Sunday, August 28, 2011

The Insanity Never Stops

A recent news article highlights the insanity inherent in religion as well as its deleterious effect on the progress of mankind.  There is apparently a movement afoot amongst conservative Catholics to declare that Galileo was wrong and the church right regarding the Earth being the center of the universe.

The goal of such people is, of course, to protect the church's reputation and to restore the church to world dominance as this quotation from one of their leaders makes clear:

"Heliocentrism becomes dangerous if it is being propped up as the true system when, in fact, it is a false system," said Robert Sungenis, leader of a budding movement to get scientists to reconsider. "False information leads to false ideas, and false ideas lead to illicit and immoral actions — thus the state of the world today.… Prior to Galileo, the church was in full command of the world, and governments and academia were subservient to her."

The proponents of this historical and scientific revisionism, of course, see the heliocentric view of the universe as a conspiracy of sorts by the church's political enemies to squelch the church's influence.

As long as ridiculous worldviews are given preferential treatment and shielded from criticism and inquiry, then there is no limit to how ridiculous they can get.  Even to the point of denying well established facts and persecuting those who dare to speak the truth.

Monday, August 22, 2011

The Truth About Islam

This has been a very un-productive month or two.  I have been very busy with personal matters.  I could not, however, fail to pass along a link to a very revealing article about Islam.  The author is one of my favorites--the ever insightful Luis Granados.  Once again, I cannot recommend his blog highly enough.  It should be required reading for all.

The article discusses a case of a trumped up blasphemy accusation made against a British educated Pakistani professor.  It seems the professor had the temerity to champion secularism and humanism.  Worse than that, apparently, was the fact that he advocated settlement of Pakistan's conflict with India by accepting the current de facto border as the actual border.  The trumped up nature of the charge was obvious and it provides further evidence of the true nature and purpose of religion:  Controlling people for political and economic gain.


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Holy War--Against Non-believers!

The religious are already at war with us non-believers.  Many of us just haven't noticed because they think that war has to involve overt homicide by trauma.  It doesn't.  There are many other ways to wage war such as social and economic discrimination and, more importantly, efforts to undermine the marketplace of ideas to deprive your opponent of support--sometimes even in his or her own mind.

I strongly recommend that all non-believers read Machiavelli's "The Prince" and Sun Tzu's "The Art of War" as a starting point for understanding many of the tactics used by the religious.  While these are the sorts of works that non-believers typically have no interest in, or are actually repulsed by, you should have no doubt that many religious leaders and "thinkers" have made a thorough study of them and the translation of the principles in them into active, modern strategies.

An essential part of this type of warfare is the use of political and social means to gain control over weapons and supplies just in case overt hostilities become necessary.  Anyone who has been keeping up with efforts to fight theocracy in the U.S. military knows that the religious are way ahead of American non-believers on this score.

Take a look at what happened in other countries, such as Chile, Argentina, and Spain.  The religious took over the military, then, when they felt they time was right, the country.  During that process they murdered as many secularists, suspected secularists, leftists and suspected leftists as they could find.  Victims weren't even necessarily true leftists.  There were instances where someone was killed merely for having worked as a volunteer in a charity that served the poor.  (Ironically, working as a volunteer to help the poor is exactly the sort of thing one would expect Jesus to do if he were alive today.  Clearly, modern Christianity has been perverted to serve those who seek money and power and is no longer a source of morality.)

The important point here, however, is to alert non-believers to the fact that believers (many if not most of them) are already at war with us and that we need to be on our guard with them at all times.  The war is a "cold war" at the moment.  As in all cold wars, the game focuses primarily on politics--gossip and public opinion.  In essence, they try to convince as many people as possible that non-believers are bad people.  They wish to pressure us into conforming or, failing that, turn us into outcasts.

A very important aspect of this cold, political war is economic.  By trying to make us non-believers into outcasts, they are attempting to "kill" us by making it impossible for us to obtain the means of making a living, not to mention the means of reproducing, or, just as important, the means of empowering ourselves.

I think that this effect of economic discrimination sheds light on the affinity so many "Christians" in the U.S. have for right wing politics.  After all, removing the social safety net makes the threat of discrimination a deadly one.  Of course, naked empowerment is not the only motivation behind the unholy alliance between Christianity and right wing politics.  Right wing politics also fits neatly into their anal-retentive, punitive mindset.  Regardless of the complexity of their motivations, however, it should not be forgotten that their goal is to get rid of non-believers by one means or another.

Monday, August 8, 2011

Faith Is the Rejection of Reason II

I have written to express this opinion before, that faith is the rejection of reason.  Today I want to add some revealing quotations on the topic that I recently came across:

"Reason is the Devil’s greatest whore; by nature and manner of being she is a noxious whore; she is a prostitute, the Devil’s appointed whore; whore eaten by scab and leprosy who ought to be trodden under foot and destroyed, she and her wisdom… Throw dung in her face to make her ugly. She is and she ought to be drowned in baptism…" --Martin Luther

"For reason is the greatest enemy that faith has: it never comes to the aid of spiritual things, but – more frequently than not – struggles against the Divine Word, treating with contempt all that emanates from God." --Martin Luther

From the horse's mouth, as they say.  Apparently, even religious people, when they are being honest (which isn't often), know perfectly well and admit that faith is the rejection of reason.

In more recent times, however, this position has become untenable because "reason" as an ideal has become more popular.  Thus, you will often meet modern religious people who will deny that reason and faith are incompatible.

Usually, what they mean, however, is that reason and logic can and do function normally even if the existence of god is taken as a given--an assumed fact.  This is, to an extent, true.  The rules of logic will still work the same.  Any conclusions reached, however, will not be reliable because, as I explained before, reasoning is unsound if based on false factual assumptions.  Therefore, until the religious can prove that their god's existence is a fact, the assumption of it as a fact renders all reasoning that follows an exercise in futility--or worse.

In other words, the acceptance of a factual premise that is not a fact violates the most basic precepts of logic.

How do we know whether or not a suggested premise is a fact?  Simple, apply the rules of logic to it before assuming it is a fact.