Reading Time: 4 minutes (Writer’s note: If you’d like to receive emailed links to each of my columns when posted, please sign up here.) A recent Pew Research Center survey on U.S. attitudes toward the so-called “problem of evil” (and implied divine impotence) brightly underscores how the perpetuating power of religious indoctrination continues into the 21st century to corrupt […]
reason
Posted inReligion
Atheists, reason, and science
Reading Time: 4 minutes Christian Tom Gilson attacks science as the source of all truth. No, it’s not, but let’s not imagine Religion has anything to offer.
Posted inReligion
Maybe atheists don’t reason so well after all
Reading Time: 2 minutes Are atheists devout followers of Reason? A conservative Christian thinks not. Maybe those atheists aren’t as reasonable as they think.
Posted inCritical thinking
How ghost stories helped me live my life to the fullest
Reading Time: 4 minutes It was a dark and stormy night. Really. A few weeks ago, we had a crazy storm blow through. I was snuggled up in my bed with the house to myself. My favorite gardenia scented candle was burning, my nose buried in a book, and a cup of chamomile tea on my nightstand. The only […]
Posted inPhilosophy
The rational fanatic: Is there such a thing?
Reading Time: 4 minutes As I watched the baseball playoffs this past season and then pivoted to the NFL, it turns out I’d unknowingly entered a laboratory exploring the human condition. Sports serve as a great catalyst for such explorations and the Red Sox, Dodgers, and Cowboys all provided such a spark: in this case, exploring the ongoing battle between […]
Posted inPsychology
If the dead visit our dreams, what does it mean?
Reading Time: 4 minutes Of several hypotheses of the genesis of supernatural religion in humankind, ancient interpretation of dreams is a top contender.
Posted inPolitics
How a critical thinking deficit aids fascism…and religion
Reading Time: 5 minutes Why do so many Americans embrace such outlandish and patently false ideas these days? Partly because they were never taught critical-thinking skills.
Posted inEthics and Morality, The Secular
Of faith and fetal cells, COVID and cannibalism
Reading Time: 5 minutes The Catholic Church has been surprisingly nuanced in weighing fetal-cell use in coronavirus vaccines vs. life-saving vaccine efficacy in advising faithful.
Posted inGeneral, Politics, The Secular
‘The Nation’ normalizing astrology is like ‘Mother Jones’ endorsing junk food
Reading Time: 5 minutes The Nation is an august progressive magazine. Then, why is it normalizing astrology and horoscopes? It can’t actually believe that stuff, can they?
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.