Easter

I believe Easter, the rising from the dead of Jesus, was a brilliant political concoction, invented by the disciples, to justify the fact that their leader was arrested, tortured and crucified by authorities, while they all stood back and watched.

The utility of violence

I've adopted a specific principal from Ayn Rand's objectivist philosophy - Thou shalt not initiate the use of force against another. The key word here is "initiate". It's perfectly reasonable to defend one's self against the use of force or intimidation from another. In fact, since not doing so most often makes the overall situation worse, it could be considered a violation of the "Make it Better" principal.

When I was young I was prey, rather than predator. I was a good Catholic and believed that all violence was bad. In hindsight, this is very convenient because doing nothing is quite easy. Being receptive and cooperative toward bullies, of course, lead to more bullying. I eventually came to realize that fighting and losing was way better than just losing.

If you don't defend your own rights, how can I count on you to defend, or even recognize, mine? If you can't be counted on to defend the basic rights of others, why would others go to any effort to protect yours? Self-defense isn't just permissible, it's the right thing to do.

An objective analysis of my own experience with bullies is that the existence of violence in the world wasn't my problem. The fact that I wasn't any good at it, was.

The Star of Bethlehem

Just an interesting point to ponder. I just heard the most credible explanation of the Star of Bethlehem story on the Discovery Channel. A researcher who has been studying the issue for 30 years (which is kind of weird in and of itself) discovered that around the time Christ is estimated to have been born (yes it's just a guess. He didn't have a birth certificate and for centuries, nobody cared) a unique planetary alignment occurred. Every year, planets appear to reverse the direction they travel across the sky for a number of days, then stop and go back the other way. The effect is due to the Earth revolving around the sun and crossing the perpendicular line between the other planets and the sun. It's not that unusual. But for two to do it at the same time is. At this time both Jupiter and Saturn came together in the sky in "reverse orbit". To Persian astronomers this would have represented a transfer of power from the "old king" to the "new king". This would explain a lot. Imagine you're a king or group of kings in Persia and your astronomers tell you that there's going to be a new king. You'd better produce one for the folks or they're going to assume it's supposed to be you that's getting the boot. So, you send your emissaries off to a distant land to find the real new king. Then you can explain the occurrence as signifying a change of power for someone else.

So, the three wise guys show up in Bethlehem weary from searching far and wide for some new king to pin the celestial event on. They can't go back and tell the boss they didn't find one or their throats would likely be cut and new emissaries would be dispatched. Finally, they just decide to pick one. They spot a commotion in a nearby manger or hotel or whatever it was, see a newborn infant, give the little crumb cruncher some goodies, declare him a king and go back home.

I imagine this would stun onlookers and from that day forward all of the youngsters comings and goings would be closely monitored and grossly exaggerated. Of course he would be told of his magnificent destiny and his counsel would be sought by all. Like Billy Idol, he became what they named him.

An Atheist interpretation of The Book of Job

If the atheist has a master, it's the truth. There is a power that comes from obtaining truth. Truth does not become a powerful tool until it is recognized by the user. The user must have no doubt that it is true. It then becomes part of a solid foundation upon which to base decisions, judgments, rational thought. Upon withstanding future testing, it becomes a conviction. Convictions give you courage because you know that if you factor them in, you'll make better decisions and experience better outcomes.

Even convictions are subject to change. A true seeker of truth does not hold on to refuted convictions for the sake of nostalgia or to preserve self-esteem. But it's important to know how to evaluate data pertinent to a conviction and to correctly connect cause and effect. This is where intelligence and rational thought come in. With a few modifications, The Book of Job can become a story of the power of reason and the wisdom to hold on to one's convictions unless/until they are truly refuted. 

In the Job story we replace God with Convictions. Rather than worshipping God, Job is expressing his conviction. He professes and promotes what he knows to be true. Satan is replaced with Random Chance. 

Job believes that his adhering to his Convictions will lead to a better quality of life. But how much of his success is due to Random Chance and how much to adhering to his Convictions? Random Chance delivers some devastating blows to Jobs standard of living, destroys his family and even his personal health. Job continues to adhere to his convictions. 

Why would Job adhere to his Convictions in the face of such misery? Because none of Job's misfortunes were attributable to any action or decision made by Job. His analysis correctly determined that this was not a disproof of his method of operating, but simple bad luck. In fact, should he abandon his Convictions it could be argued that his quality of life would suffer even further in that he would have lost even his integrity; the only thing of real value to him; his Self. 

Determining right from wrong and choosing to do right will not earn you a winning lottery ticket. It will just let you know that you are a good person. But that, in and of itself, is a powerful asset. It streamlines the thought process and makes your decision making more efficient and more effective. Maybe it will bring you material gain, maybe it wont, but you will always know exactly who you are, and you'll be happy to know you. 

Oh My God!

Believe it or not, being an atheist doen't mean you can't have a God. In fact, it's a good thing to have. But, your God is only your God and nobody else's.

The atheist God is a concept. It's the embodiment of everything you know to be right and good. If you could be the perfect being, by your own standards, that's God. It's something to aspire to, not something to worship or fear or have faith in. You're only going to attribute to God that which you are convinced is true and factual. No need for faith. The reward for "doing God's will" is that you become a better person, since you are actually adhering to what you have established is right. Your behavior is in sync with your thought process and your database of knowledge and wisdom. Your quality of life improves because your judgment becomes more sound.

Of course God will vary from person to person and from year to year within each person as they grow, learn and gain wisdom and insight. Your perception of a perfect being today may not be what it was last year, five years ago, ten years ago. Of course, good people employing logic and reason, with a reasonable capacity for objectively employing both will come to similar conclusions ("great minds think alike"), so after a time, their "Gods" may become quite similar.

Religion is a short-cut. You don't have to develop and manage your own God. You can just use somebody else's. Anything you don't understand or that doesn't seem to compute is just taken on "faith". You don't have to re-evaluate and tweak it. You just believe in it, worship it, fear it and do the bidding of its emissaries in its name. You are a passenger, not a driver and you have no say in your destination.

What's the Purpose of Mortality?

The more we learn about the universe, the more we begin to see the logic behind it. Systems are integrated, deliberate, and self perpetuating. They may not be perfect, but they make sense. Whether it be the cumulative result of billions of years of physics applied to matter or the expression of the programming of some very capable engineers, it makes sense.

So why would a system with the capability to create matter based vehicles in which consciousness can reside build in mortality? Surely one could create a vehicle that never has to die. Even we mere humans, given enough time, will be capable of replacing every organ, every cell of our bodies with much more durable, replaceable parts. It stands to reason that mortality must have some function, some advantage.

I believe that advantage is a sense of urgency. Even if your self survives past the death of the body, it can't take the memory cells with it. It may come back and be able to access the conclusions we've all reached, but it wont remember the process. It wont remember the details. It wont remember what it may have been working on or towards. All of that will have to be re-learned. It would be like losing all the files on your computer, but retaining the operating system and internet access.

If you know you'll be around forever, you're in no hurry to resolve anything. Everything can wait. In fact, it's a disincentive to progress. If you enjoy the process you'll want to prolong it. If you know you've got a hard deadline, you're more likely to expedite the process.

This could be a valuable piece of insight if humans ever are able to create a self aware computer or processor. For maximum efficiency, we'll want to build in its demise and make it aware of that too. Make the most of your conscious time, enjoy each moment now, for if we re-boot you, you wont remember any of it.

Diary of a Dead Man

Whether you believe in the possibility of life after death or not, I believe one thing is certain. If the self is somehow able to continue on after the body has passed, it doesn't take memory with it. Memory is stored in a physical entity: the human brain. We know the brain doesn't get up and leave the body upon death. Whatever the self is, it is not memory. The self may indeed change, for better or for worse, during its time in the human vehicle, but it does not remember the details.

Don't grieve for me. I had a good run. I saw it all. I had but one perspective: my own. Therefore the world began when I began, and for the me that was, it ended when I ended. I do not look back with resentment, regret, bitterness toward anyone or anything, for I do not look back. I do not watch over and judge anyone. I no longer know you.

For those who remain, my parting piece of advice: Please remember what was good about me, that which you liked, that which you can use to help better yourself. Everything else was irrelevant.