Carnival of the Godless XIII

Some of you are at Mass, others merely attending a "church service", and still yet others, eschewing organized religion, are worshipping in "your own way".  As for the rest of you (pardon me for not paying homage to any other religion that values this particular revolution of the earth over the rest), it matters not to me how your time is spent, for you cannot stop! the 13th Carnival of the Godless.  I think you'll appreciate this set of bloggers.  Out of the numerous submissions received, I've selected eight posts for your perusal.

Apropos this introduction, we begin with Tim Dunlop of The Road to Surfdom, who offers an intelligent and concise narrative of his experience of and withdrawing from organized religion.  For some atheists and agnostics, this pitiable vignette will be all too disconcerting and familiar.

Next, at Agitprop, several highly entertaining news articles revealing the fascist tendences of certain Christian sects are canvassed.  Religion need not, but too often does, suppress rational thought.  The various instances cited here will disgust you.

As we continue, Vjack offers his three reasons, at Atheist Revolution, for despising the display of religious iconography the somewhat backwards State of Mississippi is subjecting him to with the passage of a new law permitting Christians to impose their version of religion on the rest of the populace.  I suppose, however, that there aren't too many non-Christians, proportionally speaking, in Mississippi.  At least not too many (proportionately, of course) are being discriminated against?

Richard Chappell (Philosophy, et cetera) offers a brief argument to the conclusion that Christianity is false.  The post is short, but the comments continue the discussion.  The offering of concise arguments in premise-conclusion form, as Richard has here done, is a paradigmatic example of how modern analytic philosophy should proceed.  While I don't think his argument tells against many of the more academic formulations of Christian doctrine, it may be worthwhile to consider in some modified forms.  For a similar argument that appeals to concerns of vagueness, I recommend Ted Sider's paper entitled "Hell and Vagueness".  (The same academic forms of Christian religion are also immune to the force of Sider's argument.)

At his Daily Kos diary, Peter Fredson discusses the phenomenon of ever-present gullibility.  This post has bearing upon religion only in so far as it criticizes those whose belief in some religion or its tenets involves "blind acceptance".  The generalization that true belief involves blind acceptance, however, is unwarranted.  While the post should be taken with a grain of salt, a sufficient number of examples of widespread gullibility are adduced to make it worthy of persual.

Jack, of the aptly named blog Jack*, tackles an existentialist argument against materialism.  The post appears to address two arguments, but the first objection against materialism hinted at, though put off for later discussion, is likely not an objection a philosopher would seriously recognize.  There are, after all, reasons to believe (i.e., that could be taken as evidence for) that more than one sort of fundamental substance exists, pace the suggestion to the contrary.  Descartes was forced to ontological dualism through both religious and epistemological considerations (i.e., the real distinction argument), many metaphysicians take subject predicate discourse and abstract reference as evidence for the existence of non-physical entities which can be predicated of many, and sense data theorists may find psycho-physical dualism attractive as well, to name a few examples.  Yet the ensuing discussion of the alleged hopelessness, despair, and angst so often presumed the unavoidable fate of the atheist or materialist (Jack's recognition that materialism entails atheism, but not vice versa, is pleasing) raises the important question of whether or not one is entitled to the violation of epistemic duties (rationality, proportioning degree of belief to the degree of evidence, attempting to believe relevant truths and avoid relevant falsehoods, etc...) in the service of pursuing happiness, as well as whether or not this is necessary for the same.

Ben, author of the blog On Existence, writes an essay which takes on far too much, consequently resulting in the address of each of the raised points with too much haste and too little rigour.  For example, it is not at all clear that an appeal to the weak anthropic principle counts as a suitable or satisfying response to the argument from fine-tuning.  This argument cannot be dismissed merely by invoking a trivial theorem of probability theory, namely that the probability of x given x is one.  Nevertheless, the essay is a good introduction to some common arguments and the usual sorts of responses they receive, and, given the young age of its author (sixteen), it should be considered a remarkable achievement.  I hope it will inspire those of us with more years and education to more habitual study.  Ben deserves props.

Finally, Mark Rayner, of The Skwib, compares some citizens of the fine state of Kansas to their monkey ancestors.  This post provides a light-note on which to end the Carnival, and it also permits me to mention Louie, the skateboarding chimpanzee that can catch mad air (forgive me if that last locution is totally not hip or skater-esque).

I hope you've enjoyed the 13th Carnival of the Godless.  If your submission did not make this Carnival, please do not become disheartened!  In keeping with the general point and purpose of this blog, I have by and large attempted to limit the offerings to some of the more philosophical posts.  The short commentary provided is my own, and the authors of the respective posts may well disagree.  If these posts provoke your thought without offending, I will consider my goal satisfied.  And thanks for your persual!  The next COTG will be held at Deanpence, two weeks from today (May 29, 2005).  We look forward to your submissions!

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