Shion

I hate to be sexist sounding here, but I think females have more of a tendency towards spiritual practices and religion, because of their nature biologically. Females carry and give birth to babies, after the invasive practice of penetrative sex, and for many, many years this whole process could not be explained by knowledge of the body. So females probably developed both a social network and a need to trust outsiders as a means for survival. Most ancient cultures reinforced this subconscious tendency by providing the majority if not all the services women required for their reproductive healt

I'm a female atheist, and I might go even so far as to say I am an anti-theist.

Easter is always the wannabe Christmas.

We are born into a world where we can observe the death of all living things in their own ways and in their own time. I don't believe knowing about the 100% death forecast can be equated to the self fulfilling prophecy. We don't have to conceptualize this to be true. Bacteria that have no consciousness come in and out of existence without having a concept of what that is. It is a naturally occurring phenomenon and a rather necessary one. If people didn't die, we would have no need to create more people. No new people, the ideas stagnant after awhile. I think of death as a good thing, although

Ok, I haven't read Becker's book. Wikipedia's article was somewhat lacking in detail. So I will move on from that point. Buddhism seeks to transcend the mind from 'suffering.' Death really doesn't 'cause' suffering, but the feeling of loss on the part of the living that does, or even the fear of it as an individual or as a group. And suffering could be caused by all types of things in life that make death look like a picnic. So what is suffering? Biologically it is a pain response to our environment, developed to keep our mass of replicating cells out of danger. On an emotional scale, pai

A little off topic, but isn't Set evil? I mean he butchers his brother(Wesir/Osiris) at a party so he can steal a throne in front of his sisters and wife. How is that any better than worshiping Yahweh? (I'm not trying to start a fight, I'm just looking for clarification.)

I don't care if May 21 is judgment day as long as I get to see the new Pirates movie before hand, it can rain fire for all I care.

Great post and far too true. I have met people who literally believe that __________ deity/demigod spoke personally to them, and it is impossible to have a logical conversation with them. They usually carry such beliefs and experiences to the grave. But good on Dawkins for having the conviction to stand up with the truth rather than pander to these people out of pity.

From Within It Haunts Us Gray grime slathers me, From within my mind it seeps. Guilt, uncertainty, pride

I always heard this part explained as a spiritual resurrection of the jews who had passed before into the kingdom of god. But wandering zombies is just too hilarious

Personally of the biblical figures, I didn't see David as all that bad. He rules like a typical monarch of that time period. And the psalms as far as their beauty and wisdom are highly overrated. Most of them are knock offs of Sumerian, Egyptian and Babylonian texts just with God singular being replaced with the more colorful local deities of those cultures. There are uncanny similarities between the Psalms and the Hymns to Aten/Aton (varies by translation) for example. And a lot of the stories read like fables, King David was usually a good, powerful, wise king, and then one day got the hots