Reading Time: 12 minutes Like me, Voltaire was educated by men in the Society of Jesus, the Jesuits. Like Voltaire, I’ll salute my Jesuit educators and do it using Voltaire’s own words in a letter to one Father Latour, 1746: I was educated for seven years by men who took unrewarded and indefatigable pains to form the minds and […]
freethought
Posted inLatest research
Over 70% of people live in countries that ‘severely discriminate’ against nonreligious
Reading Time: 2 minutes In the recent and incredibly important annual Freedom of Thought Report, published by Humanists International, research shows that most of the world lives in countries that openly discriminate against the nonreligious. The report looks at every country in the world, looking at laws and policies that are in place and enacted to give a detailed […]
Posted inPhilosophy
Building our own meaning and purpose
Reading Time: 5 minutes The age-old problem of deciphering the meaning of life never gets old as a philosophical project. The word “decipher” here is the wrong word to use from a humanist’s point of view, of course. It is not that meaning is hidden in the fabric of the universe, laid there carefully by some deity for us […]
Posted inPolitics
Secular values in action: Rep. Jamie Raskin
Reading Time: 5 minutes What would the United States look like if it were led according to secular values? Although the US was founded as a secular nation, Christianity has always wielded disproportionate influence on our politics. How would our laws be different if nonreligious people held one-third of congressional seats, proportional to our share of the population? Secular […]
Posted inGeneral, The Secular
Who thinks aliens are more likely — believers or seculars? Wrong!
Reading Time: 4 minutes Just say “X-Files” and you’ll learn how popular the concept of aliens is to human beings. You may be surprised to know who is least skeptical of them.
Posted inCulture, Science, The Secular
Is atheist icon Richard Dawkins saying what you think he’s saying?
Reading Time: 5 minutes British atheist gadfly Richard Dawkins has come under criticism lately for pointing out that transsexuals cannot dismiss their chromosomes.
Posted inPolitics, The Secular
U.S. “nones” beef up political forces vs. stubborn evangelical heft
Reading Time: 4 minutes U.S. evangelical Christians have acquired vast political power since the 1980s, while “nones” are now just getting started — but “nones’ have momentum.
Posted inThe Secular
As Americans flee faith, they embrace astrology and other nonsense
Reading Time: 6 minutes Three-fourths of popular “Cosmopolitan” magazine’s readers are “obsessed” with astrology. It’s what a lot of Americans are replacing religion with.
Posted inPolitics
The recent U.S. Capitol attack was evil. Were the insurrectionists?
Reading Time: 5 minutes Is evil is as evil does or just good people doing bad things? The recent insurrection evil at the U.S. Capitol was probably a bit of both.
Posted inEvolution, Science, The Secular
Whales are intelligently designed — thanks to evolution, not ‘God’
Reading Time: 4 minutes Whales are a majestic example of how evolution over eons can transform a terrestrial mammal into a deep-sea creature perfectly adapted to its enviroment.