Owner: Towards a Rational America URL:http://4enlightenment.blogspot.com Join Date: Mon, 04 Aug 2008 03:30:45 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: This blog discusses various topics from the perspective of a Jewish nontheist and takes the position that there is no evidence for the existence of a supreme being that directs our lives or the course of the universe. Site statistics:Click here
What's God Got To Do With It? Fallacies of Theistic Belief 2008-07-30 01:24:00 Last night, I happened to watch an episode of "Crossing Jordan" in which Jordan encounters what appears to be the resurrection of a man who Jordan, as a medical examiner, knew for certain had died. As the plot unfolds, Jordan gives the impression that she is an atheist or at least a skeptic, believing instead in the power of science to explain the apparently inexplicable. Using her forensic skills Read more:Fallacies
President Bush, the Constitution, and a Lesson from Lee Iacocca 2008-07-20 00:56:00 Countries with military commanders in chief who are not also the elected civilian heads of state are prone to coups and power grabs by army officers against the government. In the U.S., we are theoretically protected from from such takeovers. The President
is elected by the voters as the head of the executive branch of our government and is the leader of our armed forces as well.Yet since 9-11—a Read more:Constitution
, President Bush
A Nontheistic Perspective on Independence Day 2008-07-06 01:08:00 I happened to watch the coverage of the July 4 celebrations in the U.S. on CNN. For the first time in the almost-3 years that I've been residing in the Philippines, I found myself a bit nostalgic for these festivities. I guess that it's because I recently happened to read the full American Declaration of Independence
and grasped what a truly magnificent document it is both in style and substance, Read more:Independence Day
, Perspective
Take It Off 2008-06-11 01:33:00 I support Barack Obama's progressive and populist positions. If he is elected President and follows through on the policies outlined in the speech that he gave in early June, Change That Works for You, then maybe America can be saved from the economic and social ruin that we are now heading for thanks to the Bush and the rabid Republicans.However, as a Jew and a nontheist I am worried about other
Maybe We Had It Coming 2008-06-08 19:45:00 Americans have long held a misplaced sense of entitlement to cheap fossil fuels. Maybe
$4-5 per gallon is a long overdue wake up call for us to get off our collective asses, start conserving, and investing in mass transit as well as in alternative energy sources.What a sorry sight it was to see President Bush go begging hat in hand to the Saudis to give the U.S. a price break for crude (which, the
Onward Christian Soldiers—To the Right, March. 2008-05-29 21:31:00 I recently read of attempts by American soldiers stationed in Iraq to convert the Muslim locals to Christian
ity. Why am I not surprised at this turn of events. It was only a matter of time before this would happen. The U.S. military has already become a captive force of the American fundies, no doubt with the blessing of their Commander-in Chief, President Bush, who has dialogues with God and has Read more:March
, Onward
, Right
, Soldiers
Is the Secular Humanistic Movement Elitist? 2008-04-30 01:03:00 Secular humanism is based on such concepts as rational inquiry and attempts to understand the human condition unfettered by a reliance on a supreme being. So it's no wonder that this philosophy would have it's largest following among members of academia and other highly educated professionals.In turn, considering the correlation between education and income, it's no surprise that these individuals Read more:Secular
More on Bush's War Against Science 2008-04-25 01:35:00 The phrase "politically correct" was originally a label used by conservatives to derisively describe the euphemistic, "feel-good" terminology used by postmodernists who distort word and idea meanings in order to fit their relativistic ideology. But what if the shoe were on the other foot? In other words what if Republican government policy dictated that scientific findings must conform to right-wi Read more:Science
Real Estate Meltdown-When Bad Loans Happen to Good Borrowers 2008-03-20 22:07:00 The collapse of the real estate market has generated a lot of discussion from various pundits about personal responsibility. It has been said that many stranded homeowners especially in the sub-prime category contributed to their own financial woes by taking on a larger mortgage than they could afford, or by reckless borrowing against their equity. There is a lot of truth to this. I know that from Read more:Borrowers
, Estate
, Loans
, Meltdown
, Real Estate
Bush and The Rabid Republicans: Menace to America 2008-02-12 01:38:00 Hello and welcome to my blog.My wife and I retired and relocated to the Philippines, her native land, in August, 2005, and from the looks of things we couldn't have picked a better time to do so. Within this short period, it seems that America
's retreat from reason which began in the 1980's and has accelerated since 2000 has become even more pronounced in these few short years. President Bush (who Read more:Menace
, Republicans
There's Something Happening Here 2008-08-26 02:06:00 Some events that have unfolded recently have made it possible for even an old skeptical curmudgeon like me to feel some hope for our country's future and to consider the possibility that the grip on American culture by the rabid Republicans and their ilk may be weakening.For example, according to a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center, slightly more than 50% of Americans do not want to mix re Read more:Happening
Existence—What a Concept! 2008-09-10 02:27:00 With the imminent activation of the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland which will try to replicate conditions of the universe immediately following the Big Bang, we stand on the threshold of a breakthrough in our understanding of the universe. This new knowledge will likely lead to an enhanced perspective—possibly even a rewriting of the laws of physics as science now understands them.
Yet Read more:Concept
, Existence
The Other Culprits Behind the American Economic Meltdown 2008-10-06 01:34:00 The 7 billion-dollar Wall Street bailout has riled many American
s, and rightfully so. If there had been genuine benefits in that agreement for the middle and working classes to equal those for the wealthy and businesses that greedily fed at the hog trough of deregulation, it might be easier for us to swallow the bitter pill that President Bush is ramming down our throats. But as usual, what we Read more:Economic
, Meltdown
In Remembrance of President Kennedy 2008-11-23 01:06:00 It's hard to believe that 45 years have passed since PresidentKennedy
was assasinated. November 22 (which was November 23 here in the Philippines) is a day that those of us who were at least old enough to understand the world around them will not forget.
It seems that in the last several years, much of what we have heard is the dark side of his personal life. But his flaws do not change the Read more:Remembrance
A Step Forward For American Atheists? 2008-11-09 03:12:00 To put it mildly, I am over the moon that Barack Obama will be our next president and Joseph Biden our next vice-president, not only because their progressive positions defeated that angry old man McCain and his looney-tunes running mate Palin, but in doing so Obama has also placed the rabid Republicans in disarray—at least for the time being.
Moreover, Obama's win as a black man represents a Read more:American
, Atheists
, Forward
Pastor Warren: The Best Reason for a Prayer-Free Inauguration 2009-01-05 00:28:00 Even though I stand by my position that the election of Barack Obama as America's first African-American President represents a breakthrough from which atheists also may one day benefit, (see my Nov. 9 post "A Step Forward For American Atheists?") I am disappointed that he chose Pastor
Rick Warren
, a homophobic Christian fundamentalist preacher, to deliver the invocation at Obama's inaug Read more:Reason
, Prayer
, Inauguration
The Fixed Income Myth 2009-01-01 22:21:00 When I worked as a bill collector, a common excuse among senior citizens for their inability to make their payments is that they were having a hard time due to being on a "fixed income", usually social security. At the time I didn't understand the significance of that phrase, but I suspected it was a bogus alibi.
Now that my wife and I are retired and are the ones collecting social secu Read more:Fixed
, Income
The Absurdities of Christmas 2008-12-22 21:06:00 I'm hardly the first free thinker, and I certainly won't be the last to note how gullible religious believers are in America, especially during the Christmas
season. Yet it just never ceases to astound me how even intelligent people can give credence or even lip-service acknowledgment to such notions as virgin birth (a de-evolution to asexual reproduction) and the star of Bethlehem (the reduction
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