Mr. Deity and the Naughty Bits

Another hilarious episode of Mr Deity.

More videos on their channel if you're interested.

Catholic Church trafficking babies in Spain

The headline says it all and it reads: 300,000 babies stolen from their parents - and sold for adoption: Haunting BBC documentary exposes 50-year scandal of baby trafficking by the Catholic church in Spain

I don't have a lot to comment on this. On some level, it's almost expected.

Spreading AIDS in Africa. Child rape and cover-up. And now, there's baby trafficking on the list of shit that the Catholic Church peddle. Granted it's just the Catholic Church in Spain and not the Pope's Vatican, the atrocity is still substantially religiously motivated and facilitated.

This is yet another example of how organized religion can conduct immoral actions with efficiency through its organized structure and be cloaked by inculcating a false veil of moral superiority.

Tracie Harris awesomeness

One of those informative episodes of the Atheist Experience with co-host Tracie Harris.

"Well, it's not all bad!"

 "Why do you atheists always talk about bad things that come from religion? Why don't you ever talk about the good works like feeding the poor and building hospitals, etc?"

"Well, religion is not all bad! Look at all the good things that come from religion like charity and love and etc..."

This one type of defense of religion that I find not only weak but, frankly misses the point.

Firstly, it is basically arguing for the usefulness of religion not for its truth which seems odd when we're arguing about whether a god really exist. But we'll leave that aside since this post is coming from another angle.

"Religion does good too!" sounds almost reasonable, ie not reasonable.

You mean aside from stifling science and education, obstructing justice, denying LGBT rights and perpetuating a general contempt of humanity among other historical atrocities, religions also does charity and some good works? Wow, who knew? /sarcasm.

Put it this way: Say there's a rich guy who love his wife and kids. He is rich and successful businessman who provides welfare for his workers and donates to large sums of money to charity monthly. Every fortnight, he kills a family and rape the kids. But look at all the good things he does!

No. He's a psychopath and needs to be locked up. Same with religion.

What makes the defense even more worthless is the fact that ALL the good works religion does can be and (hopefully) will be done, if not superseded, by secular means. That means we can have all the good without the bad -- religion can and should go.

Atheism is not the system

Atheism is frequently thought to be a belief system or a religion by religious people. Sometimes, atheists ourselves use the word in such a way that it would be misunderstood as such.

There is a thought process, but it's not atheism, it's skepticism coupled with the scientific method. Atheism, a singular position on a single claim, cannot be a system -- it is a conclusion.

There is no doctrine of Atheism that call upon all atheists to reject/deny god(s). There is a preponderance of the evidence of available that led to the conclusion that is atheism. There is no pope of Atheism who dictates that science is the truth. There is a recognition that the Scientific Method is the single most reliable method to get humanity as close to the truth as possible.

So perhaps, skepticism might be a more accurate label for the "belief system" than atheism?

Discarding theology

Why do atheists typically ignore "sophisticated" modern theology? Simple. The answer is embodied by the Courtier's Reply made by PZ Myers in response to critics of Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion:

I have considered the impudent accusations of Mr Dawkins with exasperation at his lack of serious scholarship. He has apparently not read the detailed discourses of Count Roderigo of Seville on the exquisite and exotic leathers of the Emperor's boots, nor does he give a moment's consideration to Bellini's masterwork, On the Luminescence of the Emperor's Feathered Hat. We have entire schools dedicated to writing learned treatises on the beauty of the Emperor's raiment, and every major newspaper runs a section dedicated to imperial fashion; Dawkins cavalierly dismisses them all. He even laughs at the highly popular and most persuasive arguments of his fellow countryman, Lord D. T. Mawkscribbler, who famously pointed out that the Emperor would not wear common cotton, nor uncomfortable polyester, but must, I say must, wear undergarments of the finest silk. Dawkins arrogantly ignores all these deep philosophical ponderings to crudely accuse the Emperor of nudity.

Simply put, theology is not based on reality.

The Scientific Method is applicable to ANY area of knowledge of reality. What we typically call Science is the different branches of physics, chemistry and biology. But the method is also applied to other areas of knowledge including history and linguistics.

In fact, you use a less rigorous form of the method in your life. When your computer power off suddenly, you hypothesize that there is a blackout or that some hardware in the computer fried. You notice that other electrical appliances in your home is still powered thus ruling out the hypothesis of a blackout and you go on checking other things, so on and so forth.

Theology is basically the study of god. But the thing is, theology does not provide evidence of god's existence. It sometimes tries to prove god through pure logic (ie, armchair philosophy) if not ignoring the issue completely and jumps straight into sophistry about god presuming its existence.

I'm sorry. How is that not nonsense?

Theology is like Germ theory where viruses and bacteria don't exist. Theology is like Paleontology where bones never fossilize. Theology is like Chemistry in a universe where only hydrogen exist forever unchanged.

Dismissing claims for which there is no evidence for is not a "science". It's basic skepticism.

The same point is previously discussed in: Justifications and Beliefs

Do realize that atheists (at least those who have been called "New Atheists") are skeptics first, atheist in conclusion. We are not hostile to religion because of some Atheist doctrine. We are atheists because we were first skeptical of religious claims.

The Non-Explanation

Here's a new video by DarkMatter2525:

Conditioned to believe that basically everything is in accordance to God's plans, religious people rationalize any and every outcome in a strange twisted way. Since God is defined to be always right, no matter the situation, God is "good" irrespective of the situation, be it an accident or a natural disaster.

It's fucking nuts.