The Atheist Power Vacuum

We won the war, now what?

That seems to be the issue with atheism on the internet these days. Years ago, religion was either dominate or immune to criticism on much of the internet.

Those days are now long gone, and in most popular areas of the internet, religion has no pass and criticism is instant and blunt.

It was the hard work of atheists that made this happen. We had an enemy, and we united to fight this enemy on all fronts, and the good news is we won.

That just leaves the question, so what now?

We are like an empire that just defeated the largest rival in town, which you think would be good for atheism as a group, but instead, it just removed the one thing that kept atheists united.

Without a “Them” to fight, what does that mean for “Us”?

In my recent studying of Roman history, it seems clear that once Rome defeated Carthage, the internal power struggles in Rome became much more of an issue, and civil war was a constant threat. Yet, before the fall of Carthage, the Roman Empire was quite united.

It seems that in the face of a threat, people are much more willing to put aside small differences and join in common cause against the common enemy, but once the enemy is defeated, the willingness to put aside small differences is greatly reduced.

Without a common threat to keep atheists united, we are left with a power vacuum.

So we see the birth of Atheism+, as an attempt to create a new enemy. Instead of fighting religious injustice, they fight social injustice, and it seems to baffle the follows of Atheism+ why everyone doesn't jump on the band wagon.

We also see the rise of the unaligned atheists, better known as the slime pit by its detractors.

The unaligned atheists seem to have no desire to move atheism beyond the simple fight against religious injustice, and they reject all attempts to turn atheism into Atheism+.

So when people like PZ Myers and Rebecca Watson proclaim that atheism alone isn’t enough and we need Atheism+ (which they just happen to be unofficial, de facto leaders of), the unaligned atheists reject that and claim that PZ and Rebecca are trying to co-opt the atheism movement for their own pet projects.

This then gives rise to Thunderf00t and Justin Vacula who stand in opposition to Atheist+ and the unaligned flock to their banner. We see yet again, that in the face of a threat, people put aside small differences to join in common cause against the enemy.

And just like that, atheists have a new enemy, each other.

We can fall back into old habits and just cross out the word religion and replace it with the slime pit, or Atheism+ and its back to business as usual.

The players change, but the game stays the same.

Feminism is the radical notion that women are people

"Feminism is the radical notion that women are people"

I hear this a lot on different websites that debate feminism and other related topics, and something about that statement seems disingenuous.

If feminism is the radical notion that women are people, then is not communism the radical notion that workers have rights? Is Christianity the radical notion that God loves us? Is capitalism the radical notion that people are rational? Is Mormonism the radical notion that family is important?

To break down an entire political movement to a single radical notion seem to be, at the very least, dishonest.

Not only that, but then using this radical notion to smear others feels very self serving. Its a tactic I see far to often used by those who cannot argue based on the facts, and instead appeal to emotion

If you see a problem with "you are either with us, or with the terrorists" or with the phrase "why do you hate freedom?", but you have no issue with "Feminism is the radical notion that women are people", then you need to check your blind spot.

Google Trends

After watching a recent Thunderf00t video where he uses Google Trends to chart the popularity of PZ Myers, I decided that I wanted to have a look at few other people with Google Trends

Here is a comparison between Thunderf00t, PZ Myers, The Amazing Atheist, Rebecca Watson, and The Nostalgic Critic as a control.

Here is the results when comparing web search:


As you can see PZ does win out with Rebecca Watson as a close second

Then I compared YouTube search:


And here it is very clear that Thunderf00t and The Amazing Atheist are well in the lead.

And finally, I compared by image search:


As you can see, there is no contest, it is all Rebecca Watson.

I must admit, that does make me pause for a moment. Other then a tiny blip for The Amazing Atheist (which I think is related to a banana incident) Rebecca Watson is the only person to even have an average higher then zero.

It seems clear that web searchers prefer PZ Myers and Rebecca Watson, YouTube searchers prefer Thunderf00t and The Amazing Atheist, and by a very large margin, image searchers prefer Rebecca Watson.

I am not sure what conclusion to draw from this

The Pycon Incident

I have seen a lot of blog posts and reddit threads about the Pycon incident, I assume that if you are reading this, you know about the incident and I can avoid the recap.

The more I think about this, the more I am conflicted.

I don't want to think that every spoken word needs to be filtered, especially in a joke between friends. What crazy 1984 world would we be living in if we need to self censor 24 hours a day or risk unemployment or worse.

On the other hand, if I was in her position and I heard a joke that mocked Atheists, I would perhaps take mild offense.

However, I have no idea what the joke even was.

Jokes are on a spectrum, at one end we get knock knock jokes and why did the chicken cross the road. At the other end of the spectrum, we have dead baby jokes and holocaust jokes.

Where on the spectrum did this joke lay?

Was the joke something like "wow that rep is hot, she gets my dongle hard and I would love to fork her"

Or was it closer to "check out that hot ass bitch, hope she likes a dongle up the ass while we rape her and pass her around for a good forking"

I think the distinction matters.

Was this joke that no normally prudent person would think was offensive, or was it the kind of joke you apologize for right after saying?

If the joke was truly offensive, then I can sympathize with her. Jewish people don't need to stand by and hear a holocaust joke and say nothing, black people don't need to hear nigger jokes and stay silent.

If the joke was just juvenile between friends, then I have no sympathy for her. Just because some people want to bubble wrap the world, doesn't mean we need to put up with it.

So in the end, I have no idea what to think.

Either 2 men told a horrible joke that would make george carlin blush and this brave woman stood up to these men, and now she is paying the price for her courage

Or 2 innocent men were telling an innocent joke and someone who sees offense in everything decided that her twitter followers would jump on the band wagon and be offended with her.

I can't tell who is right and who is wrong with this, so I use no names to help avoid slandering someone who does not deserve it.

In the end, all I can take from this is; be careful what you joke about, be careful of the pictures you tweet

So more self censorship... Great, just what the world needs.


- Sent From My Blackberry

Equality and Valentine's day

"You can be equal and still want to be treated like a princess once in a while"

I read the quote above in a Time article named 'Valentine's Day: Why Consumers Aren't Feeling the Love'

The article had many other interesting facts about this holiday:

1) Men will average $108 on gifts for their spouses or significant others, while women will spend $53

2) Guys seem to spend handsomely mainly to avoid being in the dog house with their partner

3) When I asked eight middle-aged married businessmen at a Toronto airport lounge about Valentine's Day gifts for their wives, there were groans and eye rolls all around. Yet all were of the opinion that a gift was obligatory. "Just to make sure" was the most common reason given for buying a gift.

This article does not paint a very good picture of this holiday, especially for the men involved, but what about the women involved?

"It's nice, but it's not a big deal," said Isabel, 23. Still, she admitted the pressure is mostly on guys, and that she likes being pampered. "You can be equal and still want to be treated like a princess once in a while."

So let's break down the reasoning of this thinking. Apparently equality is fine as long as you sometimes get treated as more then equal.

Imagine if the roles were reversed

If women spent twice as much as men, and men said "you can be equal and still want to be treated like a prince once in a while", how would we react to this holiday?

I wonder...


- Sent From My Blackberry

How can a working theory be wrong?

I have been giving it some thought to what it means to have a theory.

For lack of a better description, a theory is a working set of assumptions which produces useful predictions about future events.

The best example I can come up with is how I learned to play chess.

The chess teaching set I got came with 2 sets of rules. The idea is that once you master the easier rules, it should be less difficult to move to more advanced rules.

The only major difference between the 2 sets of rules had to deal with end game.

Under the easy set of rules, you just need to capture the enemy king and you win. None of that check or checkmate, just simply take the king and you win.

We can call this the "Capture the King" theory of chess.

I can play chess using the capture the king theory, and up until the end of the game, you would have no way of telling I had a different theory of play then you.

I would still move pawns, still take your pieces and go after your king while trying to protect my king.

The capture the king theory of chess works quite well in almost every way, it just breaks down in end game.

Now realize that all theories are like this.

The theory of gravity breaks down at the subatomic and becomes unreliable. Does this mean the theory has no use?

Far from it. The theory of gravity makes many useful predictions about the natural world which prove true time and time again.

Just like with the capture the king theory, I can predict you will go after my king and protect yours. Even thought I am missing the point about why you go after my king, I can still predict that you will.

That is what makes the capture the king theory useful, I can base my play on that theory and be a competent chess player.

So just because a theory does not hold true 100% of the time, it does not mean it has no use or value.

We need to realize that a theory is only a useful set of assumptions for any given problem, and not the be all and end all of reality.

So when I hear people rally against the theory of evolution because it fails to explain the origin of life, I could only liken it to a beginner chess player throwing out the whole training course because it uses the Capture the King theory.

God is my Security Blanket

I have a 2 year old son, and he has a special blanket that he sleeps with. Whenever he is in his bed, the first thing he does is reach for his blanket.

We tried getting him a blanket that was almost the same as a backup, but he can tell the difference and will only sleep with the original, no matter how dirty or puked on the blanket is.

He has a heart felt belief that he needs this blanket to sleep, and the evidence is on his side. He does not sleep without it, he simply cries.

So what is it about this blanket that makes it so special? Is the blanket soaked in a chemical that triggers him to sleep? Does the blanket emit sleep-educing radiation?

I have a feeling I could run any number of test on this blanket and prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the blanket does not cause my son to sleep, yet he won't sleep without it.

Then it dawned on me, my son has a "belief" that this blanket lets him sleep. Perhaps he feels the blanket offers security, or perhaps just comfort. In either case, it is his belief that allows him to sleep and the blanket is just the object of his beliefs in the real world.

My son has put his beliefs into this blanket in the same was a religious person puts their beliefs in god.

That daily prayer, that fish bumper sticker, that bible, it is all a security blanket to a religious person.

It is your belief in god that gives god power over your life, not the other way around.

Just like how my son believes his blanket is special, a religious believer thinks their faith in god is special.

The analogy doesn't end there either. I could rip that blanket away from my son and try to explain to him how he doesn't really need the blanket, the power to sleep was always inside him, but he would cry and not understand and want his blanket back so desperately.

I now feel the same way about a religious person's beliefs. I could rip that bible from there hand and explain to them how it's just a book of stories and all the power you feel coming from god is and always was inside you all along and you don't need god for it, but I think from past experience we would all see how that would end up.

You can's just rip the security blanket away from someone and have them take it well. They need to realize themselves that the blanket is no longer needed.

I am sure that as my son gets older, he will turn to his blanket less and less until one day he forgets about it in a closet and it will sit there for weeks or even months unnoticed.

It's not so easy for a religious person. They are reminded nearly daily to never abandon their security blanket without something horrible happening.

Imagine how my son would grow up if I shared his belief in his blanket. If every time he forgot it I scared him with stories of doom and gloom, if he always saw me with my blanket every night, if he saw me fight tooth and nail against anyone who ever said "it's just a blanket"

I guess the moral of the story is don't be so quick to snatch someone else's security blanket away from them for there own good, just live your life blanket-free and be an example that living without that blanket isn't so bad after all.