Humanist Thought of the Week

Spiritual vs. Material

I am on the advisory board for the Spiritual Naturalist Society.

I don’t use the word spiritual much in my practice as a Humanist as I find that word can be very confusing.

I am a material naturalist, not a supernatural spiritualist.

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What came first?

I have chickens. 4 to be exact. They are really incredibly funny animals to watch.

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The Joy of Reason

This weekend is the Reason Rally in Washington DC. I won’t be going, but I wish I could.

Supporters of the use of reason and logic in solving our problems will descend on Washington DC to say, hey, you know, instead of theology, maybe we could base our public policy on reason.

It’s a thought.

Why do we Humanists care so much about reason anyway?

Because, we actually want to solve our problems.

And to solve our problems we need to know what is really happening as opposed to what we think might be happening.

And the way we tell the difference between the real and the imagined is by using reason, science and logic.

Because reality matters, reason matters.

A Fool's Bet

I wish I had a penny for every time someone presented faith to me as a fool’s bet. Here’s their basic argument: If you believe and there is no god, there is no negative consequence But if you don’t believe and it turns out there is a god you are going to hell. When presented like this - belief seems to make sense. Of course, this assumes that believing things that aren’t true is harmless. And that’s a pretty big assumption. Because, let’s face it: it ain’t the stuff we know that gets us into trouble. It’s the stuff we know that just ain’t so that causes all the mischief.

Debating whether God cares about my floors

I am pretty sure that God, if he exists, abhors a clean floor.