Saturday, December 31, 2011
Friday, December 30, 2011
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Monday, December 26, 2011
Sunday, December 25, 2011
Where would Christianity be without these?
Religion is the reason why we live in a world that has no clue about how things work, that lacks even the most basic natural morality toward living beings and that poisons everything with abstract ideas that have zero connection with reality.
Carlos Butler
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An open mind is the prerequisite do gaining knowledge
The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.
-Alvin Toffler
There is no absolute knowledge. And those who claim it, whether they are scientists or dogmatists, open the door to tragedy. All information is imperfect. We have to treat it with humility. That is the human condition; and that is what quantum physics says. I mean that literally.
-Jacob Bronowski
(The Ascent of Man "Knowledge or Certainty")
There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation.
-Herbert Spencer
Saturday, December 24, 2011
Friday, December 23, 2011
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Touched by an angelhair
A number of tongue-in-cheek nativity displays on a Virginia county courthouse lawn has divided the tight-knit community Leesburg right before the holidays and created an unusual scene.
Beside a Christmas tree and creche sits a large banner with a nativity scene in which baby Jesus has been replaced by a plate of spaghetti with googly eyes. A crowd that includes pirates and gnomes surrounds Jesus. At the bottom its message reads “Touched by an Angelhair.” The scene is the work of the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monsters.
Near the courthouse fence is another display whose sign reads ”Greetings From Your Friendly Local Atheists.” It’s message is about celebrating the Constitution and honoring the separation of church and state.
Elsewhere on the lawn, a skeleton in a Santa suit hangs on a cross.
This has all become part of a battle that has many outraged.
“People are just horrified by this. It’s just created a lot of division, a lot of angst and a lot of people are upset,” Kenneth Reid, Loudoun County supervisor-elect for the Leesburg district, told ABCNews.com.
Reid has been vehemently fighting the atheist groups that are behind the decorations and says the displays are destroying people’s holiday spirit. Reid is Jewish and says he is very open to other faiths. But he believes the Leesburg atheists are forcing their beliefs on others.
“Nobody is out there preaching like these guys. They’re out there in a blatant attempt to try to stamp out religion and ruin people’s Christmas,” Reid said. “The atheist groups over the past two years have used it as an opportunity to try to ban everything. It’s no longer sufficient to be an atheist, they have to go out there and proactively try to deny and make sure other people don’t believe in God.”
When Christians were allowed to display a Christmas tree and creche on the courthouse lawn, atheist groups objected, saying the display violated the separation of church and state.
Reid’s predecessors realized that the only way to allow the Christian decorations was to open up the lawn to all faiths, including the atheists. And so began the battle on the lawn.
The atheist groups deny Reid’s accusations.
“The whole thing is a separation of church and state issue. We’ve been accused of trying to destroy Christmas, and that could not be further from the truth,” Rick Wingrove, the Virginia state director for American Atheists, told ABCNews.com. “There’s no war on Christmas. If there were a war on Christmas, I would have gotten a memo.”
The Loudoun County board of supervisors proposed a ban on all decorations, aside from the Christmas tree, but could not get enough votes. So, the decorations will stay up.
“I think it’s fair, and even if it’s unfair, it’s protected,” Wingrove said. “Provocative is still protected.”
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Monday, December 19, 2011
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Friday, December 16, 2011
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
An amazing story of an orphaned bat
In my work I have found that bats are the best example of a creative intelligence at work in the cosmos. They are amazing creatures and so important to life on earth. But the most amazing thing is how their ability to use echo location just shows up in the fossil record and there is no "gradual processes" or evidence of "natural selection". In fact the way natural selection works is to pull from a gene pool and mutate the genes, but, in the case of bats and their high tech echo location, there was no gene to pull from. But this "design" has nothing to do with a supernatural god or any religion. It is the work of this cosmic soup in our cosmos that may have the components to direct life in certain directions. Read more in my work, The Dawn of Intelligence, on Wildman Walker's blog. Also see Mathematical Proof of a Creative Intelligence on YouTube.
Kerry Craig Walker
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Monday, December 12, 2011
Sunday, December 11, 2011
We don't know...
The modern susceptibility to conformity and obedience to authority indicates that the truth endorsed by authority is likely to be accepted as such by a majority of the people.
David Edwards
The aim of public education is not to spread enlightenment at all; it is simply to reduce as many individuals as possible to the same safe level, to breed and train a standardized citizenry, to down dissent and originality. That is its aim in the United States, whatever the pretensions of politicians, pedagogues, and other such mountebanks, and that is its aim everywhere else...Their purpose, in brief, is to make docile and patriotic citizens, to pile up majorities, and to make John Doe and Richard Doe as nearly alike, in their everyday reactions and ways of thinking, as possible.
H. L. Mencken
H. L. Mencken
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Saturday, December 10, 2011
WOMEN AND THE BIBLE
"As long as WOMAN regards the Bible as the charter of her rights, she will be the slave of man. The bible was NOT written by a woman. Within its leaves there is nothing but humiliation and shame for her."
-- Robert G Ingersol
"When WOMEN understand that GOVERNMENTS and RELIGIONS are human inventions; that BIBLES, PRAYER BOOKS, CATECHISMS, and ENCYCLICAL LETTERS are all emanations from the BRAIN OF MAN, they will no longer be oppressed by the injunctions that come to them with the DIVINE AUTHORITY of 'thus saith the Lord.'"
--Elizabeth Cady Stanton
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Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Tuesday, December 6, 2011
Monday, December 5, 2011
Sunday, December 4, 2011
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