I had the opportunity to make “just another Friday” a good Friday and an overall great weekend. I attended the American Atheist Conference.
I thought I would throw out my two cents worth, see what others thought and point out some interesting ideas worth looking into. Enjoy!
Ellen Johnson – Made the case that Atheists of all synonymous titles contrive a bulk of the voting block and we should command more political weight.
I say, as it has been said many times before, organizing atheists is like herding cats or nailing Jello to a tree. Everyone categorizes their priorities in a different order and that is what, I think, Atheism has going for it – Freedom of thought.
With that being said, there may be specific short term priorities that take a different priority for the long term and vice versa. A variety of rhetorical points were made throughout the conference in an effort to raise our consciousness and find “ends” or “means” worth rallying around. Or at the vary least, to come up with our own creative approaches to these problems.
Richard Dawkins – Due to the similarities of Dawkins’ prepared speech to Ellen’s, he was forced to do some last minute editing. This led to some duplicated information anyone familiar with Richard’s talks would find old hat. I almost wish we got the original message, however similar to Ellen’s, if only to hear Dawkins take. It did get interesting none the less.
The best part was hearing his account of the Expelled fiasco with PZ Meyers. What a hilarious story, made even better by Edwin Kagin’s addition during the question & answer session.
Dawkins made a new controversial point that basically became the theme of the conference. Dawkins made his new point that we should put on hold more trivial issues such as fighting against the “In God We Trust” on our money, which trivializes our position, and focus on the more detrimental and larger issues. This appears to be a tough point to make and the jury is still out. As one questioner pointed out, seemingly trivial points such as God on our money can be abused by politicians to buttress larger arguments.
Dr. Jack David Eller - “Religion is Not What You Believe: How Religion Works without Belief or Meaning to Colonize Experience”
I was not familiar with Dr. Eller’s ideas and I was pleasantly surprised by this Anthropologist from Denver. I plan to read this book and regret not standing in line to get it signed. He talked about how Religion is so pervasive throughout every aspect of life it permeates us at a level akin to Religion by osmosis. The arguments against religion are everywhere, the facts are in and they have been reinvented many times. The challenge is to identify even the smallest parts and make our stand by raising consciousness to the silliness. There is no need to perpetuate the religious machine.
Don’t name your sons after characters in the bible. Don’t say “God bless you” when someone sneezes; instead say “the Gods bless you” or some other clever remark that causes the sneezer to recognize your acknowledgment of their condition but requires them to think a bit on your styling and lack of inclusiveness. It is the sum of all of these seemingly trivial parts that affects and effects change, in the same way refusing to use derogatory language or standing on a bus has had in the past.
Eddie Tabash - “The Threat of the Religious Right to Our Modern Liberties”
This talk was just the kind of consciousness raising necessary to get some cats to move in the same direction; if not permanently, at least temporarily. If you are unfamiliar with Eddie’s talks I recommend watching them online.
In the final question session Eddie replaced Ellen on the panel and made a great point. He likened fighting for our rights to the invasion of Normandy beach. It may look like a daunting task, but we need to fight tooth & nail for every inch if we are to have progress. He pointed out that he doesn’t expect to see the kind of political change he is looking for in his lifetime, but he can pass on knowing he gave it all he had. I can’t wait for the videos to come out on RD’s website to hear these points in their more eloquent form.
Little known fact, Eddie is apparently a skilled grappler and martial arts practitioner.
Rene Salm - “The Myth of Nazareth: The Invented Town of Jesus.”
Just like the title suggest, Rene collected the evidence from art history, science and archeology and the evidence is overwhelmingly absent in supporting Nazareth. Out of a whole town there are only 2 pots that have the potential to exist in the right time & place and even that would be at the extreme end of the scientific time tables for those items. The interesting point for me was the evidence demonstrating that religious archeologists purposefully mislabeled lamps to suggest they came from the time of Jesus.
I hope more comes of this evidence in the mainstream. Rene would make for a great interview on POI.
Dr. Lawrence Krauss - “Much Ado About Nothing: A Cosmic Mystery Story.”
This talk was the absolute highlight of the whole weekend. My mind is still running off on tangents and I love it. I have struggled to read wikipedia articles and science journals on this kind of information and even saw a few TV shows on the discovery channel and public television. None of them presented the information in the clean and concise manner as Krauss; and especially not with the spoonfuls of humor necessary to digest this kind of complex information.
I won’t even attempt to explain what Krauss did, check out the video, but I can comment on the effects. Religion may have a monopoly on emotions and I think that this is a bad thing. Emotions have a special way of motivating and logic & reason can’t do this alone. The awe and reverence I got from that lecture for the human mind and our ability to know things is exactly what we all need to hear from time to time. I want to go run and tell it on a mountain. I just have to figure out my rhetoric.
