Just Cavuto.

I haven't been blogging here at all. I'm using mostly FetLife now. :) Since most of what I'm blogging about is kink-related stuff anyway, it sort of made sense. Email me if you want my FL handle.

Message from a Catholic Professor, re my atheism...
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(Salutation and irrelevant trivia omitted)

I understand your implied point about Occam's Razor, that if a
non-spiritual, non-theistic mode of explanation can explain something
adequately, then let it! One should not resort to an "Deus ex machina" or a
"god of the gaps" explanation due to scientific impatience. Granted. But the
important question is: what exactly constitutes an adequate explanation?
What something is made out of, how it immediately came to be (proximately
and materially speaking) and how it works are certainly not explained
adequately by theology! But why something exists, how it came to be
(ultimately and remotely)-and why there is something here at all, rather
than nothing-requires, as it seems to me, at least a reasonable,
philosophical explanation, if not a supernatural, theological one. The
big-bang explains the universe, but the universe doesn't explain the
big-bang. How did it "get" there, as it were?

I am glad that you call atheism a kind of faith. That is correct. It is not
demonstrable. However, I do think that one can demonstrate rationally the
existence of some kind of immaterial, immutable, atemporal, and aspatial
God. And, I also think there is no good reason, literally, to think that God
does not exist. As it seems to me, the disbelief in God is an emotional and
existential decision, based upon one's lack of trust in reality due,
perhaps, to one's personal experience of evil. The problem of evil is the
best argument for the non-existence of God, I think.

Take a look at this debate.
http://www.rfmedia.org/RF_audio_video/Other_clips/New-Zealand-08/Is-God-a-De
lusion-Craig-v-Cooke.php

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And here's my response: (I think I spent too much time on it, TBH. You can't convince a religious person not to be religious, they have too much invested in it. But I couldn't resist.)

Dear (Religious Guy),

(While I don't normally engage in lively debate with "religious folk", you seem
to invite the discussion, so I'll indulge for a bit.)

To be honest, I think you've got things a bit backwards. The question is not
"Why don't I believe in god?", but rather "Why *do* you?"

All things being equal, there's no good reason for one to exist. Except of
course man's need for it.

Primitive man invented one to address their fear of the unknown. We're no longer
primitive; I don't have such a need, personally. Perhaps you (and others) do.

I don't try to convince you otherwise (although I do regard especially zealous
belief as somewhere between a delusion and a psychosis). I wonder why religious
folk often try to convince me of their perspective.

I do take exception to your implication that "disbelief" may have something to
do with a personally traumatic experience. That's a bit of a condescending
viewpoint -- suggesting that "faith" is some sort of a state of grace, whereas
it is simply a subjective norm. It's equally valid to suggest that "belief" has
something to do with one's own insecurity and need for validation. ** I'm not in
a hole... maybe you're just up in a tree. **

Also, if you really do think we can demonstrate that there's some sort of higher
power with any semblance of scientific rigor, we might just have different
definitions of the word "rational".

I simply have found no need for any sort of higher power in *my* life. I've also
had no evidence of any sort to suggest that one exists. *shrug* Much about life
on our little planet that we've seen so far has good and reasonable explanation
based in physics and chemistry. I'm convinced that sooner or later, we will be
able to provide a scientific explanation for everything. If you want me to
demonstrate faith, that's it.

As to the big "Why?", I'm perfectly comfortable with the answer "Why not?" or
any other sort of pointless existential reflexivity. I don't think there's any
need to explain the existence of space, energy, and matter. It's just where I
keep my stuff.

Keep in mind the failure of the English language to differentiate between the
positive, negative, and neutral. Belief and disbelief are not necessarily
antonyms. You "belive" god exists. Others may "believe" god does NOT exist. I
simply "fail to believe" in god.

Best,
-Cavuto

Here goes:

When a construction worker whistles and hoots at a hot chick walking by, that's Level 1. Pure animal response, no mediation. No attempt at empathy with his object.

We evolved to aspire to more than this. We developed "political correctness" and empathy.

One human may comment to another human, "Person of female persuasion, I note a pleasing asthetic to your clothing and bodily form, and I hope to give pleasure and not offence in the communication of such."

That's Level 2.

With me so far?

Taking it a step further…

The *truly* enlightened person sees both the cultural commonality and shared understanding in the Level 2 person's statement, and -- like the Kirk and Spock Doppleganger episode -- can emulate him when necessary.

But he *also* sees the clumsiness and arduousness of such communication, and when sharing amongst peers of other Level 3 individuals can actually be amused at the gargantuan efforts required by the Level 2 person to accomplish a simple act of delivering a compliment without offending the object of his statement.

And so, in that enlightened context, he feels comfortable both making the clear statement of his intent, while at the same time poking gentle fun at the challenge of the L2 person. He'd be comfortable with "You look nice in that dress." But, when he shares a common understanding with the person to whom he's communicating, they can share mutual amusement in "Hey baby, nice tits."

Although I've always thought this about communication in general, I have recently refined my personal approach to the Level 3 concept with the addition of the "shared understanding" requirement. It used to get me into lots of trouble because people who I thought were "enlightened" thought I was a pig (L1).

It turns out that in order to enjoy L3 communications, both (all) participants need to *understand clearly* that we are *all* at L3. Otherwise, the L3 behaviour can easily be mistaken for L1, since they tend to look the same.

Or to put it another way, without an understood shared context, you don't get the joke.

My basic trouble is that I create intimacy with new people relatively quickly through infrequent but intense conversations (often by IM or text). So I quickly slide from L2 to L3 when i get the sense that the other party would appreciate it.

I have realized that's not always the case, so I try to be at least observant of when this can occur, and have this little speech prepared.

I even have a little analogy. You want to hear it? Of course you do.

If you walked into a sushi restaurant and saw someone shoving rolls into his mouth with his hands, you might chalk him up to a L1 and move on, right?

But -- much like the story of the Earl of Sandwich -- , sushi was *invented* specifically by a chef so the diner could enjoy it with his hands, and *not* have to use chopsticks.

So while the L2 sushigoer might try to be "authentic" and eat with chopsticks -- as appropriate for all *other* Japanese food, the L3 (enlightened) eater would appropriately pick it up with bare hands.

So if I say to you:
"Hey baby, nice tits",

and you think I am a pig, please internally translate that to:

"Hello. I respect you as an individual with thoughts and feelings. I feel comfortable with you and my place in your life, so I extend to you a shared piece of understanding intended to enhance that intimacy. Let's together mock the cultural stereotypes requiring distorted and antiquated notions of proprietary while simultaneously allowing ourselves to share in the mutual enjoyment of your bodily aesthetic. "

Kewl?

Ok, I'm getting down off the agnostic fence. I am an atheist! Yay!

(That's Matthew McConaughey's line from the movie Contact, btw. Slightly misquoted.)

I don't know when I made the shift. I think I've spent the last several years softening my positions on things, thinking it would help people's overall perception of me. (I'll make another post about that, another time maybe.)

But since it hasn't done anything appreciable except make me feel icky about myself, I think I'm moving back to just being fucking clear about what I believe. Like it or not.

So goddamn it, I just don't believe. So there. Yes, yes, I know -- I'm going to go to some place hot and unpleasant where they torture you night and day. Like Guantanamo Bay.

(That was simultaneously more funny and off-color than I had intended. Huzzah!)

Anyway. Back to godlessness.

There just ain't one. I'm not interested in trying to convince you believers. I'm also not interested in your convincing me. Just deal with it.

Occam's Razor suggests that the need for gods was created by early people who couldn't explain the wacky stuff that the earth did, like rain or thunder, or plants growing, or why they starved sometimes and occasionally ate bad berries and died foaming at the mouth.

And it's also no stretch to see that clever people (probably greedy men) historically used religion as a way to maintain their power and satiate their greed by twisting people's nascent religious tendencies into self-serving procedures.

And finally, there's no trouble in seeing how a 21st-century populous could have trouble discarding hundreds of years of ritual as a simple fabrication. What riotous egotism would that require to so disregard years of tradition?

Um... when we built computers, millions of people abandoned the abacuses (abaci?) that had worked for literally thousands of years. It happens all the time.

So look, follow me on this. People believe in more-powerful beings for the following (pretty good) reasons:
1) Explain the unexplained (-able)
2) Ask for things otherwise unattained (-able)
3) Provide comfort in times of hardship or grief

[Note that -- in this entry -- I'm not actually talking about _organized religion_. People who run houses of worship do so for completely different reasons. (Probably much the same reasons that members of _organized crime_ tend to run casinos.) But I digress.]

Let's approach each of these systematically:

-=-=-

We now can explain what makes thunder. And we have a pretty good handle on which are the poisonous berries.

Do there exist unexplained phenomena? Sure. Do I think we'll explain all of them? Absolutely. In my lifetime? Probably not.

So (1) is out, for me.

As for (2), I believe in the basic philosophy of "do it your damn self". I'm a strong advocate of the human mind. I think we've only just barely touched on its potential. I think that if you believe you can do something truly within your capabilities, your mind is the thing that will make it happen for you.

What about people being suffused with "God's will" and the "power of faith". Bullshit. They got that will from themselves.

What would you rather believe?

-- That some super-being that you can't interact with in any way chose that moment to imbue some additional "super power" in you because your purpose somehow either suited theirs (or just plain amused them)?

or

-- That your human brain, through years of evolution, has all the power and will to accomplish truly anything you set out to do.

The only struggle people have with the latter view point, is of course, the correlary: that any failures are your own damn fault. People *love* to have a scapegoat. "God has forsaken me!" is almost as legion a wail as "KHAAAN!".

Honestly, the only point I can truly get behind is possibly (3). It sucks when people get hurt, sick, or die. It especially sucks when it happens to your family. Wanting comfort is a natural consequence of grief.

But really now. Are we such evolutionary children that we still have the need of a cosmic "lovey" to cuddle while we suck our collective thumbs?

What happens when you die is probably the single best reason that we have this need of a god. Think about it. If there's no god, there's probably no "afterlife". Which means there's no ever-present soul, or even a persistence of thought, feelings, emotion, or personality.

So what you've got is it. That meat that you're dragging around every day is your one chance to amuse yourself. Because when you die, you die dead. There ain't no you anymore.

Hasta la vista, baby.

[I suppose this diverges from the actual topic at hand, but the issue of godlessness and a persistent soul seem very tied up in the same mythology to me.]

I just also noticed that I erred earlier when I said I wasn't going to try to convince you. Sorry, my bad.

Anyway. Maybe if we could all cry a bit easier, and accept hugs and loves from your family and friends, you wouldn't have as much a need for god.

Oh, but you still wail "Why?!"

Because life is unpredictable. People are stupid. Accidents happen. And idiots leave manhole covers off the holes.

We *want* to blame. We blame the hammer when we hit ourselves on the thumb. It's not a lovey we need -- it's a scapegod.

-=-=-

So... I think I've covered these reasons pretty well. God is a myth created out of our own needs and insecurities, bolstered by those who stand to profit from it.

I'm sure I'll get lengthy treatises from other people noting how many different reasons I missed. Perhaps I'll update this post if I think of others as well.

But I just wanted to get my feelings straight.

I'm so bored, I'm updating my LJ, which I'm morally opposed to. So there. :P

In a distressing move to the right, LiveJournal has threatened to delete any accounts whose default icon contains images of infants breastfeeding. Despite protests and repeated appeals by members of numerous moms, supporters, and LiveJournal breastfeeding communities, LiveJournal staff continues to stay their course and insist that the pictures of child suckling "display an unobstructed view of the subject's breasts", violating their Terms of Service.

Angry moms have threatened to converge on the LiveJournal.com / SixApart, Ltd. offices wielding children and unobstructed breasts to hold a "nurse-in" -- an event bound to bring tourists, local media, and gawkers in equal number. All will be bearing cameras, one can be certain.

ProMoM, a website offering service and support to breastfeeding moms has responded with an automated form letter to use to spam LiveJournal management with righteous indignation with a minimum of mouse-clicks.

LiveJournal has reiterated their position, noting that they are a privately held company and don't seem to be subject to local, state, or federal law, additionally stating that "write-in campaigns are never effective in swaying the opinion of the Abuse Team or LiveJournal administrators".

Messages from LiveJournal staff are all in the same ominous tone, suggesting that bad things will happen if users don't comply: "If at that time, you have not made the change requested, your journal will be suspended." For many that spend countless hours using LiveJournal to document the trials and successes involved in their own breastfeeding experience, threats of suspended accounts and deleted blogs are serious indeed. Some have resorted to archiving their blogs offline, to ensure against LJ's potential action.

SixApart, Ltd. [located at 548 4th St in San Francisco, CA 94107 (415-344-0056)], LiveJournal's parent company, presumably is subject to California's legislation on breastfeeding in public. According to La Leche League's note of California law, "a mother may breastfeed her child in any location, public or private". Although LiveJournal isn't a "location" in the strictest sense of the law, it does tug at the fringes of the legal limbo in which most of the Internet finds itself. LiveJournal communities like Breastfeeding are fully accessible to any and all netziens who make their way to its pages. That's about as "public" as one can get in the ether.

Breastfeeding in public is legally protected in almost all of the 50 states and illegal in NONE of them. Why should images of a child suckling at the breast (even if it contains the nipple -- heaven forbid!) be banned? Why should the LiveJournal accounts of said mothers be subject to suspension, when the actual mother could be viewed, in person, in their full bare-breasted glory, fully legally? And -- most importantly -- why has LiveJournal management decided to focus its censorship on this small community of people working hard to raise healthy children?

Stolen from chattyv.