Surely you're joking

Huey Freeman Quotes Kahlil Gibran

2010-11-28T21:38:00.001Z

What Christmas means to Huey Freeman...

2010-11-28T21:37:00.000Z

Chomsky explains Cold War in 5 min

2010-11-28T21:34:00.001Z

If homeopathy works ... I'll drink my own piss

2010-05-25T01:26:00.000+01:00

Genius Chomsky Quote on Hypocrisy

2009-07-02T00:49:00.001+01:00

Noam Chomsky on Society

2009-07-02T00:47:00.001+01:00

The Ship of Theseus Puzzle

2009-06-27T03:12:00.005+01:00

CousinoMacul
The Ship of Theseus Puzzle
Identity Over Time

The Ship of Theseus Puzzle. The ancient historian Plutarch recounts the story of the famous ship of Theseus, which was displayed in Athens for many centuries. Over time, the ship's planks wore down and were gradually replaced. In the ancient world, the ship became “a standing example among the philosophers, for the logical question as to things that grow; one side holding that the ship remained the same, and the other contending it was not the same” (Clough 1859, p. 21). In the modern era, the case took on added interest, owing to a twist from Thomas Hobbes. Suppose that a custodian collects the original planks as they are removed from the ship and later puts them back together in the original arrangement. In this version of the story, we are left with two seafaring vessels, one on display in Athens and one in the possession of the custodian. But where is the famous Ship of Theseus? With the museum! After all, ships and other artifacts can survive the complete replacement of parts, provided that the change is sufficiently gradual. With the custodian! After all, ships and other artifacts can survive being disassembled and reassembled. Thus, at the end of the story, the ship of Theseus is present in two places at once. More generally, the argument suggests that it is possible for one material object to exist in two places at the same time. (We get an equally implausible result by working backwards: There are clearly two ships at the end of the story. Each of those ships was also around at the beginning of the story, for the reasons just given. So, at the beginning of the story, there were actually two ships of Theseus occupying the same place at the same time, one of which would go on to the museum and one of which would enter into the care of the custodian.)

This Life Is Not A Test

2009-06-08T23:53:00.003+01:00

Why a Fetus is not a Person

2009-06-08T23:07:00.002+01:00

http://www.youtube.com/user/SisyphusRedeemed

Happy Birthday to myself

2009-06-05T08:43:00.000+01:00

As I celebrate my own birthday today I would like to pay homage to the courage of the Tiananmen square protester which also happened on this day, twenty years ago.

Are You ProLife? Was Scott Roeder when he killed George Tiller?

2009-06-05T02:01:00.003+01:00

Christopher Hitchens - The Morals of an Atheist

2009-06-05T01:44:00.001+01:00

Part 1

Part 2

Bart Ehrman on The York Yurks

2009-06-05T01:27:00.001+01:00

Check Out The Hidden Contradictions Of The Bible

Guns Don't Kill People - Monkeys With Guns Kill People.

2009-06-05T01:03:00.000+01:00

Myth: Global Warming is caused by solar radiation.

2009-06-05T00:38:00.002+01:00

http://www.youtube.com/user/DonExodus2

TED Talk - Mary Roach: 10 things you didn't know about orgasm

2009-06-05T00:32:00.002+01:00

The logic is unflappable.

2009-05-09T22:18:00.001+01:00

Dawkins on Minnesota Public Radio

2009-05-01T15:23:00.006+01:00

15 minutes of interview followed by Q&A phone in

http://richarddawkins.net/article,3638,Richard-Dawkins-on-Minnesota-Public-Radio,Richard-Dawkins

http://download.publicradio.org/podcast/news/midmorning/2009/03/04_midmorn1_pod_32.mp3

The Philosophically Challenged Muslim

2009-05-01T14:59:00.001+01:00

And then some.

Evangelists don't understand logic.

2009-05-01T14:52:00.003+01:00

They are also kind of dick-ish.

Year of Darwin - Neil Shubin, Ph.D.

2009-05-01T14:49:00.002+01:00

Neil Shubin, Ph.D. University of Chicago
October 14, 2008

Cleveland Museuem of Natural History Professor Shubin (University of Chicago) is a well-known paleontologist who studies the morphological and developmental origins of the tetrapod limb. He recently discovered Tiktaalik, a species linking aquatic "lobe-finned" fishes with early terrestrial tetrapods. Held in conjunction with the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology's annual meeting in downtown Cleveland.

Is my love for Randi close to necrophilia?

2009-01-31T01:23:00.003Z

The no bullshit attitude is refreshing. Lovin the Randi.

Religious tolerance

2009-01-31T01:13:00.003Z

Ted Haggard: A good Christian

2009-01-31T01:06:00.002Z

Stephen Green is a ignorant duplicitous tool and I hope he chokes.

2009-01-31T00:49:00.003Z

Stephen Green fails again as advertising watchdog raps his knuckles.

An advertisement placed by Stephen Green's Christian Voice organisation in the New Statesman has been condemned as "misleading" by the advertising watchdog.

The advert claimed that the HPV vaccine Gardasil (which aims to prevent cervical cancer) would make teenagers sterile. Mr Green has said frequently that giving the vaccine to young girls will cause them to become sexually promiscuous and lead to a surge in sexually transmitted diseases that lead to infertility.

The ad said: "Now we have the disaster of teenage infertility. Every Government initiative, including the HPV vaccine, will increase it, but as all the targets revolve around pregnancy, no-one in power knows how many young people they are making sterile and nobody cares."

The Advertising Standards Authority found the advert breached codes on truthfulness, substantiation and principles. The ASA said: 'We considered that the [HPV] claim was a statement of fact that was a matter open to substantiation. The advert in New Statesman magazine claimed the cervical cancer vaccine would make teenagers sterile. Because we had not seen robust, scientific evidence that the HPV vaccine caused infertility in teenagers, we concluded that the claim had not been substantiated and was misleading. The ad must not appear again in its current form. We told Christian Voice not to repeat the implied claim that the HPV vaccine would result in teenage infertility."

During the investigation, Stephen Green said: "It is preposterous for the ASA to think they can outlaw Christian freedom of speech."

The advert, headlined "Violent Crime – Sowing And Reaping", also blamed the abolition of the death penalty, divorce and working mothers for the "shocking callousness and brutality in society of which the growing trend of violent deaths of teenagers is the starkest evidence".

Source: National Secular Society e-mail Newsline 30 January 2009

Glenn Beck is a moronic tool.

2009-01-31T00:47:00.002Z

Seeing and Believing by Jerry A. Coyne

2009-01-31T00:43:00.001Z

Charles Darwin was born on February 12, 1809--the same day as Abraham Lincoln--and published his magnum opus, On the Origin of Species, fifty years later. Every half century, then, a Darwin Year comes around: an occasion to honor his theory of evolution by natural selection, which is surely the most important concept in biology, and perhaps the most revolutionary scientific idea in history. 2009 is such a year, and we biologists are preparing to fan out across the land, giving talks and attending a multitude of DarwinFests. The melancholy part is that we will be speaking more to other scientists than to the American public. For in this country, Darwin is a man of low repute. The ideas that made Darwin's theory so revolutionary are precisely the ones that repel much of religious America, for they imply that, far from having a divinely scripted role in the drama of life, our species is the accidental and contingent result of a purely natural process.

Read the rest of this article here Seeing and Believing by Jerry A. Coyne

New Blog: SkepticBlog.org

2008-11-02T17:27:00.004Z

SkepticBlog

SkepticBlog is a collaboration among some of the most recognized names in promoting science, critical thinking, and skepticism. It also features the cast and producers of The Skeptologists, a pilot skeptical reality show.

What's the harm?

2008-11-02T17:24:00.003Z

What is this site?

We are all confronted with new information daily. It comes to us via newspapers, radio, television, websites, conversation, advertising and so on. Sometimes it seems like a deluge.

Not all information is created equal. Some of it is correct. Some of it is incorrect. Some of it is carefully balanced. Some of it is heavily biased. Some of it is just plain crazy.

It is vital in the midst of this deluge that each of us be able to sort through all of this, keeping the useful information and discarding the rest. This requires the skill of critical thinking. Unfortunately, this is a skill that is often neglected in schools.....

http://whatstheharm.net/

Teaching hate in UK schools

2008-11-02T17:22:00.001Z

Stop Sylvia Browne

2008-11-02T17:18:00.003Z

Stop Sylvia Browne

http://www.stopsylvia.com/home/

Psychic tries to stop Stop Sylvia Browne

skeptics-load-your-google-bombs

What's the harm?

Bad Science

2008-09-11T03:55:00.001+01:00

Ben Goldacre seen here recently on The One Show, talks about Bad Science.

www.badscience.net is his website and Bad Science is his new book.

Elitist?

2008-09-11T02:59:00.002+01:00

Obama: Fatherless, self made man. Harvard Graduate with all sorts of Latin titles. Best selling books.

McCain: Admirals son, gets shot down and tortured, gets married to a rich heiress.

Yet the Republicans paint Obama as the Elitist? It this true or is it really McCain who is the silver spoon, rich get richer, typical Republican douche.

Getting shot down and being tortured doesn't make you a hero. Supposedly he stayed with his troops in prison when he didn't have to do and that is something I give him credit for. Hero though? It is like they think no one else could have done it. Plus he has syphoned every sympathy and buck he could out of that experience and if he ever was a hero, he no longer is. Getting shot down and getting tortured is not enough of a qualification to be the president of America.

So basically we have the son of an Admiral(military royalty) who through no real skill of his own gets shot down and becomes a war hero(oxymoron much?) who then marries a woman who is rich. He then turns all that money into a senate seat.

Yea John McCain is the every man. He is the guy on the street. Obama is the snob. Who can seriously believe this?

I don't like any of these candidates. I wouldn't vote for any of them if I was American but that said I want Obama to win. I can't stand Obama's sanctimonious rhetoric and at times it makes me want too heave but McCain is just too awful.

On another note, what is wrong with being elite? I want an elite surgeon operating on me after my 100,000th Big Mac. I want the elite engineer building my fMRI machine, my Spaceship, designing my fecking car. Elite doesn't mean snob. Elite shouldn't be a pejorative.

The two party system is bullshit.

Cthulhu for president!!!

Kent Hovind vs Infidelguy.com

2008-09-08T03:55:00.001+01:00

http://www.infidelguy.com

The Amazing Dr.[sic] Kent Hovind appears on The Infidel Guy Show to address the challenges and questions by the listeners. In this 2 hour program we discuss, The Flood, salt domes, bad science, quote mining, the fossil record, dinosaurs, why the Theory of Evolution is Religion and more. If you can stomach it. Check out Kent Hovind at his best! Recorded September 2004.

Why?

2008-07-16T00:04:00.002+01:00

As biologically and culturally evolved beings, humans seem to have certain epistemological proclivities. Perhaps asking "why questions" is one of these proclivities. Perhaps sometimes asking "why questions" is nonsensical. Tantamount to asking for a square circle.

I was thinking about infinite regression of explanations. People always end up asking why instead of how. What makes us think there is a why? The human search for meaning? Perhaps there is ultimately none. This might be the case even if it is unsatisfactory.

The search continues.

Christians, what is YOUR objective source?

2008-07-14T02:15:00.002+01:00

A video from YouTube user ProfMTH

3 Articles: Science, Medicine and Politics

2008-07-09T02:16:00.004+01:00

Chimps Belong on Human Branch of Family Tree, Study Says

A new report argues that chimpanzees are so closely related to humans that they should be included in our branch of the tree of life. Chimpanzees and other apes have historically been separated from humans in classification schemes, with humans deemed the only living members of the hominid family of species. Click heading to read more.

An interesting take on the Placebo effect from sciencebasedmedicine.org

I am, I think, in a minority on this blog, in that I do not think there is a placebo effect. Period. None. Zip. Zero. Nada. Zilch.

For analysis purposes, I divide the lack of placebo effect into outcomes that do not occur with objective measurement and those that do not occur with subjective measurement. Click the heading to read more.

From Amy Goodman(an actual journalist) comes this article

I was on a panel at the Aspen Ideas Festival in Colorado this week when Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter asked me, “Is Obama a sellout?” The question isn’t whether he is a sellout or not—it’s about what demands are made by grass-roots social movements of those who would represent them. The question is, who are these candidates responding to, answering to? Click the heading to read more.

Ray Comfort: Priggish, arrogant, pious and as always FUCKING STUPID

2008-07-09T01:52:00.001+01:00

After reading this article on PZ Myers blog Pharyngula I had to check out this article for myself. It has to be seen to be believed. My comment below.

The man who thinks the banana(which is an artificially cultured crop) is the atheists nightmare has the hubris to compare himself to Albert Einstein. Is this a serious post I feel I must ask? What kind of priggish and arrogant attitude must a person have to espouse such a statement. Does his piety know no bounds?

When I think I have reached saturation point I find another super massive black of retardation to laugh and cry about.

Oh and yes, this is the daft guy who brought us the crocoduck.

Philosopher 1 - 0 Abraham

2008-06-30T01:11:00.003+01:00

And the Lord spake unto the philosopher, 'I am the Lord thy God, and I command thee to sacrifice thy only son.'

The philosopher replied, 'There's something not right here. Your commandments say, "Thou shalt not kill".'

'The Lord giveth the rules and the Lord taketh away.' replied God.

'But how do I know you are God?' insisted the philosopher. 'Perhaps you are the devil trying to fool me?'

'You must have faith,' replied God

'Faith - or insanity? Perhaps my mind is playing ricks? Or maybe you're testing me in a cunning way. You want to see if I have so little moral fibre that at the command of a deep voice booming through the clouds, I commit infanticide.'

'Me almighty!' exclaimed the Lord. 'What you're saying is that it is reasonable for you, a mere mortal, to refuse to do what I, thy Lord God, commands'

'I guess so,' said the philosopher,'and you've given me no good reason to change my mind.'

Fear and Trembling by Søren Kierkegaard (1843)

I think we can agree. The Philosopher 1, Abraham 0.

The anthropomorphic personification of retardation part deux

2008-05-24T20:26:00.000+01:00

Yokeup is set in his ways. The older you get the harder it is to accept new ideas and views. This is true neurologically because of the pruning of neurons that happens with age. Combine this with his indoctrination as a child into his religion and you have a seriously deluded individual divorced from reality on a basic level. His opinion are not his own. He did not come to them through examining the evidence and using critical thinking. He doesn't use logically coherent arguments. He doesn't care about logic, evidence, reason, empiricism or science. He only cares about "faith", what does faith even mean? To me it is just believing what you were told, just because. Just because. Just because you emotionally need too. It is the most childish epistemology you could ever have. He believes because what he believes is so wrapped up in his psychology, in his emotions, that to change his beliefs now would totally shatter his psyche. He would probably require serious medication. The fundamental problem is that he just doesn't care about reality. His methods of knowing things are ancient scriptures (which he doesn't read in the original translation), his religious leaders and his own malfunctioning neocortex. It is scary. He is beyond logic and evidence. Beyond hope. Beyond help. He has drank the religious cool aid and has never stopped. It is sad.

Something good that may come of his videos is that he will probably turn more people to atheism than even the bible.

Debunking evidence deniers (9/11 truthers)

2008-05-22T13:55:00.005+01:00

Articles of some note.

Counterpunch articles

Popular Mechanics

Debunking911myths.org

Debunking911.com

Pwning a Creotard

2008-05-22T11:52:00.001+01:00

Legendary LuLzGaSm

2008-05-19T17:02:00.004+01:00

I used to watch this TV show when I was a kid. This intro brought back so many memories. Guess what, it's still AWESOME.

SAW BOSS

WHEELED WARRIORS!

LIGHTNING STRIKES ! ! !

Too many lulz to control.

I want my own lightning league. Who wants to join me?

Stupid Design

2008-05-18T18:39:00.002+01:00

I watched for the first time about two years ago. Neil deGrasse Tyson gives up some great examples of STUPID DESIGN.

Phase variation or poetry

2008-05-16T20:42:00.002+01:00

In my microbial genetics exam today I was supposed to write an essay regarding phase variation but I got a cognitive block half way through and wrote this nice poem below by Octavio Paz. Do you think I will get any marks for it?

Brotherhood Homage to Claudius Ptolemy

I am a man: little do I last
and the night is enormous.
But I look up:
the stars write.
Unknowing I understand:
I too am written,
and at this very moment
someone spells me out.

This is a lesson to you all. If you don't want to be stuck writing poetry in a science exam then do your fucking homework. Study when you have time and don't procrastinate all week and then cram at the last minute. Even if you get away with it. Most of the time.

The Pale Blue Dot by Carl Sagan

2008-04-18T20:44:00.006+01:00

From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest.

But for us, it's different. Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, ever king and peasant, every young couple in love, every moth and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar,” every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there—on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand.

It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known.

-Carl Sagan, Chapter 1, A Pale Blue Dot

Previous Pale Blue Dot Post

Expelled Exposed - LIVE

2008-04-15T23:06:00.001+01:00

The website is finally live. Go to Expelled Exposed

Expelled Exposed

2008-04-15T03:34:00.004+01:00

NCSE's counter-site to the hideous little propaganda film, Expelled

Ben Stein's trying to popularize intelligent design-style creationism by claiming that this "brave new theory" has been "censored" from academia, because it's "controversial" and "new."

Let's get one thing straight. Intelligent design is *creationism*, with a fancy new name. It's being tossed out of schools because it's religion, not science, and Stein's movie is just the latest in a series of plans to trump up an imagined scientific controversy. Please take the chance to learn more from the resources linked below, or by asking questions on the discussion board.

Help educate the public about science. Don't let a loud-mouthed, deluded, has-been actor pretend to be a "rational" voice for the community.

Oppose Ben Stein's schlockumentary, however you choose: correct friends & family who start to fall into the ID trap, write editorials, write or contribute to blogs, hand out fliers, contact movie critics & educate them, or lead debates on campus.

Expelled Exposed

Pharnygula

Irrational thinking kills

2008-03-27T19:28:00.009Z

What do you think happened here? 1) The parents did not have enough faith so their daughter died or 2) Prayer and faith does NOT cure or treat diabetes. Which is more likely. In case you are lobotomised it is number 2.

Moronic ignorant fucks. All they had to do is call 911. What a waste.

Ignorance of the law is not a defence. They should be fully prosecuted.

Retarding for Jesus

2008-03-24T17:34:00.004Z

This is child abuse. The retardation of the minds of children with this nonsense is just wrong.

The teaching in this is not only wrong but terribly done. They get the kids to parrot back nonsense to them in a cultish brainwashing fashion. Reminds me of that Simpsons episode "NANA NANA NANA NANA LEADER!"

The ignorance and stupidity on offer is just too much.

Antioxidants and Free-Radicals - Be Sceptical

2008-03-22T19:52:00.008Z

Some links of interest.

The antioxidant myth: a medical fairy tale - from the New Scientist

2 articles from Sciencebasedmedicine.com

Wikipedia: Free Radical

Wikipedia: Antioxidant

A wee gem from Nick Gisburne

2008-03-17T19:23:00.002Z

One of the first YouTube atheist was Nick Gisburne. Here is Nick Gisburne's latest video.

Evolution - Random Chance? Simple steps to complexity

If the grand unified theory exists, what if it is untestable?

2008-03-10T20:37:00.005Z

I found this interesting website www.bigthink.com which has many 'experts' answering questions about belief, wisdom, inspiration etc.

I posited a question myself

http://www.bigthink.com/science-technology/space-time/8495

If the grand unified theory exists, what if it is untestable?

"What if something like string theory is the 'holy grail' of physics and it is the true fundamental theory but it can never be tested or verified empirically? Would science have to change? Would we be happy with only mathematical evidence?"

The anthropomorphic personification of retardation

2008-02-25T17:02:00.002Z

This guy is a cognitive black hole from which no rational utterance can escape. He is one of the most deeply retarded individuals I have seen on YouTube. He almost makes me think there is a cosmic source of retardation that he has sole access too. Perhaps he is playing a character? The love child of The Riddler and Rainman?

The bunk that is alternative medicine.

2008-02-06T00:13:00.000Z

As well as doing a module in Microbial genomes and Immunology I am also doing a Pharmacology module this semester and my shiny new pharmacology textbook arrived today. I was happy to see the following piece of text in the book.

ALTERNATIVE THERAPEUTIC PRINCIPLES

Modern medicine relies heavily on drugs as the main tool of therapeutics. Other therapeutic procedures such as surgery, diet, exercise, etc, are also important of course, as is deliberate non-intervention, but none is so widely applied as drug based therapeutics.
Before the advent of science-based approaches, repeated attempts were made to construct systems of therapeutics, many of which produced even worse results than pure empiricism. One of these was allopathy, espoused by James Gregory (1735-1882). The favoured remedies included blood letting, emetics, purgatives, which were used until the dominant symptoms of the disease were suppressed. Many patients died from such treatment, and it was in reaction against it that Hahnemann introduced the practice of homœopathy in the early 19th century. The guiding principles of homœopathy are:

- like cures like
- activity can be enhanced by dilution.

The system rapidly drifted into absurdity: for example, Hahnemann recommended the use of drugs at dilutions of 1:10^60, equivalent to one molecule in a sphere the size of the orbit of Neptune.
Many other systems of therapeutics have come and gone, and the variety of dogmatic principles that they embodied have tended to hinder rather than advance scientific progress. Currently, therapeutic systems that have a basis which lies outside the domain of science are actually gaining ground under the general banner of ‘alternative’ or ‘complementary’ medicine. Mostly, they reject the ‘medical model’, which attributes disease to an underlying derangement of normal function that can be defined in biochemical or structural terms, detected by objective means, and influenced beneficially by appropriate chemical or physical interventions. They focus instead on mainly subjective malaise, which may be disease-associated or not. Abandoning objectivity in defining and measuring disease goes along with departure from scientific principles in assessing therapeutic efficacy and risk, with the result that principles and practices can gain acceptance without satisfying any of the criteria of validity that would convince a critical scientist, and that are required by law to be satisfied before a new drug can be introduced into therapy. Public acceptance, alas, has little to do with demonstrable efficacy.

- Excerpt from H.P. RANG, M.M. DALE, J.M RITTER, R.J. FLOWER - RANG and DALE’S Pharmacology Sixth Edition.

Books

2008-01-17T20:14:00.000Z

I bought some more books.

Humanity - A moral history of the twentieth century - Jonathan Glover
The Sound Bite Society - Jeffrey Scheuer
The Essential Difference - Simon Baron-Cohen
Dialogues and Natural History of Religion - Hume
Madness and Civilization - Michel Foucault
Sceptical Essays - Bertrand Russell
How to Read Foucault - Johanna Oksala
The Road to Wigan Pier - George Orwell
Down and Out in Paris and London - George Orwell
Homage to Catalonia - George Orwell
The Plague - Albert Camus
Frank Kafka - The Complete Novels.

Prince Charles is an idiot

2008-01-15T12:29:00.000Z

He believes in homeopathy. Nuff said.

Quackfiles
BBC article on it
Skeptic's Guide talk about it here

Some thoughts, will, changing minds, meaning, nothing, something

2008-01-07T18:16:00.000Z

I have thought about the question of changing minds. I think that no one really changes their mind. It isn't really a matter of will. You don't really choose to change your mind. You learn and experience and you are convinced. Given my genetics, education and environment I couldn't not be an atheist. I could lie and say I am a theist and pretend but I am being dishonest and I would ultimately know. This also makes Pascal’s wager the dumbest argument ever. A default position (educated and informed or not) is usually in place and you are convinced and your mind changes or you aren't and you don't, but you don't do it. It happens if you like it or not.

I think I am currently in the compatibilist camp regarding "free will". I don't think freedom of causality can exist but too any great extent this isn't what people mean. They mean the freedom to make a choice. If it is determined you don't realise what completely determines it. You know the factors (genetic/environmental) but that is it.

If someone thinks they have genuine free will ask them a question.

Do you believe in god? If they say yes/no then just ask them to choose to believe the opposite. Can you do this? You can lie but ultimately you are just lying and don't really believe it. I know I can't just choose to believe something that I don't believe. Free will to any extent is an illusion. It is an accepted myth by most people.

Why is there something rather than nothing? Since nothing is in fact something that means there is always something. It is a daft question. Why implies intent. There is something, we know this. How is there something? Perhaps that is a better question. Even in areas of space that hypothetically might have no matter there are still quantum zero point energy fluctuations of virtual particles. What does nothing even mean?

I thought about the meaning question. The meaning of the creation of my life was my parents wanted a child, to fill some need (evolutionary urge to procreate I guess). Since parents don't own their children I decide what the meaning of the rest of my life is to whatever extent I can.

Ron Paul on Evolution

2007-12-27T07:10:00.000Z

I posted the below video which I found on onegoodmove.org onto YouTube. It got attacked by mental sheeple of the Ron Paul personality cult. Check it out.

WE ARE LEGION
HALLOWED ARE THE ORI
WE ARE BORG

Naturalism

2007-12-21T02:22:00.000Z

Link 1
Link 2

Rather amusing and true.

2007-12-21T02:19:00.000Z

http://www.thevillageatheist.co.uk/

The big bang for creationists,

2007-12-13T02:21:00.000Z

Darwins theory of evolution by natural selection is not the Big Bang, Abiogenesis or Atomic theory.

The big bang is sometimes described as a titanic explosion that happened 13.7 billion years ago. 'Explosion' is a misnomer since the Big Bang happened everywhere at once and there was no pre-existing void into which the Universe erupted. Space and time and energy all came into being in the Big Bang. The Universe began in a super-dense, super-hot state 13.7 billion years ago and has been expanding and cooling ever since.

Just because you don't understand it, doesn't mean it never happened. Fortunately your belief isn't a prerequisite for the truth.

A few words about the "theory of evolution"

2007-11-21T07:53:00.000Z

A few words need to be said about the "theory of evolution," which most people take to mean the proposition that organisms have evolved from common ancestors. In everyday speech, "theory" often means a hypothesis or even a mere speculation. But in science, "theory" means "a statement of what are held to be the general laws, principles, or causes of something known or observed." as the Oxford English Dictionary defines it. The theory of evolution is a body of interconnected statements about natural selection and the other processes that are thought to cause evolution, just as the atomic theory of chemistry and the Newtonian theory of mechanics are bodies of statements that describe causes of chemical and physical phenomena. In contrast, the statement that organisms have descended with modifications from common ancestors--the historical reality of evolution--is not a theory. It is a fact, as fully as the fact of the earth's revolution about the sun. Like the heliocentric solar system, evolution began as a hypothesis, and achieved "facthood" as the evidence in its favor became so strong that no knowledgeable and unbiased person could deny its reality. No biologist today would think of submitting a paper entitled "New evidence for evolution;" it simply has not been an issue for a century.

- Douglas J. Futuyma, Evolutionary Biology, 2nd ed., 1986, Sinauer Associates, p. 15

Great Podcasts

2007-11-18T23:07:00.000Z

Democracy Now!
Futures in Biotech
Point of Inquiry
Skepticality
The Naked Scientists
The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe

The following is from an essay by Louise Antony

2007-11-18T23:05:00.000Z

Looking back on my development from devout Catholic girl to adamant atheist, I think that it was its bottom-line dogmatism that drove me away from the Church, and indeed, from the very possibility of religious faith. "Faith" presents a paradox: if a doctrine can be defended on rational grounds, then it needn't be taken on faith. But if it cannot be defended on rational grounds, why should you believe it?

Descartes was right

2007-11-18T23:03:00.000Z

FUCKIN HELL. Descartes(who isn't real) is right. I am the only person who exists but for some unknown reason I have created a world in my mind containing a massive majority of insane retarded fuck wits.

To vent my frustration I seem to have created Lewis Black.

Lewis Black link

BiLL HiCKS - Comic Genius, Dark Poet, Human Being.

2007-11-18T23:01:00.000Z

"I'm so sick of arming the world, then sending troops over to destroy the fucking arms, you know what I mean? We keep arming these little countries, then we go and blow the shit out of them. We're like the bullies of the world, y'know. We're like Jack Palance in the movie Shane, throwing the pistol at the sheepherder's feet.

"Pick it up."

"I don't wanna pick it up, Mister, you'll shoot me."

"Pick up the gun."

"Mister, I don't want no trouble. I just came down town here to get some hard rock candy for my kids, some gingham for my wife. I don't even know what gingham is, but she goes through about ten rolls a week of that stuff. I ain't looking for no trouble, Mister."

"Pick up the gun."

(He picks it up. Three shots ring out.)

"You all saw him - he had a gun."

200000000000 to 400000000000 stars

2007-08-18T21:43:00.000+01:00

200000000000 to 400000000000 stars. That is the current estimation of the number of stars in the Milky Way galaxy alone. To put this into perspective. If you live to be 100 years old which is fairly rare even now, you will have lived 3153600000 seconds.

This means even if you take the lower estimate, that for every second you are alive there is 63 stars. There is 63 times more stars in the Milky Way than seconds you will live.

A Poem

2007-08-10T23:59:00.000+01:00

I am a man: little do I last
and the night is enormous.
But I look up:
the stars write.
Unknowing I understand:
I too am written,
and at this very moment
someone spells me out.

- Octavio Paz

Knowledge and Ignorance

2007-08-10T23:40:00.000+01:00

When the knowledge exists, ignorance is a crime. When the knowledge does not exist yet, ignorance is most noble and far preferable to false truths and certainties.
- Steven(1982-present) 10th Aug 2007

The defintion of a theory

2007-08-04T05:22:00.000+01:00

I think I have posted on this blog before a rant about what the actual definition of a theory is in a scientific sense compared to an everyday laymen sense. YouTube atheist Kingheathen does a good job below. Check him out.

http://www.youtube.com/user/KingHeathen

To Christians

2007-08-01T05:29:00.000+01:00

So you believe that a cosmic Jewish zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in all humans because a woman made from a rib was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree and thereby pissing off an invisible wizard who lives in the sky? Yeah..makes perfect sense.

What is life?

2007-07-27T01:15:00.000+01:00

Reposted from http://www.asktheatheist.com/question/what_is_life

Question:

I have only been able to get the Christian answer for the question, what is life, and am curious as to what the Atheist answer is. I would assume that the answer is very clinical and scientific in nature, giving me a list of scientific properties, if that is all life is why should it be valued?

My Answer:

I will for go the clinical and scientific explanation of life which you can get from many books and websites. Try wikipedia perhaps.

On to the second part of the question.

Human beings give value to things. Even if you think there is a god, which I disagree with, it is still you who is giving life any value that it has. I think it is dishonest to suggest that somehow theists value life more than atheists, after all they believe in an afterlife unlike atheists. Atheists think this is the only life they are ever going to have, so the case could be made we value it more. Speaking for myself I feel privileged to be alive at all. The fact that I am here is a huge improbability (explained by evolution), so I feel lucky to be alive. You give your own life value and meaning. As do I.

People who don't value life:

- Christians with guns who support the death penalty
(Thou shall not kill?)

- Terrorists with religious motivations.

- Administrations that go to war based on faith.

I love my family, enjoy life, enjoy learning, love science and discovery and find wonder and awe in the universe. I enjoy living and this is why my life has value to me. Therefore I assume other people enjoy living and because I don't think I am inherently better than them I think their lives have value also.

"For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring. "
- Carl Sagan

Tantum eruditi sunt liberi

Some recent articles

2007-06-19T04:24:00.000+01:00

One scientists Junk DNA is a creationists treasure.

from Wired.

-Talked about here by T. Ryan Gregory, here by PZ Myers and here by Steve Reuland.

-Torn apart Larry Moran here. Authors reply to Larry here

From the Sunday Herald comes an article with a daft title here. The title is "Rival to evolution may enter schools". This isn't crazy bible belt America folks. This is Scotland. The members of the Scottish Enlightenment would turn in their graves.

Adam Rutherford from the Guardian think Atheists should stand up and be counted
- I agree.

Atheist Blogroll

2007-06-10T06:45:00.000+01:00

I just received my acceptance e-mail at 06:40am (yes I am still up) . I have been added to the atheist blogroll.

Thanks for Mojoey for adding me. I am honoured.

Well I am off to get showered and ready for work. It is so stuffy and clammy I think I will have to go to the drastic measure of switching the shower to cold for 5 mins. Wish me luck.

Thanks again.

New Evolution USA TODAY/Gallup Poll results

2007-06-08T09:25:00.001+01:00

The poll results can be seen here POLL.

PZ Myers take on it here.

You can get the gist of it here which I will also copy below.

"Evolution, that is, the idea that human beings developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life" is probably or definitely false: 44%
"Creationism, that is, the idea that God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years" is probably or definitely true: 66%
15% said that they would be more likely to vote for a candidate that did not believe in evolution.

Memo to Creationists

2007-06-08T07:18:00.000+01:00

Great video from chadagg an atheist YouTuber. I suggest you subscribe to his videos

From Michael Shermers book "Why Darwin Matters" I present this.

Why would an intelligent designer have created these?

1. Male nipples.
2. Male uterus (yes you read that right)
3. Thirteenth rib ( in 8% of people)
4. Coccyx
5. Wisdom teeth
6. Appendix
7. Body hair (left over from our evolutionary ancestry)
8. Goose bumps. (body hair ancestry left overs)
9. Extrinsic ear muscles.
10. Third eyelid (retained in corner of our eye as a tiny fold of flesh).

Michael Shermer has 3 or 4 lines to describe each on pages 18-19 of his book. I don't want to steal it all so I suggest you buy his book or research this stuff online. Better yet why not do both. Links below.

Chadaggs YouTube profile

Why Darwin Matters at Amazon USA

Why Darwin Matters at Amazon UK

Andromeda

2007-05-24T12:34:00.001+01:00

Andromeda Galaxy

Catalogue Number: M31, NGC 224
Distance: 2.9 million light years
Diameter: 250,000 light years.
Magnitude: 3.4

This is my first attempt at making any type of video. So be nice you bastards.

"WATCH THE STARS, AND FROM THEM LEARN" - Albert Einstein.

Militant but not fundamentalist.

2007-05-12T19:55:00.000+01:00

From timesonline comes this article by Richard Dawkins titled :How Dare you call me a fundamentalist.

Anyone who calls Professor Dawkins a "Fundamentalist" either doesn't understanding what the word means or hasn't read his book. Most likely both.

Fundamentalism means you adhere to a specific dogma and don't budge. Professor Dawkins has said time and time again that evidence would change his mind.

Start of Rant

People who don't just believe in god but think they know his/her/its mind are ridiculous to me.

They are basically saying this "I know god exists, I know his thoughts, his thoughts are homosexuals are bad, foreskins should be removed, women should be covered, you can only eat certain things, don't work on a Sundays, and more dumb stuff Ad nauseam".

Lets not forget the hypocrisy of praying for someone to change what is supposed to be their perfect and divine plan.

So.

Provide scientific evidence that your imaginary friend exists.

ELSE

Keep your bronze age myths, psychological delusions and childish egocentricity away from me. Please.

On a side note: Biblical quotes and "Inner feelings" are not evidence.

End of Rant

Fundies Say the Darndest Things

2007-05-12T18:28:00.000+01:00

You know you're a fundie if this makes sense to you:

"Gravity: Doesn't exist. If items of mass had any impact of others, then mountains should have people orbiting them. Or the space shuttle in space should have the astronauts orbiting it. Of course, that's just the tip of the gravity myth. Think about it. Scientists want us to believe that the sun has a gravitation pull strong enough to keep a planet like neptune or pluto in orbit, but then it's not strong enough to keep the moon in orbit? Why is that? What I believe is going on here is this: These objects in space have yet to receive mans touch, and thus have no sin to weigh them down. This isn't the case for earth, where we see the impact of transfered sin to material objects. The more sin, the heavier something is. " --Courtesy of www.fstdt.com (Fundies Say the Darndest Things)

Music sent to the stars

2007-05-10T01:20:00.000+01:00

The incredible Voyager 2 spacecraft carried a gold plated 33-1/3 record as it made the ring plane crossing of Saturn. The record was covered in a aluminium jacket, as a greeting to anyone that might discover the spacecraft a million years into the future. The record would tell extraterrestrials of the Earth, its people, and the builders of the spacecraft.

There were some complaints about the record by Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Ryle. He was concerned that the Voyager record would reveal our location to extraterrestrials in the galaxy. They should be able to figure out the craft’s origin by its orbit, and wouldn’t need a record.

The Voyager record contains sounds of the Earth, sixty different language greetings, the President and Secretary General of the UN, and ninety minutes of the world greatest music. Indian drumming and chanting, oriental music, Mozart's magic flute, Dark is the Night, and Johnny B. Goode are some of the classic pieces. A few of the team members who worked on the record were Carl Sagan (team leader), Frank Drake, Timothy Ferris, Murry Sidlin, Linda Sagan, and others. Their spartan budget, $18,000, was about the same as that to produce a popular 45 rpm record.

The last thing they did before they placed the record on the spacecraft was to carve this greeting on the inner label: "To the Makers of Music All Worlds, All Times"

That is so cool.

TIME - The stupid people have spoken

2007-05-03T15:43:00.000+01:00

TIME magazine thought they where so clever with the whole mirror on the front page showing everyone as "PERSON OF THE YEAR" thing. Look at it now. The top 100 is now the dumbest list ever. It ranks among the lists of FHM and Maxim. Richard Dawkins is at number 7. I almost wish he wasn't on it.

If you look at that Time 100 top 5. It shows just how stupid the list is. I don't want Dawkins associated with it to be honest.

Top 5

1. Rain (Who?) (Seems like the people of Korea got wind of this)
2. Stephen Colbert (ok hes funny but most influential in the world?)
3. Sanjaya Malakar (an American idol loser, who couldn't sing and people felt sorry for)
4. Dane Cook (comedian, not influential).
5. Sidney Crosby (A feckin Hockey player I am told).

Rain is some kind of singer superstar in Asia. Is TIME magazine even sold in Korea?

Any list that has Paris Hilton (Number 19) on it (unless it is "biggest waste of sperm ever") doesn't deserve much attention.

Seriously. People are dumb.

End of rant

Star Star Shining Bright.

2007-05-02T02:53:00.000+01:00

In 1994 astronomers captured this image of a single star in the galaxy NGC 4526 briefly shining as brightly as all the other hundreds of billions of stars in that galaxy put together. It was a Type II supernova, designated SN 1994D.

How did humans evolve?

2007-04-16T00:24:00.000+01:00

Evolution of the Homo lineage of modern humans (Homo sapiens) began with the hunter of nearly five feet tall, Homo habilis, who is widely presumed to have evolved from an australopithecine ancestor. Near the beginning of the Pleistocene (two million years ago), Homo habilis was transformed by evolution into Homo erectus (Java Man), who used fire and possessed culture. Middle Pleistocene populations of Homo erectus are said to show steady evolution toward the anatomy of Homo sapiens (Neanderthals, Cro-Magnons, and mordern humans), 120,000 to 40,000 years ago. Pre-modern Homo sapiens built huts and made clothing.

The late great Carl Sagan

2007-04-14T06:14:00.000+01:00

To everyone who would look up instead of down.

Poem: The Second Comming By W.B. Yeats

2007-03-28T00:18:00.000+01:00

The Second Coming

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight; somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

W. B. Yeats

Mutation

2007-03-25T23:45:00.000+01:00

Some definitions on the word mutation in relation to evolution.

Mutation: When parental DNA is copied to form a new DNA molecule it is normally copied exactly. A mutation is any change in the new DNA molecule from the parental DNA molecule. Mutations may alter single bases or nucleotides, short stretches of bases or parts of whole chromosomes. Mutations can be detected both at the DNA level or the phenotypic level.

- Evolution By Matt Ridley Third Edition

Mutation: A change in the genetic material of a cell (arising from point mutations or base-pair changes, insertions, deletions, duplications, etc.). Mutations in the genetic material in reproductive cells (sperm or egg) are know as germ-line mutations. These changes can be inherited and are an important source of heritable variation in populations of organisms. They thus provide some of the grist for the mill of natural selection.

- God, the Devil, and Darwin - A critique of Intelligent Design Theory By Niall Shanks

Mutation: A change in inheritable genetic material, most commonly due to a "copying error" during the process of DNA replication. Mutations can be harmful, beneficial, or neutral. They contribute to the genetic variability in a population which services as the raw material for evolutionary change.

- The Science of Evolution and the myth of creationism - Knowing what's real and why it matters By Ardea Skybreak

Atheism, theism debate

2007-03-24T02:55:00.000Z

Darwin and humanity: Should we rid the mind of God?

A special debate between Alister McGrath, Professor of Historical Theology at Oxford University, author of "Dawkins' God" and "The Dawkins Delusion" and Peter Atkins, Professor of Chemistry at Oxford University, well-known atheist and supporter of Richard Dawkins.

I agree with Atkins so I think he obviously won. I will criticise McGrath below as I disagree with his position.

McGrath just annoyed me when he kept saying and inferring atheism requires faith. He says he was an atheist. I am sorry but Mr McGrath doesn't know what the word means. How can you have faith in the lack of a belief, that is madness. His atheism is certainly not mine or the atheism of anyone I know. I have a lack of a belief in many things. Santa, Fairies, Zeus, Apollo, Allah, Yahweh, Bigfoot, zombies, ghosts etc. Does the lack of belief in these things require faith. State what faith in your opinion means Mr McGrath.

Mr McGrath talks about meaning, good, evil, purpose, why? I am sorry but the universe doesn't owe you anything. It exists, it is here, and it is humans alone on this planet at least, that see things through purpose coloured spectacles. Just because we make things for a purpose doesn't mean life the universe and everything also has a purpose.

The fact that all life on this plant has a genetic origin in the primordial soup and even farther back than that all matter in the solar system more or less was once at the heart of a star, this I think is an amazing and fantastically mesmerising view. It is splendid in the extreme.

And on a final thought. The universe and the world don't revolve around you, the universe existed 10 billion years before the earth even arose and another 4.5998 billion years went by on earth without humanity. The universe and the earth and most of life that we know of doesn't need humanity. We are the first species to understand our surroundings at least on this planet. This is an amazing thing.

The fact that people don't see this as enough baffles me. You and I are lucky to be alive. Be grateful that you have the ability to understand the world at all.

Some great sites

2007-03-24T01:58:00.000Z

http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/
http://www.lecturesarchive.com/4466.html
http://www.reitstoen.com/multimedia.php
http://www.edge.org/
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/
http://scienceblogs.com/mikethemadbiologist/
http://www.rationalresponders.com
http://mitworld.mit.edu

THE NEUROLOGY OF SELF-AWARENESS

2007-03-24T01:54:00.000Z

Great article by V.S. Ramachandran from www.edge.org. A great website and a great sceintist and writer. Please check his book out "Phantoms in the Brain".

THE NEUROLOGY OF SELF-AWARENESS

What is the self? How does the activity of neurons give rise to the sense of being a conscious human being? Even this most ancient of philosophical problems, I believe, will yield to the methods of empirical science. It now seems increasingly likely that the self is not a holistic property of the entire brain; it arises from the activity of specific sets of interlinked brain circuits. But we need to know which circuits are critically involved and what their functions might be. It is the "turning inward" aspect of the self — its recursiveness — that gives it its peculiar paradoxical quality.

It has been suggested by Horace Barlow, Nick Humphrey, David Premack and Marvin Minsky (among others) that consciousness may have evolved primarily in a social context. Minsky speaks of a second parallel mechanism that has evolved in humans to create representations of earlier representations and Humphrey has argued that our ability to introspect may have evolved specifically to construct meaningful models of other peoples minds in order to predict their behavior. "I feel jealous in order to understand what jealousy feels like in someone else" — a short cut to predicting that persons behavior.

Here I develop these arguments further. If I succeed in seeing any further it is by "standing on the shoulders of these giants". Specifically, I suggest that "other awareness" may have evolved first and then counterintutively, as often happens in evolution, the same ability was exploited to model ones own mind — what one calls self awareness. I will also suggest that a specific system of neurons called mirror neurons are involved in this ability. Finally I discuss some clinical examples to illustrate these ideas and make some testable predictions.

There are many aspects of self. It has a sense of unity despite the multitude of sense impressions and beliefs. In addition it has a sense of continuity in time, of being in control of its actions ("free will"), of being anchored in a body, a sense of its worth, dignity and mortality (or immortality). Each of these aspects of self may be mediated by different centers in different parts of the brain and its only for convenience that we lump them together in a single word.

As noted earlier there is one aspect of self that seems stranger than all the others — the fact that it is aware of itself. I would like to suggest that groups of neurons called mirror neurons are critically involved in this ability.

The discovery of mirror neurons was made G. Rizzolati, V Gallase and I Iaccoboni while recording from the brains of monkeys performed certain goal-directed voluntary actions. For instance when the monkey reached for a peanut a certain neuron in its pre motor cortex ( in the frontal lobes) would fire. Another neuron would fire when the monkey pushed a button, a third neuron when he pulled a lever. The existence of such Command neurons that control voluntary movements has been known for decades. Amazingly, a subset of these neurons had an additional peculiar property. The neuron fired not only (say) when the monkey reached for a peanut but also when it watched another monkey reach for a peanut!

These were dubbed "mirror neurons" or "monkey-see-monkey-do" neurons. This was an extraordinary observation because it implies that the neuron (or more accurately, the network which it is part of) was not only generating a highly specific command ("reach for the nut") but was capable of adopting another monkey's point of view. It was doing a sort of internal virtual reality simulation of the other monkeys action in order to figure out what he was "up to". It was, in short, a "mind-reading" neuron.

Neurons in the anterior cingulate will respond to the patient being poked with a needle; they are often referred to as sensory pain neurons. Remarkably, researchers at the University of Toronto have found that some of them will fire equally strongly when the patient watches someone else is poked. I call these "empathy neurons" or "Dalai Lama neurons" for they are, dissolving the barrier between self and others. Notice that in saying this one isn't being metaphorical; the neuron in question simply doesn't know the difference between it and others.

Primates (including humans) are highly social creatures and knowing what someone is "up to" — creating an internal simulation of his/her mind — is crucial for survival, earning us the title "the Machiavellian primate". In an essay for Edge (2001) entitled "Mirror Neurons and the Great Leap Forward" I suggested that in addition to providing a neural substrate for figuring out another persons intentions (as noted by Rizzolati's group) the emergence and subsequent sophistication of mirror neurons in hominids may have played a crucial role in many quintessentially human abilities such as empathy, learning through imitation (rather than trial and error), and the rapid transmission of what we call "culture". (And the "great leap forward" — the rapid Lamarckian transmission of "accidental") one-of-a kind inventions.

I turn now to the main concern of this essay — the nature of self. When you think of your own self, what comes into mind? You have sense of "introspecting" on your own thoughts and feelings and of " watching" yourself going about your business — as if you were looking at yourself from another persons vantage point. How does this happen ?

Evolution often takes advantage of pre-existing structures to evolve completely novel abilities. I suggest that once the ability to engage in cross modal abstraction emerged — e.g. between visual "vertical" on the retina and photoreceptive "vertical" signaled by muscles (for grasping trees) it set the stage for the emergence of mirror neurons in hominids. Mirror neurons are also abundant in the inferior parietal lobule — a structure that underwent an accelerated expansion in the great apes and, later, in humans.. As the brain evolved further the lobule split into two gyri — the supramarginal gyrus that allowed you to "reflect" on your own anticipated actions and the angular gyrus that allowed you to "reflect" on your body (on the right) and perhaps on other more social and linguistic aspects of your self (left hemisphere) I have argued elsewhere that mirror neurons are fundamentally performing a kind of abstraction across activity in visual maps and motor maps. This in turn may have paved the way for more conceptual types of abstraction; such as metaphor ("get a grip on yourself").

How does all this lead to self awareness? I suggest that self awareness is simply using mirror neurons for "looking at myself as if someone else is look at me" (the word "me" encompassing some of my brain processes, as well). The mirror neuron mechanism — the same algorithm — that originally evolved to help you adopt another's point of view was turned inward to look at your own self. This, in essence, is the basis of things like "introspection". It may not be coincidental that we use phrases like "self conscious" when you really mean that you are conscious of others being conscious of you. Or say "I am reflecting" when you mean you are aware of yourself thinking. In other words the ability to turn inward to introspect or reflect may be a sort of metaphorical extension of the mirror neurons ability to read others minds. It is often tacitly assumed that the uniquely human ability to construct a "theory of other minds" or "TOM" (seeing the world from the others point of view; "mind reading", figuring out what someone is up to, etc.) must come after an already pre- existing sense of self. I am arguing that the exact opposite is true; the TOM evolved first in response to social needs and then later, as an unexpected bonus, came the ability to introspect on your own thoughts and intentions. I claim no great originality for these ideas; they are part of the current zeitgeist. Any novelty derives from the manner in which I shall marshall the evidence from physiology and from our own work in neurology. Note that I am not arguing that mirror neurons are sufficient for the emergence of self; only that they must have played a pivotal role. (Otherwise monkeys would have self awareness and they don't). They may have to reach a certain critical level of sophistication that allowed them to build on earlier functions (TOM) and become linked to certain other brain circuits, especially the Wernickes ("language comprehension") area and parts of the frontal lobes.

Does the mirror neuron theory of self make other predictions? Given our discovery that autistic children have deficient mirror neurons and correspondingly deficient TOM, we would predict that they would have a deficient sense of self (TMM) and difficulty with introspection. The same might be true for other neurological disorders; damage to the inferior parietal lobule/TPO junction (which are known to contain mirror neurons) and parts of the frontal lobes should also lead to a deficiency of certain aspects self awareness. (Incidentally, Gallup's mirror test — removing a paint splotch from your face while looking at a mirror — is not an adequate test of self awareness, even though it is touted as such. We have seen patients who vehemently claim that their reflection in the mirror is "someone else" yet they pass the Gallup test!)

It has recently been shown that if a conscious awake human patient has his parietal lobe stimulated during neurosurgery, he will sometimes have an "out of body" experience — as if he was a detached entity watching his own body from up near the ceiling. I suggest that this arises because of a dysfunction in the mirror neuron system in the parieto-occipital junction caused by the stimulating electrode. These neurons are ordinarily activated when we temporarily "adopt" another's view of our body and mind (as outlined earlier in this essay). But we are always aware we are doing this partly because of other signals (both sensory and reafference/command signals) telling you you are not literally moving out of yourself. (There may also be frontal inhibitory mechanisms that stop you from involuntarily mimicking another person looking at you).

If these mirror neuron-related mechanisms are deranged by the stimulating electrode the net result would be an out-of-body experience. Some years ago we examined a patient with a syndrome called anosognosia who had a lesion in his right parietal lobe and vehemently denied the paralysis. Remarkably the patient also denied the paralysis of another patient sitting in an adjacent wheelchair! (who failed to move the arm on command from the physician.) Here again was, evidence that two seemingly contradictory aspects of self — its the individuation and intense privacy vs. its social reciprocity — may complement each other and arise from the same neural mechanism, mirror neurons. Like the two sides of a Mobius strip, they are really the same, even they appear — on local inspection — to be fundamentally different.

Have we solved the problem of self? Obviously not — we have barely scratched the surface. But hopefully we have paved the way for future models and empirical studies on the nature of self, a problem that philosophers have made essentially no headway in solving. (And not for want of effort — they have been at it for three thousand years). Hence our grounds for optimism about the future of brain research — especially for solving what is arguably Science's greatest riddle.

Evolution is a theory, well done.

2007-03-23T03:57:00.000Z

I made this as a response to comment but thought I'd repeat it here because I read the nonsense everywhere.

It is true that most people who call evolution just a theory don't actually understand what the word theory means in science. A theory isn't just a wacky and kooky idea that a scientist thought up. A theory coherently and scientifically combines many different facts and laws. It is a comprehensive explanation of many pieces of information. Evolution is a theory the same as gravity is a theory, atoms are a theory "atomic theory" and plate tectonics are a theory. Theories are the most important thing in science. Every scientific discipline has them.

Facts change. It was once a fact that the world was flat. It isn't now. Facts can change within theories but the "Fact and Theory" of evolution is so massively backed up with tons of evidence that people who think its a lie or deny is are either 1) Stupid 2) Completely ignorant on subjects of science or 3) Have been blinded by ignorance because of their religious faith. Sometimes all 3 apply which is scary. This is why Richard Dawkins does not debate creationists. Within evolution, evolutionary biologists debate evolutionary topics all the time. They debate certain areas of evolution. How a certain organ developed or something like that. No one in their right mind debates that it didn't happen. None of these biologists disagree and state that it didn't happen. That is ludicrous. If you think that evolution is "just a theory" and not as real as the fact that we orbit the sun then I feel bad for you but you are just WRONG. That is me being nice.

Another thing. Micro and Macro evolution are basically the same thing. If you say you believe micro but not macro you don't know anything about evolution. They just refer to time scales. Micro evolution (lots of small changes) follows to macro evolution. What do lots of small changes equate to after a long time? A big change. All big change are is the accumulation of many many many small changes over many many many years.

Also. Please don't quote your mythical book to me. Your book isn't magic. Grow up and stop pretending it is.

Zaytuna doesn't get it

2007-03-09T23:21:00.000Z

1. After 1 minute it is obvious he hasn't read "The God Delusion", "The End of Faith" or "Letter to a Christian Nation".

2. Dawkins doesn't put Science against religion and compare them. He says Dawkins puts the mohammed ali version of science against a 90 pound weakling of religion. Dawkins doesn't do this.

In my opinion for finding truth religion is a 90 pound weakling compared to science.

3. Science is a methodical, logical and rational process for find truth about the natural world. Science is not a belief system. If you think it is, you don't know what science is.

4. Zaytuna says "humans aren't acting like humans". I beg to differ. Since the beginning of recorded history the one thing we seem to be able to do with record efficiency is kill each other. I do not like this but it does seem to be human nature.

5. He says the wars of the 20th century where over ideologies. Religion is the worst Ideology. Stalinist Russia, Nazi Germany etc. all had dogmatic belief systems. Religion is the ultimate dogmatic belief system

6. Zaytuna says "god expects more for us". What religion is he referring to? In the bible god tells humans to kill in his name. He even kills humans himself. Oh yea and anyone who doesn't agree gets to burn forever in a lake of fire. The Qu'ran is just as bad if not worse.

God made man in his image? I think not. Perhaps man made god in his image.

Proof of god?

2007-02-12T19:49:00.000Z

I read alot. I read alot on the internet. Especially when I read stuff about god on the internet people always say "you can't prove or disprove god". This is true. It is not true however that just because you can't prove or disprove something that they are both equal in validity. I can't prove or disprove that invisible pink unicorns exist in this world and they pass through all solid matter and noone can ever see them but they exist. Is it equally likely that they do or don't exist? Of course not. The fact that I or anyone can't disprove something does not mean that the thing is likely to be true.

If you believe the bible is true and right then...

2007-02-06T07:41:00.000Z

the following is true and was right to have happened.

God kills the Egyptian firstborn humans, including babies and animals. (Ex 12:30)

Children who strike their parents are to be killed. (Ex 21:15)

God kills Aaron's sons for offering “strange fire before the Lord.” (Lev 10:1-3)

Children who curse their parents, adulterers, and homosexuals must be killed. (Lev 20:9-12)

The unchaste daughters of priests must be burnt to death. (Lev 21:9)

God hardens King Sihon's spirit and then kills him and all the men, women, and “little ones” in his kingdom. (Deut 2:30-34)

God delivers Og into Moses' hands, who then kills every man, woman, and child in every city. (Deut 3:3-6)

Kill everyone who has differing religious views. (Deut 17:2-7)

Kill the men and boys in the cities that God “delivers into your hands,” but keep the women for yourself. (Deut 20:13-15)

Kill everything that breathes in the cities that God gives you for an inheritance. (Deut 20:16)

Kill rebellious or disobedient sons. (Deut 21:18-21)

Kill the rape victims if they fail to cry out loud enough. (Deut 22:23-34)

God will make you eat your sons and daughters. (Deut 28:53)

Those who do not believe in Jesus are tortured forever in hell. (Jhn 3:18)

Jesus says that the wrath of God is abides on all unbelievers. (Jhn 3:36)

God kills 2 people for not giving a said amount of money to the church. (Act 5:1-10)

God, in flaming fire, will take vengeance on those that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. They will be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power.” (2Th 1:7-9)

God gives death and hell the task of killing one quarter of the earth's human population with the sword, starvation, and "with the beasts of the earth. (Rev 6:8)

Four angels will kill a third of the earth's population. (Rev 9:15-19)

God will kill people by fire, plagues, and beasts. There will be dead unburied bodies rotting. (Rev. 11:5-10)

Whoever isn't found listed in the book of life (that God wrote before the foundations of the world) will be cast into the lake of fire. ( Rev 20:15)

If you believe those are true and not only that, that they should have happened then you are the most amoral person on the planet. Worse than Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, etc. The god of the above sentences is the most vile, disgusting, cruel bastard that has ever existed if he is infact real as christians claim. You can't deny it, look them up. I am not making this shit up. Check for yourselves.

Noah was a timelord

2007-02-02T02:22:00.000Z

Creationists you will love me.

I have just thought of a way to fit all the animals on the ark. Noah was a timelord like the Doctor in Doctor Who. Hell maybe he was the Doctor. The ark was the T.A.R.D.i.S and is bigger on the inside than the outside. Perhaps the chameleon chip wasn't broken at this time and the T.A.R.D.I.S was disguised as an ark.

My theory has more basis than any other creationist crackpottery lol.

The Biggest Douche In The Universe

2007-01-31T06:32:00.000Z

I love the episode of South Park title "The Biggest Douche In The Universe". Below is the text of my favourite bit. The very end is also great.

JOHN EDWARD
So, you think you can talk to dead people
better than me, huh?!

STAN
No, I don't think either of us can.

JOHN EDWARD
They told me your show is getting better
ratings than mine, that you're saying
I'm a fraud on your show! You'd better
not ever call me a liar, or a fake,
or a douche again, or else I'll sue
you for slander!

STAN
I'm saying this to you, John Edward,
you are a liar, you are a fake, and
you are the biggest douche ever!

JOHN EDWARD
Everything I tell people is positive
and gives them hope! How does that make
me a douche?!

STAN
Because the big questions in life are
tough: Why are we here? Where are we
from? Where are we going? But if people
believe in asshole douchey liars like
you, we're never gonna find the real
answer to those questions. You aren't
just lying, you're slowing down the
progress of all mankind, you douche!

JOHN EDWARD
I'M NOT A DOUCHE! And I challenge you
to a psychic showdown! I'll prove to
the world that I'm psychic and you're
not!

STAN
Fine, douche!

JOHN EDWARD
I'm not a douche

Brian Flemming on Blasphemy Challenge (Fox News)

2007-01-29T20:26:00.000Z

Heartland on Fox news with John Tasich hosts Rational Responder, Brian Flemming (director of God Who Wasn't There movie) on the show to talk about our Blasphemy Challenge.

That interviewer was a contemptible tool. He just doesn't get the point of the blasphemy challenge. He just gives the typical religious response. See below.

1. Why do you want to take away their hope?
2. Religious people do good things?
3. Why are you so angry?

My Answers

1. Religion may give hope to some but it also segregates, indoctrinates and isolates alot of people.

2. SHUT UP. PEOPLE DO GOOD THINGS. NOT JUST RELIGIOUS PEOPLE OR JUST ATHEISTS BUT ANY TYPE OF PERSON CAN DO SOMETHING GOOD.

3. If any atheist is angry it maybe because when they where young they feel they where lied to about important stuff and told idiotic myths about sky daddies(god) and wizards(jesus).

All 3 points are irrelevant of religions truth. If it gives hope, does good or makes you angry it doesn't alter what is true.

Religious myths are obviously false to people if they think rationally unshackled by their faith.

If god is real or not we can't prove and may never be able to. If god does exist and is petty enough to care about people worshiping him then I deny him/her/it even more.

I deny the holy spirit, god, jesus, allah, vishnu, zeus, tom cruise and superman.

Long live the silver surfer. Galactus is comming.

j/k

or am I.

What kind of reader are you?

2007-01-28T23:08:00.001Z

What Kind of Reader Are You? Your Result: Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm You're probably in the final stages of a Ph.D. or otherwise finding a way to make your living out of reading. You are one of the literati. Other people's grammatical mistakes make you insane.
Book Snob
Dedicated Reader
Literate Good Citizen
Fad Reader
Non-Reader
What Kind of Reader Are You? Create Your Own Quiz

Jackass goes to jail

2007-01-24T04:24:00.000Z

The jackass goes to jail.

I guess I should have checked that wikipedia link to Kent Hovind. A little snippet is below.

"On November 2, 2006, Hovind was found guilty by a jury in a Pensacola, Florida federal court of fifty-eight federal tax and tax-related offenses; his wife, Jo, was also convicted on 44 counts. On January 19, 2007, he was sentenced to 10 years in prison, three years of probation after his sentence is served, and $640,000 in restitution. He had been previously ordered to forfeit $430,400 and faced a maximum of 288 years"

I have to admit I laughed. I didn't feel proud of laughing but laughed none the less. Schadenfraude is what it is :-S. So much for his high and mighty morals eh.

Ali G taking the piss out of scientists and a creationist jackass

2007-01-24T03:52:00.000Z

Ali G takes the piss out of some scientists and a creationist jackass "Kent Hovind".