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My wife helps out at her church’s nursery. She helps watch barely or non-walking kids while their parents attend services and whatnot. Though she doesn’t really offer the lessons that the rest of her church’s children’s ministry does, she gets kept in the loop on what they’re teaching.

I happened to look at her computer screen this morning, and saw this week’s or month’s bible story. It said something along the lines of “God is your strength and shield,” and was meant to emphasize their god’s omnipotence.

I mean, at first take, that’s foolish enough, because there are plenty of homeless people … Continue Reading

Just wrapped up The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins. It was a thorough challenge to common held beliefs by most people I know, and I like that it helped me think through other arguments that I’ve read. Dawkins has the luck to be both brilliant and articulate. While I never doubted that Hitchens was a really smart guy, he wrote in such a way that it took a long time for me to understand anything he said.

The Ugly: Dawkins actually writes really well, and there wasn’t much about the … Continue Reading

I think in everyone there’s some sense of wonder. It manifests itself in stupid things (”what happens if I light my hand on fire?”) to funny things (”what happens if I put the cat in the crib with the baby?”) to awesome things (”why is light getting bent around some invisible spot in the universe?”)

As wonder increases, we’re required to shed some preconceptions. Maybe electricity isn’t magic, and follows a set of rules. Maybe bacteria doesn’t spontaneously appear (this was a valid theory for the origin of life for a long time), but comes from other bacteria and changes over … Continue Reading

Growing up, I remember hearing lots of stories about monsters. From monsters that live in the mirror and are summoned by chants to monsters who stray outside kids’ windows to that punk who lives way up north who will give you coal for Christmas if you’re bad.

With monsters, there’s always some contract that you’re under, and if you break it, you get punished. Sometimes monsters reward you for not breaking the contract (Santa brings you gifts if you’re good!), but most of the time they’re more rooted in fear than reward.

Some time in our maturation there’s an awakening, where we … Continue Reading

The line of reasoning and questioning goes something like this:

Moore’s law doesn’t show any sign of failing, causing computer power to double every 18 months.
This is exponential growth.
With that in mind, it’s entirely feasible that within the next few decades we have machines that think.
Thinking could lead to emotions.
If a robot thinks and has emotions, what happens when you pull the plug?

It’s a question that people can dismiss pretty easily right now, but what separates us from machines right now? The will to live? An ability to reproduce? Thinking? Emotions?

What if we made a robot that could do all of … Continue Reading

There’s examples all over the place of isolationism running rampant. From Lou Dobbs whining about illegal immigrants taking jobs to fellow parents talking about homeschooling their kids to religious people getting visibly annoyed when they’re questioned. While the actors in those examples are different, the central tenet is the same: new ideas are scary.

This is a terrible approach, and in my experience leads to slower development. America seemed to develop quickly (relatively) among other countries in the world. This can be attributed to a few things, each of which helps ideas mature and develop faster, like the first amendment and … Continue Reading

I read a post and a thread on Reddit the other day that said that it’s not good to answer Christians with “there’s no evidence for a God” when they ask “why don’t you believe?”

The answer instead should explain all the things wrong with their religion, yadda yadda yadda. So, here’s my answer:

“I don’t believe in a god because there’s nothing that can only be explained by a god. Natural wonders, like life and stars and Neil Patrick Harris, have logical explanations built upon the study of the environment for hundreds of years. Further, groups claiming to know of a … Continue Reading

And I spew bullshit that my congregation eats up.

I think there’s a lot of problems with religious groups, and at the root is that they all ask an imaginary friend for help and give him/her credit even when nothing happens (”some of god’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers…”).

That said, another issue with these groups is the credibility they lend to their leaders. Pastors and preachers and cardinals and popes can say whatever they want, and it often goes unchecked, happily swallowed by their respective congregations. 

Case in point: We host a Christian small group at our house. I wouldn’t usually participate, … Continue Reading

I realized a while ago that if you argue in the context of a specific religion, you’re conceding a lot that can’t be compensated. If you stop arguing for the existence of a god and start debating a specific god - say, Jesus - you’re done. The other guy, granted he has an efficient handle of logic, will argue you into a corner, because you’ve conceded so much.

The same goes for arguing in the context of science. If you try to prove a god’s existence in science, you have to play by the same rules as everybody else. This means … Continue Reading

Before Sara and I got married, or before we even got engaged, I’d been talked to by several family members (on both sides) about my lack of commitment to God. It wasn’t that I was anti-God or anything; I just hadn’t given it much thought. The only debates I’d engaged in were over passages from the Bible, and the debates centered entirely around a Christian god.

After we got engaged, I decided that I wanted to be a Christian. So, I prayed about it. I read about it. Probably not nearly at the length that other people do, but I did, … Continue Reading