Miscellanea Agnostica

This post isn’t about religion or atheism. It is, however, about the twisted thinking that many people engage in. Illogic in the U.S. is so pervasive and insidious, that you can find it in even the most innocuous “celebrity news” items. Since this is such a brilliant example of the phenomenon, I thought it worth remarking on. Hopefully you will be able to use this example to see other kinds of illogic in other places.

Perhaps Jerry Lewis was on his way to Dennis Farina’s house.

The original Nutty Professor was briefly detained Friday at Las Vegas’ McCarran International Airport after trying to board a flight to Detroit with an unloaded gun in his carry-on luggage.

Police confiscated the .22-caliber Beretta, and Lewis was cited for carrying a concealed weapon without a permit. …

[A]ccording to his manager, the so-called weapon was actually a hollowed-out prop gun that wasn’t capable of firing.

Las Vegas Metropolitan Police spokesman Officer Bill Cassell said, however, if it had really been a shell of a gun, “it wouldn’t be a weapon, and we couldn’t cite him for carrying a weapon.”

There, did you catch it? The illogic here comes in the form of circular reasoning and is in the police spokesman’s comment. He’s denying the gun could have been a non-functional prop, since if it had been one, it wouldn’t have been an actionable offense; since action had been taken, we know it cannot have been a prop gun.

Casell’s comment is so stunningly asinine that I find it difficult to believe a professional spokesman said it — but there it is, a shining example of brazen illogic and fallacy.

Every copy of the U.S. Constitution that I’ve ever seen has had the following as part of Article VI section 3:

no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States

This clause is famous enough to have its own moniker, that being the “no religious test clause.” Oddly, however, the Justice Department under former A.G. Alberto Gonzales appears not to have known about its existence. The New York Times reports on Justice hirings based on prospect’s attitudes toward God and other religious notions (such as having to be anti-abortion):

In forwarding a résumé in 2006 from a lawyer who was working for the Federalist Society, [Gonzales deputy Monica] Goodling sent an e-mail message to the head of the Office of Legal Counsel, Steven Bradbury, saying: “Am attaching a résumé for a young, conservative female lawyer.” Ms. Goodling interviewed the woman and wrote in her notes such phrases as “pro-God in public life,” and “pro-marriage, anti-civil union.” The woman was eventually hired as a career prosecutor.

Gee, and here I thought that the Justice Department, which should be run by lawyers, would know that the Constitution doesn’t permit this sort of qualification. This revelation comes from the Justice Department itself, under the same presidential administration, so this report cannot easily be dismissed as “partisan” — since it’s not!

Just another example of how sufficiently-ardent Christians will stop at nothing to bend the country to their will — they’re willing to violate the explicit terms of the Constitution in Jesus’ name!

The shooting that took place yesterday in a Knoxville, TN church is, by now, well known. Initially folks of the Rightward persuasion declared it must have been a “hate crime” against Christians by a raging atheist. Unfortunately that turns out not to have been true. Here are the facts which weigh against this belief:

1. The shooting took place in a Unitarian-Universalist church. The UUC is not exactly a Christian church, however; it embraces multiple doctrines (that’s what the “Universalist” in its name means — it views spiritual truths as being universal to all religions). It’s likely many Christians were there, but chances are, not all were. If Jim Adkisson, the shooter, were trying to gun down Christians, he picked the wrong place to do it.

2. He wrote a letter explicitly stating who his targets were, and they were not “Christians” — he was targeting, instead, “gays” and “liberal views,” blaming them for things which had gone wrong in his life. While some Christians are politically liberal and some denominations accept gays, not all do, and in fact, most denominations decry both gays and political liberalism.

3. That he chose a UU church shows that he was, in fact, more interested in targeting gays and liberals, since the UU as an organization tends to be much more politically liberal than Christian denominations, and accepts gays as members. Had he gone to — say — a Baptist church, it would have been very unlikely he’d have encountered any liberals or gays.

Early reports had pointed out that Adkisson complained about Christians, for instance railing against a woman who told him his daughter had attended a Bible college. This fits, of course, with most Christians’ inherent compulsion to feel persecuted, and the story was told according to this angle — until Adkisson’s letter surfaced, showing his motivation to be much more personal and not a philosophically-driven effort to wipe out Christians just because they’re Christians.

So it turns out this was not a “hate crime” against Christians … it was against people of two classes that Adkisson had a personal grudge against.

Folks on the Right were — and possibly still are — railing about this being a “hate crime” because largely they despise the very notion of “hate crime.” They fear that any crime by a Christian against, say, a gay person — regardless of whether or not religion or sexual orientation played a part in the particular event — would have “hate crime” charges tacked on for added measure. Some go further, claiming that all “hate crime” legislation is, by definition, an attempt to “silence” all Christians everywhere. This sort of paranoia is, of course, yet another example of the Christian Martyr Complex, which I already mentioned. While I consider “hate crime” laws to be dubious at best — after all, aren’t all violent crimes “hate” crimes? — this fear is completely irrational.

At any rate, hopefully the Right will stop claiming this crime is an anti-Christian massacre, because truthfully, it wasn’t — and they know it.

A wrestling coach at a high school in Dearborn, MI — which has a relatively high Arab population — has lost his job due to his assistant who tried to convert kids to Christianity:

A veteran wrestling coach at Fordson High School lost his job amid concerns that his one-time assistant, who is a local minister and parent of a wrestler, attempts to convert local Muslim youths to Christianity.

The decision not to renew the contract of Jerry Marszalek, a coach for 35 years at Fordson, sparked a firestorm of controversy, with 200-300 parents packing a Board of Education meeting Tuesday night to support the decision of the school’s principal, Imad Fadlallah. The board directed administrators to consider reviewing the source of complaints against Fadlallah.

The developments occurred as officials and parents grapple with conflicts over faith, education and the future of a predominantly Muslim school, amid one of the largest Arab populations in the country. …

According to Marszalek, parents and community leaders, Fadlallah and other parents have long been concerned about contacts between the wrestling team and a local clergyman, the Rev. Trey Hancock of the Dearborn Assembly of God.

Hancock, who helped Marszalek with the team for 10 years, and whose son, Paul, is now a member, confirmed that he attempts to convert Muslim youths to Christianity and that he baptized a 15-year-old Muslim student in Port Huron a few years ago.

The resulting outrage among the Religious Right™ (of the Christian variety, of course) has been palpable. Principal Fadlallah has been accused of hitting a student, apparently as part of an effort to get him fired.

I’m always amazed at the lengths Christians go to in order to express themselves religiously; in this case:

1. By breaking the law (kids are not supposed to be proselytized to in public schools)
2. Engaging in behavior that got someone else fired (Hancock’s missionizing made Marszalek lose his job)
3. Trumping up accusations against someone in retaliation

This is supposed to be an example of righteous, exemplary behavior on the part of Christians? Really?

Christians, see if you can get this: Leave other people alone, especially kids in public schools whom you are not allowed to proselytize to. Is there some part of this which is not clear to you?

Oh, and spare me the sanctimonious responses about having “religious freedom.” First of all, your freedom ends where other peoples’ begins; Muslims who want to remain Muslim are just as entitled to do so, as you are to remain Christian. Second, this is not part of an effort to stamp out Christianity. No such movement exists and in fact it could never happen since c. 80% of the country is Christian. That you think it’s happening is solely a figment of your hyperreligious imagination and is the natural product of your own religion. You cannot help but feel this way — nevertheless you have no right to force your own theological delusions on the rest of the world.

For me this item is big news. Most other people won’t really be interested — unfortunately. Hopefully you will be. It seems a Bible from classical times, the Codex Sinaiticus, will soon be made available online. This codex is a nearly-complete Bible of the 4th century. It has a lot to tell us about early Christianity, if we take the time to listen.

It contains most of the Old Testament in Greek, known as the Septuagint, and almost all of the modern New Testament, along with two additional books, the Epistle of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas. It is very likely that whoever penned this codex considered these two additional books to be “canon” (even though, at that time, no decisive canon existed). Among the many other differences between modern Bibles and the Codex, in this ancient collection the gospel of Mark ends abruptly with the three women who found Jesus’ empty tomb running off in fear. (As it turns out, all the earliest copies of Mark end at this point, so in this the Codex is not unique.)

What’s remarkable is that it is being assembled and placed online at all. The Codex is actually no longer a single book; it’s in pieces around the world as a result of its strange history. The German scholar Constantin von Tischendorf found some loose vellum pages, in Greek, which had once been part of a larger codex, in the monastery of St Catherine in the Sinai region in the 19th century.

The full story of how the monks found the rest of it, and it ended up in pieces, scattered around, is a convoluted one and not a tale I can tell very well here; see the Answers.Com entry on the Codex for more information.

I had never thought the pieces could ever be assembled in one place — even if only online and not physically — but apparently it’s being done. But the British Museum is doing it, and the world will be a better place for it, if only to shed light on the textual history of the Bible books. If nothing else this will debunk the common myth among Christians that the Bible books have been unchanged since they were first written … this is, of course, quite untrue.

On his trip to the Middle East, Barack Obama had the following to say about the modern state of Israel:

Barack Obama called Israel a “miracle” as he courted Jewish voters back home Wednesday …

Woops, looks as if the Senator and presidential candidate misspoke. The modern state of Israel is not a “miracle” if one defines that as an event of divine intervention. Far from it. It was founded by human beings who did human work. God had nothing to do with it.

If Israel is to survive — and if it is to reach some accord with Palestinian Arabs and bring peace to the Middle East — that will have been accomplished by (yep!) human beings, not by God.

Obama essentially is robbing human beings of credit for what they accomplished, by stating that their actions were not important, it was God alone who created Israel. Not only is this factually untrue, it’s obviously insulting to people who’ve given a great deal … in some cases up to and including their lives … for their state. At the very least he owes them an apology (which, I suspect, will never be offered).

It’s surprising to think that educated Americans in the 21st century (such as the Senator) still talk about “miracles,” especially given that — as David Hume logically demonstrated centuries ago — there can never be any such thing as a definite, certain “miracle.”

In a time when “flip-flopping” is considered a cardinal sin, Dr James Dobson, the ruling prince of the Religious Right™ appears poised to commit an egregious flip-flop of his own:

The AP reports, “Conservative Christian leader James Dobson has softened his stance against Republican presidential hopeful John McCain, saying he could reverse his position and endorse the Arizona senator despite serious misgivings. ‘I never thought I would hear myself saying this,’ Dobson said in a radio broadcast to air Monday. ‘… While I am not endorsing Senator John McCain, the possibility is there that I might.’”

You’ll note the twisted language Dobson used — “I’m not endorsing McCain, but I might” — which shows just how tortured the Dobster must feel over this. As I blogged earlier, just a few weeks ago the Dobster had vehemently denied the slightest possibility of any support for McCain, going so far as to declare his sheep “stay-at-homes” rather than vote for a conservative who’s not quite conservative enough for him. Now he’s hedging, implying he might.

This is precious, especially since that the idea that someone might “flip-flop” sends shivers down the horrifically righteous spines of the morally straitjacketed Religious Right™. The political reality that the Dobster will not get a slavering mindless evangelical into the White House this year must have unhinged him.

Of course, the poor man need not have put himself through these contortions; it’s not acceptable for a tax-exempt organization to endorse a political candidate. I’ve tried, but somehow cannot find how it is that religious groups and their leaders are entitled to do so and remain tax-exempt. Maybe someday the IRS will do its job and stop America’s clergy from doing this … but I’m not going to hold my breath waiting for it to happen.

In his defense of Christian exclusivity (i.e. that there is no salvation without Jesus Christ), Cal Thomas trots out an old apologists’ argument:

It finds most Americans believe there are many ways to salvation besides their own faith. Most disturbing of all is the majority of self-identified evangelical Christians who believe this.

Apparently they must think Jesus was a liar, or mistaken, when he said: “I am the way, the truth and the life; no man comes to the Father but by me.”

Thomas implies here that it’s scandalous that anyone might think Jesus could have lied … so — since we know this accusation is such an outrage that it cannot possibly be true — then of course he is the only way.

Unfortunately Thomas forgets a few things:

1. Do we even know there was a Jesus who said such a thing? (As it turns out, Cal, Jesus’ existence is not the least bit certain).

2. Even if Jesus did exist, do we know he said such a thing? (No, Cal, we only have this from the evangelists, who wrote decades afterward … not the most reliable accounts.)

3. Third, if Jesus lived and if he actually said them … ? Yes, Cal, he may actually have lied.

You read that right. I did, indeed, dare say it: Jesus may have been a liar. But that assumes he lived, which is not certain, and that he said this, which in turn is even more uncertain.

It’s time people stopped letting their assumptions and their outrage guide them.

The Hartford Courant ran a story recently on a restaurant not far from where I live. The building dates back to Revolutionary times (1780, I believe). For years I’ve heard stories about it being haunted. But now the Courant proudly declares — get this! — that the building is known to be haunted:

The ghost of Abigail Pettibone is known to haunt the upstairs of the locally famous Pettibone’s Tavern, which dates from the 18th century.

As I said, I’ve heard stories all my life. Rumors that the building was haunted. Tales about the ghost that lurks there. Assumptions about why she lingers there. And so on.

But until I read this, I had not realized that it was known to have been haunted. As in, certain that it’s haunted, or proven to be haunted.

This is interesting. I must have missed something, because a demonstrable haunting would have made the news — and much further away than just my part of Connecticut.

Sorry, but the reporter is incorrect. The haunting of Pettibone’s Taven is not “known.” It may be “assumed” to be haunted, or “claimed” to be haunted … but it is most certainly not “known” to be haunted.

If it were, I’d say someone ought to apply to the James Randi Paranormal Challenge and make a cool million bucks before the prize runs out next year!

These days, in the US and the rest of the occidental world, it’s not uncommon to think of religion as promoting peace. The Quakers, for example, were pacifists; many Abolitionists were strongly religious; and more recently the most prominent leader of the civil-rights movement, Martin Luther King Jr, was a pastor who promoted non-violent resistance to racism. A column in today’s USA Today follows this reasoning, and claims that religion can stop wars:

Faith is sometimes the fuel that feeds conflict and spreads strife. History is a witness to this. But lest we forget, believers also can be the salve to bring people and religions back together. …

Religion — a solution to the problem of religiously motivated conflict and violence? Yes, actually. Because in their best traditions, the world’s two dominant faiths do promote peace, both through their central teachings and the lessons-by-example taught every day by innumerable Muslims and Christians who take their scriptures seriously.

The author cites examples of this phenomenon in, for example, some recent defections from al-Qaeda, and the request for “understanding” by Christians, offered by some 138 Muslim scholars, a little over a year and a half ago.

I hate to say it but these are fairly meager examples, given the much-larger scale of religiously-fueled violence that has taken place — and which is currently taking place (as in the Palestinian conflict, among others).

And to be honest, many of the positive religiously-inspired movements I mentioned already (e.g. abolition, and civil rights) had strong secular components that went along for the ride; among abolitionists were many northern capitalists who hoped to gain from the decline of the southern economy if slavery ended, and the civil rights movement of the 60s was not made up solely of religious people, but was aided by secular organizations as well, such as the ACLU. While both of these had strong religious components, they were not solely religious movements.

Articles like this one tend to gloss over the damage that religion has done, and amount to an attempt to whitewash the harm that centuries of religious-inspired violence has done to humanity. It serves no one to minimize the horrors of religion, precisely because, without keeping this in mind, it’s far too easy for it to happen again. It likewise does little good to cite a couple weak examples of religion fostering peace, and assume that religion automatically will do so again. It won’t — and in fact, it can’t, unless people make it happen.

Another way of putting it is: Religion cannot and will not save humanity; only humanity can save itself. We will either choose to live with one another, or we won’t. Religion will not make that happen, all by itself. It will take societal maturity, willpower, patience, determination, and tolerance. None of these can be forced on people from pulpits or by reading sacred texts.