Reading

Happy Inauguration day.
Reading has been an important part of my life for about seventeen years. It started with the Narnia books, traveled to Tolkien, bloomed into SF and then expanded beyond. If we ever have kids, then I hope to encourage reading in the wee ones. Outside of the benefits of learning and brain development, I think one of the most important things is the constant challenge in perspective. We all look at the world in slightly different ways. Sometimes in vastly different ways. Reading can challenge our preconceived ideas. From blogs on the internet to Mark Twain, rarely will authors let us sit comfortably with our ignorance. Yes a person can sit within one genre and thought, but the true gift of reading is to find books that don't reinforce what you already think. This is the true fear of the fundamentalist, and why books get banned. It just occurred to me, that's why I not longer go to "Christian" book stores. I think that's why I always loved SF, it shows you the possibilities. Where ideas can take you, or the consequences of current actions. It's amazing what people like A.C. Clarke foresaw in their writing. They can also tell really cool stories, that are just fun to read. Terry Pratchett is brilliant in this way. He makes me fall down laughing, but also pokes fun at how we look at the world.
Why did I feel the need to write about this? I guess because the written word gives me hope. As long as ideas can be passed around, then the fundamentalist can't make the rest of us stay static. Also, once again America has a president that values learning and it looks like he is going to end the war on science. I think it's telling that one of the insults in the election was 'elitist', which, as far as I could tell, meant that you could read.
"Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings."
Heinrich Heine 1933

Ethics

Something that I have varied my beliefs in is ethics or how we view right and wrong. Are things good and right whether God exists or not, or are they only good because 'God' says so?
I am not a moral relativist, I lean towards things being good and evil all the time, and yet I realize most of what I think of as good is culturally influenced.
I have heard it said, "If I did not believe in God, then I would do whatever the hell I wanted."
I think that is the moral equivalent of being a child. It's as if I only do something because my parents say so, but have not considered the reason or thought behind the action. It is also the sort of thinking that leads people to commit horrible acts because their religion tells them to, and I reject that.
It's a topic I feel the need to think about more, and this is a short post, but that's what I am pondering at the moment.
Scott

Recovery

It's been two months, my only new years resolution is to write in this every Tuesday morning.
I had a realization last night, I am a recovering fundamentalist. Between 1999 and roughly 2004 I went all out with my Christian faith, in how I thought it was supposed to be practiced. Which would be the Christianity of Spurgeon, Robert Murray McCheyne, Lewis, and modern teachings of that sort. With hindsight, I would say I ignored reason and objectivity and just went 'balls to the wall'. God and Jesus were all I cared about, and figuring out how to live life for them was my goal. From the position I am in now, I am amazed that I was able to be freed from that. It's hard when I think about it, and I have a lot of mixed emotions about it. I will admit, it was good times, the travels, and the peace in thinking you understand how the universe works was comforting.
I obviously still have aspects of that time still working in me, one is the need to proselytize whatever I think is important. I'm fairly social anyways, so it's hard to just let things slide.
Not everything I learned during that period was of no use, and it did teach some valuable lessons. Moving on from then has been hard, and understanding from the few very close to me has helped. Some of the fundamentalist teachings can be good, think sermon on the mount variety, but a lot of it can also be very very harmful.
Moving on from here, something that I want to work on more in how I view the world is summed up in the famous quote from Spinoza,
"I have made a ceaseless effort not to ridicule, not to bewail, not to scorn human actions, but to understand them."
S.
Oh, and I am super stoked that my brother and sister in law both got me a subscription to Skeptic.