Heaven and Hell... the board game

Looks like the right place for such ideas to me and as usual this spiky but funny concept comes from Crispian Jago

Click the image to see a full sized view.

Frequency of miracles

Obvious really...

Undesirable side-effects of faith

Faith, or in other words believing things without evidence or against all evidence often leads otherwise intelligent people to do really strange and sometimes insanely inhumane things. Take these 4 morons in Chile for example, they belonged to some kind of quasi-religious personality cult and believed in their own imaginary crap (grounded in Bible crap) so intently that they took a young baby they believed to be the anti-Christ and burnt her alive. The interesting part of this story for me was nothing to do with the pathetic actions of the feeble minded end-timers themselves but the fact that everyone in the sect had university degrees!

I guess you can lead a horse to water etc..

Why do I need Warsi?

Baroness Warsi (the person in the photo who most resembles Liza Tarbuck) is our (unelected) "minister for faith and communities", she recently attended and spoke at a meeting of the Federation of Student Islamic Societies (FOSIS) an organisation that has previously hosted some highly undesirable characters including people who openly support suicide bombing, one of the three people said to have inspired the 9/11 attacks and many other extremists. Warsi's own party (and the Lib Dems) boycott this organisation and condemn it as "failing to fully challenge terrorist and extremist ideology" so its rather surprising that the Baroness chose to speak there and also that her talk was rather apologetically on the subject of media demonisation of Islamic students, something which given the evidence and history of late is a pointless question with a rather obvious answer.

Warsi is famously anti-secular, and from the point of view of her efficacy and qualification to govern hides behind her superstitions; she is after all a token (middle class) Muslim in a Government keen to tow an apologetic line. Like a lot of religious politicians she seems keen to fight aggressively for a level playing field for religion when it comes to hand-outs and access to political power and yet demands special privileges for them against the cultural and political forces of equality, secularism and reason. For me she represents one of the most objectionable faces of religion today, the sickly sweet façade of respectability and liberal reasonableness that attacks hard won secular values (like freedom of speech) from the comfort and security of enlightenment institutions.

We don't need to scratch very hard to expose the true colour of metal below the surface of Warsi, its the same old privileged arrogance that pays lip service to the truth of religion and faith and really just rides the audience, utility and influence that it delivers. No contradiction illustrates this better than Warsi's own position, in this BBC report she comments on how Islam is perfectly compatible with "British values" and visits an Islamic centre in the North West. Like most TV reports of this ilk the images carefully depict Women visiting the centre but if you look closely you can read the sign above the door, it says "Women's entrance". With such glaring cognitive dissonance regarding her own position and the attitude toward Women and free speech of the tradition she defends it's very difficult to take Warsi seriously, in fact I would question why in a modern, secular country like ours we need a "minister for faith" at all?

Double standards

I read with fascination and a sense of utter incredulity that some bloke called James McCormick has recently been convicted of fraud for selling fake bomb detectors to the Government for £27,000 a piece when they consisted of nothing more than a novelty golf ball finder normally sold for $13. My disbelief stems not from the conviction but the fact that he was able to get away with it for so long and make millions of pounds selling utter trash packaged up as something miraculous to otherwise intelligent people.

This story made me think of the strange double standard at work in our society, i.e. how come we can convict someone like McCormick for selling fake bomb detectors but embrace Homoeopathy into our state funded health service? The parallels seem excruciatingly similar to me, false security in potentially life threatening situations, extortion of unreasonably large amounts of money for unproven and unskilled products and services and a complete disregard for normal processes of testing and validation.

The more you think about this case and the wider implications of it the more you realise that our society is riddled with similar situations, in fact you could say this predator-prey state is the norm and not the exception. From greedy bankers exploiting unrealistic aspirational borrowing, unscrupulous doctors seeding future measles epidemics via scaremongering media moguls selling newspapers through to handicapped people paying thousands of pounds to travel to Lourdes hoping for a miracle, only to catch a water-born parasite from drinking polluted "blessed water" from a communal font.

If we want to examine the true cost of credulity then we don't need a case like this, we need only look around, it seems to be part of our nature.

Vapid chumminess

For those people of a nervous religious disposition, whatever you do don't click on the play button, you may just be offended to your core by this piece of foul-mouthed, subversive and blasphemous church bashing. Seriously though, how the hell did the BBC end up pulling this little sketch from the iPlayer, what has our pluralistic and supposedly enlightened nation come to when on the same (charity) show jokes about disabled people are fine but jokes about elite, privileged members of the establishment are censored.

“Foul-mouthed” is the wrong phrase, Rowan Atkinson’s offence was simply being accurate, perfectly characterising the cheerfully vapid chumminess of a thoroughly liberal Christian leader. That’s what got people upset, he didn’t just dis religion, he showed the objectors what they looked like through our eyes, and it was so close to how the believers see them too it was a palpable smack in the chops!

Spirit of the dance

Love this Christian advice...

The most unbelievable part is that you'd actually want to dance to "Christian rock"...

Blood non-relativism

Here's a rather odd story, apparently some Jewish Rabbi/leader has decreed that in the case of an accident, orthodox Jewish males should not receive blood from Jewish women unless it's a matter of life and death and even then the donor needs to be married and not single. Receiving blood from a non-Jew is strictly verboten in all cases and blood may not be taken from males and females at the same time or in a synagogue ... obviously. It's not clear who female orthodox Jews can receive blood from, maybe women don't actually get healthcare in this religious sect, who knows. It all sounds like a lot of making stuff up as you go along in order to exert control over the lives of ordinary people to me.

In other Orthodox Jew related health news today I noticed that some bloke has produced the first ever sex manual for Orthodox Jews, good for him! Although why this is different from the countless other sex manuals already out there is a slightly strange concept to grapple with. What with all the prohibitions this particular group has on food, behaviour, clothing, healthcare and human interaction a less natural state of affairs for a group of people seems hard to imagine, maybe that's the point?

CofE cool wall

More class humor from Crispian Jago, click the image to see it full size.

Beatriz's choice

Imagine being told that your unborn foetus is suffering from Anencephaly (which means it's developing without a brain and will die, see above) and in addition to that it may just take you with it. That's exactly what is facing a Woman in El Salvador right now as medical services try desperately to help her.

If this isn't traumatic enough, imagine also being told that if you abort the foetus chances are you'll recover but then you'll go to jail because you live in a country that has a government so backward that it enshrines in its law an interpretation of an ancient myth from the Middle East, delivered to its shores in the 16th century by Spaniards (who no longer bake these religious interpretations into their legal system) at a time when the medical remedy for most things was thought to be a bucket of leeches.

People often ask the question, why do atheists care about religion when they don't believe in God, it's simple, atheists are also human beings and have empathy, we can't help it we're just wired that way. A more relevant question in my view would be why aren't Catholics?

Islamophobia

This says it all really...

Chatting up geeks

Dealing with geeks must be hell for most normal people, particularly geeks who are also computer programmers. These folks lives are dominated by precision and a desire to eliminate ambiguity yet they often lack the social skills flexibility to be able to switch into the normal fuzzy, egocentric, ambiguous imprecise communication mode that most non-geeks are comfortable with. I sometimes think that anyone observing a typical geek conversation would think it torturous, strained and mostly unnecessary or not to the point.

To illustrate what I mean, here is an imagined conversation between a geek boy and a non-geek girl he wants to ask out for a date (it would be initiated by the girl obviously)

-Girl: so why should I go out with you?
-Geek: because I think I might like you and you might like me
-Girl: you don't seem too sure, let me ask you some questions..
-Geek: ok
-Girl: do you own a BMW?
-Geek: no
-Girl: do you have your own flat?
-Geek: no
-Girl: do you have a good salary?
-Geek: no
-Girl: ok, let me think about it, see you later.
-Geek: great, email me

Conversation ends..

Later the geek thinks to himself,

- I don't understand why she wouldn't go out with me, I own a software company worth 50 million, a house in the London, a house in France and a house in California, I pay myself £250,000 a year through dividends and I don't see why the hell I need a BMW since I already have 2 Mercedes, 2 motor bikes, a speedboat and a jeep for weekends?

It's all about the detail..

Real wonder

Great imagery from the ISS (International Space Station) - it's fun to try and pick out the countries and land-marks as they whizz by below.

From way up there you can get a sense of our place in the enormity of the universe, IMO we should send our politicians and especially that twit from North Korea up there for a few weeks so that they might gain some perspective and perhaps even humility.

Success

Particularly relevant in the tech industry..

The nature of experience and evidence

You hear a crash and a bang late at night, perhaps it wakes you, what could it be?

We've all experienced surprise like this, and perhaps even fear, especially when confronted by sensual stimulus (like noise or feelings) that can't necessarily be seen directly. A frantic thought process ensues as we scramble to identify possible causes, we all seek causes for things its in our nature; from an evolutionary perspective it's obvious to understand why establishing potential causality would be useful from a survival point of view, without it our bodies would be totally unprepared for whatever happened next.

Did something fall, is someone breaking in, is there a ghost? We can't disprove any of these ideas without evidence but a lack of evidence leaves us with only statistics to go on, what's more likely? That a decrease in ambient temperature caused the central heating pipes to contract and make a noise, or, that every known physical law of nature has been temporarily suspended and a phantom from beyond the grave has taken time out from a busy haunting schedule to bump into the kitchen table (how ethereal beings interact with real molecules is perhaps a philosophical point for another time)?

Evidence is the raw material that we use to help us sort out the useful ideas from the frivolous ones, in the mysterious case of what went bump in the night, how about a pigeon flying into the bedroom window? Pretty unlikely you may think, but how much more likely than a poltergeist, 100 times, 1000 times or more? A quick inspection of the windows may even turn up a greasy imprint like the one in the picture, sealing the deal, not 100% of course (an angel might have put it there to fool you) but good enough for me to settle back down to sleep, case closed.

None of this commentary on Human nature is new of course, back in 1748 a rather smart Scottish philosopher called David Hume wrote a book that explored such ideas, here is a short extract.

An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding 1748 - A miracle is a violation of the laws of nature; and as a firm and unalterable experience has established these laws, the proof against a miracle, from the very nature of the fact, is as entire as any argument from experience can possibly be imagined. Why is it more than probable, that all men must die; that lead cannot, of itself, remain suspended in the air; that fire consumes wood, and is extinguished by water; unless it be, that these events are found agreeable to the laws of nature, and there is required a violation of these laws, or in other words, a miracle to prevent them? Nothing is esteemed a miracle, if it ever happen in the common course of nature. It is no miracle that a man, seemingly in good health, should die on a sudden: because such a kind of death, though more unusual than any other, has yet been frequently observed to happen. But it is a miracle, that a dead man should come to life; because that has never been observed in any age or country. There must, therefore, be a uniform experience against every miraculous event, otherwise the event would not merit that appellation....

The plain consequence is (and it is a general maxim worthy of our attention), 'That no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind, that its falsehood would be more miraculous, than the fact, which it endeavours to establish....' When anyone tells me, that he saw a dead man restored to life, I immediately consider with myself, whether it be more probable, that this person should either deceive or be deceived, or that the fact, which he relates, should really have happened. I weigh the one miracle against the other; and according to the superiority, which I discover, I pronounce my decision, and always reject the greater miracle. If the falsehood of his testimony would be more miraculous, than the event which he relates; then, and not till then, can he pretend to command my belief or opinion.

In the foregoing reasoning we have supposed, that the testimony, upon which a miracle is founded, may possibly amount to an entire proof, and that the falsehood of that testimony would be a real prodigy: But it is easy to shew, that we have been a great deal too liberal in our concession, and that there never was a miraculous event established on so full an evidence.

So, next time some apologist for religion or fan of the supernatural confronts you with that tired old canard of "you never know", just ask them to think about what's more likely, i.e. that,

a) all the natural laws of our universe were suspended momentarily just so that one evolved primate (of billions) on an insignificant speck of rock somewhere in a minor galaxy (of hundreds of billions) could learn something about themselves, or..

b) they are mistaken...

Rust in peace

Its going to be difficult to avoid Mrs Thatcher over the next few days, there'll be the reviews, the obituaries  the specials the tributes and countless spurious references from politicians who desperately need to get their chubby little faces on the goggle box. I have mixed feelings about her, I admire her for what she achieved as a Women in the male dominated world of politics and I admire her resolute approach, but I'm less keen on the divisive and unsympathetic nature of some of her more dogmatic policies. We should only really judge people in their time I suppose and I believe we live in a fairer country today, although I can't help sometimes wishing that we had more politicians with a backbone, iron would be nice although just plain bone would do.

Topless Jihad

Ukrainian feminist group Femen urged women throughout Europe to stage protests last week in support of a young Tunisian activist named Amina Tyler. Last month, Tyler posted naked images of herself on-line with the words "I own my body; it's not the source of anyone's honour  written on her bare chest.

Most reasonable (i.e. grown up) states wouldn't pay much attention at all to such a harmless protest but unfortunately for Amina she lives in a country where the government is infused with religion, in her case Islam. The head of Tunisia's "Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice," (yes there really is such a position!)  reportedly called for Tyler to be stoned to death for her putatively obscene actions, lest they lead to an epidemic. Tyler has since gone quiet, leading some to fear for her safety.

Sometimes I think that Women really do hold the key to dismantling the various oppressive (and mostly theocratic) states that still exist in the 21st century. The sooner Women in these countries feel empowered to take some influence and stake in their own lives the better.

A glimpse into the dark ages

Looks like an interesting and enlightening program due to be broadcast on Monday; Panorama has been secretly filming experiences of some unfortunate Muslim women trying to seek remedy for domestic abuse via the Sharia council system in the UK, no doubt the program will cause some ripples in the pond of community harmony, if its accurate so it should. This is a system which in my view is simply divisive and frankly unnecessary in a modern secular country. The law, like ethics should be based on current learning, reason and inclusiveness not religions which in most cases are the antithesis of these, it should evolve and improve based on experience and not be shackled to ancient books, anything else seems like a retrograde step to me. To me this looks like a glimpse into a long since abandoned way of doing things based on vested interests and superstition that regardless of peoples beliefs is simply inferior. Of course our legal system is imperfect, there are flaws and it can be slow to move sometimes, however, on the whole issues do get addressed over time.

Sharia (or any kind of alternative Law) don't need it here, don't want it here.

Happy April

Its been ages since I've posted anything, my excuse is that I took some (rare) holiday last week and went skiing with my family. Wonderful place (France - Val Thorens) and great snow conditions for the time of year but because of the pesky Gulf Stream the weather was awful (low cloud) as it has been here at home; we only had one nice day in the week (as per this picture of my son).

If I ever get rich and decadent I think I'll buy a pad in the mountains somewhere..

Wine and Chinese ambition

Looking forward to watching this..

A load of betty swallocks...

Superb work as ever from Crispian Jago, click on the image to see a larger version.

Can't beat a bit of bull y..

Well, come on, it does look like him!

You might be a hypocrite if...

I like this line of thinking from soggymog.

It never ceases to amaze me how fragmented and splintered most religious thinking is; for me it simply seems so much more likely and logical that there isn't enough evidence to sufficiently show any of it is true. Anyway, regardless of your view take a look at the following list of potentially hypocritical statements that are frequently made by religious apologists and see if you agree that they are (the ones in italics at the bottom are some extra ones I thought of after reading soggymogs' list).

• You don't accept evolution but you take antibiotics.
• You believe in the Young-Earth creation story but use petrol.
• You credit an omnipotent, omniscient being with all the good stuff, but blame him for none of the bad stuff.
• You believe in your god on the grounds that it can't be disproved, but think invisible unicorns, the Flying Spaghetti Monster and other deities are silly.
• You've had life-saving medical treatment and then thanked God for your recovery.
• You think you're exercising your right to free speech when you tell us we're going to hell and then scream persecution when we tell you your religion's a crock.
• You believe your magic book is the work of an infallible god, but think you're allowed to overlook the bits on slavery and genocide.
• You call yourself "pro-life" while supporting war and the death penalty, and opposing gun control, state-funded healthcare and stem-cell research.
• You claim to believe that God looks after you but you still lock your doors, use seatbelts and take medicines.
• You tell your congregation homosexuality is an abomination and then turn out to be gay.
• You think the idea of a loving God who'll torture you for eternity makes sense. (Actually, that one makes you not so much a hypocrite as a moron.)
• You categorically disavow evolution despite not understanding its most basic principles, like why its not a random process.
• You say the Old Testament is not to be taken literally... apart from the bits that are.
• You use Leviticus to argue against marriage equality, while ignoring all the bits about tattoos and trimming your beard.
• You believe in heaven, but oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide.
• You believe you'll go to heaven when you die, but you'll fight tooth and nail for that heart surgery.
• You tell us science is a hoax or doesn't work ON F***ING TWITTER!!!
• You think God's rules are set in stone and must be obeyed on pain of being sent to hell, but you drive on Sundays and have kids out of wedlock.
• You think a human foetus has more rights than a human adult.
• You think other people need God's rules to be moral, but you ignore them yourself.
• You thank God for saving one life in a disaster that kills dozens or hundreds or thousands of others.
• You think people need the threat of hell to be moral, and think that makes YOU more moral than us.
• You accept evolution but still believe in the original sin of two people who can never have existed.
• You accept all the benefits and perks handed to you on a plate by modern science, but cry like a little child when it shows up the ridiculousness of your religious beliefs.
• You tell us that God is beyond human comprehension, then give us a list of his pet hates and tell us in detail what'll happen to us if we disobey the rules.

• You claim that nothing is knowable in order to discount science as a way of knowing things and yet claim to "know" that (insert deity of choice) is the personal saviour of mankind.
• You claim that science and religion are both equal as ways of knowing the truth and yet for 99% of your life decisions you use the methods of science (i.e. evidence) to make them.
• You agree that a lot of the stories in your holy book are allegorical and yet selective ones are not, however you provide no reasoning for why some are and some aren't other than blatant alignment to narrow self interest.
• You claim that your God is eternal and yet you can't possibly get something from nothing.

I'm sure there are some secular/atheistic equivalents out there too, I'll try and construct a list and publish later.

Yay 1000 posts!

In the name of..

History of me

Here's a fun site for a boring Friday afternoon, Yearbook Yourself is where you can upload a photo and then have the software transform your image back over the decades to the 50s, 60s, 70s etc. replete with appropriate hair-do and accessories, see below...

I think I prefer the 50s..

Holy cr*p!

So here's a cute little story, some American chap thinks he's had a message from Yahweh, not a burning bush or a bolt of lightening of course but a splat of bird poo on his windscreen that looks like Jesus (how would we know?). The opportunities for making fun of this kind of thing are like the traditional Christian view of their glorious leader, i.e. infinite, which is strange since this Christian at least thinks he's a shit communicator. (phnar phnar)

There were 10 in the bed and the little one said..

I read that Catholic Cardinal Keith O'Brien has quit his post today. O'Brien is someone I've blogged about several times before regarding his seemingly arrogant and antiquated outbursts on social subjects such as same sex marriage, secularism and abortion when such views appeared in the media. I must confess that it's with a smidgen of  schadenfreude that I see accusations regarding his own (alleged) dubious behaviour have forced him to resign his position only weeks away from retirement.

Against the backdrop of the Pope himself stepping down and various birds coming home to roost regarding the sexual and financial in-proprietaries of several of the candidates in the new leadership race any casual observer could and probably should reasonably conclude that the whole damn organisation is rotten to the core and long overdue for a complete overhaul.

Hopefully justice will prevail and hopefully rational and fair-minded people will not loose sight of the fact that it's not same sex marriage that's "grotesque and unnatural" as Mr O'Brien puts it, rather, it's the ludicrous adherence of certain religions to obsessive, outdated and misogynistic ideas about reality, specifically the realities of human Biology. If O'Brien is found guilty and is truly a moral man he will have a fantastic opportunity to help many other people in similar quandaries by simply admitting that he was wrong and by encouraging people to accept the realities of their own Biology and not cling onto unnatural and harmful abstinences.

Homeopathic cartoon

Atheist Church Services

Here's a wacky idea I came across today, Atheist Church. Well more like church with a small "c" I suppose but it does sound a lot like the other kind to me, with someone at the front talking, audience participation and singing songs etc. I'm not convinced this would be for me. I'd be the one sitting at the back thinking of all the things I could be doing with the time, like enjoying the one life I have, but I can certainly appreciate how some people might feel the need for the community and ritual aspects of a regular gathering like this, albeit minus the supernatural parts.

There was one thing I liked, a clever inversion of Pascal's wager which goes like this,

"In the absence of firm evidence for any particular God, why not to live your life as though it is the only one you have? Every moment will be sweeter, every minute more precious. Then, if there is a God, they will doubly reward you for living a good life without the bribe of heaven, or the threat of hell."

Job hunting?

Saw this today, fine Friday (fun) material..

Dumb news

Ever since the Pope resigned yesterday superstitious people have been scrambling around trying to find some omen to tell them if it's a good thing or the signalling of the start of the "end-times", as they do. The mainstream media picked up on a story that a bolt of lightening struck St. Peters Basilica in Rome a few hours after the announcement, this story has been leapt upon by credulous people worldwide. What a natural imbalance of electrical charge in the atmosphere has to do with job vacancies in the Vatican I'm not too sure, but those among us more prone to believing in the power of non sequitur clearly think it's a sign from their big man in the sky.

This kind of thing always amuses me, if these people really think that their God communicates with us via electrical discharges then why put lightening conductors on tall buildings like churches? Surely this is as "contra Deus" as wearing one of those little rubber thingies, you know, those "man-focused" temporary coverings that also prevent unwanted consequences from other kinds of discharges, a theological quandary if ever there was one.

So the search for a replacement Pope begins, much like organised religion itself really a process involving the perpetuation of worldly self interest wrapped up in mystery, ritual and obfuscation in order to elevate it above the mundane affairs of its "flock" and secure their reverence  The Cardinals need not vex themselves too much though, I'm pretty sure I know who should take over. The answer to their prayers was revealed to me in a dream, there exists a perfectly qualified person; a person who lives in Italy, is not a Woman, definitely not gay, used to handling obscene amounts of money, power and arrogance and to cap it all he's currently looking for a job...

All hail Pope Silvio...

Atheists for Jesus

Following on from the Super Bowl post last week I happened across this, it's some kind of advertisement for Atheism. Very nicely made but slightly odd viewed through English eyes, what's it for I ask myself? I imagine that it plays out better in America where Atheists are certainly under a lot more pressure from the various aggressive religious factions there. I suspect that just having something to accompany the overt (and pervasive) public religious messaging stateside makes non-believing people feel better or maybe it's aimed at provoking fence-sitters, who knows, it's a free country as they say.

ex-Popes

In what sounds like the beginnings of a Monty Python sketch I read today that we now have an "ex-pope", Pope Benedict having quit his post as "Vicar of Christ on Earth" via the somewhat mundane act of releasing a resignation press release through international media channels this morning (what no angels?)...

I'm intrigued, does this mean Herr Ratzinger is now fallible again, will he wake up tomorrow morning, stumble down to breakfast bleary-eyed like the rest of us mortals only to stub his toe on the kitchen table leg and swear like a trooper? The world needs to know! I'd love to be at his next job interview too, so Herr Ratzinger, why did you leave your last job, personal development opportunities not good enough? Did you feel like you were in a bit of a dead end, was your boss simply not listening to you?

Seriously though, I can't help thinking there's some massive revelation about some horrible scandal just about to break across the worlds media, I do hope not.

Super-natural Bowl

Here's a scary statistic, 27% of Americans think that "God" (presumably their God) has a hand in determining the outcome of the Super Bowl. Wow, how conceited can some people get? To think that God would take time out from ruthlessly slaughtering African children by the 000s every day in order to preside over a silly game of football, and not even real football at that!

Dem bones etc.

I read with interest that the bones found under a car park in Leicester are indeed those of late King of England Richard III. DNA tests have confirmed royal genealogy and carbon dating has placed the body at the temporal scene of Richards' last battle Bosworth, where he was killed in action and York begat Tudor as the name of the leading crime family in medieval England, the rest is history as they say. (cue lots of infantile scatological jokes about Leicester)

Wondrous Life of Brian

A new BBC science series started yesterday, called the "Wonders of Life" it's been advertised all week and is fronted by the ubiquitous Prof. Brian Cox, so, at 9 pm I settled down on the sofa with a nice Thornbridge IPA and tuned in.

The first thing that became clear was that this program will almost certainly generate a lot of "letters" to the BBC from quivering Christian and Muslim apologists who will probably be offended by the lack of deference to their various myths. Brian Cox is a fairly outspoken rationalist, he doesn't believe in God(s) and is outspoken on the subject of woo-woo (i.e. things like homoeopathy and astrology) this was clear from the outset. Life as he described it is a natural process, no need for magical spirits or souls and science should be able to explain everything about it using only the laws of physics. He's got all the evidence on his side of course but as the words were emerging from my TV speaker I was thinking about all those tedious CIF comments espousing "mystery", "fundamentalist atheists" and "you never know..". It was refreshing to watch something that went to the heart of things and took a strong position rather than the usual dancing around the handbags when it comes to public broadcasts and the origins of life / nature of conciousness etc. Creationists be damned.

As for the content, I quite liked it, I learned a few things and overall I though that it handled some complex topics with reasonable examples and analogies whilst not dumbing down too much. The filmography was slightly cheesy (lots of stunning backdrops, unnecessary helicopter shots and dramatic music) but then again his hero is Carl Sagan so what do you expect. I recorded it for my kids to watch at an earlier time, that's usually the acid test for me, if it holds their attention for an hour then it's all good in my book.

Lines on the map (and in our heads)

Once we've voted on whether the UK wishes to remain in Europe or not I think we should vote on our position in the North Atlantic, personally I've always preferred the Mediterranean, the food is so much more interesting and the wine situation incomparable. Then we should sort out the thorny issue of planet Earth, I find the gravity here limiting, somewhere with less mass would be much better for those of us reaching a certain age and starting to suffer minor niggles with our backs and joints, isn't the democratic process wonderful.

Time flies like bullets at an NRA open day..

Where has January gone? Last time I looked at my watch it was new year, and now it feels like everyone is well and truly gripped by a bad dose of the mid-January blues. Apparently the 21st of January is the most depressing day of the year, I wouldn't argue, what with the mildly inclined road I live on under 2 inches of solid ice; every morning is an angst filled adventure. Will I make it to the main road or will I join all the other under-qualified ice-drivers in the front garden of the nice (but rather depressed) man who lives at the bottom of the hill.

Anyway at least the kids are having fun throwing ever more discoloured snow around at every possible opportunity. Mine get home from school looking like they've been dragged through a cold car wash backwards but at least they have rosy cheeks and smiles on their faces unlike most of the adults arriving at my office in the misty first light of morning; they grasp their cups of tea in clenched hands and stare unblinkingly into the middle distance as their stress levels and core temperatures return to normal.

Still, mustn't grumble, there is always someone worse off than you, spare a thought for the many people killed or injured from accidental shootings whilst attending the recent NRA "Gun Appreciation Day" event in America, I suppose at least they now appreciate the problem with guns, well, the ones that aren't dead.

What discrimination?

Looks like the European courts have junked all but one of the recent religious discrimination appeals although the one upheld was certainly the case that made the least practical sense. The ECHR upheld the appeal of Nadia Eweida who back in 2006 had a job as a check-in clerk for BA and was told not to wear a piece of jewellery which happened to be a cross on a necklace. At the time BA had a very strict policy on jewellery (which I can sort of understand for public facing roles) regardless of the religious significance or otherwise. The BA rules have since changed (2007) and interestingly Nadia still works there, so I guess she forgave them. In any case I'm not sure where it says that Christians must wear crosses, I always thought fishes were the approved symbol, then again, I'm no theologian. Perhaps one of my religious readers could point me to the verse that says "And Jesus said, take this rather delicate and attractive 9 carat necklace and wear it in remembrance of me...and perhaps a nice little brooch sometimes too"?

The downside of claiming the moral highground

Here is a fascinating insight into the mind of a Catholic apologist, his article is from 2011 before the Jimmy Savile scandal was unpleasantly inserted into our conciousness. The author of the piece is irate that the press would report on the death of a celebrity like Savile (who died in 2011) elaborating on his many charitable and voluntary acts but not reporting on where these things came from, which according to the author was the fact that Savile had "faith" and was a devout Catholic attending regular Mass. The choice of quotes in the article about the fallen star is (with hindsight) chilling, the author particularly likes the question Savile is reported as asking Broadmoor inmates, “what do you want to go round strangling crumpet for?”.

The problem with this kind of claim of course is what happens when it all goes wrong, as it invariably does, and the people you hold up as leading lights of your faith/political party/race/nationality etc. turn out to be nothing more than ordinary, weak, flawed and sometimes monstrous human beings. If religious people of any flavour feel inclined to attribute good things like charity, flowers, sunshine and puppies to their particular omnipotent Deity then they also need to accept the logical necessity of attributing the bad as well, suffering, disease, hate and child molesting ex-BBC presenters.

I maybe sometime

Here's an interesting idea, retrace our species ' "long walk" out of Africa through the Middle East, Asia, North and South America to the furthest point of our colonisation of the planet Tierra del Fuego at the Southern tip of the American continent, and do it all like they did, i.e. on foot.

It's estimated that humans made this migration around 45,000 years ago although there is evidence of earlier migrations 65,000 years ago and as many as 100,000 years ago, in any case even at walking speed this journey will only take US journalist Paul Salopek 7 years to complete (and he won't be walking every day). Of course it's not likely that early humans did the trip in a oner as Salopek will, most of them probably found a nice spot along the way somewhere and stayed a few generations before moving on. Even when they did some must have left the odd tribe behind since we now see people that are physically adapted to the climate and environments of their chosen plots along the route. Its also interesting to consider the land bridge that must have existed at some point between Asia and America during this period, we already know from fossil evidence that other species made this same journey back and forth much earlier (Bison, Horses, Bears etc.) but even during warmer periods the crossing must have been a fantastically daunting proposition for barefoot primates equipped only with with fur coats, stone tools and curious minds.

How do you know you're old?

I remember seeing my first personal computer when I was 16 years old, I thought it was amazing, the size of 4 bread bins stacked on top of each other and a tiny monochrome screen with a resolution of  40 X 25 characters. In the picture above we have a potty with an integral iPad mount, perish the thought that little junior could go more that 15 minutes without a full colour, high resolution, internet connected, multi-core multi-media, touch sensitive computing experience; that's progress I suppose.

This photo did make me think though, a device like this could be quite handy for those excruciatingly long meetings with arty agency types who bang on interminably about how wonderful Apple products are and how "they just work", no need for even the shortest comfort break.

Perspective..

Here's a chilling photo for you, it shows (amazingly) the super massive black hole at the centre of our galaxy and the white stuff is matter (planets, stars etc.) being sucked in and mashed.

We tend to think of our cosmic backyard in the universe as safe, unchanging perhaps boring even, but as this picture shows even our own neighbourhood we have some pretty scary stuff going on. Once black holes start digesting stuff then you tend to end up with chaos, beams of matter blasting out at nearly the speed of light, bursts of high energy X- and gamma rays, and pretty much annihilation for anything with a few hundred light years. Fortunately for us our galaxy is a hundred thousand light years wide and we're located out in the sticks, so we're safe... for now.

Autocorrection

We've all been there, pesky auto-correct software on mobile phones that messes around with the banal, poorly spelt and grammatically incorrect stuff we type and turns it into pure comedy gold. Follow the link here to see more of the same although be careful if you're in an office, you will laugh out loud.

News me

I spotted a couple of interesting stories on the BBC site today. First we have news that the oldest man in the UK has died at the grand old age of 110, wow now that's a pretty decent innings! It made me think, imagine having the title of being the "oldest" person in any given population, a cursed position if ever there was one.

I also spotted this little Biology story, it's about restoring the sight of mice by transplanting photoreceptor (light sensitive) cells into their eyes. The hope is that similar treatments might be developed that help humans with degenerative sight disorders, I must admit though I was distracted by thought that there was probably only 3 mice and the scientists probably spent a lot of time watching them run.

Lastly we have the on-going saga of gay people and the slightly weird simultaneous obsession and revulsion that organised religion has with them. This time it's my favourite state religion, the Church of England and their recent decision to allow gay men to become Bishops so long as they don't actually have gay sex with anyone. It amuses me how otherwise normal educated people can support the idea that an all powerful omnipotent deity really cares where certain men put their penis. This is doubly baffling to me since this edict is clearly taken from a book Christians supposedly revere (the Bible) that also endorses slavery and treats rape as property crime among many other things that modern Christians would abhor.

My verdict on Christmas TV

Worst ever...

Final Hitch

Well, it's Christmas eve and before I settle into a good film and some mince pies here's my last Hitchens quote. Talking about life and death in direct language like this means that superficially it may look depressing or unwelcome to some, but look further than shallow fear or desire and you may find something more worthwhile than you think.

"Death is certain, replacing both the siren-song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. Life on this earth, with all its mystery and beauty and pain, is then to be lived far more intensely: we stumble and get up, we are sad, confident, insecure, feel loneliness and joy and love. There is nothing more; but I want nothing more."

Hitch 6

Only one more day to go, here's the sixth hitch quote to Christmas...

"Atheism is not a creed, it's the only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance."

Hitch 5

Here is my fifth quote of seven from the late Christopher Hitchens, only 3 sleeps to go :)

"Atheism is not a creed, it's the only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance."

Last (EOW) joke

Well that's another apocalypse negotiated without incident, hopefully we can all breath easy again and focus on the calorific catastrophe that is rapidly approaching us, i.e. Christmas lunch..

It's interesting to see the affect that this particular non-event has had on everyone, it's been a constant topic of conversation in the office for the best part of a week (in a humorous way), the best one-liner I heard today, which will be my last word on the whole "end of world" subject (until the next time), was the following,

"people are making apocalypse jokes like there's no tomorrow"

te he..

Stone huggers

I see with some amusement that our stone hugging brothers and sisters have been having fun at Stone Henge today. As I'm sure most enlightened people know today is the shortest day in the UK or the Winter Solstice as its known, when the Northern Hemisphere is at it's maximum tilted distance from the Sun, i.e. the Sun appears lowest in the sky at it's highest point. The good news is that from here on in we're approaching next Summer as opposed to retreating from last, certainly something to celebrate for warm blooded mammals like us.

The orbit of the Earth around the Sun is a great example of cycles in nature, the clue is in the name, i.e. they're cyclical, they will just keep going around for ever until some element of the system causes a tipping point and a new trajectory is established, nothing pre-planned, nothing aimed at human beings and certainly no anthropological guiding hand at work, just physics doing what it does. The exciting thing for me is not that these cycles occur in nature but that we now understand (more or less) why, something our Mayan forebears unlikely ever did.

Hitch du jour

Continuing the theme of quotes from the late Christopher Hitchens, here is number 4...

"Gullibility and credulity are considered undesirable qualities in every department of human life -- except religion."

Keep calm

I hope people aren't going to get silly about this silliness...

Reasons to be fearful, part 1

Following the dreadful school massacre in the USA last week I spotted this story today. I guess it's inevitable but still seems catastrophically stupid to me, an 11 year old has brought a gun to school for "protection". I can just imagine playground disputes over sweets, marbles and kiss-chase being resolved via a Glock 9mm and a clip of soft nosed rounds, what the hell kind of society are they trying to create over there?

Third day

Day three of my countdown to Christmas with another Hitch quote...

"Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it."

Holy tweets

On the money as usual;

Hitch quote

Here's the second of my top seven favourite Christopher Hitchens one-liners, only 6 sleeps to go now..

"That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence."

Political analysis (for morons)

That odious American entrepreneur James Dobson who made his fortune from selling dreams (aka religion) has offered his followers an analysis of the political state of the union and suggests the reason for the recent mass murder at a school on the East coast of the USA. You can probably guess where this is going but Dobson believes (or says he believes) that the reason for the slaughter is because America allows abortion and gay marriage, the awful events of last Friday were nothing to do with gun controls or mental health issues, nope, Jimmy reckons it's all down to his vengeful God.

I always find it surprising that moderate (and sane) Christians don't do more to discredit morons like this, they continually give secularists spectacularly good arguments with which to marginalise them from the public square. They also don't do religion any favours either, even if his "God" existed at all then who'd want to worship an entity that kills terrified young children in a brutal and sadistic fashion just because some other (unrelated) people don't follow some random sub-set of interpreted rules. The cognitive dissonance this drivel causes is palpable.

Quoting down to Christmas

As we run down to the consumer-feast that is Christmas these days I thought I'd remember that feisty old curmudgeon Christopher Hitchens who died of cancer a year or so ago. Here is the first of seven of his more well known quotes, a pearl of wisdom for each day.

"Take the risk of thinking for yourself, much more happiness, truth, beauty, and wisdom will come to you that way."

Mapping madness

I saw this sobering picture today, it's the 13 countries in the world today where I could get punished or even executed simply for not believing that there exists an invisible, all-powerful supernatural man in the sky. 12 of the 13 countries are Islamic, which isn't a surprise but Laos? what have they got against us atheists I wonder?

The full list is as follows,

- Mauritania (officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania)
- Sudan
- Egypt
- Eritrea
- Maldives
- Comoros
- Saudi Arabia
- Kuwait
- Iran
- Afghanistan
- Pakistan
- Indonesia
- Laos

Anyway, more places to be struck off my holiday list, their loss.

Micro-blogging miracles

I was most concerned this morning when white smoke started coming out of my iPhone, fortunately it was only the Pope sending his first tweet...

Its only a theory...

Love this picture, it shows the proportion of (current) peer reviewed scientific papers supporting the idea that we're heating our planet up versus those that reject this view. Looks suspiciously like a wedge strategy to me.

Down, down, deeper and down

Findings from the 2011 census for England and Wales have revealed the number of people who say they are Christian has dropped dramatically from 72% to 59%. The figures published today by the Office for National Statistics also show the number of people who say they have no religion has risen from 15% to 25%.

Its interesting to ponder why this may be the case, I think there are several key factors involved. Since the last census in 2001 we've had a surge of Islamic extremism spawning the 9/11, London and Madrid bombings among other atrocities both in the Middle East and in other parts of the world (Bali etc.) Closer to home we've seen a reactionary lurch toward evangelicalism, during the Bush Era and particularly within the Catholic church but also within more traditionally moderate organisations like the Church of England. From religions in this decade we've seen many despicable and arrogant attitudes being thrust into the public square over issues like child abuse, misogyny, gender discrimination and other matters of simple Human equality like gay marriage. The fact that members of these religions are out of touch with modern society is not in itself the point, they can believe what they like (even though they don't often espouse that right for everyone else) the issue for them is that their medieval attitudes are simply driving the support of moderates and "undecided's" away at a ferocious rate. It's probably reasonable to say that the default stance of most people born in the UK since 1980 is either Atheist or Agnostic (which we all know is just a softer word for Atheist)

Hopefully this is a trend which will continue, realising that you don't need to believe mythological authorities to live an ethical, healthy and fulfilled life is one of the most liberating experiences a Human being can have in my view, it certainly was for most Atheists I know. I also note that the number of Jedi's is on the decrease too and that's never a bad thing, may the force be with you :)

Getting with the plot

It would seem that members of the Christian Union of Bristol University have been caught with their trousers down (not what you're thinking!) over the issue of gender equality. In an investigation by the student union there a memo emerged that stated Christian women were not allowed to present at weekly meetings, but could address an audience in other settings if accompanied by their husbands. I admit I had to do a double take over this article, I thought for a second I had been bodily transported to the Islamic Republic of Iran. No, apparently Christians affiliated with this organisation feel that in 21st century England it's still OK to discriminate on the basis of gender.

The (majority) secular community figured all this out back in the 60s however the Christian community still seems heavily divided on this embarrassingly straightforward question, as evidenced by the recent furore over women bishops. My question is, when will these retards ever learn and why the hell should the rest of us take them seriously until they do?