How smart people manage to say nothing for 20 minutes

Yesterday I saw a tweet by the great Sam Harris calling out a neuroscientist by the name of David Eagleman. Sam Harris calling someone out? I had to check it out.

I found an apparently extremely bright scientist say nothing in particular for 20 minutes.

David started out his talk by referring to Hubble Ultra-Deep Field experiment and discovery of 10,000 galaxies within it. That is a beautiful story except that I am not sure how it into the rest of what David was saying. After telling this story, he jumped into saying how he doesn’t agree with the writings of “new atheists”, before circling back to the Hubble story to say that when he talks to strangers, none of them ever heard of this experiment but are willing to talk about their personal beliefs. Either I am missing something, or two have nothing to do with each other, OR .. or.. David is grossly misunderstanding the concept of a religion and a belief implying that had these people knew about these 10,000 galaxies, this knowledge would invalidate their belief and they would stop believing.

Then there’s David disagreement with these new atheists. What this disagreement is based on – I am not certain. I think he objects to these new atheists insisting that science knows everything, or that science can explain everything. I am not sure which one he’s having a problem with because he doesn’t say.

As far as I know, none of the new, or old, atheists ever made a claim that sciences knows everything or provides an explanation for everything. To make that statement is to commit a fallacy worthy of religious apologetics. I think David says this because at one point, he uses a metaphor that standing on the edge of knowledge, everything ahead is uncharted. I fully agree, but who are these new atheists that said otherwise?

Or maybe he is referring to the claim that science is capable of explaining everything? Well how can it be argued otherwise? David even pays homage to Descartes, saying how integrals cannot explain smells or feelings, but I’m not sure if that’s what he’s driving at either. The non-overlapping magisteria question has been addressed by many, including non-new atheist philosophers and scientists. Also, as a neuroscientist, David must know that in the last 150 years, science explained and discovered so much, and there isn’t a reason to believe that this will change. David must surely know this, right?

Then, he debunks all of the known religions as something that we know too much to take seriously. In other words, none of the existing religions can provide any rational explanations for anything since we already know at least something in which they are wrong. Ok, I’m in complete agreement with that premise, but where does he go with that? To a catchy phrase and a concept that he probably came up with on a whim, but didn’t think through.

What David came up with is the concept of possibilian, which is pretty clever. At least on the first pass. On the second pass, it is complete nonsense.

He explains that all current religions are just points of view (according to David, they are all wrong) as is science (according to David, it doesn’t provide an explanation for everything), so you must keep your mind open to new possibilities. Huh? I mean WTF HUH?

Since he claims that science cannot explain everything, then he’s not referring to the scientific possibilities. And since all of the current religions are wrong, he’s not talking about the possibilities of their proof. The only thing that’s left is what? New gods and religions that we haven’t thought of yet? It seems that’s all we got. Talk about misunderstanding both concepts (science and religion). Am I missing something here or is it a totally fail on the part of David, and his many followers?

During the talk, David jokes about how someone suggested that he should be in politics. I think that’s exactly right, David. I don’t know you (obviously) but based on this talk, you seem to have a great ability to talk for a long time without saying anything and look smart doing it. I can’t wait for your discussion with Sam Harris.

Either malevolent or non-existant, but not ‘of love’

The beginning of the end of my religious affiliation lies in one horrifying story.  Perhaps it took me many more years to fully comprehend my own madness, but it was that particular story that started it all.  The story is something I accidentally found on the news wire about a decade ago and it haunts me to this day.  Forgive me as I now pass its horror to you.

The story was that somewhere in Russia, a band of I don’t even know what to call them, kidnapped 3-5 year old boys.  They would then proceed to rape and torture them to death, all while videotaping the whole ordeal and then selling it to various other like species, which resided at different parts of the world, including here in the US.  One of these clients was under an FBI investigation for something else, and the FBI agents overheard him complaining to his Russian supplier that the video he just received was not good enough because the boy didn’t die.  To which the Russian supplier responded that in the next video, he’ll make sure that the boy dies.

That conversation set off an investigation where Russian and American authorities worked together to get the creatures responsible for it and hopefully make sure they die in the worst possible way.

There are no words to describe what I, or any other human being with exception of select few, feel hearing that story.  To anyone of us, crimes against kids are absolutely of the worst kind.  In fact, it is said that child molesters have to be kept in isolation in prisons because even criminals who committed murder, robbery, and rape, do not tolerate child molestation and deal their own justice.  Even to the “worst” members of our society, this sort of crime would be intolerable.  Furthermore, I would imagine that even the most stout humanist and pacifist, walking into the place where all of that was happening, would absolutely do something about it and would probably make sure those responsible would die the most horrible death imaginable. 

Let’s forget for a second that all those participating in this – all of them just have to profess their love for Jesus and all they’ve done would be forgiven and they would spend an eternity in bliss.  The unforgiveable would be forgiven – talk about a fucked up moral compass, but pointing out the immoral nature of that injustice is not the point of this post.  Let’s forget about that.

As I’ve read the story, and as it actively haunted me in the following days, what I couldn’t reconcile was that there was someone else in that room with those boys being tortured and raped to death.  If he is who judeo-christian religion says he is, god was in that room as well.  Omnipresence dictates that. And while not a single human being with even a modicum of decency would idly sit by and watch what was happening, god did.  The fucker was present, watching, and what?  Lamenting that they didn’t believe in Jesus?  Not only that, if judeo-christian idiocy is true, he knew that these little boys would die this way since the beginning of time.  He knew it all, still ALLOWED it to happen. 

In our justice system, if you knew the crime was about to take place and did not report it, you are just as guilty as those who committed the crime.  But in this particular case, the religion dumbs down the people and they will use the “god works in mysterious ways” bit to try and justify why he knew about this, was present while this was happening, and did not do anything about it.  Not a damn thing.  It’s irreconcilable.  Except maybe to say that judeo-christian god does hate little kids as he himself, and his cronies, murder them repeatedly.  But then you’d have to defend him being the god of love, and not god of hate.  Again, it’s irreconcilable.

So what’s the alternative? Simple.  Few very fucked up individuals did that.  They now deserve to be slowly melted in acid, or whatever other form of slow and painful death religions of the world came up with over the years.  Then you are not left with trying to defend the indefendable, to forgive the unforgivable, and to believe the unbelievable – that is the danger, and the poison, of religion.

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”

- Epicurus

Homosexuality, government interference, and religious hypocrisy.

It is hard to imagine a more joyous occasion than victory of justice over prejudice, of reason over thick-headedness, of people over institutions. Yet there are those who view just this sort of situation as a negative. It is mind bugling, I know, but there it is. The story du jour is the recognition of New York State of same sex marriage. Translated for the sake of thickheaded, it means that a group of people will no longer be discriminated against based on perceptions of ignorant. It also means that the government will not be interfering with the lives of people – something most of these lunatics scream they want. But hypocrisy is something of a religious right.

I could care less what you believe about marriage. If you think marriage is a union between a man and a woman – good for you. My two questions are: why are you set on forcing interference into people’s private matters, and why are you not content to crusade for the issue by yourself, but need the government to do the work for you?

The answer is obvious – it’s the dumbing and bewitching effect of the religion. And the confusing, hypocritical nature of the book you are reading that tells you to love thy neighbor, and to do unto others as you’d like for others to do unto you, yet offering a ridiculous number of intolerances, calls to hate, and injustices.

Generally, the religious offer the following arguments against same sex marriage:

It destroys the sanctity of marriage. Really? More than the high divorce rate amongst different sex marriages? Which are incidentally one of the highest amongst those who identify themselves as evangelicals (see Barna Research Group study). Even those of you who have gone through a divorce as an adult, or as a child, claim that seeing a little boy with two daddys or two mommys is worse for the little boy than seeing his parents go through a divorce?

It corrupts the moral fiber of our society. Really? More so than calling “the good book” a piece of text that glorifies incest, slavery, genocide, infanticide, women servitude, and other moral concepts? If two people getting education, finding out who they truly are, and wanting to spend the rest of their lives together is undermining our moral fiber, we can use more undermining. Next time in your prayer group, figure out if praying for peace on earth is the same thing as supporting war and only then look at the question of moral fiber.

An overwhelming majority of the people on this planet, even those who are under the religious spell, would otherwise condemn the sort of injustice that homosexual population in the United States is subject to, except that their heads are filled with nonsense and nonsense they spew. Out of all the awesome atheist quotes, it is Steven Weinberg that best describes the reason to fight to eradicate the stone age concept of a religion.