It’s not hard at all to find some well-meaning advice about success, usually something about achieving your dreams by dedication and hard work, and most of the time, it pisses me off seriously. It’s not that I have anything against advice or optimism, or provoking people to try harder, but the implication, far too often, is that this is all that it takes to become successful. Variations
Category: Critical Thinking
That’s racist! I think…
Racism is one of those topics that the vast majority of people in the world will agree is bad. Which is helpful, because it provides a common factor in ethics, a value that is actually hard to argue against. However, the definition of racism is something that is often not pinned down very well, so broad in scope that the epithet is often applied in situations where the detriments cannot
Just one day? Sheesh
Tuesday, June 21st, is World Humanism Day, an event sure to be celebrated with fireworks and elaborate cakes and a big ol’ music festival featuring the remaining members of Spanky and Our Gang. Or it will pass, at least in this country, largely unnoticed. One or the other.
Which is unfortunate, because it’s really hard to argue against the whole principle, especially if you refuse to
But how? Part 21: Assertion
So, I started this category many moons ago with the idea that it would be used to answer (mostly unasked) questions that religious folk like to pose towards atheists, essentially showing how a secular standpoint covers more bases than it’s usually given credit for. At times since, the structure of posing an initial question hasn’t really worked, yet I still felt that the topic fit in
You telling me or asking me?
Over at Why Evolution Is True far too many days back (time really has been getting away from me,) Jerry Coyne ran a post on how he, as an atheist, found ‘meaning’ in life. Surprising few who have engaged in such discussions before, religious commenter ajmgw saw fit to correct everyone’s impression, which Dr. Coyne featured in another post. For the edification of all, it reads:
The
Like we meme it
It’s safe to say that this blog is wordy, which is one of the more significant ways that it distances itself from social media the quick memes and the sound bites are not really at home here. And this is largely because they’re far too simple to be of any use. Take this image here, lifted from The
But how? Part 20: Consistency
This episode of ‘But how?’ is going to deal more with observations than answering any specific questions through a secular outlook as such, the title question itself doesn’t really fit, but there still may be a lot of things that become clearer nonetheless. So let’s take a look at consistency in regards to religion.
From time to time, I hear the argument that ‘science’
Crossing the great divide
There’s a kind of approach comes up from time to time among skeptics, and it’s often considered a good thing, but I’ve always been of mixed feelings about it. It’s the idea that, in order to get to know those who hold what we consider to be irrational beliefs, we (meaning anyone that wants to promote critical thinking) need to immerse ourselves in the culture. Hemant
So did, uh… did jesus really exist?
If you’ve read anything else on this blog, you might think it’s curious (or completely out-of-character) for me to even be asking this question, especially since I’ve been pretty clear about its relative worth. From a strictly historical standpoint, however, it retains
Book and theory review: Chaos
First off, a disclaimer: I’ve never been good at math, or at least, not since the sixth grade or thereabouts. I’ve struggled with it enough that I suspect there’s something fundamental that I missed, or a mental block or even something about my brain (could be that root beer incident when I was 10,) but so what who cares? The point is, someone may be inclined to