toxic thought waste site

Where does the hatred for gay people come from?

2010-07-09T21:49:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while I like to ask people this question. To me it is a significant mystery. Rationally it would seem that heterosexual males should encourage as many males as possible to be gay. It can only help your odds with the ladies. And yet we live in a world where gay people are loathed (almost as much as atheists).

Invariably the first answer I get is that because the Bible condemns them. Now let's make a *huge* leap here and suppose just for sake of argument that, well, the Bible is completely fiction and the edicts of God are just normal people *pretending* that there is a God and that he said these things. (I know, a huge leap). So why was this such an important thing to codify?

The best I can come up with is that many/most non-gays have a bit of an ick response to gay activities. I do and I've heard the same from many people who intellectually support gay rights etc. I really liked 6 Feet Under, but it was hard to watch sometimes because of this.

As with many things in the Bible people just made God command something that they wanted to be forced on others. Stop being icky.

Of course even if this is correct there is still the question of why we have an ick response. (Well if you are heterosexual. Presumably gays don't have this. Or that would just be weird and sad).

So here's my crazy idea. If all dudes were gay all then the human race would disappear pretty fast. So there would be some evolutionary advantage to avoiding same sex interactions. Therefore the ick factor helps raise the threshold against the likelihood of someone not getting their genes into the next generation.

So ironically the edicts in the Bible against man on man action were put there by evolution. Hows that for a giant irony sandwich. :)

My Pet "Crazy" Idea

2010-07-03T15:51:00.000-07:00

I suspect most people have a few crazy ideas that continue to hang around even after they have done their best cognitive maintenance and rebooting. Sure, you've banished belief in god or expelled parapsychology, but perhaps there is something lingering around that *seems* like it should have just gone by now. And what's more you only sort of think it's a crazy idea. Actually you think there is some sense to it and it is others who just haven't given it proper consideration.

So it's not so much that you really believe its a crazy idea, its just that others wouldn't easily understand.

So what is my crazy notion that surprises me with its tenacity and that others would think odd? That there is a non-negligible chance we are living in a simulation.

You might be surprised to learn that I didn't (directly) get this from watching "The Matrix". Even if I did consider it at that time it didn't stick with me. I believe the seed got planted by reading (not surprisingly) Are We Living In a Simulation?. This was a serious case made by a serious person. And I found it surprisingly convincing.

So how does this affect me? No much really. But I do take this idea off the shelf of my mind surprisingly often and dust it off and look it over. Sometimes daily (perhaps for just a few seconds). Probably never less than once a week.

Probably the most impact I get from this idea is that I often consider this question: What (if anything) would I do differently this moment if I really *was* living in a simulation? I don't usually have a shocking answer to this question. I mostly feel like I'd pretty much do what I'm doing. Being in a simulation wouldn't (presumably) change what my options are and what makse me happy. In fact in a simulation this real it's not clear what the difference between reality and simulation would be.

So what crazy idea do you have that even your "sane"/"rational" friends would think is weird?

To the random redditor who recommended "A Brief History of Everything"

2010-07-02T14:49:00.000-07:00

I hate you.

So, I keep a long list of books to add to my ipod commute "reading" list. Generally this works out pretty well and I've been exposed to things I normally wouldn't have thought twice about (e.g. Hayek's "Road to Serfdom" for instance). But sometimes something gets through the filter and I end up listening to the most unbelievably awful garbage.

The current winner of the books that have no right to exist award is "A Brief History of Everything". Ken Wilber has got to be the most crazed New Age science ignorant person outside of an Oprah studio.

He starts off by talking about evolution. So I figure this is going to be a science-y book. Then he right away starts down the "half a wing is useless so obviously Darwin isn't the whole picture route". Then he starts talking about "holons". And then I died a little inside.

In the interest of exposing myself to things I don't agree with already I'm going to continue to listen for a couple of chapters. But really it is awful.

Pascal's Wager and Probability Aptitude

2010-05-14T22:16:00.000-07:00

It's hard not to get exposed to Pascal's wager at some point in your life. It's one of those things that's so offensive to clear thinking that it practically has noticeable stench to it. It's pretty much a given that any one in this day and age who presents it as a valid argument for belief is a serious crack pot and/or hasn't really thought about it for more than a few minutes.

But then, how did the great man Pascal come to make such an argument. I mean the guy has a triangle named after him and everything. He's got to have been a sharp cookie. But of course after a while you stop being surprised when otherwise smart people have these huge blind spots with respect to religion. That's just one of those weird failure modes of the mind.

But what if the explanation was simpler? What if Pascal just simply didn't understand probability theory? Surprisingly this actually seems to be the case.

Here is a video of Keith Devlin (who I normally find pretty objectionable as the NPR "Math Guy") giving a talk that among other things goes over the inception of probability theory. And who should be at attendance at the birth of this topic? Our friend Pascal. And who should be showing a complete confusion at the topic? I think you can guess.

Pascal, Fermat and Probability

The Power of 11:11

2009-02-06T23:11:00.000-08:00

I have a number of personal productivity blogs I check on occasion. Reading about being productive is the next best thing to being productive, doncha know! In any case it occurred to me recently that for some reason or another Steven Pavlina's feed had disappeared from my list. So I hopped over to his page to see what he was up to.

Apparently he is a pretty famous productivity guru. I had read a couple of his essays at one point and they were pretty inspiring. Dream big, work hard, etc. Over time he seemed to veer farther and farther off into the weeds. He would mention how he and his wife had an actual psychic link. He did a weird polyphasic sleep experiment (nap for a few minutes every few hours and don't sleep at night), and raw veganism among other things. I don't actually have anything against the last two, but I completely turn off when people start talking about their psychic abilities.

So I didn't know if I was going to get productivity advice or bizarreness or woo when I checked in. Well, the answer was woo. Woo in a big way.

The two things that compel me to write are: (1) it's always interesting to come across a new area of crazy that I'd never heard of before and (2) it's always oddly compelling to watch the train wreck of a life dedicated to crazy ideas.

I thought I was pretty educated in the ways of woo, but I had never heard of the "11:11" thing before. The funniest part is that it was apparently started by Uri Geller. I kind of find it amazing that people do anything but laugh at this guy. Apparently, I'm pretty out of touch with the New Age movement these days. Here is a pretty succinct response to the whole 11:11 school of thought. In any case, I now have another crazy belief system to add to my collection.

Even more interesting is the long essay that Steve writes on this subject. He clearly really believes it and really believes it's important. At one point he writes:

Form this intention with your thoughts, but feel it as well. You must really want it. You must desire to see the truth about reality as strongly as a drowning man desires his next breath. If you don’t really want to see the truth, nothing will change.

Here he summarizes my feelings about knowing the truth. And yet he does this in service of the idea that seeing a digital clock with the numbers 11:11 on it is a message from the universe. Something special is going on.

And so now I have to stand back a second and be kind of amazed that I'm even surprised by this sort of thing. I guess it just makes me mad that this sort of nonsense is so contagious. Who knows, I'm probably adding to it by mentioning it at all....

I sort of freaked myself out while writing this post, because I noticed that there were 11's all over my screen. Of course this is because I typed them all as I was writing this post and searching for links. But still, what are the chances....?

Of course, what if I'm wrong and being closed minded? Are you brave enough to challenge your preconceptions and experience the power of 11:11? Do you have the guts? No? Okay then... As for me, I'm taking the red pill. Actually 11 of them.

I'm ready to embrace the truth.

Christian Radio Watch: Why a cold, hostile and mostly empty universe proves that god exists and loves us

2009-01-09T22:09:00.000-08:00

Listen to the interview here (starts at 1h30m). The book is called: "Why The Universe Is The Way It Is". See how many logical fallacies and out right lies you can count before your head explodes.

It turns out the entire universe really was created just to make this one planet work. You see, there really was no other way to do it. And, um, we had to be in a dark spot so, um, we could see the rest of it easily.

Prayer-cebo?

2009-01-07T21:16:00.000-08:00

I've heard about placebos, obviously, but I had never heard that they often work even if you *know* they are a placebo? I recently heard this in this video and then again in an essay by Ramachandran. This paragraph really jumped out for me:

Her ability to hold mutually inconsistent beliefs seems bizarre to us but in fact we all do this from time to time. I have known many an eminent theoretical physicist who prays to a personal God; an old guy watching him from somewhere up there in the sky. I might mention that I have long known that prayer was a placebo; but upon learning recently of a study that showed that a drug works even when you know it is a placebo, I immediately started praying. There are two Ramachandrans—one an arch skeptic and the other a devout believer. Fortunately I enjoy this ambiguous state of mind, unlike Darwin who was tormented by it. It is not unlike my enjoyment of an Escher engraving.

If it's good enough for Ramachandran, then it's good enough for me. So I think I'll try an experiment and pray to Placebo Jesus for a month and see if it works or not. Here is a sample prayer:

Dear Placebo Jesus,

I know you don't exist and if you did it's not clear why you would be listening to my thoughts and care about my needs, but any hoo, please make me smart, give me good health, keep my family safe, send some extra cash my way, and generally make life awesome for me.

If there's anything I can do for you, just let me know.

Ramen (oops, I mean Amen, of course)

Religulous on google video

2009-01-03T07:00:00.000-08:00

While it lasts: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1839369108234002661

Programming and Religions

2008-12-19T21:23:00.000-08:00

Two great tastes that taste great together:

If programming languages were religions...

Dear Global Economy

2008-12-04T22:11:00.000-08:00

A rationalist prayer of thanks:

http://www.overcomingbias.com/2008/11/thanksgiving-pr.html

Pythonistas and their religion (or lack thereof)

2008-12-03T21:00:00.000-08:00

I had to chuckle at Steve Holden's recent entry "Religion is not python". I'm always carefully observing bloggers and other writers to see if I can ascertain where they fit on the religious spectrum. It's easier when they pretty much come out and tell you.

I still don't have a firm picture of Guido's religious tendencies but from his blog his writing definitely seems to skew to the skeptical side of things.

It's funny how even this far along in life I'm still surprised when I come across a smart well spoken person who is religious. I guess I'm a slow learner.

Is it already too late for most people?

2008-10-11T13:13:00.000-07:00

Someone (I forget who) once observed that people had only until a certain age to reject their religious faith. Afterward they would have answers to all the objections, and it would be too late. That is the kind of existence you must surpass. This is a test of your strength as a rationalist, and it is very severe; but if you cannot pass it, you will be weaker than a ten-year-old.

(overcomingbias.com)

I wonder how true this is. And fear that it is more true than not. And further, I fear that you can almost never see this in yourself without exahuastive (and exhausting) ongoing effort.

But you should try.

The Gay Left Handed Bayesian

2008-07-06T23:09:00.000-07:00

Don't know why this little story problem jumped in my head, but here you go.

The number of people who are homosexual seems to be around 4.5% of the population (wikipedia says 2 to 7%). The percent of people who are left handed is about 10%. For males, being gay increases your chance of being left handed by 36% (90% for females) [link]. So if you meet a left handed man or woman, what are the chances they are homosexual?

Pulling out my book of Bayesian spells....

P(h) = 0.045 # probability of being homosexual
P(l) = 0.1 # probability of being left handed
P(l|h) = 0.1 * 1.36 = 0.136 for guys (or 0.19 for dames)# probability of being left handed if you are a homosexual

What we *want* to know is P(h|l) (probability of being a homosexual if you are left handed). For you Bayes newbies you must resist the temptation to assume that P(h|l) = P(l|h).

By Bayes theorem:

P(h|l) = P(l|h) * P(h) / P(l)

Or

P(h|l) = 6% for dudes and 9% for the ladies.

I'm not sure what use this information is, but you are welcome anyway.

Christian Radio Watch: "I don't have enough faith to be an atheist"

2008-07-02T20:58:00.000-07:00

Fortunately, you don't need faith to be an atheist. In fact, sir, I think it's safe to say you don't really grasp the concept. Part 1 (1h31m), Part 2(1h31m)

This guy really spent some time addressing this book...

I don't know why I love listening to Christian apologetics so much. I guess it's sort of like watching a car wreck. Except it's a human brain spinning wildly out of control.

Achewood and the Improved Bible

2008-07-02T20:48:00.000-07:00

Having recently discovered Achewood I've been catching up by reading it from the beginning. Truly a masterpeice. Here was today's entry (for me, catching up):

Comedy gold. I totally need to get a bible printed with coupons and tear out adds. I think this is now my life's work.

Godless Code 0.3

2008-06-25T21:02:00.000-07:00

REFERENCE: (godless code 0.3)

The first entry of the godless code is always your disbelief path, the rest of the items are optional and may appear in any order. ":" is used as a delimiter between terms.

Belief path: each step of your disbelief journey, separated by "->". You may prefix a node with a number in parentheses to indicate at which age a transition occurred.

Protestant
------------
P++ : The bible is 100% true and I spend much of my life studying/evangelizing
P+ : I really believe, but I could be more involved
P : I call myself a Christian but I'm not on fire for it.
P- : I attend church but some of the ideas don't really hang together

Catholic
-----------
C
[use +/- as above]

Atheist
-----------
A++ : I'm very convinced, very vocal. I am defined by disbelief
A+ : I'm convinced and and active but it's not everything to me.
A : I don't believe, but I don't really think about it too much.
A- : I don't believe but I'm still pretty uncomfortable with disbelief

agnostic
--------------
a+ : I really don't think you can know either way. Also, there might be a tea pot out there. Who can know for sure?
a : The word atheist make people uncomfortable and we don't want anyone to be uncomfortable.

and so on:

B : Buddhist
H : Hindu
I : Islam
M : Mormon
7 : SeventhDay
W : Jehovah's Witness
J : Jew

The above single character codes may be used or if you are feeling fancy go ahead and use the following 3 digit codes:

ADV Adventist
ALL Alliance Church
AMI Amish
ANI Animist
ASA Ásatrú
AOG Assembly Of God
BAH Baha'i
BAP Baptist
BUD Buddhist
CAT Catholic
CHR Christian
CMA Christian Mission Alliance
COC Church Of Christ
COG Church Of God
CON Congregational
CSC Christian Science
DCD Christian Disciples Of Christ
DST Diest
EPI Episcopalian
FRE Free Church/Independent
GRE Greek Orthodox
HIN Hindu
ISL Islam
JAN Jainism
JEH Jehovah's Witness
JEW Jewish
LUT Lutheran
MEN Mennonite
MET Methodist
MOM Mormon (Latter-Day Saint)
NAR Native American Religion
NON Non Denominational
PEN Pentecostal
PRE Presbyterian
PRO Protestant
QUA Quaker
SAT Satanist
SCI Scientology
SHA Shamanism
SHI Shinto
SIK Sikhism
SPI Spiritualist
TAO Taoism
UCC United Church Of Christ
UNI Unitarian
WIC Wicca/Druidry

You can further modify the above with an abbreviated sub-type in []. For instance if you want to specifify Theravadan Buddhism you could write it as: B[Thera]

Religions I find tolerable:

TR(x,y,...)

A tuple of religion codes from the religion path section. The tuple
may be the empty set, e.g. TR().

Holy Books read:

r({B|K|BoM}%XX[, ...]) # one or more holy books you've read and how much

B : Bible
K : Koran
BoM : Book of Mormon
D: Dhammapadda (Buddhism)
TR: Tripitaka (Buddhism)
V: Veda (Hinduism)
BG: Bhagavad Gita (Hinduism)
T: Talmud (Judaism)
TTC: Tao-te-ching (Taoism)
ZA: Zend Avesta (Zoroastrianism)
K: Kojiki (Shintoism)
N: Nihongi (Shintoism)
JS: Jaina Sutras (Jainism)
SGGS: Shri Guru Granth Sahib (Sikhism)

eg. r(B%20,K%10)

Religious instruction: How much religious instruction have you received
in your life?

RI(pX,sY,uZ, ...)

hW : years of home schooling
pX : years of primary school
sY : years of secondary school
uZ : years of university
mQ : years of seminary

Exposure: How many people know you are a non-believer?

ex(XYZ(x)[, ...]) or ex(ALL)

Fam - Family
Wk - Co-workers
Fr - Friends

values can range from 0.0 (no one knows) to 1.0 (everyone knows)

e.g. ex(Fam(.54),Wk(.5),Fr(1.0))

ex(ALL) indicates you're godlessness is known 100% to the world.

Religious affiliation of significant other(s):

SO([X, ...])

Where X is one of the religion codes from above. Empty set means no SO. :(

Fanboy (or girl): What non-believers inspire you? And how much?

FB(X[,...])

Currently available non-believer codes:

RD : Richard Dawkins
SH : Sam Harris
DD : Daniel Dennett
SB : Susan Blackmore
BF : Brian Flemming
RC : Richard Carrier
MS : Michael Shermer
JS : Julia Sweeney
CS : Carl Sagan
JR : James Randi
RI : Robert Green Ingersoll
PJ : Penn Jillette
PZ : PZ Myers
CH : Christopher Hitchens
SJG : Stephen Jay Gould

You may include as many as you want to. You may also add a "+" (e.g. DD+) to show special approval of or "-" if you don't really like them (opposite of fanboy appreciation)

Getting the message out:

What do you do to share the news and/or stir up conversation?

M(X[,...])

Blg : blogging
Auth : writing books
D2D : door to door evangelization

What godless memberships do you have?

MS(o,l,n,i,...)

o Online atheist related groups.
l A member of a local atheist group
n A member of a national atheist group
i A member of an international atheist group
csi A member of CSI (formerly CSICOP)
bha A member of The British Humanist Association
iheu A member of Internation Humanist and Ethical Union
nss A member of the National Secular Society

a plus can be used for additional groups up to 2...a single * can be used to denote that the person is active in the leadership of the group(board member, webmaster, etc.)

An example...

MS (o++,l+*,i*)

For member of at least 3 online groups, at 2 local groups and is in the leadership of at least one of them, and is a leadership member of an international organization.

Development of the godless code:

GCD : godless code deity - they who develop the code and/or have
suggestions incorporated

optional "+" if it was your idea in the first place. :)

Version: As the code evolves need to know what version to use for decoding.

[gc-0.1] = Use version 0.1 for decoding this

This coding system is new so if you have suggestions for additions,
clarifications, etc please let me know and I'll try to address for
gc-0.4

The KJV in a blender

2008-06-14T21:45:00.000-07:00

(A markov chain bible chapter using the entire KJV as input. The final verse is especially, er, chilling)

1:01 crow, thou shalt take the goods of his land:

1:02 And thou shalt fear, and let him acknowledge that the children of Ammon;

1:03 And Gilead, and Galilee, all the set feasts, by number, according to Christ Jesus:

1:04 That ye love one another, even as a servant, for a memorial before the ark of the Chaldeans:

1:05 for thou shalt not be purged from thy glory, and wisdom, and bow myself in great abundance.

1:06 And Solomon said, If we say then? Shall we give, or shall the earth feared, and said, He is antichrist, that denieth me before men, to pray before the LORD;

1:07 for he beareth not fruit he taketh away:

1:08 and they shall smite him;

1:09 or if there be any work that they might stand before their eyes, and, behold, they are consumed out of your dwellings.

1:10 And Pharaoh said unto them, and returned unto the king, That Daniel, which art infamous and much vexed.

1:11 Behold, the Hebrews hath met with us of his person, and well favoured.

1:12 And it came to her maidens.

1:13 She considereth a field, and thou shalt eat it in her month they shall burn it on a smoke, because the LORD which is a feast by an ordinance for Israel unto this day;

1:14 give me half thine house, and his hand toward heaven, that thou doest well to draw water.

1:15 And he answered, Here am I.

1:16 Are they not judge.

1:17 Shall I yet to cry unto God a more sure word of God made a covenant of the offering up of the LORD was there upon me.

1:18 They that forsake the idols of Egypt:

1:19 in vain shalt thou change them, and the priests of the children free.

1:20 Notwithstanding, lest we should pray for you in Egypt since it became as a bride adorned for her husband.

1:21 And I will make drunk her princes, and gave him to be feared above all gods.

1:22 For all this people, who have purposed to return unto thee the righteous shall be of the priests the Levites which are my people, and tongues, stood before the testimony, and cover you with mine own bowels:

1:23 Whom I would not destroy it for me, O thou fairest among women? what is his body, according to the earth.

1:24 And when the Jews which dwelt in a strange woman, from the pestilence;

1:25 that they might put us therein.

1:26 And when they had emerods in their own souls by their own confusion, as with his face about, and when thou shalt make two cherubims of gold, and for every man's money was not to covetousness.

1:27 Turn away my peace be with the mouth of the tabernacle of the LORD thy God, those deliver thou me.

1:28 For ye know these things will I send pestilence among you;

1:29 that ye might be the woman returned out of the night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, is the stumblingblock of their enemies:

1:30 and awake for thee, and as for me, which to day into mine hand?

1:31 Now therefore kill every woman

Make Your Own Bible Verses

2008-06-14T21:28:00.000-07:00

I was reading this article on the unholy union of Garfield and Markov models and it reminded me that I'd never gotten around to trying out markov modelling first hand.

Over my lunch hour I cranked out the code at the bottom of this entry. And yes I write code over my lunch hour as a form of relaxation. What do you do?

In any case, the previous blog entry was the result of running this script on the book of Mark. Mark, Markov, get it?

Any way if you've ever wanted to generate your own biblical sounding text, here's your chance. Just download some scripture and crank up your python interpreter and away you go!

BTW, I'm really curious if Mark(ov) Chapter 1 get's any hits from people seeking Biblical inspiration. I know it inspired me.


import sys
import random
import itertools

#http://www.o-bible.org/download/kjv.txt

def make_frequencies(words):
    result = {}

    for i in range(2, len(words)):
        w1, w2, w3 = words[i-2:i+1]
        if (w1,w2) not in result:
            result[(w1,w2)] = {}
        if w3 not in result[(w1,w2)]:
            result[(w1,w2)][w3] = 0
        result[(w1,w2)][w3] += 1

    return result
    
def find_first_random(freqs):
    return get_random_ith_item(list(set([x[0] for x in freqs])))

def find_second_random(first, freqs):
    pair = get_random_ith_item(list(set(x for x in freqs if x[0] == first)))
    if not pair:
        return find_first_random(freqs)
    return pair[1]

def find_markov_random(first, second, freqs):
    markov_words = freqs.get((first,second), {})
    word = get_random_ith_item(itertools.chain(*[[x]*count for (x,count) in markov_words.items()]))
    if not word:
        return find_second_random(second, freqs)

    return word

def get_random_ith_item(stream):
    item = None
    for i,x in enumerate(stream):
        if random.randint(0,i) == 0:
            item = x

    return item
   
def markovize(freqs, output_length):
    result = [find_first_random(freqs)]
    result.append(find_second_random(result[0], freqs))
    output_length -= 2

    while output_length > 0:
        w1, w2 = result[-2:] 
        result.append(find_markov_random(w1,w2,freqs))
        output_length -= 1

    return result

def main():
    output_length = 500

    words = ' '.join(sys.stdin.readlines())

    word_frequencies = make_frequencies(words.split())
    print ' '.join(markovize(word_frequencies, output_length))

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

Bible Study: Mark(ov) Chapter 1

2008-06-12T21:32:00.000-07:00

Mark(ov) 1:01 he, casting away his wife, and raise up seed unto his disciples, How hardly shall they cast stones, and wounded him in the ship again departed to the poor, and thou shalt deny me thrice.

Mark(ov) 1:02 And when they had sent forth and laid hold on him: for they have heard the word, and it becometh unfruitful.

Mark(ov) 1:03 And these are they which are sown on good ground, and prayed that, if it were but the end shall not be among you: but whosoever shall say to you, Lo, here is Christ;

Mark(ov) 1:04 or, lo, he that hath, to him from every quarter.

Mark(ov) 1:05 And again he sent him away empty.

Mark(ov) 1:06 And again he sent another;

Mark(ov) 1:07 and him they cast stones, and wounded him in the bush God spake unto him, Seest thou these things?

Mark(ov) 1:08 And Jesus answered and said unto them, Why, what evil hath he done?

Mark(ov) 1:09 And they call the King of the physician, but they that were rich cast in of their abundance;

Mark(ov) 1:10 but she of her daughter.

Mark(ov) 1:11 But Jesus answereth again, and saith unto him, Go thy way;

Mark(ov) 1:12 the devil out of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee.

Mark(ov) 1:13 But Jesus said, Verily I say unto him, Why do ye premeditate: but whatsoever shall be hated of all men counted John, that he would not suffer that any man should cast seed into the hall, called Praetorium;

Mark(ov) 1:14 and they bring a blind man by the farther side of the multitude, they took up twelve baskets full of fragments took ye up?

Mark(ov) 1:15 And they all saw him, and killed him, and said, And thou also wast with Jesus and his disciples asked him again of the Blessed?

Mark(ov) 1:16 And Jesus said, Forbid him not: for of such is the kingdom of God of the Jews?

Mark(ov) 1:17 For he taught in the morning: Lest coming suddenly he find you sleeping.

Mark(ov) 1:18 And what I will, but what thou sayest.

Mark(ov) 1:19 And he cometh, and findeth them sleeping, and saith unto him, By what authority doest thou these things?

Mark(ov) 1:20 and what shall a man satisfy these men with bread here in the days of Abiathar the high priest rent his clothes, and saith, What need we any further witnesses?

Mark(ov) 1:21 Ye have heard the word that was possessed with the wild beasts;

Mark(ov) 1:22 and the cock crew.

Mark(ov) 1:23 And Peter calling to remembrance saith unto them, How is it ago since this came unto him, and put it on his eyes, and put his hands again upon his eyes, and put his own house.

Mark(ov) 1:24 And the unclean spirits, when they looked, they saw no man of him.

Mark(ov) 1:25 And always, night and day, and the chains had been seen of her, believed not.

Mark(ov) 1:26 After that he was as one that was sown in their synagogue a man leave his wife behind him, and from Idumaea, and from Idumaea, and from Judaea, And from thence he arose, and rebuked the foul spirit, saying unto him, By what authority doest thou these things?

Mark(ov) 1:27 and what buildings are here!

Mark(ov) 1:28 And Jesus answered and said

Zero to Zen Master: Zen as Mind Poison

2008-02-11T20:47:00.000-08:00

So I'm trying to take zen seriously. I really am. But I feel like I'm in charge of testing whether or not some food has poison in it and I'm told, "just taste it!". Umm, sorry, no.

Here's the problem. I have my own ideas what enlightenment is or should be like. If I knew what it was exactly, presumably I'd already be there. But at the very least it seems fair that if someone points in the direction of enlightenment I should at least have some sanity check as to whether it's a reasonable direction. If you haven't noticed there are a lot of people claiming to point to enlightenment and they are pointing in a lot of incompatible directions.

My two main problems with studying zen then are: (1) do I have *any* indications that the zen people (and specifically which ones) are pointing in a valid (or at least interesting) direction? and (2) how do I jive this with what I think enlightenment is or should be?

On the first point, are there any examples of zen awesomeness? Presumably you can use zen to be calm, learn to go with the flow, etc. But seriously, who cares? If you are completely at sea and zen helps you find some inner calm, go for it. But how much calm do you need? And more importantly what is the value of a unit of calm worth compared to mastery of some skill or other life experiences? Don't get me wrong, I'm the first guy to sign up for alone time. But if I need to decide whether to use the time to get a little more "centered" or for instance learn another programming language. I get more joy from learning than pursuing calm. And if I could trade calm units I already have for instant mastery of another skill I'd probably be willing to do so. And probably even willing to go into debt.

I know zen is supposedly not about achieving some end, but really that's a BS answer. No one does something for no reason at all. Even if the reason is to satisfy your curiosity or some other unconscious inkling, you are not acting without some purpose. People do zen because they want something.

There is the idea that zen people are more in touch with their spontaneous side (really this is a Taoism thing, but we'll let the zen people have it for now). And of course doing zen will make you a master archer. Unfortunately there is no compelling reason to suppose that "zen" was the secret sauce, when we can just as easily rely on the simple maxim that mastery takes time. If you find some archer who practices archery everyday AND practices zen everyday why should you think zen helped him get to mastery? For all you know it slowed him down because he spent less time doing archery.

Secondly, it seems like enlightenment has to have something to do with true, deep understanding. In the case of zen the self or at least your awareness is your subject. Great. But do zen people have any great insights here? People studying cognitive science have learned a lot about the mind. It's not very clear to me that zen masters have really learned anything worth sharing on the topic. And it seems pretty likely that they have *lots* of metaphysical baggage from taking things like the existence of the soul, or atman or reincarnation seriously. And to make things worse, since they typically hide behind a wall of abstruse metaphors and nonsensical anecdotes, it's really hard to know.

They really could know something amazing about the self and awareness or other things I don't have an inkling of. But how would I now? If you don't have enlightenment already then sort of by definition you are going to have trouble identifying enlightenment in others. And honestly I think if people had true enlightenment they'd be able to share it more explicitly.

I can understand quantum mechanics (at least well enough). Is there any chance that the zen "truths" are more complicated, less expressible in words? Color me skeptical.

And yet...

And yet I plan to continue with my admittedly too brief meditation practice. And reading some zen books and thinking about the ideas.... I can't shake the feeling that there *is* something to meditation and the zen people seem to have spent the most time thinking about this area. But it's not really clear that the zen outer coating around the practice of mindfulness is anything but kruft.

And there is always a better way to test for poison than just eating whatever you are fed.

A Random Walk Through The Bible: Hosea 7:4

2008-01-19T21:02:00.000-08:00

Using our random verse finder and the basic methodology:

Hosea 7:4 (New International Version)

They are all adulterers, burning like an oven whose fire the baker need not stir from the kneading of the dough till it rises.

So last time God said I was to be his messenger (or something like that). Now this has *got* to be the message.

discern the spiritual principle in this verse
- God hates adulterers
ask what was god trying to get across to these people when he spoke these words
- you are going to experience the powers of a convection oven, up close and personal like
ask how does this apply to me
- I'm not an adulterer (that you can prove) so, *whew*.

I wonder if God has any more important messages to give to me (and to the world by me). I guess we'll find out next time on the next installment of A Random Walk Through the Bible!

A Random Walk Through The Bible: Exodus 19:6

2008-01-13T06:07:00.000-08:00

Using our random verse finder and the basic methodology:

Exodus 19:6 (New International Version)

you will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites.

discern the spiritual principle in this verse
- God wants me to be his priest unto the Israelites
ask what was god trying to get across to these people when he spoke these words
- He wants me to tell them something
ask how does this apply to me
- Stand by for an important announcement...

OK, folks God has chosen me to present a message. I don't know what it is yet, but I think it's going to be important!

Zero to Zen Master: How I got here (again)

2008-01-09T20:19:00.000-08:00

Some thoughts on how I came to spend my ever so valuable time thinking about silly things like zen. Like a lot of people I read a bunch of zen books in college. But that's college. You are allowed to do crazy experimental stuff. But now I'm a grown up (sort of) why am I wasting my time on this stuff again? I sort of got hit from three directions and decided to pay attention.

First, Sam Harris talks glowingly about contemplative practices in a number of places. And I was really intrigued by his essay on Buddhism and meditation.

Secondly I heard an interview with Susan Blackmore on pointofinquiry.org. It was a really interesting discussion on memes and parapsychology and drugs and consciousness and atheism. I was really surprised I had never heard of her before. I started reading her articles on her website and well, they are drenched in zen.

The last zen-ish thing was a little more circuitous. I had been reading some John (End of Science) Horgan writings on edge.org. This led me too his web site full of his essays and book excepts. I was particularly interested in his debunking of enlightened gurus. Some how from looking at this I found this article by Brad (HARDCORE ZEN) Warner which comments on Horgan's views on the topic. Soon after I started to read through his zen essays he started a blog which I keep in my feed and check every once in a while.

The funny thing is that it was Brad's writing that sort of broke the camel's back. And mostly it was his suggestion that to do zen you need to sit correctly. To what ever degree this is true it was what I needed to start having a *serious* meditation practice as meager as it is. Sitting slightly uncomfortably and with good posture really does make a difference. And his writings on zen are believable to me. He writes how he had a semi-mystical experience transcending space and time and viewing the whole universe in a vision of sorts and his zen teacher ridiculed him and told him it was garbage. It's a little thing, but that gives him credibility to me.

Now I need to actually read one (or more) of his books and see if I like him as much as I *think* I would.

Any way, dear reader, that is how I found myself in Zenville, in the zen district accross the street from Zen R Us, on Zen avenue. Perhaps you know the place.

Zero to Zen Master: General Plan

2008-01-06T22:07:00.000-08:00

My basic plan for the year is to come up with month long experiments related to zen and to read some books. Nothing much fancier than that. Unless I think of something fancier. I've pondered briefly trying to identify a zendo in my area, but the thought of hanging out with a bunch of strangers and sitting quietly for long stretches of time seems kind of weird. Almost weirder than just going to church. So we'll just stick with my modest plan.

I have a list of books I'm planning to work through. I'll go over my list in the near future in some detail. As it happens I decided to read "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Zen Living" first. And despite my knee jerk expectation that the book would suck (just the title I guess) I actually like it and it seems like a pretty calm and level headed introduction.

To a large extent zen is really just about meditating. When I was in college reading about it it always had this sense of *magic* about it. If I could just "get it" some how I'd have this calmness, this well spring of spontaneity and I'd have wisdom in some deep way. And the ability to shoot a bow and arrow in the dark and hit my target. To what ever extent that stuff is true I currently am just of the opinion that zen is really just about training your attention.

In that vein I will try not to get too bound up in my books but will mostly focus on the zazen practice. For each month I'll try some variation of poses, meditation style, perhaps some koans and other little things that I think of. I'm trying not to plan too far ahead so that I can just do whatever makes sense based on what I've tried so far.

So for January here's the plan:

- meditate 8 minutes a day
- count to 10 with breath
- sit in half lotus
- keep in mind the first of the Noble Eightfold Path - right view
- mindfulness trigger: first bite of food each meal

8 minutes doesn't seem like very long, but if you've never tried it, it's *insanely* long. Also I don't have a lot of time. I think it's more important to establish a doable habit than to try to do things perfectly.

I'm doing the count to 10 thing as a sort of training wheel. I've kept up a nightly meditation routine for the last 6 months or so but I still find it so very hard to focus on my breath for the 8 minutes. I've read that counting to 10 is a good "hack" to help you stay focused.

Sitting in a slightly uncomfortable position has made mindfulness possible. Years ago when I tried meditating I always fell asleep. Now it's never a problem. Doing a "true" half lotus is beyond my skill but it's the perfect level for me to aim at for now. I would *love* to get to a full lotus during the year but I'm not going to hold my breath.

Right View. I'm not deeply interested in the Buddhist aspects of zen but I also don't want to ignore them completely. So I'll just review the different steps of the noble path for a while.

Mindfulness triggers. The goal of zen (for some) seems to be as much awareness of now as you can muster. A useful tip I've heard in this respect is to create "mindfulness triggers". In other words set up a habit of having your environment remind you to be mindful. My first trigger will be for first bites of meals.

Ok, that's enough talking about zen for now. Gotta go sit on my ass for 8 minutes before I head off too bed.

A Random Walk Through the Bible: 2 Chronicles 18:23

2008-01-05T21:23:00.000-08:00

Using our random verse finder and the basic methodology:

2 Chronicles 18:23 (New International Version)

Then Zedekiah son of Kenaanah went up and slapped Micaiah in the face. "Which way did the spirit from the LORD go when he went from me to speak to you?" he asked.

discern the spiritual principle in this verse
- huh?
ask what was god trying to get across to these people when he spoke these words
- um.....
ask how does this apply to me
- errr....

One verse is more profound and meaningful than the next. No wonder people people find such meaning and solace in this grand old tome. Oh, what's that you say, no one actually reads it? I guess that makes more sense.

Adventures in Enlightenment: Zero to Zen Master

2008-01-04T22:16:00.000-08:00

So it's time to take it up a notch. I've had some fun with my monthly samplers from the enlightenment buffet. But now it is time for a full meal. While I'm capable of many things, becoming enlightened by way of a month long experiment is apparently not within my power.

Let's make it a year then. If I can't get enlightened in a year then I think it's safe to say that this whole enlightenment thing is (gasp) a sham. Or I'm spiritually tone deaf, metaphysically color blind, or just dumb.

By a not very scientific assessment it seems that zen is the best bet. First of all the amount of clearly ridiculous beliefs you have to start out with are at a minimum and secondly there does appear to be some half way credible evidence around that meditating is good for you.

Zen seems to be one of those things that in a sense gets a "free ride" from otherwise skeptical people. My goal is to determine if there really is something interesting behind this whole zen thing or if its just more metaphysical gobbledygook. Along the way I could just get in on some of that satori action.

Over the next few days I'll start outlining exactly what my year long schedule is going to be and what the specific month long zen themed enlightenment experiments will be. Until then if you want to help a struggling zen-weenie along, what books would you recommend or warn against?

If you need a little zen snack to get you through the day while you are awaiting my words of wisdom, you could probably do worse than checking out the HARDCORE ZEN blog. (This author actually has at least a small role in my revisiting zen as I hope to talk about in the near future).

A Random Walk Through the Bible: Psalm 148:12

2007-12-29T21:38:00.000-08:00

Psalm 148:12 (New International Version)

young men and maidens, old men and children.

Using our random verse finder and the basic methodology we begin our adventure.

discern the spiritual principle in this verse
- no idea
ask what was god trying to get across to these people when he spoke these words
- no idea
ask how does this apply to me
- no idea

OK, God is not going to make this easy I see. Perhaps it's more meaningful in the original Klingon.....

I guess I'll meditate on those profound words and try again next week. Let me know if anyone sees the wisdom of these words that I'm missing....

A verse a day keeps the hellfire away...

2007-12-28T22:35:00.000-08:00

"When you begin to ask yourself questions you will hear God speaking to you"

As you may have discerned by now I have an unhealthy fascination with Christian radio. On a recent program they were talking about the book "He Speaks to Me" (starts around 1h20m). Among other things they discussed the wonderful efficacy of reading a random verse a day and trying to apply it to your life. Now they suggested that you start with John, but that's not very random. Hence the program I posted yesterday.

Now I'm all about giving God a chance to talk to me. Unlike some religious skeptics I actually have no problem with a universe with a god in it. I just don't happen to think that this is such a place. But if it was I'd rather know. Just for the truthiness if not the eternal life (or at least avoidance of eternal torment).

So on the advice of the above program I will endeavor to occasionally (let's say weekly for now), take one verse completely at random (or by God's influence?) and do the following:

- discern the spiritual principle in this verse
- ask what was god trying to get across to these people when he spoke these words
- ask how does this apply to me

Also I vow not to cherry pick. I will take the very first one I find (ie I will just run the random verse picker once). If God has a message to get thru to me it should be easy enough to direct me to the important bits and show me things that relate to my life right now.

Tune into the next posting for the first episode of this feature.

PS: The random aspect of this experiment reminds of this interesting video series I saw awhile ago with Knuth talking about, among other things, his semi-random exploration of the Bible.

Finding random Bible verses

2007-12-28T21:10:00.000-08:00

The code below can be saved in a file (e.g. find_random_verse.py) and run as: python find_random_verse.py. The verse statistics were taken from: http://www.deafmissions.com/tally/bkchptrvrs.html. I was surprised to learn that there are 137 verse that are "unnumbered" (in Psalms). Just assume that those belong to the previous numbered verse.

Why do I or anyone else need a random Bible verse finder? Stay tuned for the exciting conclusion.... (or is it just the beginning?)


verses_data = {
 '1 CHRONICLES': {1: 54, 2: 55, 3: 24, 4: 43, 5: 26, 6: 81, 7: 40, 8: 40, 9: 44, 10: 14, 11: 47, 12: 40, 13: 14, 14: 17, 15: 29, 16: 43, 17: 27, 18: 17, 19: 19, 20: 8, 21: 30, 22: 19, 23: 32, 24: 31, 25: 31, 26: 32, 27: 34, 28: 21, 29: 30},
 '1 CORINTHIANS': {1: 31, 2: 16, 3: 23, 4: 21, 5: 13, 6: 20, 7: 40, 8: 13, 9: 27, 10: 33, 11: 34, 12: 31, 13: 13, 14: 40, 15: 58, 16: 24},
 '1 JOHN': {1: 10, 2: 29, 3: 24, 4: 21, 5: 21},
 '1 KINGS': {1: 53, 2: 46, 3: 28, 4: 34, 5: 18, 6: 38, 7: 51, 8: 66, 9: 28, 10: 29, 11: 43, 12: 33, 13: 34, 14: 31, 15: 34, 16: 34, 17: 24, 18: 46, 19: 21, 20: 43, 21: 29, 22: 53}, 
 '1 PETER': {1: 25, 2: 25, 3: 22, 4: 19, 5: 14},
 '1 SAMUEL': {1: 28, 2: 36, 3: 21, 4: 22, 5: 12, 6: 21, 7: 17, 8: 22, 9: 27, 10: 27, 11: 15, 12: 25, 13: 23, 14: 52, 15: 35, 16: 23, 17: 58, 18: 30, 19: 24, 20: 42, 21: 15, 22: 23, 23: 29, 24: 22, 25: 44, 26: 25, 27: 12, 28: 25, 29: 11, 30: 31, 31: 13},
 '1 THESSALONIANS': {1: 10, 2: 20, 3: 13, 4: 18, 5: 28},
 '1 TIMOTHY': {1: 20, 2: 15, 3: 16, 4: 16, 5: 25, 6: 21},
 '2 CHRONICLES': {1: 17, 2: 18, 3: 17, 4: 22, 5: 14, 6: 42, 7: 22, 8: 18, 9: 31, 10: 19, 11: 23, 12: 16, 13: 22, 14: 15, 15: 19, 16: 14, 17: 19, 18: 34, 19: 11, 20: 37, 21: 20, 22: 12, 23: 21, 24: 27, 25: 28, 26: 23, 27: 9, 28: 27, 29: 36, 30: 27, 31: 21, 32: 33, 33: 25, 34: 33, 35: 27, 36: 23},
 '2 CORINTHIANS': {1: 24, 2: 17, 3: 18, 4: 18, 5: 21, 6: 18, 7: 16, 8: 24, 9: 15, 10: 18, 11: 33, 12: 21, 13: 14},
 '2 JOHN': {1: 13},
 '2 KINGS': {1: 18, 2: 25, 3: 27, 4: 44, 5: 27, 6: 33, 7: 20, 8: 29, 9: 37, 10: 36, 11: 21, 12: 21, 13: 25, 14: 29, 15: 38, 16: 20, 17: 41, 18: 37, 19: 37, 20: 21, 21: 26, 22: 20, 23: 37, 24: 20, 25: 30},
 '2 PETER': {1: 21, 2: 22, 3: 18},
 '2 SAMUEL': {1: 27, 2: 32, 3: 39, 4: 12, 5: 25, 6: 23, 7: 29, 8: 18, 9: 13, 10: 19, 11: 27, 12: 31, 13: 39, 14: 33, 15: 37, 16: 23, 17: 29, 18: 33, 19: 43, 20: 26, 21: 22, 22: 51, 23: 39, 24: 25},
 '2 THESSALONIANS': {1: 12, 2: 17, 3: 18},
 '2 TIMOTHY': {1: 18, 2: 26, 3: 17, 4: 22},
 '3 JOHN': {1: 15},
 'ACTS': {1: 26, 2: 47, 3: 26, 4: 37, 5: 42, 6: 15, 7: 60, 8: 40, 9: 43, 10: 48, 11: 30, 12: 25, 13: 52, 14: 28, 15: 41, 16: 40, 17: 34, 18: 28, 19: 41, 20: 38, 21: 40, 22: 30, 23: 35, 24: 27, 25: 27, 26: 32, 27: 44, 28: 31},
 'AMOS': {1: 15, 2: 16, 3: 15, 4: 13, 5: 27, 6: 14, 7: 17, 8: 14, 9: 15},
 'COLOSSIANS': {1: 29, 2: 23, 3: 25, 4: 18},
 'DANIEL': {1: 21, 2: 49, 3: 30, 4: 37, 5: 31, 6: 28, 7: 28, 8: 27, 9: 27, 10: 21, 11: 45, 12: 13},
 'DEUTERONOMY': {1: 46, 2: 37, 3: 29, 4: 49, 5: 33, 6: 25, 7: 26, 8: 20, 9: 29, 10: 22, 11: 32, 12: 32, 13: 18, 14: 29, 15: 23, 16: 22, 17: 20, 18: 22, 19: 21, 20: 20, 21: 23, 22: 30, 23: 25, 24: 22, 25: 19, 26: 19, 27: 26, 28: 68, 29: 29, 30: 20, 31: 30, 32: 52, 33: 29, 34: 12},
 'ECCLESIASTES': {1: 18, 2: 26, 3: 22, 4: 16, 5: 20, 6: 12, 7: 29, 8: 17, 9: 18, 10: 20, 11: 10, 12: 14},
 'EPHESIANS': {1: 23, 2: 22, 3: 21, 4: 32, 5: 33, 6: 24},
 'ESTHER': {1: 22, 2: 23, 3: 15, 4: 17, 5: 14, 6: 14, 7: 10, 8: 17, 9: 32, 10: 3},
 'EXODUS': {1: 22, 2: 25, 3: 22, 4: 31, 5: 23, 6: 30, 7: 25, 8: 32, 9: 35, 10: 29, 11: 10, 12: 51, 13: 22, 14: 31, 15: 27, 16: 36, 17: 16, 18: 27, 19: 25, 20: 26, 21: 36, 22: 31, 23: 33, 24: 18, 25: 40, 26: 37, 27: 21, 28: 43, 29: 46, 30: 38, 31: 18, 32: 35, 33: 23, 34: 35, 35: 35, 36: 38, 37: 29, 38: 31, 39: 43, 40: 38},
 'EZEKIEL': {1: 28, 2: 10, 3: 27, 4: 17, 5: 17, 6: 14, 7: 27, 8: 18, 9: 11, 10: 22, 11: 25, 12: 28, 13: 23, 14: 23, 15: 8, 16: 63, 17: 24, 18: 32, 19: 14, 20: 49, 21: 32, 22: 31, 23: 49, 24: 27, 25: 17, 26: 21, 27: 36, 28: 26, 29: 21, 30: 26,
             31: 18, 32: 32, 33: 33, 34: 31, 35: 15, 36: 38, 37: 28, 38: 23, 39: 29, 40: 49, 41: 26, 42: 20, 43: 27, 44: 31, 45: 25, 46: 24, 47: 23, 48: 35},
 'EZRA': {1: 11, 2: 70, 3: 13, 4: 24, 5: 17, 6: 22, 7: 28, 8: 36, 9: 15, 10: 44},
 'GALATIANS': {1: 24, 2: 21, 3: 29, 4: 31, 5: 26, 6: 18},
 'GENESIS': {1: 31, 2: 25, 3: 24, 4: 26, 5: 32, 6: 22, 7: 24, 8: 22, 9: 29, 10: 32, 11: 32, 12: 20, 13: 18, 14: 24, 15: 21, 16: 16, 17: 27, 18: 33, 19: 38, 20: 18, 21: 34, 22: 24, 23: 20, 24: 67, 25: 34, 26: 35, 27: 46, 28: 22, 29: 35, 30: 43, 31: 55, 32: 32, 33: 20, 34: 31, 35: 29, 36: 43, 37: 36, 38: 30, 39: 23, 40: 23, 41: 57, 42: 38, 43: 34, 44: 34, 45: 28, 46: 34,
             47: 31, 48: 22, 49: 33, 50: 26},
 'HABAKKUK': {1: 17, 2: 20, 3: 19},
 'HAGGAI': {1: 15, 2: 23},
 'HEBREWS': {1: 14, 2: 18, 3: 19, 4: 16, 5: 14, 6: 20, 7: 28, 8: 13, 9: 28, 10: 39, 11: 40, 12: 29, 13: 25},
 'HOSEA': {1: 11, 2: 23, 3: 5, 4: 19, 5: 15, 6: 11, 7: 16, 8: 14, 9: 17, 10: 15, 11: 12, 12: 14, 13: 16, 14: 9},
 'ISAIAH': {1: 31, 2: 22, 3: 26, 4: 6, 5: 30, 6: 13, 7: 25, 8: 22, 9: 21, 10: 34, 11: 16, 12: 6, 13: 22, 14: 32, 15: 9, 16: 14, 17: 14, 18: 7, 19: 25, 20: 6, 21: 17, 22: 25, 23: 18, 24: 23, 25: 12, 26: 21, 27: 13, 28: 29, 29: 24, 30: 33, 31: 9, 32: 20, 33: 24, 34: 17, 35: 10, 36: 22, 37: 38, 38: 22, 39: 8, 40: 31, 41: 29, 42: 25, 43: 28, 44: 28, 45: 25, 46: 13,
            47: 15, 48: 22, 49: 26, 50: 11, 51: 23, 52: 15, 53: 12, 54: 17, 55: 13, 56: 12, 57: 21, 58: 14, 59: 21, 60: 22, 61: 11, 62: 12, 63: 19, 64: 12, 65: 25, 66: 24}, 
 'JAMES': {1: 27, 2: 26, 3: 18, 4: 17, 5: 20},
 'JEREMIAH': {1: 19, 2: 37, 3: 25, 4: 31, 5: 31, 6: 30, 7: 34, 8: 22, 9: 26, 10: 25, 11: 23, 12: 17, 13: 27, 14: 22, 15: 21, 16: 21, 17: 27, 18: 23, 19: 15, 20: 18, 21: 14, 22: 30, 23: 40, 24: 10, 25: 38, 26: 24, 27: 22, 28: 17, 29: 32, 30: 24, 31: 40, 32: 44, 33: 26, 34: 22, 35: 19, 36: 32, 37: 21, 38: 28, 39: 18, 40: 16, 41: 18, 42: 22, 43: 13, 44: 30, 45: 5, 46: 28,
              47: 7, 48: 47, 49: 39, 50: 46, 51: 64, 52: 34},
 'JOB': {1: 22, 2: 13, 3: 26, 4: 21, 5: 27, 6: 30, 7: 21, 8: 22, 9: 35, 10: 22, 11: 20, 12: 25, 13: 28, 14: 22, 15: 35, 16: 22, 17: 16, 18: 21, 19: 29, 20: 29, 21: 34, 22: 30, 23: 17, 24: 25, 25: 6, 26: 14, 27: 23, 28: 28, 29: 25, 30: 31, 31: 40, 32: 22, 33: 33, 34: 37, 35: 16, 36: 33, 37: 24, 38: 41, 39: 30, 40: 24, 41: 34, 42: 17},
 'JOEL': {1: 20, 2: 32, 3: 21},
 'JOHN': {1: 51, 2: 25, 3: 36, 4: 54, 5: 47, 6: 71, 7: 53, 8: 59, 9: 41, 10: 42, 11: 57, 12: 50, 13: 38, 14: 31, 15: 27, 16: 33, 17: 26, 18: 40, 19: 42, 20: 31, 21: 25},
 'JONAH': {1: 17, 2: 10, 3: 10, 4: 11},
 'JOSHUA': {1: 18, 2: 24, 3: 17, 4: 24, 5: 15, 6: 27, 7: 26, 8: 35, 9: 27, 10: 43, 11: 23, 12: 24, 13: 33, 14: 15, 15: 63, 16: 10, 17: 18, 18: 28, 19: 51, 20: 9, 21: 45, 22: 34, 23: 16, 24: 33},
 'JUDE': {1: 25},
 'JUDGES': {1: 36, 2: 23, 3: 31, 4: 24, 5: 31, 6: 40, 7: 25, 8: 35, 9: 57, 10: 18, 11: 40, 12: 15, 13: 25, 14: 20, 15: 20, 16: 31, 17: 13, 18: 31, 19: 30, 20: 48, 21: 25},
 'LAMENTATIONS': {1: 22, 2: 22, 3: 66, 4: 22, 5: 22},
 'LEVITICUS': {1: 17, 2: 16, 3: 17, 4: 35, 5: 19, 6: 30, 7: 38, 8: 36, 9: 24, 10: 20, 11: 47, 12: 8, 13: 59, 14: 57, 15: 33, 16: 34, 17: 16, 18: 30, 19: 37, 20: 27, 21: 24, 22: 33, 23: 44, 24: 23, 25: 55, 26: 46, 27: 34},
 'LUKE': {1: 80, 2: 52, 3: 38, 4: 44, 5: 39, 6: 49, 7: 50, 8: 56, 9: 62, 10: 42, 11: 54, 12: 59, 13: 35, 14: 35, 15: 32, 16: 31, 17: 37, 18: 43, 19: 48, 20: 47, 21: 38, 22: 71, 23: 56, 24: 53},
 'MALACHI': {1: 14, 2: 17, 3: 18, 4: 6},
 'MARK': {1: 45, 2: 28, 3: 35, 4: 41, 5: 43, 6: 56, 7: 37, 8: 38, 9: 50, 10: 52, 11: 33, 12: 44, 13: 37, 14: 72, 15: 47, 16: 20},
 'MATTHEW': {1: 25, 2: 23, 3: 17, 4: 25, 5: 48, 6: 34, 7: 29, 8: 34, 9: 38, 10: 42, 11: 30, 12: 50, 13: 58, 14: 36, 15: 39, 16: 28, 17: 27, 18: 35, 19: 30, 20: 34, 21: 46, 22: 46, 23: 39, 24: 51, 25: 46, 26: 75, 27: 66, 28: 20},
 'MICAH': {1: 16, 2: 13, 3: 12, 4: 13, 5: 15, 6: 16, 7: 20},
 'NAHUM': {1: 15, 2: 13, 3: 19},
 'NEHEMIAH': {1: 11, 2: 20, 3: 32, 4: 23, 5: 19, 6: 19, 7: 73, 8: 18, 9: 38, 10: 39, 11: 36, 12: 47, 13: 31},
 'NUMBERS': {1: 54, 2: 34, 3: 51, 4: 49, 5: 31, 6: 27, 7: 89, 8: 26, 9: 23, 10: 36, 11: 35, 12: 16, 13: 33, 14: 45, 15: 41, 16: 50, 17: 13, 18: 32, 19: 22, 20: 29, 21: 35, 22: 41, 23: 30, 24: 25, 25: 18, 26: 65, 27: 23, 28: 31, 29: 40, 30: 16, 31: 54, 32: 42, 33: 56, 34: 29, 35: 34, 36: 13},
 'OBADIAH': {1: 21},
 'PHILEMON': {1: 25},
 'PHILIPPIANS': {1: 30, 2: 30, 3: 21, 4: 23},
 'PROVERBS': {1: 33, 2: 22, 3: 35, 4: 27, 5: 23, 6: 35, 7: 27, 8: 36, 9: 18, 10: 32, 11: 31, 12: 28, 13: 25, 14: 35, 15: 33, 16: 33, 17: 28, 18: 24, 19: 29, 20: 30, 21: 31, 22: 29, 23: 35, 24: 34, 25: 28, 26: 28, 27: 27, 28: 28, 29: 27, 30: 33, 31: 31},
 'PSALMS': {1: 6, 2: 12, 3: 8, 4: 8, 5: 12, 6: 10, 7: 17, 8: 9, 9: 20, 10: 18, 11: 7, 12: 8, 13: 6, 14: 7, 15: 5, 16: 11, 17: 15, 18: 50, 19: 14, 20: 9, 21: 13, 22: 31, 23: 6, 24: 10, 25: 22, 26: 12, 27: 14, 28: 9, 29: 11, 30: 12, 31: 24, 32: 11, 33: 22, 34: 22, 35: 28, 36: 12, 37: 40, 38: 22, 39: 13, 40: 17, 41: 13, 42: 11, 43: 5, 44: 26, 45: 17, 46: 11,
            47: 9, 48: 14, 49: 20, 50: 23, 51: 19, 52: 9, 53: 6, 54: 7, 55: 23, 56: 13, 57: 11, 58: 11, 59: 17, 60: 12, 61: 8, 62: 12, 63: 11, 64: 10, 65: 13, 66: 20, 67: 7, 68: 35, 69: 36, 70: 5, 71: 24, 72: 20, 73: 28, 74: 23, 75: 10, 76: 12, 77: 20,
            78: 72, 79: 13, 80: 19, 81: 16, 82: 8, 83: 18, 84: 12, 85: 13, 86: 17, 87: 7, 88: 18, 89: 52, 90: 17, 91: 16, 92: 15, 93: 5, 94: 23, 95: 11, 96: 13, 97: 12, 98: 9, 99: 9, 100: 5, 101: 8, 102: 28, 103: 22, 104: 35, 105: 45, 106: 48, 107: 43, 108: 13,
            109: 31, 110: 7, 111: 10, 112: 10, 113: 9, 114: 8, 115: 18, 116: 19, 117: 2, 118: 29, 119: 176, 120: 7, 121: 8, 122: 9, 123: 4, 124: 8, 125: 5, 126: 6, 127: 5, 128: 6, 129: 8, 130: 8, 131: 3, 132: 18, 133: 3, 134: 3, 135: 21, 136: 26, 137: 9, 138: 8, 139: 24,
            140: 13, 141: 10, 142: 7, 143: 12, 144: 15, 145: 21, 146: 10, 147: 20, 148: 14, 149: 9, 150: 6},
 'REVELATION': {1: 20, 2: 29, 3: 22, 4: 11, 5: 14, 6: 17, 7: 17, 8: 13, 9: 21, 10: 11, 11: 19, 12: 17, 13: 18, 14: 20, 15: 8, 16: 21, 17: 18, 18: 24, 19: 21, 20: 15, 21: 27, 22: 21},
 'ROMANS': {1: 32, 2: 29, 3: 31, 4: 25, 5: 21, 6: 23, 7: 25, 8: 39, 9: 33, 10: 21, 11: 36, 12: 21, 13: 14, 14: 23, 15: 33, 16: 27},
 'RUTH': {1: 22, 2: 23, 3: 18, 4: 22},
 'SONG OF SONGS': {1: 17, 2: 17, 3: 11, 4: 16, 5: 16, 6: 13, 7: 13, 8: 14},
 'TITUS': {1: 16, 2: 15, 3: 15},
 'ZECHARIAH': {1: 21, 2: 13, 3: 10, 4: 14, 5: 11, 6: 15, 7: 14, 8: 23, 9: 17, 10: 12, 11: 17, 12: 14, 13: 9, 14: 21},
 'ZEPHANIAH': {1: 18, 2: 15, 3: 20}
}

import random

def random_verse(data):
    index = 1
    current = None
    for b in data:
        for c, vc in data[b].items():
            for v in range(1,vc+1):
                if random.choice(range(index)) == 0:
                    current = (b,c,v)
                index += 1

    return current
   
def main():
    print random_verse(verses_data)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

There is no polite way to say...

2007-12-11T21:05:00.000-08:00

With all due respect, sir, have you considered the possibility that you have blighted your whole life with a fantasy and are polluting the minds of defenseless children with dangerous nonsense?

Quote from Dan Dennett on day one of Beyond Belief 2. That needs to be a shirt.

A revelation.

2007-12-07T20:55:00.000-08:00

So I had a revelation the other day. And what's weird is that it's about something I've long believed. It's just that I've never really been satisfied with the belief. It's something that I knew the rational, scientific response for but for some reason it felt slightly dishonest or at least dodgy. But now I find much to my surprise both how much I didn't like my old understanding (I was in a little bit of denial about it) and how clear my new understanding is. In fact my head's been spinning a little because of this even though I don't *know* anything I didn't already. Its sort of like going from using calculus equations and getting the right answers to actually understanding calculus and using the equations to get the right answer. And knowing you are right without needing to check the answer key. And being confident if you spot an error in the given answer key.

Anyway, here's the deal. It has to do with whether morality is truly selfishness in disguise. Discussions of morality from an evolutionary perspective often come down to the fact that our genes are selfish. And we are all the product of evolution, a relentlessly uncaring, and merciless process. Therefore, the reasoning goes, when I do something nice I'm *really* doing it for fundamentally selfish reasons.

Now the response to this (a la Dawkins and friends) is that just because our genes are selfish doesn't mean that I am selfish. That answer has never once felt right to me. It might have had some intellectual satisfaction but it has never really sunk into my bones as obviously and fundamentally true. It always felt like saying that sure this house is made of bricks but the house itself is not a brick. Sure that's true but there are sure a lot of bricks around and it's hard not to think of bricks when looking at the house. And if I want to understand the house I need to understand bricks. So it feels dishonest to pretend that brick houses aren't fundamentally about bricks.

To be more visceral (and disgusting): if I made some jewelry for someone out of dog shit and they complained that I just gave them dog shit I could say that they were focusing on the wrong level since that was merely the building material and they were making a fundamental error regarding levels of abstraction. I'd feel pretty disingenuous about that reply. I guess in this case in particular there is a leak between levels of abstraction. A very disgusting leak.

So what was my magical mystical insight? I'm not sure exactly how it happened but I have finally disassociated the uncaring, selfish process of evolution from the result of that product. It's as if someone told me that sausage was made in steel machines with all sorts of sharp knife blades and I had originally thought that sausage must taste like steel and have knives in it. Then I matured and realized that that of course wasn't true but still had a fear of sausage in almost a superstitious contagion sort of way. That there is still something ineffably steel-like and sharp about sausage. And today I find that it's just obvious that while there might be other valid reasons to not eat sausage, attributing steel flavor and inherent knives to the sausage is just pure silliness. A non sequitur.

I don't know why this insight has landed on me, it just did and it feels like a revelation, and frankly a relief. Undoubtedly a combination of reading overcomingbias.com and chat's with various christian apologists over the last year making me rethink some of my beliefs and the reasons for these beliefs.

Here's an admittedly absurd example that gives the flavor of how I think of things now.

Imagine an evil genius who was hell bent on killing someone. As it happens they are an expert at creating robots that like to hug. (Yes, I really do think like this, why do you ask?). Anyhoo, he only knows how to make (genuinely loving) hug-bots, but the hug-bots aren't (very) intelligent so he can easily make them killing machines by increasing the strength of their hugs and making them suffocate their target or by releasing a huge number of hug-bots at once and achieving essentially the same thing with a herd. Now, from the hug-bot's perspective they are still creatures of pure love but because of their context they are achieving the evil genius's goal. If the hug-bot interacts with someone who is much stronger than the originally intended victim then they will seem completely loving. The hug recipient might even ask how a loving hug-bot could associated with a homicidal evil genius at all. It doesn't make sense. But it does make perfect sense if you happen to have seen the big picture and understand the history of the situation. (And you accept the existence of evil geniuses that use hug-bots to achieve their nefarious ends...).

Just because sausage is made in a steel machine filled with knives doesn't mean there is anything steel-like or knife-like about sausage. The maker and the makee don't necessarily share properties. The agents/processes on one level don't necessarily reflect how things work on another level. Hofstadter's "Aunt Hill" didn't like ants and that's not even remotely contradictory; it just seems that way from how our intuition works sometimes.

Like I said I've known this in my brain for a long time but now I know it in my heart. And the truly funny part is that I don't expect it will change how I live my life at all (probably). It will just feel slightly different. Maybe.

Anyway, sharing time is done now.

Infidel Links - 2007-12-01

2007-12-01T21:26:00.000-08:00

Genesis 19 - Total bleep-ing insanity! For my money this is the funniest thing I've seen in a while

Win Ben Stein's Credibility

Your favorite atheist (Sam Harris) in Rolling Stone

Best. Bible Verses. Ever. (#4 is my all time favorite)

Worst. Video Games. Ever.

Pope insists that being an atheist is totally uncool

Academic consideration of the role of the the FSM

Sunday School for Atheists

Micahel Behe (intelligent design advocate) interviewed by an atheist

Jesus loves Osama

Infidel Links - 2007-11-17

2007-11-17T07:26:00.000-08:00

A vote for Romney is a vote for Satan

This is the most awesomely manipulative thing I've ever seen/heard. Godtube really is the gift that keeps on giving

Jesus vs a dinosaur (based on a true story)

Vote for your favorite bible verse

The Economist on religion

Bad assed popes

The year of living biblically

Apparently God hates "God Hates Fags"

What would you do if your kids started believing in god behind your back?

Onward Science Soldiers

The Evolution of Creationism

Adventures in Enlightenment: Tai Chi (status report)

2007-11-03T20:51:00.000-07:00

[update on]

I hate when something that appears so simple is too hard for me. Anyway I have not mastered Tai Chi in one month. Apparently some people spend their whole life perfecting it so perhaps I shouldn't have expected to master it in one month. Even if I *am* better than almost everyone else who has ever lived.

Any way I'm going to stick with this and see how far I can get. My goal it to be able to do the Yang Short Form from beginning to end. It doesn't have to be pretty or graceful or even entirely correct but it does have to be complete and at least in the ball park of correct. A halfway solid base to build upon if I should so choose. So I'll just keep working on this for at least another month. I guess sometimes enlightenment takes more than one month.

Christian Radio Watch: Faith in the Halls of Power

2007-10-31T20:11:00.000-07:00

So, I'll admit that I'm embarrassed by my country on occasion and it's leaders. But I have to say that I'm especially embarrassed to know that Jimmy Carter used to evangelize (starts at 1h31m) to visiting heads of state. And you can also thank him for basically making it mandatory for every subsequent president to state that they are born again.

Thanks for that Jimbo!

Infidel Links - 2007-10-28

2007-10-28T05:52:00.000-07:00

Detailed stats on how many people believe the various bible stories

The BBC on the growing atheist movement in the US

Show that you are on the winning team

Bob Jones University dress code

A perhaps not entirely favorable review of "The Faith Equation" (part 1, part 2)

What Atheist kids can watch on a lazy Sunday (Go snow bears!)

I'm high on Jesus dude

"if there's one thing that the Lord enjoys more than making free booze at wedding parties, it is killing."

Foreskin's Lament

Christian Radio Watch: The God Conversation

2007-10-26T21:03:00.000-07:00

How to talk (starts at 1h31m) with your co-workers and friends about God.

I find it funny how hard it is for Christians to talk about their faith. You have to wonder how much they actually believe what they claim to believe. If you *really* believe that you are presenting information that will save someone from eternal torment or if you *really* believe that the creator of the universe is on your side, how shy are you going to be?

The main question I'm left with though is, if the polls are to be believed, and ~90% of the US population believes in God already, then who the hell are they evangelizing to? Are they just evangelizing to each other at this point?

One small favor...

2007-10-20T12:30:00.000-07:00

Dear Jesus,

Unfortunately all this prosperity you've given me (happy, healthy family, well paying, interesting work and the rest) is seriously interfering with my belief in you. In fact at this rate I'm pretty sure I'm going to hell. I mean, sure I pay my taxes, am generally honest and almost never stomp on kittens, but I know that I deserve eternal torment for not believing in you. Perhaps you could do me a solid. I've noticed that a lot of people get cancer or suffer some other horrible tragedy and then come to believe in you and have their faith strengthened. So what are you waiting for? Please sock it to me (and my family). You decide what it will take to get my faith in the right place and unleash with abandon.

Thanks,

evtujo

PS. And make it nasty. I tend to be a slow learner.

Christian Radio Watch: Evangelicals and the Environment

2007-10-19T05:29:00.001-07:00

I think the thing that freaks out a lot of non-religious people is how believers have a "short timers" attitude regarding caring for the planet. If Jesus is coming again soon and we're just going to abandon the earth and go to heaven anyway, then taking care of the earth is a big waste of time. With that in mind it's interesting to see the slowly growing environmental (oops "creation care") movement within the evangelicals. Even more interesting is how controversial and politically risky this is for them. Here's a recent radio article(1h20m) on this issue.

Christian Radio Watch: Hilary and the Christian vote

2007-10-13T06:53:00.000-07:00

Here's a two part interview that presents a surprisingly positive discussion about Hilary Clinton. Apparently she is super-churchy. I'm not sure if this is a masterful marketing job aimed at winning the religious vote or a disturbing revelation about how important a role religion plays in her life. I'm afraid it's a little of both.

As an extra bonus the following day they talked about some of the Republican candidates and it cracked me up how reluctant the guest was to promote any one of them over the other.

I have a feeling if it comes to voting for a Mormon or Hilary many Evangelicals will have to stay home or vote for Hilary. Either way, Hilar-ity will ensue. :)

(Note for all three links above the relevant section starts a 1h31m)

Christian Radio Watch: unchristian

2007-10-11T20:57:00.000-07:00

A few days ago there was a discussion about this new book. Apparently (shock) Christianity has a bad image among 16-29 year olds. Hypocritical? Anti-homosexual? Insensitive? Judgemental? Moi?

Seems like the kids are all right after all.

No need to hurry back Jesus

2007-10-10T21:13:00.000-07:00

We seem to be doing just fine. Violence has been on the decrease for millennia. I'm looking forward to Pinker's next book but this video will tide me over until then. I love talking about this issue with people of a religious bent because it's absolutely impossible that this is true. If violence is on the decrease then that means and religion is on the decline then why am I getting up so early on Sundays? Well at least that is how I imagine they should respond. Instead they say that he is obviously wrong.

The Programming and Belief Challenge

2007-10-08T19:34:00.000-07:00

So ruby is a language for Mormons. Really. Go look it up, I'll wait. Matz is a Mormon and if you read the fine print when you down load the binaries you'll see that you are agreeing to all the precepts of the Mormon faith if you use ruby in any fashion. Additionally perl is for post-modern Christians. Really. Go look it up, I'll wait. Programming in perl is a tacit admission that Jesus is real and that all your coding is for the glory of god. Of course if you consider code that looks like swearing cartoon characters to be a worthy gift to the almighty then more power to you.

This got me thinking about the relationship between programming languages (users and designers) and the various faiths. So here is your challenge: tell me what languages work best (or are incompatible with) which faiths.

Here's a start:

- Java is for christians since it was created specifically to prevent people from thinking bold thoughts. And you have to be sort of a sheep to think that this is in any way a good language. And yet people blather on about it as if it's the second coming.

- perl is for atheists since it's impossible to believe in a benevolent deity while staring at perl code.

PS. For extra credit, what other religion programming links do you know of? The two above are the only ones I know. Does anyone else know the religious predilections of any other famous language designers or programmers?

Infidel Links - 2007-10-07

2007-10-07T20:44:00.000-07:00

Mathematical proof

Sam Harris: don't call me an atheist

The logical path from religion to evil deeds

Christianity's image problem

Jesus may love you but is he willing to share?

Jesus was a party animal

The archbishop and the condom

Chick tracts explains: What really happened to the dinosaurs

How to believe in god in 6 easy steps

Christian Radio Watch: Slandering Jesus

2007-10-05T21:52:00.000-07:00

You got to feel bad for a god who is powerless to stop all the slander (at 1h31m) being spread about him. I mean, come on, give an infinitely powerful being a break. Even Oprah doesn't seem to know how to treat the big guy correctly.

What's the deal with Christians and gays?

2007-10-03T22:53:00.000-07:00

I was listening to this segment (1h:31m) today on Prime Time America (Moody Broadcasting) about a new book "Ex-Gays?". The authors report on the current research in converting gays into ex-gays using a religious approach. (Is there any other approach?)

In any case this reminded me of a question I've thought about for a long time but have never heard any where near a decent answer to: why do Christians (and Jews and Muslims) hate homosexuality so much? The answer is not "because it's in the bible". Because then we have to ask, *why* is it in the bible? And you can't just say it's cultural, because there had be a something that got anti-homosexual sentiments started in the first place. And besides there is plenty in the bible that is ignored. But for some reason people are especially eager to denounce homosexuality. So it seems like there is something pretty deep in human nature that makes it easy some how to be against homo-sexuality.

Objectively it seems like straight men should prefer that their competitors not compete for the limited pool of females.

So any way if any one knows the answer to this or has a plausible hypothesis, I'd love to hear it.

And by the way I am super not gay. I'm probably one of the least gay dudes you'll ever come across. I've never even seen another man naked. Ever. (Hmm... that sounds like I'm over compensating and trying to hide some secret feelings, better delete that last bit before hitting publ-

Adventures in Enlightenment: Tai Chi

2007-10-01T21:17:00.000-07:00

OK, this month my enlightenment adventure will be a continuation of last months. I'm going to dominate the dojo with respect to this whole Tao thing. I searched google for "tai chi enlightenment" and sure enough tai chi is promoted as a way to achieve enlightenment. That's all I need to know.

I have a VHS tape tutorial of the "yang short form". For those new to tai chi there are approximately 256 million variations of tai chi. The yang short form appears to be one of the more common ones. The main advantage of this is that I'll be able to easily find different instructions that I can cross reference. This form has 24 basic moves. So that's less than 1 a day. How hard could it be?

If you want to have a rough idea of where I'll be at the end of the month check out this video.

See you on the other end of enlightenment.

Adventures in Enlightenment: The Sleepy Taoist (conclusion)

2007-09-30T21:15:00.000-07:00

[follow up on]

So I got much more sleep this month and definitely feel better rested than I have in a while. Which sucks, because if you get used to not being well rested you don't really miss it. Now I'm probably going to have to stick with my new schedule. Truth be told I'm still probably not sleeping enough, but I did average about 6 to 6 1/2 hours of sleep a night which believe it or not is almost decadent compared to what I'd rather do which is closer to 5 hours. (Of course I'd rather do 0 hours - I hate sleep - but that has never worked out too well for me).

The strangest part was waking up at 5:45 am on the weekend. It actually wasn't nearly as painful as I would have thought and some how morning time by myself seems much more enjoyable than evening time by myself. There is something about sitting around in the morning as the sun is rising and the house is almost alive with the anticipation of a new day starting. It's certainly more invigorating than fighting off sleep at the end of the day.

Anyway, did I learn anything about Taoism? I've read much of Alan Watts and even the Tao of Pooh but my favorite author on the topic is Raymond Smullyan. I've read his Tao is Silent many, many times. His interpretation is by far my favorite idea of a religion. If some religion had to be true and I got to pick I would pick out the philosophy laid out in his book. Strangely I can't even begin to describe what his take is. It seems somehow essentially Taoist that I can't put it into words. But honestly that's just probably just laziness on my part. Or maybe he doesn't actually *say* anything and I just like reading his nonsense.

Interestingly in the last year I read Karen Armstrong's "The Great Transformation". She has a great discussion of Taoism in there. Unfortunately I've loaned it out so I can't refresh my memory on it now. From what I recall Taoism was much younger than is usually suggested (it was actually about the last great Chinese religio-philosophical system to be created) and strangely was aligned with obedience with the government and other seemingly un-Taoistic ideas.

But in any case I'm not sure I learned to much about Taoism with my sleep experiment. Of course it's impossible to fight the Tao so in a sense I'm already a Taoist. Blah, blah, blah.

Tomorrow starts my next adventure in enlightenment. I wish there was a path to enlightenment that was based on eating chocolate. I would so kick the ass out of that one.

How to turn a skeptic into a theist

2007-09-28T21:12:00.000-07:00

A question I think about occasionally is what small different changes in my past would have left me with my former religious beliefs intact or what changes in the future could make me a believer of some sort. This talk is one skeptic's discussion of how he grew to be a theist. I think if I went thru what he did that I could find myself believing as well (but it's still hard to imagine). His talk it utterly unconvincing on an intellectual level but emotionally I can easily see where he's coming from. An interesting discussion.

Creationist programmer disproves evolution with fortran

2007-09-28T06:12:00.000-07:00

Or does he? markcc at GM/BM does a great unraveling of a supposed computer programmer's claim to have simulated the entire universe on his lap top to show that evolution can't have occurred.

This claim is so beyond idiotic to anyone who knows the first thing about physics or computers, but it's still fun to have Mark walk us through the debunking.

Discussion of Joseph Smith's lack of linguistic skills

2007-09-27T22:00:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting article about the linguistic improbabilities associated with the Mormon holy book. And just to keep it interesting there is some nice Mormon apologetics in his comment section.

blasphemer 1.0

2007-09-26T22:39:00.000-07:00

It seems increasingly common for an anti-christian remark to be met with the response: "That's not fair. You wouldn't say that if I was Muslim". And they are right. It's not fair. To be fair I need to renounce / deny / criticize all religions equally. Of course there are so many and new one's being created all the time so at first it seems almost hopeless to achieve this goal of equal opportunity religion mocking.

And that's when it occurred to me I could use the power of programming.

So I present the following code to be used by anyone who feels that they want to be precise and exhaustive in their blaspheming.


#! /usr/bin/env python
#
# Blaspheme a collection of religions in a systematic 
# and automatic fashion.
#
# This program is provided as is with no guarantees 
# you won't spend an eternity in any of a variety of 
# hells. If you make money or fame or something else 
# by using this program then you owe me my fair share. 
# Otherwise just enjoy....

import fantasy.delusional

def blaspheme(bs):
    print "As far as I'm concerned:"
    print " There is no evidence that %s exists" % bs.deity()
    print " Your prophet, %s, (if he even existed) was merely a human" % bs.prophet()
    print " I hereby %s" % bs.unforgivable_sin()

def main():
    # create BeliefSystem ("bs") objects
    for bs in fantasy.delusional.belief_systems():
        blaspheme(bs)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()

Bow before me!

2007-09-25T21:25:00.000-07:00

Unless you got 1st or 2nd place.... Getting third place for a comment that took me 30 seconds to come up with has finally given me a sense of validation. That emptiness of being an atheist is finally filled. Thank you random stranger on random site. You truly are the friendliest atheist of all..... :)

Out of Thin Air

2007-09-23T19:53:00.001-07:00

I'm always looking for ways to be more informed and receive balanced, timely information on matters of scientific and philosophical matters. Unfortunately all I ever find are events like this.

Actually the thing I love most about this is that after you watch the initial promo, the announcer stays on the screen in the creepy yet funny infinite loop with him blinking and slightly smiling like some sort of cheerful unthinking automaton. Hey, wait, that would explain a few things...

I would totally go to this if I didn't have kids and my time wasn't valuable. How I miss grad school.

Infidel Links - 2007-09-22

2007-09-22T19:36:00.001-07:00

"Suck it Jesus" (uncensored)

Bill Maher's religious test for politicians

Not too surprisingly belief in creationism is correlated with belief that the world is flat

Never let Jesus do the grocery shopping (124)

The JesOs operating system

God's in trouble, since he doesn't have any lawyers. (Get it? All the lawyers are in hell.... heh, heh)

Personally I'd prefer a monkey god

Now we see why there are no atheists in fox holes

You are really trying to make it impossible for me to vote for anyone, aren't you?

Who hangs ten for our sins?

Dinosaurs and:
- Bible II
- Buddhism II

The Psalms sans soul

2007-09-18T21:15:00.000-07:00

OK, get your shocked face ready. The Jews didn't believe in a soul or the after life. And to make things worse they believed in multiple gods. At least that's what this guy says.

Good ol' H. L. Mencken

2007-09-15T21:52:00.000-07:00

As I was browsing through one of my favorite counter-apologetics magazines I came across the following Mencken quote in this article:

I believe that religion, generally speaking, has been a curse to mankind--that its modest and greatly overestimated services on the ethical side have been more than overborne by the damage it has done to clear and honest thinking.

I believe that no discovery of fact, however trivial, can be wholly useless to the human race, and that no trumpeting of falsehood, however virtuous in intent, can be anything but vicious....

I believe that the evidence for immortality is no better than the evidence for witches, and deserves no more respect.... I believe in complete freedom of thought and speech, alike for the humblest to the mightiest, and in the utmost freedom of conduct that is consistent with living in an organized society.

But the whole thing, after all, may be put very simply. I believe that it is better to tell the truth than to lie. I believe that it is better to be free than to be a slave. And I believe that it is better to know than to be ignorant.

I wonder how sad he'd be to see how little progress has been made since his time. Or perhaps he was too savvy about human nature to be surprised at all. Any way, Mencken is the dude. He does not need to suck it.

The vas deferens between Catholics and sane people.

2007-09-14T15:27:00.000-07:00

Recently, my wife was chatting with a women in the park as our two kids and her 4 kids were playing together. It turns out that she had learned with her last birth that for a reason she didn't disclose the doctor told her that having more children would be life threatening. As a good catholic she and her husband consulted with their priest. Now of course using condoms is right out, but he agreed that she could get her tubes tied, but that it would be a sin for the husband to get snipped.

This is stupid on several levels.

First of all if you are going to your priest for medical advice you are probably not bright enough to care for yourself and should be made a ward of the state.

Secondly, for those of you who haven't had to think about these things or who aren't aware of the biological significance of this difference, let's just say that the cost difference is an order of a magnitude cheaper for the dude to get snipped. Not to mention that it's a vastly safer out patient procedure for the man.

Any way, to paraphrase Kathy Griffin, Catholic's can suck it.

Christian Radio Watch: Lee Strobel - The Rock Star of Christian Apologetics

2007-09-13T21:10:00.000-07:00

The one thing that always cracks me up about Bible apologetics is that it is an attempt to give evidence for something that you are supposed to take on faith. I mean any one can have faith in something that seems likely and for which a strong case can be made. It takes actual faith to believe in crazy stuff that your mind is constantly rejecting. But of course no can one silence that little voice of common sense completely so apologetics is the result.

As I was saying in my previous post there has been an upsurge in interviews defending the historical accuracy of the bible and the historicity of Jesus. And this interview with Lee Strobel is a great example of that. His interview is a special gem since he is able to condemn bible scholars who don't believe the bible is 100% true as the equivalent of the DaVinci Code conspiracy theorists and then implies that "militant" atheists are the equivalent of 9/11 hi-jackers.

Any way, you can hear it from the master here.

Christian Radio Watch: Reinventing Jesus

2007-09-12T21:19:00.000-07:00

It seems like in the last year there has been an up surge in titles defending the historicity of Jesus. Probably this in not entirely unrelated to the fact there there has also been a rise in books challenging that historicity. Bart Ehrman seems to be the guy irritating them the most at this time.

Today they discuss (1h:31m) how awesome the authenticity of the new testament is. My favorite quote:

INTERVIEWER: Pretend for a minute that you aren't a Christian. Objectively, how credible is the gospel record?

AUTHOR: The New Testament canon is incredibly credible.

How can you argue with that?

"Suck it Jesus"

2007-09-11T21:14:00.000-07:00

I thought this was about the funniest thing I've read in a long time. I really hope someone got a video of this and it ends up on youtube. Wait, let me check for it. Nope.

I wonder how you justify religious hate speech? Pretty much if someone makes fun of your deity and your deity lets them then that is a problem for you and your deity. I'm pretty sure the maker of the universe can handle them self just fine without your help. If you make a big stink aren't you just admitting that you are concerned that your deity needs help defending them self? Do we really need laws protecting god from comedians?

Any way, gave me a good chuckle.

Infidel Links - 2007-09-09

2007-09-09T21:15:00.000-07:00

Bringing Biblical principles to the internet in a whole new creepy way

Can you be an atheist and a saint? Were about to find out

I can't wait to see what his crazy sidekick looks like

As far as I'm concerned partial differential equations are the work of the devil

Could there be any other mistranslations lurking in there? Could there?

God answers wheelchair bound boy's prayer

Mostly this is here just for the picture of Mormon underwear

Dinosaurs and....
Buddhism
Not causing others to lose their faith
The devil's extended family

Christian Radio Watch: The Truth Behind the New Atheists

2007-09-06T21:36:00.001-07:00

It's time to learn more about these new atheists (1h:31m) that have been stirin' up trouble.

In summary, Dawkins based all his "research" on google searches and Christians invented science. *snap*

Christian Radio Watch: Irony == Truth, dontcha know?

2007-09-05T21:15:00.000-07:00

You really have to like the reasoning that ironic undertones in a text support it's authenticity (1h31m). By this reasoning Mormonism is even more true than Protestantism and Scientology is truer still. Hmmmm... I may be confusing crazy with irony. Anyway, another classic from Moody Broadcasting.

Adventures in Enlightenment: The Sleepy Taoist

2007-09-04T21:31:00.000-07:00

When hungry, eat, when tired, sleep.

So this month I'll be a Taoist. Specifically my challenge will be to sleep when tired. This is actually a big challenge for me. I've actually spent enormous time and energy fighting the natural sleep cycle. At the height of my disciplined sleep reduction program I had gotten down to about 5 hours a night. I'm currently averaging about 5 and 1/2 during the work week and eagerly catching up as much as I can on the weekend. If prayer worked I'd use it to get my kids to sleep in on Saturday and Sunday. But alas if it works at all it is only ironically.

As someone who has to hold a job, I need to be in a certain location at a certain time most days so the rules of engagement for this month will be to fix one end of my sleep cycle and let the other be controlled by the Tao. So I will wake up at 5:45 am every day (including the weekend) and just let my natural urge to sleep happen at the other end.

I am very curious to see what happens. I actually think I naturally tend to need less sleep than average but I'm not really sure anymore since I've been fighting sleep for so long. I don't know if I know what natural is with respect to my sleep habits.

I can tell you that waking up at that time on the weekend will require an iron will (not very Taoist I reckon) but if I'm truly getting enough sleep then it really shouldn't be a big deal. I'm very interested to see what it's like to have an hour of two to my self in the morning on the weekend. Sounds almost decadent.

I'll assume when I nod off the first time in an evening that this is the Tao telling me to go to sleep and I will respect it, no matter how many interesting things I can think of that I'd rather do than sleep (which is a lot).

Adventures in Enlightenment: Lent (thoughts)

2007-09-03T21:40:00.000-07:00

[follow up to this]

First a summary of how I did. As a general statement I'll say that I wasn't a perfect stickler for staying away from the things that I gave up. In fact, I have a semi-good reason for planned lapses of a sort. I think the key to giving up something is being able to engage in the bad habit (or what have you) and not fall completely off the wagon. In fact I'd say getting back on the wagon is the most important skill to have. But you can't practice getting on unless you fall off at least a little.

- cokes (sodas): this was actually pretty easy. I've been slowly weaning myself off these for the last year or two and it was time to just be done with it. I'll allow myself an occasional can or two but I'm not planning on buying these to have around the house or work anymore.

- chocolate: I eat exclusively dark chocolate anyway so I'm not so sure giving this up was a net health gain. I'm still not sure what baseline I want to return to with this. The most humorous aspect of this goal for the month is that my wife's family paid for a cruise as a sort of family reunion. For anyone who has been on a cruise I'm sure you'll agree that avoiding chocolate on a cruise is a fairly daunting thing to do. But I did pretty good all things considered.

- religion/atheism: so here's the really critical item of this month's experiment. Would I miss reading about and writing about religion and disbelief for a month and how would I otherwise fill my time? Turns our I didn't miss it too much. It's sort of like going on a TV fast. At first you miss it, but then you are thankful that you've cut yourself off and are amazed at all the fun things you all of a sudden have time to do (in my case computer science reading / programming projects). Even something as simple as simply sleeping instead of reading about or writing about religion/disbelief is so much healthier on so many levels. Anyway we'll see where this leads me. Tentatively I'm thinking of setting a timer and limiting my time with all things religious to a small fraction of my week. Interestingly, I'm not very tempted to open up my new feed reader and start catching up and so far haven't. I sort of like the extra time. *sigh*

As far as lent as a concept goes I'll have to file this under clever mind control techniques. On the one hand it seems like practicing discipline is just a good thing no matter what. On the other hand giving up pleasure to prove yourself to god is sort of warped. The point it to think about how much more important god is than your own enjoyment and how you are failing to serve him enough. So you spend a month or so of deprivation thinking about how much you suck. So now you are in a position to realize how unworthy you are and how much help you need from higher powers. Well done religion engineers. Well done.

Anyway, I'm still pondering my next enlightenment adventure, hopefully something by tomorrow.

Adventures in Enlightenment: Lent

2007-08-01T22:08:00.000-07:00

Let's try a little deprivation this month. Is it ever a bad time of year for lent? From a website on lent:

Q: Why is giving up something for Lent such a salutary custom?

A: By denying ourselves something we enjoy, we discipline our wills so that we are not slaves to our pleasures. Just as indulging the pleasure of eating leads to physical flabbiness and, if this is great enough, an inability to perform in physically demanding situations, indulging in pleasure in general leads to spiritual flabbiness and, if this is great enough, an inability to perform in spiritual demanding situations, we when the demands of morality require us to sacrifice something pleasurable (such as sex before marriage or not within the confines of marriage) or endure hardship (such as being scorned or persecuted for the faith). By disciplining the will to refuse pleasures when they are not sinful, a habit is developed which allows the will to refuse pleasures when they are sinful. There are few better ways to keep one's priorities straight than by periodically denying ourselves things of lesser priority to show us that they are not necessary and focus our attention on what is necessary.

So let's give up some things that are enjoyable, but to be practical let's also throw in some things that I probably should be doing less of anyways (e.g. for health reasons). Here is my list of things to give up for the month:

- no cokes (or any other soft drinks)
- no chocolate (I eat an insane amount of this actually)
- no religion/atheism blogging or checking my blog stats or checking religion/atheism blogs

As usual I suspect that if this enlightenment exercise has any value it will be in the practice of discipline. Discipline is the key to everything. (And I don't even believe in free will, a paradox!). Giving up the food components will be a little challenging but I think the hardest part will be giving up the reading of religion/atheism blogs. I've just hidden all the relevant feeds from my self. *sigh*.

So in keeping with my promise you won't hear from me this month (except for this entry). See you on the other side of August. With any luck I'll be a little thinner and a little more enlightened....

Adventures in Enlightenment: Mindfulness (final thoughts)

2007-07-31T22:23:00.000-07:00

(the mindfulness adventure)

So that was pretty interesting experiment. I stayed pretty disciplined at it. Even though I didn't put in a lot of time, I did do it pretty much every day (both sitting meditation and random moments of "mindfulness" throughout the day). I find meditating to be one of the weirdest experiences. You don't really realize what a chatter box your brain is until you just sit there and watch it and try to get it to just shut up for a second.

It occurs to me that in a way mindfulness and meditation are a way of running your brain in a "debugger". Debuggers are certainly an interesting way to learn how a complex system works. But the funny thing about debuggers is that some problems go away while you are running the debugger and some problems only occur while you are running a debugger. In any case it's nice to have the option to run in debug mode on occasion so you can try to understand the root cause of how a certain system works. It's just not clear if the effort of getting the mindfulness/meditation debugger working is worth it in the long run. But if nothing else it is entertaining to try.

One thing I thought about a lot is why I should think mindfulness/meditation is necessarily a good thing. About the only thing good you can say unequivocally about it is that it tends to reduce stress in the practitioners. But other than that does it demonstrably improve my life in some way? Does it make one more enlightened? I certainly don't associate proficiency in meditation with success in the world. It may be that the acceptance and peace of mind of meditation actually makes you less likely to have the partial insanity required to do great things. Certainly you need focus to do great things but I'm not sure why I would think that mindfulness/meditation is a necessary or sufficient condition for this sort of thing. Do I really need any more peace/relaxation in my life? Maybe the thing I really need is to create more chaos and hunger for greatness. Meh. Sitting is easier. :)

In any case I'm going to try to stick with the minimal mindfulness plan for a while and see how it goes.

Tune in tomorrow for next month's adventure in enlightenment.

Infidel Links - 2007-07-29

2007-07-29T21:31:00.000-07:00

I couldn't help but think of the bumblebee man from the Simpsons. But, man, that's really crazy.

Im in ur scripturz updatin teh lingo

Baby's got book

The shocking truth about atheists

Solution to all of the worlds problems: get everyone one on the planet to work as a religion reporter.

The relationship between IQ and belief. Do you want to guess what it is?

The Creation museum: a biblical perspective on dinosaurs and the 7 C's.

2007-07-26T22:50:00.000-07:00

Sure you've seen all the mocking tours of the Creation Museum done by deluded atheists. Isn't it time you heard the view of the faithful? No? Well, here you go anyway. In two parts: part 1 (starts at 1h20m) and part 2 (starts at 1h20m).

Anyone other non-believers going to OSCON this week?

2007-07-22T10:29:00.001-07:00

Shoot me a note and we can get together for a bible study or something. Probably "or something"....

Infidel Links - 2007-07-15

2007-07-15T21:05:00.000-07:00

Song of Praise (with subtitles help for the belief impaired)

Mr Bean spake of the Amazing Jesus

The Simpsons: Left Below! (the Simpsons are still on? Who knew?)

I thinks this whole thing could have been avoided if he just explained that Jesus is one of the avatars of Vishnu

Biblical precedents for the sex acts of your choice?:

I believe technically these are called "Jesus Horses"

Pope decides to set record straight regarding who is really the really real church and not the super fakey church

Map the the US showing religious density

Virtual Prostelyzation

2007-07-14T22:01:00.000-07:00

I wonder, if you get converted while playing Second Life, does it count for real? Maybe the convertees still go to hell but their avatar goes to virtual heaven. In any case, if you see a pair of young male avatars with dark slacks, white shirts, ties and backpacks, fly away to another zone as fast as you can....

Double Dose of Dennett

2007-07-11T21:27:00.000-07:00

Recently came across these couple of gems. I'm hoping that I can get a seat next to him in hell. We'll have a good laugh about the whole lake of fire thing...

Dennett in Denmark (good summary of "Breaking the Spell")

Dennett on TED (memes and friends)

How's your God-ar?

2007-07-09T21:46:00.000-07:00

As I was reading this article it got me thinking about my flawless sense of "god-ar". I don't know about you, but I am almost never surprised when I learn someone's religious inclinations. If I've had a chance to interact with someone for even a short while I can usually place them within a fairly accurate band of belief intensity and flavor. Maybe one in 20 surprises me a little.

About four years ago I was shocked at how badly my godar had misfired. I totally had someone pegged as a blatant unbeliever only to learn that they were very active in their church, ran their web page, blah, blah blah. But then it turned out I was totally right all along. I had no idea that Unitarian Universalist was essentially a code word for non-believer. In fact he was as hard core of an atheist as you'd care to meet. Whew. Some flavors of catholic sometimes through me off a little but in general I'm just not surprised very often.

Is it the hair cuts? Figures of speech? Fake niceness? Crippled sense of humor? I dunno.

I should work carnivals and try to make some money off my gift.

How's your god-ar?

OK, I give up for real this time.

2007-07-06T21:03:00.000-07:00

You know how you hear that all the cool kids are doing something so you give it a try and you don't like it and you figure that something must be wrong with you and then you forget about it for a while and then you try it again and you still don't like it but are left with this lingering confusion about why everyone else seems to like this thing and either they are crazy or you are and then finally you realize that everyone else is crazy and you are the sane one.

Well that's where I am with anime. I really have tried to like it but it's like country music. You can call Johnny Cash country but he is really just his own thing and he's good. But the core of country just sucks, sucks, sucks. Same for anime. There are occasional cross genre pieces that I have really enjoyed or at least found moderately fascinating (Ghost in the Shell, Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, and a few others) but in general it's just terrible. I really don't get it and I've tried past any reasonable amount of time to "get it".

My last effort was prompted by a list of anime recommendations on Steve Yegge's blog. I really like reading this guy. He seems to have a halfway reasonable head on his shoulders. Why that should indicate he has good taste in anime is not clear, but I thought I'd give it a shot. So I took one of his top picks, Last Exile. And from the first episode it sucked and pissed me off. But he said he was going to name his kids after the main characters, so maybe it gets better, I think. And my wife has the same mixed feelings as me about anime but she indulges me and we keep working our way through. And the story just gets more and more random and stupid. It's all the worst parts of Steam Boy, except it goes on for hour after hour....

So it's official. Anime is dead to me now. And like an abused wife in some crappy country song I'm still open to the idea that anime is awesome and I'm just missing something. But please tell me, what am I missing? What do people think is so great about Last Exile in particular and anime in general?

... END TRANSMISSION ...

Who are your must read authors?

2007-07-03T22:08:00.000-07:00

I learned recently that Steven Pinker has a new book coming out soon. And immediately it passed through my mind that without any doubt I will buy that book the moment it is available and find time to read it. As I pondered how sure I was of this fact I tried to compile a list of authors in my head for which it is a certainty that if they publish a book I will buy it and read it and think it's awesome without exception.

I was actually surprised to find that I only came up with 2 authors for my list: Steven Pinker and Daniel Dennett. Now there are of course a brazillion other authors who I love to read and if I had more time I would read more of them, but for some reason these two are non-negotiable. I must consume all of their content as soon as it is available.

Who are your must read authors?

Adventures in Enlightenment: Mindfulness

2007-07-01T21:46:00.000-07:00

OK, experiment for this month will be an old, old, old school technique: mindfulness. I've thought about this topic and even tried it in a casual way off and on for years. Most recently I've seen it discussed by Sam Harris and Susan Blackmore among others. If nothing else mindfulness is the ultimate pragmatic spiritual practice. "Don't take my word for it, just try it".

As usual I'll play around with what is interesting to try and what is "working", but as a first pass I'll try the following:

- Read this mindfulness description and suggestions.
- Try 6 minutes of sitting in as close to a lotus position as I can and try the various mindfulness exercises. Why 6 minutes, because time is money my friend. Why the lotus position? Hopefully the discomfort will prevent me from falling asleep. If I happen to have more time or the practice is interesting this time slot will go up.
- Try to remember at least three times per day to do an "in the moment" awareness exercise.
- If I'm feeling ambitious, crack open my copy of "Where ever you go, there you are" and read an occasional chapter.

OK, let's try my first micro-zazen and see how that goes.

... 6 minutes later ...

Well, I'm not *quite* enlightened yet and ouch!

So it goes...

Infidel Links - 2007-07-01

2007-07-01T21:33:00.000-07:00

Satan hates churches. Get it? Get it?

Who would Jesus spank? Your wife apparently

You say formerly gay, I say looking for an opportunity to be fabulous again

Dawkins gives his book review of the latest Behe book. Care to guess what he thinks?

That whole atheist "fad" through the lens of fox news

Creationism = human rights abuse?

Adventures in Enlightenment: Hunger (final thoughts)

2007-06-30T21:51:00.000-07:00

So this month's experiment has come to an end. And this was a good one. In fact I think it would be hard for me to stop doing this now. I think any time you add a little discipline to your life and go off autopilot in some small way, you are better for it.

Am I more enlightened? Hell ya. Isn't it obvious? But I didn't lose any weight. This doesn't surprise me much since I think I'm already at the natural level that I can get down to without serious effort and deprivation. (Something that I will probably experiment with in a future installment of Adventures in Enlightenment).

So what does the average religious person expect they will find in hunger? I imagine it's an identification with those who are hungry involuntarily and perhaps a metaphysical experience of the spiritual hunger.

For me the most interesting thing was observing that hunger is something that is not very scary or powerful. It just comes. Sniffs around and then goes away for a while. That surprised me since I think I had somehow acquired a *very* low grade fear of hunger. As if being hungry meant my blood sugar levels had gone down too far and I wouldn't be able to think straight if I was too hungry for too long. (I had a firend who was hypoglycemic and used to get really moody and generally unpleasant if he skipped a meal so I may have been worried about becoming that persona). Furthermore I found that it cleared out my mind. Knowing that I just wasn't going to eat anything between breakfast and lunch just freed my mind from worrying about it and not focusing on what snacks I could be eating and worrying if I'm eating too many snacks. Etc. Instead I just had one less thing to distract me, and strangely I didn't find hunger distracting at all. Surprisingly so.

OK, new experiment starts tomorrow and it's related to the one just finishing up. I'm that much closer to enlightenment now.

The decrease in violence and the rise in secularism

2007-06-28T21:02:00.000-07:00

A comment from a couple of entries ago got me wondering how well established the two statements in the title are. Is there strong evidence for a long term decrease in violence in the world? Is there evidence that despite noise to the contrary, the world is becoming relentlessly secular.

My original exposure to the decreasing violence claim comes from Steven Pinker. Now, I'm an admitted Pinker fanboy so I may not being skeptical enough, but I'm curious if anyone knows of any actual evidence against this thesis? This is actually something I've discussed with my dad for over 20 years and we had basically come to the same conclusion, but not in any scholarly way.

I've recently seen a number of articles on the somewhat surprising increase in secularism. I've also linked to other articles recently in the same vein.

So I'm curious, am I just a sucker for everything that comes my way on the internet or, contra the above, is there any reason to believe that the world is getting more violent and less secular?

On the virtue of never doing what you are told.

2007-06-27T21:14:00.000-07:00

So apparently I've been tagged. But the problem is I'm morally, physically, spiritually and hermeneutically opposed to chain letters of any kind. And I'm lazy. But more importantly in the spirit of this blog I will experiment with metaphysically passing on the tag. So here is me not really following the rules:

1. All right, here are the rules.
2. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
3. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
4. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
5. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and list their names. Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they're tagged, and to read your blog.

8 facts:

- I used to be fluent in Chichewa
- I've literally travelled around the world (all the way back to my home in one direction)
- My wife has a PhD in microbiology
- I only sleep 5 and a half hours a night (but would gladly sleep more if there weren't so many interesting things to read and do)
- I was in mensa for one year just so I could say I was in mensa.
- I have trouble keeping my tropical fish alive, but I keep trying.
- I love the snow but I don't particularly care for skiing.

I hereby tag: ?

(here is the metaphysical part: I have sent the tagging (via spiritual channels) to 8 special individuals dispersed through time and space. Some of these people do not yet exist. Some of these people are already dead. Some don't even know they should be blogging. But each will realize in the fruition of time that they have been tagged and will respond here by a means appropriate to their spiritual and technological evolution. Godspeed!)

"But we Christians believe that humans are basically sinful..."

2007-06-26T21:04:00.000-07:00

I really need to stop listening to so much Christian radio news. But it's addicting I tell ya! Today they were interviewing (starts at 1:20) a guy who wrote about about the indisputable fact that violence has been on a massive decrease for the last millennium (e.g. 99% drop in the last 100 years for instance). It's pretty subtle (but priceless) to hear the confusion in the voice of the interviewer as he tried to reconcile this fact with the notion that man is inherently sinful.

I'm sure it has nothing to do with the relentless march of secularism. Probably a trick of Satan!

Infidel Links - 2007-06-24

2007-06-24T21:03:00.000-07:00

Beautiful commercial for a monument to stupidity

God-Man: The Hero with omnipotent powers!

God Hates the World - The Musical (last 30 seconds are especially creepy/heart breaking)

Christian Condoms

Sam vs. dude making up his own definition of religion and god

Finally a simple, easy to follow chart for understanding your sins in detail

Jesus loves dinosaurs

Bush vs. Jesus

Well, that's just an eensy bit redundant

So who is this Bart Ehrman character any way?

2007-06-22T21:48:00.000-07:00

If you happened to listen to the radio link I pointed to recently on "Misquoting Truth" and you want to know more about Bart Ehrman's view of things, you could do a lot worse than this debate as an introduction.

I have to admit I'm a sucker for a good apologist vs. skeptic debate. It never ceases to amaze me the artistry of the apologist for making insane ideas sound almost plausible.

Misquoting Truth (yes you are actually)

2007-06-21T21:31:00.000-07:00

I love books that inadventantly describe themselves ironically. On Prime Time America today (at 1h:31m) (Christian news show) they respond to Bart Ehrman's "Misquoting Jesus". It turns out that we *do* know that the bible is the perfect word of god. Well, I'm glad that's been resolved....

Does the new mega-church being built down the road have you worried?

2007-06-21T05:36:00.000-07:00

Don't sweat it. Just the last throes of the beast as she goes down...

Behe and Astrology

2007-06-20T21:29:00.000-07:00

One of the common criticisms of Behe is that he claimed that Astrology fits his definition of science. And of course he claims he was taken out of context. And you know what I agree with him. In fact I have to wonder how many people have read the transcripts to see what he actually said. This seems like one of the cases where a marketing opportunity ("Behe says that astrology is science!") has gotten out of hand and just gives him a justified opportunity to claim that he's being taken out of context. I have no sympathy for the man, but let's not hand them ammunition. Am I missing something? Here's the relevant part as far as I can tell:

Q And using your definition, intelligent design is a scientific theory, correct?

A Yes.

Q Under that same definition astrology is a scientific theory under your definition, correct?

A Under my definition, a scientific theory is a proposed explanation which focuses or points to physical, observable data and logical inferences. There are many things throughout the history of science which we now think to be incorrect which nonetheless would fit that -- which would fit that definition. Yes, astrology is in fact one, and so is the ether theory of the propagation of light, and many other -- many other theories as well.

Q The ether theory of light has been discarded, correct?

A That is correct.

Q But you are clear, under your definition, the definition that sweeps in intelligent design, astrology is also a scientific theory, correct?

A Yes, that's correct. And let me explain under my definition of the word "theory," it is -- a sense of the word "theory" does not include the theory being true, it means a proposition based on physical evidence to explain some facts by logical inferences. There have been many theories throughout the history of science which looked good at the time which further progress has shown to be incorrect. Nonetheless, we can't go back and say that because they were incorrect they were not theories. So many many things that we now realized to be incorrect, incorrect theories, are nonetheless theories.

Q Has there ever been a time when astrology has been accepted as a correct or valid scientific theory, Professor Behe?

A Well, I am not a historian of science. And certainly nobody -- well, not nobody, but certainly the educated community has not accepted astrology as a science for a long long time. But if you go back, you know, Middle Ages and before that, when people were struggling to describe the natural world, some people might indeed think that it is not a priori -- a priori ruled out that what we -- that motions in the earth could affect things on the earth, or motions in the sky could affect things on the earth.

Q And just to be clear, why don't we pull up the definition of astrology from Merriam-Webster.

MR. ROTHSCHILD: If you would highlight that.

BY MR. ROTHSCHILD:

Q And archaically it was astronomy; right, that's what it says there?

A Yes.

Q And now the term is used, "The divination of the supposed influences of the stars and planets on human affairs and terrestrial events by their positions and aspects."

That's the scientific theory of astrology?

A That's what it says right there, but let me direct your attention to the archaic definition, because the archaic definition is the one which was in effect when astrology was actually thought to perhaps describe real events, at least by the educated community.

Astrology -- I think astronomy began in, and things like astrology, and the history of science is replete with ideas that we now think to be wrong headed, nonetheless giving way to better ways or more accurate ways of describing the world.

And simply because an idea is old, and simply because in our time we see it to be foolish, does not mean when it was being discussed as a live possibility, that it was not actually a real scientific theory.

Q I didn't take your deposition in the 1500s, correct?

A I'm sorry?

Q I did not take your deposition in the 1500s, correct?

A It seems like that.

Q Okay. It seems like that since we started yesterday. But could you turn to page 132 of your deposition?

A Yes.

Q And if you could turn to the bottom of the page 132, to line 23.

A I'm sorry, could you repeat that?

Q Page 132, line 23.

A Yes.

Q And I asked you, "Is astrology a theory under that definition?" And you answered, "Is astrology? It could be, yes." Right?

A That's correct.

Q Not, it used to be, right?

A Well, that's what I was thinking. I was thinking of astrology when it was first proposed. I'm not thinking of tarot cards and little mind readers and so on that you might see along the highway. I was thinking of it in its historical sense.

Q I couldn't be a mind reader either.

A I'm sorry?

Q I couldn't be a mind reader either, correct?

A Yes, yes, but I'm sure it would be useful.

Q It would make this exchange go much more quickly.

THE COURT: You d have to include me, though.

BY MR. ROTHSCHILD:

Q Now, you gave examples of some theories that were discarded?

A Yes.

Q One was the ether theory?

A Yes.

Q And the other was the theory of geocentrism, right?

A That's correct.

Q And what you said yesterday was that there was some pretty compelling evidence for observers of that time that that was good theory, right?

A Yes, sure.

Q Look up in the sky, and it looked like the sun was going around us, correct?

A That's right.

Q And we know now that those appearances were deceiving, right?

A That's correct.

Q So what we thought we knew from just looking at the sky, that's not in fact what was happening, right?

A That's right.

Q So the theory was discarded?

A That's correct.

You want me to build a what?

2007-06-19T21:19:00.000-07:00

I always find it humorous that Noah's ark is one of the favorite "kid" stories from the bible. Yes, let's celebrate a genocidal deity that encourages a second repopulation of the planet based on incest. But, ahhhh, look at the cute wittle wions and giraffes and hippos on the ark. Two by two....

Any way, I've been increasingly interested in the myths of the surrounding cultures that were plagiarized in the bible. This web site is a little lo-tech, but it has some interesting info for you flood lovers.

Infidel Links - 2007-06-17

2007-06-17T21:39:00.000-07:00

It's simple, the lions kept the Bible dinosaurs in check on the ark

Jesus and the Argonauts

Tough Guys for Jesus

The Creation Museum Revealed

Could Archie comics suck more? Apparently.

Mostly this link is here because I wanted an excuse to use the name Sir Fuxalot

Evolution e-cards

Questions your pastor will hate

Fallible Sensors

2007-06-17T20:54:00.000-07:00

Ever since I read Mind Hacks I've been a connoisseur of just how bad we are at observing the world around us. Here are some good reminders of this fact: (the second link is really awesome)

Genuine or fake smiles? (via Brian Flemming)

Magic trick related to this book.

The Jesus Project

2007-06-16T12:00:00.000-07:00

Interview with Joseph Hoffmann on Point of Inquiry. I remember a couple of years ago when I first heard the theory that there was not even an actual historical Jesus (let alone all the miracles and what have you). It sounded so crazy. Now I have trouble even entertaining the idea that there is *any* historical kernel in the gospel account. In any case the Jesus Project will be completed in 5 years and we'll settle the historicity question once and for all. And then we can all move on with our lives.... :)

The Church of Awesome

2007-06-15T20:49:00.000-07:00

So I have a number or religion projects I've been developing for a while. I both create new religions from scratch and update old tired ones (you're gonna love Christianity 2.0). Today's offering is one of my "from scratch" creations. I am still playing around with a suitable name, but currently it's going by the name of The Church of Awesome, but some other potential names I am kicking around include: Awesome-ism, The Church of Awesome (Latter Day Awesome-ists), The Church of Awesome-ology, and the Seventh Day Awesome-ists.

In any case it works like this: whatever you are doing, any time, any where, just ask yourself: "What could I do right now to most personify Awesome-ness?". Whatever the answer is, do it! Lather, rinse, repeat. Awesome-ness awaits you.

Pretty straight forward, but I've tried to anticipate a few questions:

Q: Is this just hedonism?
A: No, because that is not true awesomeness. When you are in tune with awesomeness, you will know it. The awesomeness that is not awesome is not the true awesomeness.

Q: Is awesome just being used as some lame substitute for Tao?
A: Is the Tao awesome? If yes, then yes. If no, then no.

Q: I want to be awesome but I'll be killed if I leave my current religion (really)!
A: That's *not* awesome. Fortunately Awesomeness is like an Emacs minor mode and is fully functional by itself or in conjunction with other religions. For instance if you are a Christian then just ask your self: "What would Jesus do to be awesome?".

Q: How does one address another member of the Church of Awesome?
A: Dude! The longer the "u" sound the better. But let the vowel be held for only an awesome length of time and no longer!

Be awesome one to another!

Conversion Economics

2007-06-14T17:23:00.000-07:00

How much does a soul cost anyway?

As my family and I were walking through a street fair recently a man walked up to my 4 and 2 year olds and handed them a pair of shiny coins. This made their day of course. Yeah, shiny! Later I got a look at one of the coins and it had John 3:16 on one side and the sinner's prayer on the other. Since our kids can't read and really have no interest in how they will be spending eternity, I'm assuming that this was just a simple minded attempt to "trick" me and my wife into reading his message. I considered his message and am waiting to hear back from Jesus, but so far I'm not convinced. In the meantime, I can't help but wonder if the people who hand out such coins have worked out the soul conversion economics.

First of all is there any chance that any one at any time has been converted by such a coin? It's probably not zero, but it's hard to imagine why it would be much higher than zero. If we are to believe the polls, most of the people that would receive such a coin are already believers in which case the coin is not going to change their hearts. If the coin ends up in the hands of non-believer such as myself what are the chances that this is going to have any effect? To be generous let's say that 1 in 1000 non-believers would be swayed by this coin (this is a *really* generous assumption in my opinion). Then if we assume there are 10% non-believers in the general populace Then they would have to hand out at least 10000 coins to reach one new soul.

How long does it take to hand out these coins? There are only so many people at a street fair and you'd probably quickly saturate the crowd but let's say for an order of magnitude estimate that he can get 100 handed out an hour. So it would take 100 hours of handing out coins at street fairs to reach one new soul. Of course the street fair only goes on for a couple days on a weekend so it's going to take a lot of weekends at different street fairs to get those hours in. All for one soul.

Presumably this guys time is actually worth something. Let's say at minimum that his time is worth $10 an hour. So this guy could've made $1000 dollars that he could have spent on other evangelization effort, instead of walking around street fairs. How many souls could you get for $1000?

And maybe that's the problem. To me it seems like a hugely ineffective way to reach new souls, but maybe the market is already saturated and getting new customers (like me) is an extremely competitive and expensive business and the coin trick is really about as good as they can do. Some enterprising chiristian MBA out there needs to work out the soul/dollar ratios and determine the best way to spend soul winning dollars. (Just for the record there is a dollar amount for which I will exchange my soul, please make an offer!)

I wonder if god cares at all about efficiency? Is it just the number of hours that you are pounding pavement he's following or does he care about results? Will there be a president's club in heaven for the high earners (with front row seats for watching sinners burn below)? I just wish there were some book that was had all the answers to my questions....

Blogging the Bible

2007-06-13T22:53:00.001-07:00

The OT is all done.

If you have any interest in what the bible is *really* like when it's not being being carefully filtered to make it seem quasi-sane, you could do a lot worse than this series. I'm especially happy to see that they are planning on doing the NT as well. Go Jebus!

The End of Faith

2007-06-13T22:05:00.000-07:00

I've owned the End of Faith for quite a while but I figured since I have limited time and I've seen most of Sam's online debates and read most of his online essays that there wasn't much point in reading this book. Life is too short to sit in the choir and be preached to. Well I recently discovered the time saving world of audio books and I decided to listen to the book while I did dishes and other puttering.

HOLY CRAP is this book good. This man can write. Not only are his examples and logical flow crisp and tight, he really has a way with words. I wish I *had* been reading the book so I could have underlined choice turns of phrase.

But I do know that I will be reading (or listening) to this book again. I get a little nervous in my old age when I can't find *any* logical flaw in an argument or I agree completely on every page. It's always possible that he is simply a very smart and persuasive man with whom I should agree on every point. Or maybe I'm just easily led to any conclusion. In any case it will be enjoyable to review this book in the near future and see how it survives a more skeptical pass. Anyway, 2 enthusiastic horns of Satan up for this book.

Unicorns

2007-06-11T20:47:00.000-07:00

So this is truly off topic, but it cracks me up, so here it is anyway.

We were visiting some friends this weekend who have 3 children 4 and under. They were telling us how they sometimes let the kids pick a theme and then they try to find some videos on the interweb for them to watch on this theme. Now as chance would have it a few weeks ago the theme was unicorns and they came across the video below. Now usually they watch the video with the kids but for this particular one the phone happened to ring just as it started. So they walked away for a second. Lets just say they were kind of surprised when they came back and heard the chorus (audio is NSFW is your boss and co-workers are totally lame):

And speaking of unicorns, here is the best unicorn appearance in a comic hands down.

Common sense, don't fail me now!

2007-06-06T21:22:00.000-07:00

When a new ID book comes out I always love to follow the savaging that it receives from some of my favorite experts - PZ, GM/BM, Panda's Thumb, etc. And yet it's also an occasion to ponder just how reliant I am on the opinion of experts. I find I'm in the intellectually muddy situation of being pretty sure this book is crap, because *my* experts tell me so.

Can I read the book myself? Of course, but I probably won't since I already believe the conclusion is wrong, I'm trying to minimize the nonsense I put in my head and there are only so many hours in a day. Can I follow debates from both sides on the merits of the arguments in the book? I can and have. But the fact that people who believe one way or the other read a book such as this and come away more convinced that their side is all the more correct reeks of confirmation bias. (Of course *my* experts don't suffer from this, just the other guys.)

How do you inoculate your self against confirmation bias? One way would be to become an expert in the field. Am I going to become an expert in both evolutionary biology and intelligent design and then make a fair and balanced decision? Probably not. I've got lots of other things to do. So I read "Darwin's Dangerous Idea" and lots of other books, I am swayed by their arguments and don't really give the ID guys that much attention since my common sense tells me they are full of it. Then I just go on with my life.

But then occasionally I have to face reality. I don't really *know* (with a capital K) who is right. I have placed my bet on one side but to a greater extent than I'd like I'm just trusting experts. How did I choose my trustable experts? I just find that some people make more sense to me. Then in a temporary moment of clarity I realize this sounds exactly like a reply that someone could give to justify *any* appeal to common sense.

I think the thing that bugs me the most is I'd like to be the guy who could argue the fine points of bible apologetics or ID with anyone and win the argument, convert them to my views and also anyone else who is listening in. The thing is, even the experts almost never succeed at this, so why should I worry about trying to even come close to this goal of being a perfectly informed and convincing debater? It's just a huge time sink. I've already convinced myself. I don't have a responsibility to make everyone believe the same as me (or do I?).

Personally, my common sense is satisfied. I know that I've read up on the topic and I'm not worried about being shown to be fundamentally wrong. The chance that the majority of the world's scientists are deluded or in a secret cabal under the orders of Satan is too silly to contemplate. Yet somehow the mere existence of people who confidently and vocally disagree with what my common sense tells me is true bugs me. Just knowing they are out there (with or without compelling reasons supporting their beliefs) seems wrong to me. My capacity for second guessing myself knows no bounds.

On the other hand people who deny the moon landing don't bother me at all. They are clearly idiots (though their arguments are a little intriguing when you first hear them). Bible apologists and ID advocates are also delusional but I think that as a former christian it's harder to completely turn off the sensitivity to those arguments. I don't worry about whether the Koran might be right, for instance. (Except the part about flying horses. Pixar, contact me about my script).

So in the end I trust my common sense and get on with my life. I just personally don't like this reliance on common sense. Sadly, no matter how much I study, I can't be an authority on everything. I will be wrong sometimes and hopefully will have the flexibility to realize it on occasion and self correct as appropriate.

(I've been pondering the above off and on for a while and then came across this essay which resonated quite well with my own thoughts on on certainty and proof and such things. Glad to know that other people are bothered with how certain other people claim to be.)

ps. Just an afterthought. One reason why my confidence in my common sense is not much shaken by the ID crowd is exemplified by their response to GM/BM review. There may be more substantial replies there now but when I last checked it was just a bunch of people griping that he's not a mathematician. Dude, reply to the arguments not the person. That just stinks of bad thinking. Plus, here's a little secret for ya, PhDs in computer science know a shit load of math (in particular about information theory). And let me say for the record, M.S.s in computer science are super sexy and the life of every party.

Wow, there really is a Bible cow

2007-06-05T22:09:00.000-07:00

but it's true, Bible dinosaurs *are* better:

Bible cow is good, but it don't come close to Bible dinosaurs

2007-06-04T20:59:00.000-07:00