Deon Barnard

Among all the screaming, bigoted, childish and patronising responses I get from Theists online, there are those few who at least try to make an attempt at a reasonable argument for God. Mostly these are arguments for “a god” in general rather than any particular god, but even a convincing argument for an unnamed God would be an interesting discussion, if the arguments were not logically invalid. Here are four common arguments for the existence of God, and reasons why the argument doesn’t work.

1. The Ontological Argument
   

The argument:

This is an argument using ‘a priori’ (logical rather than experiential) reasoning. It claims that a perfect being like God must exist in reality because we can imagine him, and he wouldn’t be perfect if he existed only in our imaginations and not in reality too.

The problem:

There are two big problems with this logic. First, it expects us to believe that any perfect thing we could imagine must exist in reality too – i.e. if I can imagine a perfect Unicorn, it must therefore exist. Secondly, it makes an assumption that “reality” outside of our imagination is somehow “better” without making any effort to prove this assumption first. This is as logical as saying, “I can imagine a perfect Drakadoodle (half Dragon, half… doodle?). It would be less than perfect if it wasn’t on TV as well as in my imagination. Therefore perfect Drakadoodles must exist on the TV.”
Impressively befuddling, but not very convincing.

1. The Argument from Design
   

The argument:

This argument basically puts forward that things in the universe are so orderly, and conditions so exactly perfect (fine-tuned) for life on Earth, that there must have been an intelligent designer.

I have seen defenders of this argument use various examples from the convenient shape of the banana in a human’s hand, to the (convenient) position of the earth in the solar system, to the complexity of various organs like the eye, which apparently could not have evolved because they would be useless in any version less complex than its current one.

The problem:

This argument puts the cart before the horse. Douglas Adams put it superbly when he said, “”This is rather as if you imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, ‘This is an interesting world I find myself in — an interesting hole I find myself in — fits me rather neatly, doesn’t it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!’ This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and the air heats up and as, gradually, the puddle gets smaller and smaller, frantically hanging on to the notion that everything’s going to be alright, because this world was meant to have him in it, was built to have him in it; so the moment he disappears catches him rather by surprise.”

As one who plays table top war-games I am very aware of how easy it is to start thinking your dice are “on your side” when you’re rolling 6′s or “against you” when you’re rolling 1′s. The reality is of course that the dice don’t know or care about you at all; they simply follow a set of physical laws and fall in random positions.

Another way of looking at it is – imagine the universe had evolved in a different way, and because of that, a different species of intelligent being on another planet might have looked at their own good fortune (being alive) as a sign of an intelligent creator, even though those particular beings lived on a boiling planet and were themselves made of sulphur and molten rock.

The fact that we can think about these questions in this particular world with these particular conditions can quite easily be explained by random chance and really does not require the addition of a creator being at all. Furthermore, any natural scientist can testify just how NOT fine-tuned the world really is (for human life) and how, if there was a designer, we’d have to call him a really bad one. The only reasonable explanation for the spleen, the appendix and our “poorly designed” knees is that we are a product of an evolutionary process that neither thinks, nor allies itself with the human race.

… and by the way, the eye thing has been thoroughly disproved. There are many versions of the eye in nature (some creatures have two versions at the same time) all of which could be useful in any lesser, or previous, version of itself on the evolutionary track for various reasons.

1. The Cosmological Argument
   

The argument:

There is stuff in the universe – where did that stuff come from? Everything is caused by something else, so if you keep going back in time, what caused the first thing to happen? This must have been God.

The problem:

This type of reasoning asserts that if science can’t tell us exactly how the universe started then there’s only one logical answer – it must have been God. The main problem with this reasoning is that we could just as well ask, “Then what/who made God?”

Not knowing something doesn’t mean we get to simply insert God as the cover-all answer. This is called “God of the Gaps” logic. 6000 years ago humans had no idea why volcanoes erupted, so they decided it must be punishment from God. 1000 years ago we did not understand the germ theory of diseases so again we attributed illnesses to the anger of God, or even demons and spirits. Today we understand plate tectonics, genetics, germ theory and a host of other previously mystifying things which means that we no longer need to insert “God” as the answer to these mysteries.

Similarly, we may not understand right now exactly how the universe started, but that doesn’t mean we won’t in time. Until then we’ll just keep asking the questions and seeing what the evidence reveals. Theists often criticise the “Big Bang” theory because it essentially proposes that everything came from nothing, which seems unreasonable, and yet they don’t seem to have any objection to the concept of an everlasting God who always was and is and is to come.

1. The Moral Argument
   

The argument:

This argument proposes that there are universal moral laws in the world, and that somebody (God) must have commanded these moral laws. How would all people everywhere understand that say, murder is wrong, if God hadn’t created this moral law?

Some people also argue that morals are invisible and immeasurable by “scientific means” which means they must have a supernatural origin. E.g. you can’t see love, or hold love, or measure love, but you know it exists, so it must be “beyond science” and therefore supernatural.

The problem:

This is nothing more than a problem of semantics and definitions. Firstly, let me restate the point that, just because science has not yet discovered or understood something, doesn’t mean that it won’t or can’t, and it certainly doesn’t necessarily mean that thing is therefore supernatural. In fact, history demonstrates that most of what we previously thought of as magical or supernatural has become understood in scientific and natural terms. We have no reason to believe that the remaining mysteries of the universe won’t similarly be understood in time.

Morality however is not one of these mysteries at all. Morality is the idea of what we “ought” to do, or how we “ought” to be, which by definition implies that somebody or something has made a decision and has an expectation in this regard. Morality is nothing more than adherence to a particular list of commands issued by very human leaders, churches, cultures, nations, clubs, families, authority figures or some other group or individual. This is easily recognisable in the obvious differences in moral codes and expectations across various religions and cultures. One person thinks God hates alcohol, and another thinks God is indifferent on the matter. Surely he can’t be both?

There are moral principles that are fairly universal, like the idea that it’s bad to steal or lie, but these would certainly pre-date religion and can easily be explained in the context of evolving communities. The individual may feel an urge to lie for their own benefit, but a community quickly attempts to demonise this behaviour because of the negative macro effect on the stability and advancement of the group as a whole. I.e. if everybody lied all the time the community would cease to be functional. In any case, and in every community in existence today, individuals still lie, despite the moral codes they claim to adhere to. This is the constant struggle between the individual’s self-interests and the greater good of the larger community.

We have no reason to believe that morals exist somewhere in space separate from our use of them as a means to describe and categorise. Morals are adjectives rather than nouns. We use them to control how communities behave, and over time we adjust them to suit the changing needs of society. Not too long ago (and even in certain religions today) slavery was considered morally acceptable. Strangely enough God seems to have changed his mind on the matter…

Morality is, in my opinion, more of an argument against the existence of God than for.

In closing:

All of these arguments, and in fact every argument I’ve ever heard for the existence of God, are logically flawed. In contrast, the overwhelming evidence against God is so convincing as to leave me with very little doubt about the matter. Even if a half reasonable argument could be found for the existence of a “Creator”, it would still not make any specific Religion or God or Holy Book any more likely – if anything it would point to a more advanced intelligent life in the universe, one that could be studied and verified and understood in time.

Recent events have had me thinking about the utter meaninglessness of most of our lives.
That may seem a little harsh, but in the face of world hunger, aids, local community murders and unexpected vehicle accidents, the average city dweller’s life seems brutally short, stressed, joyless and insignificant.

I keep asking why? Why do we accept an existence that starts with a caffeine shot, moves onto an hour or two in the traffic, followed by 10 hours of sitting in open plan offices pushing paper around, hidden from the sun, and ending with another two hours in the traffic, a TV dinner, and few hours of restless sleep before it all begins again? Who has convinced us that we need to earn as much money as possible at the cost of family and friends and dreams and health? Why have we accepted, without question, that this system is the only valid option for a life of happiness when it is entirely evident that we are not happy at all?

Sure, we have moments of happiness here and there, and convince ourselves that those moments are what we work so hard for… but I’m not convinced. How many people breaking their backs, working overtime and bringing work home can say that their lives are better for it? When you’ve given up on your dreams, family, friends, hobbies and health, what is life worth? That of course leads us to the question of, “What is the value of life?” or, “what’s it all about?” – An ancient and frustrating question indeed.

As a naturalist who doesn’t believe in any sort of afterlife or spirit world, I do not entertain comforting thoughts of a “better place” to take the edge of our present sufferings. This is it. We only have one go at this. We have to create meaning out of the lottery we were born into or alternatively accept our ultimate fate and get it over and done quickly. I choose the former. Why? Because the joys I have been privileged to experience have been incredible, wonderful, glorious, and I want to have them again, and again, and again.

When I find happiness in this life I am often amazed by how little (cash) it costs. We have been conditioned to accept a system of acquisition and wealth creation and ambition, and yet some of the happiest moments of my life cost me nothing.

I think back to my childhood running free on the streets of Durban. My father had died and my mother had nothing. There were days we lived on toast or Pro-Nutro and yet I was happy. I had no Lego, no Xbox, no cool clothes, and yet I had a gang of friends with whom I spent hours building tree houses and discovering the city with wonder and excitement. We created amazing toys out of scrap wire and other bits and bobs. I learned how to play chess, look after people less fortunate (there’s always someone less fortunate), and create paper Mache superhero masks with which I attempted to help a few willing (but more often flabbergasted) old ladies to cross streets they may or may not have needed to cross.

Most of my life I have managed to escape (or surf) what I call “the tide”. The unstoppable force of societal expectation created through an intricate mix of education, media, religion and hearsay which ultimately creates a definition of what is a “normal”, “good”, “desirable” and “acceptable” life. The tide is so strong it sweeps away even the most determined individualist and results in a population of greedy zombies, all the same, all with lifeless limbs outstretched and crying out for more, all moving in the same direction… all the living dead. When the tide of zombies encounters a living soul in their path they simply devour all the good bits, leaving the remaining deformed corpse to join their ranks in a sort of unholy march toward an unknown destination.

I once met a man who, with his wife and daughter, travelled the world on a bike and side car. He had travelled through Asia for years and was now passing through Africa. They “home” schooled their daughter on the road and stopped for a few weeks in each town where they camped at the local caravan park before moving on. He did odd jobs wherever they stopped to keep them going. He was happy. I remember trying to convince him to settle down. I remember the church trying to make him feel guilty about “dragging” his wife and daughter around the world, and about “not being accountable” to a church or a system. They were immune to the system. They smiled and waved and moved on. They were happy.

If I were to write a list of the 10 happiest moments of my life they would include the births of my kids; some amazing moments of intimacy with friends and lovers; winning certain games of chess or Warhammer; losing certain games of chess or Warhammer; many wonderful moments on the porch with my dogs and lady; special times chilling and camping with my kids; some amazing discussions with friends at Rumble events; meeting new friends at parties and occasions; reading some incredible books; listening at full volume to some incredible music; beating up Horde players on World of Warcraft…

When I start giving up these things to become more zombie-like, I lose the real reason to live. No corporate promotion, car, fancy house, retirement plan or latest gadget upgrade could possibly give my life more meaning or satisfaction than what I can get if I just focus my attention on the stuff that really matters.

Now to go grab a cup of coffee and get those papers pushed!

Sigh… I am conflicted. A part of me wants to scream “what’s wrong with you people!! Can’t you see how stupid this belief is? How limiting? How dangerous?” But another part of me remembers (with a flush of embarrassment and regret) that once I thought the very same thing. I feel like maybe I ought to have some insight into what makes someone hold onto completely irrational beliefs despite all evidence against those beliefs – and yet I feel like my memories of faith are someone else’s, like trying to remember a bad dream from last week. Nevertheless, I’ll give it a try.

What makes someone believe in a talking snake despite the fact that we have no evidence that such a creature ever existed? What makes someone believe in Noah and his flood and his Ark, despite the fact that marsupials ended up all living in Australia? What makes someone believe that God heals people in church services when the only ailments that ever get healed are subjective, and never as convincing as a re-grown limb? What makes people believe in Heaven or Hell when we have no photos of these places and no one has ever returned from there with evidence for a CNN interview?

Firstly it’s important to understand that believers are the product of an intensely complicated and convoluted mass of interwoven stories, ideas, myths, poetry, prophecy, culture and history. It’s kind of like an unfolding family drama. Everyone involved in the drama is intensely committed to the relationships and the conflicts and the emotions that are constantly evolving and becoming more layered and complex. It’s almost impossible as one of the stakeholders to step back and ask the simple questions – as a stranger looking in from the outside might do. Family members will spend hours discussing who said what to who and how they feel about the situation, and never once ask whether the events in question were valid or true in the first place.

This level of complexity allows for innumerable contradictions and logical fallacies to emerge, grow and die within the lifecycle of the drama. Individual points of error may be corrected along the way only for new errors to emerge next door. In our family drama, people will say, “was Susan correct to reprimand Bob about…”, but no one will ask, “Does this family matter? Should we be interfering with each other’s lives at all? What’s the point of all of this? Are we following rules and traditions that make no sense?” i.e. the big questions are never engaged with – in fact the surest route to being cast out of the community is to start engaging with the big questions at all.

How does this play out in Evangelical Christianity? Here are some examples:

People will discuss what makes someone “worthy” of preaching behind the pulpit, and never ask whether preaching behind the pulpit is a valid activity to engage with in the first place.

People will debate whether tithing should be 10% of gross or net income without ever asking whether tithing makes any sense at all.

People will talk at length about whether God is speaking through person X or Y without once questioning whether there exists a God to do any talking to start with.

People will debate the revealed meaning of a single sentence of scripture without ever questioning the validity of the bible as the so called “word of God”.

Elaborate rituals and requirements keep believers feeling that their “knowledge” is meaningful and that some biblical “scholar” has worked out all the details so that the core questions never have to be revisited. Their own scripture even backs up this approach, comparing fundamental questions to milk food and elaborate discussions on dispensational theory, tithing or pre, post and mid tribulation… “meat”.

So why do Christians believe in God despite the fact that children are dying in Africa; or that people are being murdered in their homes; or that limbs never grow back; or that very few of their prayers are ever “answered”… because the thought of a world without God terrifies them. They extrapolate that if the world is this bad with God; imagine how bad it would be without him! They have convinced themselves that God acts in mysterious ways and that somehow contrary to all our faulty human logic that God has a loving plan which we simply can’t understand. They have been led to believe that against a backdrop of pain and suffering life only has meaning if that meaning is serving the being that created them.

With God things become clear. With God they have a mechanism to manage their emotions and fear. They can go to bed calmly at night knowing that an asteroid simply won’t ever wipe out life on the planet because that’s not in God’s plan. They can go to work knowing that they are strong in Jesus (whatever that means) even though they feel fragile and incompetent. In a nutshell, ignorance is bliss.

How many of us haven’t walked into our closet hoping against all hope that we’d find Narnia on the other side; or rubbed an antique lamp in a shop when no one was looking just to test out the genie theory? Why? Because it would be AWESOME if something like that happened! Because it would mean that absolutely nothing was impossible and we could treat those pesky laws of physics with contempt. After all, how many times have you put a glass on a counter only for it to be pulled down to a shattering end onto the floor by the ever present gravity of the earth? Christianity is a Narnia that seems real, or real enough, to its adherents. It’s comforting. It’s calming. It creates a framework for meaningfulness and social acceptance.

But it’s wrong.

I enjoy going on the odd virtual journey to Azeroth, the fantastical world of the online game called World of Warcraft. The difference between religious adherence and online gaming of course is that I don’t actually believe anything I’m seeing, and when I leave the game world I understand that I was never actually there, and that I can’t actually turn into a bear, or fly, or resurrect from the dead – and I don’t tell other people to believe any of it either. I’d hate to see people jumping off buildings to test out their brand new cold weather flying license in real life. The problem with religion is that it does just that. Christians make actual real life decisions based on fantasy logic. They go to war based on these ideals. They prevent Africans with AIDS from using contraceptives. They withhold legitimate scientific information from their children at school about the age of the earth and the origins of life on the planet. They insist that poor people pay a tenth of their incomes to a questionable organization… and the list goes on.

Of course, some Christians are able to leave the fantasy at church on Sunday and live pretty rational, reasonable lives for the rest of the week, not unlike a World of Warcraft player, but that’s not the message being preached from thousands of pulpits every Sunday.

Faith (despite evidence) is a trait that is applauded and recognized as the ideal in most Christian organizations. This one thing alone – faith despite evidence – is the single biggest reason I will continue to speak out against religion. When people believe in invisible things despite the fact that the evidence all but removes the probability of those things existing, we have a breeding ground for quack science, superstition, extremism, conspiracy theories and all sorts of other societal ills.

1. Meaning is a construct.

Life is full of meaning for individuals who create meaning in their life. Wealth, sex, friends, family, social causes, politics etc only have meaning to those who assign meaning to them. For one person ‘saving the Pandas’ is meaningful, to another it’s completely meaningless. For one person ‘family traditions’ are meaningful, to another they’re just meaningless time wasters. One man screams for the Stormers every weekend, another has no clue and doesn’t care. We all try share the ‘meaning’ we get out of things with everyone else but there are people who simply aren’t going to care and we need to get over it. Does that mean that nothing is meaningful? Not at all! Well… maybe to the universe at large, yes, everything is pretty meaningless, but we’d all be suicidal if we didn’t attach meaning to the arbitrary things of our lives. So go ahead and get passionate about things – it’s what makes life worth living. Sex, super heroes, crispy bacon, cigars, whiskey, children, vampires, guitars, costumes and hobbits are just a few things that have tons of meaning to me even if they mean all of nothing to you.

2. Friends are temporary but essential

Friends come and go. We make friends by investing time and effort into the kinds of people that meet a particular need in our lives at a particular time. The reality is that we are always changing ourselves. What we believe or enjoy or desire changes over time and so do our needs. As a result we find new people that are more enjoyable to be around and lose friends with whom we’ve lost what once connected us. Just go to a matric reunion 20 years later and you’ll see what I mean. So I figure we need to enjoy the friends we have now and not cry too much over the one’s we’ve lost.

3. People pick a social reputation

Everyone decides at some point how they want to be seen by the community at large. Some pick the ‘nice guy’ reputation and want to be seen as easy to get along with and lovable. Others pick the ‘fuck you’ reputation and want people to fear them until their trust is earned. Still others want to be seen as ‘crazy’ or ‘quirky’ or ‘mature’ or ‘fearless’ etc. We build and nurture these reputations and get quite offended when people don’t take them at face value. We even assign moral judgments to validate our choices like, “Being cautious and mature is BETTER than being spontaneous and fun loving” or vice versa. I have identified at least three reputations that I have adopted since childhood, and I have a good mind to test drive a few more, just for fun!

4. People are scared

People fear everything. They fear small creatures and large creatures. They fear the unknown. They fear pain, and death, and discomfort. They fear change. They fear confrontation and embarrassment and loss of reputation. There is almost nothing that is not feared by someone; and very few people who are not severely hindered by fear in their lives. I think this is sad. I often just sit and watch people going about their daily lives, and this one thing is clear to me – people would be so much more than they are if they weren’t scared. The problem with fear though is that it’s primal, and so it activates involuntarily as a defense mechanism. Our tools for dealing with fear are courage and rationality, traits that are still hard to find, even in 2011.

5. Life is a journey

There is a common misconception that “people out there” (everyone except yourself) are living “normal lives”; that everyone has a college or university degree; that everyone has medical, house, life and car insurance; that everyone knows what they want to do with their lives; that everyone is married with kids; that everyone goes to gym; that everyone wants an enormous salary; that everyone except you is happy and has what they need! More importantly, there is a perception that this is how it SHOULD be – that this is the definition of life; what it means to be a human. This might be the most deceptive illusion in western society. Of course, this is not how things are at all, and in fact the percentage of people in the world for which the above list is true is almost zero. Very few people know what they want to do with their lives. Very few people are in their career of choice. Very few people stay married for long and most people live in ‘dysfunctional’ families. We’re all so busy trying to be like someone who doesn’t exist, and even if they did we’d probably be uncomfortable in their lives. Every individual has their own peculiar path to walk. Every individual is working out what works for them in their own way. There is no ‘model’ or ‘right’ way to live. I think if we all understood this principle we could get on with ourselves a lot better and just enjoy the journey for what it is.

Thor; Loki; Odin; Zeus; Chronos; Prometheus; Atlas; Diana; Ares; Hades; Hercules; Isis, Osiris: these are all cool Marvel and DC comic superheroes (or villains) with powers that defy the laws of physics. Some fly or move really fast. Some have super strength or amazing combat abilities.

Although I love these comics and the characters I don’t for one minute believe they exist, or ever existed, and nor does anyone else any more… but that wasn’t always the case.

As recently as 300 AD people seriously worshipped Greek or Roman gods in temples and with prayers in the same way millions worship Jesus or Allah today. If you lived in ancient Egypt and did not believe in Ra you would have been seen as a heretic, or crazy – certainly misguided and ignorant. The same would be true for anyone living in Greece in 400 BC and not believing in Zeus etc. And yet, all these “gods”, once revered, and sacrificed to, and worshipped, and died for, have been relegated to cute comic book characters. Anyone today who claimed to still believe in the existence and deity of Hercules would be considered as much a fool as a member of the flat earth society.

How is it then that in the year 2011 billions of people still worship mythical man-made super heroes like Jesus, Krishna or Mohammed? How is it that we believe these beings are real, and all powerful, and control our lives? Is it not evident that they too will become, and are becoming, cute stories that need to be seen for what they really are? Are we supposed to believe that the best evidence the creator of all things could supply for his deity was to walk on water or turn it into wine? Really? That’s it? That makes someone God? Clearly that puts David Copperfield in as a serious contender for creator of the universe!

Already the convoluted Christian story is moving into the realm of comic fiction where it belongs. I’ve just downloaded a comic called Jesus vs. the Vampires, and although I haven’t read it yet I’m sure it’ll be great fun and that Jesus H. Christ will kick a few vampire asses, while walking on water and sipping a good vintage wine, like some sort of robed and bearded demon hunting Van Helsing character. The nativity scene with the wise men and sheep we see all over the place during Christmas is simply the Christian addition to the jumble of kitschy traditions we’ve borrowed from a bunch of ancient cultures we now call heathen.

We need to stand back from our little cultures and families and church communities and see the big picture – Isis, Zeus, Odin and Jesus are simply stories we used to give our lives meaning when we understood nothing about how the universe really worked. Look around you – I mean really look to see: people’s limbs are not growing back; people are not walking on water; gods are not interacting with the general populace. Pretending that it’s true doesn’t make it true. It never has. There never was an Odin. There never was a Hercules. There never was a Jehovah. If there is a God we know nothing at all about it, and it has no interest in our affairs at all, unless that interest is completely academic.

The world will evolve when we understand the difference between fiction and reality and we stop acting on directives issued in works of fiction. We don’t obey the words of Sauron or Gandalf, neither do we plead to Dr. Spock or Wonder Woman to affect our job interview or heal our child of a fever. Instead we prepare for our interview and give our child panado or antibiotics because these things are real and we understand why they work.

Ah, I see my download’s complete. Go Jesus! Do a Chuck Norris on that Vampire ass!! And since when do Vampires sparkle? Your holy shine will put an end to that rubbish! Woohoo, the two finger gesture of God and he turns into ash – yowzers! I hope there’s a Jesus vs. Green Lantern coming soon…

This might be the biggest copout line ever used, right up there with, “It’s not my fault”, and, “It’s not my job”.

It is used by well meaning Christians and Muslims everywhere (yes, everywhere).

When someone says, “Reindeers have horns”, it is not a generalization; it is a fact. Sure, there are exceptions, but if someone were looking for reindeer horns for, I don’t know… reindeer horn soup, they would not be silly or naïve to go looking in a herd of reindeer. And to say that reindeer are generally brown in colour would not be spiciest or derogatory – again, it would simply be a statement of fact. The white reindeers without horns would not define the group; instead they would give cause to consider whether these exceptions are reindeer at all.

When I speak out against the Catholic Church and their many atrocities against mankind I usually get an onslaught of angry individuals who boldly state that I have no right to paint all Catholics, or all Christians with the same brush. Instead of considering the claims against the church, they separate themselves from those claims and pretend that they are entirely innocent of anything they were not directly involved in. Ironically, these same people have no problem feeling proud or taking glory for some distant feeding or philanthropical programme the church is running that they also have no direct involvement with. They claim that their tithes and offerings support the feeding programme, but deny that those same coins support all the evil propagated by the church. These people say things like, “Not all Catholics are bad”, or, “Not all Catholics abuse children”. What do these statements have to do with the moral state of the church? Nothing. Do these statements absolve individual Catholics of their part in the whole thing? Not at all.

Let me break down the fallacy of this type of logic (I have no misconceptions about the uneasy relationship faith has with logic) with a parallel.

Most people agree that the Nazi party was a corrupt, even “evil” institution that did great wrong in the world. Most people also agree that not all Nazi’s were evil. Most Nazi’s were probably just following orders out of fear or some misguided ideology. Did those who were innocent justify the existence of the whole organization? Absolutely not. Most people agree that the Nazi party was too evil to continue existing and had to be shut down. It makes no difference how many “good” Nazi’s there were, the whole thing had to come to end for the good and safety of all mankind. The “good” Nazi’s were the support base of the whole evil organization. Their “good” money was used for evil purposes. Their “good” support politically and numerically gave power to an evil structure. Every one of those “good” Nazi’s is responsible for their own actions and how those actions contributed to one of the darkest times of human history. Many “good” Nazi’s went to church and prayed and claimed to love God, but none of that is a “get-out-of-jail-free card”.

This is true of every sinister group and organisation you can think of from the Mafia, to suicide cults, to… yes, many religious groups! Just because individuals claim to be unknowing, or naïve, or “good” does not take away from what their organisations are doing in the world.

You may be thinking that it is my own logic that is faulty – that if we applied this principle to Atheists, then Atheism is responsible for the atrocities of Stalin or Mao, but this too is flawed. If Atheists all over the world supported these individuals [in the name of Atheism] then I would agree and would certainly NOT continue to consider myself an Atheist; neither would I support Atheism financially or otherwise. But these men did what they did in their own names, or in the name of some broken ideology (forms of communism). Maybe they didn’t believe in God, but that was not their motive or their goal. To say that Mao and Stalin were Atheists is to say they were males, or chess players; all of which may be true but none of which has anything to do with the evil of their organisations. No “good” person could support these organisations with a clear conscience in full knowledge of what was being done by them; and all should agree that they needed to be resisted and ultimately closed down for the good and safety of all humans.

If I was an employee of a large company, and held a good position there, and I discovered that this company financially supported the blood diamond industry in Liberia, or that they were supplying weapons to pirates in Somalia, could I in good conscience continue working for that company? Would I not resign rather than have blood on my hands? Or would I claim ignorance and plead innocence based on the fact that I’m a hard working employee that pays his taxes and goes to church – and furthermore, take offence at the accusations and fight to keep the company open. Maybe, at the very least I would attempt to expose the corruption to see the company continue without those that made the evil decisions. Would it matter that the company also gave a percentage of its earnings to charity? Whichever way you look at it, you could not merrily go to work every day and sleep well at night.

So why is it that the Catholic Church, or Islam, or Protestant churches that do sinister things in the name of Jesus and Christianity, continue to thrive and find support despite all the evil they do? These organisations have the full and knowing support of millions of “good” people. Millions of people turn their eyes from the sins of their churches and selectively dissociate themselves with the dark deeds of their organisations. “Innocent” Catholics, humble family folk, support with weekly attendance, submission and finances the great evils of their church, and take great offence when these dark matters are brought to light. The Pope (their Pope) supports these crimes either directly, or by willingly covering up the actions of his clergy. The WHOLE WORLD knows what the Catholic Church has been up to and STILL people don’t cry out to have the whole thing shut down??

Today in Africa millions of people have contracted AIDS, a death sentence, because the Catholic Church insists that contraception is evil, and “good” Catholics everywhere believe them. This is not the act of one insane Mao, or Stalin, this is the decree of a church that has the support of millions of deceived sheep; all in the name of Jehovah God, the Pope and the Bible.
Thousands of paedophile priests who ought to be in European prisons doing useful community service have simply been relocated to Africa where they have even easier access to all the small boys and girls they could dream of; swept under the rug in the name of the church.
Muslim females today in many Middle East countries are subjected to brutality and inequality comparable to the worst medieval conditions you can imagine; all in the name of Allah, Mohammed and the Kuran.
Lower middle class Protestants in English colonies all over the world are manipulated to give 10% and more of their hard earned cash to Pastors and Reverends and Bishops who drive BMWs and have every need taken care of, while the givers would do better to take care of their personal debt; all in the name of Jesus, scripture and promises of personal financial return.

So, telling me that, “not all Christians are bad”, is completely irrelevant. I have no desire to bring down good Christians or good Muslims, nor do I care how many soup kitchens and feeding programmes you are personally involved in. Feel free to keep feeding the world – we surely need it. What I want to see is the dismantling of religious organisations involved in corrupt, sinister, harmful and evil actions in the world. If that means your particular corrupt organisation needs to be dissolved, it’s really not the end of the world, join something friendlier and less harmful, like the local gaming club

Of course you could always become a Humanist and put your energies and finances to better use without all the holy middlemen.

Ok, so you’ve heard about a great podcast you just absolutely MUST listen to and all your friends and family have been bugging you to get with it and up your game with technology, iPods and the like, but every time you start trying to work it all out your eyes glaze over and you give up in despair.

For this reason, as well as the fact that I want people to listen to my own awesome podcast PRIMORDIAL SOUP, I’m going to help you get yourself sorted on ITunes, podcasts and your portable MP3 player.

Let’s start with the big picture, and then I’ll take you through the details.

1. You need to know where to find the web site of the podcast you want to listen to, OR, simply know what the RSS feed address of the podcast is (Don’t panic yet, we’ll get to that).
2. You need a computer (duh).
3. You need to install ITunes on your computer.
4. You need to tell ITunes how to find the podcast you want to listen to.
5. You need to download the podcast using ITunes (ITunes does this for you every time it sees a new episode of the podcast is available)
6. You need to have an MP3 player. This could simply be your computer, but if you intend to listen to your podcast in the car, or gym, or while visiting your mother in law, then I suggest an IPod or cheaper equivalent with earphones.
7. You need to sync your ITunes on your computer with your portable MP3 player.
8. Now you’re ready to enjoy your podcasts!

Now the details…

You need to know where to find the web site of the podcast you want to listen to, OR, simply know what the RSS feed address of the podcast is.

1. Most podcasts have a web site. You can Google the name of the podcast to find their site.

1. Go to the site and look for an RSS feed button. Here are examples of what it might look like… you get the picture.
   
   
   
   1. Right click on the button and select Copy Link Location. Your feed address is now ready to be pasted into Itunes.
   2. Here are some feed addresses for some of my favourite podcasts. You can simply copy them from here if you like:
      1. Primordial Soup: http://primordialsoop.wordpress.com/feed/
      2. Consilience: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ConsilienceAnAfricanSciencePodcast
      3. Skeptics Guide to the Universe: http://www.theskepticsguide.org/feed/rss.aspx?feed=SGU
      4. The Good Atheist: http://www.thegoodatheist.net/feed/

You need to install Itunes on your computer.

1. To install Itunes on your computer go to http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/ and click
   
2. It’s quite big so go get a cup of coffee.
3. Once downloaded, double click the file, answer all the questions and install ITunes on your machine.

You need to tell ITunes how to find the podcast you want to listen to.

1. In ITunes click advanced (at the top), then click Subscribe to Podcast…
   
2. Paste the podcast feed URL that you copied earlier into the URL box. Then click OK.
   
3. Your podcast will appear in the podcast list in ITunes.
   
4. ITunes will automatically look for all backdated issues of the podcast which you can see by clicking the small arrow symbol next to the podcast name
   
5. ITunes is defaulted to download the latest version of each podcast. So if you want the earlier versions you just need to click on the GET button next to that podcast episode.
6. Podcasts can be quite large so if you’re setting up several podcasts for the first time you may need to leave your computer downloading overnight.

You need to sync your ITunes on your computer with your portable MP3 player

1. Cool, now you have some podcasts. You can listen to them on your computer by selecting them in Itunes and pushing play – or you can sync them with your portable device.
2. To sync an IPod to ITunes, connect your IPod to your computer with the white Apple cable you got with the device.
3. A new menu item will appear on the left called DEVICES. Click on your device name in that menu.
4. At the top, click Podcasts.
5. Click the check box next to Sync Podcasts.
6. On the bottom right of the screen click the Sync button
7. All the podcasts you have downloaded and not yet played will be synced to your IPod.

Now you’re ready to listen. Enjoy!

“In brightest day, in blackest night, No evil shall escape my sight.
Let those who worship evil’s might, Beware my power… Green Lantern’s light!”

So a question I’m getting a lot at the moment is, “Who the f%^$# is Green Lantern??!” as well as, “Why the hell are you so retarded whenever you talk about him?”… both reasonable questions.

If you’re living in the dark ages of superhero fandom, or were one of those kids who played cricket and soccer at school or smoked at the bottom of the field with the “rebels”, then the chances are you don’t know or understand the answer to either question.

I was probably about 10 years old when I read a Green Lantern comic for the first time, and I was instantly hooked. I knew about Superman, Spiderman and Hulk, but Green Lantern was just much cooler than any of them. I think I related to Green Lantern (Hal Jordan in particular) more, with his cocky attitude, weakness for pretty girls (yes even at age 10), and general desire to do good and save the universe. He also had an awesome outfit with a wicked cool symbol on his chest. There was also something really intriguing about his “superpowers” which resonated deeply in my personality, but before we get to that let me start by explaining the whole Green Lantern fiction in a paragraph.

An ancient race of little blue bald aliens with big heads and great power called the “Guardians” worked out how to wield the green spectrum of light as a weapon against fear and tyranny in the universe. Because their numbers were few (and the universe is a big place), they decided to recruit sentient beings who had the ability to overcome great fear from different sectors of the universe and bestow on them each a ring which could harness the green energy through imagination and willpower. They called this intergalactic police force “The Green Lantern Corps”. Effectively with enough will, focus and imagination Green Lanterns can create constructs of green energy that can do just about anything. The rings are also “programmed” to protect their wearers and provide other powerful abilities like flight and phasing. In various times of need the Guardians recruited humans from earth, the most famous of which is Hal Jordan, military test pilot. There are thousands of Green Lanterns in the Corps of which only four have been human.

Hal Jordan is in my view the perfect superhero. He is not the boy scout, unrealistically perfect Godlike being that Superman is, neither is he the pessimistic manipulative cynic that Batman is. He is a regular guy with a regular job and all the usual worries around love and relationships, both with females and with family. He is given access to amazing potential which he never asked for and is constantly trying to improve himself and his skill with the ring. What really separates him from the rest is not that he can move planets or create big green dragons, but that with or without the ring he has the character to face his fears and exercise enormous courage in the face of adversity. His tenacity, willpower and imagination make him my favourite fictional hero of all time – yip, even better than Jesus

This Friday (17 June 2011) the premier of the movie Green Lantern will show in South Africa. I had been predicting for many years, and hoping like crazy, that someone would do a Green Lantern movie in my lifetime – not only a Green Lantern movie but particularly a Hal Jordan Green Lantern movie. When I saw the trailer months ago for the first time, needless to say I was ecstatic, and have been ever since! What I’ve seen of the two official trailers so far have not disappointed. I have every reason to believe that this may be the greatest superhero flick (Marvel or DC) that has ever come to the big screen. The CGI, casting, script and general production look amazing, and it seems they’ve gone to every effort to stick to the comic script and details exactly.

I will be watching this movie on Friday with a group of my best friends, then the following Friday with another group of good friends (in costume) followed by a Green Lantern party, then the Friday after that again with my kids.

If you have never heard of Green Lantern till right now, then I hope this will be enough to convince you to go see the movie, but I suggest for a richer experience that you go down to your local comic or Incredible Books store and read a Green Lantern graphic novel before you do!

As a comic book fan I was thoroughly impressed and entertained by Thor. That is not to say that I feel the same about all comic book films at all. I gnashed my teeth and pulled my hair out during the early Batman films, and let’s not even talk about the disasters that were Daredevil and Elektra! I’d also like to see an adult version of Spiderman some time… but back to Thor.

Director Kenneth Branagh really went the extra mile to keep the characters, atmosphere and locations true to the Thor we all (or at least some of us) know and love from the comics. Thor’s outfit was from the ‘Ultimate Thor/Avengers’ arc which was slightly disappointing only because I went to some trouble to create myself a Thor helmet which I proudly wore around the mall for the movie trip, only to discover that Thor wore no helmet at all throughout the film and a whole pile of youngsters probably thought I was in the wrong cinema or something.

In general films portray a slightly, if not tremendously watered down version of a comic book mythology, which is not surprising when you’re trying to squeeze 30 or 40 years of intricate story telling into just under two hours. Thor I felt was different. The movie incorporated an enormous amount of the original fluff from the comics and even added certain elements that improved the buy-in-ability of the whole fiction. In the movie they downplay the ‘God’ nature of Thor by using, among other things, one of my favourite sceptical quotes by Arthur C Clarke – “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.” Effectively Thor and his race are really advanced aliens that were worshipped as Gods by less sophisticated societies in the past (Vikings). The whole thing was far more ‘sciencey’ than ‘magicky’ – which I appreciated. Even his body armour was a type of nano-morphing-metalic-skin of some sort.

This movie had it all. For the guys – cool gadgets, one liners, mass destruction, flying tough guys, beer drinking and awesome mixed fighting styles, not to mention the lead actress Natalie Portman… droooooool!!! For the ladies – well, a topless Chris Hemsworth, a smiling Chris Hemsworth, Chris Hemsworth in a cool Thor outfit, etc..

The comedy timing was great! I laughed out loud regularly to the annoyance of a few folk sitting around me. There’s a particularly cool moment where the human Chris Hemsworth becomes Thor and Natalie Portman’s character is, shall we say, impressed. I won’t give it away.

As has been the build-up in the Hulk and Iron Man movies, there were the usual references in Thor to the existence of… well, Hulk and Iron Man! And with Captain America coming up it is clear that there are plans afoot to assemble the Avengers soon, and I absolutely can’t wait!!! Under any other circumstances I’d be telling the world how DC is way cooler than Marvel, but for today, congratulations Marvel – job well done!

This movie is a must see for absolutely everyone.

Last year I offended someone with a humorous Atheist cartoon on my Facebook wall… well, I offended a few people, but I’m used to that. This particular situation was interesting however for the following reason. The person I refer to let me know he was offended and that I was losing friends by posting such things. Losing friends? I asked him what friends I was losing and he said possibly himself. There were many other statements made in the line of, “friends respect their friend’s beliefs…” etc. I found it fascinating that someone who I had seen once in five years, and had nothing in common with, felt so free to use the ‘friend’ card to get me to shut up and behave, as though the thought of losing his ‘friendship’ would strike the fear of God into me.

What it did do was make me think, “I must write a piece on friendship some day!” This is that piece.

I didn’t shut up. I didn’t behave. The reality is that this human wasn’t a friend’s backside and had no rights to insist anything from me as a friend. Friendship isn’t a weapon to be wielded when it suits. Friendship is a commitment, a journey, a sacrifice. Needless to say, this human quickly unfriended me on Facebook and vanished into the sunset from whence he came… not unlike so many others who vanished the moment I stopped believing in a God.

I have often pondered over the idea of friendship. How does it work? Who are your friends? What rights and responsibilities does friendship bestow? What is friendship not? Having discussed this issue at some of our Rumbles, and amongst friends (true friends), I have some suggestions about what a friend IS and ISN’T.

A friend is…

1. Someone who has the wellbeing of their friends in mind.
2. Someone who takes the time and effort to get in touch i.e. initiates contact.
3. Someone who speaks well of his/her friends behind their backs.
4. Someone who won’t let their friends destroy themselves.
5. Someone you look forward to spending time with.
6. Someone who honours their commitments to their friends.
7. Someone who will help you move house.
8. Someone who will bring you a meal in time of need.
9. Someone who will come to your aid in a dangerous situation.

A friend is NOT…

1. Someone who only thinks of you when you call.
2. Someone who can’t remember a thing you said because they were too busy hogging the conversation.
3. Someone who says, “I’ll be there”, and doesn’t arrive – without warning or apology.
4. Someone who says, “I’ll be there at 8″, and arrives at 9 – without warning or apology.
5. Someone who suddenly doesn’t know you anymore because they heard rumours that you believe/did something strange – without consulting you about it before jumping to conclusions.
6. Someone who is happy to take continually without a thought to giving.
7. Someone who loves to have you along at their life events, but never attends yours because, “it’s not their thing”.
8. Someone who can change their allegiances in the blink of an eye.
9. Someone who takes pleasure in pointing out your ‘faults’, but heavens forbid you point out theirs!

How do you rate as a friend? You can’t be a friend to everyone, but when you claim to be someone’s friend do you really qualify? Just a thought.