These are the old writings that I feel survived the test of time and deserve to be republished on the new site. Or at least they were close enough and were edited.

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Why Your Religion is Stupid And You Should Stop Believing in it Right Now and Do Everything I Say

(Or, a more pretentious title, “An application of the properties of omnipotence and omniscience in understanding the apathy of God.”): compliments of www.glasskite.com (March 14, 2002) Why did my little cousin die of a brain tumor? Why did my father slip and die on our living room stairs? Why did an earthquake kill my baby nephew? Questions like these are commonly referenced when atheists or agnostics try to justify their non-belief in the existence of God. The question, “Why do bad things happen to good people?” is centuries old. It is commonly perceived as the biggest obstacle in attaining faith. It’s fun to ask the questions like the above to Christians to see what they say. Unfortunately, most are not very well prepared to answer and will give you a response somewhere along the lines of, “we can’t know god’s will” or “all will be revealed when we die.” Though simple, these answers pretty much sum up the conclusion of the best that modern Christian philosophy has to offer. In the best selling apologetics book, ‘The Case for Faith’ by Lee Strobel, the famous Christian philosopher John Kreeft answers the question this way. “…imagine a bear in a trap and a hunter who, out of sympathy, wants to liberate him. He tries to win the bear’s confidence, but he can’t do it, so he has to shoot the bear full of drugs. The bear, however, thinks this is an attack and that the hunter is trying to kill him. He doesn’t realize that this is being done out of compassion.” “Then, in order to get the bear out of the trap the hunter has to push him further into the trap to release the tension on the springs. If the bear were semiconscious at that point, he would be even more convinced that the hunter was his enemy who was out to cause him suffering and pain. But the bear would be wrong. He reaches this incorrect conclusion because he is not a human being…I believe God does the same to us sometimes, and we cant comprehend why he does it anymore then the bear can understand the motivations of the hunter. As the bear could have trusted the hunter, so we could have trusted God.” In this little analogy, the hunter is of course a representation of God and the bear is us. Though the hunter was really helping the bear, the bear is a stupid animal and he did not realize this. From this we are to see that when God lets bad things happen to us, it is actually for our own good. So God really does love us and does not want to see us in pain. The pain we do suffer is necessary to achieve a desirable result of some kind. In the case of the bear, the result was freedom from the trap. In the case of human beings, the result may be preparation for eternal paradise. Well, it’s a cute story. But I think it’s a load of shit. When presented with this argument I’ve come up with a few things you can say in retort. Adding rude sarcasm and throwing your hands up in the air is optional. The Unlimited Resources Argument In this analogy, the hunter must push the bear “further into the trap to release the tension on the springs.” This causes the bear to suffer even more pain and increased fear. Now our hunter was forced to do this because he did not have at hand a better method to free the bear. God however, has access to unlimited resources. A more intelligent and better equipped hunter may have (for example) a pair of strong wire cutters at his disposal. He could have elected to release the trap tension by cutting the springs instead of the painful method used in the story. In other words, there are infinite ways to help someone. Why does God choose to use such archaic and painful methods if he has the ability to use painless ones? The Omnipotence and Omniscience of God Argument Omnipotence: Having unlimited or universal power, authority, or force; all-powerful. Omniscience: Having total knowledge; knowing everything: an omniscient deity; Most religions (including Christianity) have omniscience and omnipotent Gods. If God really does have infinite knowledge and power, then it seems like he should start using it to do some good. It’s easy to envision many ways in which this bear trap could have been removed without the use of pain. Here are a couple quick ones. God could have temporarily blocked the activation of the neurons traveling from the bear’s leg to the bear’s brain such that the bear did not experience pain in its leg during the trap removal process. God could have temporarily reconfigured the atomic configuration of the trap such that it was instantly turned into nice and soft Swiss cheese. God could have frozen time and removed the trap from the bear’s leg while the bear was in a state of temporal suspension. In other words, a being that has so much power and can relieve pain so easily, yet chooses not to, is just plain mean. The Imposed Limitation Upon Human Intelligence Argument In this analogy, the bear is unable to comprehend the actions of the hunter. Now the hunter could do nothing about the intelligence of the bear. But God could. According to Christianity, human intelligence was designed by God. Hence, if we cannot understand the actions of God, then whose fault is that? It is God who created the limitations of human understanding. If we get confused about the rational of a particularly painful situation, then this confusion is indeed a direct result of said limitation. In other words, if you choose to make stupid creatures, you can’t blame them (send them to hell) if they act stupid.

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A Practical Proof against God(s):

by dimmer (March 13, 2002) In this day and age there is no way to either prove god exists, or that god does not exist. However there is plenty of evidence that no god exists who interacts in our daily lives: Perhaps the most damning evidence against god is that if one does not believe in god, god ceases to be an influence in your life. Could it all just be in the believer's head? A statistical reason: Throughout history there have been millions of religions. Most (I'd guess) of which do not allow room for other religions to be correct. If any one of those religions is correct, the vast majority of people (Billions upon billions of people!) ever born have at best wasted their time, and at worst, are now in hell, hades, valhalla, whatever. With the above in mind, how do you know which religion is fake and which is real? Most religious people are sure they are right, yet they cannot all be. People from many religions have already done everything they could for that religion, including dying for it. Yet religions, like all things human, grow and die, wax and wane. If any monotheist religion is right, Christianity for example, god allows everything to happen that happens. Then God created suffering across the globe. If God loves you, why did he kill your puppy or mother with cancer? Christian apologists will answer that suffering is a result of humankind's freewill. But this is not true because suffering can be caused by all natural disasters, by animals, and by social circumstance. Also, God must have created people who do not believe in him. If God created a species that he knew would not believe in him, how could he damn them to hell? So, if like many religions say, god is all powerful, why the hell would god give a damn (npi) if you believed in him or not. If he is all powerful, he can do anything he wants. What does he need you for? Many theists try to answer these questions by quoting scriptures. All scriptures were written by men, so the scriptures as subject to error as man is. There are tons of inconsistencies in the Christian and Hebrew Bible. There are Christians bibles and books that were never included in the "new testament" - because the socio-political factions who wrote them were not down with El Pope. There is no evidence that any scriptures were actually divinely inspired. The works of L Ron Hubbard are no more factual than the Koran, the Hebrew Bible, or the Book of Mormon. In fact, there is evidence that points to the artificial nature of every holy book. Furthermore, the burden of proof is on the theists. You must have evidence to show that something exists, or else logically it does not. Christians will answer that you must have blind faith to believe. However, one can have faith in absolutely anything. I can have faith that my keyboard is a bear in disguise and might eat me. The problem being: no evidence supports that claim. Even if 3 billion other people believed that, it does not make it any closer to the truth. So how can you know that your faith is reality? You can never know by definition. You're better off believing no religious bullshit. Form your values and your belief systems on your own. Sure it's hard, but there are people out there who will help you. And in the end, you're the only one who can convince yourself of what's right and what's wrong. Stand on your own two mental feet, or stay out of the fastlane you handicapped motherfucker.

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Black and White

by dimmer (March 11, 2002) In youth and ignorance the world is black and white, The differences in the world are clear, Easy to distinguish as day and night, The rules and standards: universal for every here. As knowledge is gained and thought criticizes, Questions arise, occurrences don't fit the model, Life becomes complex for he who categorizes. Problems become acute for those who refuse to dawdle. A black and white for this; another for that, Upon scrutiny, even these obstinately do not obey, Another black for this; another white for that, Until everything becomes infinitely dense shades of grey.