Sample Horoscope

One day, I went down the aisles of my grade 10 science class asking the kids their birthdays. Each was given the appropriate horoscope. Here's Aries:

Aries – March 21- April 19

You have had some difficulties in the recent past. Sometimes you wonder who your best friends are, or will be in the future.

Someone's words will take on a tone of intensity for you now. Don't fall into a dark, brooding mood as a result. It's good to clear the air, and time to break your silence.

There's high drama on your schedule for the next couple of days, so prepare yourself. That's not necessarily a bad thing. Still, you might want to warn your close friends.

Some encounters will be a very significant -- some more pleasantly so than others. Think of it this way -- you have a choice about how to use this energy, so use it to its best ends.

You're in the mood to catch up on the latest scoop, but your family and friends have been a little too intense for your tastes -- at the moment, anyway. Let them talk, and just listen closely. Your turn will be coming up soon.

I asked the kids to put up their hand if they felt the horoscope was accurate. Hands went up around the room. Then I had them pass it to the person beside them. They started to laugh because all the horoscopes were the same. (I made it up.) It's so easy to persuade people of the truth of something so loony (luney?) as astrology. And easy to demonstrate how false it is. Still, few believers can ever be persuaded otherwise.

BTW: Not a single person pointed out that in the second paragraph I advised them to speak out, but in the last paragraph to just listen.

Belief in God

I just finished sending a comment to “Tim” (http://existence-of-god.com/author-information.html). Sorry, I don’t know any more about his name. Tim’s site provides a huge discussion of arguments for and against the existence of God. Each argument against God’s existence is refuted. The counter arguments, however, are very well presented, though, which is rare on “Evidence for God’s existence” sites.

If you look down the left, you see links to other sites or pages arguing for God’s existence. You see links to proclamations that “So and so rejects atheism.” I don’t see any saying “So and so converts to atheism.” I would feel better had I seen these. I realize, though, that “Tim” has no wish to convince anyone of the unreasonableness of his belief in God. And therein, really, lies the problem. The ideal philosopher, the ideal searcher after truth, should not care whether the statement “A is B” is actually true. The ideal searcher after truth should not have an agenda to convince readers that his point of view is the (only) correct one.

I am always suspicious of people’s objectivity when they have a strong belief in the truth of some statement, whether the statement is “We never went to the moon”, “HIV (virus) does not cause AIDS” or “God exists.” As I said before, though, I commend Tim for the depth of his coverage of both sides of the discussion.

I have a confession to make: I’m an atheist. As a high school physics teacher, I never stated this fact to my class. I taught that there is a separation of science from religion/philosophy/belief. I suggested that if there was any way to absolute truth, only religion could get there. I taught that science didn’t say anything about God; only that science’s goal was to come up with a useful, testable, non-divine explanation for observed phenomena. I never answered the question “Do you believe in God?”

Now, having retired, I can concede that the concept of the existence of God just does not fly with me.

One of the arguments for God’s existence is based on probability: the likelihood of the universe being precisely right for the development of intelligent life on Earth is so small that one concludes that there had to be a designer.

But I use probabilities a different way. Most people follow the faith of their parents. What is the likelihood, of all the faiths on this planet, that the one my parents happened to believe is the only true faith? I don’t think I’m that lucky. The fact that most people believe the faith of their fathers leads me to the conclusion that the correctness of their faith is suspect.

Related to that argument is the statement of humility: So many people believe in other religions, other Gods, other ways that the universe may have come to be, who am I to assume that my way is correct?

Frankly, I find the certitude of believers disturbing. I can’t buy the existence of an entity watching me/us/humanity/the cosmos, caring what we do, (perhaps) interceding (on our behalf), desiring to be worshiped, judging us.

A friend told me, “You are a good person. You have to believe in God because God is the source of all goodness.” Sorry, but I think you can be good without the need for a God (to set a standard, presumably, for ultimate goodness).

And people say, “Yes, but in the Bible it says…” Again, I don’t mean any disrespect when I say that, not believing in the existence of God, I don’t accept the Bible to be the word of (any) God.
I respect people’s belief in God. Fanatics apart, most people I meet are sincerely interested in doing good, sincerely interested in the welfare of others (not just their own kind or own religious group). If belief in a God helps them to be that way, good for them. When their loved ones die and they find solace in a belief that “God had other plans for them” or that they have “gone to a better place”, I’m happy for them. Perhaps I’m even a little envious of believers’ satisfaction, or the peace that a belief in a God has brought them.

I concede that I might be better off if I believed in God. But that is not a valid reason for a belief. I don’t think you can say, “I believe it because it’s advantageous to do so.”

So, do I believe in God? No, but if you do, that’s OK. As long as you don’t discriminate against others who believe differently from you.

Standard Accepted Knowledge

In my last article I commented on the differences in positions held by scientists and non-scientists on whether Earth had been visited in the past by intelligent extraterrestrials. I use the term scientists widely, not referring to an occupation but to a state of mind.

No matter what your occupation, I call you a scientist if you look for answers by studying the evidence; if you test to see if proposed explanations work; and if you assume that there are reasonable, physical explanations first, before resorting to magic or far-out justifications for an extraordinary claim.

I made a statement that there is near universal agreement among scientists on the big issues. Here is a list of what I consider those issues to be.

Earth is a speck in the cosmos. There are likely to be many small, rocky planets orbiting stars, some of which will be similar to our sun. There are so many stars, there are bound to me many Earth-like planets at suitable distances from their sun that conditions were similar to those on early Earth.

Earth is old and changing. Continents drift around and collide. Mountains rise. Rivers cut canyons. Lakes and oceans fill up with debris that eventually becomes sedimentary rock. As you dig down through layers you reach older and older rock.

Life processes follow the laws of chemistry and physics. There is no process that requires “magic”. We don’t know all the processes, but are confident that they are “knowable”. (Consider the opposite. If, for example, some magical process causes the heart to beat, then we might as well stop trying to understand how the heart works!)

Life evolves. Little changes in short periods add up to bigger changes over long periods.

The laws of mathematics and physics apply everywhere. The formula for a circle and value of pi is the same on Mars. Magicians don’t do true magic: they are still constrained by the laws of physics. (While watching a magic show, everytime you ask yourself, “How did he do that?” you are applying this concept. You feel that there was a physical explanation, a “trick”. You didn’t see true magic.)

Matter is particulate. Substances are made of atoms that join to become molecules. (Atoms themselves are made of particles.)

The properties an object possesses depend on the observer. (This claim, for which there is much evidence, arises from relativity and quantum physics. Relativity deals with the big concepts of time, space, gravity, matter and energy; quantum physics with the behaviour of matter and energy at the tiniest level.

I might as well mention the fringe items, too.

There are no ghosts, werewolves, vampires, living dead, mammoth spiders, King Kongs, Spidermen, invisible people, extraterrestrial aliens living amongst us.

Astrology is false.

There is no such thing as psychic ability. You can’t move objects by though alone. No one can actually read minds, see the future (rather than predict likelihoods), perceive present, past, or future events by other than the five senses.

Men HAVE landed on the moon (i.e. the landing in 1969 was not a hoax.)
Humans and dinosaurs did not inhabit the Earth at the same time.

I expect many to disagree with me on many of this last list. In particular, countless people will cite amazing occurrences, coincidences, anecdotes, and “facts”. I will leave it as this: I have seen no repeatable, non-controversial evidence that convinces me that, for example, ESP exists. A million dollar prize is available for ANY purported psychic who can demonstrate ANY psychic ability. No one has yet been able to do it.

As much as we, scientists included, might wish for exceptional abilities, extraordinary creatures, and assistance from the stars, there is just no good evidence for any of it.

ESP

I had a discussion recently with members of my writer’s club. A small group of us meet regularly to exchange critiques of our developing novels. Two involved forms of ESP. In one, a character had the ability to picture previous inhabitants of a house and, specifically, “feel” terrifying experiences that happened to others. Another novel featured a scene in which a character was awakened in the night at a crucial time via a “signal” from her distant mother.

I’m a physics teacher and sceptical of the these phenomena. No, I’ll be honest, I’m not just sceptical, I don’t believe ESP exists. I’m careful not to let this disbelief affect my critiques of the novels. After all, my novel-in-progress uses parallel universes, a concept no less dubius.

I made the mistake, at the end of the evening, of mentioning my scepticism. Jim, one of the authors, was incredulous. “You don’t believe in ESP?” he remarked.
Me: No. There’s no good evidence that ESP exists.
Jim: You don’t think people can read minds?”
Me: Of course not. Nobody has been able to demonstrate that ability when examined carefully.
Jim: How about Edgar Cayce?
Me: Are you kidding? Magicians can do that stuff.
By this time Jim was laughing. At first I thought he was just having fun. But he was laughing with disbelief that I could be so mistaken.
Jim: How about astral projection?
Me: For heaven’s sake. There’s no evidence for that.
Jim: [laughing harder] Uri Geller bending spoons?
Me: URI GELLER!!! He couldn’t do it on Johnny Carson. Magicians can bend spoons. They aren’t using any special powers.
Jim: Astrology?
Me: Jim, astrology and horoscopes are demonstrably false.
Jim: [laughing uproariously at my ignorance] Alien abductions?
Me: No way. There’s no evidence for that.
Jim: Have you read about Betty and Barney Hill.
Me: I’ve read about them, and am satisfied that alien abduction is not the explanation for Barney’s drawing.
Jim: Well, they’re my aunt and uncle. They believe it.

At this point, the teacher of our little group spoke up passionately.

Lynda: What about when a little girl at home sees her Dad in the doorway waving goodbye when he was actually in the hospital, and her Mom next to her in bed awakens and says “You just saw your Dad, didn’t you?” and the Mom telephones the hospital to find out that he just died?

I wanted to respond with some more old saws (like “when my grandmother died, her picture fell off the wall”) but bit my tongue, for Lynda was talking from personal experience.

Me: I accept that you experienced what you say, but my explanation might be different from yours.

Suffice it to say that I took quite a roasting for expressing strong doubts about ESP and its kin. There is not much you can say when honest, intelligent people give testimonials. When I related this story to my friend Bruce, he pointed out that my disbelief in ESP’s existence is a belief in its non-existence. So I’m expressing a belief just as ESP’s proponents are.

Me: But there’s evidence that supports my position.
Bruce: But believers consider anecdotal evidence to be of equal value to scientific testing.
Me: But it’s not.
Bruce: That’s your BELIEF. You believe that the scientific method is the only way to truth. They believe that there are other ways to truth for some phenomenon that science just can’t catch reliably.

Bruce was not necessarily defending ESP’s existence, only arguing for the equality of belief for and against, given different background beliefs in the validity of the scientific method for determining truth. Interesting.

More on that in the next article.

Are the religious right right?

CBC Radio ran an interesting program today in which a committed, evangelical, fundamentalist Christain minister took the CBC reporter into his home for a week. The program, told entirely in alternating first-person accounts, related how they came to respect each other even though their viewpoints about God, homosexuals, abortion, G.W.Bush, and almost everything else, were so different. Each told how wary they initially were about each other, how they became friends, and respected the other (even though his view was wrong!)

Here's what bothers me a little about the certainty of strongly religious people. Throughout history, religious people have always been strongly convinced of the correctness of their own beliefs. A while ago, African Americans were unworthy of treatment as humans; before that Native Americans, witches, heretics, "infidels" in the holy lands. Jews have been persecuted by Christians for a couple of millennia. Church doctrines have changed over time.

At each instant in history, I will bet that committed religious people have always said that they were certain their beliefs were true. They would have said that those who lived before them were misguided; that, in fact, EVERYONE who thinks differently is wrong.

My question to an evangelical, fundamentalist person of any religion is this. Isn't it worth considering that all of the people in those earlier eras felt as strongly that they are absolutely right as you do? You have been born and raised (or otherwise come) to accept certain tenets as absolute truths. If you are truly open-minded and rational, shouldn't you acknowledge that there is a rather low probability that you happen to have been born at just the perfect time in history that your generation was taught the absolute truth, while all those who came before (or believe different things now) are the ones who are wrong? How can honest, clear-thinking, fair evangelicals be so certain of the correctness of their positions?

Thoughs on whether God exists

I often think how lucky I am to be born a Canadian. I could have been born one of India’s teeming impoverished children. I could have had to grow up in the middle of sectarian warfare in Ireland, Serbia, or Iraq, or under a tyrannical dictatorship in the U.S.S.R. or North Korea. How fortunate I was that my parents happened to be Canadians!

The fact that the majority of citizens happen to have the citizenship of their parents is obvious and of little significance. Yet, when applied to religion, the observation leads to some serious questions in my mind. The vast majority of people end up following the religion of their parents. Of course some people convert to other denominations, Anglican to United. Some cross larger chasms, converting from Judaism to Christianity, or Christianity to Buddhism. It is surely safe to say, though, that most people who grow up in a family of a given faith become members of that faith themselves. That is, they accept the beliefs of the faith of their parents, or at least their surroundings during their formative years.

At first glance, this observation seems of as little significance as the citizenship “coincidence”. After all, how can you accept the beliefs of, say, Muslims, if you haven’t been exposed to that faith? The difference comes, though, with the importance believers of a faith usually place on the truth of their beliefs. Canadians do not go about announcing that Canada is the only true country. But many religious believers proclaim that their faith is the only true faith. That is, they feel that their God is the only God, or the practices or beliefs of their faith provide the only way to reach God or heaven, The Roman Catholic Church has, with no embarrassment, openly proclaimed itself as the one True Church. Devout Christians seize upon the word “only” in the scriptures and state that the only way to salvation is to accept Christ as the Son of God. Jehovah’s Witnesses tell the world that those who survive the coming apocalypse will be from their ranks only.

It is at this point that the coincidences become a little too much to accept. The good luck of being born Canadian pales compared to the good luck of being born into the only true faith.

When I think deeply about religious matters, such as the existence of a Creator, whether there is an afterlife, or whether there is a God who can hear your silent prayers, I wonder about the certainty that many believers possess. When I see good, intelligent, devout people disagreeing on what constitutes the absolute truth in these matters, I wonder what right have I to assume that my beliefs are the true beliefs? The conclusion that I have the monopoly on truth seems of low probability, and quite egotistical or chauvanistic.

I would like to pose some questions to religious people about this point. Because of my lack of knowledge of the other world religions, I will address the questions to fundamentalist Christians who consider their beliefs to be absolutely true. But I believe my questions have general applicability to other faiths, if tailored to their specific beliefs.[1]

Question 1: Does it concern you that you happen to believe what your parents believe? Do you ever worry that such a “coincidence” could be the result of indoctrination rather than free choice, uninfluenced by your superiors or upbringing?

Certainly, no one can be uninfluenced by his or her upbringing. No one is, or should be, brought up empty of knowledge and void of concepts of right and wrong. After all, that’s why we have universal education. Suppose, though, a button could be pressed which causes all preconceived notions about religion could be wiped from a 25 year old’s brain. (Perhaps the Men in Black have one!) Gone would be the suggestion that there is a God. Gone would be the assumption that the Bible is the literal truth (the question was addressed to fundamentalist Christians, remember.) I anticipate that the majority of such mind-blanked people would attain a belief in God. There seems to be a universal human nature or need to feel that someone is looking out for them, or there is life after death, or that their presence on Earth has a grand purpose. But would most pick up the Bible and say “You know, I this script seems to be the actual Word of God.” My guess is that many would see the Bible as representing something else: what ancient people thought was the word of God, or what early religious leaders wanted their flock to think was the word of God, or what early devout leaders though God would say if He were currently speaking to them. The point of my question and this subsequent impossible (some would say ludicrous) hypothetical scenario is to try to find out if fundamentalist Christians accept (their interpretations of) the teachings of the Bible because they have been told the Bible is absolute truth or because they have concluded, independent of their upbringing, that it is absolute truth.

I would be more satisfied intellectually to accept claims of religious fundamentalists if I felt that their ideas and passions did not come from parents or upbringing. Please remember that I am not claiming that the beliefs of religious fundamentalists, or any religious people for that matter, are untrue. I am saying that if I were to hold these (or any) beliefs myself, the “my parents thought that, too” coincidence would give me pause.

Question 2: Have you ever wondered what changes in your beliefs would results if the Bible were not absolutely true? Or, more to the point, have you ever wondered if the Bible might not be the literal Word of God?

Again, I would be more impressed with a fundamentalist’s convictions if he or she concluded that the Bible was literate, historical truth after honestly and fairly considering the question. I fear that it may be impossible to fairly question a fundamental tenet of faith that has been part of a person’s upbringing from day 1. True, some people convert to other religions, which suggests that open-mindedness is possible. On the other hand, conversion might indicate that they never actually accepted the article of faith in the first place. Unfortunately, this leads to a situation with no solution:
Convert: Yes I accepted it…now I reject it.
Skeptic: You never accepted it, you just think you did.
Convert: No, I actually accepted it.
Skeptic: No, you just think you actually accepted it…

It worries me that belief in God, based on the Bible’s claim of God’s existence, is subject to circular reasoning:

Person A: God exists.
Person B: How do you know?
Parson A: It says so in the Bible?
Person B: How do you know that the Bible is true?
Person A: Because God wrote it.
Person B: But how do you know that God exists in the first place?
Person A: It says so in the Bible.

Is it possible to come to accept that the Bible is the literal Word of God without first being told that it is? Perhaps. A fundamentalist might say “I get evidence for this every day, throughout my life.” My worry here is that such acceptance occurs in other situations which are too similar to be ignored: the concept of the self-fulfilling prophesy, the Rorschach ink-blot test, vision of God in the clouds or the devil in the smoke from the World Trade Centre, the “my horoscope sounds like it applies to me” claim. My grandmother says “I’ve played Bingo all my life and I think I’m a little ahead.” No bingo player thinks otherwise.


[1] (For the purpose of this essay I am defining fundamentalist Christians as those who believe that the Bible is the absolute word-for-(Hebrew)-word literal truth. This would take in standard Baptists and Nazarenes. Fundamentalist, but not Christian, would apply to Jehovah’s Witnesses’ interpretation of the Old Testament. For example, they would say that there actually was a Daniel in a lion’s den who plucked a thorn from the lion’s paw. Anglicans and Catholic standard doctrine would see the same passage as a fable showing the value of belief in God and charity to your enemy. For a non-fundamentalist, the Bible’s truth would be of a more general nature: a moral or educational truth, rather than a literal one. Similarly, for a fundamentalist Adam and Eve were real people. For a non-fundamentalist, Adam and Eve were characters in a creation myth that tells us many truths about how God wants us to behave. Of course there are many Anglicans and Catholics, and people of other faiths, who would consider themselves fundamentalists, so the questions that follow are not directed solely toward Baptists.

Blind Acceptance

I little while ago I attended a friend's church service. The pastor give an interesting sermon--they call the Message. At one point she said "Just as twins separated by great distances can feel each other's distress, so can ..."

I wrote her a letter. In it I explained that one of my goals as a physics teacher is to have students think, examine, and test hypotheses and claims before accepting them. Many students enter my classroom being firm believers that Earth has been visited by aliens, that we have not gone to the Moon, that ghosts exist, that mysterious disturbances happen in a Bermuda triangle, that people can read minds and move objects by pure thought, and so on. I try to persuade the students to look at these claims sceptically. And here she was talking pseudoscience.

I mentioned to the pastor that there was no reputable scientific evidence that separated twins can sense, for example, when the other breaks an ankle or has a bad dream. I requested that she refrain from stating dubious, unsupported claims as fact(and using them to support her argument).

But this brings up an interesting question: Where do I stop with my request? Obviously, I can't ask her to stop repeating untestable claims about the existence of God. To her God's existence is a fact. I'm trying to be fair to her, here. Regardless of whether I'm believer, agnostic, or atheist, I feel I have to let her state claims about God as facts as she sees them. But I want her to stop stating OTHER unsubstantiated claims as fact.

I think there's a line here that the pastor, priest, rabbi shouldn't cross, but it's a little tricky justifying it.

I am reminded of the requirements for good science fiction. We allow certain breaches of the laws of physics (warp drive; transporter beams; instant communication, perhaps). But having granted this limited latitude, we want consistency with the rest of the known laws of physics. I have a hard time explaining to my wife why I allow one "magic" device but not another. If you are a sci.fi. fan, though, I expect you know what I mean.

(I remember one episode of Star Trek, the Next Generation where Geordi and Ro were in a semi-dead state, or a different dimension, or something ("cloaked and phased", actually, they need the anyon beams to wipe out the chroniton fields!). Anyhow, they couldn't be seen by normal matter (i.e. everyone else). They could run through walls! My 10 year-old daughter saw the inconsistency: If they pass through the walls, she asked, why they didn't fall through the floors!)