BLASPHEMY - ATTESTATION

"I am atheist."




"I am an atheist."





As I've posted previously, I prefer the former. But why exactly?



Used the first way, 'atheist' is an adjective. Used the second way, it becomes a noun. Grammar is a subtlely powerful device, and that small change makes all the difference in the world. For example:

"A fat, happy, playful dog." Adjective, Adjective, Adjective, Noun. The first three are its component attributes, the fourth is simply 'it'.

When identifying ourselves , Most of us put 'atheist' in that last place, and it overshadows all the good adjectives that might come before it. All the adjectives characterize the atheist, instead of 'atheist' being among words characterizing the person. I think this is a misstep, especially in a time where the term 'atheist' is so widely misrepresented.

For one thing, to anyone outside the category it de-personifies us. For another, it defines us in purely adversarial terms against anyone who might be described as religious. And we don't always want to be that... or at least, not always so blatantly so.

We've been labeled that way by the religious for so long that we've gotten used to it. It's probably our own fault that we haven't done so much to correct the misinterpretations of what it means to be atheist. This is my point from above: Most people who hear the word think that 'atheist' is all we are, or all that matters when it comes to judging our character. Collectively, we do tend to say "I'm an atheist," the way we'd say "I'm a realtor." That makes it an all-encompassing descriptor; it's what you spend the majority of your time doing. But if you just say "I'm atheist", it's like saying "I'm superstitious". It describes an aspect of you, not YOU. Nobody says they're superstitionists.

When somebody finds out I'm atheist and reacts in shock with a phrase like, "But you're such a good person!", I use a little analogy to help them understand that their notion of 'atheist' is dramatically exaggerated. It goes like this:

"Do you eat hamburgers*? Yes? So you're a hamburgerist? Should I assume that all you ever eat is hamburgers, all you ever think of are hamburgers, and that you believe hamburgers are better than the food other people eat?"

Yes, it's designed to be a little preposterous, but it drives the point home. I should mention that I don't just reply with this canned phrase. That would be too rude and condescending for all but the most infuriating debators. I introduce it as an analogy first.

Anyway, I thought these thoughts were pretty good and worth worth sharing...

...not that I'm proclaiming myself an intelligentist, or anything.


* - I originally wanted to use 'vegetables' in place of 'hamburgers', but there really is such a thing as a vegetarian... and 'hamburgerist' is too funny a word to pass up.

BLASPHEMY - REJOINDER

My responses to the FriendlyAtheist short-answer project:

• Why do you not believe in God?

The 'supernatural' is undefined... kinda like 'divide by zero'; it's a concept we can label, but there's nothing we can actually put into that category. The entire universe is natural, and within it there's only the already-known and the unknown.

• Where do your morals come from?

I am comfortable with certain things happening to me (good) and uncomfortable with other things happening to me (bad). I recognize that all other living things behave similarly to me, so it's easy enough to assume that if I don't like it, you probably won't either.

• What is the meaning of life?

'Life' is a word that describes "the behavior living things exhibit before they die". Oh, what is the purpose of life? I don't think there is a single pre-intended purpose of life that we can identify... but I highly respect people who choose to apply a purpose to their lives, especially if the purpose is a positive one.

• Is atheism a religion?

Only as much as total darkness is a color.

• If you don’t pray, what do you do during troubling times?

I do my best to find a way to gain strength from the ordeal so I can better face it the next time I endure it. If it's too much to bear on my own, then I draw strength from the support of my friends and loved ones who are there for me during troubling times. If it's someone close to me enduring troubling times, then I do everything in my power to help them through it.

• Should atheists be trying to convince others to stop believing in God?

I believe so; I think humans should have an interest in helping humanity as a whole. If you're spending any time at all worshiping a deity, then you're not helping humanity as much as you could be.

• Weren’t some of the worst atrocities in the 20th century committed by atheists?

That's an irrelevant statistic. Some of the worst atrocities of the 20th century were committed by people who had dark hair, but we don't campaign against that. A more appropriate statistic would be the ratio of atheism-motivated vs. religiously-motivated perpetration of atrocities in all of recorded history. The number would be small enough to illustrate that this is an absolutely stupid argument against atheism.

• How could billions of people be wrong when it comes to belief in God?

There was definitely a value in believing in a higher power when primitive humans were fighting each other for survival. This religious tendency is a residual trait that was never extinguished, since up until the last century or two we didn't have the capability to answer the biggest questions we were able to ask. Now our eyes are opened wider.

• Why does the universe exist?

I don't believe that is an answerable question. I also don't believe it needs to be answered. Interestingly, the fact that the universe exists is a source of unspeakable awe and 'reverence' to me. It drives me to never stop learning. This is the kind of awe the religious could only dream of experiencing.

• How did life originate?

I personally don't know. But some of the best minds out there are working on further refining the very solid theories that we have. Once we find out for sure, it will promote a whole new category of capabilities that we will be able to use to vastly improve the state of humanity and of the world as a whole.

• Is all religion harmful?

No, assuming we apply a broad definition of 'religion'. The Eastern spiritualities do nothing to stifle our inherent benevolence. In some cases they actually promote it. The harmful religions are those of ethical theism; the ones that have codes dictating behavior.

• What’s so bad about religious moderates?

They're not bad in and of themselves. But their existence enables fundamentalism to thrive. They make a case for being complacent about religion, which is actually a very dangerous thing.

• Is there anything redeeming about religion?

Good things can come out of religious motivation... but to be redeeming I'd have to find an instance of something that religion provides more effectively than does rationalism (which is naturalistic in nature). For every good thing religion does well, there is a natural and rational thing that does it better.

• What if you’re wrong about God (and He does exist)?

Then everyone who did believe in and everyone who didn't believe in the particular god that does exist (and it's not necessarily Yahweh) will be subject to the rules (if there are any) established by that god. If it ends up that Yahweh exists, then I will be undeservedly punished for eternity. If the actual god is one that values rationality and abhors blind faith, then I'll be handsomely rewarded for passing the test of religion. The god that does exist might not care at all what I did while alive, and he might not even have made us for everlasting life. We might still just die.

• Shouldn’t all religious beliefs be respected?

Only the ones worthy of respect... but chances are, the aspects of those beliefs that deserve the respect predate and are independent of the religion itself ("Do unto others as you would have done unto you," et cetera). Rather: whether a belief is to be respected has nothing to do with the fact that it's religious.

• Are atheists smarter than theists?

Not on account of their atheism, no. But smarter people are more likely to be atheist than theist.

• How do you deal with the historical Jesus if you don’t believe in his divinity?

I assume you're talking about Yeshua ben Joseph, a man who was a small political/spiritual leadership candidate (and thus given the title 'Jesus', as such candidates were all given) of a growing sect of a monastic society in the middle east a few thousand years ago. With my understanding of the vernacular and the culture of the people who wrote what surviving historical documents we have, he never said he was divine. Other people did, much later. People all throughout history have been calling themselves and other people divine, and as far as I can tell they've all been wrong.

• Would the world be better off without any religion?

I believe so, and I'm doing everything I can so that someday we can find out for sure.

• What happens when we die?

We permanently lose consciousness; it is not unlike before we were born. Of course, there is the possibility of developing technology that will allow a person to live indefinitely; but that's a whole other can of worms.

BLASPHEMY - PERSIFLAGE

Atheist Stand-Up Comedy.


Two critical aspects of stand-up are the delivery and the physical component of the presentation... but it's still funny to read the punchlines, so here's a little joke that I thought up on the way home from work. I need lots more material to add to this, but it's a start:

---

I wanted to do a caricature of Ann Coulter, but I realized it would be impossible because she already is one...

...You just can't exaggerate Ann Coulter's rage! I tried! In the real world, that woman hasn't changed her tampon in years.

Creationists want us to produce fossil evidence of transitional species? Fine. BURY ANN COULTER. We'll dig her up in a year and say, "She walked upright, but completely lacked higher brain function. Also note the pronounced claws."*

---

Yeah, so, don't worry, I didn't quit my day job. But I will try to come up with some more to add later.


* - If you didn't find this passage funny, it's not because I'm not funny. It's just because you missed my delivery and physical presentation.

BLASPHEMY - COVENANT

Most internet-savvy atheists know about the Rational Response Squad. If you don't, feel free to check in on them at their site linked above, and at the Blasphemy Challenge, which is what I want to talk about today.


If you're unfamiliar with what the Blasphemy Challenge is, take a moment to familiarize yourself, then read on with abandon :) The link is above.


I'm planning on making a contribution to The Blasphemy Challenge, but I don't have convenient
access to a camera that will take more than 15 seconds of footage at a time... so, being the verbose motherfucker that I am, things are not so much with the "filmed" part yet.


But I have scripted my statement, and I might as well publish it here. Hope you like what I've come up with. And if you have any critiques, feel free to leave me a comment.

Okay, enough introduction.

---

Hello, Rational Responders!

I'd like to help out by contributing to the Blasphemy Challenge...

But I'm not sure I can deny the holy spirit... since in my mind, actively denying something implies that it is a thing that exists that you're interacting with. It calls to mind dealing with an unruly youngster... like, "No! Bad holy spirit! You cannot have the cookie!"; this particular cookie being, of course, my soul (which, by the way, I also cannot even relinquish, since I don't think I have one of those either). In short, not only can I not deny something due to its nonexistence, I can't do so because I have nothing to withhold from it. It's like trying to bluff during a hand of poker when you're not playing with real money: you have chips on the table and you've assigned arbitrary values to them, but no matter how many chips you're betting, whether it be none, one, or many... it's all the exact same real value: zero. In the end nobody has won or lost anything. I don't think we even have cards.

And in case there was any misunderstanding about the context of Mark 3:29, let me unambiguously state that the acts performed by Christians to spread Christianity represents the absolute worst of human nature. If any of our human behaviors deserve to be called demonic, it's the fear-mongering critical to successful religious indoctrination.


Pretend for a minute that this supernatural contest for souls between God and the devil is actually going on. If I were the devil, I tell you what I'd do. I'd prey on the weakest minds I could find. Minds that would believe anything. And I'd do my best to convince them that I was God. I'd even present the idea of an evil devil for them all to rally against. I'd make them as afraid as possible of abandoning me, and I'd sweeten the deal by promising them eternal rewards for choosing what would appear to be the only right choice. In other words, I'd make it sound too good to be true, and then watch the volunteers pour in.

It's not a devil you should be afraid of. It's a silver-tongued Satan pretending to be God.


Okay, there you go. And just in case all that didn't do the trick, Let me make clear that I intend to commit an unpardonable sin. I'm hoping this follows along the same line as "whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart." Even if I haven't performed all this correctly due to a technicality, I've already committed the unpardonable sin in my heart.


In conclusion, I will pledge this with my full name as a baptized and confirmed Roman Catholic: I am Kevin James Christopher Savino-Riker, and I completely and wholly deny the holy spirit.

---

I'll post the video here once I make it. Meanwhile, more text-based creative compositions to follow.


It's Friday, so say a prayer to Freyja!

BLASPHEMY - SODALITY

And the hits just keep on comin'!

Prose Justice has just been added to the Atheist Blogroll. This is a big step for me, since, well... other people will be visiting this page. That hasn't happened for a long time.

In preparation for the potential influx of readers, I've done a little upkeep here to make the site more manageable for people that are here to read what interests them. This site will still be my personal journal, and my archives consist of the better part of a hundred posts that have nothing to do with atheism, and due to my inconvenient post-titling scheme it'd be tough to discern which of my posts have anything interesting to say at all... so if you want the good stuff about my new favorite A-word, click the link at the top of the page.

That's all for now. I'll finish with a link to post-previous, the one that represents the bulk of my creative outpourings of the last eight months, and the post that got me on the blogroll in the first place.

Okay, really finishing this time. Thanks to Mojoey for creating the blogroll. You're putting your money where your mouth is. Thanks for setting the example and providing a platform for the rest of us to follow suit!

BLASPHEMY - SATIETY

Started 11/3/06, completed 8/8/07

SATIETY

I read an interesting theory about life, in which it is hypothetically supposed that humans are not so much a lifeform, but a byproduct of a lifeform... that DNA itself is the real animal, the defined living being. The means by which it found the solution to its survival is clumping together in a massive swarm that spends a period of time advancing through stages which ultimately allow it to combine with another swarm of DNA which will allow the new generation to propagate...

Life itself is, when conceptually condensed for the sake of the argument, simply the persistence of information: the significant pattern arranged in a (relatively or even arbitrarily) meaningful way. In the case of humans, it is their DNA and all its associated emergent attributes.

When viewing a homologous sample population of a particular sect of any organized religion, the same type of pattern is identifiable in the higher-order philosophical arguments and belief systems... to that end, some have called religion a 'virus of the mind'.

In recent years, I found myself coming to that realization on my own. Seeing religion itself as a 3rd order sociological lifeform: Self-sustaining, reproducing, and adaptive; whereas humans are constructed in a tangible medium of molecules... religion is a swarm entity literally made of the intangible stuff of mob mentality, cemented together by vestigial fight-or-flight instincts. Fear. Anger. What's especially interesting to me is that this 3rd order lifeform exhibits evolutionary footprints itself. It conforms to the broad definition of life, and even follows rules out of the same playbook we do. A virus of the mind. There is a pointedness to that description... not many viruses are known to benefit their hosts.

A Roman Catholic born and raised, I believed in what I was taught from the beginning. I didn't always have the presence of mind, however, to be aware that I never felt the presence of God. Eventually, I grew more self-aware, and noticed at least in the background, that I never felt this thing I believed in. But time passes, and experience hones the ability to process data like these. Inevitably my Catholicism fell by the wayside. If you asked me about religion, I'd likely reply, "I'm not into organized religion, but I'm one of the most spiritual people you'll ever meet." And yet, I wasn't done with organized religion. I was compelled to study it. Not just Christianity, either. I had developed a ravenous appetite for theological materials. I would study it and get into deep conversations about it. Something in me wouldn't let me leave religion alone.

For a long time, I studied it. For a long time, I exhausted myself trying to define my place along the spectrum of faith. For a long time I firmly planted myself within the boundary of agnosticism, but something still wasn't right. Agnostic. It really worked well publicly, but it didn't describe me. There was something truer than that, but it was a scary word indeed. It was another A-word. Luckily, a matter of semantics reconcile an inadequacy of a definition...

The religious and the agnostics draw a circle, within which is the natural and explainable, outside of which lies the supernatural. The religious populate this external region with God. The agnostics don't populate it with anything, but they make sure the space is reserved in case anything does occupy it. The problem with this is that they've fixed the proportions. I draw my circle, and if something comes into my experience that falls outside that circle, I have the liberty of drawing a larger circle to accommodate it. The religious drew their circle and it has a fixed area. More accurately, someone drew the circle for them, in a time when there was not much known about the universe. The circle was very small indeed. They managed to cram most of our modern knowledge into that fixed space, which only makes it easier for them to imagine the 'rest of it/the undiscovered' in the supernatural space outside the circle. The circle to them is a point-of-no-further-investigation. But I can just keep drawing my circle bigger and bigger. There is no limit to the canvas of a scientific mind.

Something new became apparent to me here. Not only am I not religious, I am not agnostic. The larger and larger my circle gets, the more magnificent the entire universe becomes to me. The larger circle has no stigma attached, no dogma applied, no means to induce fear or doubt. The larger circle is that of an atheist. My current assessment then, is that the term 'atheism' accounts for this sense of wonderment quite adequately.

More concisely: if something is proven/explained that was previously regarded in terms of the supernatural, then by the fact of its discovery it is obviously a part of this universe, and is therefore part of nature. This is consistent through all of recorded history. Thus, something as of yet unexplained is likely to be a part of nature that we haven't yet mastered... but a part of nature nonetheless.

I'd take this perspective so far as to say if the anthropomorphic God of ethical monotheism walked out of a cloud and announced his existence irrefutably to the world, then the only logical conclusion I could make is that there is this 'god aspect' of nature heretofore undiscovered, with its own fundamental properties. There'd be a whole new category of physics to learn about: God physics. How he reads minds and can be everywhere at once and how he exists on his (or apart from all) timescales. Those would be exciting times for scientists!

Going back to my 'circle' analogy, it seems rather arbitrary and unnecessary to draw the circle once we realize that there are things yet to be discovered in the natural universe. Why then do we feel that we need to draw a line that separates the unknown of the natural universe and the 'supernatural'? What value is a border if the things on either side of it are identical? That's all we're doing: going into the already unknown (which is obviously the worst place to start concocting firm assertations) and draw a line, saying, "...and past this line is the more unknown." If it's even more unknown than the unknown, how can we possibly know enough about it to conclude that it is definitely unknowable? In truth, the only responsible position is to avail oneself to the idea that time is a powerful tool and say, "it is not yet understood." No deadlines, no goals. Just the humility to admit that we cannot understand it, but someday, somebody better might come along.

It's a paradox, or perhaps is ironic, to consider that the hardiest argument for god is the "incalculable complexity" of the world we live in. They look at what science has presented and call it too cumbersome to be taken seriously. They say that it's foolish to try to explain it with intricate theories. They say the simplest answer is usually the correct answer. In that statement, I agree with them completely. To shake a leaf out of their own tree for a moment: You know what's the most complex thing in the universe? God. Their 'simple answer', by their own definition, is in fact something so complex as to be considered unknowable.

Whereas evolution is about simple beginnings that lead to more developed ends, looking back from the religious perspective means you end up looking at something more complicated than what you're struggling to justify here and now. What makes more logical sense: tracing back from today's complexity to ever simpler iterations the further back you go, or tracing back to something that gets more complicated the further back you look, all the way to the conceptual limits of an infinitely complex god who's been around an infinitely long time? And let's say that the latter strikes you, for some reason, as the more logical of the two. Then I shall ask a better question. Which of those two scenarios does a better job of addressing the actual question: how do I explain the complexity around us now? If your answer is "it was more complex in the past", then you've shot yourself in the foot with a rather large bullet. Because if it was worth it to you to ask about the universe's complexity, wouldn't it be more worth it to ask about God's greater complexity? That's only a rhetorical question because the religious would never dare to ask that. In the meantime, Remember that simple beginnings are easy to explain. Unfathomable complexity, on the other hand, should have no part in any sentence with the word 'answer' in it. The complexity of the world around us was slightly simpler yesterday. It was simpler still the day before. And you know what? There are enough yesterdays to follow that progression back to the very beginning. And a trillion or so to spare.


But the faithful want to save me. They say, "All you have to do is obey God's rules and you will be rewarded with entrance into heaven." So, you want me to take part in an experiment that will occupy me for the REST OF MY LIFE, and it turns out that I'm right, I won't know until I'm dead, which is another way of saying I'll never get to know. Those are awfully high stakes to play with. Awfully high stakes for a pretty peculiar reward: my sincere difficulty with this is that their intentions are based upon the notion that there is the magnificent gift of heaven ahead of us all. But that argument would only seem to hold water if there wasn't this massively rewarding life I'm living right here and now. Even to tally up all the joy I've experienced in my relatively short 26 years of life is a tremendous amount of evidence for this life being rewarding enough - that they fail to notice this is what astounds me. Their tunnel vision is incomparable; it's something akin to using a microscope to view the room you're sitting in.


This also brings about stunning implications: I spoke of the apparent invalidity of the heavenly-reward concept as evidenced by how rewarding life on earth was. That sentence may have sounded to you as subjective and terribly shortsighted. I could have worded my statement more precisely, instead saying that there were examples of how rewarding life on earth could be. I admit that I have had a fortunate life, and I therefore represent a painfully small fraction of the human population. There are hundreds of millions (and I sadly suspect more than a billion) of people alive today who will not be alive for long. Their short lives will have consisted of only hardship, suffering, and despair. While I was, in a way, 'for' the end of religion as we know it, I had previously decided that I would not be militantly so. I understood that there are people out there (like those I described above), a great many, in fact, for whom religious belief is a wholly positive influence on their lives; a refuge from a life of physical and emotional starvation. But it's simply not good enough to let them have their faith at the cost of letting them die tragic deaths for lack of intervention. As such I now realize that I am militantly 'for' the end of organized religion. I say so without remorse because I acknowledge a very real problem that invalidates the "But what about all the good things the Church does for people?" argument. No church spends all their money for good works. They may spend a large portion, but there is ALWAYS a portion that is spent on sustaining itself and on gaining new members. That money spent harvesting believers represents a significant opportunity cost. With equal funding, a nonreligious organization will always have the capacity to care for and to improve the lives of more people than the religious one whose true intent is to make people religious before making them well. If we reach the understanding that this life is indeed the only one we are privileged enough to experience, and we also see that not all of us (and in fact most of us) desperately need more help than even the most dedicated and capable can provide, then there is only one conclusion: it is in our hands; we must decide to make this Earth into our collective heaven or let it be hell for them. We have to stop wasting money on organizations that cannibalize our good will.

Consider that. The pyramids were, with the obvious exception of their geometry, pointless. How many hours, how much raw material, how many lives were consumed in the building of these religious monuments? They serve well as a poignant example of the resource-sapping by the religious that occurs even today, though to a thankfully less drastic extent.

For the record, I used the term 'militantly' tongue-in-cheek. I don't want to firebomb a church or support the violent overthrow of any religious organization. I could never advocate sacrificing them for the benefit of the rest of mankind, even if there would be a morbid symmetry to the whole thing. I suppose the more accurate term would be 'vigorously'. That's it.

I am vigorously advocating the end of organized religion as we know it.

So that leaves me with few options. The best one I can fathom is to be a part of the grassroots effort to show a public and unafraid face to the world. There are more atheists out there than have been counted, and the best thing for them to see is that it's getting easier to admit it. The only way to topple the tower is to weaken the foundation, and that means that we have to spread the word bottom-up. Don't think that I don't realize that I'm describing a Mission. It pains me that we have to play that same game with the same people. Spiritual ping pong. But it's the only tool we have and if we're serious about wanting to change the world for the better, it's a tool we must use.

Why am I so confident that theism is incorrect? Because I can satisfactorily explain why 95% of the world's population can be wrong about their belief.

Yahweh, for example, was a small and petty tribal god. In his ten commandments (of which there are more like 20-30, most of which are grotesque, unethical, or just plain obtuse), he identifies himself as 'the one true god', which is not to say that he is the only supernatural being in the universe. Rather, it serves to validate the idea that other gods did exist, but Yahweh's own people would get into some serious trouble if they were to take any time to worship them. He says, 'do not honor other gods than me'... now why would he say that unless there were other gods vying for their reverence? He should've said 'there are no other gods than me'.

...but I digress.

So what was the value in a tribe believing in their tribal god? Survival value. Small tribes get into wars with other small tribes. Survival then was a luxury, not a right as it is becoming in present times. You'd better believe there was a value to a tribal warrior about to go into battle, knowing that there was a power greater than his own who was going into battle with him. Who is the more effective warrior, the one who knows only of his own muscle and agility, or the one who has a divine protection? Which one is more aggressive? Which one, statistically speaking, is more likely to deal a crippling blow to an adversary? Which of the two, at the end of the day, is more likely not just to have survived, but to have survived as a member of the victorious tribe, the one to whom all the land is now bestowed? Those who found a resourcefulness in supernatural belief survived and populated the planet.


One thing I want to address: I've been reading some books lately by Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, and have been scouring countless atheist web pages... but nobody "taught" me atheism. It was a conclusion I came to along the way while growing up. But that is not to say that there was a defining moment in which a switch was flipped and I said, "okay, I'm atheist now." It's a description that I gradually came closer and closer to resembling as I matured and resolved my ideologies with greater and greater precision. The closest I could come to pointing out the defining moment was the reconciled definition I spoke of earlier in this essay. Not a single thing about who I was or what I believed changed in the slightest. Only the language I used to describe it was eschewed in lieu of something more accurate, and if I may go so far as to say, more 'confident'.

People claim to use the god concept to answer fundamental questions. But there is a difference between answers and excuses. Especially considering that it's always only one excuse. "This thing we don't understand? Well, it's because of God." Pardon me for preferring answers. I don't need to know everything right now. Is that the only reason we need a be-all-end-all answer? Because we're not comfy unless we can account for everything? Is that why people need God so much? To be a shortcut to the comfort of having everything accounted for? I promise that I will get to know much, much more, by pacing myself... by accepting that I don't need to have an answer for everything right now... the answers will come as soon as we become 'enough' to be capable of understanding them. Meanwhile, I'm not sweating. I'm just busy learning more. And I could not be more fulfilled.

This essay is my public affirmation of rationality. I am atheist. Society isn't content to let that go by so quietly the way they would if I were to say "I am left-handed". They want it to be my title, like it defines me as opposed to defining one of my attributes. They label me an atheist.

Fine. If you give me a badge, then I'm going to wear it. I am an atheist. I'm joining the ranks of those who will speak out in defense of those who are misunderstood and persecuted for their lack of religious beliefs. I am just about finished with the word 'supernatural'.

For me, from now on, the word supernatural will only have one purpose. It will define an empty-set. It is a reminder to me that, according to my rules, nothing shall ever occupy that space. It's a rather dualistic thing in itself, really. It is the hard-line boundary I have set to the universe, and it is by being so, the thing that enables the borders of the 'natural' to expand indefinitely so long as we find new things to put there. It reminds me that there is not a single shred of evidence uncovered in the collective history of mankind that would suggest that we cannot eventually understand a mysterious thing we've encountered. There is no reason to think any less of ourselves.

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Thanks for bearing with me on that; I know that was a long read.


And, thus begins the new incarnation of Prose Justice. While there will still appear the occasional 'personal journal' entry, the primary purpose of this blog will be to share my thoughts on the atheists' uphill battle to carve out a safe space to exist in the United States and on the internet. My dream is to help make that place a place from which we may concert our efforts toward making the world a safer and better place for all humankind. There is a lot more to come.

**
This essay was, believe it or not, much longer at one point. A byproduct of the fact that I spent eight months writing it was that the piece jumped around from topic to topic. Before publishing it, I pruned it down until it focused mainly on my deconversion and my justification of atheism. The rest of the chunks have been kept as individually-packaged snippets, and will be published here at a rate of one every couple days or so. At present there are about thirty of these posts waiting in the wings. I am continuing to write new ones on a pretty regular basis as well. So, this blog will become much more active than it has ever been.
**
I will also point out, tongue in cheek, that I made good on my promise to stop using a one-word post-titling scheme in order to make it easier for readers to find articles of interest to them. I am now using (for all atheism-related posts) a two-word titling scheme, the first word always being 'BLASPHEMY'.

I crack myself up.