"I will not forget one line of this."

I finally have the words for what I've been trying to say.

I need to get my life together, and I can't do that here. There's too much of what I was, too many memories.

I've done this before, stopped writing here, but this will be the last time. And this time, it's not out of frustration, anger, or sadness.

The me that was a follower of Christ, that grew up in that subculture and made that his identity, is gone. I can't keep going on pretending like my future has anything to do with it any longer. There is no more processing in writing necessary, it's done. I could write an entire paragraph blaming others for the pain I've experienced, or explaining how everything I say about this is now useless, but that would also be pointless. It's time that I stopped living in the lies I was told growing up by so many beautiful, well-meaning, and loving people, and accept that it's all been a nice story. It's time that bitterness became something that was, and it's time I accept what I've known for way too long. The philosopher is dead, and will make cognitive dissonance no longer. There need not be cognitive dissonance any longer in my mind when there is truth, and when freedom has replaced what once was magnificent and delusional purpose.

I plan to continue writing one day, but not here, and not in the way I have. It's useless, because the more I bare my soul here, the more people will take it for granted, the more I'll be tied to what I used to be, and the more bitter I will become at humanity and their endless waiting to speak, their inability to listen when they can cleverly disregard others and smugly think they know it all. As it stands, I can barely take myself or anything I think seriously, and anyone that disagrees with me runs me over, while I help them do it. That's no way to live.

So I'm done with this blog and what it stands for. This is merely a symbol of what I have to do next. Living in the past is done, because there is so much more to see. Observing does not necessitate pontificating, and experiencing does not necessitate explaining. I'll no longer be a know-it-all or the egotist I once was. I'm a fool, and the fool's place is to be quiet and to help others in any small way he can. In addition, I choose to live well and learn all I can.

Should I choose to write more, there will be one more post here linking you, my readers, to where you can read it. It will be different, but it will still be me. But this is the last time I'll tell you what's really on my mind here.

There is still the pain, and it is a lot of pain even still. But there is an infinity of possibility ahead of me, making that pain unimportant. Sometimes the best way to heal is to move on, and this blog is the last vestige of the pain I've been dragging around for way too long. It's done.

Readers: live well!

Something to Believe In

I've found that words don't come easy for me lately, when it comes to talking about the important things in life. I used to be asked, seemingly out of the blue, what it is that I believe. It's a hard question to answer because it's not just asking what you believe, but what is important to you. I think I have an answer.

A few years ago, my answer would have been something along the lines of "Love," with a dual meaning of god. Unconditional love, the perfect way that I longed to be real. But something felt wrong with that answer, and I couldn't figure out what it was. However, I felt it in what was around me. I saw it when people would gloss over other people with their eyes, continually wait for their turn to speak, brazenly show their apathy about other peoples' difficulties that were supposed to be their friends. I watched as people that touted love as the supreme virtue disregarded and minimized the opinions of those not like themselves, and I began to wonder if I did the same thing.

I've missed the accusations that used to get flung at me within Christian culture. For me, it was a confirmation that I was being compassionate, that I was listening to all sides of a story, that I was at least trying to be objective. It is that intuitive knowledge that began to disturb me most of all, that largely, if you ask questions and are unafraid of answers, if you seek to be kind and compassionate in what you do, and if you listen to the people you're told not to, you will end up with people praying for your salvation at best, and attacking you and calling you sub-Christian or heretical at worst. It becomes a badge of honor to be attacked, a sign that you were doing the right thing.

The problem is, this only happens if you still claim the name "Christian" and believe in god. Atheism is treated with detached disdain and condescending dismissal by some of the religious "intellectuals," and with confusion and by being ignored by others of the faithful. Truly, it's scary to some people when someone thinks differently than they do. Some have to find convenient ways of disregarding or defeating the evil atheists. I sometimes will seek out these people, the ones that will become angry with me and try to defeat me, because it demonstrates some level of caring from an institution/movement that labeled me unacceptable and invisible long ago.

This is not a cry for help. This is not me being depressed or sad because no one's paying attention to me. This is an observation that I find sad. Those who profess and worship unconditional love fail to show even a basic ability to listen to anyone that isn't within their group, and then disdain those unlike them for attempting to form some kind of community, by calling it a "religion,"  or "church." It's unfortunate, and I am sad to see that otherwise reasonable, kind people can be so hostile and cold to those not like them. Ignorance just makes it worse.

The reason I know this is not merely observation, but because I've done it. I understand how freaked out you can get when you talk to an atheist. You think they've got all of these philosophical arguments that they've designed just to trick you, or they treat science as a religion, or they're going to get angry and yell in your face if you say you believe in god or are religious. Furthermore, it's easy to dismiss people who don't think like you do instead of ask questions and listen, especially if they're scary or easy to write off. This is a human trait that religion happens to exacerbate with its' tribal nature, but it's by no means confined to the religious.

People want to be known and heard and accepted. It floods every piece of media we consume. We watch how even the most despicable characters are listened to, how they all have some redeeming characteristic, even if they're a "high functioning sociopath" or something of that nature, or perhaps they're just interesting. The problem is, many people think that they're the interesting one, and that everyone else should be interested in them.

The truth is, none of us know what the hell is going on in this life. We may think we know, or we may have some pretty good ideas, but there's always something that needs to be rationalized, always something to get around so that we can keep going until we either can't anymore, or we stop listening to hold onto what is important to us.

It's hard to continue to be enraged by the injustice you see when you realize this. You instead want to correct it in order to make things better. You want to shake the person who seems to have a soul that's asleep, drifting through life without caring. You want to argue down the angry fundamentalist just so he'll realize how destructive he's being. You want to tear down the false compassion you see when people don't understand those who are different and are condescending and ignorant in their attempt to be kind. You want to scream down the people that are going on and on about how terrible another group that they don't understand is, like atheists, often claiming to be a former one themselves who's "recovered" in order to fabricate an understanding they do not possess, and display their ignorance of every time they open their mouth. And most of all, when you see these in yourself, you want to correct it immediately, no matter the cost, just so you won't hurt anyone else. The past has shown you how hurtful you can be, and you want to do some good, to make people happy and to be happy yourself in life.

I believe in happiness. Not simply my happiness, but in happiness for everyone. I think it's a goal worth striving for. In a world full of people claiming confidence in their absolute morality and smug armchair philosophers who think people can be easily dismissed if they don't think the same way, happiness is an ideal that flies in the face of it all. There's power in the simplicity of it, and it moves a person forward like nothing else.

I'm still angry with those who've rejected me, and I don't know if that will change. It always hurts more when good people who were your friends either decide to or have to think of you as unacceptable, or when people you trust to help you decide to not care, or to work against your ability to move forward in life. However, I think if one thing can heal a person who's been wounded, it is long term happiness with their life, and in sharing that with those close to them. This is what I believe in, and I believe it because I choose to.

The Appeal of Mysticism

I wish to talk for a little while about my journey. Having not written here for a while, it seemed appropriate to put this down for others to see.

Nearly two years ago, I publicly announced that I was leaving my faith on this blog. What's happened since then has been both harder and more inspiring than I thought possible. It's changed me in ways I never thought would change, and I've moved on from many things I've written here, while embracing others.

You see, when I first asked the questions that lead me away from the faith of what I've come to think of as my "past life," I was just doing business as usual. Stuff came up, information about the scientific method, history, comparative religion, theology, and more than anything, the epistemology of mystical experiences. It was a messy time with a lot of messy questions, and I've come to believe that I should not have said things how I did at the time. However, had I not done so, I never would have come to understand the way people struggle.

You see, I was a member of the majority where I live. Sure, I was a Christian with some weird ideas and beliefs, but I was still a Christian. I thought it was persecution when arrogant Christian academics would call me a heretic or say I wasn't really a Christian, but there was always a network of people to fall back on, and you can always make new connections through the network that is the "church," as vague of a term as that is. I had never really learned what it meant to take people as they are, despite valuing it so highly, because everything had to fit into a framework where God exists and controls everything and if people don't believe in God, they can safely be disregarded.

I had never thought about what it was like to be disregarded until I found myself in this undeniable position of agnostic atheism through my studies, and through my experiences. I can talk to you about evolution, church history, the holes in theological systems and the ways people try to account for them, and even get into more advanced stuff like abiogenesis, metaphysics, and cosmology. These are all things I've looked at and studied, and there are those who have studied them so much they make me look like I know literally nothing. That's the trap of academia, you never have read enough. Your opinion, if it differs with that of another academic, is uninformed, uneducated, able to be disregarded. Yes, this applies to more than just religious academics.

I've realized one thing of late: I am no academic, at least not in the sense that some people I've met are. I do not wish to disregard others any longer, and I find compassion and acceptance much more valuable than rational certitude. Even writing this is hard for me because of how many times I have been told over the years that I don't care about the truth, because I differ from others in beliefs. I have committed the cardinal sin in the eyes of some: I have changed my mind based on new data, and correction has come to be an exciting experience, in most cases, unless it is one of the many condescending "corrections" that I've had to learn to deal with since my deconversion.

It is with all of this in mind that I have taken a long, hard look at mystical experiences. You see, god always exists in what we don't know, or perhaps she exists in the realm of the laws that allow our universe to function. Perhaps she exists within our minds, a byproduct of psychological complexity, consciousness manifesting and mirroring itself onto our thoughts in such a way that we transcend ourselves. That is beautiful, and I doubt I will ever stop thinking so, but why call this, the emergence of our consciousness into higher levels of self-awareness, "god"? Perhaps it fits for some, but for others, it carries way too much baggage.

One day, a long time ago, I was put in spontaneous tears a few hours after seeing the beauty in two of my friends deciding to spend their lives together. It's the only time I really remember crying in public, and it was a beautiful moment that was quickly interrupted by a man trying to help me, but assuming I was crying in shame and praying with me about sin in my life.

I have never forgotten this happening. It was probably the biggest turning point in my religious journey, and I've come to see what it represented as the biggest reason I have made my exit from religion. You see, this man had no idea what I was going through, what I was thinking, or what was happening inside me, but he took it on himself to bring correction to me, to make it okay. It disturbed and embarrassed me, brought me out of that place where I was appreciating something great, where I was feeling how far I had fallen short of that dream (I had just ended a relationship that was very serious weeks before), where I was seeing two people embrace something truly greater than either of them individually, and it had become a prayer session. A prayer session about shame and sin and correcting oneself.

In retrospect, I was disturbing others with my outburst, and he used a good method to bring that disturbance in line with the expected environment at the time, and probably just wanted for me not to suffer, as though it were a bad thing.

This is not an odd story in a religious setting. It's actually quite common. There are stories about people that can "sense" sin on others, and they use the social or religious power they have to try to correct it. I am certain that the man trying to help me in that instance had the best of intentions, but he lacked respect for another person's experience, he made it about his perceptions, and he imposed those on me in a vulnerable state.

When people ask me why I left religion, I often give academic answers. I've come to see this as an approach that should rarely be taken, as religion is not about that. I've often challenged religious people and have read multiple expositions on why someone believes in the face of our science, our history, and the lack of good evidence in each of these for a god. The answer always comes down to faith, or subjective mystical experience that somehow convinces a person that an institution that's endured for two millennia has power over every aspect of their lives, and they choose to live that way, falling in line with the authority.

To put it another way, a subjective question requires a subjective answer, because subjective experience is, in fact, of enormous value. However, religion attempts to move subjective experience toward an objective system, and we've seen the results.

My subjective experience with the church is one of abuse, disrespect, assumptions, and, probably the most damning of all, people being wrong. Being wrong is not a problem, it is an opportunity to learn, but when someone insists on their wrong subjective conclusions in the face of correction by people who would know (like the person they are concluding things about), there is a problem. When people are wrong about dogmas that cause significant suffering and rejection in the lives of others, that makes me mad.

I have nothing but respect for those who have had experiences that convince them of the existence of a god. I'll discuss Jesus, church history, theology, science, mystical experiences, or whatever with a person, but the moment it becomes about their experiences, that is not my territory to judge, and it never will be my place to say anything about it unless they want an opinion. 99% of the time people don't want an opinion, they want to be listened to, and to have another person accept them at face value.

My journey through atheism has lead me to value mystical experiences and peoples' religious convictions in their lives, but it has lead me to violently reject any and all authoritarian religion. In retrospect, this began a long time ago, and it's probably some of the cause of people calling me heretical or sub-Christian or whatever other word they wish to use. The Christianity I've experienced is about authoritarian submission, and that's a force I've learned to be extremely wary of. The only "type" of Christianity I've ever encountered that is not subject to this has nearly nothing to do with historic Christianity, and I find that to be interesting. The early church, the formation of the Orthodox and Roman Catholic churches, the Protestant Reformation...they all smack of rejecting previous authority and then imposing their own, and there's been enough blood shed over that nonsense, though I'm sure there will be plenty more. By stark contrast, there are those who wish to share the joy in what they've experienced, who do not have an agenda, who do not wish to force people to believe anything or disregard those that make them uncomfortable, and they freely help those less fortunate, often with no recognition whatsoever. I aspire to be one of those people, though I doubt I'll ever call anything good in someone's life a "god" or "jesus" thing.

There is nothing wrong with my experiences leading me to where I am now. I have not "only encountered hypocrites," I have encountered a lot of nice, generous and good religious people as well as those attempting to impose authoritarianism on everyone they can, and I will continue to encounter all of the above. My experiences are not "less" than another person's for any reason, though there are many more to have, many more things to change my mind about, and much more adventuring to do.

If there's one thing I have become convinced of by all of this, it is that I cannot make an objective conclusion from subjective data. So sure, god exists, but she exists in the minds of those who believe in her. Hence, I am an agnostic about the existence of god due to insufficient objective evidence, and that is the best description I can come up with for where I've arrived. It should be interesting to see where this goes.

Credibility, Ad Hominem, and Ghosts

If there is one thing that continuously confuses me, it is people that are hung up on talking about the credibility of an individual rather than the facts of an argument. I see it all over the place, and to a certain point I understand it.

If I were to make a claim, for example, that I see ghosts on October 31st every year in some location that no one ever is, and no one has ever witnessed it, then what I am doing is making a statement tied to my credibility. However, if someone tells me that they think I am a gullible sod that believes inane superstitions, then they are questioning my credibility. This is understandable and warranted, because I have no evidence for what I believe. This is an anecdotal experience, and someone has to believe me in order to believe it.

However, if I were to see a lot of ghosts on October 31st, and myself and a lot of other people correlate those experiences, we're starting to have a better case to consider. We now have to ask what would delude a large group of people into believing something, or if that thing is actually happening. We also have to define what was seen, and whether it actually was a ghost. In this case, though my credibility is not necessarily the only thing in question, it is reinforced by other anecdotal experiences, so that it need be considered moreso than some insane person seeing something on one else does and trying to convince people of that. The person may no longer have an agenda if a ton of other people agree with them.

Unless, of course, that witness is paying those other people a large sum of money to lie about it. That throws a wrench in the whole thing.

Why am I talking about this? Because the way to settle the question of whether ghosts appear on October 31st is to get some evidence that it is happening. This doesn't mean, necessarily, to establish what the ghosts are or why/how it is happening, just that there's evidence that it is happening. The easiest way is probably to get a video recording that can be confirmed to be legitimate without tampering (a difficult task). This is evidence, and it makes the question of my credibility irrelevant.

So, if I am the only one that sees ghosts on October 31st, and I make a video of it and there are forensic tests done on the video to confirm its' legitimacy, then it doesn't matter what I stand to gain from it, whether I'm paying people to agree with me, whether I am a terrible person or a blight on society. I am still correct about this one thing, and we can deduce from there to find out more.

This is why I do not understand the question of credibility. To be sure, there are cases where it is important. However, even if there is a large group of people that all think the same thing and they have high levels of it in the form of qualifications, ethical standards, attractiveness, reliability, etc., they can still be totally incorrect. The human capacity for self-delusion alone makes this so, and large groups have, historically, all agreed on things that are, in retrospect, insane when we find evidence to the contrary. We've not only agreed on it, we have killed others who disagree, we have ostracized and hurt people that disagree, and we have created entire groups devoted to telling ourselves that we're right.

To make matters worse, this level of groupthink makes a fallacy called Ad Hominem very effective. Ad Hominem is rejecting a proposition on the basis of some irrelevant fact about the author of or the person presenting the claim or argument. So say someone claims something for which there is evidence, such as say, the heliocentricity of the solar system (sun at the center, planets and other bodies orbiting), and they show the evidence. Let's say, for the sake of argument, that this person has no qualifications that others do who have a vested interest in that area, and the people with the credibility simply cite that that person doesn't know what they're talking about, and explain how little they are qualified to state such things. Their qualifications, by contrast, show that they know what they are talking about, and they believe that the solar system's center is Earth. Clearly, the sun goes across the sky and comes up every day, and sets every night, as do other bodies that have been identified as planets.

In this case, the geocentrists' claim is supported by a fallacy of perspective. We appear to, intuitively, be at the center of all we see. So clearly, we are, and what business has the man with no qualifications to say otherwise?

Well, he has evidence. The question of where we are in the solar system is not a matter of qualifications or credibility, it is a matter of evidence. Observations and deduction from those observations lead to a conclusion that anyone can see.

Of course, we end up in deeper intellectual water when we discuss philosophy, and deep questions like the existence of god and the implications of scientific discoveries. As familiar as the example of heliocentrism should be the theory of evolution, which is railed against constantly by those with a vested interest in it being untrue, and which I have written about previously. The evidence for evolution is overwhelming, and it is still denied with no counter-evidence, accompanied by irrelevant details about credibility, oftentimes attacking the credibility of the scientific community itself.

So why the irrelevant details being thrown around? Evolution is a threat to people with an interest in the things it addresses, just as heliocentrism was. In its' time, heliocentrism was a threat to the authority of the church, just as evolution has been today. This is slowly becoming not the case as the evidence is slowly becoming undeniable to all but certain sects, but what should be obvious to the observer is that credibility is a matter of authority in cases like these, whereas evidence can ignore that entirely. I have no scientific qualifications, but if I prove something and the scientific community all tries to disprove it and fails/ends up proving it, I have made a discovery, regardless of whether I have the credibility to back it up.

I want to come back around to the example of the ghost. You see, there's no totally reliable evidence that ghosts actually exist, but some people tend to think they do. People that are otherwise reasonable and rational people, people interested in evidence, think that ghosts exist. Ghosts are usually witnessed visually, and sometimes audibly, but they are typically believed to be the spirits of the dead, something beyond measuring in all other ways than by sight or sound, and no evidence has been conclusively proven using these criteria.

They may exist, but to choose to think they exist is a belief, a type of faith. You either have your own experience, or you believe the anecdotes of others. There may even be circumstantial evidence of their existence, like things that could only be caused by ghosts (objects falling over, doors closing). However, those things do not constitute evidence, as they can be caused by any number of things. Again, all of what one feels about ghosts could be correct. But it is a belief, not evidence.

Why does this matter? Because if you recall, we have discussed that evidence preempts this whole question of credibility. So I could simply say that that belief is incorrect, and I could be just as correct about the issue as the other person is. We could agree to disagree, or the believer could become angry that I don't believe. He could say that it should be relevant to my life, because ghosts are going to end the world. He could even say that they're a superior form of life and deserve veneration in some respects, and because they deserve it, I should bow down. Perhaps a ghost is the source of our world or our universe or all of reality, and that all scientific inquiry should bow down to ghost theorists' views, because their views are all encompassing.

Perhaps the head ghost got so angry that we were killing each other or venerating not-ghosty things or masturbating that he destroyed us all, and saved a few people, in his ghost-like mercy. Perhaps he has eternal torment by his ghost pals in store for those who don't agree, or perhaps we'll simply be missing out on his ghost-like love if we do not agree with the head ghost that all ghostists know, and we'll be left to our own personal torment by not being in the know, embracing his possibly existent...ghost appendages. Perhaps this analogy is getting creepy, and is as thinly veiled as the ghosts I'm talking about, and you are starting to see the problem.

You see, we've gone in a few paragraphs from something that is a belief that we can agree to disagree on, to something that people can easily intellectually bully others into believing, with threats, with credibility attacks, with any number of tactics, and we've even usurped and changed what evidence is.

If people have always believed in something and seen patterns of them throughout history, all we need to do is research it, all we need to do is become an expert, and we gain the authority to call everyone else an idiot if they don't agree, or to bully others into submission, or to terrify them into believing like they do to avoid wrath.

The problem is not that people disagree, it's that people are far too easy to bully and manipulate with a little sleight of hand, and so we have to ask a question when someone is really into getting us to believe something that lacks evidence. What are they selling? Why are they adamant about this? What do they get? What do words like evidence and love and good mean to them? Why are they attacking those who do not believe how they do and why do their arguments totally ignore the topic, and instead focus on attacking the credibility of the people that say such things?

I think that at some point, a person can become so used to needing authoritative sources for things that they lose sight of how easily they can be kicked out from under them. They become so entrenched that they stop thinking beyond certain bounds, and those not like them begin to terrify them. When you have everything to lose from changing your mind, you simply do not change it, and defining something, like a ghost, in such a way that it cannot be disproven by anything meaningful makes this even more possible. One's faith becomes unassailable, and the people that don't have it just end up beyond their understanding. They may even begin to shove those people into categories that they already have, and make claims regarding their lack of faith being a type of faith itself. Perhaps, people that are used to having this sort of faith will even create a rudimentarily tribal system that functions in much the same way, building off of authority and credibility, and end up confirming these suspicions.

How messed up would this all be? I'm just making it up, I must be a madman.

Religion and Science: Dissonance

I originally made this blog to talk about cognitive dissonance, and in transitioning from writing in a deeply religious to a more critical of religion tone, there has been an interesting change that I've noticed. For those unfamiliar, cognitive dissonance is descriptive of a process whereby someone holds contradictory beliefs simultaneously, and usually is talking about the mental stress that comes from doing so. One has a few choices when they encounter cognitive dissonance. Embrace it, and not back down from any of the conflicting beliefs, citing things such as paradox and mystery, choose one belief over the other, hopefully because of some kind of epistemic priority (such as growing up being taught that Earth is the center of the universe and then changing one's mind due to the evidence that it is not), or throwing up one's hands and walking away from the entire question.

I think a healthy individual probably does all of these things. If something is unimportant or distant enough from my ability to change, I readily will choose the third option, and simply walk away from the question. However, the thing I've noticed when I read back over this blog is that my writing has gone from the first option to the second. The best example I can think of for this, and what I wish to write about, is the huge question that's come up lately regarding science and religion.

Traditionally, people will pit the scientist vs the religious advocate, and basically look to see who wins, such as in the recent debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham. While this approach is crude and lacks nuance, I think there is a very good reason that we do this.

The huge reaction I've seen from the moderate religious community is that both sides of this debate are wrong, and that science and religion coexist. This is a point worth engaging, because it has huge implications and because it's just way too smug of a point not to engage, in my opinion. Indeed, this is a point I would have made a few years ago, and it falls solidly within the first choice when dealing with cognitive dissonance. So, what is the dissonance we are encountering here, and what are the full implications of this point?

The religion usually being referred to here is typically Christianity, and it's my go-to example. So, the academic moderate form of Christian sources that tend to make this kind of point usually stand within the Christian spectrum as close to the middle as possible, with the hyper-conservative young-earth creationist on one end, and the liberal "it's all a metaphor" spiritualist on the other. To the moderate, the Bible is all about genre, intent, and where literalism and symbolism both have their places. A good example of this is one who embraces theistic evolution. The bible teaches that god created everything and all life, and the theistic evolutionist states that we are learning how he did this by learning about evolution. Imagine this approach to every possible theological topic and enough information being given when anything is brought up, and you have an academic moderate Christian. While they usually balk at terming things "mystery," they will call things such as a trinitarian god (three persons in one god) a paradox rather than a mystery or rather than trying to explain with some analogy like an egg or water being 3 states/parts/modes. I am grateful for this, as if I hear one more analogy of this type, I might start pelting them with whatever item they are trying and failing to make this analogy with until they stop.

Moving on.

When we speak of science, we are talking about a process of investigating the universe and coming to conclusions based on repeatable and peer-reviewed data. So a scientific claim starts out, usually, as an educated guess, and then that guess gets put through the wringer until it is proven wrong or until it becomes what is called a theory, or a factual explanation of how something works. Some good examples of this are the germ theory of disease, relativity, gravity, biological evolution, and magnetism. Theories are our understanding of how things work, and are subject to proof, in the form of other repeatable and falsifiable hypotheses that contradict the previous theory.

So we have a method of thinking here that is based in curiosity, understanding, and adaptability. What's wrong with it coexisting, as the moderate would say, with something like christianity?

Let's go back to theistic evolution. Evolution, by nature, operates off of a mechanism called natural selection. What this means is that things that cannot survive die, and things that are best suited for the environment survive, as life randomly grows and mutates and changes and becomes something else. The adaptation that has enabled our survival is probably consciousness, along with a lot of random chance. We are not stronger than a lot of animals, but our ancestors began developing high intelligence, and ended up outsmarting and innovating its' way to being the dominate species on this planet. However, well before this happened and while it was happening, a lot of death happened. Indeed, 99% of the life on this planet has already died, most of which happened well before homo-sapiens proper came into existence and began trying to figure out what powers govern their lives and why tons of beings die and what they can do to control it.

Why can god not be involved with this? He could, but which god are we talking about? Is it the christian god? If so, why use such a wasteful, random, and cruel process to do so? Does that not contradict the loving or at least "on man's side" god that we're supposed to be talking about?

Of course, this is a difficult question to ask, because the christian god is a reference to literally thousands of different gods from denominations, not counting personal differences among people that splinter it even further. So, let's make it simpler. Let's avoid the malevolent god of calvinism altogether and go with the deistic god, the one that created the universe and set it all in motion, and has not interfered since (perhaps even incapable of doing so), allowing evolution to run its' course.

Alright, so I suppose that is possible. However, if god so obviously created the universe, then why has all scientific investigation thus far not turned up one shred of evidence of this god, and tons of evidence about all of these mechanisms? Perhaps god, in fact, is not a scientific claim at all, and is merely a belief or matter of faith.

This is fine, but where are we with the eternal insistence that faith and science coexist, then? We not only have had to throw out the christian god to get here entirely, moving to a creator that does not influence what happens after that point, but we've closed this supposedly all powerful and knowable god into merely what we cannot explain. This is the dissonance with theistic evolution, and indeed, with the point that is science and faith in harmony. The god purported by advocates of such things cannot be guiding and influencing evolution and still be all powerful and all loving.

Perhaps god's ways are higher than my ways. Perhaps my knowledge is limited, and I am merely a tiny human shaking his fist at a god that is smugly existing, asking only that I have faith on bad evidence to "see" him.

In this area, I must fall into the second response to cognitive dissonance, as it seems the most defensible and reasonable course, and be solidly agnostic regarding the existence of the undefined and irrelevant god that may or may not have created the universe and then had nothing to do with it afterwards, and atheistic toward other gods.

There is a fairly common counter-point to this, in the form of a rebuttal phrased something like this:

"You are simply interpreting the evidence in favor of atheism, why are you angry at the god you know exists?"

One need look no further than the preview for the upcoming film "God is not Dead" for proof that this is indeed a point that is made by people.

Perhaps I am angry at a god, but it is not one that I know exists. The only god that I know exists is the one that people fervently believe in, and there is no direct evidence that he exists outside of those persons' minds. In this case, I am angry about something else, not about a god.

Perhaps I am interpreting the evidence, so interpret it another way and then explain the DNA and fossil evidence that is there in a different way that supports another theory, one that does not include natural selection.

While we're at it, allow me to retort and say that it's certainly possible that evolution in its' purest form makes us feel not so special, just another animal that's developed conscious intelligence, with no spiritual or transcendent significance as the christian religion teaches.

This is the real problem I have with the moderate christian position. Sure, maybe god exists. Sure, maybe we're missing some evidence or interpreting it wrong or some other such thing. However, hidden under that is often the centrality of the doctrine of hell and eternal torment outside of the kingdom of god, explained dozens of different ways. Or perhaps it is a concern that one cannot live a full life without being a theist, and one cannot be spiritual.

Now you've finally found my anger. We are literally the universe exploring itself, made up of matter that constantly changes and yet we remain uniquely us, and our complexity makes all of us a universe to be explored. Why does one need a god to be spiritual, when there is so much to be in awe of otherwise? Why do I need to stop appreciating scientific exploration and discovery at the point it makes me uncomfortable? Isn't that a more shallow sort of spirituality, polluted by fear and afraid of what we might discover if we explore further?

I get it, I've had the panic attacks about hellfire and torture and I know about Pascal's wager. For those unfamiliar, it goes something like this: god might exist, so hedge your bets, even if you don't think he's there, just believe so he doesn't punish you! Just have faith!

There are days I am terrified and I talk to the god that I don't think is there, asking her to prove she exists, challenging him to do anything to demonstrate his existence, calling it out of its' sleep, and being what I was taught not to be by religion: inquisitive of god's ways, and damned hostile about it.

There is no doubt that I am just as irrational as any human, but that does not change the fact that we can be more, we can be spiritual without needing to wager or be afraid or stop asking questions when our findings begin walking all over what we were taught is sacred.

Perhaps I am wrong, and the paradox is the correct response, and we don't have the evidence yet. One might hope that if the paradox is correct and god exists, he might be a little more understanding than simply throwing tons of people into hell because they didn't make the right conclusion or believe in him the right way. But hey, maybe he is the calvinistic god, and he wants most of us to be tortured forever for his glory. Gotta make a contrast or good loses its' meaning, right?

I think, perhaps, we just need to redefine words like sacred and spiritual, and even the word god, to better understand what we are discovering, and perhaps there is no such thing as too much awareness of when we're being sold something, manipulated into something, or scared into something for the sake of keeping people in power or luxury. There is no doubt, however, that science and religion cannot coexist well because they exist in two different universes, and have two entirely different approaches, even if someone can be a christian or believe in some other religious mythology and also accept evolution in the cognitive dissonance that that requires.

There is a very good reason for our cognitive dissonance regarding science and religion, and I think we should, at the very least, pay attention to it and make our own conclusions and be willing to change our minds and be convinced otherwise.

Silence

It is a very easy, a very simple thing to have an opinion, in my experience. It is even easier to take offense to other peoples' opinions, to the point that it happens every day. We call them different things, syllogisms, facts, statistics, absolute truth. However, when we get down to what's really happening, we are relying on our senses to tell us how the world is, and we are relying on our feelings and our ability to think logically and perceive adequately to tell us correctly about reality.

Sometimes, we are confronted with facts that contradict what we think are the facts. We can then choose how we want to respond. Elementary, but necessary to point out, when the natural reaction may seem to be the only choice, whether it be oppositional defiance, discerning debate, passive acceptance, or any number of other things.

Regardless, we end up in dissonance, and that's a beautiful thing. It should not be sacrificed to maintain some level of peace or discretion or to, above all things (apparently), avoid bothering others. They may not act offended, they may simply approach you with smug self-assuredness coming from any number of factors, or they may simply dismiss you using clever words, so that any response ends up sounding trite or desperate. Ostracization, attacks on credibility, ad hominem, the infamous gish gallop, condescension, and any number of other things are extremely effective at getting a mob on your side.

It's extremely fashionable to be intelligently revolutionary, and I think in our many words we have forgotten the value of silence. I have felt it quite often when I would express what I think or feel about a topic, and receive no feedback whatsoever. It was so nonexistent, in fact, that I was left to speculate why this was even the case. Silence, in this case, said more than any number of words could have. Sometimes, you let it speak for you, whether you intend for it to or not. Sometimes, you don't know what to say, or you don't want to say something so that you don't hurt another person, so you hold your tongue, and that very act says everything about how you feel and what you think, especially if it contrasts with what you do say. The contrast says it all, makes what you don't say deafeningly, violently loud.

I took a long break from writing here, and was bothered by my own silence. I had become used to making a post when I felt strongly about a topic, and when I found myself in need of a break, it drove me crazy for a time. Then, at a certain point, something in me broke, and I found that the silence was therapeutic, even with that desire to write and be heard there, now free of the pretentious wants that I ended up with. Because sometimes, in our many words, in our cursory examination of philosophies and logic and science and religion and politics and art and our ability to express ourselves to anyone and everyone, we forget that we also have the ability to hold our tongue, the ability to let the facts speak for themselves, the ability to not start the adversarial process so familiar to human nature by putting forward our opinion and demanding that people agree or be mocked, to the point where it becomes trite and meaningless to discuss anything at all.

Sometimes, the best dissonance comes from holding out tongue, observing, gaining understanding, and not attempting to exert our power over others. The power is in the silence, the dissonance happens without our attempt to explain it all, fix it all, revolutionize it all.

I do wonder, however, if the destiny of humanity is to end up with everything having been said, so we all stand around a road traveled so many times in silence, with nothing else to do, nothing else to say. However, that day is certainly not today, and we may yet end our own existence or end up discovering boundless new knowledge and gaining new abilities we cannot yet dream of. After all, in the grand scheme of things, are we even the most interesting life in the universe? I have no idea, but it does make me wonder why we get so upset over the smallest things, like who tweeted what about who, or whether this celebrity is being rude, or whatever other random things happen to get us all fired up, as if we enjoy being offended, like being angry, get off on being united against the evil of the moment, to feel as if we have some contrived spiritual purpose. If we'd slow down, stop multitasking 5 things at once constantly, exist and enjoy the one life we get a little, and be excellent at what we do, we could be so much more.

Entrenched Dogma vs the Philosophy of Science, Thoughts

It's been a while friends. Can't promise that I'll consistently post here again just yet, but let's see what happens.

I've been giving a lot of thought to the recent debate between Bill Nye and Ken Ham, and have seen a pretty common question pop up. To put it succinctly, people have been wondering if the debate was even worth the time. I have a few thoughts I want to share.

For those of you that don't know what I'm talking about, you can check it out here if you want to. The debate was between a young earth/6 day creationist view of the origins of life and the scientific theory of evolution by natural selection, with Ham and Nye respectively representing their viewpoints in opposition to each other.

I was pleasantly surprised by a few things in this debate. Firstly, and most importantly, I cannot emphasize enough how right on Bill Nye was about how a lot of people, many of them religious, disagree with Ham's view of origins. Almost everyone I know disagrees, and a lot of them are deeply religious.

Ken Ham's Creation Museum and his arguments present a very interestingly disturbing view of the world. To break it down as succinctly as I can, he draws a distinction between observational science and historical science, and says that we cannot make any conclusions in historical science, because it is in the past. This point struck me as quite interesting and difficult to square with his very definite view of what happened in the past. On Mr Ham's view, we are meant to take his word for what happened in the past from the authority of a religious text and his literal method of interpreting it, because science cannot tell us anything accurately about the past. An interesting side-debate here might've been how he defines the past, since I presume science could tell us things about the recent past, otherwise crime scene investigation and things of that nature would be a complete dead-end. Regardless, Mr Ham backed up this criticism by drawing on numerous examples of how scientific conclusion aren't "quite right," criticizing everything from dating methods to the scientific method itself, whenever it treads on what Mr Ham calls "historical science." His view, of course, hinges on a view of the Bible as an inerrant and scientifically/historically accurate record of the past preserved by God, and his point was that any other source for the historic past is futile and incorrect.

We can debate the specifics of religious belief and authoritarian claims from religious texts until we're blue in the face. What really interested me is that Bill Nye did no such thing, he merely pointed out where Mr Ham was coming from repeatedly, and how those with similar religious beliefs to his do not agree, nor do they draw the same distinctions he does between "historical" and "observational" science, in contrast to the examples that Mr Ham started his presentation with. Mr Nye spent the rest of the time educating, which is one of my favorite things anyone can do in a debate setting where it's so easy to get caught up in points and counterpoints that the topic becomes obscured. Mr Nye explained multiple topics, especially the details of radiometric dating, in broad strokes and why they lead to the conclusions they do.

So on one side we have a person who references several people that agree with him and who brings forward criticisms of scientific concepts that are a threat to a view that he admits is an entrenched one, based in an authoritarian view of the universe (I believe God has said this, hence we must be wrong if we say differently), and on the other side we have someone who is educating, bringing forward data, pointing out the ways in which things do not add up and the ways in which other things do, and is honest about what they are disturbed by in the opposing view and what would change their mind (evidence). In addition, the invitation to Mr Ham to write a scientific paper disproving evolution by natural selection is extremely consistent with the scientific method, and I think made it obvious exactly what type of thought process difference we were seeing here.

I must answer the question of whether this debate was worth the time with a definite yes. Normally I dislike debates, but this one was a very interesting clash, and demonstrated the profound differences in thought processes between the two debaters, and perhaps the differences in schools of thought that they represent. I do not believe this was a debate between religion and science per se, especially since I know a lot of religious people who disagree with Mr Ham's view, I believe it was a debate between entrenched dogmatism and the philosophy of science. This is important, because it is very easy to criticize, very easy to bring forward one's dogma and make strong arguments, but it is far more difficult and worthwhile to take a step back from one's dearly held views and allow them to be destroyed or changed if there is evidence that can do that. The deeply religious can do this as well as anyone else, though it may end up changing them in unexpected ways that I could not begin to imagine.

One thousand pages of erased text.

There are times in life when one has to step back into the shadows, for everyone's sake.

When I write, I open up a gaping wound in me. I don't even know where it came from, when it started, or what made it get to this level. I just know that for most of my life I have been fighting, criticizing, thinking, and butting heads with people, an action I cannot currently sustain. Every action costs something, and the cost for writing on this blog, a blog specifically made for cognitive dissonance, is too high for me right now. I am exhausted on every level possible, and something has to give.

I cannot write honestly on this blog anymore, something I swore to myself I would do when I started it. If you've read faithfully, you've seen me journey from faith into faithlessness, from Christian to atheist and, I suspect, into something else entirely. I cannot even claim atheist anymore, as it implies way too much about me that is not true. I respect my Christian friends and family, I am bad at being part of tribal groups such as the popular atheist movement, and I sometimes suspect that there is a god, when I feel like it and when I can successfully dismiss the horribleness that's happened to me from my memory for a time. I am this complex, insane, contradictory, irrational individual, and I've been able to bring about dissonance because of that. However, labels are no longer sufficient for any of that, and I think that means I'm healing. It also means that I cannot be bothered to defend anything constructive or even have a theme for writing (formerly Christianity), and that is suicide for an endeavor like this. Christianity cannot be my theme anymore because it is, for me, writing about a period of abuse. At some point, you have to stop. You have to let your decisions stand alone, you have to criticize yourself privately and with people you trust, and you have to heal in order to be objective again. Even though I stand by what I have to say about making my decisions for objective reasons, that is meaningless in the grand scheme of things, and especially in writing on this level. There comes a point in life when you must make peace with the fact that you are screaming into a void, with trenches on either side filled with people with weapons pointed at each other.

I do not believe in myself anymore, I do not have the conviction that anyone should take what I have to say seriously, and I'm honestly sick of everyone pointing weapons at me. Until I can heal, it is time that I journey by myself for a while. I don't know what my next move is as a writer, but you can be assured that I am incapable of giving it up. If you enjoy reading what I have to say, watch for another update from me here at some point. Until then, from an absolute no one to all of you who have journeyed with me,

-Daniel

Fury, in Retrospect

Sometimes one feels something so powerfully that they simply cannot even communicate it properly. The extremely fortunate among us will feel love in this way, or perhaps the extremely patient. Regardless of what the state of being is, love, anger, happiness, contentedness and so forth, when one really feels it it takes over their entire being, they become elemental and powerful in it and it's on display for all to see.

The religious propaganda that is often heard associated with this is that one should be a christian like they are a football fan. I've never related to this analogy very well, as I have apathy at best toward football and most sports in general, but I do understand. Someone who is genuinely passionate about something does not need to convince others of it, they radiate it and can't help but talk about it when the opportunity presents itself, because they want to share it.

I'm not completely certain if I was ever this type of christian, but I suspect so. I searched the philosophy, I found the truth in it, those things I still hold dear, though not exclusively christian components, such as the golden rule, generosity, passion, justice, and love. When someone's religion or philosophy or passion becomes so elemental, you can just tell. A friend once told the administration of my college, who weren't sure I was a christian at all due to questioning scripture's absolute inerrancy and primary source of truth, that I was what all christians should aspire to be. I never saw myself that way, but I do believe this means I had a true faith, one that was part of me. I never evangelized anyone, except for one regretful incident on my high school missions trip that I will never feel good about, I just believed, and I was what that belief made me.

I have problems even stating what I want to do with my life now because my career goals were defined solely in christian terms before about a year ago. I am fortunate I didn't go into ministry and establish myself before losing my religion, as the stories I've read of losing the core of one's being and the inspiration for one's career, and having to maintain appearances to support a family are horrifyingly close to home. The organizations I've found that support ex-pastors and ex-ministry leaders are some of the most beautiful organizations I've seen. The apostate need support, more than just monetarily, but not having to worry as much about taking care of their families when they're consumed by such a crisis is beautiful.

I grew up being taught to question the world, being taught apologetics and critical thought regarding all things secular, especially atheism. However, I was a defective student. I began to turn those questions on the beliefs I was told never to question, much to the horror of the teachers. Where had I gone wrong? I was going to lose my faith! I denied this, because my faith was ultimately important to me, and I absolutely believed it to be true. What is the harm in seeking the truth, I asked, if we really do believe the truth? How am I going to be mislead by the very skills I've learned? If christianity is true, it has nothing to worry about. If it is not true, then I will leave, regardless of the personal cost. This is not just an intellectual statement for me, it is a way of living. I was taught that Jesus IS the truth, and so to seek truth is to seek Jesus. All truth is god's truth.

In retrospect, I understand why the conservatives that looked at me with so much skepticism and even condemnation felt how they did. When you go out into "the world," your faith is challenged. When you leave "the bubble," you begin to have to deal with things you were never taught to deal with before. I was prepared for this, or so I thought.

You see, when I detached myself from my faith and truly used my critical thinking skills to look at it, I realized that the evidence is insufficient, and faith is absolutely required. You must assert on bad evidence, because that's the only type of evidence you are going to get. "Hold onto those experiences with god, hold onto this book and how you've been taught to interpret it, or you will lose your faith!" I saw that as propaganda, and I still see it as propaganda that is successfully taught to people. I feel fortunate that a friend threw my beliefs into chaos 10 years ago, as it was that process that really made me test what I'd grown up being taught.

When I lost my faith, when I truly stopped believing, I was consumed with anger. I was dating a very angry individual at the time as well, but she's not the reason I was as angry as I was, and claiming atheism did not make me angry. You see, I was taught growing up that evolution, at best, was to be treated with extreme skepticism. I was taught that science is the most horribly limited tool ever, because our minds are depraved and broken. I was taught not to trust myself, and the typical social drama of my youth reinforced that when I got a huge culture shock in high school and decided hating myself was the best course of action, because pretty much everyone in my social group, with a few exceptions, thought that I was an idiot, and not worth their time. Women asked me out as a joke, so I must have the horrible sexual motives I was taught growing up, and I should punish myself for ever thinking anyone is attractive. I was taught that the Bible is a defensible book if any book is, when that is not how history works. I was barely taught proper history by a group of people so consumed with nationalistic conservative faith that it's a wonder I ever escaped from the view at all. I was taught that, above all, I must seek out god's will for my life, his perfect plan, his perfect mate that would fix me, his perfect calling that would be the work that I would give my life to. I was taught to coast through life, and that god would do everything for me. As long as I was righteous but humble but faithful but joyous but uncompromising but didn't complain but loving but a thousand other things, god could use me, and it was my sole confidence.

Imagine my surprise when I had a hell of a time of it, when I found that I couldn't just be lazy. You may read this and say "but Christianity doesn't teach this Dan, it teaches us to work hard and seek god!" What does that mean? How does one seek god? Read their bible? Pray? Do evangelism or missions work, convert others to the same views? How does that have anything to do with a faith that is real, that flows through you like your own blood? Must one train themselves to truly believe?

You see, I tried both. I tried the ritual, I tried the conservative christianity, the lack of questioning, the uncompromising stance that is unafraid of criticism. Something in me broke doing that, and it made me immeasurably sad. It doesn't make sense that god would kill so much of the race he created on a regular basis, it doesn't make sense that he would allow guilt to be imputed on all of us for wanting knowledge. It does not make sense that god would be a genocidal (but justified by racial purity. clearly.) maniac in 2/3rd of this book I'm supposed to accept on faith, and then I have to use the other 1/3rd to cherry pick it because jesus. Jesus isn't even original anyway, which is the only reason he resonates so much with people. The Christ figure is iconic, a part of our culture, but that does not make him god.

I tried to really feel my faith, I tried to love god with my heart, soul, strength and mind. I tried speaking in tongues and prophesying, I clawed for something to really make it mine, and I succeeded. I was the unique and special snowflake that would be a legendary christian thinker, respected as a defender of true christianity, a system of my own reckoning, because I was full of faith and love and righteousness and people agreed with me, dammit!

I really believed. I had answers for all of these questions, theories about how god was progressing along with humanity, how jesus was the latest iteration of cultural norms so god could reach the most people in the fullness of time, about how the bible was not really a historical record or scientific book, but only relevant in what it teaches us about god, and about how the trinity is like a person's three components, mere aspects that god had more truly because he's so incomprehensibly huge. Anyone that took me seriously back in the day can tell you, I could discuss this stuff for hours, and if they really knew me, they knew I did it because it was so insanely important to me, because it was me, in a very real sense. I was elementally christian.

In the end, it all turned up empty when I put my ideals to the test. The truth won out when I put it up against the sum total of my faith, the church history, the exploration of all of its' branches, the sum total of my experiences, all of my justifications and philosophy and reasoning and reading and learning, the sum total of all of it. I didn't even leave christianity when it put me through years of systemic emotional abuse, because I believed it was true.

There is a phrase I once heard, that I cannot remember the exact phrasing of. It goes something like this:

If Christianity is not true, then we are miserable above all others, but if it is true, we are happy above all others.

One might recognize this as a reframing or inversion of the infamous Pascal's wager, pointing out the consequences of leaving christianity if it is, in fact, true.

It is a miserable thing to devote one's life to something and then, upon investigating and truly searching, find that you have devoted so much time, so much emotional and mental energy, to absolutely nothing. It is infuriating to think of the possibilities your life may have taken on had you not simply been taught to accept something that placed drastic limitations on your potential by teaching you to look down on science and history and scholarship and philosophy. It is infuriating to realize that you really were in the process of losing your faith by embracing those ideals you truly felt in embracing your faith, to realize you were self defeating your own faith for years, and didn't even realize it. It is ultimately frustrating to have to start over just because you will not make an ultimate decision purely based on consequences or what you want to be true or fear.

Every emotion is immediately converted into an icy, ultimate rage. You live in the frigid torrents of emotion hammered into a singular purpose, your lifeblood solidified in your veins, and you make sure everyone feels your rage just to prove you exist. Your former hope turns to poison in your soul, and you spit it all over everything. You throw around facts and figures and anger and satisfying quotes or images, and you are ready to defend any of it.

Well, what do you think happens? People give you a wide berth, because they don't want to be touched by the toxic bile you're spewing everywhere. You feel ignored, and that makes you even more angry!

Or maybe that's just me.

In retrospect, this type of rage, this brutally powerful anger, is only another method of harming oneself, and all too natural for someone who grew up to hate one's most fundamental urges as a human being, such as curiosity, sexuality, and compassion for its' own sake. It is useless to continue being a vessel of such rage, as it will destroy your health and any chance you have for happiness. It's okay to be angry when someone aggravates you by asserting that this puritanical and toxic morality must be propagated to even more people to stunt their growth and create more converts, but let it go before it chokes your soul and distances you from everyone, before you become a paranoid and delusional individual, and you see demons where none are there. You will end up being the image of what you cannot stand, because you're still tied to it by your own angry soul.

Becoming elementally enraged is ultimately an exercise in fighting oneself. When you run out of enemies to fight, you start beating on yourself, or looking for more outlets to keep it going, so you don't have to face the difficult and messy business of dealing with life.

I don't regret my fury, it was a necessary part of my life for a time. After a season of fury, however, must come acceptance, harmony, and progress, for the sake of one's health and happiness. If you feel like I do, know that you do not have to be remain damaged. You can heal, because you're spectacular, and asking for help does not make you weak. Move forward, accept the losses, even if they still feel unacceptable, and you will be able to become singular and powerful in who you are.

Faithless, Redux

I'd like to explore some things differently than I usually do. Someone once told me that I am very good at "taking the head with the heart," a tendency I've always valued, and I think one I have gotten away from of late. The reasons for that are varied and are unimportant at the moment, but I may get to them at some point.

For some time, I've been wondering what step is next for me. I've gone through many labels in my life, and regular readers or people that have known me through some of them will know that very well. I change my mind frequently, depending on data and depending on another factor. That factor is what I want to talk about today.

Firstly, a disclaimer. I speak of labels a lot, using ones like theist, atheist, christian, calvinist, agnostic, etc. I do this only for the sake of clarity, and only so I can avoid explaining in 4-5 sentences what one word will suffice for. I will define something further if I feel there is a need to beyond what would normally be implied by the word, as some labels are not at all clear. Moving on.

I am 28 years old. To some, that means that I am very young, that I haven't even begun to really live or really come to good views about life. To some, that means I've been through some things that they have not yet, and that I might have a little wisdom. Both are wrong. My wisdom has always turned out to be pretty empty in the grand scheme of things, and I pretty much am never going to stop changing my views, until I just run out of steam. Regardless, I've found a lot of adversity in life so far because of my tendency to ask questions and to never shy away from showing my innocence or experience with things. Some might call that transparency, but those that really know me know that I'm very much not a transparent person about most of who I really am. It's an odd way to live, I admit.

What seems like a long time ago, I was a fundamentalist christian. What this means is that I grew up being taught the "Essentials" of the christian faith, and how not to associate with those who were labeled as "liberals." I moved from that into a strict calvinism, which is kind of an extension of determinism. Basically, the only thing with true freedom in a strict calvinism is god, and humans are puppets. So if a baby dies and goes to hell, then that's according to god's good pleasure. I poured myself into everything I could find, everything that seemed true according to my data set, and eventually, when my knowledge expanded to begin to ask questions about the book I grew up being taught to revere and idolize, I was eclipsed by vast cognitive dissonance. The type of people that used to be my allies became my enemies, a skill I had been developing and am still very good at, unfortunately. From there, I moved into liberal christianity, and eventually out of religion altogether.

Regular readers can breathe a sigh of relief at this point. Don't worry, I am not redescribing ad nauseum my deconversion or the scientific and historical reasons for it. I don't mind doing so again, but I don't think a lot of people I've spoken with care.

Let me clarify. When I speak to a lot of people that have known me a while about god, they have a dissonance of their own to deal with. They must deal with the fact that I poured myself entirely into christianity, and that it is no longer relevant to my life. They're not thinking about the history of the church, the scientific reasoning for leaving a theistic worldview, or even logical inconsistencies that one must get around to affirm something like the inspiration of the Bible. I know this because I've been there. A few years ago, I would've been the same.

This brings me, finally, to the other factor with which I make decisions like this, one that has bugged me for a long time. I can only describe it as an intuitive grasp of the psychology behind a philosophy. To clarify that needlessly confusing description, I invite you to try out a thought experiment.

A man believes in god, and sees god in the order of the universe. He investigates scientific theory through his bias and sees god in fine-tuning things so we can live, so we can exist, and so we can bear his image to others. He sees god as the ultimate control, the mechanism for the universe working how it does, and the ultimate determining factor of the eternal fate of all things. If this god wants to create a hell for those who do not know him from the obvious fingerprints of him in the universe, then it is his creations' fault for not acknowledging it, even if he made them thusly destined for destruction. As the ultimate cause and control, god's ways are higher than our ways, and he never had to make us at all. We should glory in whatever he brings our way, for it's all for him.

Another man is revolted and disgusted by this image of god. He also has faith in god, even claims the same religion as the other man, but he sees god in our ultimate freedom. He also believes that man is the special image-bearer of god, but he sees the universe as constantly changing, humanity adapting by the power given by god, and the ultimate love pouring through the universe from his power and his grace. This man does not see god as the one ultimately in control, even though he must believe he has the power to do so, but as someone who gives up his power to give his creations the free will. Man must freely choose god, or love is meaningless. We are, therefore, ultimately free, beautiful, special, and so forth, necessarily distinguished from other forms of life on our planet. Except for cats, because we were made to serve them. Clearly.

What of these two men then? Do they worship the same god? Are they even of the same religion? Some say yes, some says absolutely not, and some say it's irrelevant.

The first man's god is one of security and control, necessarily so. Perhaps if god exists, this is an "aspect" of god, just like the second man's perception of a loving and freely gracious god is an "aspect" in an eternal "paradox."

The thing is, paradox is unnecessary. For both of these men are not telling you about god when they describe him, they are telling you who they are. Perhaps they debate each other one day, proof-texting like crazy, citing church tradition or instances in their personal life or verse after verse or grudgingly agree to disagree or come to blows and burn with anger. What's really happening here? Are they debating something academic? Not at all, they are debating philosophies born out of who they are. They are literally gods clashing, at odds with each other.

This is the other factor that I use to decide what I believe is true. You see, my "god" is one of allegiance to the truth, regardless of what that is. Throughout my life, I've allowed social ostracization, ridicule, massive consequences, and ultimately my current state of loneliness because of this alone. I don't give a damn what this group or that group says or how long they've been saying it, I care if they can show me, factually, that what they say has evidence and is defensible. Sure, humans are subjective creatures, prone to whimsy and folly and shenanigans and emotional displays of ridiculousness, but we have the potential to cut through that, to suspend our views at any time for the sake of considering the evidence. This is all I ask of myself, and when I say I've paid a price for it, I am not understating what has come about because of it. But that's irrelevant, because I recognize this tendency in myself for what it is. It's who I am intellectually, it's integrity, and I value it above almost anything.

I can relate to the martyrs of my former faith for not sacrificing what one truly believes, one's truest self, just to satisfy the sickening whims of those in power. No doubt, many have been persecuted when a discussion might have done better. It is not my job to blame persecution on christians, muslims, atheists, or whatever other label. This is a misuse of labels to me, because it brings about needless drama instead of clarification. It doesn't matter what I am, what matters is whether I'm still thinking, challenging myself, and pestering other people to be better.

I would not, for a second, trade this tendency for anything. Perhaps that makes it my "faith," though I really have no idea what to call it, and it is certainly not something I believe in or think is important for no reason. "Faith" is a bad word for it, but it may suffice to convey my point. It's not christianity, it's not atheism, it's not agnosticism or nihilism or anything else I've ever heard of, except, perhaps, for critical thinking. I don't really care what the truth is, as long as I can keep looking for it. Give me more data, more information, more experiences. Challenge my perceptions, and don't for a second think I have so much ego that I won't throw it all aside if you're making a good argument.

A good argument is free of personal attacks, free of needless verbosity in the name of "holistic thinking," and free of summarizations that throw aside nuance and detail. A good argument is not reactionary, it is not based in tradition or appeals to authority, and it is not petty. A good argument is based in good information, consistent interpretation that can be done by anyone, and is falsifiable. It does not appeal to risk or consequence, and it does not needlessly assume things. It is baseline, and deductive from there. A good argument shows the integrity of the person making it, and their ability to adapt to new information, regardless of their disdain for the opposition.

This is my meaning, and I'm proud of it. Those who hold their meaning in equal pride and can be respectful and honorable doing it have my respect as well. Questioning of motives does not become anyone, and that is the main reason I wanted to write this. Not to puff myself up or talk about how awesome I am (okay, maybe a little bit), but to clarify the most pervasive misunderstanding I've seen to date of those who try to talk to me. It is frustrating, because I come off so wrong so often, and I can't stand it. People think I'm apathetic when they present me with petty and trivial reactionary nonsense instead of what they really think. People think I'm arrogant when I deconstruct and disagree with their most deeply held views, and they get infuriated when they can't do the same to me, because my views are self deconstructing by their very nature. Most of all, I think people mistake my approach to things for coldness or lack of caring, when nothing could be further from the truth.

I am bad at small talk, have suffered from social anxiety all of my life, and I often do not know what to say, so I either say stupid things, ask about things that apparently everyone is supposed to know about, or just say nothing and appear to think I'm better than everyone. I'm nothing special, but I think my unique blend of growing up how I did, psychological tendencies, and philosophical orientations have lead me to this point, and I'm pretty happy it did. I love discussion, but I sadly have almost no positive views to throw out into discussion, because I tear them all apart the instant I have them. Perhaps this is what it means to be truly faithless.

I'm sure I'll have more on this later on, but that's enough for now.

Making Trouble

I feel that I am caught between two worlds, and most of all, that it shouldn't be that way.

I really miss my life of being a theist/christian. I had so much more confidence, I could explain so many more things, and the people I became friends with over the past several years knew me. Now that I'm a nonbeliever, I don't have those luxuries anymore. I have become a student of reality all over again, relearning a lot of things I thought I knew. A lot of my old friends no longer speak to me, and I have to believe that it's simply because they're uncomfortable. Some people still talk to me like it's normal all the time, and retain the ability to have normal conversations about disagreements, and if I've made one thing consistently clear, it's that disagreement does not bother me in the least. I don't mind being told I'm wrong, and I don't mind debating issues if people want to. I change my views if it is warranted by evidence and good arguments, and I think that bothers some people.

I must conclude that some people don't want to discuss issues. Maybe they're scared, maybe they're confused, maybe they're trying to justify themselves, maybe they just don't care. Either way, it really sucks that to some people, I am apparently a set of beliefs instead of a person, and they cannot get past their disagreements enough to still speak to me. It's unfortunate that this sometimes comes out in rather petty ways, and it's sad that people can't take 10 minutes out of their day to thoughtfully speak to me when they think I'm incorrect or out of line. It's sad that a lot of people disregard my continued idealism as anger.

Then again, it's nothing new. I'm just on the wrong side of the fence now.

I totally get why some atheists act religious about atheism. Humans are social, and they need social groups. Tribal groups provide that, and they provide a cause, a way of uniting against a common enemy. It seems like a lot of people choose this, and my understanding is because that's how people evolved to act. That doesn't upset me, though it used to. It certainly doesn't make sense to act this way about being an atheist, of all things, but it's apparently the majority. If there's one thing that's always been true about me, it's that the majority is the first thing I question, and if they don't measure up to ideal definitions, then we have a disagreement. Some people simplify that with the term "making trouble."

I have to accept this part of me, because it's not going away. Though it has made a lot of people go away, that is their decision, not mine. I can't be upset about it anymore, because it's killing me. I'd rather be happy about the people that still want to talk to me and hang out with me and discuss issues and disagree if necessary without it being the end of the world, because that's much more enjoyable.

I think there's an unfortunate tendency for people to need a tribal group lead by authority figures, and I think that the sooner people can overcome this, the sooner we can have peace. Wars don't surprise me, yet another group of people that trod on the rights of others doesn't surprise me, political manipulation and religious abuse don't surprise me. What surprises and amazes me is when people rise above all of it and care about what's true and choose to act in a way that is transparent and beneficial. Those are the people I enjoy and admire, and there should be more of them. What's funny is, these people are also troublemakers. The people with agendas and axes to grind can't stand them, because they change their mind when it should be changed, they question things when they should be questioned, and they don't swear blood allegiance to a group of any kind.

I aspire to make as much trouble as these people. I wish to be dispassionate and at once enthusiastic in pursuing truth, and I wish to never settle for what a majority of people tell me to just "have faith" or "come to conclusions" about. Making trouble is a good goal, I think.

The Death of the Philosopher

A little dramatic, right?

Disclaimer: What follows is personal, probably overly so. You have been warned. Run away if you don't care to read about my personal life, I won't be offended. Also, I'm aware that I tend to bitch and moan at times, and I've taken an active effort to keep that out of this post. Some things, however, have to come out, and I feel that this should be somewhere where people can see it.

I've changed a lot lately. I don't know that I can point to a single event that has caused this, and I really wish I could. However, anytime I try to tag it onto anything that's happened to me, such as my time in Ohio or at college or certain events with regard to career, personal life, family, friends, or anything else, I come up short for explanation. The truth is, I think this is just me, and there's no stopping it.

The first thing one must understand about me as a person is that my arch-enemy shares my body with me. No, I don't have a split personality, I just abuse myself constantly. Psychologically, emotionally, socially, health-wise, and anything that is not overt self-harm. What's really strange is that I didn't realize this for a very long time, and when I did, I became extremely interested in why I would do things like this to myself.

I developed severe social anxiety when I was much younger. As a result, though I tend to be eloquent with the written word, I am pretty much a blundering mess in any social setting where I'm not completely at ease, and my facial expressions often become weird and my body language exaggerated when I feel I have excess nervous energy to burn off. It offends me, unnecessarily so, when this is pointed out, simply because I can't help it. I'm not good at laughing at myself when I'm under pressure. I have tried to adopt the mentality of not speaking to remove all doubt that I'm a complete idiot as a policy, but I just can't seem to do it. Because try as I might, when I have something to say, I just have to say it. It's important to me.

If you were paying attention, I just did it again. I called myself an idiot. I'm not gonna keep count of this, but I just caught that reading over this, and I'm not correcting it.

What can cause a person to hate themselves so much, and why persist in such behavior when that person is rational and understands exactly what they're doing? What is the point? Why not be normal and roll with the punches, make mistakes, get yelled at, and move on without turning every slight error into an internal cycle of self-hatred? Even though I'm the one doing this to myself, it's taken me a very long time to even process sufficiently to figure it out.

I didn't realize the full extent of what I was doing to myself until around the same time I left my religion. Now this is not an anti-religious tirade. I truly don't care how one rationalizes their religion, or what someone thinks the essence of it is. That is personal. However, this also means that my religion is personal to me. My religion, the one I learned growing up, was overt and extremely damaging self-hatred, wrapped in religious dogma. It would be very easy to point to authoritarian figures teaching fundamentalist faith, and it would be very easy to talk about religious extremism and try to make connections to more moderate religion here, but I don't care about that right now. You see, for me, there were some extremely influential things that happened to me, resulting in repressed memories. I wish I was making that up.

Firstly, I experienced bullying and being the bully, in reverse order. Quite simply, when I was very young, I was an ass to everyone around me and very popular. This then reversed as I grew up, and I became what seemed like universally ostracized. One might call that justice, and one might be correct to do so. However, because of how this happened, I became acutely aware of what it is like to be disregarded, what it is like to be alone and hated for no apparent reason. The ultimate expression of this happened in high school, when going to school was like stepping into a portal to hell. Socially, I was the weird kid that was constantly criticized while minding my own business, I was the guy that didn't know all of the popular things, and for the most part, people enjoyed ridiculing me about it instead of telling me what I was missing. I learned to stop asking. I learned to mind my own business, aware of the fact that I suck and will be alone, and standing up for myself results in people just walking off and leaving me alone with my thoughts. There were no fistfights, only silence and quiet rejection. The Christian classmates I had at my Christian school, who were all recognized for knowing their Bible, knowing the right answers, and being great, didn't care about me because I was a little different, and any explanation I had to give fell on deaf ears. I learned my lesson well, and it's taken a very long time to unlearn it as much as I have so I can have friends. I was poisoned with what I thought was the knowledge that no one gave a damn about my existence, outside of my immediate family, and if they did, they were there to criticize me and attack me, kick me until I conformed.

Secondly, I learned about hell before anything else related to religion. It is literally one of the first things I remember, and remembering it is like remembering pure terror. This touches on religious dogma that I reject, but one must understand this above all: to a seven year old, sitting in a church service where someone is screaming about the decay and depravity of humanity, screaming about how we all deserve hell (complete with vivid description) and we'll get it if we die tonight, unless we accept the Lord Jesus Christ as our personal savior, does something very dark. I would go so far as to call it psychological abuse. I never received it from my family, but I did receive it from the church. So what did I do? I prayed for salvation, and I didn't stop. I laid in bed so many nights being terrified of going to hell, being scared that I didn't really mean it, that I wasn't repentant for how terrible I was enough, that I hadn't criticized and destroyed myself enough in the sight of the the Lord to be good enough. I really don't give a damn about grace-based dogma vs performance doctrine, which is the standard response to this. I do not care because I wasn't thinking about that, I was thinking about who I was being told I really am. I was thinking about whether I'd actually repented, because I had been told my heart is deceitful, evil, horrible, two faced, you name it. I believed the core of my being was dark and horrible, and I got saved publicly at least 3 times before the age of 18, and probably hundreds of times in private, with just me and God.

Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, I discovered that I was being lied to about a book you probably all know called the Bible. This hit me hard because the one thing that kept me sane in high school was getting into Apologetics. If you know standard Christian defenses of the faith, you know they center around classical philosophical arguments for the existence of god and hinge on the Bible being true, inspired, and inerrant. Along with this, I began to believe the things I was being told about being unique, about being a superhero that can save Christianity. I then discovered criticisms about the Bible for the first time, and when I lost my belief in inerrancy, my religious nature was given a killing blow. Then I went to college, was written about as "sub-Christian" in the school paper for debating the inerrancy of the new testament autographs (and winning, by the way). Given what you've already read here, you'll understand when I say I was not surprised when I read those articles, but I was disappointed. That's alright though, I thought! I will be a superhero, I will save Christianity and redeem it from this dead religious dogma and worship of a broken book into true Christianity, true communion with God! All one needs is one's intuition. Of course, as a lot of you can probably guess, this met with serious, serious opposition. Being excluded and alone was nothing new for me, but I wasn't totally excluded. I had good friends at school. It was a golden age for me, and I can't write about it enough to do it justice. Then, well, we all graduated and drifted apart, they to their lives, and me to well...whatever I'm doing. I keep in contact with some of them still, and that's pretty cool. What you have to understand, though, is that the entirety of the controversy around inerrancy was a pivotal period for me, where the apologetics I'd learned imploded and I began clawing for something, anything to save my faith, which I didn't know had been struck with a killing blow. Liberalism, Emergent Christianity, Eastern Orthodoxy, whatever it took, I was going to find that one piece of the church that had anything to do with truth. I was going to prove that I was not "sub-Christian," but the more I met people that had already heard about me, the more I realized that these people were mostly the same as the ones I knew in high school. The more I studied the authorities, the more I realized that "authority" is a word that should barely ever be used, because most of the time it means the person that is the best in a group at fooling everyone into believing we have a clue what's going on.

I could write an entire paragraph about my experiences dating here, but I can't do that in good conscience. Let's just say if there is a fourth influence, that is it. I do have one thing to say about it that does not apply to anyone in particular: Somehow, I gained a belief that someone was going to fix me, make all of this rejection and despair worth it, be my strong other half to hold me up and point me the right way. This belief was so strong and so poisonous to me that I've not only just figured out I have had it, but how very very wrong it is. You see, no one can do that for you. You have to, and you're the only one that can heal those emotional scars, you're the only one that can bring about fulfillment and wholeness in your life. I, of course, learned the hard way.

It doesn't take a genius to figure out that at this point, I have brought rejection and despair with me, I had been causing it with  my own actions, and the seeds of this tendency were in my past. My religious intuitions began to vary wildly, and when I came into contact with others like me with totally different views, I retreated into the only practice I've felt good about myself for: critical thinking. I began to analyze every bit of data I could find about religion, about the church, about science, about philosophy, about anything claiming knowledge of ultimate reality, or just reality in general. I'm nowhere near complete on this, because there is so much data. However, two things have become obvious to me from this investigation:

1. Though religions spring out of personal enlightenment, not a single one contains the ultimate truth. I'm inclined to say that there is not one, and that if there is an ultimate truth, a god of sorts, it is extremely well hidden behind layers of our reality, and none of us have the faintest clue about the true nature of reality.

2. People have an inexhaustible propensity for egocentrism, and to prove they exist, to make their world exist to others, they must compete and be the best at something. Whether it is enlightenment, religious expertise, being spiritual, being mediocre, being revolutionary or intuitive or intellectual or achieving immortality or being the best at one particular thing or being above it all, people seem to have this propensity for going straight for it. It makes great evolutionary sense, and I think if we want to understand religion, we must understand just how psychological it really is, how much it plays into egocentrism and narcissism and vanity.

I became an atheist for a while, and now I'm at the point where that word doesn't have a meaning for me anymore. I disagree that atheism is a religion or anything like a religious movement, but the movement itself has already corrupted the correct definition of the word (totally apart from recognized experts, by the way), making conversation about it impossible without a fucking sociology study. I will not fight another one of these damned uphill battles just trying to make a simple statement, and the truth is that labels are just too comfortable to hide behind.

You see, when I became a non-believer, I let the horrible raging fury in me pour out, and it was nowhere near the anger that I've learned to constantly direct at myself over the years. I was so mad that I'd been lied to, so angry that all of this torment I'd put myself through for so many years was all for nothing, all to bring me to this singular moment of loneliness, this death of my god at the simultaneous realization of his name.

I've just figured out what the title of this post means. You see, my god was called the Philosopher, and he was that idealized version of me that I wanted to be. I'd even have conversations with him and he'd tell me the nature of the universe. Maybe I do have multiple personality disorder. Intuition leads to understanding indeed.

The truth is, my fury is unimpressive, unimportant, and small. I am one person, and my opinion means less than nothing. All I managed to do is alienate some of my friends, piss people off, and convince even more people that I'm an angry person. I am not an angry person, I am a defeated person. I was given dreams, given all of these grandiose delusions about being unique and special and beautiful and how all of this stupidity I've had to deal with for years would be worth it, and the truth is that it's all for nothing.

It's in the faces of the people I see, in the words insisting that others should just be quiet, stop ranting, stop railing, just stop, just be quiet. Go get help, go see a therapist, stop being so angry, come back to Christianity for more abuse, just calm down and be cool. Just be silent. Go to your slaughter silently. Buck up and take it in silence like a man, stop complaining.

Maybe that's why I'm writing this post. This post is as emphatic of a no as I can muster toward every downcast face, every exhortation to shut my mouth, every trite solution and stupid tautology that people use to try to fix me. I have become spite in the face of an unfair and ridiculous society, and I will not cooperate, nor will I participate in the sickening nauseating mob mentality that we're all supposed to just go along with. As much as I enjoy being a mysterious quirky guy that no one understands, this needs to be said. My opinion does matter, my experiences do matter, and so do everyone else's. They don't matter because of some cosmic plan or because of some beautiful spiritual essence they have, they matter because our race is an emergent product, coming out of the sum of its' parts. If that's spiritual, then I'm spiritual. We can be better, but we need to leave this absurdity behind, we need to stop one-upping each other and seeing who has bigger swords/guns/nuclear missiles/insert phallic references here and figure out the power of thought.

It really doesn't matter that I dealt with some hard stuff in my life. What really disturbs me is that I am unbelievably and unfairly far from being the worst case scenario, and I am nowhere close to the only one. If you want to know why I criticize everything, that is why. Because it's not fair, and people should not have to deal with a world that kicks them over and then keeps kicking until they submit. They should not be poisoned by hope and fear from a young age, they should be taught to rise above their egocentrism, and they should be taught that the universe is scary and beautiful and wonderful and terrifying and we change it with our very thoughts, so we should make them good ones. Maybe I'll be able to take my own advice one day.

Here's what I really mean to say: the Philosopher is dead. How can I continue to worship a god that does not exist and is such offensive vanity? Who taught me to deify and to destroy myself? Who taught me to be a sheep, silent to the slaughter, simultaneously a god and the ultimate reject, the one that is being killed and takes it all on willingly?

Yeah, haunting, isn't it?

If you care at all, if any of this bugs you at all, then do me a favor. Don't pity me, don't apologize to me, don't feel sorry for me. I don't care, it's done. It's painfully clear to me at this point that arguing does nothing and that being a revolutionary will just create more of these delusions. If you care at all, do one thing: question everything about yourself, and don't let this systematic abuse keep happening. Sure, I'm full of shit. That doesn't mean everything I say is wrong. Take what you know to be true from this and really think. Kick over your preconceptions, realize your limitations, and think. Don't hate yourself, but do violence to your ego just for a little while and really come to conclusions because you believe in them, not because of fear or hope or what you want to be true. That is the best gift you can give me.

The Philosopher is dead, and his eulogy has been read. Time to move on.