Atheism and Knowledge

A friend and I frequently discuss the merits of raising atheist children.  I take up the cause of raising children as atheists, with my friend taking the contrary position.  My views boil down to the simple idea that, if not taught to worship a god, children will not invent the idea.  There are also obvious issues with the impressionability of younger minds.  Finally, if they decide to become religious later in life, it will be of their own accord.

I believe the propensity to become religious is at the heart of the disagreement.  I think it is somewhat likely that someone can become religious after childhood.  On the other hand, my friend thinks the chances are next to zero.  Therefore, not teaching children about god forever deprives them of religion.  In further disagreement, my friend purports that it is quite easy to become an atheist.  Thus the kids can fix the delusion by themselves.

George Washington?

As a new tradition, I am going to try posting something fun on Fridays from here on out.  Currently, I am in love with all things Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, so there might be a lot of their videos for the first few Fridays.  But check out the comic and youtube pages if you get a chance!  (NB: As of 11/22, that page's home video is NSFW).   Without further ado:

Thomas Jefferson: "But this is a good thing ... you don't worship the founders as I feared you might."

Random Person: "Yeah that's basically true.  Oh, except we exploded your face into a mountain."

Hitchens on al-Awlaki

Anwar al-Awlaki

The great Christopher Hitchens has recently devoted two columns at Slate.com to the assassination of Anwar al-Awlaki.  I discussed this topic previously on this blog, but Hitchens brought up questions that were too thought-provoking to miss.

To summarize, I agree with Hitchens that the Obama administration's assassination of an American citizen raises a host of issues which need to be discussed by thinking individuals.  However, he brings up a salient point: what do we do instead?  That is to say, if we are not willing to kill homegrown terrorists, how else can we prevent the destruction of civilization?

Science and unsolvability

"Mathematics may not teach us how to add love or how to subtract hate.
But it gives us every reason to hope that every problem has a solution."
     -Twitter.com search for "math"

Google Image Search for
"hippie math."**

Aside from the overly-saccharine tone of the quote, the major problem is that it expresses a major misconception about mathematics and the other sciences.  This is, of course, the idea that every scientific problem has a solution.

An overly-simplistic definition of science might be: a discipline that attempts to solve questions about the natural world.  Scientists have, in large part, been very successful at this pursuit.  Since humanity's first attempt at explaining the universe (religion), we now have explanations that are logical, evidence-based, and falsifiable.  But, the idea that most problems are solved, or even solvable, is a fallacy. 

Jillettean Atheism

In Penn Jillette's best-selling book, God No!: Signs You May Already Be an Atheist and Other Magical Tales, he poses a simple question before the table of contents.  Titled "You May Already Be An Atheist!" he writes: "If god (however you perceive him/her/it) told you to kill your child - would you do it?  If your answer is no, in my booklet you're an atheist.  There is doubt in your mind.  Love and morality are more important to you than your faith.  If your answer is yes, please reconsider."

I will get to the underpinnings of his logic in a bit, but first let me strongly recommend this book to anyone.  Not just anyone interested in atheism or religion, but anyone who loves good nonfiction writing.  I would argue that the book is not mainly about atheism or religion.  To paraphrase Mr. Jillette again, it's more about how one atheist magician has lived his life in Las Vegas, Nevada.  To be clear, there is plenty of profanity, some very graphic scenes, and even some (sober) bacchanalia.  But what really comes across is Penn Jillette's love of life, and that is beautiful to behold. [More below the fold.]

Save Community!

The main cast.

This is a big change in tone from previous blog posts, but here it goes.  It was recently announced that NBC's spring television schedule will not include Community.  The show's dedicated fans have taken to their Twitter accounts in outrage over this.  Many are sadly predicting that this is an early warning sign of cancellation.  I wanted to take a blog post to defend the show and lend my voice to the Save Community movement.

Community is a brilliant show.  It has great characters, vivid acting, and good week-to-week stories.  The show begins when attorney Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) is disbarred for forging his college degree.  He can only afford to go to Greendale Community College, where he takes an introductory Spanish class.  He quickly, but reluctantly, forms a special bond with his study group, and the show's premise is built from from there.

Killing American Citizens

While this topic has certainly got a lot of (libertarian) press over at Reason, what brought it to my mind was the so-called "Commander-in-Chief" debate hosted on CBS on November 11.  During this debate, both Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney were asked about whether they would assassinate Americans like Anwar al-Awlaki.

Since I don't watch news television, I don't know to what degree the media covered the Awlaki assassination.  I imagine it was not covered very much, so I will redirect you to the above link to Reason Magazine and to the less partisan wikipedia page.  If you are not interested in reading the gory details, I will summarize the story.  Anwar al-Awlaki was a Yemeni-American who later became a popular imam and self-proclaimed anti-Western jihadist.  To be clear, he was a citizen of the United States.  He has been linked to many terrorist activities since then, including the "Underwear Bomber," the Times Square Bomber, and the Fort Hood Shooter.  For a more complete list, see the wikipedia page.  In any case, he was put on the Obama Administration's targeted assassination list in early 2010.  Thus we used drone assaults to bomb the various places the administration thought they could kill him.  In September 2011, the United States of America successfully killed him in Yemen.  Two weeks later, we killed his 16 year old son, American citizen Abdul-Rahman al-Awlaki. [More below the fold.]

We Need More Representatives Now!

To continue on yesterday's theme, I generally believe that the country would benefit from a closer adherence to the Constitution.  Thus, instead of slowly, apathetically drifting away from the rules set forth in the Constitution, perhaps we should try to think about the spirit of the document as well.  Contrary to Bill Maher, I think one of the biggest problems in government today is the lack of representation.  Instead of abolishing or completely restructuring the Senate, let's try to find ways of giving people a (slightly) more direct voice in their government.  I agree with the founders that the vox populi ought to be represented by . . . Representatives.  For some idea of how to increase representation without compromising the republican nature of our government, let's consider the issue from the founders perspective.

The framers fought contentiously over the issue of how many people should be in each Representative's perspective district.  While it was generally agreed that each state should have at least one Representative, a debate raged as to how big or small to make the final number.  In order to clarify the discussion below the fold, since ratios are fractions and, in this discussion, the numerator will always be one, the following holds: a given ratio 1:A is smaller than 1:B if and only if A is greater than B.  That is to say, the larger a ratio is in the following discussion, the resulting democracy would be more representative or more direct. [More below the fold]

Bill Maher Constitutionalism

On the November 4, 2011 episode of Real Time with Bill Maher, Bill had Delware's State Attorney General, "Beau" Biden, on to talk about how the banks are evil.  I was actually impressed with Biden III because he made the correct assertion that the recession was caused by a systemic failure of the market and even admitted to some governmental role.  But since this was only the latest of hundreds of discussions of banking on the show, it was not what piqued my interest.  Toward the end of the interview Maher, presumably looking to insult yet another guest, started berating Delaware for being a small state that the same representation in the Senate as California.  He did make sure to say that Delaware was not the worst sinner in his holier-than-thou eyes, but he said it was a wrong and stupid idea.  Beau Biden seemed, quite reasonably, taken aback by this and muttered something about how great the Founders were and how it seemed like a good policy to him.

Now, one does not have to be an astute constitutional scholar to know that the idea of a bicameral Congress was one of the great compromises that came out of the Constitutional Convention.  I am 90% sure that the problem is mentioned in the musical "1776," not to mention the numerous other media that cover that period of American History.  Indeed, when Bill Maher gets on his bully pulpit, he frequently bemoans the fact that the current Congress cannot get anything done.  So it seems to me that such an astute compromise should be looked at with great admiration.  But instead it is ridiculed and seen as one of the main reasons the Senate gets in the way of all "progress."

The oft-heard retort is that one of the Senate's main purposes is to be such a stumbling block.  That between the filibuster and the equal representation, the states with the largest populations would never be able to exercise their tyranny against the smaller states.  This argument is laughed at by those in Bill Maher's corner and reinforces their idea that there needs to be another Constitutional Convention to right these wrongs. [Continued after the fold]

Veteran's Day Post: Issues with the U.S. Military

As the title suggests, since today is Veteran's Day I thought it would be helpful to outline some of the main problems with the U.S. armed forces and the attitudes towards the military in this country.  As a disclaimer, I do think it is courageous for the men and women of the military to offer to give their lives for their country.  Therefore, there is certainly nothing wrong with honoring those men and women who have served or died in the armed forces.

However, I am sorry to say that I think the esteem and admiration of soldiers has swung too far in one direction.  It is certainly not anything like the level present in Nazi Germany, nor do I think it is a slippery slope to that hell.  The republican virtues are still pervasive enough in the country and the citizen led nature of the army is still firmly in place.  But what is very troublesome is that I see people repeatedly assert that the men and women serving in the military are the best of their respective generations.  This adulation seem to come from people who are from all walks of life and any political party.  Jon Stewart, Nancy Pelosi, Glenn Beck, and Mitt Romney all seem to agree on this point.  But that sort of praise really is terrible.  It simply implies that if you are not willing to kill another human being for your country, then you are automatically excluded from being one of the best people in your generation.  I don't think that the people who say it intend it this way, but it is a direct implication. [More below the fold.]

Declaration of Occupation of Wall Street

From what I can tell, the so-called Declaration of Occupation was released a little over a month ago.  But I only noticed it in its most recent media resurrection, and I thought it was worthy of commentary.  In short, sorry if this is all too repetitive.

The primary intent of the document is to list some of their grievances, which I will get to below the fold.  But I think the preamble requires comment as well.  One of the most problematic statements is "[...] corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth."  First of all, the idea that corporations or any conscious agent requires consent to do something is not the attitude of a free people.  I am not an anarchist or even that hardcore of a libertarian*.  However, I am distressed by the pervasiveness of statements like the above, or that tax cuts cost the government money.  But the occupiers claim is the worst I have heard, because the restriction they seek to place on corporations is against economic agency.  Furthermore, the idea that wealth is something that can be extracted is incredibly naive.  Better writers than me have tackled the subject, but just in case any occupiers happen across this post, wealth is not some sort of finite good.  As the wealthiest 1% gain more wealth, it does not necessarily mean there is less for the rest of us.  As Penn Jillette, Matt Ridley, and lots of other libertarians like to say "Things generally get better." (more below the fold)

My Take on Occupy Wall Street

Noam Chomsky gave a rousing speech to the Occupiers yesterday saying:

After the first few years, by the mid-1930s, although the situation was objectively much harsher than it is today, the spirit was quite different [...] There was just a sense that somehow we're going to get out of it. It’s quite different now. Now there’s kind of a pervasive sense of hopeless [sic], or, I think, despair.

Full disclosure: Professor Chomsky is consistently called the smartest man in academia and has a lot of credentials to prove it.  I am an unemployed college graduate.  Long story short, his analysis is probably right.

However, I don't know anyone with a sense of hopelessness or despair about the current economic climate, and I am willing to bet most people don't.  I also find it strange that he thinks the protests are really indicative of those feelings to begin with.  My reading of the situation is that a lot of unemployed liberal and fine arts types have banded together with socialists and market-reformers to protest the banks' actions over the past couple of decades.  A few videos I have seen have featured protesters who say they love capitalism.  Though maybe Dr. Chomsky is right; perhaps those sentiments are widespread.  My question is: should that really affect policy?

Hello World!

This is the inaugural post of the Anvil Needle blog.  Stay tuned for a more substantial posts.
    
In general I will be writing (in order of likelihood):
1) Commentary on politics or current events.
2) Reviews of media I have recently read or watched.
3) Random musings.

I hope to gain some sort of readership (doesn't everyone?).  Once this has occurred, I hope that they will guide the direction of the blog.