All I know is, I am the happiest girl in the world, mainly because I am so crazy in love with my husband. We have been everywhere financially, from up to down to up again, and no matter what I have always felt rich with his love.

That seems cool, but we don't do it like this. We have made pursuing accumulation the requisite personality trait for every citizen. Anyone who doesn't play the game and play it well is a bum.

I think we should regard accumulation the way they do in Star Trek. The Ferengi are the capitalists, and power to them. No one tries to stop them from loving the Rules of Acquisition. But the unquestionably more advanced species are not concerned with accumulation, and dedicate themselves to science, exploration and the arts.

I honestly think our culture could grow beyond accumulation with the half a chance that would be provided by post-scarcity. Then we can find out if we are Ferengi or if we are humans.

Of course. People try to be thrifty during economic downturns and it just makes things worse, because our spending is their income and their spending is our income. Economies depend on profligacy.

However it would suck to live in a world where everyone has to be terribly concerned with acquiring baubles, or else risk crashing the economy. If that is where we are, then we have to change it. Planet-to-bauble conversion is reaching several limits, not least of which is the soulessness of bauble concern. Eventually we will have to base our society on something else, hopefully something more edifying.

Only until we get tired of striving for what we can get instead of what we can be.

Of course, capitalism and socialism can ONLY work together.

The problem is not necessarily with any particular individual well-off person, getting wealth and then enjoying it. The problems are with a system that does not have enough checks on exploitation, and structurally benefits most the ones who need the least help.

True, but it's not a conspiracy. It's more like a confluence. Each individual rich guy who bought influence affected the law to favor his situation in some small way, and those changes stick with the system, until there are thousands of laws and loopholes on the books which favor people in those situations. The result is a very unlevel playing field.

There is nothing wrong with a certain amount of inequality. Rising in rank is a powerful motivator for the human psyche. And some inequality is perfectly fair. But, a lot of it just isn't.

So, we need to structure our inequality so that it is more fair.

It will get old. Post-scarcity will make accumulation seem stupid. Eventually the Ferengi will notice that the rest of the Federation is having more fun with personal growth and immersion in discovery.

The economy is nothing more than what we make it. We don't have to make it this way. We don't have to do what "it" wants. We should structure it to benefit more people, not structure people to benefit the economy.

I would say it kinda resembles a backlash, which may be extreme but is far overdue nonetheless.

What are you talking about? I'm not saying that the extremism is overdue. I am saying that New Atheism and the backlash against religion is overdue. Not all "new atheism" is extremism. Most of it is not. And it serves a very important purpose.

The religious conceit, that religion has answers to supernatural questions, is ridiculously overdue in being challenged. The truth is that the Christians and the AFs do not know one single thing more about God than anyone else and they are just liars or wrong when they claim otherwise.

"New Atheism" is a process of throwing off medieval superstition for something realer. Some backlash to centuries of deception and misunderstanding is to be expected if we want society to have a more realistic view of what can be known.

I am not an atheist, but I have no problem with atheists challenging religion. It doesn't matter if "God" is real or not. What matters is speaking the truth. If "I don't know" is the truth, then anything else is bullshit.

No. But they are entitled to point out the discrepancies and prejudices that remain, in as loud a voice as it takes to be heard. This I would say is true of those questioning religion also.

No. I am defending New Atheism and the backlash against religion. Were Tommie Smith and John Carlos "wack-a-doodles" when they raised the Black Power Salute at the 1968 Olympics? Or were they trying to call attention to systematic racism which was woefully unaddressed?

Getting public attention focused on the ills of religion is not wrong. That is the purpose of "New Atheism" and a few extremists don't redefine it.

What exactly is "less real" about this issue?

They are pointing out the unreason of Christianity. They are doing it by writing books.

The New Atheists movement is about exactly this.

Throughout Christian history, heresy has been punishable by death.

Do you think that has not made non-theists into second-class citizens who must hide their views at all costs? The lingering hangover of this horrid conceit is that centuries after discovering science and reason and accurate ways of acquiring knowledge, we still have to pay lipservice to this one mythology.

It is also about equality of ideas. It is about subjecting religious claims to an equal level of scrutiny as that we subject all other claims of truth to, and dismissing them as unwarranted when that is what they are, just as we do for any other kind of claim.

What about this is making you feel like shit?

I disagree. I talk to a lot of atheists, and they don't complain at all about Christians doing negative atheist publicity. I have never heard one complain about atheism being questioned, or feeling personally insulted when Christians malign atheism. I don't think that is what they hate.

The kind of thing they say they hate about Christianity is the holy wars, the inquisitions, and the witch trials. Also, the utter disregard for reality.

Since the atheists are not conducting holy wars or disregarding reality I would say that they are not doing what they hate.

I would say that, considering that the penalty for heresy was death until relatively recently, and social oppression against non-theists continues to this day, some atheists may feel that they are unfairly oppressed and the ONLY way to get the attackers to stop is to offend and hurt them, with ridicule. Thomas Jefferson called it "the only weapon against unintelligible proposals."


So, the question is, how much of this is genuine attempts to throw off millenia of horrid oppression, and how much is just gratuitious? Clearly, some of it is gratuitious. But some I think arises from a genuine need to be free to express scorn for what is scorn-worthy in religion.


Frankly, I think it would be far more effective and less offensive, if only it was funnier.

Actually, no. The formal systems of reason - science and logic - are very new inventions for humans.

That is different from having the system formalized and widely, rigorously followed. You only have to see how quickly our knowledge and technology have changed since acquiring these tools to observe their superiority over previous means of acquiring knowledge.

Well, I'm not an atheist, but I don't think it is about dismissing everything remotely spiritual. Just specific unverifiable claims of knowledge.

First of all, "God" and "Christianity" are not "spirituality." Second of all, where people make specific claims of fact about "God" and "Jesus," these ideas can be scrutized for accuracy like any other claims.

If a person is making a claim, like, "People who don't believe in Jesus go to Hell when they die," it is possible and completely legitimate to examine this proposal and see if there is any reason to think it is true. If there isn't a reason to think it is true, then it can be thrown on the scrap heap along with the coins for the Ferryman as old superstition with no acertainable basis. It is certainly possible to see if specific claims of fact are warranted.

Sure they can. But "spirituality" is far from the same thing as "Christianity." Specific claims of fact, like "Christians know what God wants," are rendered unwarranted by reason.

Of course this is true. But frankly, I think some Christians tend to hide behind this "fine line" to avoid the atheists questions. There is no need to consider what someone said if they were rude, right? Therefore, it was rude.

I don't understand which of these jibes is hurting you.

Who is doing this?

Christians are specifically claiming that God told them what He wants in a book. Are you saying that does not constitute a claim of knowing what God wants?

Christains claim that they know how God feels about certain issues, how He wants humans to act, what day of the week He wants us to worship, and what He wants us to believe to get the good afterlife. Are you saying this does not constitute a claim of knowing what God wants?

Christians are certainly claiming to know more about God than, say, Hindus. Christians know that there is only one God, right? How is this not a claim of knowledge about God?

Actually, this is the exact opposite of "innocent until proven guilty." The essence of justice, reason and science is habeas corpus - "show me the body." Evidence.

You can "think" you are right that your neighbor murdered someone. You may just have that feeling about him. There is certainly no possible way to prove you are wrong. But the justice system will not bring murder charges against your neighbor just on your say so. Not without a body, without evidence.

There is a reason why habeas corpus is the backbone of our legal system, and evidence is the backbone of science. It is because doing it the other way around is known to produce error.

Sure. Those aren't the types of claims in Christianity that I would describe as unwarranted.

I'm not an atheist. I know people feel God, and I avoid arguing that point. However, that does not show truth of any particular claim, like "Hell exists" or "We know how to avoid it."

There is no reason to think it is a more accurate description of what God wants than the holy scriptures of other religions, or the stories of in Norse or Greek mythology, or something I just wrote this morning. Claims that the Bible is "special" are unwarranted.

Nobody does. Claims of knowledge in this are unwarranted.

Or, it might be because it is just something some people wrote.

No, I have never made claims of any specific knowledge of Hell. However there is no doubt that Hell is portrayed in Christianity as the WRONG one.

The exact same thing applies to your description. There is no reason to think you understand it better than Dante did.

So, you don't know. You and everybody else. You are in good company. And, it is true. Why not stop there? The problem with making up stories we like to fill in the gap is that your story will be in conflict with the stories of another. There is no way to determine which story has more merit. They are all just speculation. Unresolvable conflict is the inevitable result.

There is evidence for something of this kind in a lot of people's lives and I will assure you that I'm not an atheist and I do not consider "is God real"? to be the important question in this matter. Only specific claims of knowledge, such as, descriptions of the afterlife, etc., concern me, because it seems obvious that no human knows anything about it at all. It is a blank upon which various cultures have piled very different descriptions.

Perhaps that would be better, but if it isn't possible, it just isn't.

Considering the thousands of gods, afterlife stories and customs in this world, that is certainly a chance. But why worry? Whatever it is, it seems to be a natural process that appears to take care of itself.

Every word. I appreciate you speaking of this with me, very much.

I'm not really sure what you are suggesting. Do you think they should have done their blasphemy more politely? Or do you think that the atheists should refrain from celebrating Blasphemy Day so that you will not be offended?

Great! What I want to know is, what do you think would be a better way for atheists to handle it?

Of course they aren't. But people should not be claiming their beliefs are true if the claim is unwarranted.

That doesn't mean I should refrain from exposing the moral paucity of unsubstantiated claims.

If I am doing "hate" you had better tell me what it consists of. What "hating" am I doing? Be specific.

Oh, undoubtedly. But religous claims are the only ones that are completely unresolvable, there being no possible way to determine which have merit and which do not. I did not say it would end all conflict, I am saying it would reduce unresolvable conflict.

The move towards secularism in government has already gone a long way towards this goal. We currently have far fewer holy wars and religious conflicts than theocracies.

People did them in the name of Christianity, based on the unsubstantiated claims of Christianity.

I didn't say all, I said a lot. Some of it would be. Some of it already has been.

We abandoned rule by Christianity and determining knowledge without evidence in the Renaissance. Massive amounts of human progress have been the result.

We could use one less.

Christianity is making unsubstantiated claims of fact, and plenty of them.

You do not understand. I certainly accept a person's views as his own. Who said they weren't his own? What I do not accept is his claims that the views are true, if the truth of the statements cannot be verified.

I think you must have missed the forty seven times I mentioned that I am not an atheist and I have never asked anyone to "prove" God. Such a discussion is entirely beside the point.

The point is that specific claims of fact, like, "You have to believe in Jesus or you will go to Hell," or, "God doesn't like homosexuality," are pure speculation, and there is no reason to think there is any truth to them.

Facts matter. Ignore them, and you have no means to distinguish knowledge from delusion.

I think they feel the need to show that some beliefs are not worthy of respect because they lack merit, no matter how deeply they are held.

I can see some very valid reasons to question religious beliefs.

For example, we had a long struggle in this country against marraige laws that seriously discriminated against gay people. Marriage discrimination, and the whole "anti-gay" attitude in our society, was based - as far as I can tell - on the idea that God considers homosexuality to be abomination.

So, what are the facts? There is no pathology associated with homosexuality. It appears to be naturally occurring in many species, including our own. There is not any apparent reason to consider homosexuality abomination, outside of the unsubstantiated claims that Christians have some idea how God "feels" about homosexuality.

So. Do we just go along with the unsubstantiated claim, and seriously disenfranchise a large segment of our population, reducing them to second-class citizenship? Or, do we examine the claim? If we find it to be completely unsubstantiated, then what? Do it anyway?

Allowing unsubstantiated claims to be accepted as facts is hurting people.


As another example, there is an explanation available for how life on Earth has developed into so many complex forms. This explanation is supported by mountains of evidence which show a direct correlation between what occurrs and this description of it. This explanation is so well-supported and provides so much verifiable preditability that it is considered as close to fact as any other explanation in science.

And yet, people come to school board meetings blathering about "intelligent design," an idea derived - as far as I can tell- from religious notions of divine creation.

So, what are the facts? Upon examination, "Intelligent Design" is revealed to be a ridiculous idea with zero supporting evidence and no predictive ability. There is no apparent reason to consider it equally worthy of being discussed in science class.

What is the result? Various school boards are losing thousands of hours to wrangling over a non-issue, and a general impression that beliefs are just as valid as facts is foisted upon the entire population.


Which leads me to another major problem, which is a widespread lack of respect for what constitutes knowledge and facts. On the day we marched to war in Iraq, eighty percent of the U.S. population believed that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, and/or that he was responsible for 9-11.

There was no evidence of this. In fact most people realize now that it was a bunch of bullshit.

There were people on the ground back then who knew the actual facts. Their information was available to anyone. If the people of this country had respected facts, they might have thought that marching to war on flimsy accusations with no evidence was maybe not a good idea.


Facts are the only way to separate knowledge from delusion. A society with more respect for the facts would be slightly less deluded. That would be good.

Delusional people aren't much fun to watch, it's true. And people who are delusional will make stupid mistakes, like reducing some of the population to second-class citizenship or marching to an unjust war.

Why should I? There is no reason to.

Accepting claims without verifying them is a great way to get duped.

Every single day.

People are legislating their pure speculation. They are letting it interfere with clear judgement. It affects me every time my country veers in an irrational direction.

They are people, free to form views and then say them.


As an example, one Christian dogma is that the first woman was made from a man's rib. There is exactly zero evidence that this happened or ever could happen. On the other hand, there are literally mountains of evidence demonstrating that women came about in a completely different fashion.

With this kind of evidence, I think a person would be justified in suggesting that the Eve-rib thing appears to be wrong.


As for stupid, that is more of a matter of judgement, but I can think of a few dogmas in any religion which seem, at least, silly. There are times to point that out. I would suppose "Blasphemy Day" would be one of those times.

It would only be hypocrisy if the claims on both sides were unsubstantiated. However, a rejection-of-dogma claim, like "the first woman does not appear to have made from a man's rib" has a lot of substantiation. A claim like "that's sinful" really doesn't. That's one difference.

Of course that's not true, but that's not what it means. There is no way describing that particular dogma as wrong equals=declaring everything and everyone associated with the religion to be utterly lame. It is just discussing that one unsubstantiated claim, which is perfectly legitimate.

Of course there are! This describes the majority of Chistians I have met.

But, I haven't heard any atheists calling out the metaphors or the great ideas. I don't know a single atheist who makes fun of "Do unto others" or "Consider the lilies." Those ideas are not unsubstantiated claims about the supernatural or the unknown. They are precious gems of human wisdom. There is nothing wrong or stupid about them and I don't know anyone who is calling those ideas into question.

People are examining specific dogmas, and questioning the unsubstantiated ones. That is eminently reasonable.

I agree. The people who are asking for religion to be "done away with" are asking too much and it would never happen anyway. It is a ridiculous notion that I would certainly never support. It isn't even necessary.

But I still support the examination of dogmas. Any religion could stand to lose a few obviously unsupported dogmas while keeping the wisdom alive at its heart.

Well, I would not necessarily disagree with that. But, do you think that view is commonly held by Christains? I certainly know there are many Christians who think of God as an actual being, who observes activities on Earth and has agency to intervene in human affairs. I'm not sure most people see this as equivalent with a "metaphor for higher consciousness."

I don't know anyone who says it is. I personally am interested only in unsubstantiated claims, and "higher consciousness" is not a claim.

Of course. That doesn't mean I shouldn't talk about it. There have been many people I have talked with who have thanked me for giving them a different perspective. I see no reason not to try for that outcome.

I am not telling people what to believe. I am telling people what I think.

I do not intend to protect people from my message. I am being civil. I am being scrupulously honest. Any claims of fact I make are very well supported. I am not getting personal. Speaking such is not wrong.

Also, depending on the claim, I may actually have some knowledge about it. Considering that I majored in in Anthropology and have a detailed understanding of human origins, I feel reasonably informed to claim some knowledge in this area. Since I have studied world religions, tribal cultures, and creation mythology in particular, I feel reasonably informed to discuss those subjects, just as you do. I see no reason to act like that knowledge doesn't exist or has no bearing on a discussion of human origins.

I'm really tired of dancing around the main issue. The issue is that sometimes people believe things which are almost certainly wrong. Sure they have a right to think whatever they want. They do not have to listen to a word I say. But they do not have a right to go through this life and never hear anyone say it.

I am not going to act like accurate understanding doesn't matter. I have a duty to the truth.

My message is: Christianity is making a vast number of unsubstantiated claims about reality, the supernatural and the unknown. Some of them are extremely cruel and exclusionary. Others are factually innaccurate to the point of great error. Cruel, error-producing unsubstantiated claims are hurting people, devaluing reason and shitting on the truth. This is wrong.

I am not using the word truth like "opinion," where can be different for everybody. I am referring to truth as that which can be verified. I'm talking about what is the same for everybody, that would be the same even if there wasn't anybody there.

There may be some minor differences in our perception of reality, but anybody who can catch an airplane has enough similarity in perception to others, in terms of space, time and matter, to come to an understanding on basic reality.

I am not talking about personal choices. I am talking about truth as correspondence to reality.

I'm not talking about philosophical Truth. I am talking about truth like when you swear in court that you will tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. It may not be perfect, it may not include everything they need to know, but you are supposed to be presenting it honestly and to the best of your knowledge.

If you don't want me to use the word truth to talk about it, what word would you suggest?

That doesn't make it good. I am certainly trying not to, to the very best of my ability.

There is. There is reality. If we want to know what is true we can look at reality and find out. Not perfectly, not everything, but A LOT. You can double-check it yourself any time. Any claim I make I would be sure that you could double-check against the Cliffnotes of Reality yourself before I made it.

Ask Martin Luther. Or the Founding Fathers. I am a person who sees injustice and wants better.

I checked.


I don't have all the answers. I am not the only person who has the answers I have. But when I say something is an answer I check to make sure it is true first. I don't just say it.

Claiming answers are true when you know they can't be verified, and could just as easily be completely incorrect, produces error and is morally wrong.

Because I will not be silent.


People can put their hands over their ears and sing "La la la la la!" People can leave. People can act extremely offended and get very angry and attack me personally. But I will speak.


Take it or leave it. But do not attempt to silence me.

So what? Must I be so polite to the finely-tuned sense of religious offense that I cannot raise a conflicting position in a debate forum?

I don't assume I'm right. If I think I am "right" about something, it is because I looked into it very thoroughly and assessed that there is a discernible reality and honed my position to match it as precisely as possible.

I have massive amounts of evidence to support any position I take. That is the point.

If I don't have the evidence, I don't take a position. I just don't know. As far as I can tell that is the only valid position, when it is true.

Claims about what your favorite color is are personal. Claims about what happens to humans when they die are about everybody.

I disagree. The claim "red is prettier than blue" has no right or wrong. It is a statement of opinion.

The claim "You have to believe in Jesus to get the good afterlife" is not a matter of opinion - is it? Either that is a description of what really happens - every human really has to believe in Jesus to go to Heaven, and every person who doesn't believe it ends up in Hell...or, the claim is just a bunch of words people say which don't describe anything that really happens. If the former, the claim is right. If the latter, it is wrong.

So, it certainly seems like a matter of right or wrong. If true, the claim would seem to be a very important matter of right and wrong, with eternal implications. If false, the claim would seem to be a horrible cruel deception whose wielding has been a blight on humanity for millenia. Seems like it matters.

How could such an important claim be off the table for scrutiny and discussion?

Is that what you would have told Copernicus, Kepler, and Galileo? Back then the position of the sun and the orbits of the planets were articles of faith. Should humans have refrained from examining the reality to see if it differed from the story? Should humans have refrained from discussing their findings to avoid offense?

Precisely. No person appears to know anything about it. But some are claiming they do know.

Some people are claiming it is a fact.

I disagree. There is an actual fact right now. The actual fact is that humans do not know what happens after death. Saying this is right. It is true. You are telling this truth, but there are people who are not. They are saying they do know. That is the lie. It is untrue. It is wrong.

I don't see that happening, but who knows? Until then, we still have the fact: We do not know. We have the lie: We do know. I intend to dispute the lie when I hear it.

Well, I have opinions too.

If the Christian claim of Salvation through Christ is not true, then, in my opinion, the lie that has been perpetrated upon Christians will have been a terrible blight on humanity. Better?

Sure.** The position of the sun and orbits of the planets were articles of faith to the church, who resisted acknowledging heliocentrism. Those gentlemen were right to insist that it be discussed anyway. The fact that the orbits were articles of faith did not make them immune to challenge.

Unsubstantiated Christian claims are not articles of faith to me. Some are to some Christians who I discuss this with. I feel I am right in insisting that it be discussed anyway. The fact that they are articles of faith does not make them immune to challenge.

That is the purpose of the comparison.


** You could argue that they were articles of faith to Kepler, at least initially. He was devout. He himself was reluctant at first to embrace the laws of planetary motion. He had so wanted to prove the perfect circles of the heavens. It is to his great credit, and humanity's great debt, that he followed the data instead, which described ellipses.