Oprah Dashes the Hopes of Atheists Everywhere
Ok, a slight exaggeration but watching the video below was, quite frankly, maddening. It’s the part where she says, “Maybe you believe and you don’t know you believe” which translates to me as “I can’t conceive that you really don’t believe in God, therefore, you must be in denial – you really believe – you [...]
Vacation Book #1: On the Origin of Species by Charles Darwin
Well, a year after purchasing it, I finally finished On the Origin of Species. It was quite the read – all 650 Victorian Era pages worth. Although Darwin’s writing style was a lot more accessible than I expected, it was still a bit dry in places. That said, there were multiple rewards for my perseverance. [...]
A Letter to a Friend: Evidence for Evolution
Hi Friend, I thought I’d follow-up on our disagreement about evolution. Before I go further, I thought I’d confirm what I think you said so I don’t put words into your mouth: Evolution has been dis-proven. Many scientists say that evolution has many holes in it and that it has not held up to scientific [...]
The Secularization of Quebec
Have you ever thought it might be nice to move to a less religious part of the world? If so, you might have thought you’d have to go all the way to Scandinavia. Well, you’d be wrong. Starting in the early 1960′s, the province of Quebec, Canada went through a Quiet Revolution – a revolution [...]
Hey You Atheist Bloggers – Who’s Your Audience?
I wrote earlier this week on the reasons I blog about atheism. In doing so, I also came to a clearer understanding of who I write for: Me, Myself and I (you could say, I write for an unholy trinity of sorts): I find writing about atheism/religion to be stimulating and satisfying. Other Atheists: It’s [...]
Doubting Your Faith For the Hundredth Time? Church Shopping Yet Again? It May Be Time To Think The Unthinkable.
I remember when I began to have doubts about my faith. The world – according to Christianity – just wasn’t adding up. At first, I tackled the problem by exposing myself to more religion. I attended more church, met more church people, and read more of the Bible. Still, nothing made sense. “It must be [...]
How to Piss A (Friendly) Atheist Off
Us so-called “New Atheists” have gotten a bad rap in many circles. As our numbers have grown, one counter-attack from the religious is that we are not like the old atheists – that we are militantly against religion and are attacking liberal-minded believers who are not concerned with our atheism. For my part, I am [...]
Proud Atheist Pappa
We took the kids for a treat tonight – dinner at Red Robins (one of their favorites). Almost as soon as we sat down, my daughter (11 years) mentioned how someone in the family thinks they saw a ghost at the side of her bed. My response was an immediate and confident, “there’s no such [...]
Why Religious “Objective Morality” is a Bunch of Balogne
An oft made claim believers make is that, without god, there is no objective morality. Meaning, without a higher power, we are free to make up whatever morality suits us, or the societies we live in. I call bullshit. Someone needs to explain how god’s morality can be so hopelessly confusing as to lead to [...]
Alberta Lives Up To Its ‘Texas of the North’ Handle – Introduces Legislation That Will Help Parents Protect Their Children From Science
This is a sad day for the province I call home. It should also end any discussion I’ve had with people who claim Canada is a ‘moderately’ religious nation.
The Stages of Grief Re: Atheist De-Conversion
I have often thought about how closely my de-conversion followed the stages of grief described by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross. Wondering if I was alone, I googled stages of grief in atheist deconversion. It turns out that many atheists go through a similar experience. At the top of my search, I found a wonderfully written post over [...]
The Emptiness of an Atheist’s Life
Ed is a Christian who’s chosen this place as one he’d like to do some converting in. Check my comments – you won’t have to look far for him. He’s trying quite valiantly to bring me and my readers to Christ. One of the lines of thought that keeps creeping into Ed’s conversation is that [...]
The Insatiable Atheist
I wonder if other people who are new to atheism go through a time when they just can’t seem to learn enough? It’s been almost a year since I became an atheist. I remember thinking at the beginning of that year that I’d have a lot to say about the ongoing experience (it’s why I [...]
What God, Ghosts, Santa Clause & Other Imaginary Things Have In Common
I’ve heard (mostly from Christians) the accusation that atheists tend to replace Christianity with other forms of spirituality. Specifically, I’ve heard it said that we often believe in paranormal concepts such as ghosts, witchcraft, telepathy and past lives. The implication of these claims is that an atheist who believes in unproven paranormal stuff has no [...]
How I Will Raise Two Little Heathens
I became an atheist five years into my daughter’s education, and one year into my son’s. They both attend Catholic elementary school. My wife has also largely abandoned religion (believes in “a greater force” but not a personal god) so we are, for the most part, on the same page with regard to religion. But [...]
Statistics: Awareness of Atheism
Disclaimer: From the school of you can make statistics say anything you want, I’ve collected some data and made some speculations (feel free to make your own). — I’ve heard it said that atheism is growing, but I wonder if the assertion is true. One way to get a clue is by surveying the public [...]
Can Atheists Be Spiritual?
I am slowly finding like-minded bloggers who feel the need to express what they believe in, in addition to the assertion that they have no belief in god(s). Here’s a gem written by David Garnet over at Glittering Muse. If we are to attract more people to atheism and the humanist worldview, we need more [...]
Seth MacFarlane Likes to Piss Off Southerners
The creator of Family Guy is one funny dude. MORE AT ATHEISTNATION.NET
XTC ‘Dear god’ Lyrics & Videos
I trade emails with a group of co-workers and past co-workers. Today, someone in the group said, “God Bless Canada”. Another friend replied with, “What if you don’t believe in god?” (huzzah!) and then followed up with the lyrics of a 1987 song called Dear god by the British Band XTC (probably best known for [...]
Who Needs To Be In My Blogroll?
I’ve been doing some work on my sidebar and bookmark page. What links am I missing that you think should be in every good rational, freethinking, atheist’s blog?
Karma Isn’t The Answer Either
It’s funny how one broken brick can lead to an entire wall falling down… One of the first aha! moments I had after letting go of my god delusion was the realization that leading one’s life according to the laws (?) of Karma isn’t much better. The Stoke-On-Trent Humanist Group has it partly right: These [...]
Who’s Your Nomination For The Fifth Horseman?
I downloaded the Four Horsemen from richardawkins.net a couple of nights ago, and got to wondering who the fifth horseman might be. Even though I like to think I have the occasional original idea, I decided to Google the matter here and here and found that there were at least a few people wondering the [...]
The Five Most Important Days for Atheists
Head on over the Hemant’s for an interesting 10 year retrospective.
The Problem I Have With Atheism
It’s a negative thought. That is, it merely takes a position against something. And, while I proudly call myself an atheist – a person with no belief in gods – I am a whole lot more than that. Aren’t you? I now fully realize this as the purpose for this blog – to explore all [...]
U.S. Doesn’t Have a Monopoly on Fundie/Creationist Crap
Much of the ridicule aimed at fundamentalists and creationists is directed at the US Bible Belt. I’m not from there. I’m Canadian. And while many people are correct to say that Canada has much less of this garbage going on, there is one province that is the exception. That province is where I make my [...]
My Atheism Advocacy Rating – What’s Yours?
Following up on yesterday’s post, here’s where I’m putting myself on what I’ve decided to call my Atheism Advocacy Scale (I should probably update the graphic): Atheism: 6 out of 7 (using Dawkins 7 point scale, I am a “De facto Atheist”) Antitheism: 7 out of 10 Evangelism: 8 out of 10 Militancy: 5 out [...]
What Kind of Atheist Are You? Place Yourself on the Atheist Advocacy Scale
After my de-conversion to atheism, I was compelled to contribute – to share the great joy of being freed from religion. I decided to start blogging about atheism, naively thinking there didn’t seem to be many atheist bloggers. How wrong I was. There are hundreds – perhaps thousands of us! Knowing there were many atheist [...]
Continuation of the 7 Pillars Stuff
Seeing my 7 Pillars post get linked to by the Friendly Atheist made me as excited as my kids were when we finally got a Wii. I was even happier to see the discussion it generated (32 comments last time I checked)! But some of those comments made me want to clarify a few things: [...]
Dawkins Raps
via The Amanda Show comes a pretty funny little video satire of Richard Dawkins (and some like-minded folk) rappin’ Eminem style.
One Atheist’s Abbreviated World View – 7 Pillars I Try to Live By
An excellent post from the Atheist Revolution archive made its way onto the reddit atheism what’s hot list this past week. The post is vjack’s endorsement of the secular humanism worldview (which I like to think of as a belief system), coupled with a suggestion that other atheists follow suit. The goal in this is [...]
Conservapedia Shifts Focus From Homosexuals To Atheists?
In November, Boing Boing posted a list of the ten most viewed articles on Conservapedia. At first blush, it looked as though Conservapedia’s fundie, creationist right-wing community was obsessed with homosexuality. While that may be true, it was soon postulated at Infothought and Crooked Timber that there was something fishy about the stats (make sure [...]
George Carlin Dies
Via The Atheist Blog comes word that George Carlin has died. Mr. Carlin was unquestionably my favorite comedian, and was an atheist who chose to spread the word through brilliantly crafted comedy. George will be missed and remembered.
Newest Member of the Atheist Blogroll is…
Me! I’m astounded at the vastness of the atheist blog community (it’s much larger than I could have imagined) and am excited to be added to Mojoey’s incredible Atheist Blogroll. Thank you to Mojoey, and welcome to any visitors who find their way here from the blogroll. As you can see, I am just getting [...]
Your Comments
- meh: i was number 2 my family wasn’t that religious but i studied the fuck out of it...
- Rob: Interesting that you can think for God. The important issue for Christians is the...
- Rob: Good question. It isn’t whether we have need for a soul. We were created in...
- Rob: Hi – What strengths are there in atheism? I would like to know.
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Recent Articles
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Amazing Atheists
- AnAtheist.net run by James Tracy who also looks after ‘The Atheist Spot’ (an atheist link sharing service)
- Atheist Climber Thoughts about science, nature and religion, as well as politics, philosophy, atheism and the occasional rant
- Atheist Revolution by vjack – an unbelievably prolific writer on the subject of atheism
- Attempts At Rational Behavior Godless liberal firmly supporting separation of church and state
- August Cline is the atheism & agnosticism author at about.com. He is excellent.
- Common Sense Atheism Awesome, awesome, awesome awesome atheist blog. End of story.
- Dangerous Talk an atheist/progressive blog discussing the three most dangerous topics of polite conversation: Religion, Politics, and Sex
- Daylight Atheism Night time is for dreaming. Daylight is for action.
- Friendly Atheist warmth and wisdom from the guy who sold his soul on eBay
- God is for Suckers! Group blog, providing commentary, news, and rants on the evils and stupidity of belief in the big invisible daddy in the sky.
- Godless Girl Ex-christian sarcasm-a-tron armed with a vag and a brain. Curiosity killed the faith, not the sass.
- Greta Christina's Blog I don’t think anyone writes more powerfully about atheism than Greta
- Happy Jihad's House of Pancakes As the title suggests, HJHOP is a fun and quirky (but still thoughtful) critique of religion.
- Lousy Canuck He’s Canadian and he’s an atheist. Need I say more? ;)
- Monicks: Unleashed Monica is the tireless force behind the ‘Think Atheist’ community
- No Religion Blog Nice, clear explanations relating to historical accuracy/claims in the Bible, among other things
- Pharyngula by PZ Meyers – evolutionary biologist, heathen and communion cracker desecrator!
- Stupid Evil Bastard What the hell is wrong with you people? (I love that tagline)
- The Gaytheists group blog for LGBT (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgendered) Atheists, Skeptics and Humanists
- Unreasonable Faith Excellent atheist blog (one of my favorites) by former evangelical Christian Daniel Florien
- Watching the Wheels see-er. do-er. writer. photographer. thinker. doodler. worker. lover. whiner. reader. cooker. planter. designer. laugher. cleaner (sometimes). remember-er. traveller. questioner. dreamer. organizer. learner. giver. crier. taker. sleeper. imagine-er. eater
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Heathen Bling!
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Awesome Atheism Websites
- Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster Touch his noodley appendage!
- God is Imaginary 50 simple proofs for non-existence of god
- Iron Chariots Wiki Awesome encyclopedia of counters to Christian apologetics.
- Secular Web contains a simply fantastic article library from both modern and past atheist/agnostic writers
- Skeptic's Annotated Bible Great place to learn about the contradictions, scientific fails and absurdities within the Bible (and there are many)
- Talk Origins Archive Exploring the Creation/Evolution Controversy
- The Freethinker Excellent secular focused site based on the magazine founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion.
- The Panda's Thumb excellent site focusing on evolution/creationism & the defence of science
- Why Won't God Heal Amputees? Is God real, or is he imaginary?
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Skeptical Rulers of the Universe
- Doubtful “Skepticism is a process.” This is a great place to learn. Sharon really does her homework for our benefit.
- Grassroots Skeptics A volunteer organization promoting critical thinking and a reason-centered worldview by helping local skeptics groups to share tools, information and strategies, and connect with skeptical individuals and activists.
- ICBS Everywhere Knowledge, science, reason, education, philosophy, behavior, politics, religion, and B.S.
- James Randi Educational Foundation Not-for-profit organization that promotes critical thinking by reaching out to the public and media with reliable information about paranormal and supernatural ideas so widespread in our society today. Home of the $1 million paranormal challenge.
- Podblack Cat Science, Superstitions and Skeptical Life
- She Thought women. thinking critically.
- Skepchick A group of women (and one deserving guy) who write about science, skepticism, and pseudoscience. With intelligence, curiosity, and occasional snark, the group tackles diverse topics from astronomy to astrology, psychics to psychology.
- Skeptic North The first Canada-wide blog for skeptics. Its mission is to affect and promote positive, science-based change in mainstream media, Canadian culture and education, and in government policy
- Skeptic's Dictionary Definitions, arguments, and essays on topics ranging from acupuncture to zombies. Detailed information on the supernatural, paranormal, and pseudoscientific. Dozens of topics in logic, perception, science, and philosophy.
- SkepticReport Extremely well organized and laid out skeptic site. Lots of good information here.
- Skeptics Society A scientific and educational organization of scholars, scientists, historians, magicians, professors and teachers, and anyone curious about controversial ideas, extraordinary claims, revolutionary ideas, and the promotion of science.
- Skeptics Society Blog Official blog of the Skeptics Society, featuring the writings of Michael Shermer as well as many others.
- Skeptigirl dedicated to free thinking, critical thinking, science, and skepticism
- Woo Fighters Purpose is to promote critical, skeptical, and scientific thinking by inspiring students to become active promoters of scientific skepticism and defenders of science.
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Health & Medicine
- Quackwatch International network concerned with health-related frauds, myths, fads, fallacies, and misconduct. Primary focus on difficult/impossible to find quackery-related information.
- Science-Based Medicine Exploring issues and controversies in the relationship between science and medicine
- Science-Based Pharmacy Turning an eye on the profession, separating fact from fiction on both sides of the counter.
- The Denialism Blog Discussing the problem of denialists, their standard arguing techniques, how to identify denialists and/or cranks, and discuss topics of general interest such as skepticism, medicine, law and science.
- The SkepDoc Retired family physician, former U.S. Air Force flight surgeon and skeptic who writes about alternative medicine and quackery.
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Why I Blog
I'm here to help doubting believers let go of their fear and guilt, to provide an example of an atheist leading a happy, moral and fulfilling life, and to connect with fellow non-believers. Welcome!
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Navigation
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On Youtube
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Podcasts/Radio
- For Good Reason Interview program hosted by D.J. Grothe, promoting critical thinking and skepticism about the central beliefs of society.
- Skeptic's Guide to the Universe Home of one of the longest standing skeptical podcasts.
- Skepticality Official podcast of Skeptical Magazine
- Skeptically Speaking Live radio/podcast hosted by everyone’s favorite geek girl, Desiree Schell “Call in. Question Everything.”
- The Atheist Experience Fantastic call-in atheist TV show out of Austin, Texas with big focus on talking with believers.
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Great Reads
- Letter to a Christian Nation - by Sam Harris
- Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible & Why - by Bart Ehrman
- The God Delusion - by Richard Dawkins
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History & Statistics
- Adherents.com Excellent statistics and maps on the subject of religious adherence.
- History of the End of the World This is a great link showing the 220 times the world was predicted to end, but did not.
- Maps of War: History of Religion
- What Charles Darwin believed about religion an excerpt from his biography should clear things up
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Favorite Articles
- Frequently Asked Questions for the Newly Deconverted is for new atheists wondering where they go from here
- Jesus Myth the case against the historical Christ
- Why are atheists so angry? Greta Christina has a post that sums the reasons up quite well!
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Communities
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Atheist Blogroll
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Advocacy & Activism
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Favorite Videos
- Atheist a simply made video with an incredibly inspiring message
- Intelligent Design on Trial An excellent documentary about the controversy that occured in Dover, Pennsylvania over the teaching of evolution.
- My Spirituality as an Atheist One of my favorite videos – truly poignant and beautiful.
- Pat Condell’s Youtube Channel is Atheism on the offensive (controversial, funny & brilliant)
- Potholer54′s Youtube Channel home of the amazing “Made Easy” series (evolution & natural selection, the scientific method, and history of the universe etc)
- Why Do People Laugh at Creationists? is an excellent 24 part Youtube video series by Thunderfoot
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The Four Horsemen
- Christopher Hitchens author of “God is Not Great”
- Daniel Dennet author of “Breaking the Spell”
- Richard Dawkins author of “The God Delusion”, “The Blind Watchmaker” & more
- Sam Harris author of “The End of Faith” & “Letter to a Christian Nation”
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Meaning of Life Type Stuff
- Ethic of Reciprocity “The Golden Rule” is one of things that guides my life
- One Source of Morality might be from our feelings of empathy
- Secular Humanism check out the Council of Secular Humanism affirmations and declarations
- Secular Humanism on Wikipedia atheism is what I don’t believe & secular humanism is, more or less, what I do
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Kick-Ass Science
- Action Bioscience Promoting bioscience literacy. Great articles on evolution, genomics, the environment, biotechnology and more.
- Bad Astronomy My favorite astronomy blog! Written by Phil Plait
- NASA Image of the Day Pure awesomeness!
- Sense About Science responds to the misrepresentation of science on issues that matter
- Wired Science Nice, eclectic mix of science articles from a variety of fields. Always entertaining.
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Fun/Entertaining
- Atheist Cartoons Best atheist related comics on the web!
- Jesus & Mo The adventures of modern-day Jesus and Mohammed. What could go wrong?
- The Onion News Network The best satire news on the web. Not an atheist site, but often satirizes religion and religious beliefs.
- xkcd A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language
