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
Category: Reference
Let me take this opportunity
Cruising through the botanical garden early yesterday morning, the very first thing I happened across was something that I’ve, honestly, never spotted in ‘the wild’ before. Which is pretty surprising to me, considering how often I specifically go out not just into prime habitats, but actually looking for snakes. You can put this down to rotten observation powers if you
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
Cry, “Sexism!” and let loose…
I’m not going to finish that header, because no matter what, it’s going to be taken the wrong way…
If you’ve been checking out links on that blogroll over on the sidebar, you may be aware that Ed Yong at Not Exactly Rocket Science has a semi-regular Saturday post called, “I’ve Got Your Missing Links Right Here,” that often has links to some interesting
The myth of “live and let live”
It’s not hard to find articles that decry the efforts of the “New Atheists” for their bullying of innocent and defenseless religion, in terms that range from disapproval to outright vehemence, nor is it hard to find comments where the commenter prides themselves on their “live and let live” attitude, maintaining that the only proper behavior is to not judge
I know you are but what am I?
Some time back I created the ‘Ask an Atheist’ page linked above, prompted by a similar effort elsewhere, to provide anyone the ability to fire away with any questions they might have regarding atheism, secularism, or perhaps just my own personal outlook on some issue. Some time after that, I amended the initial paragraphs to reflect the bare fact that very few people ever bother to try
But how? Part 19: The defense against evil
I was working on another post that dealt with clarifying some details about atheism, and the initial premise of this was one of those points. As I started to address it, I realized that it wasn’t going to be covered in a paragraph or two, and so it has become the latest installment in the But How? lineup, to wit: But how does atheism or secularity defend against evil?
What I was originally
What are they hiding?!
This one is born out of a post on Mental Floss – or at least, that’s the most recent thing to provoke the thoughts the attitude is remarkably common and can be found connected to countless topics. In short: if a government agency or some otherwise
On capital punishment
Capital punishment yet remains a contentious topic, even while we’ve found comfortable positions on many of the moral issues we struggled with for centuries – slavery and racism, women’s rights, legal adulthood, and so on. Perhaps the biggest reason behind this is, there are too many factors that motivate a response, most of them emotional, and most of those have been
You animal!
You know, there are a lot of misconceptions about animal psychology and behavior out there, and they’re all over the map. I’m going to address a few of the more prevalent ones here, with the hopes of at least promoting a little more perspective and forethought among the topics.
Let’s get one thing out of the way right from the start: “animal” is a simple