A Requiem for 2017

Hi everyone!

Today:

We had a great conversation today at Secular Sunday. While, as usual, there were a great many tangents, our topic was basically about whether or not it's okay to make fun of religious people. How non-religious people Engage is something we've talked about at great length. Charles and Andy began by pointing out that this a case by case, person by person, situation by situation thing. To wit, it might not be a great idea to start a conversation with a significant other's parents by pointing out a lineage of justifying rape and murder within the religious text of their choice. But, if someone shows up on your doorstep and wants to tell you about the dangers of Xenu, their religion is fair game. A few people shared their feelings on this: ranging from (and I am paraphrasing and probably taking some big liberties, correct me if you feel that I misrepresented or did not represent what you meant) "I just want to be left alone" to "if you're going to knock on my door, be prepared to listen to my feelings" to "if it's someone I care about, I'll act out the act because their comfort is important to me" to "the religion of the person is inconsequential to me, so long as I can sense that they are good people."  Again, responses vary as much as the people involved and the situation at hand.

Somewhat predictably, the conversation eventually found its way to the political, pointing out that if a group of people is intentionally forcing religious beliefs, via laws, on another group of people, being polite just isn't going to cut it. That having been said, we talked a bit about how to talk to religious people without coming off as what Michael had aptly described as "the stereotypically combative atheist", which will often turn the discussion into a contest rather than an actual discussion. We talked about having to out-Christian the Christians. And Betty Bowers name was deservedly mentioned. Christian pointed out that attacking fundamentalists of any religion is 1) pretty low hanging fruit 2) a kind of straw man argument. If we were judged - and I'm sure many of us have been - by the craziest examples of atheists, it's a logically fallacious as it counterproductive. That having been said, if a gauntlet has been thrown down and there is no way out, it could be beneficial to make sure that expectations are made clear in the beginning of the discussion. Additionally, if someone is a frighteningly fundamentalist variety of any religion, we discussed the possibility of pointing out to them that there are people, say Episcopalians in the Christian religion, whose views aren't quite so draconian - I don't remember if it was brought up during the discussion, but I think it is quite probable that a true fundamentalist would see any tepid believers as undeserving of whatever reward their religion has promised them  or even heretical. That having been said, I think it does stand to reason that we'd be in a lot better world if all of the Baptists were Episcopalians - to make a sweeping generalization. After all, they're the Church of England in America, and we know that they can't have an Inquisition (NSFW and the relevant bit is at the end, but it's worth a view if you haven't seen it.)

Mike asked how much success people have had confronting religious people with the fallibility of their own beliefs, which then brought up what percentage of people's beliefs they actually believe. After all, when Jesus walked (if he existed to walk) the earth, the ideas of Virgin Birth and Resurrection weren't the sole property of any one religion. Followers of Jesus probably even knew this, but at a certain point it wasn't so much whether or not the story was believable as much as it was: is this a good story? And, for better or worse, Jesus' ideas of inclusivity, humility, and charity give Christianity a kind of soft power that's lacking in other religions. Now, many Christians have about as much truck with loving their fellow man as the church did in the poem in Tolstoy's The Brothers Karamazov. (Sorry, English teacher.)  As Christian pointed out, these are bad Christians.

There was more to the discussion than that, but I was honestly enjoying myself so much that I didn't take notes. Still, I hope everyone had as good a time as I did.

Next Meetups:

I need to amend what I said at this past meet up and let everyone know that I'm going to be absent for the next two meetups, per plans for Saturnalia and the ushering in of 2018. I shall return on January 6th, perhaps with Douglas McArthur corncob pipe and aviator glasses. The Meetup dates will still be open so that people interested in them can RSVP if they'd like to. Please, if you can think of a topic you'd like to discuss or any changes you might want to float past the group for one of those two dates, you can post them in the conversation threads for December 24th and December 31st, respectively.

2017:

2017 was a year that brought about a lot of changes. I don't think that I am alone in saying that a lot of them were terrible. What I do want to say though, as this will be my last mass e-mail of the year (I think?), is that I love this group. You are all people with whom I feel a significant bond, and I want you to know how important your friendships have been to me. I've been really busy and stressed out since I started teaching in High Point, but I look forward to Sundays as a respite from the pressures and stress of the week. I never had that when I was religious. I either felt bored, felt bad that I felt bored, felt bad that I wasn't good enough, or (as a teenager) was really just pissed off that I had to be there. The members of this group (that's YOU even if I haven't seen you in a while!) challenge me, laugh with me, and make me want to be the best me that I can be. 2017 stunk, but we're about to see the other side of it. I believe that 2018 will be a better year, if for no other reason than the simple dark fact that 2017 hasn't set that bar particularly high. And, even if it isn't, I look forward to facing its challenges with a great group of friends. I know that I am not the only person in the group that feels that way, but we never know unless we tell each other. So, reach out! And, because I cannot resist, if you don't believe me, take it from him! Have a great couple of weeks till I see you again!  

(Don't forget to check out www.jovialitybeforemortality.org! I'll be updating it as I've just bought the domain for another year - though right now, it's just going to be this e-mail and a backlog of our older meetings and content. But still, check it out!)

A Few Topics and Other Items

Hi everyone,

I hope that this finds you well, and that everyone is as happy and as healthy as they can be. I just wanted to throw out an update for a few things.

1) Topics

I'm putting together topics for a few Secular Sundays, starting with the next one - November 19th. At that, I plan to discuss Skepticism vs. Denial. We've discussed things pursuant to this several times, and I find it worthy of revisitation. Hope to see you there.

The 26th of November, I won't be able to make it to Geeksboro that morning, but I will leave the event open to anyone who would like to be there.

I'd like to discuss Artificial Intelligence on December 3rd. I am reading up on the subject and would like the discussion to keep its footing in what is currently possible as ground work before we start mentally inventing HAL or even Johnny 5.

December 10th, I think we can take a break from topics, unless a reason presents itself.

December 17th, I was thinking we could talk about blasphemy/insult/hate speech and nuances and baggage that come with all three. Credit to Lyn for thinking of it, and I'd agree that it's a very relevant thing to discuss. After all, how many of us have been accused of nastiness in the name of truth. Beyond that, is it wrong to make fun of something that gives other people hope? Is it wrong to profane that which others will kill and die for? We've had a lot discussions along these tracks, but every time, we come away with some new ideas, and new people get to share their thoughts.

2) Potential Topics

I have wanted to talk about Quantum probability for a very long time. That having been said, it's not a topic that too many people understand. The implications of it are, I think, certainly worth discussing - if my understanding of it is correct. If anyone is versed in the subject or knows someone who could be invited to our Sunday discussion, that would be fantastic. I don't want to, as several of you have heard me say, enter into ultracrepadarianism. 

If you have a topic you'd like to discuss and a date you'd like it discussed, let me know!

3) Directory Information

Those of you who have given your directory information, I'm going to send private e-mails to you in the next few days with the rest of the list included in it. If you've submitted info, but would like to opt out. Let me know.

4) Memories

I just wanted to let you all know - and this is NOT a guilt trip - that I haven't seen some of you in a while, and I miss you! I do not in any way want for Secular Sunday to ever feel like an obligation. After all, isn't that sort of thing why people leave religion? The "thou shalt" sort of mentality? Anyway, even if you can't drop by, I understand. I just hope that everyone is doing and feeling well. Drop me a line!

Have a great one! Love you all!

I Fear the Greeks and Their Gifts

Hi everyone!

Today's Summary:

We our initial discussion today centered around entitlement, privilege, and tribalism. James brought up this TED talk. We talked a bit about the kind of mindset that people enter into when they enter into the anonymity of being part of a crowd or a team. Ann pointed out that this famous experiment has been banned (? I can't remember if you said "banned" or if it just wouldn't be acceptable in today's society.) Steve brought up Lies My Teacher Told Me, and the idea that public school was essentially design to turn children into productive cogs in a machine. I talked a little bit about the fact that education is becoming more of a reinforcement about the entitlement that comes with money and the competitive aspects of a zero sum society.

At this, James brought up a topic that a lot of people in our group have probably had to deal with: whether or not to accept anything from religious organizations at work. James presented several of his own thoughts on the topic, each of which we discussed in some detail.

1) Religious organizations making donations to places of work often make the assumption that everyone there is Christian. It's an errant assumption or, if you prefer, an attempted negation of the identity of those who are unlike what the church members see as their "tribe."

2) Slimy feeling for accepting something from a group whose *ahem* philosophical inclinations do not match our own - if it was the NRA, would you take the food? What about the Westboro Baptist church?

3) Take advantage or a stand for yourself - if no one can start a conversation with you about the food because you're in a secure area and there is no "prayer card" or whatever to add strings to the meal, what's the harm in taking advantage of a bunch of people who are clearly not interested in maintaining equity in the world anyway? Or would it be better to stay true to ourselves in such a case - don't take food from a church because it is not something that we agree with?

4) Bait - does it seem like a person is participating as prey in a predatory activity? Does it seem like the normalization of an activity that should be in no way normal? Churches use bait all over the place - Charles pointed out that many Christians became that way, either first or second hand, because of predatory churches in the developing world. "Come to our meeting; we have food." Or, as I liked to put it, everyone is being baited into Christianity with the use of bait-after-death.

Ann continued our discussion by bringing up another local concern: a church meeting being held in a public school gym - it's apparently being rented by the group, but run by adults (please correct me if my notes are wrong). We talked about that kind of thing in a professional setting - whether a person is working in the public or private sector. While we are often, if not always, well within our rights to take issue with this sort of thing, it might not be a hill worth dying on, so to speak. We shared anecdotes of people losing out professionally and even at the high school level (This sounded like what we talked about, but I'm not entirely sure that it's the same). Subjective attacks can be really, really difficult to combat - once our colleagues decide that they don't like our faces because of our beliefs, it can be a short trip out the door. Economic reprisals are surprisingly, insanely easy for Christian colleagues to use against us in the sense that we can easily be professionally undermined, simply for not believing what the rest of the "tribe" believes.

We talked about how, as people get farther along in their careers, they become less and less interested in "playing nice" or *ahem* "caring about our jobs." Again, we come back to the debate over whether its important to not allow the normalization of prejudice against us in the workplace or to not have to worry about our career because of what we believe.

Ann told us an anecdote about the entitlement of some preachers who deigned it necessary to knock on her door at 8:30 one evening. The conversation wended toward, "Well, what are you going to do when you die?"

Ann: "Be dead!"

This turned our discussion to the insanity that surrounds funerals and death - Charles talked about the Egyptians imagining that their rulers would continue to need food and other comforts after dying. We talked about the whole industry surrounding the treatment of corpses - which is antithetical toward a lot of Christianity anyway. Why does a body need to be sealed in a leak proof tomb if the soul is going to heaven? What if there is a resurrection and the bodies are sealed under six feet of dirt in a coffin, inside of a metal container? Would this complicate a zombie apocalypse? Obviously, we went a little ad absurdum with this, but zombies are written into Christianity from the get-go. After all, what would you call a group of people beyond death, who have no free will? Does that mean that heaven is full of zombies? After all, heaven wouldn't have any evil in it, right? Soooooo... will-less post-death corpses, right? There are some great takes on heaven - Twain and Dar Williams. 

Charles brought up the man who asked Jesus for a seat next to him in his kingdom - (James or John, I think?) It does seem a lot like heaven's just an extended church session. Yikes. I jokingly added that in the time period when Jesus was living, the idea of having a chair may have been very, very attractive - even just having the ability to sit around at leisure may have been blissful at the time it was written. Dunno. Wasn't there.

We talked a bit more about the many faces of YHWH, El, and, eventually, Kal El and Jor El

Steve brought up a book that Lyn has spoken of many times: The Chalice and the Blade. I'm probably adding that and, maybe, Stargate - according to Joe and James (I saw the original, but never the tv show), which is about the USAF killing alien gods - to my queue of Things to Check Out.

Next Time:

I won't be around on the 15th or the 29th. If someone has a topic, that'd be awesome (let me know, and I'll e-mail everyone). If not, by all means, get together and be a community. I plan to have a topic for the 22nd, but I'll update you about that soon! Have a great week! See everyone as soon as I can! Have an awesome week! 

Not Your Average Sunday Summary

Hi everyone!

Our conversation ranged sort of all over the place, but we started with the definitions of

"tautological" and "teleological." *Ahem* Per Wikipedia:


In rhetoric, a tautology (from Greek ταὐτός, "the same" and λόγος, "word/idea") is a logical argument constructed in such a way, generally by repeating the same concept or assertion using different phrasing or terminology, that the proposition as stated is logically irrefutable, while obscuring the lack of evidence or valid reasoning supporting the stated conclusion.

TL;DR: tautological pertains to reasoning that we don't want to use.

Teleological is as follows:

teleology

[tel-ee-ol-uh-jee, tee-lee-] 

 


Word Origin
noun, Philosophy.
1.
the doctrine that final causes exist.
2.
the study of the evidences of design or purpose in nature.
3.
such design or purpose.
4.
the belief that purpose and design are a part of or are apparent innature.
5.
(in vitalist philosophy) the doctrine that phenomena are guided not only by mechanical forces but that they also move toward certain goals of self-realization.

---

I think it is safe to say that these are related. Teleology will use tautology to obscure the fact that "design" and "purpose" are often illusions brought on by the human resistance to the idea that the universe is (at very least often) an indifferent and random place.

We, then, went on to talk about potential future topics, future activities, the ins and outs, as it were, of those future activities.

There will be more posts on this page and on our content page in the coming days. I hope that everyone has a fantastic week and joins us next time for our Spectacular Secular Sunday! In the meantime, here are some notes about our discussion:

Also, I think, next time we're planning on having a topic - so stay tuned!

-Sean

Short, Sweet Summary for September 10th.

Today:

As per usual, we had a meandering discussion that wound around a variety of topics. This time, we touched on politics, philosophy, and linguistics - to name a few. I'm going to endeavor to keep my summaries short from here on out because this time of year (the beginning of the school year) I'm up to my armpits in work. We talked about the structuring of the education system and the boons and banes of public/private sector of education. People shared personal experiences in public and private education. We talked a lot about nuance and the necessity in expressing clarity and being concise. Specific points touched on tribalism, America's arrival at its "place" in the world, what that place is, and what people believe it to be. Jon pointed out that the government generally does not do a great job of changing tracks once certain programs have momentum. We talked about competition vs domination and the future of the school system.

There was discussion of why politics come up in our discussions so much and whether or not that can be avoided. Lyn showed off her oh-so-stylish FAACT t-shirt and told us about this great wine. So, we joked about infowars' Alex Jones hocking his junk - not a goal of our group.

We talked about future discussion topics - Artificial Intelligence and That Which We Do Actually Believe came to the surface as good ideas. I'll be in touch for when we are going to do those, but we also said if you have any ideas for future topics, let me know. 

Upcoming events:

Don't forget! Next weekend is Greensboro Beautiful! If you're interested, here is the sign up!

Also, Lyn's movie night and potluck is nigh!

OH! CHECK THE CONTENT PAGE OF THIS SITE FOR SOME OLDER UPDATES!!!

Sunday, July 30th: Ghosts and Memories and Information and the Hadron Collider

This Sunday: Information, Identity, Memories, and Ghosts!!!

We've talked in the past about the possibility of a deity-free life after death scenario. Well, there are a few articles that have come to my attention recently that are pretty wild.

1) http://gizmodo.com/does-the-large-hadron-collider-actually-disprove-ghosts-1792686748

2) http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/ghosts-brian-cox-large-hadron-collider-cern-real-truth-standard-model-physics-a7598026.html

3)  http://bigthink.com/philip-perry/scientists-have-discovered-how-to-implant-false-memories


One and two are at odds. Three is an interesting point because it speaks to what a person's existence sort of is. Check them out or just come join the conversation! I'm back from Pennsylvania and will be happy to see anyone who comes on the 30th.

Come and talk. Come and listen. This is a judgement free zone. Hope to see you some Sunday!

Secular Sunday - New Setup!

For the foreseeable future at least, our Secular Sunday page will read as follows:

This is us getting together and being a community. We meet every Sunday at Geeksboro. Sometimes, there are specific topics: morality without divinity, deconversion stories, historical relativism, etc. 
Come and talk. Come and listen. This is a judgement free zone. Hope to see you some Sunday! 

We still may have specific topics from time to time - as people suggest them, but it was recently decided that discussions often open up more and can go deeper if there isn't some sort of "central goal" to them. I will still update this site with notes (as well as an e-mail) whenever I can. Have a great day everyone!