This blog entry is about the Secular Coalition for Arizona. Please log onto the website at www.secularaz.org and read about the organization. While you’re at it sign up for the “Take Action!” email list located at the top of the column on the right.

Perhaps a little mood music while you read this entry is in order. The Arizona State Legislature begins operation on the 14th. Are you all ready for this? The last call for donations has just been sent out by the CAP (Center for Arizona Policy) as they gear up to impose their will on everyone in the state regardless of religious affiliation. There have been a few posts here about the CAP and a few mentions of the Secular Coalition for Arizona. Both organizations are mentioned in the left sidebar on this page and it’s worth reading over from time to time.

The Secular Coalition for Arizona is also gearing up for the legislation session. Many of the affiliates of the coalition met this weekend in Mesa to make plans for the coming year as we closed out our second year of operation. Last year we hired a full time lobbyist to support the members of the coalition and this year we’re adding a development director to further enhance the effort to keep and maintain the secular character of the state government. Present at the meeting was the entire board of directors along with representatives from Flagstaff Freethinkers, FFRF Valley of the Sun Chapter, FreeThought Arizona, Humanist Society of Greater Phoenix, Military Atheists Agnostics and Freethinkers, Phoenix Atheist Meetup Group, Prescott Freethinkers, Secular Student Alliance from Mesa Community College, Sedona/Verde Valley Secular Freethinkers, and Tucson Atheists along with a couple of Liaison Members at Large. In all there are 15 member organizations in the coalition, up from 10 last year. We are often joined in our efforts by other groups such as Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

The Secular Coalition for Arizona is starting to make its presence known and receiving press coverage. This year instead of being constantly on the defensive, we will be promoting at least two bills before the legislature. One is an Oregon-style “Death with dignity” bill and the other proposes to teach science based sex education in public schools. We will also work against many of the bills proposed by the CAP specifically, ones that blur the line between church and state and those that are based on dogma instead of science and reason.

The main issues that drive the Secular Coalition for Arizona are: Science-based Medicine, Secular Public Schools, Marriage Equality, End-of-life Choices, Religious Privilege in Tax Laws, Women’s Healthcare, Military, and Government Involvement in Religious Expression.

Please log onto the website at www.secularaz.org and read about the organization. While you’re at it sign up for the “Take Action!” email list located at the top of the column on the right.

As stated in the last blog entry, this should be a very good year for Skeptics. The fact that we are still here is a clear indication that it is better to believe scientifically rather than superstitiously. While the failed end of the world prediction of the Maya calendar was one of the largest of the 2012 failed predictions, there were others. In politics, many of the pundits were wrong about the last election when they predicted that Michelle Bachmann would be the Republican candidate, Romney by a landslide, war with Iran before the election, the affordable healthcare bill would lose the mandate portion in the Supreme Court, and that Donald Trump would run for the presidency. Obviously, these predictions by pundits were a mixture of wild guesses, wishful thinking, and unvarnished opinion. In most cases, these predictions came from listening to a very limited source of information, the kind that seemed to reinforce their biases. Psychics on the other hand say that they get their information from supernatural sources not available to everyone. Yet they missed some pretty big events in 2012. They missed: Hurricane Sandy, the Aurora Shooting, the Newtown tragedy, the discovery of the Higgs Boson, and the death of Whitney Houston to name a few. It would be interesting to find out if there were any psychics on board the Costa Concordia that ran aground killing 15 people in the process. It is a shame that the CIA investigation into “Psi Warriors” was a failure because Director David Patraeus could have used some help avoiding his embarrassing situation. At the first part of the year, there are many web sites dedicating time to covering all the failed and successful predictions so I won’t go into great detail. However, the favored strategy is to make a lot of predictions on the hope that a few will actually come true. Apparently, we remember the hits and forget the misses because if we remembered all of the misses, we wouldn’t have so many playing the yearly game.

Skepticism and Critical Thinking go hand-in-hand while Skepticism and cynicism does not. Also, successful application of Skepticism doesn’t get the press that paranormal stories do. For example, many people heard about the news report on UFO sightings over Denver but few are familiar with the investigations done by Skeptics such as the Rocky Mountain Paranormal Research Society.  They demonstrated similar phenomenon that produced the UFO footage can be reproduced by placing insects close to a recording device. Of course the original footage could be of visiting extra-terrestrials but the simpler conclusion which requires the fewest outlandish assumptions is that there are insects flying over the dirt field directly in front of the camera. Since they are close to the lens, they would be out of focus. Since they are closer, their motions, such as acceleration and ability to change directions, would be exaggerated. The principle of selecting the explanations with the fewest assumptions is called Occam’s razor.

Skepticism is appealing to many and easier than ever now that information is easily available everywhere. Smart phones are participants in almost every discussion today and the result is that participants can get past faulty memories and biased opinions in order to improve the experience. The James Randi Education Foundation has been on the forefront of Skepticism for decades and would be a good place to start if one was serious about getting into Skepticism in a big way. They hold a convention not far from here in Las Vegas every year in the summer and it attracts many of the leaders in the Skeptical movement as well as 1500 or so participants but you don’t have to wait until July to benefit from the organization’s efforts. You can download a few teaching modules, participate in their discussion forums, or just read the daily blog called Swift (Swift, named for Jonathan Swift, is the JREF’s daily blog, featuring content from James Randi, the JREF staff, and other featured authors.)

Have a great Critical Thinking—Skeptical 2013!

The title refers to an old joke…A skydiving instructor was reviewing procedures with his student just prior to his first jump. He reminded him how to deploy his main chute and then discussed how to activate the emergency chute, if necessary. The student asked what to do if both chutes failed. The instructor says, “If all else fails, clear your mind and say ‘Buddha, oh Buddha.’” So as it happens in old jokes and made up stories, the student was faced with the failure of all of his equipment at which time he clears his mind and says, “Buddha, oh Buddha.” Much to his amazement a couple of hands appear under him and begin lowering him safely to the ground. Happy and greatly relieved he says, “Thank God!” and the hands open immediately allowing him to perish as he hit the ground at terminal velocity.

I was a believer when I first heard this story. It was a bit uncomfortable to hear for a couple of reasons. First, it laid bare the idea that we are on our own during dire situations as it is very unlikely to be saved in a miraculous way by God. In all my life, I had never heard or read about a miraculous save such as the one depicted in the story and part of the humor was the how unlikely the situation really is. The second reason it was a bit uncomfortable was that it opened me up to the idea that if the other deities are looked upon by outsiders as ridiculous, how does the God of the Bible stack up?

Hearing that joke may have been my first experience with cognitive dissonance. It made me realize that there may be answers that I hadn’t considered before. Many current believers must have a similar feeling when they hear Mike Huckabee blame our most recent tragedy in Connecticut on the lack of prayer in public school. The difference of course is that he wasn’t telling a joke, at least not on purpose. It is a most “cringe worthy” statement and it’s amazing that he states his opinion with such confidence. Do you believe that saying a prayer before classes would have made the least bit of difference in that tragedy? But also buried within his statements is the underlying theme that there is no morality and no values in secular society. Dave Noise in Psychology Today also cites Huckabee’s comments in his article on Atheist discrimination. Somehow Atheists are to blame for everything bad that happens. Mike Huckabee and others forget that religion played no part in the Sandy Hook tragedy.

About that religious student skydiver, do you think it showed a lack of faith for him to put on a chute to begin with? Mike Huckabee may be a hero of the religious right and his professions, while silly to the unbeliever, may resonate with those who believe in Christianity but Atheists have their spokesmen too and many of them are comedians (on purpose). For example, Eddie Izzard got it right when he says, “If there was a God, don’t you think he would have flicked Hitler’s head off?” And just between you and me, don’t you think he might have made Adam Lanza’s four weapons inoperable?

For the most part, we celebrate Christmas. We decorate our houses; invite friends and family over, exchange gifts, and some travel to family gatherings. Celebrations this time of year can transcend the religious beliefs if we let them. Before Christianity claimed the season as its own, people worked hard at celebrating the season and there are a lot of reasons they did. Most of what I’m about to cover relates to the fact that we’re in the northern hemisphere of the planet There is more darkness this time of year. The Earth’s axis of rotation is tilted away from the Sun and reaches its maximum at the winter solstice. Snow and cold takes over the land. Most of the trees appear to be dead. Some animals disappear into hibernation.

Before Christmas, there were pagan observations. In Babylon, there was the feast of the Son of Isis celebrated on December 25^th. The Romans had Saturnalia followed by Dies Natalis Invicti Solus or the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun. Christmas caroling has its roots in the Roman celebrations. The Mummers were groups of costumed singers and dancers who traveled from house to house entertaining their neighbors. In northern Europe, Yule and the Sun god Mithras were celebrated. On the shortest day of the year, a fire was lit at sunset to encourage Mithras to reappear. Evergreen trees were often brought into homes during the deepest part of the winter to remind the inhabitants that life continues and brighter days are ahead. It wasn’t until the middle of the 4^th century that Pope Julius I decided that Christ’s birth was to be celebrated on December 25^th. The celebrations continued, seemingly for a new reason. The birth of the Christmas tree was in 1521 in the Alsace region of Germany.

The common thread through all of the discussion above is that this time of year can be depressing if there is not a celebration of some type to distract you from the misery. Some people say that the holidays are the worst time of the year. One web site suggests 25 ways to find joy and balance during the holidays.

Over at Fox News, Bill O’Reilly distracts himself from the holiday doldrums by creating a fictional “War on Christmas.” The bombastic commentator seems to enjoy mixing it up with David Silverman and the Atheists. To him saying “Happy Holidays” is a war cry and the only “correct” way to pass on season’s greetings is to include the word Christmas. As I’ve stated in a previous posting “Happy Holidays” is more inclusive but according to Bill O, not saying Christmas is part of the “Secular Progressive” agenda. Bill O’Reilly went as far as calling David Silverman a fascist in his last encounter. I’m sure that some people are entertained by such conflicts just as some people like to watch  bottle rockets launched  from butt cracks.

There are a variety of ways to celebrate the Christmas season that don’t involve religious activities. However, I do have nostalgic memories of my family’s traditions. In our home, Catholic mom took us to high mass while Atheist dad played Santa back at the house. Perhaps I’m better for that experience. This year it’s just the two of us and our surviving family members are scattered around the country. We’ll go out and look at the lights in Winter Haven, and watch a few themed television shows (A Christmas Story is my favorite). This year, as in the previous 4 years, we’ll have a few dozen folks over to the house. It will be an eclectic group of heathens and believers–all friends–to share a potluck dinner, roast marshmallows, sing Karaoke, and other activities.

If you’d like to gather with fellow non-believers for some raucous fun with Brother Sam Singleton, you can take in the Atheist Revival show at Laffs Comedy Café. The Tucson Atheists will be “Drinking Godlessly” again at the Red Garter at 6 PM on Thursday the 20^th of December. There will be a variety of winter solstice parties around town. One will be at Black Crown Coffee Company and there will plenty of private gatherings.

The point is you don’t have to believe in Jesus to enjoy the Christmas season. I think Jon Stewart is going to eat Chinese food and go to the movies. Happy Holidays.

Thanksgiving has been a part of my life since my earliest memories. There were times when the family went out to a big feast and times when the family would gather and the women spent the day preparing the feast while the men watched football on TV. They were pleasant gatherings mostly and a few that were less than the “Norman Rockwell” ideal. Nearing 60, I have fewer Thanksgivings ahead of me than behind me but that is probably for the best. Now it’s just me and the wife. It’s hard finding a turkey for two. This year’s turkey looks like a huge chicken and we’ll probably be having leftovers for a week but it still will be great to get pleasantly stuffed and enjoy the tryptophan induced sudden nap in front of the TV watching A Christmas Story for the umpteenth time. I’ll make sure that I listen to Alice’s Restaurant first.

But that’s not the point of Thanksgiving. The clue is in the name. As an Atheist I have no god to thank but there are plenty of others that deserve my thanks.

I thank all the people that came before me. I also thank all the people that are still here working to make life a more pleasant experience. I thank the first humans that decided to cooperate with each other and pool their resources and skills. We owe most of what we have now to those first altruistic efforts. I thank those that decided to work to understand the world around them—the scientist and the engineer that applied that knowledge for our benefit.  I thank early leaders, traders, and builders. I appreciate the development of farming and the people that made that happen. I thank the people who chose to protect others through their service—the sentry and the soldier. I thank the well paid and most especially the volunteers. If my parents were still alive, I’d thank them for providing and protecting my life when I was too weak and too ignorant to be on my own. I’d thank them for all the lessons they taught me—some on purpose and some by accident—because they made me the man I am now.

On Thanksgiving nine years ago, my life would have ended if not for the efforts of the doctors, nurses, and all the people that took care of me at St. Joseph’s Hospital. I thank them for keeping me alive that day fixing my heart so I could live a little longer. I thank the firemen and women that drove me in the ambulance to St. Josephs and the support the neighbors gave my wife. But I can’t stop there. I have to thank the creator of the stents and the inventor and builder of the fluoroscope that guided the doctor’s hand when he manipulated the catheter to place the stents. I give thanks to those that educated the professionals that worked on me that day and all the support staff that allows them to do their job…I can’t chalk it up to God’s work. I don’t know there is a god. However, I do know that there are real people with real lives that I owe a lot of thanks to.

Finally, I’d like to thank the Catholic priest that came by to offer what help he could but understood when I told him I didn’t need to talk with him.

Darrel’s presentation style will be fast paced, humorous and engaging. He is not afraid to explore even the most sensitive areas of religious infection from sexual guilt to abstinence only, from the hypnotic techniques of ministers to music’s role in infection and how it all fits together.

The talk will be at 10 AM. There will be time for questions and answers and book signing will follow. There is no admission fee for this talk but donations to keep quality speakers coming to Tucson will be accepted.

You can get more information HERE.

FreeThought Arizona is a 501c3 charity, as such, we are not allowed to take a position on individual candidates but now the election is over. Mitt Romney is no longer a candidate and Barack Obama has been green lighted for another four years in office. Given the choice between the two from a Secularist’s point of view, neither candidate was ideal. Atheists including Agnostics and other FreeThinking Americans are famously independent and leading them is often compared to herding cats. Some say that it’s more like herding butterflies but one thing that we all agree on is that there should be a separation of the church and the state. We universally agree that laws and public policies should be based on science, empirical evidence, verifiable experiences, independent historical accounts, and sound logic—not religious dogma. Given that one concern, President Obama was clearly the better choice.

Here in Arizona, we need to do a better job of keeping church and state separate. We’ve allowed the Center for Arizona Policy to have way too much power in our legislature. With the election behind us, it is time now to begin to work to roll back the power of Cathi Herrod. Her 501c3 organization is in flagrant violation of IRS rules for non-profit charitable organizations and has been active in partisan politics since 1995. She brags about over 100 laws that she has supported that have been enacted into law. We didn’t vote for her but she in effect tells everyone in the state who they should marry. She has decided that gambling is wrong, not just for herself, but for everyone in the state. She’s been instrumental in siphoning off money from the public education system into private institutions that don’t answer to the citizenry and are able to accept and reject students based on arbitrary criteria. She has supported a law that delays divorces by instilling a waiting period and unfunded mandatory counseling which in some cases extends the time women must endure in abusive situations. One of the laws she pushed through made it more difficult for children to be adopted by those that would remove them from state care. However, her most egregious violation of human dignity was her part in killing the Anti-Bullying law. The bill was killed by her because it protected gay kids from bullying. Never mind that it also protected all other kids as well.

The country has rejected Mitt Romney, the homophobic bully. Perhaps it’s time we started rejecting our own homophobic lobbying organization and Cathi Herrod. The best way to make that happen is to support the Secular Coalition for Arizona. The Secular Coalition for Arizona operates on a total budget that is less than the yearly compensation of Cathi Herrod. It is legally organized as a lobbying organization and represents many liaised non-theistic organizations in Arizona. Go to their website (http://www.secularaz.org/) and sign up for Email notification and find out about some of the liaised organizations make up the coalition.

It’s very difficult during an election season to not delve into politics and our self imposed rule here in the FreeThought Arizona Blog is to try and stay away from pure politics. However, when politicians from one particular party are seemingly duty bound to impose their religious beliefs on others, that position must be discussed here.

Most of the GOP candidates are “pro life” and would criminalize abortions. However, MSNBC reports that there are 12 GOP Senate candidates that hold the position that they would not make an exception even for victims of rape or incest. Twelve! There are only 100 senators so that means if they all win there will be at least 1 in 8 senators holding this extreme position. These people are so convinced that their religious convictions are right that they feel that they can in good conscience dictate to the victims of rape that the government has the right to make them criminals if they choose to end their unwanted pregnancy.

In a way, this discussion represents a “de-facto” win for the Religious Right. They have moved the discussion to their side so much that they are able to concentrate on just the extremes. In their world, Roe V Wade is already gone. Let’s remember that it’s still the law of the land and move the discussion back to where it should be. Women still have a choice in this country and it should remain that way. If your religion forbids that choice, that’s fine for adherents to your religion. Most people regardless of religion believe that abortions should be legal, safe, and rare. In a properly educated society with access to birth control, unwanted pregnancies along with abortions would be rare. In Sweden, they believe that every child should be wanted and have much better statistics than we do.

The GOP Senate candidates that have been reported to hold the position that rape victims must be forced to carry their rapists’ babies to delivery are: Richard Murdock (IN), Rick Berg (ND), Michael Baumgartner (WA), Pete Hoekstra (MI), Tom Smith (PA), Todd Akin (MO), Josh Mandel(OH), Deb Fischer(NE), Ted Cruz (TX), John MacGovern (VT), Wendy Long (NY), and John Raese (WV).

While we’re thinking about a women’s right to choose remember the next president will probably appoint a judge or two on the Supreme Court. Something to consider before pulling the lever…

Freedom depends on FreeThought

This is a slogan printed on the side of stainless thermally insulated coffee mugs offered as a reward for joining or renewing membership in FreeThought Arizona. There are similar slogans but this one is unique to us. The “board” came up with the slogan. Many were suggested and after a couple of rounds of votes we settled on this simple, short slogan.

FreeThought Arizona is a scientific SkeptiAtheistHumanist organization that supports the Tucson community. That’s a lot of ground to cover and it is very difficult to capture all that in one short blurb. The former editor of this blog shares his thoughts:

Does Freedom Depend on Free Thought? That’s the inscription on the mug. Can there be a free society in which its members all think alike and never deviate from the way the group thinks about anything? In theory, it is possible. If knowledge about every subject is so well distributed that everyone reaches the same conclusion on their own you might have that. Our own society nearly approximates this in regard to certain once-disputed facts like the Earth being round. In practice, knowledge about many things is not so evenly distributed. And there is no way to know, a priori, which side of disputed issues is actually correct. People have historically dealt with this either by conforming to what the majority of the group thinks, or by continuing to discuss their differences as long as there is disagreement. The latter approach is consistent with the idea of free thought, since thinking differently is much more useful if the reasons behind different thinking are discussed rather than concealed. The latter approach is also characteristic of free societies. The more conformist a culture, the less freedom that culture tends to allow. In this sense, I agree with the statement, “Freedom Depends on Free Thought”.

On another note:

Roy Zimmerman will make another pass through Tucson soon. He’s bringing his “Starving Ear” virtual nightclub and global meeting place with him. He’s been on the road for months spreading his message. He’s taken his show through 49 states playing songs such as “Vote Republican,” “Hope, Struggle, and Change,” and “Creation Science 101.”  If you like your music slightly folksy and progressive, you shouldn’t miss his live performance:

Friday, Nov. 2   8 pm   TUCSON, AZ

Hope, Struggle and Change
with special guest Ted Warmbrand!

Southside Presbyterian Church
317 West 23rd Street
Tucson, AZ
$15 or pay what you can

Here is another incredulous entry from Jim Wilson:

Americans display disinterest, distrust, or illiteracy when it comes to science. They enjoy their smart phones and the other toys and conveniences science produces, but few delve further than that. Many felt a sense of nationalistic pride with the landing of the Curiosity rover on Mars in August but these moments seem all too infrequent. On a given day, there is more interest in sports or celebrities than scientific issues. Too many in this country reject scientific thinking in favor of new age superstition or ancient religious nonsense.

Today’s case in point is US House Rep. Paul Broun from Georgia; he recently told an audience at Liberty Baptist Church that:

 God’s word is true. I’ve come to understand that. All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the Big Bang Theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell. And it’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior. You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I’ve found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth. I don’t believe that the Earth’s but about 9,000 years old. I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That’s what the Bible says. And what I’ve come to learn is that it’s the manufacturer’s handbook, is what I call it. It teaches us how to run our lives individually, how to run our families, how to run our churches. But it teaches us how to run all of public policy and everything in society. And that’s the reason as your congressman I hold the Holy Bible as being the major directions to me of how I vote in Washington, D.C., and I’ll continue to do that.

In other words, we have a superstitious, religious zealot in our government who rejects all scientific findings that contradict his favorite story book. The theories he rejects as being conspiracies from Satan himself are the cornerstones of our understanding of the universe. Evolutionary biology, old Earth geology, and the big bang cosmology are consistent with all existing evidence and are contradicted by none of it. The universe we live in makes no sense without these theories. Scientific literacy requires knowledge of these theories. Representative Broun rejects them in favor of willful ignorance.

Can you believe that this superstitious ignoramus is on the U.S. House Committee on Science, Space and Technology which has jurisdiction over NASA, the Department of Energy, EPA, ATSDR, NSF, FAA, NOAA, National Institute of Standards and Technology, FEMA, the U.S. Fire Administration, and United States Geological Survey as well as over federally funded scientific research and development that is not military-related? He shares this position with Todd “legitimate rape” Akin, who recently made news because of his incorrect belief that pregnancies are not likely to result from rape. There is certainly disagreement, among freethinkers about what role government should have in the sciences, but nearly all will agree that if we are to have a science committee the last people on it should scientific illiterates like Broun and Akin.

There are quite a few problems with Broun’s claims that the Bible is a good source of information on how to run society or a family. It is silent on many important issues like Nuclear proliferation, space travel, vaccinations, fossil fuel usage, and television to name a few. The New Testament’s main political instruction is to be obedient to earthly authorities: The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves (Romans 13:1). The Bible’s instructions on family life are completely insane. For example, it prescribes killing rebellious young people as well as family members who suggest you join other religions. Jesus himself was surprisingly anti-family when he said: If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters–yes, even his own life–he cannot be my disciple.(Luke 14:26)

Unfortunately, as of the time of writing Representative Broun is running unopposed. We need to free our government from the influence of superstitious crackpots and scientific illiterates who cling to Bronze Age mythology. Science has endless potential for improving our lives and our understanding of the universe we live in. We need law makers who understand this, rather than ones who want to base policy on primitive stories and outdated belief systems.