Winter’s Haven

I found this comic via Hemant.


That hypothetical situation sure showed what an intellectually dishonest fellow that fictional atheist was! I have no idea whether this comic is trying to make some sort of point, or what that point might be.

The only reason I’m posting this is because I’ve long dreamed of launching an array of satellites able to act as a huge billboard in the sky. On the first night, I’d arrange for them to read “I am God and I am real”. As for subsequent nights, well, the possibilities are limitless. (”God says: Thou shalt honor the sabbath day by breakdancing to minimalist music in a kiddie pool full of borscht.”)

Please leave suggestions as to what God should say in the comments. The best ideas will appear in the night sky just as soon as my satellites are up and running.

Actually, there is a broader point to this post: if you see some extraordinary phenomenon, don’t just assume that it’s beyond your mortal comprehension. Take a closer look. Investigate. Make an attempt to understand what’s going on. Be curious about the world.

This evening I encountered a creationist while working on math in a cafe. This particular creationist thought that stars burn out on a timescale much shorter than billions of years, and hence the Earth could not possibly be that old. The creationist, who happened to be an engineering student, couldn’t give any particular reason as to why he thought the entire astrophysics community was so egregiously wrong. However, what I found most appalling was that he had not the slightest interest in figuring out just why accepted models make such terribly wrong predictions about stellar lifetimes. He didn’t care at all about how stars work.

Ask an angry atheist why they dislike religion, and you’ll most likely hear about how religion encourages humankind’s worst impulses: sexism, out-group hostility, violence, etc. There’s plenty of reason to be angry at the Osama bin Ladens of the world, but right now I’m just as furious at religion for what it did to the kid I met in the cafe as I am for what it did to the World Trade Center. That kid, that engineer, was not a stupid person. Yet he was told — by some non-violent, moderate, downright friendly pastor — that all of The Answers can be found in the collected mystic ramblings of a bunch of desert nomads. Those theists took a smart, talented kid and utterly crushed his sense of curiosity about the world. I’m mad at Christianity for destroying what was best and most noble in that kid, and so many others like him.

This entry was posted 2008-Feb-11 and is filed under Epistemology, Natural Sciences, Rants, Religion. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.