How do Atheist groups differ from Humanist groups? And how can we best work together to promote a rational, ethical and secular society?
Did the historical Jesus exist?
If Jesus existed as a human being and did so many amazing things, surely somebody at the time would have written about him? Well, actually, no. The first time Jesus is mentioned outside the Bible is sixty years after he supposedly died.
Reality is basically as it seems
Note: This article was written several years ago. I have since incorporated its content into a more recent article that you can read here:
Why nothing can be known with certainty, and why it is reasonable to say that we know things
I suggest that you read the above article instead of the old one, for a more up-to-date version of my thoughts on this issue.
Old article follows
This is the third article in a series about why I assume that reality is basically as it seems to be. In the first article, I explained why I believe nothing can be objectively known. In the second article, I described five possible theories of reality. This third article examines the patterns in the five theories of reality, and concludes that:
Five possible theories of reality
Note: This article was written several years ago. I have since incorporated its content into a more recent article that you can read here:
Why nothing can be known with certainty, and why it is reasonable to say that we know things
I suggest that you read the above article instead of the old one, for a more up-to-date version of my thoughts on this issue.
Old article follows
This is the second article in a series about why I assume that reality is basically as it seems to be. In the first article, I explained why I believe nothing can be objectively known. This second article deals with a sequence of five possible theories of what reality might consist of:
Nothing can be objectively known
Note: This article was written several years ago. I have since incorporated its content into a more recent article that you can read here:
Why nothing can be known with certainty, and why it is reasonable to say that we know things
I suggest that you read the above article instead of the old one, for a more up-to-date version of my thoughts on this issue.
Old article follows
This is the first article in a series about why I assume two things about reality: (1) that nothing can be objectively known, and (2) that reality is basically as it seems to be. This article is about the first of those assumptions – that nothing can be objectively known.
The pretend Vatican State at the UN
The Vatican is by far the smallest State in the world, being just over a hundred acres in size. It plays at being a real State by issuing its own stamps, but it has no proper citizens (just transient employees of the Catholic Church), few public services (Italy provides it with police and water) and no real economy (though it does have a novelty ATM machine that issues instructions in Latin).
The unelectable atheist President of the USA
An atheist running for President of the United States today faces roughly the same level of prejudice from voters as a female candidate would have faced in the 1940s while women workers were being sacked to make way for returning soldiers.
Continue reading “The unelectable atheist President of the USA”
Is Mathieu Ricard the World’s happiest man?
When Tibetan Buddhist monks meditate for many years, they gradually change the molecular structure of their brains. MRI scans show they experience more activity in the left pre-frontal cortex, a part of the brain that is associated with happiness, and less activity in the right-hand side, which handles negative thoughts.
Continue reading “Is Mathieu Ricard the World’s happiest man?”
But will it make you happy?
Why do people believe that living in California would make them feel happier than people who do live in California actually are? And why do people, who are afraid of being rejected, want more drugs than people who have actually been rejected?
Why I am an atheist
I am an atheist because I reject the idea that gods exist, in the same way and for the same reasons that I reject the ideas that that the earth is balanced on the back of a sea turtle, that homeopathy is more useful than a heart transplant, that Rapunzel wove her hair into a ladder or Rumpelstiltskin wove straw into gold, that stepping on a pavement crack will break my mother’s back, that a deposed Nigerian prince wants to email me several million dollars, that Uri Geller can bend spoons with his mind, that I am in danger from vampires or zombies or broken mirrors, or that I am protected by angels or leprechauns or horseshoes.