hypocrisy with its statement. I say this because the Vatican is always trying to assert control over the lives everyone – including people who do not choose to affiliate themselves with the Catholic empire. The pompous Pope is always going on about condoms, abortion, and demands discrimination enshrined in law for homosexuals. China was merely moderating Rome’s influence over Chinese citizens – citizens who listen to the Catholic empire of their own free will. I’d say Beijing had the moral high ground – its actions probably serve to stifle dissent, but its actions also protect its citizens from the scourge and scam which is the Catholic empire.

Thursday, January 13, 2011

Gotta love this graphic!

There is some very amusing stuff mixed with all the thought contagion on the World Wide Web. I liked this bit well enough to take the time to recreate it as a vector file. That means I could easily have it printed really big with no “fuzziness.”

Lying “Creationists” #1

Lying creationists keep telling us that The Theory of Evolution means “everything is randomness” and that this is reason to believe in an “intelligent designer.” Well, evolution is about as random as losing money at a casino. If one goes to the casino everything might first appear to be random – there are randomly shuffled cards, spinning roulette wheels, and dice being thrown. Yet there must be something making operation of the casino profitable. The something which makes the operation profitable is a set of underlying rules which favor the house. Thus on average each visitor looses much more money than they “win.” This pays the electric bill for all that glitz. Evolution also has underlying rules which favor certain outcomes. One could consider that each new offspring and each new seedling as a “roll of the dice” by mother nature. Except that mother nature is rolling load dice! The dice she rolls are heavily weighted in favor of genes and combinations of genes which have worked in the past. So yes, evolution involves a sort of “randomness” but nothing like the “randomness” claimed by creationists.

Welcome to Origin of Religions

This blog is an adjunct to origin-of-religions.org – a project which aims to explain the origin and diversity of religion just as Darwin’s Origin of Species explained the origin and diversity of life. Hopefully this knowledge will reduce the power and influence of religion. This is important because religion imperils the future of humanity and much of life on Earth. This statement may seem to be over-reaching, but read origin-of-religions.org and this blog and you will surely change your mind. Thanks for reading and praised be the Flying Spaghetti Monster!