thoughtful ideas on life's big questions
I think about belief, and the reasons I believe, quite a lot. And I sometimes ponder, if I cut it down to just one reason, what would it be? What is it that I just can’t go past? I don’t think I really can simplify it like that, but if I could, this would maybe […]
I came across it yesterday, not for the first time, but maybe the 21st. Quoted as if it was significant and telling. You have almost certainly seen it too. I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other […]
It is commonly stated that science and religion are irreconcilably opposed. A recent article by atheist author Sam Harris cranks the argument up a notch by declaring Science Must Destroy Religion. To be fair, I think he means “science will inevitably destroy religion”, not the rather more alarming “science has a moral duty to destroy […]
I suppose most of us have looked up at the night sky and wondered at some time – is there any other life out there? Another way of framing the question is to ask – is the earth unusual in supporting (supposedly) intelligent life? I have investigated this question in the past (see A rare […]
Last post I offered some thoughts on faith, based on Peter Boghossian’s idea that faith is “pretending to know things you don’t know”. I suggested that he was mistaken in what many christians think about faith. So, do atheists think very differently to christians on this?
Last post I discussed philosopher and educator Peter Boghossian’s ‘crusade’ to help atheists wean christians off their dependence on faith. But is Boghossian’s understanding of faith correct? What do christians mean when they use this word?
You may not have heard of Peter Boghossian. But one thoughtful christian blogger (Tom Gilson at Thinking Christian) thinks he’s a “dangerous man” and wonders whether his 2013 book (A Manual for Creating Atheists) might be seen as “a turning point in the decline of Christianity in the West”. Perhaps Tom has been a bit […]
We all like to think that we base our views on evidence, but sometimes evidence gets in the way of a good argument. Here are 8 good ways to avoid evidence (with examples).
We human beings are aware of ourselves in ways that robots and computers are not, we can think in ways they cannot, and we firmly believe some things are truly right or wrong. Granted humans have evolved by natural selection, science finds it difficult to produce an explanation of these facts – how does a […]
Benjamin Corey’s Formerly Fundie blog is one I read regularly. Benjamin mostly writes, from a slightly radical perspective, about christianity and church in America. But his latest blog (Why I Just Couldn’t Be An Atheist, Even If I Wanted To) discussed how he and an atheist friend sometimes discuss their respective beliefs.