My Flying Spaghetti Monster pumpkin

My family and I went to the in-laws' house last Sunday, as we usually do, and we all carved pumpkins. I usually abstain, and go sit on the couch and read instead. But this year I felt inspired to create something, and here it is. Unfortunately by now, almost a week later, the center part is mostly shriveled up, but the overall shape still looks okay.

Reading The Reason For God

I'm a little disappointed with how much time I spend thinking, reading, and writing about religious or philosophical topics. On the one hand, it's obviously a very important subject, and one that I've been giving a lot of thought to in the past few years. On the other hand, I don't think it's very important at all, and it bothers me that I spend so much time on a subject that is essentially arguing about fairy tales.

Recently, a Christian friend on another message board recommended The Reason For God by Timothy Keller, so this week I checked it out from the library. It purports to address the most frequently heard "doubts" that skeptics raise, and to point the way to the true path and purpose of Christianity. So I was hopeful that this book might contain some actual meat. Unfortunately, here is the list of specific questions the book appears to address:

• Why does God allow suffering in the world?


• How could a loving God send people to Hell?


• Why isn’t Christianity more inclusive?


• How can one religion be "right" and the others "wrong"?


• Why have so many wars been fought in the name of God?

I can only speak for myself, but these are not the kinds of questions I tend to ask. These questions seem to presume the existence of a God, and not just any God, but the Christian God. They seem like questions that a struggling Christian might ask, not questions that an actual atheist or skeptic would ask. My questions are more along the lines of, "Why is it necessary to posit the existence of a supernatural realm?", "What does the evidence suggest?", and "How does the God hypothesis explain the data better than naturalism?"

After reading the Introduction, I don't have very high expectations of this book, but I would love to be surprised. The major premise seems to be that skeptics ought to doubt their doubts. Funny, that's the exact same thing my father-in-law said to me after I came out as a skeptic, and it still makes no sense. Doubting your doubts will lead you to believe anything and everything. For example, check out this paragraph:

Some will respond to all this, "My doubts are not based on a leap of faith. I have no beliefs about God one way or another. I simply feel no need for God and I am not interested in thinking about it." But hidden beneath this feeling is the very modern American belief that the existence of God is a matter of indifference unless it intersects with my emotional needs. The speaker is betting his or her life that no God exists who would hold you accountable for your beliefs and behavior if you didn't feel the need for him. That may be true or it may not be true, but, again, it is quite a leap of faith.

I don't see why not believing in God is a huge leap of faith. Is it a huge leap of faith not to believe in Santa Claus, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster? Here's my version:

Some will respond to all this, "My doubts are not based on a leap of faith. I have no beliefs about the Flying Spaghetti Monster one way or another. I simply feel no need for the Flying Spaghetti Monster and I am not interested in thinking about it." But hidden beneath this feeling is the very modern American belief that the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is a matter of indifference unless it intersects with my emotional needs. The speaker is betting his or her life that no Flying Spaghetti Monster exists who would hold you accountable for your beliefs and behavior if you didn't feel the need for him. That may be true or it may not be true, but, again, it is quite a leap of faith.

I simply substituted the word "God" with "Flying Spaghetti Monster", and now it sounds pretty ridiculous, doesn't it? Is it really a leap of faith not to believe in the Flying Spaghetti Monster? Why not? What's the difference between this paragraph and the original one? What makes this one ridiculous while the other one supposedly isn't?

The only difference I can see is that humanity has a long history of believing in an anthropomorphic "God" (or gods), thus the concept is so familiar to us that it does not seem crazy when someone talks about it. The Flying Spaghetti Monster enjoys no such tradition.

I'm not sure whether the book will get better once I dig into it, but I'll let you know if it does.

More Prop 8 nonsense

Three things.

First, the arguments being used to support Proposition 8 are generally false, misleading, and based on faulty logic. Don't take my word for it; see Mormon lawyer and scholar Morris Thurston's rebuttal of the "Six Consequences" memo for detailed examples. It bothers me greatly that the Mormon church is doing all it can to push this deceptive nonsense forward.

Second, apparently the latest Yes on 8 ad uses images of children without their parents' consent and against their wishes, and some of these children's parents want it taken down. Just beautiful. Way to go, Yes on 8. Way to think of the children. Oh, the irony.

Third, conservative Christian leaders are quoted in the New York Times as calling Prop 8 "Armageddon", "more important than the presidential election", and saying "we will not survive . . . as a nation" if Prop 8 does not pass. Yes on 8 is looking to raise $2 million this week, and with this kind of rhetoric it's likely they'll get it. If you care about this issue, please donate any amount to Equality For All (at the bottom of the page). Polls are showing that voters are moving back and forth on this issue, and the outcome may well depend on who spends more advertising dollars in the home stretch. Sad but true.

If you're in California, please vote NO on 8.

Standing For Something

If we can't think for ourselves, if we're unwilling to question authority, then we're just putty in the hands of those in power. But if the citizens are educated and form their own opinions, then those in power work for us. In every country, we should be teaching our children the scientific method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency, humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted world that we inhabit by virtue of being human, this may be all that stands between us and the enveloping darkness.
– Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World

As you may know, I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), though my personal beliefs and feelings seem to move farther in the opposite direction day by day. On Friday, I had the privilege of joining a group of about 50 Mormons and former Mormons who delivered a package to Church headquarters, to protest the Church's heavy involvement in the campaign to pass Proposition 8 in California. The event was organized online via the web site Signing For Something.

Proposition 8 is a proposed amendment to the California constitution to ban marriage between people of the same gender. The Mormon church has used church time and resources to actively campaign for Prop 8, and has directly solicited the time, money, and effort of its members to campaign for Prop 8's passage. It has organized massive efforts via its membership network, which we believe violates its own stance of political neutrality, for example as stated in Doctrine & Covenants 134:9, "We do not believe it just to mingle religious influence with civil government."

Our delivery on Friday contained about 300 letters written by individuals, carnations to symbolize those who have lost their lives over this issue, and copies of a petition explaining why we oppose the church's involvement. The petition can be found here, and has currently been signed by about 700 people, Mormons and non-Mormons alike. Those who have signed the petition hold various positions on the issue of same-sex marriage, but all are opposed to the Mormon church's attempts to use their religious influence to impose their beliefs on the larger secular society in this civil matter.

The event was covered on almost all of the local news networks, and you can see coverage at the links below. You can actually see me in some of the videos; I have a beard and ponytail, and was wearing a purple dress shirt and tie.

• Fox 13 - I consider this the best coverage, with the clearest explanation of our position.


• KSL - a station owned by the Mormon church; it's interesting to compare how they chose to report the story.


• ABC 4 - also good coverage.


• Salt Lake Tribune


• Deseret News - a newspaper owned by the Mormon church; again, interesting to compare the differences.

Honestly, I doubt the petition or the letters will have any effect on the church's stance toward same-sex marriage, much less its stance toward homosexuality. But I cannot imply my agreement on this issue by remaining silent. I find it sad that the church characterizes this as a moral issue, when I see the issues of gay rights and same-sex marriage as analogous to the issues of black civil rights and interracial marriage in the 1950s and '60s. This has nothing to do with morality.

If you are in California, please vote NO on 8. Wherever you are, please donate to Equality For All (at the bottom of the page - contributions through ActBlue are being matched only through today!), sign the Signing For Something petition, talk to your friends and neighbors about this issue, or do whatever you can. And regardless of your feelings on this or any other issue, remember to vote on November 4.