Saturday, December 12, 2009

The God of Atheism

As a blonde man married to a brunette wife, I find the following cartoon completely offensive:

 


Like the World's established Religions, Atheism is also a faith, the belief in no higher power, without proof.

I'm a faithless Agnostic, because I'm Scientifically minded. I "believe" in the Scientific Method (Observe, Hypothesize, Test, Conclude), because it's the only logical system I know of to answer questions.

There is NO "proof" in any established Religion ... OR Atheism.

Therefore I am skeptical of all of them.




I understand the anger of Atheists regarding the established Religions, though. I believe it should be aimed at the Politicians who USE Religion as a means to an end, that end more often than not benefiting the greed of their sponsors.

To better understand how the world we live in got into the mess we find ourselves in today with the Religion bits, I can suggest no better book than The Great Transformation by Karen Armstrong. In an enlightened school, it should be required reading, for everyone.

"Agnostics are Atheists without balls."
... Stephen Colbert, author of "I Am America ... And So Can You"

Ouch.

I should point out that Colbert (pronounced: "cole-BEAR" in the great French tradition of sounding their words differently than how than spell) is an American Comedian, like this guy:

"Theoretical Physicists are fucking nuts."
... George Carlin

Not quite. Mathematicians are nuts. Physicists are adorable. We love Mathematicians anyway, though.

Mathemeticians like Paul Erdos, the way he chose to live his life, are greater sources of comedy than professional comedians.

Will the laughter ever end?



Now, now. See Alan Guth and Inflation theory, notably: Quantum Fluctuations. There's your Speculative Proof !
:-)

He should know, look at how organized his office is:



I'm not joking! That IS impressive! I bet he knows where everything in his office is located. If any "secretary" or "administrative assistant" or "grad student"/"post-doc" cleaned that mess up, he'd be lost.
 
















2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I have a question. What is that thing Alan is using to hold up that cardboard box?

Does he have an abormally high kneecap, does he have a pipe wrench in his pocket (Plumbing is Physics, right?), or is he just happy to see the photographer?

Steven Colyer said...

Happiness Theory? See; Jeremy Bentham, one of the six heroes of The Enlightenment, and his "Fierific Calculus" which attempted to use Math to quantify "Happiness", for more on that.

I vote pipe wrench, possibly a superball (were it "happiness" he should be a porn star, not a speculative physicist). I think the photograph, being a two dimensional representation of a 3 dimensional scene, provides an illusion. I think he's standing behind the box, which is held down by the paperwork on top of it.