Author Archive

What the Higgs boson shows about rationality

Jul 04, 2012 1 Comment by

A new particle has been discovered, almost certainly the Higgs boson first predicted 48 years ago. If so, then at last the final prediction of the Standard Model has been confirmed. To be sure, there are many questions still to answer, such as how real physics deviates from the Standard Model at very high energies, [...]

Articles, Biology, Neurology, and Medicine, Logic, Mathematics, News, Philosophy, Physics and Cosmology, Religions and other Belief Systems, Sciences, World Read more

Consider Easter

Apr 08, 2012 1 Comment by

Critics of Christianity are often well-aware some of its festivals are stolen. The most famous example is that the Northern Hemisphere’s celebrations of the December Solstice, in which days finally get longer again, began as an agricultural festival. The Ancient Egyptians, recognizing the role of the Sun in this occasion, quickly co-opted it for their [...]

Articles, Catholicism, Christianity, Humanities, Humour, News, Religions and other Belief Systems, Sciences, Statements and Analysis, World Read more

If only religious apologists understood statistics…

Apr 06, 2012 Comments Off by

The last time I uploaded many articles in quick succession, I had just returned from on the all-inclusive holiday with my parents in Spain during which I authored said articles. My return to writing for this site after a long recess also involves authorship during such a holiday. This is what is often called a [...]

Articles, Biology, Neurology, and Medicine, Logic, Mathematics, Philosophy, Religions and other Belief Systems, Sciences, Statements and Analysis Read more

Something from nothing

Apr 05, 2012 Comments Off by

I haven’t written anything for this site in a few months because my efforts to secure a funded PhD place in the competitive field of quantum gravity have taken up all of my time. Now I’ve been granted such a place in York, I can return to writing here. What makes quantum gravity such a [...]

Articles, People, Physics and Cosmology, Religions and other Belief Systems, Richard Dawkins, Sciences Read more

RIP Christopher Hitchens

Dec 16, 2011 Comments Off

People are sometimes asked where they were when a tragic event happened or when they first heard of it. The answers are often pretty unimpressive (e.g. I learned of the 9/11 attacks when I met someone off a bus coming home from school). In my opinion, the best way to learn of them is in [...]

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On miracles: how religious people don’t understand their own concept

Nov 22, 2011 Comments Off

In September 2011 neutrinos were apparently spotted exceeding the speed of light. This week we received confirmation a second experiment had apparently spotted the same thing. We’re far from having enough evidence to confidently say whether or not neutrinos really have broken the light speed limit, though physicists highly doubt they have because so much [...]

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Religion and morality, and why we need to seriously rethink it

Nov 06, 2011 Comments Off

For centuries British monarchs have been required to be Church of England members and have been barred from marrying Catholics and, in particular, those married to Catholics have been barred from the throne. Needless to say, this was unethical. Recently a Commonwealth Summit in Perth led to the repeal of this rule, as well as [...]

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Tunisia update

Nov 06, 2011 Comments Off

In a previous post, “A bad omen”, I critiqued the theological start the “liberated” Libya is getting and noted we’d no way of telling what consequences the Tunisian elections shortly thereafter would have. We now know that outcome. While an Islamist party secured over 40% of votes (whether their government will be a coalition as [...]

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“Spiritual health” (whatever that is)

Nov 03, 2011 Comments Off

Archbishop Sentamu has suggested in the House of Lords the NHS cater to “spiritual health”. This concept does not originate with Sentamu, and has been brought up in American and British medical and military contexts frequently in recent years. While one would hope the NHS would limit its treatments and list of properties considered unhealthy [...]

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More on anti–atheist bigotry

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

I realise I’ve said a lot recently about anti–atheist bigotry, but there’s one other point I think it worth making about it. Association with atheism is so toxic in some regions attempts to avoid it enhance other forms of bigotry. In recent years a US high school refusing to allow same–sex couples to its prom [...]

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Two new series of posts, on religions’ faults and student atheist et al societies

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

I hereby announce two new series of posts I will be making in the near future. In one, “Faiths in the Firing Squad”, I will go through the world’s extant religions in descending order by size, explaining succinctly (but hopefully without unduly simplifying the issues) why there is more to be critically said about those [...]

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What theists and atheists have in common, even where different types of theists don’t

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

In a previous post I explained ways in which those who seek to exemplify religious tolerance are often still guilty of anti–atheist bigotry. Therein I gave an example of a reason moderates may feel they have more in common with religious extremists than they do with atheists; at least the religious extremists are religious. Anyone [...]

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The stealth bigotry of “religious tolerance”

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

For centuries people have held prejudices against and discriminated against those of other religions or other sects in the same religion. Extremists, fundamentalists, literalists – call them what you will (these terms are not quite synonymous) – are especially liable to do this. There are people who call themselves “religious moderates” who, for all their [...]

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Stop bringing up logical positivism

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

In the debate over the veracity or rationality of religious doctrines, the greatest thorn in the theists’ side is our asking what evidence supports their claims. As they can’t answer that challenge, they do all they can to excuse taking umbrage an evidential criteria. It has been said theology is not an effort to justify [...]

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Atheism and autism (and why theists bring it up)

Oct 30, 2011 4 Comments

Before I launch into this post it is only right I acknowledge having Asperger Syndrome, as it makes me an example of the sort of correlation evidence is beginning to uncover (and at this stage could well be wrong about), and which some theists have already become crowing about. There has been an occasional suggestion [...]

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Labelling children

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

Richard Dawkins has brought our attention in recent years to how wrong it is to automatically label young children with the religion of their parents. “That is/you are an X” are the two formulations this error takes. The problem is, just as there’s only so young one can be if one can form one’s own [...]

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Creationism moving backwards

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

Nicolaus Steno, the only saint to also be a scientist, introduced to geography in the seventeenth century the principle of superposition, which says geological strata that look alike are equally old and those on top are younger than those underneath them. Taxonomy, the systematic classification of living things, began in the eighteenth century with Linnaeus, [...]

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A bad omen

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

As I said in a previous post, I’ve been writing while in Spain. Our room had one English channel, BBC News. I turned it on at 5 PM BST on Monday and saw three main stories: the announcement of the liberation of Libya, a Turkish earthquake and Tunisian elections. Libya and Tunisia are both examples [...]

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By their fruits you shall know them

Oct 30, 2011 Comments Off

This is my first article here written while on a holiday in Spain (where limited internet access forced me to take a break from publishing). When in a foreign country I try to know something about its culture, e.g. the role of religion therein. A recent news story quantified the number of Spanish newborns the [...]

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Novelty in the new atheism … or theism

Oct 22, 2011 Comments Off

Post–9/11 atheist works have been characterised as the New Atheism. Many atheists have objected that atheism doesn’t come in strains; you either lack a belief in a god or gods, or you have one. They add that the arguments on both sides haven’t changed much historically either. They concede only one new aspect of atheism, [...]

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