god doesn't exist, get over it

theonlybigboss at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUew-e9ntiA

God is Imaginary

God is Imaginary is a set of exercises. See also GIIVideos.

Motto Madness

I received the following email From: Dr. Walter Jones eCampaign@gop.com
Subject: In God We Trust
Date: July 29, 2006 10:30:13 AM EDT

Dear Thomas,

On Friday, President George W. Bush officially proclaimed July 30, 2006, as the 50th anniversary of the national motto of the United States, "In God We Trust".

Mr. Bush succinctly chronicled the motto's history from its original wording in Francis Scott Key's poem (which later became our National Anthem)--"And this be our motto: 'In God is our trust!'" during the War of 1812--to its establishment as our national motto by President Dwight D. Eisenhower on July 30, 1956.

In commemorating this day and "recognizing the blessings of the Creator," the President encouraged all Americans to "offer our thanks for God's great gift of liberty" and to "observe this day with appropriate programs, ceremonies, and activities."

For the full text of the President's proclamation honoring our national motto, "In God We Trust", click here.

Take Action. Forward this proclamation to 5 friends.

Sincerely,

Dr. Walter Jones
Director of Conservative Development

It's officially at the White House:

50th Anniversary of Our National Motto, "In God We Trust," 2006 A Proclamation by the President of the United States of America

On the 50th anniversary of our national motto, "In God We Trust," we reflect on these words that guide millions of Americans, recognize the blessings of the Creator, and offer our thanks for His great gift of liberty.

From its earliest days, the United States has been a Nation of faith. During the War of 1812, as the morning light revealed that the battle torn American flag still flew above Fort McHenry, Francis Scott Key penned, "And this be our motto: 'In God is our trust!'" His poem became our National Anthem, reminding generations of Americans to "Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation." On July 30, 1956, President Dwight Eisenhower signed the law officially establishing "In God We Trust" as our national motto.

Today, our country stands strong as a beacon of religious freedom. Our citizens, whatever their faith or background, worship freely and millions answer the universal call to love their neighbor and serve a cause greater than self.

As we commemorate the 50th anniversary of our national motto and remember with thanksgiving God's mercies throughout our history, we recognize a divine plan that stands above all human plans and continue to seek His will.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, GEORGE W. BUSH, President of the United States of America, do hereby proclaim July 30, 2006, as the 50th Anniversary of our National Motto, "In God We Trust." I call upon the people of the United States to observe this day with appropriate programs, ceremonies, and activities.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-seventh day of July, in the year of our Lord two thousand six, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and thirty-first.

GEORGE W. BUSH

Aside from being an incredible waste of time, this is a clear violation of the constitutional separation of church and state. It brings us one step closer to a theocracy. I suggest that everyone who objects to the proclamation to write to Jones.

"Why do nonbelievers seem to be threatened by the idea of God?"

Rabbi Marc Gellman asks "Why do nonbelievers seem to be threatened by the idea of God?"

First, we are not threatened by the idea of gods anymore than we (and presumably you) feel threatened by the idea of the easter bunny. Neither exist except in people's stories. We feel threatened by the things people DO in the name of gods such as fly airplanes into buildings, crusading around and killng thousands while torturing others and building big walls to exclude other peoples. I hope you recognize which religious groups of people were responsible for these atrocities. Don't forget that slavery is condoned by the bible. One can read the religious books to support any position that is politically expedient - and people do and then they kill their neighbors. Doesn't that tragedy make you angry?

There just isn't any evidence for gods. I'm a scientist and, although we do not know everything (otherwise I'd be out of a job!), it is clear that we already know enough to exclude god from all the traditional places such as the formation of the sun, earth and yes, formation of all living things all the way down to the deepests molecular levels.

Given that it is clear that there is no purpose, we must wake up and take responsibility for ourselves and our planet. Camu's idea was as wrong as thinking that there is a purpose given by a god. Have you ever asked someone what they think god's purpose is? They invariable say they don't know. This is the most important thing that god does for people, give them purpose, and they don't know what the purpose is!

So we must chose our purposes and take responsibility for everything that happens.

There is nobody guiding what happens. The recent tsunami and Katrina have dispelled that myth. If there is a god then it is really a horribly mean creature to have done those things. But we understand the physics behind waves and winds and we had better recognize that the winds will get worse if we keep on driving our cars without figuring a way to reduce their emissions. We are responsible! So an atheist gets angry because people are not taking proper responsibility for what is happening on the planet and we identify the problem as religion and beliefs in fairy tales about gods. The sooner we get rid of those primitive ways of thinking, the sooner we can get on with figuring out how to live sustainably on the planet.

We get angry when we think about the phrase "be fruitful and multiply" and hear about people with 23 kids. We know that no gods will rescue us when our population hits the limits of the planet. We recognize that there is a finite amount of oil and we WILL RUN OUT. Whether it is the peak last year (as predicted) or 10 years from now does not matter - we WILL RUN OUT and belief that some mythical creature will save us does nothing but make the situation far worse because we waste our time. People are sitting around thinking that god will take care of everything while we calmly go over the cliff.

What's not to get angry about? A vast majority of problems on the planet are caused by a belief in gods!

Listen to this: Letting Go Of God by Julia Sweeney

There is still hope for you: let go of god and become a responsible person.

Cargo Cults

Cargo Cults are religions on Pacific islands that started when Americans built air strips and landed cargo planes there during World War II. After the Americans left, the natives assumed that if one built things that look like air strips, more cargo would arrive. They have been doing this for the past 50 years. An article in the Smithsonian (Paul Raffaele, Feb 2006, 70-77) and one in the Washington Post (Peter Carlson, Tuesday, January 31, 2006; C02) describes The John Frum religion. Even the famous physicist Richard Feynman wrote about Cargo Cult science.

It is odd to see an American flag venerated as a religious symbol, along with red tipped fake bamboo "rifles".

What's the difference between this so-called 'cult' and other religions? None. One might argue that cargo cults haven't been around too long, but it's been many years. Raffaele asked Chief Isaac "John promised you much cargo more than 60 years ago, and none has come, so why do you keep faith with him? Why do you still believe in him?" Chief Isaac responded "You Christians have been waiting 2,000 years for Jesus to return to earth, and you haven't given up hope."

Have you ever heard of a religion that makes an instrument of horrible torture and death its primary symbol? Can you imagine that this symbol becomes so venerated that it comes to represent life itself?

CNN (April 9, 2006) reports that Pope Benedict as saying "But Palm Sunday tells us that ... it is the cross that is the true tree of life."

Objectively the only difference between a 'Cargo Cult' and a mainstream religion is size and acceptance.

sanctity unveiled

We now know exactly what the 'sanctity of life' means.

Today CNN reports that Clarence Ray Allen was intentionally killed by the state of California.

Allen had asked not to be resuscitated if he had a cardiac arrest before being executed but prison officials would have refused to honor this.

Prison spokesperson Vernell Crittendon said "At no point are we not going to value the sanctity of life. We would resuscitate him." After that they would execute him.

Of course that's completely illogical - he would die either way. In one case it would be natural and in the other case it would be state supported murder.

In other words, the 'sanctity of life' is not, as religious folk would have you think, that life is precious and sacred. Rather, they mean that they have the right to chose how someone dies on their own terms. The inquisition showed this quite clearly, where their terms meant horrible torture.

It is ironic because a heart attack is considered by religious people an act of 'god'. That is, most of the time 'god' is supposed to take care of the matter of when someone dies. Here these people have done the killing themselves, an act that only 'god' is supposed to do.

This killing, in direct violation of the highest religious directive 'thou shalt not kill', must have been fully supported by the churches and their members because there were no reports of crowds of church goers at the prison in protest.

Religious people protest, harass and kill in the name of a single cell (abortion), but when 100 trillion cells are intentionally destroyed (execution) they are totally silent.

That makes all the church goers within traveling distance from San Quentin the deepest of hypocrites.

But you and they knew that already. Religions have taught most people not to be honest about what is really going on.

Sanctity, smhanktity, the real issue is that religious people are dishonest with themselves and everyone else.

Lying UNDER OATH for the 'Truth' in Dover

The Kitzmiller Decision (also available from CNN) is the 2005 Dec 20 ruling by John E. Jones III, United States District Judge, Case No. 04cv2688 TAMMY KITZMILLER, et al. v. DOVER AREA SCHOOL DISTRICT, et al.,

Among several direct statements that religious members of the Dover school board lied under oath, on page 115 we find:

As we will discuss in more detail below, the inescapable truth is that both Bonsell and Buckingham lied at their January 3, 2005 depositions about their knowledge of the source of the donation for Pandas, which likely contributed to Plaintiffs's election not to seek a temporary restraining order at that time based upon a conflicting and incomplete factual record. This mendacity was a clear and deliberate attempt to hide the source of the donations by the Board President and the Chair of the Curriculum Committee to further ensure that Dover students received a creationist alternative to Darwin's theory of evolution. We are accordingly presented with further compelling evidence that Bonsell and Buckingham sought to conceal the blatantly religious purpose behind the ID Policy

Stunning. I have known that religious people are dishonest and that they will lie for what they consider the 'truth' but I never imagined that they would commit perjury!

The board members railroaded the teachers by refusing to accept the standard biology textbook they needed unless the teachers accepted the creationist text Pandas for teaching and yet Judge Jones reports that

Furthermore, Board members somewhat candidly conceded that they lacked sufficient background in science to evaluate ID, and several of them testified with equal frankness that they failed to understand the substance of the curriculum change adopted on October 18, 2004. ... In fact, one unfortunate theme in this case is the striking ignorance concerning the concept of ID amongst Board members. Conspicuously, Board members who voted for the curriculum change testified at trial that they had utterly no grasp of ID. ... Board members ... admittedly had no comprehension whatsoever of ID.

(page 121) These people didn't know any science and they were forcing their religion on others.

Jones states that the Defendants created a "sham" and gave "repetitious, untruthful testimony" (page 130-132). "Defendants' previously referenced flagrant and insulting falsehoods to the Court provide sufficient and compelling evidence for us to deduce that any allegedly secular purposes that have been offered in support of the ID Policy are equally insincere." (page 132). "It is ironic that several of these individuals, who so staunchly and proudly touted their religious convictions in public, would time and again lie to cover their tracks and disguise the real purpose behind the ID Policy." (page 137) "The breathtaking inanity of the Board's decision is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has now been fully revealed through this trial." (p. 138)

Before you debate about creationism and Intelligent Design I strongly recommend that you read the ruling.

"Rapture": Utter stupidity founded on nonsense

Rapture Letters claims that suddenly, soon, all the people who believe in (their flavor of) "god" will die and those who don't believe in their flavor of "god" will remain. The silly part is that many people are looking forward to being killed by their "god"!

It would be laughable but for the fact that 40% of the people in the USA have this delusion.

So the Rapture Letters web site is devoted to sending letters to the sane people who don't believe in god(s) after this supposed mass murder has occured. The example letter includes a magic incantation which if uttered by a survivor will supposedly cause them to die instantly too.

Could anything be more insane?

The God Who Wasn't There

www.thegodmovie.com