Or maybe it’s like this: The Breakfast Club Conceit
Claire, Brian, Andrew, Allison, and John may have belonged to different cliques, but they were united in their disillusionment with their parents’ value systems and their fascination with each other. Image source: My Vinter In my last post I introduced the Bronze Age Goat Herder Conceit. This is the idea, held by many atheists, that [...]
On making stuff up, featuring Michael Shermer on Colbert
When I first read this I laughed out loud. Courtesy of Jesus and Mo Once again, Jesus is right: Science is limited by its refusal to make stuff up. That is: He’s right if by “make stuff up” he means taking seriously ideas that do not have their grounding in the natural sciences. But, as [...]
Meet good interatheist Chris Stedman
An inverted Chris Stedman and his “awful giraffe,” which I find rather endearing. Stedman is a humanist interfaith activist. Yes, you read that correctly. Image taken from NonProphet Status, Stedman’s blog Read Stedman’s shirt (in a mirror). It says “Good (Without God).” This particular atheist cliché always makes my head hurt. On one hand, as [...]
Notes on my delusion
Not deluded, apparently: Thomas Jefferson by Rembrandt Peale, 1800. Jefferson is quoted by Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion thus: “Question with boldness even the existence of God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason than that of blindfolded fear.” I wonder if Jefferson knew that orthodox Christian [...]
Two days and counting: What about Fluffy?
An image from this video from After the Rapture Pet Care. Image source: timesunion.com Lo, the day draws nigh! The folks over at Family Radio must be all in a tizz. Why? Well, because Jesus is coming back on Saturday and he’s taking all the good people — them — back to heaven with him. [...]
Percy’s conundrum
Walker Percy (1916-1990). Image source: Wikipedia. Here’s a wonderful excerpt on Percy from HiLoBrow (“middlebrow’s not the solution”): “So, if you want to be Walker Percy, here’s what you do: have a father (whose own father committed suicide) who shoots himself with a shotgun when you’re twelve. Have a mother who might or might not [...]
Art Sunday: Stories and numbers meet in the theater of the sky
Stanislaw Lubieniecki, Theatrum cometicum (The Theater of Comets). Amsterdam, 1666-68. Here, the sea monster Cetus seems ready to chow down on some comet. Image source: Out of this World from the Linda Hall Library of Science, Engineering, and Technology. The interested reader will also want to investigate Thinking Outside the Sphere, another fine online exhibition [...]
On prayer: Simone Weil and the excluded God
Simone Weil‘s 1935 factory identification photo. In that year she began working as a power press operator at the Alstom Company in Paris. She was highly educated and had many options but chose to work alongside those who had no power. She later wrote, “A modern factory reaches perhaps almost the limit of horror. Everybody [...]
Introducing Art Sundays
Alfred Stieglitz, Georgia O’Keeffe, 1918. Image source: Wikimedia Commons Today Pastor Julie preached a beautiful sermon on being open to new things. So we’re thinking it’s a great day to start a new thing. It is Transfiguration Sunday, the day Christians worldwide remember the story of Christ’s metamorphosis before the eyes of Peter, James, and [...]
We like Hume. He doesn’t flame us
Allan Ramsay, Portrait of David Hume, 1766. Hume’s our man. He was skeptical as hell but never got all defensive about it. Image source: Wikimedia Commons For the life of me, I don’t know why I care so much about atheists and atheism. Off the top of my head, I can think of two possible [...]
