Monday, March 28, 2011

A Few Statements of principle, values, and beliefs...

1)  I will believe in a god or afterlife when you can show me sufficient evidence that it is no longer reasonable to not believe.

2)  I'll be damned if God actually exists. The Judeo-Christian god is horrible, possessing all the worst traits of spousal abusers, child abusers, and despots. If you somehow convince me that a god exists, and it's that god, I can neither worship nor love that being, and would rather spend an eternity in hell than an eternity in heaven with such an individual.

3)  Moral relativism is logically false and self-defeating. There are right and wrong answers to questions of morality. I challenge anyone to show me a time, place, or situation in which it could be considered ethical to gang rape an 11 year old child.

4)  Secular policy and government protects everyones rights, regardless of belief or lack thereof, as well it should.

5)  My life has meaning, and purpose, and joy, and love, and hope, and delight, and wonder.  All this, and without religion.

6)  My life is my own. It doesn't belong to the government, or any church. I have every right to end it should it become intolerable, or to continue it for as long as I choose and science and reality permit.

7)  I love life, and I have a hard time imagining a time when I will not want to see what happens next, and knowing that the evidence says I will die someday is bloody annoying as hell. I want to be immortal. Being remembered through my works doesn't count.

8)  Some opinions are worth more than others.  An accountant's opinion on the best treatments for, oh, let's say cancer, is worth far less than that of a trained physician.  However, an accountant's opinion on whether strawberries taste better than blueberries is equally as valid as a physician's.

9)  Pepsi tastes significantly better than Coke, and anyone who thinks otherwise is just plain wrong ;).

10)  What's real and true are more important (and often more interesting) than comforting and pretty illusions.

11)  A magic trick is far more interesting and enjoyable when I know how it's accomplished, and annoying when the magician won't tell me how they did it.

12)  Gay, straight, bisexual, or something else, I don't mind. The sex and love between consenting adults is not something I feel a need to constrict.

13)  Homosexual marriage does no harm to heterosexual marriage.

14)  If churches are going to have a tax-free status, they should be subject to audit like any other nonprofit.

15)  Good education is key to any future that actually does look bright.

16)  Just because something is natural, is not a moral defense of it. Rape may very well be natural, but that hardly makes it moral.

All of the preceding are subject to change based on good arguments and evidence, but that's not very likely.  In their current form, they're mere assertions of course, and at least one is pure opinion that can be readily disagreed with as a matter of opinion.  Later, perhaps, I shall go into more detail on some of these.

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