By Neece
We are reading The God Virus for the book club in February. On page 18, Darrel W. Ray describes an experiment. I think I’ve heard of it before, but I thought I’d share it with you because it shows how religion attacks the critical thinking skills of the mind. As Mr. Ray says, it leaves the skill intact for other religions but disables critical thinking about one’s own religion. It really is like a virus of the mind.
Here’s the experiment as explained in the book:
You have a serious conversation with a deeply christian friend. Your friend is intelligent, well educated and knowledgeable. You agree to record the session. The topic is islam. During the session, you discuss that mohammed was a self-appointed prophet and that he claimed he talked to allah and the angels. He wrote a book that he claimed was infallible, and he flew from
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By Neece
Was Jesus unique and special, born of a virgin on December 25th? The Anointed One, the Messiah? Was his message even all that original? Not at all. Back in the day, religions and cults mixed and borrowed freely from each other. The only thing special about Jesus, you could say, is how long his myth has been embraced as truth. Butch found this at American Atheists and I thought you’d enjoy it for the holiday season.
December 25 is close to the Winter Solstice which has been an important event for ages. It’s the longest night of the year. December 25 was the Roman Winter Solstice upon establishment of the Julian calendar. We now have the Gregorian calendar which put the Winter Solstice to December 21st – 22nd. Many cultures recognized this Longest Night with holidays, festivals, gatherings, rituals about rebirth and…
By Neece
Cherry-Picking is when you count the hits and ignore the misses. It is used when only certain quotes, data, studies or research are used to support an argument while ignoring other valid and credible quotes, data, studies and research. In my personal experience, cherry-picking is rampant in the religious population.
Examples:
When christians speak of the bible, they invariably cherry-pick the parts that support whatever they are trying to get across. Homosexuality is a prime example (leviticus mentions it twice). Of course they don’t mind eating shellfish or wearing a poly-cotton blend shirt, which is expressly forbidden in subsequent chapters. We’ve all dealt with the hypocrisy of the old testament, especially the homosexuality issue. Instead I’m going to share a bit of the new testament, which most people use to show how kind and loving jesus was. I’ll stick to the gospels for this exercise, to make my point:
Here…
By Neece
This is somewhat late notice, but there is still plenty of time. Some members of Freethinkers Morgantown are planning a field trip to the creation museum (I think it’s outside of Cincinnati). Here is the notice that I received from Michael Pipkin on Monday (they will be going with PZ Myers):
Claire and I are thinking about attending the Creation Museum field trip with the Secular Student Alliance on August 7th. The event is on a Friday, so it would require taking a day off of work. I want to see if anyone else might be interested in going so we could carpool and share expenses.
PZ Myers will be acting as a “guide” and there will even be a special presentation that day, with one of the AIG “researchers” (I use that term very loosely) giving a lecture in which he will present the “Ultimate Proof of
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By Neece
The Codex Sinaiticus, which means ‘the Sinai Book’ holds a special place in history. And now the whole world has access to it for free. Here, let the website explain. This is from their about page:
Codex Sinaiticus, a manuscript of the Christian Bible written in the middle of the fourth century, contains the earliest complete copy of the Christian New Testament. The hand-written text is in Greek. The New Testament appears in the original vernacular language (koine) and the Old Testament in the version, known as the Septuagint, that was adopted by early Greek-speaking Christians. In the Codex, the text of both the Septuagint and the New Testament has been heavily annotated by a series of early correctors.
The significance of Codex Sinaiticus for the reconstruction of the Christian Bible’s original text, the history of the Bible and the history of Western book-making is immense.
First, the…
We are reading The God Virus for the book club in February. On page 18, Darrel W. Ray describes an experiment. I think I’ve heard of it before, but I thought I’d share it with you because it shows how religion attacks the critical thinking skills of the mind. As Mr. Ray says, it leaves the skill intact for other religions but disables critical thinking about one’s own religion. It really is like a virus of the mind.
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