Tuesday, February 27, 2007

Atheism

Richard Dawkins’ atheism arguments
The “No one should believe in God because there is no scientific evidence” argument I find unconvincing because I believe loads of stuff that I cannot prove

1.Other people having consciousness. We just assume they do but it is impossible to prove. Even if you hook up an MRI and say their brain lights up in the same way as yours does that does not really prove they have a true inner life. We kind of just have to assume that they do.

2.Mental illness. Believing in god is not that different to believing in schizophrenia in terms of evidence available. Yes something weird is going on but we do not know what it is so until we do locking people up and forcibly drugging them seems a bit harsh.

3.Smell, you fancy your partner because of their smell. This is impossible to rationalise to some primitive reptilian part of your brain. Your sense of smell responds not to logic and reason but genetics. No amount of reasoning can make you fancy someone.

I am fascinated by anti-cryptography how to make a message so simple anyone can decode it without any of the assumptions we usually make when sending messages. Have a look at the Arecibo Message Take a few minutes to try figure out the message we sent into space it will give you some idea how difficult it is even to try operate without all the discrimination, presumptions and stereotypes we use all the time.

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