In Search of an Atheist Moral Hero

John Lennon: moral hero and atheist?

I'm not trying to be a dick about it or argumentative. I really want to know about a great person in history who also happened to be an atheist. Much of my inspiration in life has come from reading about great men and women: about St. Francis of Assisi, Martin Luther King Jr., the current Dalai Lama, Dorothy Day, Gandhi, Jesus, Simone Weil...the list goes on. After thinking about this for years, I am yet to land on a figure living or dead who was a great moral hero and who was an atheist. Now, don't get me wrong, I realize that history has not been kind to atheism, and therefore many atheists never "came out." I also realize that biographies and (especially) autobiographies are a little exaggerated, and that many of my "great men" were also ordinary people with ordinary problems. But the fact that all these great men and women were great because of their religious beliefs is, to me, indisputable. Get rid of the religion of MLK, for example, and you get rid of MLK. That's another discussion.

Anyway, please suggest an atheist hero in the comments section below. This is a challenge and an opportunity for learning. I would like to read their biography.

Ground Rules

1. They must be an atheist, which is simply defined as a person who doesn't believe in God or a supreme being. So don't give me Thomas Jefferson (he was a Deist), but perhaps Thomas Paine (although wasn't he mostly a political revolutionary?). Also, the person cannot be religious. In other words, don't give me a Buddhist that doesn't believe in a personal, monotheistic God. Also, several religious people have been fiercely critical of religion. For example Luther, Tolstoy, Isaac Newton. That does not mean they are atheists (far from it, they were real Christians). Give me a real atheist, like Freud for example (but don't give me Freud...see next rule). Of course I am not saying that their morality has to be related to their atheism in any way (that would be absurd...atheism is a lack of belief). Or, if you must, give me an outspoken agnostic even, I'll go with that.
2. They must be really good people. Not great scientists, or great thinkers alone - great moral people. Great people do great things for other people, as all the people I mentioned above. Bertrand Russel perhaps? He was a social activist for peace and was behind some good causes. But I would need more information. Also I heard he was actually a dick in person. I don't know that, I just heard that from a professor of philosophy whom I respect. Einstein was a Deist as far as I can tell. John Lennon perhaps? Now we're thinking. How about Carl Sagan or Neil Degrasse Tyson? Well, maybe. Besides being excellent science popularizers (and great scientists in their own right), what have they done ethically?
3. No Socrates. He is one of my greatest heroes; in fact, part of my tattoo is based on him. But as I read Plato's dialogues, I'm convinced that Socrates believed in one God (or at least Plato did...it's hard to pull apart Socrates from Plato).

Not Fair!

You might find yourself saying "not fair" for several reasons. First, atheists were persecuted so much that they never "came out." I answer, like Jesus you mean? Great religious people have been persecuted too; indeed that is why they were so great. Or perhaps you think that historical figures lied about being religious, when secretly they were atheist. Setting aside that fact that lying  is not a virtue, you have to provide some evidence. You can't just name drop historical figures and say they were atheist. If they were silent on the issue, I might even buy that. But mostly I don't find this argument very successful. My Kant professor in college, for example, thought that Immanuel Kant was secretly an atheist. If you've read any of his work, you know that's silly. The truth is my professor really really wanted him to be. Second, you might say that atheism is not a moral worldview, so my quest to find an atheist moral hero makes no sense. But I'm not making that connection. All I'm asking is for a great person who happened to be an atheist. Now, I do see the connection between religion and morality of course. By definition, religion is a moral endeavor. Third, I'm not suggesting that atheists cannot be good people. My brother is a good person, so is my wife. Fourth, you might argue my rules above are too constricting. How so? Fifth, you might say that history has been dominated by religion; therefore, the atheists have disappeared from the record. I can see that.

Morally I'm Pro-Life, Legally I'm not, and why Pro-Lifers need to calm down

Morally I'm Pro-Life
For some of our beliefs and opinions, we should recognize a distinction between the moral belief itself and its legal implications, or its potential legal implications. For example, I believe everyone should love others, including their enemies, but I do not believe that should be a law. I don't think, for example, that disliking your neighbor should come with a $200 fine. I believe in radical forgiveness, but I would not support getting rid of all prisons and jails (in the name of forgiveness). I believe in God, but I also think government should be secular. These are moral and religious issues that may or may not become legal issues, depending on whether we want to extend them. The more I thought about the abortion debate and how complex it is, the more I realized that abortion is the same kind of issue--it's moral and legal.

• Moral Pro-Life: When you believe that abortion is wrong.
• Moral Pro-Choice: When you believe that abortion is permissible.
• Legal Pro-Life: When you think abortion should be illegal
• Legal Pro-Choice: When you think abortion should be legal.

Pick two. Before you think I'm splitting hairs or creating distinctions ex nihilo, check out this Pew survey which suggests we all look at it this way. I believe terminating a pregnancy is wrong, except in the case of rape and the mother's safety. That's my moral view. I wouldn't get an abortion, and if I extend my morals to other people, I don't think they should get an abortion either (the same way I don't think they should dislike their neighbor, or lie, or punch people in the face). I would never judge someone that got an abortion, based on the Christian prohibition against judging (Jesus: "judge not"). I would not hate them for it. I would simply think it's not right. That's all. Negative emotion is not required. The proper response is compassion, understanding, and sadness (both for the baby and the parents). I believe in contraception, which includes Plan B (in my understanding, it's preventative, not a termination). More on that later.

Why am I morally pro-life? Five main reasons. First, everyone is pro-life to a certain extent. When having these arguments, we forget that almost all Pro-Choicers are pro-life when it comes to the third trimester (i.e. babies that pretty much look like a real baby). Even liberals do not want to see mothers kill these kinds of babies. So the real question is: where exactly do we draw the line? From sex, to fertilization, to "viability," this is where the science gets very murky and the place we pick seems a bit arbitrary. Therefore, I don't blame people for picking "fertilization." Intuitively, it makes sense, but people don't even understand the science behind fertilization (I don't).

What we mean when we say "it's perfectly natural"

It's completely natural. It's totally natural. There's nothing wrong with it. Do it.

From masturbation to racism, from organic food to free range cows, from shampoo to all-purpose cleaners, from beards to smoking pot, from home births to refusing vaccines, the word natural has been employed to convince people that something is okay because....it's totally natural dude. Here is the magical formula:

x [behavior you like]   +   "is natural"   =   x is morally permissible/good

biological necessity

Masturbation. We say it's natural because the human body practically requires it, especially during young adulthood. The evolutionary and biological forces are so strong that it would take an enormous amount of moral will power to not do it. Kant, a product of his times in this respect, actually produced a moral argument against it, saying that masturbation amounts to muddying up your imagination, using your mind as a means to an end. Suffice to say we don't buy that argument, for good reason. In this case, the natural impulses far outweigh any moral arguments you can come up with, and the moral arguments are pretty weak. Leave it to the monks I say.

Sex. It's perfectly natural for human beings to have sex with many people, and even for partners to be unfaithful. It's so common that a zoologist, for example, would have to conclude that we are not in face a monogamous species after all but somewhere in the middle (explains our divorce rate). Yet, morally speaking, we do not condone sleeping around or cheating; not even close. Why? I think it's because sex also happens to be a moral issue, not just a biological impulse. Both are real. In fact, the moral argument is strong, and the natural inclination is not so strong that we cannot defeat it. In other words, it's in the moral sweet spot, in between natural inclination and moral inclination. Personally, this is how I harmonize my moral and biological natures: Sex is a special thing to be done with people you care about, and you should never cheat on your partner, ever. Just my opinion.

the Varieties of Racism

I've been reading a fantastic book (Dog Whistle Politics) on the coded racial language that politicians use to scare people and get votes (specifically, how Republicans are able to get poor white people so scared that they will vote against their own interests).

Hate
Actual hatred or animosity. The Klu Klux Klan, for example, when they were hanging black people from trees. Simple, obvious, crazy, gets all the attention; yet it's the least common nowadays. Do you know many people that actually hate black people? Didn't think so (or at least they won't admit it).

The sad thing about this form of racism - actual hatred - is that our Supreme Court has adopted it as the only kind of racism...good luck proving that your employer actually hates you because you're black. According to Michelle Alexander (The New Jim Crow), this has made the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964 impotent and meaningless.

Institutional
The American prison system is the best example (read The New Jim Crow if you want your mind blown). If you look at the shocking statistics of African American men in our prison system, you can only come to one reasonable conclusion: the entire criminal justice system is, so to speak, racist. Or, another way to put it, African American men are disproportionately represented in the prison system (and that's a huge understatement). But it's a tricky thing. One person is not behind this kind of racism, it happens slowly, and it's hard to track down. But it's effects are quite obvious; a racist tree will produce racist fruits; whether it's housing, jobs, or government programs.

Unconscious
If a white person walks by a black person on the street, typically something will happen in their brain that resembles fear. This is sad be true (I have read that several experiments were done on this). In America, we have been taught to fear black men; and so we do. It's nothing that we did, it's simply the air we breath, the culture we live in, what we learned from media, and the long history of oppression that we inherited. As Carl Young might say, racism is part of our Collective Unconscious. And that is a scary thing.

Nixon used race as a political tool, called the Southern Strategy

Strategic/Political
Perhaps the most insidious of all is when politicians use racism for political gain (again, utilitarian thinking rears its ugly head). According to the book I'm reading, both parties are to blame but especially the modern Republican Party, which was essentially built on a racial platform (called the "Southern Strategy"). Have you ever wondered why poor white people vote for a Party that gives tax cuts to the rich and slashes social spending? Whether it's the coded racial language of politicians, the race-baiting of right wing media, or the non-stop fear mongering about Muslims and terrorists - white people are scared shitless.

Natural?
Some people make the argument that we evolved to naturally discriminate against human beings that look different than our tribe. I'm skeptical, and I'm not sure if this is widely accepted, and I don't know how much science this is based on, but I do know it's out there. Some people explain the happiness of Norway and Sweden, for example, by pointing out the fact that they all look similar. People obviously point to their progressive tax code and liberal laws as well. Interestingly, racism seems to be infecting these countries as outsiders trickle in.

I suppose I can see an evolutionary advantage to being skeptical of "outsiders"--that is, people that clearly are not part of your own cooperative survival group--but race is a different concept all together.

Why theories about other people are wrong

Person: "People are stupid."
Wise Person: "I'm so sorry you feel that way about yourself."

We do this all the time. We have a theory about "how people are," a handful of negative, blanket statements like "people are irrational" or "people are selfish" or whatever, that we like to sarcastically talk about with friends to pass the time or lament how we cannot save the world because, you know, people are like this or that. These conclusions about human nature start out perhaps by random experiences with people, watching people on TV, a book we read, an ideology we consumed. These things end up ingrained, a part of our worldview - the way we view and treat other people.

Other people. Except ourselves.

That's my point. The fatal flaw with all these half-baked theories is that they never include the person behind the curtain, the theorist himself. You call people stupid and, for some odd reason, never include yourself in that statement? You are not stupid. It's just those other people who are the stupid ones. What kind of arrogance is that? What kind of blindness?

When we make blanket statements about vast groups of people, we should realize that we are actually subscribing to a particular theory of human nature. We are saying: this is what human beings are like. Therefore, shouldn't we apply it to ourselves first? Is it true about you? No. Okay, then perhaps it's wrong (on many levels).

One way to trick ourselves, of course, is to put people into neat little buckets like "republican" or "liberal" or "black people." Luckily, we never put ourselves in any of the buckets we make fun of. Nice try. People are people. If Republicans are stupid, and republicans are people, and you are a person, then you are stupid.

My blindness, perhaps, might be the opposite. I am categorically opposed to negative theories of human nature, ask you can probably tell, for several reasons (one is purely pragmatic...what good will that do?). I positively assert that human nature is basically good, that we can do anything, that our potential is unlimited. However, at least I apply it to myself. I believe that I am basically good, that I can do anything, that I am unlimited. I believe this about other people too. That's the difference. If you have a poor view of human nature, that's fine, and you might be correct; but please apply to yourself.

"rights" talk is a fancy way of expressing feelings...right?

I recently finished a fascinating book, Moral Tribes, that argued, believe it or not, against rights. Specifically, he argued that "rights" are really words that we hide behind. I think there is some truth to that.

Abortion is wrong because all humans have a right to life. Abortion is okay because all women have a right to choose. Gay people have a right to marry. The government has a right to define marriage. We cannot kill one person to save five because people have a right to life. Whether it's carrying a gun into the library, burning a flag, or not vaccinating your children, we love to use "rights" and "duties" when talking about moral issues, when making moral judgments, or justifications, or rationalizations. Rights do all the heavy lifting, they are the argument; we hide behind them, they sound objective, smart, impartial, universal.

But what if the word "right" is nothing more than a fancy way of saying "I don't like it." In other words, "I don't like abortion, it feels wrong." A feeling, a gut reaction, an emotion, subjective. Everything else - all the arguments, justification, rationalization - is extra, meaningless, scaffolding. "I like when mothers can choose." Same thing. First comes the feeling, then comes the argument to justify the feeling. If you keep asking why, you eventually get to feelings, intuitions, and gut instincts.

It reminds me of working in the Law Library. Patrons many times come in asking about "their rights" on any number of subjects. But sometimes what they really mean is this: I want x. Does a "right" exist to allow me to get x. In other words, please give me a fancy legal term that will magically get what I want.

Well, overall I think this is a negative, simplistic, reductionist view of human beings, similar to the "boo-hiss" theory that reduces all moral reasoning into simple emotions, so I don't buy it for those reasons. I apply it to myself (which everyone should do), and I do find some truth in it.

Here's the point. The argument tends to stop when you throw the R-bomb, and that's really the worst thing. I believe in a right to life, you believe in a right to choose. Let's go our separate ways, right?  Wrong. It's not that simple. Public policy needs to be written, and these issues bear directly on laws that influence our lives. So politically at least we cannot ignore each other. Also, we might kill each other (people have killed for much less). Therefore, we need another solution.

Joshua Greene's solution is to reduce rights talk into Utilitarian calculations. How much suffering does abortion cost overall? How much happiness does gay marriage promote? And let's go from there.

Sounds promising. Does it work? Well, sadly, according to what I read in his book, it doesn't. His utilitarian solution to abortion, for example, the only problem he tackled, was horribly complex, speculative, long-winded, not mathematical, and ultimately not convincing...it ends up being pro-choice, which is fine, but it leaves the reader scratching his head as to how the argument got there and how smart you have to be to engage in moral debate for God's sake--do we all have to go to Harvard to think correctly about these issues? Greene takes nuanced thinking to a whole new level here, to the point of meaninglessness. Maybe I will stick to my "rights talk" - much simpler and people get my meaning. In fact, the same old arguments against Utilitarianism rears its' ugly head - it's very very hard to actually calculate suffering and happiness.

Top 5 Kalamazoo Foods (co-authored with Katherine Platte)

1. Bangkok Flavor!

Not just because it's Thai food - I'm not cosmopolitan - but because it's awesome food. Pad Prik is my favorite: chicken, red & green pepper, spanish onion, green onion, & mushroom in a garlic brown sauce. That's really the main question: what sauce?: brown (garlic) sauce, or red/yellow/green curry sauce with coconut milk. They are all delicious. Spicy as you want. Tastes nothing like Chinese food by the way, no MSG. Lunch prices are around 6 dollars, which seems ridiculously low to me considering the flavor explosion.

Katie: What?  We have the same favorite restaurants? At least we have something in common! I like all the curries with coconut milk, especially with eggplant and mushrooms to soak up the flavor. The fried tofu is amazing. The only downside is that everything I love the most has fish sauce in it, so isn't really vegetarian. You can get food cooked in mushroom soy sauce so that it is vegan/vegetarian, but it isn't the same. I like the food "hot" which is warm enough that your nose runs, but you can still taste all the flavors. It is still really good "medium" which is what I got while I was pregnant.

2. Saffron

Fine Indian food, buffet style. I must admit the first time I had it, I didn't like it that much. I wasn't used to the weird flavors. Also all the food looks really similar, like mush. But after that, I loved it. The rice pudding especially blew me away. I have like five servings of that shit. For reasonable prices, you have to go during lunch on weekdays or Saturdays. We rarely go.

Katie: Best food ever! I know the vegetarian stuff is vegetarian. The reason it is #2 is that if you go to the buffet you never know what dishes you are going to get, obviously. If they always had the spinach and paneer and the Korma and if the buffet was spicier it would be #1.  At dinner you have to buy the dishes, rice and naan separately so it adds up fast.

3. Shawarma King

Lebanese food. Again, I'm not picking foreign foods just to be cool....I really do like these the best. It's a meat sandwich wrapped in pita bread with a pickle. I get Chicken Shawarma with Feta. But it's really the white garlic sauce (=God sauce) that completes everything and makes it....a little bit REAL nice. The meat is slow cooked on a vertical pole. Picture a hug wasp nest except tender and delicious.

Katie: God Sauce!!! I could eat here every day and not get bored. Lots of great sandwiches, but hard not to get the falafel with god sauce every time it is so good. and the hummus is amazing, sometimes it comes with a monkey face made of olives and onions.

4. El Gallo Blanco

Best Mexican food in Kalamazoo. The best way to explain the food is like this: picture a huge pot of flavor. Now picture your food being placed into that pot of flavor, and marinated in flavor for 24 hours. I've never had chicken so flavorful in my life. I go really simple: get the grande chicken burrito, which is around 6 dollars for two meals.

Katie: I thought the tamales were great the first time I went here, but they keep on getting better. What I order is a lot different then what Matt gets, no slow cooked pot of flavor exactly, but really good. My favorite mexican restaurant in Kalamazoo and they don't even have my favorite mexican food, chili rellanos.

5. Qdoba

Self-explanatory and self-evident.

Katie: I differ here. I think I would have put Bell's at #4 and El Gallo Blanco at #5. I don't want to like Bell's food since it was horrible for so many years ("well there is one veggie burger at the bottom of the freezer, or you can have a peanut butter and pickle sandwich") but they really picked up their game with the competition from other breweries in town. Now they have awesome tempeh burgers.

Honorable mentions: Shakespeare's nachos, Beer Exchange onion rings, Erbellis calzones, Bells Jumbalaya.

So, I do realize that we give special treatment to foreign food. It must have something to do with the fact that it's special, we didn't grow up with it, etc etc.

Book Review: Moral Tribes: Emotion, Reason, and the Gap between Us and Them

Different people. Different values. Can't we all just get along?

Pro-lifers yell “Right to life!” Pro-choicers yell “women’s right to choose!” End of discussion, right? This book is an attempt to solve that problem. From conservatives to communists, from Jews to Jehovah Witnesses, we need a way to make decisions together — especially about public policy — if we are to get along. We need a “metamorality,” a universal language, a “common currency,” says the philosopher/neuroscientist Joshua Greene. We need an ethical code that transcends each particular ethical code.

And his answer is…drumroll please….utilitarianism! (I can feel your excitement). A moral philosophy invented by Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill in the 1700’s, utilitarianism is amazingly simple: maximize happiness and reduce suffering, as much as possible. That's it. Instead of talking about rights, principles, commands or duties, perhaps we can all agree on this one thing: happiness is good; suffering is bad. Act accordingly.

Can we agree on that?

Probably not. That’s why the book is 300+ pages. And still, probably not. Nice try though., right?



As for me, I must say, I am convinced...in theory at least. This book has fundamentally changed some of my opinions. This is one of the most important books I have read this year, perhaps in my entire life. It has certainly brought together several intellectual strains that have been floating around in my head for decades now; specifically, Kant and John Stuart Mill. Kant I named my son after. Kant's morality is a strict, rule based, "no exceptions" kind of system (never lie, never kill, never cheat, never steal). You can think of it as a religious ethics with a rational foundation. Kant also didn't think that happiness was the most important thing (Mill did). John Stuart Mill, on the other hand, founder of Utilitarianism, I have admired from a distance. His system, as I mentioned, is very simple: morality has one rule: in all your actions, reduce suffering the most and maximize happiness the most impartially (counting yourself as only one person). It's hard to disagree with that. Finally they come together in a harmonious embrace. This book says that Kant is right and Mill is right, depending on which context you find yourself in. Within groups, Kantian morally works the best. Which means that when dealing with your family, friends, and church, you should be a strict Kantian. Never cheat on your wife. But when it comes to dealing with "others," with global issues, public policy -- then you should put on your utilitarian hat and start calculating, weighting, crunching the numbers. Sometimes you have to break an egg for the greater good.

I was so blown away by this conclusion, I emailed the author and told him so. He emailed back right away said “that makes it all worthwhile.” Whether you hate utilitarian thinking or not, this book is amazing on many different levels: brain science, psychology, philosophy, politics, and religion. A bright, interdisciplinary guy and a good writer.

But...

The end of the book, which is supposed to apply the theory to actual cases (conflicts between groups), is very deflating and depressing. He only talks about abortion in detail, and that discussion was painfully abstract and intellectual (after making a strong case for pro-life and pro-choice, he falls on pro-choice). You can tell he is trying to make everyone happy. Does he really expect normal people to be able to philosophize in this way? The tree is good, but not its fruit. It almost feels like he built up all my expectations, and then, at the end when it really counts, he quits. Utilitarianism, which on the face is very simple and powerful,  ends up being very complex, abstract, and subtle - a puff of smoke. Worse, his version of utilitarianism ends up being very close to what everyone already believes: punishment is good, inequality is okay (some), buying presents for your kid is good, capitalism is just fine. All things that, on the face of it, are not utilitarian. The message, at the end of the day: just be a little less selfish, a little more altruistic, okay? He even calls himself a hypocrite at one point for not being a “true” utilitarian. C'mon Greene, where's your balls? That's why I have such respect for guys like Jesus or Gandhi. They set the bar extremely high and put their life into it, they make no excuses and make no accommodations for the morally weak. They say: love your enemies. Yes, it's hard. Yes, it goes against human nature and how our brains are wired. Do it anyway. And they did. And you can too.

Women are more religious than men. Why?

According to Pew, "Atheists and agnostics are much more likely to be male (64%) than female (36%)." Not only that, women are more religious when it comes to a variety of measures:

http://www.pewforum.org/2009/02/26/the-stronger-sex-spiritually-speaking/

But why? Well, I'll take my best shot at it. First, my short answer:
Women are more empathetic then men. Religion is tied to empathy. Therefore, women are more religious.

Not convinced? Let me explain. I admit this is a bit of a stretch, and I hate to shit on my own gender; but here's my long answer:

Let's start by asking: Are men different from women at all? Yes, I think we all agree. In what ways? Well, size and musculature, but that doesn't seem to be relevant, does it? What else... We know men have more testosterone which is linked to aggression. We also know that women have more oxytocin which is linked to cooperation and empathy (the so called "love" hormone, which now conveniently comes in nasal spray form!). Okay... How does this link to religion? Hmm. Broadly speaking, if you look at religion without prejudice, I think it doesn't take a rocket scientist to say that religion generally promotes cooperation (especially within-group), good will towards others, empathy, and love. For example, the entire core of Jesus teachings is two-fold: love God, and treat others as you would like to be treated. Indeed, the golden rule is at the core of all major religions. Therefore, if women tend to be more empathetic then men, then they will be more religious than men. And they are. Oh crap. Am I making a link between morality (empathy) and religion? Yes, I am. Again, this is just my best guess really, I'm not claiming these links are rock solid. Perhaps the different between men and women is not big enough to even require an explanation.

atheism and intelligence: is there a link?

No. Judging by the latest statistics by Pew (a reputable, unbiased source for this kind of information), there is no link, not in America at least (I didn't look into other countries yet). I'm not saying atheists are dumb by any means, far from it (I would guess that minorities who have to defend intellectual positions tend to be smarter than normal actually). But, let's be clear here: it would be flat out incorrect to say that smart people tend to be atheists. Not even close.

The Numbers

What if we filled an auditorium will all the very smart people who have attained post-graduate degrees? What percentage of those people, do you think, would be atheists? The answer is 3%. Of all the really smart people, only 3% are atheists. 68% would be Christian, 6% Jewish, 2% Buddhist, 2% Hindu, 1% Muslim. 5% are agnostic and 8% are "secular unaffiliated". So a fairly religious bunch of people (over 80%). Now, let's imagine a room of people who are smart but slightly less smart. What if we filled an auditorium will all the smart people who have graduated college? What percentage of those people, do you think, would be atheists? The answer is only 2%; even less atheistic, a little more Christian but less Jewish. Again, a fairly religious bunch of people (over 80%).

source: http://religions.pewforum.org/pdf/report-religious-landscape-study-chapter-3.pdf

So the point is fairly clear: the link between intelligence and atheism, although talked about by some people, is really not there. In getting smarter, we do not lose God. To make a connection, to even start the conversation you simply need more atheists to begin with. Out of all the people in America, only 2% are atheist. That's such a small number, it's hard to really say anything about it. However, you could say, perhaps, that people who happen to be atheists also happen to be smart. In other words, you could analyze the small group internally to find out more about it. So you could say "atheist people tend to be smart," but you cannot flip that around: "smart people tend to be atheist"--that's clearly not true. We are talking about 2% of the population here! Obviously there are tons more smart people who are religious (shown above), so that's really not an argument that atheism wants to make (unless they want to be very elitist and arrogant and claim that 98% of Americans are really dumb, even all the ones with degrees). 

What about You?

Do you fall in line with these statistics? Or do they not match for you? As for me, they do match. I have a Master's degree and consider myself a Christian. So I'm part of the 68%. If you do not match, either you are weird or not a real American. Just kidding. ha. 

Of course, all these statistics do not speak to the deeper truth that "religion," "Christianity," and "atheism" are all very complex things, complex ideas. Like people, they really cannot be pinned down without the category bursting at some point. What's in a label? Sure, I'm "religious" I suppose (in my heart, attitude, mindset); but I don't go to church. Sure, I'm "Christian," but I don't believe in the Trinity doctrine. You get the point.

There are so many other fascinating statistics and trends when it comes to religion. Another time.

in praise of the moderate person (Churchill, not you buddy)

We pay attention to the loud people, the extreme, the newsworthy. Instead of the person who silently pays his taxes and goes to work, we lend our ears to the idiot Texas rancher, grazing cattle on federal land, who doesn't believe in the federal government, is racist, and is part of a militia that apparently would use their wives as shields. Why are we listening to this guy? Who gets a voice? Or how about Mike Tyson, who is now the darling of the UFC, a guy who probably raped several women. Instead of listening to public debates with big ideas, we consume pointless details of the lives of the rich and famous: brainless, materialistic, drug addicted nobodies that history will not remember. We praise the guy who runs around telling people: "I've been sober for a year now!" Congratulations! What about the guy who never had a problem to begin with? Is there a way to praise him? We love the person who lost 300 pounds, but what about the person who was never obese to begin with? It's fascinating how much we cling to underdogs, to people who did something horrible and then turned their life around (like the apostle Paul, who we all love of course but certainly wasn't the best apostle by a long shot...wink wink).What about the person who drinks in moderation, eats in moderation, and (most importantly) thinks in moderation? What about the person who lives a quiet, moderate, good and simple life? The people who never do anything horrible to anyone? Forget about giving to charity, just stop the nonsense, right?

Aristotle thought that virtue was essentially being a moderate person - or, as he put it, aiming at the "mean" between two "extremes." So, for example, never steal but also never give all your stuff away; instead, aim for the middle path, between those two extremes. Was Aristotle right? Is moderation the king of all virtues?

Luckily, on the whole, the typical person actually is moderate. Americans, for example, contrary to what we hear in the news, are moderate people with moderate views, even politically. That's just how it is. So cheers to that.

I must admit, I do love reading biographies about the heroes of history. And I do think history if largely the biography of great and horrible men. But even our most cherished heroes, real heroes like Gandhi, led such extreme lives that they sacrificed certain virtues for others. At one point Gandhi disowned his son. MLK cheated on his wife, Einstein was a bad husband, Saint Francis of Assisi despised his body. And, even worse, why do we make up heroes? Why, for example, do we pay lip service to the war mongering, manly man Winston Churchill? With all the actual heroes to choose from, we choose him? really? (I really shouldn't pick on Churchill, I've only watched a couple TV programs on his life and was totally disgusted by it...history buffs feel free to correct my view on this amazing man who pulled a country through a horrible war...(as if history buffs read my blog).

So raise up a beer and drink to the moderate. Don't drink to much!

to my fellow Believers: evolution is true. Move on.

If you believe in God, you do not need to worry about evolution. I've spent most of my life thinking about religion and science, so trust me. It's all good. Or, don't take my word for it. Here is Charles Darwin himself on evolution: "I see no good reason why the views given in this volume [Origin of Species] should shock the religious feelings of any one." In fact, here's my best advice to any religious person who worries about evolution: go read Origin of Species by Charles Darwin. You might be surprised. I read it. I loved it. As a religious person myself, it made a ton of sense to me, it gave me another way to think about God. Just please read it - or stop having an opinion about it.

I would like to stop here. It's really not worth the effort. The overwhelming consensus of the scientific community is that evolution by natural selection is true (they disagree on the details). Scientists are real people like you and me. There is no conspiracy here. Can we please just accept it, be humble, and move on? That should be enough. Why waste our breath.

Okay, fine. Let's play on.

I suppose it's a little more complicated than this. In all honesty science does make us change our religious beliefs sometimes. And that can be hard for some people. Smart theologians, like Augustine, were well aware of this. They said you should never read the Bible as a scientific text. That solves the problem before it starts. So if the Bible implies that the sun moves around the sun, then stop reading it as a book about astronomy; treat it as a metaphor (or myth, or just disregard it...they obviously didn't know that back then, c'mon give them a break!). With evolution this is no exception. If you believe that God created human beings in one instant - as if we just popped into existence like some ghost or something - if you believe that, then you probably have to reconsider. Human beings were created very slowly on this earth, over millions of years. We adapted, mutated, procreated, changed, and fit into our habitat the best we could. We all have common ancestors, we all share roots, we are all connected to animals, to life, to everything. That's how God chose to do it, and it's amazing if you think about it. Like the heliocentric theory, it's humbling.

Consider this: Evolution is a beautiful system that you could thank God for (I do)

We wouldn't be here if not for evolution! Evolution is a system whereby the species that are best fit for a particular environment survive. If you believe in God, then you believe that God "thought up" the system, engineered it, guided it, made its' laws. If you don't believe in God, then evolution stands on its own. No harm in that, right? But let's be clear: evolution allows species to adapt and thrive. I don't know about you, but that sounds pretty smart to me, pretty wise from a survival standpoint. Let's just say that if it wasn't this way, if survival depended on blue eyes or short legs instead, the endangered species list would be much, much longer. We would't be around to enjoy our huge brains.

Evolution says we came from monkeys!
Well, apes actually. Chimps and Bonobos are our cousins. The point is that we all come from common ancestors, a tree of life with probably one trunk - which means we all probably came from a single-celled organism. God made us from dust, and to dust we go, right? I find it humbling that we came from animals. The moral message is clear: respect animals, respect life, respect the earth. Again, when moral principles are practically written into nature, as discovered by science, we should probably be thanking God.

But Richard Dawkins says...
Don't listen to him. He's dumb (as a philosopher, not as a scientist).

Doesn't evolution paint a bloody picture of nature?
Animals that are not fit to survive tend to die out, yes. And animals fight over resources. I suppose you could call that harsh. But how could it be any other way? The earth is finite, resources are finite. Luckily human beings have the ability to transcend this. "Blessed are the meek, the downtrodden," says Jesus. We don't need to kill our weak, or let them die. Because we have morality. However, we are not off the hook just yet. There is something to this. God is all powerful. Could He have made a better system? Perhaps. Something to think about at least.

Why I still love my ex girlfriends and always will

I am not ashamed to admit that I still love my ex girlfriends. Rather than suppressing, I celebrate. Our love passed the test: it was real. It's a beautiful thing and the greatest gift from God. I admit, nothing compares to my marriage, and my past relationships were not perfect by any means - nothing close to the near-perfection I actually have with my wife - but when I think of Elyse, or Tracy, as I do occasionally, I feel nothing but love, fondness, and well wishes. There is really no other emotion to explain it. It's pure, and I'm grateful.

Of course the lust is gone; but lust, as we know, is only a small part of the picture. I feel privileged to have had such an intimate connection with other human beings. To have learned, laughed, and cried with them. In a world of isolation and sadness, true love is the greatest privilege of all. Does wealth compare? fame? power? No. Love cares not for time, or distance. It simply is. We know that. Love has a way of sticking, even haunting. Elyse and Tracy invade my dreams, my unconscious, my thoughts. My wife and I both talk about our past relationships on occasion, which is productive. It helps to remember what you learned. I thank her for open-mindedness. Elyse and Tracy represent my evolution as a person, my education of how to love (and how not to love - just as important) - a better education than all the books at the library.

Love has a way of erasing bad memories. That's called forgiveness. Without it, all you have are bitter memories. Given the circumstances, I could be bitter. But I'm not. Thank God. Thank my psychology. Even if I remember Elyse at her worst, I am glad we both learned lessons. I know that, whoever Elyse is with now, she is better. I'm glad to be part of that. I remember breaking up with Tracy Waitz because, embarrassingly, I hadn't reached puberty yet. We couldn't take "the next step" because I wasn't ready yet (biologically speaking). In hindsight, it makes our relationship precious, innocent, and interesting.

The fact that we can love many women at the same time is not more surprising than the fact that we can love many men at the same time. It's a very odd thing that I have an extra special place in my heart for all my high school friends: DJ, Dylan, Jared. There is something really special, I think, about first relationships. Even though we rarely speak, I love Jared Hoffman as much now as any time.

We need to stop worrying about sex so much, it's an extension of love we give to one person. I believe we put too much pressure on romantic relationships, as if they are the most special thing in the world. Really? What about your mother? daughter? humanity? Keep it simple. Don't get me wrong, sex is an amazing thing. But when we consider the depth and breadth of love proper, sex is an add-on, a decoration. Well, I take that back. It's rather the capstone to a perfect union, it's symbolic of the most intimacy you can have physically with another person. And by God it produces a baby! But the foundation - agape love, compassion - is the same exact thing you share with your mother, your friend, your son, even God.

And when I am old, and the end is near, love will be my only solace: perhaps I will still think of Elyse and Tracy with a smile. Perhaps they will fade. What matters, I think, is that we all took part in something greater than ourselves.

How I payed off my Student Loans

I'm so happy to say that as of today, May 1st 2014 - over a decade after college began - my student loans are no more. That includes undergraduate and graduate loans, about 25k each (at least..I'm afraid to look). So long! The horrible weight has been lifted.

Here's how I did it.

1. I lived in Poverty

When you are $50,000+ in debt, you are poor. Simple as that. You might not think you're poor, but you are. Therefore, you should live that way. Don't live like other people. Bad news: the chance you will get job in your field is about 50%. Good news: your education will probably pay off financially in the long run. But for now, you still need to aggressively pay off those loans. With 7% interest rate, time is not on your side. Interest will sap your soul.

As for me, I'm naturally a simple man for the most part. That helped. I don't buy much crap. Stoicism: "knowing that you have enough is abiding contentment indeed." As Jesus said, don't be worldly. I remember living in a really shitty, cold, small studio apartment one year, sleeping on an air mattress, working well over 40 hours in food service jobs. The floor was so cold that I would wake up because the air mattress was completely deflated. Yet I loved living there. A guitar and a laptop were my biggest expenses (the laptop I needed for an online degree). And a fridge full of Natty Light. I never had cable, just Internet. No smart phone. I didn't buy a TV until recently (it was for hulu, not cable). We walk to work. I rarely buy clothes, we eat out once a week, never go to the movies, rarely buy gifts for other people (my wife and I rarely buy gifts for each other). We use freecycle, garage sales, and hand-me-downs. I cut my own hair, brew my own beer, and roast my own coffee. As for hobbies and entertainment, a library card works 90% of the time.

The point of living in poverty, of course, is to free up all extra income, pumping a large percentage into your debt. But - this is really important - you still have to invest some of that money into your retirement (401k, IRA). If you can. That's also a numbers game. I once read a Dummies book on investing, which opened my eyes. Time is not on your side if you wait to invest.

2. I got a decent job

It's hard to pump all your money into student loans when you are working well over 40 hours in food service jobs. You get by. Then something amazing happened. Liberals like me call it a "living wage." Luckily, I was able to get a one at the library, getting my Master's Degree in Library Science at the same time (another huge debt). I was able to pay off some of my undergraduate student loans while I was getting the degree.

Every month counts, every payment counts. A few promotions later, I was making extremely aggressive payments: $1,000 dollar payments every other month, sometimes even more. When you are 50 grand in debt, that's a drop in the bucket. Importantly, I was still putting money into my 403(b) for retirement.

Unbelievably, I was able to actually start a family and have a kid. It's sad to say that many people my age are not able to do this because of their massive student loan debt. This is a political issue, but blaming it on politics will not make your loans go away. I'll save that for another post.

3. Help from my wife

Perhaps most importantly - and you probably think this is cheating, that's okay - my wife agreed to help me out by giving me a 0% interest loan, which took care of some of my student debt (about 1/3 or so). I had already payed several thousand dollars in interest alone at this point. I'm extremely lucky, but this saves our family thousands of dollars in future interest that I would be paying to Citibank, or SallieMay, or Educationloans.org, or the various other banks that have "serviced" my loan (yeah, it's fucking ridiculous that private companies make huge profits off so called "federal" student loans, but I won't go there). Anyway, without her help, I would be paying for years to come (maybe 2 years). Now, I can pay her off much faster.

Not only that, but my wife must have lived during the Great Depression. She is the epitome of frugality, an amazing saver, and a great example to me. She was raised that way. She could save money on minimum wage - she's that good.

4. Pay aggressively

There is only one smart way to pay off your loans--aggressive, often, and as much as possible. To make the "minimal" payment is absurd. And forget about stupid payment plans - that will make them rich and you poor; you will never be able to start a life that way; the debt will hover over your entire life like a black cloud. Live poorly, get a living wage, and pay aggressively - and some day, just some day, you might be able to buy a house, have a kid, or do other things you want to do. Good luck!

Book Review: Would You Kill the Fat Man?

http://www.kpl.gov/blog/?id=15032395264

You automatically believe whatever you think...therefore you believe what I just wrote

You probably think that thinking and believing are two separate things. First, we consider a thought. Then, we deliberate on it. Finally, we either believe it as true, reject it as false, or abstain from judgement. Then we file it away for safe keeping.

Not even close! says Harvard professor Eric Mandelbaum. I just read an eye opening article from an interdisciplinary philosophy journal. The article, "Thinking is Believing," by Eric Mandelbaum, argues that whenever you think, hear, consider, or read something (e.g. "unicorns are pink"), your brain has the default setting of automatically believing it (so I guess now you believe unicorns are pink, sorry about that). In other words, everything is true unless you consciously reject it, override it--which takes extra effort so rarely happens. What makes all this worse, he says, is that we are not even aware we are doing this--it all happens unconsciously, in the background processing of the brain (mostly perception and memory). In other words, this is an extreme thesis: we are not rational creatures--not by a long shot. Although he is arguing for a particular philosophy of mind, he is not just doing armchair philosophy here; he is drawing from a body of scientific studies (which all philosophers ought to do).

This big idea explains a number of things:

1. evolutionary speaking, it makes sense. A tiger is coming! You will be much safer if your brain simply believes that statement without having to think it over. But does the same principle apply when someone tells you the universe is composed of invisible harmonic strings? He thinks so.
2. this explains why we have so many conflicting, contradictory beliefs. As Whitman said, "Do I contradict myself? Very well, I contradict myself. I am large; I contain multitudes." Well, it's really because we believe every damn thing we hear! And we just file it away, unaware of how many other beliefs it conflicts with (until we consciously pull out all the files, sort them, deliberate, reject some, strengthen others...something that is incredible hard to do because memory has it's own problems...sometimes we can't even remember what we believe! Hard to believe, huh.)
3. several psychological experiments seems to confirm this. I don't remember them exactly, but here's the gist: you can have test subjects memorize a bunch of random statements like "Jim likes ice cream" "the car is purple" "the equator is 57,000 miles long". Later, even if you tell them those statements were all false, they will remember them as being true.
4. confirmation bias: this refers to the fact that we seek out things that support what we already believe. It goes deeper. Not only do we seek positive truth rather than debunking negative truth, but we have trouble processing negative information to begin with. For example, "Jill is not male" is very hard for us to process. "Jill is female" is extremely easy. Studies show that when we hear "Jill is not male," we unconsciously switch is to "Jill is female"...and file it away. Or we could fuck it up entirely and believe that Jill is male. This is why it's always a good idea to communicate in positive terms, so people will understand you better.
5. everyone who watches Fox news believes it, even when it's not "news" or "factual." I added this one. Not to pick on conservatives, this really goes for all news. Why do most people think we live in a violent world, even though we don't? Because the news only reports violent news. And what about those nasty political attack ads? We all know these ads are probably not true, but heck do they work! It's like once an idea gets "mainstream," it becomes true by virtue of existing.
6. This explains why parents are so important in the development of childrens' beliefs, and why kids are pretty much set on a particular path by the time they become adults. We are sponges, a blank slate as Locke said. This also makes you really think hard about what ideas you want to even expose your children too. Shit, forget children: yourself! If you flood the mind with tons of ideas, is that the best thing to do? Or does that make you the biggest hypocrite ever (according to this theory).

But is this idea true? Do we believe everything we think?

Well, what a question! Notice that by posing that question--is this article true?--I have, in a way, debunked the very conclusion of the article. I do not have to accept the conclusion, even if I don't find evidence to the contrary. I read his ideas. I consider them. I accept, deny, or forget them. I was exposed to them but don't believe them. I do find them very interesting and somewhat convincing. Later, perhaps in a year, I will mention this article to someone at a party: "I read this article once that argues we believe everything we read. I'm not so sure about it." An agnostic approach, something he predicts can never happen.

Either way, I just don't see how this could be correct for the more intellectual beliefs that matter in our lives, the ones we actually think about and care about. For all those other beliefs, however, which the mind passively accepts for survival/evolutionary reasons--sure I think he's probably right. Psychology is good at telling us trivial truths about how our minds act when we are not looking. Perhaps this is another example. Perhaps the author is a victim of his own belief--perhaps his underlying belief in the irrationality of human nature is being fueled and puffed up by a couple of psychology experiments he read about. Which made him write this article.

My Religion

God exists. That is my religion.
Jesus preached the truth about God. That is my Christianity. That is all for me, thank you.

Oh, and in case you forgot what Jesus preached: Love your enemies. That is enough.

I have read so much about religion and theology that, instead of expanding my religion into a full blown systematic theology, I go back to the basics. Simplicity! says Thoreau. The simple religion of God and love is all I need for my life. I prefer it. My mind is full yet empty. Everything else, all the doctrine and creeds; that's all extra. Sure, I believe the soul lives on. Sure, I believe reincarnation is better than hell. I am not against beliefs or people having them. But these are all fancy additions to a firm foundation. God exists. God is good. God is love. Act accordingly. This alone lights up my world, always has. When you focus on what really matters, you begin to take it more seriously. For example, I believe in loving my enemies. Really? Really. And when Jesus teaches to turn the other cheek and not to resist evil, I believe it. Literally, he really meant that? Yes, of course he did! Having enough love and understanding to actually love your enemies--that's the pinnacle of religion, the mountaintop, the goal.

Modern Western people tend to think of religion as a set of beliefs that you agree to, like filling out an application for church. No. Religion is life. Your religion is your life. As Karen Armstrong says in her books, the point of belief is action. Faith without action is dead. And, God forbid, you find yourself doing something stupid because of a belief, perhaps you should rethink it?

• Other Religions: I left for college a Christian and came back a "religious pluralist," or enlightened Christian (sounding arrogant). Religious pluralism allows space for other religions. It means all religions are valid paths to the same transcendent Reality. If God is beyond our comprehension, it makes sense. We look at the night sky and say "did you see that?"..."See what?" Religion begins. We experience the spiritual world differently. It's okay. Sure, some doctrines differ drastically among and within religions, but at the end of the day all religions share the same basic moral code (love and compassion). See John Hick.
• Prayer: sadly, I don't pray anymore. But I do believe in prayer as meditation on God, on yourself, on other people, and on your life. I believe it can have many psychological benefits, as some studies show. It makes you slow down and think, which is really important. I am against petitionary prayer; that is, asking for stuff. It's not that God doesn't care about you, He just thinks your silly little requests are silly. God works through the beautiful laws of nature that he created--deal with it. The best way to pray for healing is to become healthy. I know this is hard when it comes to accidents, cancer, and when bad things happen to good people. For that, we rely on faith alone, not prayers for God to "fix it." Again, religion is life. Live out your religion instead of relegating it to a sleepy Sunday night prayer session.
• Jesus: he was a mystic, a great man, a true spokesman for God, and my hero. In fact, the greatest hero in my life. He has opened my heart to love enemies more than anyone else, living or dead. That's an incredible thing. I do not think he was God (judging by what he says in the Gospels), but I am open to the fact that his death might mean something greater. If you ask me "did Jesus die for my sins?" I must admit I don't really understand the question. What really matters to me about Jesus is his teachings; diamonds in the ruff, life changing and world healing teachings.
• The Bible: experience is primary (you and God), scripture is secondary. Scripture, however, is special because it describes the original experiences that brought about the religion in the first place: Jesus preaching the gospel, Buddha sitting under the tree. It is crucial. Is the Bible the Word of God? Well, sure, the good parts are. But not the bad parts (and there are many).  Even Jesus criticized or reinterpreted many of the bad parts of the Bible. St. Augustine and many great Christian thinkers have taught us to interpret the Bible through the lens of love. They also taught us not to interpret the Bible against scientific fact. The truth, like God, is much too big for one book. As for reading the Bible, I stick to the Gospels, Proverbs, and Psalms--all beautiful books that have a direct impact on my life.

As I look back on my religious life, I must be honest with myself. My passion has lessened. As a high school kid who would wake up at six in the morning to read the Bible, when Christianity was fresh and new and God was opening my mind, I was much more zealous, excited, passionate. I was much more willing to go out of my way to help a perfect stranger (that's the sad part). I have tempered. In the Case for Faith, I remember reading that this is normal. We all become moderate with age I suppose. But my faith in the God of love has never been more rock solid. And the religious life never ends. I expect to have different views in 20 years.

Did a burglar really sue the owner and win?

A burglar falls through a skylight onto a knife and sues the owner. A woman sues McDonalds for hot coffee. A man has a heart attack starting a lawnmower and sues the lawnmower company. This is supposed to make us feel disgusted with the civil justice system, disgusted with those greedy poor people trying to win huge jackpot lawsuits from corporations. Those poor businesses!

After watching the fascinating documentary Hot Coffee, it seems that corporations themselves might be the reason we hear about these lawsuits to begin with. They are the voice in your head crying "poor businesses!" They are the ones promoting them!

Promoting, embellishing, exagerating, and distorting. Take the burglar case, made famous by a comment Ronald Reagan once made (and distorted). We picture an armed man in a mask trying to rob a lady in the suberbs. It was a young kid, along with some friends, on the roof of his former high school. He was in fact stealing a flood light, fell through a skylight, and became paralyzed for the rest of his life; not being able to care for himself for the rest of his life. The McDonalds "idiot" was an elderly woman who suffered 3rd degree burns all over her lap that required skin graphs. She was parked, in the passenger seat adding cream and sugar, and the coffee was indeed too hot (according to McDonalds standards). Now, don't get me wrong, there is truth to all these stories--they are all slightly ridiculous, even when you hear all the facts.

Corporations, seeing an advantage, are making a big fuss about these extreme cases. That big fuss is called "tort reform" and, at the state level, they have managed to make several strides in limiting the amount of money that people can win over big business. Caps on damages, no matter what the jury or judge says, no matter how negligent, no matter what the damages are. On the other side, of course, are the lawyers and the consumers (us).

But--and here's the point--these cases are exceptions to the rule. The civil justice system is not represented by these cases, they are outliers. In fact, working in a law library, it was almost impossible for me to find these cases (they happen at lower level courts, are unpublished, and are usually settled on). At the end of the day, the legal system is generally solid, generally promotes common sense justice, and compensates people who were wronged by other people.

You see this kind of thing happen all the time: first, something crazy happens; second, people make a big deal of it; third, sweeping solutions are proposes so that this crazy thing never happens again. And in hindsight, the solution is too sweeping and causes too many other problems but, hey, at least that one crazy thing won't happen again.

Let me convince you that a tree doesn't make a sound

If a tree falls and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a sound?  After you're done laughing, let's think about this. This is not a stupid question: it brings up fundamental questions that are still fundamental, even for scientifically minded people.

Before indulging in The Matrix hypothesis and talking about how the external world doesn't exist, I'm going to start with what's not controversial. First, animals perceive the world differently than humans (some drastically different). Second, among humans there is variation (due to various physical and psychological causes). Conclusion: the external world and the world we actually perceive are two different things. It is interpreted, processed, constructed, measured--by our sense organs and brain. In other words, the diagram above is a fiction; we do not see an exact copy of the tree "out there"; our eyes are not giant gaping windows that "let the tree in" so to speak. Naive Realism is false. Again, not controversial so far.

And if you're still not convinced that your eyes are playing tricks on you and that your sense organs are all sacks of shit, consider two more facts: (1) sense organs evolved (like everything) and thus survival are their main concern--truthful representation of the external world is not necessary their concern at all. Whether you see the berry as white or red, all it cares about is what works. As Williams James would say, the truth is what works. For us believing folk, a nice way to put it would be: God made you so that you would survive rather than be an astrophysicist--be happy He did. (2) sense organs detect change more than anything. Vision is not like a video camera that is always recording everything like a faithful steward, not even close.  Not to mention that memory, state of mind, personality, beliefs, language, societal norms--they can all affect the way we perceive things, literally. Let's stop here.

Representational Realism

So what is happening here? Most common sense people will say there is a physical tree "out there", made of physical stuff (atoms) having certain fundamental properties: size, shape, texture, mass. Those properties are "really out there" and our sense organs pick up on them the best we can. Okay, cool. But notice color is not on that list. Green is nothing more than the way light reacts with our retina/brain. Color is not "out there," light is. The tree has the potential to be perceived as green and brown when light bounces off it and hits our eyeballs, that's all. This isn't controversial either. Qualities like color, heat, loud, bitter, the smell of a fart--they are all quasi-real, in limbo, secondary, dependent. I hope you feel the world crumbling. Color seems pretty fucking real to me thank you very much!

Enter the Idealists

Some people just scrap the whole idea of an external world altogether. We don't need it. When I'm dreaming, I see green trees, I move through space, I eat cake, I cry (hell, I even have sex and ejaculate sometimes). All in the mind, mental, not caused by physical objects. There is no external tree causing my perception of a tree in the dream. So why can't reality be the same way? Well, it can. The Matrix, although improbable, is possible. We could all be "plugged in" right now. Descartes imagined a powerful Evil Demon that might be tricking us, pulling this fake reality over our eyes just for the hell of it. George Berkeley simply replaced the external world with God. God doesn't need physical matter, a useless middle man, when He can just implant sense experiences directly to our mind. We are living in God's dream, God's mind; God holds up reality. As a believer, this is a very tempting position to take. There is a simplicity to it, sort of. Kant replaced the external world not with God, but with an unknowable world, a foundation, a world that causes our perceptions but one we can know nothing about--except that it must exist.

So does a tree make a sound if nobody is there to hear it? No. Or, sure, God hears it. Or, the question itself makes no sense. That's really the point here. What do we mean by a tree, after all? Green, brown, particular shape, particular feel, particular smells, etc. A tree is nothing but a group of sense experiences or possible sense experiences, therefore to talk about an unperceived tree makes no sense at all. To be is to be perceived in some way. Yes a tree has size, shape, texture, and mass. All those qualities are real. But notice those qualities, just like color, are qualities we perceive the tree to have. They are real because we perceive them, simple as that. Yes we can say the tree is made of atoms, but that just means if we look in a microscope we see it's made of smaller stuff, and smaller stuff, etc. We can speculate about what's really "out there," but all we really have is our perceptions, all we have access to is the end product (in my diagram above, it's the thought bubble). We can only look at the world through eyes, smell the world through noses, and feel the world through touchers. We cannot float above our body and brain to see what the world really looks like when nobody is looking at it. Human reality is human reality. There is something out there, but who knows what that is? Perhaps it's really a pink, squishy ball that's causing my perception of a green, hard Sugar Maple. As long as we all perceive the tree, nobody cares.

5 Things Wrong with our Legal System

Laws Not Accessible to Citizens
Have you ever tried to actually read a law? Have you ever tried to find one? Even in a digital age, if a citizen is lucky enough to find a law on a given topic (say, illegal evictions), the law is written in such hyper-technical language that is virtually inaccessible to normal people. It might as well be written in Greek. The Michigan law on illegal evictions, for example, is called the "Forcible Entry and Detainer Act" and contains the beautiful words "unlawful interference of possessory interest" and "injunctive relief" and "put out of any lands." What? And that's not even a bad example.

Thus a fundamental parodox: the law is extremely important to our daily lives, yet we are divorced from it. This flies in the face of an informed democratic society. One solution is that lawmakers start writing laws in plain English, simple as that (they cringe at the notion). The ridiculous technical language employed by lawyers and judges, although fun as a game to play, has got to go. This isn't rocket science. Ordinary language would suffice. Don't call it "Summary Proceedings"; call it Eviction, a word we all know. That would be a huge leap closer to a Direct Democracy, where the people directly vote on our laws (as opposed to a Representative Republic where we hire corporate-backed politicians to write and vote on our laws).

Courts Not Accessible to Citizens
This directly follows from 1. and is even more damaging. If you cannot understand the law, and if the Court Rules make no sense either (these are the specific rules you have to follow when filing a case, filing motions, conducting yourself in court, etc)--then it's almost impossible to represent yourself in court. Yet this is a fundamental right we are supposed to have. Court employees hate when people are set on representing themselves because (a) they know how hard it will be for everyone involved and (b) the citizen will (rightly) ask them how to do things (file paperwork), to which they will reply "sorry I cannot give you legal advice" and (c) that's bullshit. That's a problem with the court system, not with the citizen of normal intelligence. What about Small Claims court? Yes, that's nice, Small Claims is accessible to people, but the whole system should be like that. Also, you can only use Small Claims when you want money from someone else, there is a cap on how much you can ask for, and if you sue a business in Small Claims they have a right to "bump it up" to district court and then you are screwed.

Poor People Get Screwed
This follows from 1. and 2. If you cannot use the court system, then you have to hire an attorney. If you cannot hire an attorney, then you are screwed. This happens in both civil court, where poor people could lose all their money, or in criminal court, where poor people could go to prison for having bad representation. Not only are poor people more likely to not understand the law, they are more likely to get screwed when they break it.

Black Men Really Get Screwed
Go read the book The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander. Even if you don't agree with her conclusion--that our criminal justice system is a form of racism comparing to the Jim Crow south--the statistics are shocking. 1 in 6 black men have been incarcerated as of 2001. If this trend continues 1 in 3 black men born today will go to prison in their lifetime. A lot of this has to do with the drug war and how it has been waged for decades. Studies show that white people do drugs just as much as black people. Yet how many police officers have you seen in the suburbs, systematically stopping and frisking soccer moms for pot? Yeah, none.

Judges Shocking Power
When the law is horribly confusing and badly written, this gives judges not only a tough job but the unrestrained power to "interpret" the law pretty much in any way they want (to review, the law comes from two main sources: politicians and judges). This can be good and bad. We have all heard of the burglar who fell on a knife and sued the owner of the house. That shit happens. It's a problem. The law has become a huge monster. Given any particular case, you could find case law to support whatever position you want (in law school I believe this is a typical exercise). It would be funny if it didn't affect real peoples' lives. If the law was in plain English and understandable, it would rarely happen. In a way lawyers and judges are like the Pharasees of Jesus time--they hold the keys to the kingdom at the expense of the poor.Don't you find it completely absurd that we talk about Supreme Court Justices the same way we talk about politicians?

Having said all this, I remain proud our our legal system for the most part. In all it's complexity, checks and balances, and evolution there is a beauty to it. There is no conspiracy here, and many lawyers and judges want to do good for people. But for the reasons above, I have a love-hate relationhship with it and think there are obvious reforms to make.