Technovia

Richard Dawkins reads his email

One reason Kazahkstan won't be joining the EU soon

I'm an atheist, but I believe absolutely in freedom of religion, something that's enshrined in Article Nine of the European Convention on Human Rights. It's worth remembering that, not very far away, states make it compulsory to register religions, and in Kazahkstan there's a new law going through which requires new levels of registration:

"Among its controversial articles, the law currently in the drafting stage, would require all religious organizations to reregister meaning that even religious organizations fully registered at this time and in full compliance of all laws would have to go back through the registration process. It would mean that 1) all religious organizations would become illegal until they reregister and it would also allow the law to have retroactive force. In other words, a religious organizatio fully established in Kazakhstan which didn’t meet new requirements would have to pack up and leave."

Infinite life or infinite death?

Harry Erwin talking about the difference between secular and religious views, in View From England:

Perhaps that might be the case, but the underlying issue is something left unsaid--there is a basic conflict between the secular state and the religious perspective about the value of human life. Religion believes that the value of an individual life is infinite, while the secular state claims it knows the value in pounds or dollars. This shows up in the conflict between the NHS, which is concerned with curing those diseases that are inexpensively curable, and the Church, which seeks to heal illness, whether curable or not.

I think Harry is fundamentally correct when he talks about the difference between secularism and religion as being about the finite versus the infinite. However, the flip side of the view that he proposes is that religion - or at least the big monotheistic ones - view human life itself as infinite, in the form of the immortal soul. This reduces the value of corporeal life, and in its most extreme form leads down the path to suicide bombing and "martyrdom".

Most religions are, though, fully aware of the need to avoid falling into the trap of only valuing the soul, so they have developed multiple layers of injunction against causing harm to yourself and others. Yet still, at its heart, the belief in an immortal soul leads to a devaluing of real life. Religion, in this sense, is a like a form of virtual reality which the person has become so wrapped up in that it dominates their real lives too.

Follower of one of the major Abrahamic faiths?

You probably don't want to listen to Marcus Brigstocke's rant from "The Now Show".

As he puts it, "can the rest of us have our planet back?"

Richard Dawkins on Creationism

Creationism: God's gift to the ignorant - Weekend Review - Times Online

The creationists’ fondness for “gaps” in the fossil record is a metaphor for their love of gaps in knowledge generally. Gaps, by default, are filled by God. You don’t know how the nerve impulse works? Good! You don’t understand how memories are laid down in the brain? Excellent! Is photosynthesis a bafflingly complex process? Wonderful! Please don’t go to work on the problem, just give up, and appeal to God. Dear scientist, don’t work on your mysteries. Bring us your mysteries for we can use them. Don’t squander precious ignorance by researching it away. Ignorance is God’s gift to Kansas.

Bonkers

The five-secret-person Department of Education panel that allocates funding for closed-captioning will no longer provide assitive tracks for the deaf to shows that mention witchcraft, including Scooby Doo, Bewitched, and Justice League.

[T]he result of this mysterious panel's deliberations was that the US Department of Education was to declare over 200 TV programs (almost no cartoons, except for things like Prince of Egypt. No more sports. Precious little drama...) were now inappropriate for closed-caption funding...

28 million Americans are now being protected from Sabrina...

Witches of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your vertical blanking interval! Link (Thanks, Sam!)
[Boing Boing Blog]