Godless Business

Atheists – An Increasingly Outspoken Minority

  • http://au.youtube.com/user/askegg askegg

    “Jewish Humanist”?   WTF?  How can you be Jewish and not believe in a god?

  • http://evilpoet-lostinthought.blogspot.com/ EvilPoet

    How? Like this.

  • http://au.youtube.com/user/askegg askegg

    Ahh, so they are using the term “Jewish” as one might use the term “American” or “Australian”.

    I have always found this slightly odd.  The Jewish people are not a race, or a country – it is a religious group.  To call yourself “Jewish” (to me) means you affiliate yourself with this religion and its heritage.

    To draw a parallel, a “Jewish Humanist” is like calling myself a “Christian Atheist”.  It just doesn’t make sense.

  • http://evilpoet-lostinthought.blogspot.com/ EvilPoet

    Sure it makes sense – lots of it. If you spell it like this cents and look at it from a business stand point.  ;-)

    It brings to mind this quote by Lazarus Long: “The most preposterous notion that H. sapiens has ever dreamed up is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of all the Universe, wants the saccharine adoration of His creatures, can be swayed by their prayers, and becomes petulant if He does not receive this flattery. Yet this absurd fantasy, without a shred of evidence to bolster it, pays all the expences of the oldest, largest, and least productive industry in all history.”

  • http://au.youtube.com/user/askegg askegg

    …and boom!
    That becomes the newest quote on this site :)

  • http://evilpoet-lostinthought.blogspot.com/ EvilPoet

    Cool. :-D

  • hand

    “how can an atheist lead a good and moral life without god?”
    well, for one, I didn’t kill anyone yet, and how many of so called peace loving christians did?
    or is it ok cause they will talk to some priest in jail and will be forgiven..
    I’m not judging all those people based on actions of few, but really if you ask that question having criminals among your group theres something wrong going on..

Subscribe to the Podcast

44 – An Atheist Temple

BBC News – Row over Indonesia atheist Facebook post Priority is to protect marriage | Herald Sun No Fetus Can Feed Us | Unreasonable Faith Alain de Botton: Atheism 2.0 | Video on TED.com

Standard Podcast [ 1:44:50 ] Play Now | Download

Further Reading

Persecuting Christians

The other day while discussing the merits of nutrition based treatments for the prevention and treatment of cancer, a good friend of mine accused me of “persecuting Christians”.  The comment may have been fired without much thought in the heat of battle, but it has stuck with me for a few days.  Do I really…
Continue reading

Dog Heads

The excellent British broadcaster BBC 4 recently aired a fascinating program called “The Medieval Mind” which explores the philosophy, theology, and predominate thinking of the dark ages.  The first episode deals with knowledge and revealed numerous intriguing insights into how the medieval mind determined epistemological truths. Monks, priests, and other godly people were in possession…
Continue reading

Matt’s Human Morality

Matt Dillhunty (president of the Atheist Community of Austin, co-host of “Non-Prophets Radio“, and “The Atheist Experience”) recently debated Father Hans Jacobse (an Antiochian Orthodox Priest) at The University of Maryland on 16th November.  Full video of the event can be found here (although only 6 of the 9 videos have been posted online as…
Continue reading

The perfect God

I want a god whose ultimate goals which do not necessitate the creation of mysterious suffering and death. I want a god who doesn’t violate causation by causing things to begin to exist from nothing in the absence of time. I want a god who does not give us “free will” then punishes us for…
Continue reading

Atheism 2.0

“Atheism 2.0” is a 20 minute TED presentation by Alain de Botton in which he proposes a new approach to evangelising atheism. Alain suggests (apparently without evidence) that we have “secularised badly” and we should sift through the rituals, traditions, and behaviours of religion to identify and adopt their efficient mechanisms. “I have come here…
Continue reading

The Bizarre Bible

Atheists are often told by believers to read the Bible and it will all become clear.  Trouble is, many of us have tried that and it doesn’t seem to have helped.  Take these verses for example: This does not sound like a great night out to me. “But Rabshakeh said unto them, Hath my master…
Continue reading