The Inferno

Here’s an excerpt from 1992’s Small Gods by Terry Pratchett, one of my favourite authors. It’s true that on topics of sheer lunacy, only comedians are brave enough to speak the truth, by mocking the lunacy in question.

Where do gods come from? Where do they go?

Some attempt to answer this was made by the religious philosopher Koomi of Smale in his book Ego-Video Libe Deorum, which translates into the vernacular roughly as Gods: A Spotter’s Guide.

People said there had to be a Supreme Being because otherwise how could the universe exist, eh?

And of course there clearly had to be, said Koomi, a Supreme Being. But since the universe was a bit of a mess, it was obvious that the Supreme Being hadn’t in fact made it. If he had made it he would, being Supreme, have made a much better job of it, with far better thought given, taking an example at random, to things like the design of the common nostril. Or, to put it another way, the existence of a badly put-together watch proved the existence of a blind watchmaker. You only had to look around to see that there was room for improvement practically everywhere.

This suggested that the Universe had probably been put together in a bit of a rush by an underling while the Supreme Being wasn’t looking, in the same way that Boy Scouts’ Association minutes are done on office photocopiers all over the country.

So, reasoned Koomi, it was not a good idea to address any prayers to a Supreme Being. It would only attract his attention and might cause trouble.

And yet there seemed to be a lot of lesser gods around the place. Koomi’s theory was that gods come into being and grow and flourish because they are believed in. Belief itself is the food of the gods. Initially, when mankind lived in small primitive tribes, there were probably millions of gods. Now there tended to be only a few very important ones – local gods of thunder and love, for example, tended to run together like pools of mercury as the small primitive tribes joined up and became huge, powerful primitive tribes with more sophisticated weapons. But any god could join. Any god could start small. Any god could grow in stature as its believers increased. And dwindle as they decreased. It was like a great big game of ladders and snakes.

Gods like games, provided they were winning.

Koomi’s theory was largely based on the good old Gnostic heresy, which tends to turn up all over the multiverse whenever men get up off their knees and start thinking for two minutes together, although the shock of the sudden altitude tends to mean the thinking is a little whacked. But it upsets priests, who tend to vent their displeasure in traditional ways.

When the Omnian Church found out about Koomi, they displayed him in every town within the Church’s empire to demonstrate the essential flaws in his argument.

There were a lot of towns, so they had to cut him up quite small.

Eat this, Ernie Pyle.

I remember reading a science fiction story a long time ago, about a scientist who was sent as the first man to a distant world, where the people were peaceful and knew nothing of wars, of killing, of greed and of religion. The scientist was a geologist of some kind and taught the primitive but happy people much of what had created their world and so on. One day this idyllic outpost was shattered by the arrival of a man of the cloth, who insisted that it was his sworn duty to teach these heathen primitives the teachings of one dead Jewish carpenter who had lived on Terra aeons ago. The geologist exploded, but the missionary warned him that there was nothing he could do.

So the geologist sulked and went about his work. One day, some of the natives came up to him and asked him what god was and why he hadn’t taught them about him. The geologist sneered at the idea of God and told them it was all bosh. The natives were puzzled and unable to decide which member of the more advanced race was speaking the truth, retired to give the matter some thought. In a week, they met the geologist and told him they had come up with a test that would decide the matter for once and for all. The geologist divined (no pun intended) in a second what they were up to and ran to the missionary and begged him to leave. The missionary refused and was crucified by the natives, who then buried him. After all, if one dead guy can return after 3 days, another one should be able to, right? Sterling logic, but unfortunately for the missionary, things didn’t end so well.

Anyway, the whole point of this preamble is an article I saw a couple of days ago about a missionary who went to an Amazonian tribe and tried to teach them about Christ. Forget for a moment the colossal arrogance of him and the institution that sponsored this, this shameless “you need saving” bilge that smacks of every detestable -ism there is. The tribe asked him succinct questions, trenchant queries that cut to the core of the ridiculous sham that is organized religion. Lo and behold! One less Bible-thumper and one more atheist. Apparently, their queries were of a critical nature that we only wish everyone else around here had.

Here are some excerpts:

Tribe members asked the missionary whether he had seen or experienced any of the things he was telling them about. He had to admit that he hadn’t; that he was simply passing things onto them that were told to him by people who hadn’t seen or experienced them either.

This is priceless and covers 99.99% of all religious people today. The remaining 0.01% who see visions and talk in tongues are usually in mental asylums or on Fox News.

Here is a little bit of what Daniel Everett himself had to say about the Pirahãs:

The Pirahãs have shown me that there is dignity and deep satisfaction in facing life and death without the comforts of heaven or the fear of hell, and of sailing towards the great abyss with a smile.

And they have shown me that for years I held many of my beliefs without warrant. I have learned these things from the Pirahãs, and I will be grateful to them for as long as I live.

You mean people can be happy without an alpha male in the sky? You don’t say!

And of course, I can’t forget Terry Pratchett’s classic mockery of faith:

On the veldt of Howondaland live the N’tuitif people, the only tribe in the world to have no imagination whatsoever. For example, their story about the thunder runs something like this: ‘Thunder is a loud noise in the sky, resulting from the disturbance of the air masses by the passage of lightning.’

And their legend ‘How the Giraffe Got His Long Neck’ runs: ‘In the old days the ancestors of Old Man Giraffe had slightly longer necks than other grassland creatures, and the access to the high leaves was so advantageous that it was mostly long-necked giraffes that survived, passing on the long neck in their blood just as a man might inherit his grandfather’s spear. Some say, however, that it is all a lot more complicated and this explanation only applies to the shorter neck of the okapi. And so it is’.

The N’tuitif are a peaceful people, and have been hunted almost to extinction by neighbouring tribes, who have lots of imagination, and therefore plenty of gods, superstitions and ideas about how much better life would be if they had a bigger hunting ground.

Of the events on the moon that day, the N’tuitif said: ‘The moon was brightly lit and from it rose another light which then split into three lights and faded. We do not know why this happened. It was just a thing.’

They were then wiped out by a nearby tribe who knew that the lights had been a signal from the god Ukli to expand the hunting ground a bit more. However, they were soon defeated entirely by a tribe who knew that the lights were their ancestors, who lived in the moon, and who were urging them to kill all non-believers in the goddess Glipzo. Three years later they in turn were killed by a rock falling from the sky as a result of a star exploding a billion years ago.

My source is here.

P.S. If anyone knows the name of the sci-fi story, I’d be much obliged if you could leave a comment stating the name and the author.

Before you put good money into their red kettles, examine their position on these issues. Their issues are taken from their website, the link is here. Visit it for more detailed opinions, some of which I’ve pasted pertinent bits from below. My thoughts are below.

Abortion – It is opposed to abortion as a means of birth control, family planning, sex selection or for any reason of mere convenience to avoid the responsibility for conception.

Yawn, so 1940s. Get over it, SA.

Alcohol and Drugs – …it nevertheless believes total abstinence to be the only certain guarantee against overindulgence…

This here has to be a joke.

Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide – The Salvation Army believes that euthanasia and assisted suicide undermine human dignity and are morally wrong regardless of age or disability.

Of course, since God wants you to suffer every excruciating pang of agony it has in store for you. Quitting is for losers, children.

Homosexuality – Homosexual conduct, like heterosexual conduct, requires individual responsibility and must be guided by the light of scriptural teaching….The Salvation Army believes, therefore, that Christians whose sexual orientation is primarily or exclusively same-sex are called upon to embrace celibacy as a way of life.

This is priceless. God doesn’t like gays, but it makes them anyway. And as a final cruel twist of the karmic knife, it wants you to be celibate. No inserting penises in rectal tracts, only birth tracts! Got that, kiddies?

Marriage – Marriage is the only proper context for sexual intimacy.

Hopelessly antediluvian. And come to thnk of it, it was being broken even then.

Pornography – The Salvation Army opposes pornography in all of its forms.

Has anyone from the SA been on the webternet lately? Say, since 1995? I guess this laughable position means either you’re Amish or if you’re on the net, you must not click on the boobies. Good luck!

Suicide – Suicide is never an acceptable option

This “sanctity of life” angle is getting stale. Seriously, life isn’t that big a deal. It arose from random genetic mutations and will arise again, long after our feeble species has committed suicide on a global level. We’re so smart we destroy the only home we have, take that, you pro-lifers! Ask any Rwandans about the sanctity of life, seriously.

Their standard reference for all these positions: the Bible. Of course, it’s not even a surprise, but just so we know.

I used to feel bad about walking past those people with extremely bored expressions as they dingled their bells, but no more. Now I’m free of guilt, something religious people will seldom be.

In their defense, SA does have some very good points, such as helping the poor, feeding the homeless, endless compassion (unless you’re gay) and so on. If you feel these outweigh their outmoded moral stance on some of the above, go ahead and donate. My money’s staying firmly in my pocket. In return, I might actually go help at a soup kitchen or help some recent immigrants with English or something. We shall see.

So it seems that not all the creationist idiots in the world are confined to Kansas or Alabama. Romania has just done something incredibly stupid. I guess they’re in a mad hurry to live up to Stoker’s dramatization of Transylvanians as barbaric, mindless peasants, obsessed with religious symbolism. To quote Elizabeth Miller:

Its inhabitants are still depicted as backward peasants who hold fast to their primitive and superstitious past, who still hang garlic on their windows to keep vampires away, and who would never venture out at night without a crucifix in hand.

Why this vitriol against the bumpinks of the Carpathian? Well, they’ve just banned the teaching of evolution from the national curriculum, opting for a more “balanced” worldview, which of course, consists of liberal doses of balderdash from everyone’s favourite sci-fi/fantasy novel: the Bible.

Some choice excerpts from the news article:

Evolution has been removed from the school curriculum in a move which, pressure groups argue, distorts children’s understanding of how the world came into being.

Meanwhile, religious studies classes continue to tell Romanian children that God made the world in seven days.

Followed by

Meanwhile, in religious classes, pupils are taught that the world was created in seven days and God made plants on the third day and the sun on the fourth. Textbooks claim the first man was Adam, who was ‘made of ground’, and that Eve, the first woman, was made from one of her husband’s ribs.

“The Romanian state, whether it intends or not, offers pupils a unique perspective on the world, the religious one, without any critical scientific or philosophical offset,” argues Cernea.

And finally, one benefit of being a religious person, sleeping in on Sundays:

At present, children are taught religious classes from ages seven to 18. This is mostly an Orthodox curriculum. They are also taught that to sleep in on Sunday mornings is bad because children should be going to church.

And why is this not surprising at all?

But there are new proposals to make all religious classes compulsory for the education system, regardless of the parents’ wishes.

I can just see all the other fundamentalists living in other, saner secular societies nodding their heads and wishing their countries were more like Romania. “We need to be more like that”, they whisper to each other, “this liberal, atheist, gay, heathen, multicultural, leftist, feminist, 9/11, UFO, non WASP, Zionist, Manson-family, Commie agenda leaves no place for rational people like us”. Suckers!

Here’s the source.

Next target, Chemistry!

Don’t laugh. In a country stupid enough to allow this, you never know what’s coming. Then again, ridicule is a powerful weapon, so disdain away.

Check this simple flowchart out. What’s next, all men have to grow their beards and spend 4 hrs a day in the church/temple/mosque/synagogue brainwashing camp?

The most telling fact: these are the lunatic ravings (“thoughts” was too sane a word) of a woman, not some unenlightened, redneck male stuck in 1233. Your own kind always knows how to hurt you best.

I’m sitting in the cafeteria at SFU, waiting for my girlfriend, making a move in Scrabble online. Just a few minutes ago I’d realized that I waste too much time and energy hating religion, it’s just not worth it. As I sit there, basking in my newfound tolerance, I’m approached by two strangers. They walk up to my booth and ask me if I mind answering a few questions, since they’re doing a survey. I tell them I don’t mind, I have some time to kill. They sidle into the vacant seat in the booth I’m in and the first one says:

#1: We’d like to ask you some questions about God and spirituality.
#2: Oh yes *huge smile*
Me: *doing a double take inside, since I’d just sworn off the topic* Sure fellas, what’re your questions. *meanwhile, I have the biggest grin ever on the inside of my head*
#1: Well, you see, we’re just asking students where they stand on this topic. Do you believe in God?
Me: No
#1: I see, when did you arrive at this conclusion, recently?
Me: A few years ago, when I was 12 or 13
#2: Can I ask why you don’t believe in God?
Me: There is no evidence, that’s all.
#1: I see, so no verifiable way to document the existence of God, is that it?
Me: Exactly.
#1: And is that the only reason you don’t believe in God?
Me: Yep, seems like the only reason it would take, don’t you think? There is no evidence, so I don’t see the need to believe in it. I mean, you’re free to believe in it, for psychological comfort or spiritual solace or whatever you might need from it.
#2: Ok, but there is another side as well, if you choose to look at it that way. What if, instead of believing that because there is no evidence, there is no God, instead believing that there is a God and no evidence yet.
Me: What are your degrees in? Arts?
#1: Biology
#2: *mumbles something I didn’t quite catch*
Me: Well, then you know how the scientific method works. You formulate a hypothesis, then find supporting evidence, if none exists, you look for other theories. Simple as that. I mean, you’re free to worship anything, you can worship that bus stop for all I care, it’s just not for me.
#1: Haha, I see
#2: *Smiles*
#1: So it’s just the lack of evidence that’s keeping you from believing in God then. But some people think there is evidence. How about proving that there is no God, as opposed to proving that there is God?
Me: Well, if I may use such a term, that is the “wrong” approach. The onus of proof is always on the claimant. If I come to you and say, I saw Santa Claus in New Westminster, I have to prove that he was there, you don’t have to prove that he wasn’t.
#1: I see, so how about spirituality?
Me: I think it’s all bunk. In the end, it comes down to faith. If I may say so, I’ve debated this exact matter with some of my religious friends and in the end it comes down to faith, to what they “feel” is right, it’s all in their head, no one else can feel it.
#1: I see, so do you believe in an afterlife?
Me: No
#1: So when we die, we rot, that’s it?
Me: Yep.
#2: You see, we’re from the Christian Works Ministry and we’re canvassing students’ opinions on this topic.
Me: I see.
#1: So what are you studying here at SFU?

And the rest of the conversation was small talk, and then they left. So I stuck to my resolution to be nice. But this merely proves my point that individuals are nice, it’s merely the institution of organized religion that is evil. Of course, this doesn’t apply to fundamentalists of any sort.

to make your head explode!

A Muslim Astronaut’s Dilemma: How to Face Mecca From Space
By Patrick Di Justo

Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor has a problem. Two problems. The first is that Mecca keeps moving.

Well, not really. It’s Shukor who’ll be moving. As Malaysia’s first astronaut, he’s scheduled to lift off October 10 in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft for a nine-day visit during the holy month of Ramadan to the International Space Station.

He’s a devout Muslim and when he says his daily prayers he wants to face Mecca, specifically the Ka’aba, the holiest place in Islam (“Turn then thy face towards the Sacred Mosque: wherever ye are, turn your faces towards it …. ” The Quran, Al-Baqarah, 2:149).

That’s where the trouble comes in. From ISS, orbiting 220 miles above the surface of the Earth, the qibla (an Arabic word meaning the direction a Muslim should pray toward Mecca) changes from second to second. During some parts of the space station’s orbit, the qibla can move nearly 180 degrees during the course of a single prayer. What’s a devout Muslim to do?

“As a Muslim, I do hope to do my responsibilities,” Shukor says. “I do hope to fast in space.”

Malaysia’s space agency, Angkasa, convened a conference of 150 Islamic scientists and scholars last year to wrestle with these and other questions. The resulting document (.doc), “A Guideline of Performing Ibadah (worship) at the International Space Station (ISS)”, was approved by Malaysia’s National Fatwa Council earlier this year. According to the report, determining the qibla should be “based on what is possible” for the astronaut, and can be prioritized this way: 1) the Ka’aba, 2) the projection of Ka’aba, 3) the Earth, 4) wherever.

This leads to Shukor’s second problem. There are two distinct schools of thought for determining the qibla: the commonly used Great Circle method, and the less common rhumb-line method. Looking at a flat map using any standard projection shows that a rhumb line (a line that cuts equal angles across all lines of longitude) drawn from, say, the Johnson Space Center in Houston to Mecca runs east-southeast. The numbers also bear this out — the space center is to the north and west of the Ka’aba, so any travel to the holy city should naturally be to the southeast.

Lay a string across a globe, however, and everything changes. A great circle — the shortest distance between two points on a sphere — between Houston and Mecca initially arcs to the northeast, then curves southward to the Saudi peninsula. Islamic scientists knew as early as the ninth century CE that the great circle route provided the shortest path to Mecca from anywhere in the world, even though it may in some places seem counterintuitive (Muslims in Alaska, for example, pray facing almost due north). Great circle formulae are at the root of nearly every online qibla compass.

Dr. Kamal Abdali, a cartographer who is also Muslim and who has written (.pdf) extensively on determining the qibla, favors the great circle route, but adds, “Prayer is not supposed to be a gymnastic exercise. One is supposed to concentrate on the prayer rather the exact orientation.” He points out that in a train or plane, it’s customary to start in the qibla direction but then continue the prayer without worrying about possible changes in position.

But how does that work in space? Mathematically, Shukor would need to place both ISS and Mecca on the same imaginary sphere — by either comparing the place on Earth directly beneath ISS with the real Ka’aba, or by projecting the Ka’aba into space (the option recommended by the Fatwa Council).

Yet the option to pray while facing a point in space brings up another problem. Muslims face the ground to pray, in part to avoid any hint of pagan sun or moon worship (“Prostrate yourselves not to the sun nor to the moon, but prostrate yourselves to Allah Who created them, if you (really) worship Him” (The Quran, Fussilat 41:37). If the Ka’aba projection happens to line up with the sun or moon, purists might believe the prayer invalid.

For now, Shukor is keeping the details of his plans fluid until he is actually on board ISS, a point with which Dr. Khaleel Mohammed, assistant professor of religion at San Diego State University, concurs. “In space,” Mohammed points out, “the ritual prayer might be offset for more of a prayer that is allowed when on jihad … for the lack of gravity and directional accuracy makes it legitimate to do as one sees fit. God does not take a person to task for that which is beyond his/her ability to work with.”

Can you believe this rubbish? I thought astronauts were supposed to be smart, score one for metaphysical supernatural gibberish. If man wasn’t meant to rise above his station and all that rot, then why is this fellow in space? Doesn’t he have women to oppress or minorities to disparage or children to brainwash with hate or whatever it is religious people do on a daily basis.

Questions like these will continue as more and more religious astronauts travel into space. When is sunset in low Earth orbit if you’re experiencing a dozen sunrises and sunsets in every 24-hour period? When does Sabbath begin on the moon, where the sun sets once a month? When is the first sighting of the crescent moon if you’re on Mars? Religious councils of all faiths will have plenty to keep them busy for years.

Questions like these would not arise if they simply didn’t send religious twits into space. On the other hand, if only they did and they met extraterrestrial entities, who would simply laugh for a millennia straight after hearing this ludicrous “God” hogwash. Or even better, perhaps the aliens would think of us as a cosmic shithole, something to be avoided for another 3 billion years until we either wiped ourselves out or grew up, mentally and physically, to participate meaningfully in cosmic exploration. Which wouldn’t be such a bad idea after all. I think the solution is clear.

Taken from here.

Remember kids, Santa Claus doesn’t exist, and neither do any of the other fairy tale figures everyone tells you to believe in.

If only this DID come with this, especially for the young and impressionable who get sucked in at such a tender age.

Thanks to Eddy.