From the Washington Post, July 2005: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/28/AR2005072802085.html “Exxon Mobil Corp., the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, said yesterday that second-quarter profit rose 32 percent, to $7.64 billion….” “ConocoPhillips, the third-largest U.S. oil company, said Wednesday that profit rose 51 percent, to $3.14 billion.” That’s profit. ABC News, Aug 2005: http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=1029991 ” ‘The huge profits [...]
READ MORE »Monthly archives for August, 2005
Creationism: God’s Gift to the Ignorant
Just read an article on TimesOnline: Creationism: “God’s gift to the ignorant” http://www.timesonline.co.uk/printFriendly/0,,1-196-1619264,00.html It’s all the same information and rational, reasoned thought I’ve read a million places before… but reworked into a short, easy to read summary about how mystery is vital to science–as a means to finding answers. And fundamentalist’s annoying way of converting [...]
READ MORE »Iraq: Where is the Moral Outrage?
Here’s what I don’t get. We impeach a President for lying about extramarital sex, yet this president sends us into an illegal and immoral war resulting in the unnecessary deaths of thousands and increasing our risk to terrorism, and we don’t seem to care. I don’t get it. I just don’t get it. Why did [...]
READ MORE »An Answer to The Answer to the Skeptic’s Annotated Bible
When I first decided to mention this last Friday, I was blogging in my head for hours what I’d say with all kinds of bloated, arrogant ranting. Now, eh. Don’t really care at the moment. I’m just going to make it short just so I can purge my mind of the matter and move on. [...]
READ MORE »This Is The Rosetta Stone Of Creationism vs. Evolution
Not sure if “Rosetta Stone” is the best metaphor, in fact, the more I think about it the less it applies. But I will say this: This page is the BEST page I have read yet to critically, succinctly, expertly, comprehensively explain why Creationism and “Creation Science” is utterly flawed as both a scientific concept [...]
READ MORE »Character Assassination, With A Bullet
Was listening to Jerry Springer’s call-in show on XM Radio’s “Air America” station (and let me digress for a second to say that this is his political radio show, not his crappy trash-TV show. And those of you who know me know I don’t cuss, so when I say trashy crap TV show, I mean [...]
READ MORE »Rationalizing in Eden
Here’s a question I would like any Christian to really consider seriously. Adam, Eve, the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Do you believe God is so conniving and deceiving and tricky as to put this Tree in the Garden, (remember, he’s God! He could have put the Tree anywhere, or nowhere. After all, [...]
READ MORE »Dark City Full of A.I., Revisited
Watched a couple of movies this weekend I haven’t watched in years. In fact, I got the A.I. DVD when it came out a couple of years ago, and actually haven’t watched it since, until this weekend! “Dark City” A great sci-fi flick! That is SUCH an underrated movie. It’s one of those I so [...]
READ MORE »More on Morality, Objective, Universal
Listened to the 8th Episode of Skepticality podcast, and they had an interview with Tom Flynn, one of the editors of Free Inquiry magazine. He asks this question of Christians: In the story of Abraham and Issac where God told Abraham to kill his son Issac, and at the last moment when he was certain [...]
READ MORE »View of One Universe to Another
This is WAY cool! Secret Worlds: The Universe Within: http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/java/scienceopticsu/powersof10/index.html
READ MORE »The Necessity For God?
A month ago, Skepticality podcasts (I’m still working through the Skepticality Archives,) did an interview with Dr. Michael Shermer, author of such books as “Why People Believe Weird Things,” “Science Friction,” and “Science of Good and Evil,” and editor of Skeptic Magazine. He presented, among many excellent points and arguements, the fact that Christians themselves [...]
READ MORE »Did Jesus Really Exist, pt II
A followup to my original entry: Did Jesus Exist? Here is another site that present a lot of historical evidence to support the theory that Jesus actually never existed as presented in the cannonical Bible: Non-Christian Testimony? A lot of evidence I’d be interested in hearing a Christian apologist’s take on. I read on a [...]
READ MORE »Does Your Boy Get Bullied? He Might Be Gay!
Oh. My. God… http://www.focusonyourchild.com/develop/art1/A0000684.html I can’t even begin to express just how disgusted I am at this site.
READ MORE »Gun Control Debate Still Continues, Within Myself
Listened to an interesting program a few days ago, it was an old episode of This American Life: http://thislife.org/. It was an episode involving guns and our relationship with them. This link should work: http://207.70.82.73/pages/descriptions/97/81.html which has the Real audio file of the program. But if not, use this to find the program. Title: “Guns”, [...]
READ MORE »How a Holy Man Should Handle Annoying Children
From 2 Kings 2:22-23 23 He went up from there to Bethel; and while he was going up on the way, some small boys came out of the city and jeered at him, saying, “Go away, baldhead! Go away, baldhead!” 24 When he turned around and saw them, he cursed them in the name of [...]
READ MORE »Faith or Delusion?
Why do people believe in religions? Why do Christians believe the dogma? Why do people retain a faith that flies in the face of reason and rational thought and critical thinking and skepticism? Isn’t faith a belief in what is unseen, not belief in what is absurd and irrational? Isn’t that delusion? Here I am [...]
READ MORE »Observation of Reality from The Machinist (and Roger Ebert)
Watched “The Machinist” the other day. Wow, good movie. Something like “Jacob’s Ladder” but without the supernatural. It’s all psychological. A little disturbing, but very good. But that’s not the point of this blog entry. I just re-read Roger Ebert’s review of it, and at the end he says: We get up in the morning [...]
READ MORE »The Thomas Jefferson Bible
This is interesting. Evidently Thomas Jefferson cut-n-pasted the Bible around to create a version he felt removed dogma and early church agenda and supernatural fantasy: The Thomas Jefferson Bible (Remember, Thomas Jefferson, one of the greatest architects of the US Constitution said in a letter to John Adams, April 11, 1823 “One day the dawn [...]
READ MORE »More on Skepticism of American Christian Foundation
Part 2 has a very good discussion on the fact that the US was not founded on Christian or otherwise religious beliefs. That morality should be defined by what’s “right or wrong” and not a belief structure. That the US government was quite heavily secular and anti-religious until the 1950′s. http://www.skepticality.net/episode_skep_002_foundingfathers.htm
READ MORE »Burden Of Proof For The Truth When It Becomes False
From the Skepticality Podcast, 1st episode, Derek said the following and I particularly liked it. “Put false info in, teach it as truth, and it becomes true to a lot of people. Then when they hear the truth, they actually want you to prove the truth, because the false has become what is accepted.” Take [...]
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