“You have to start out learning to believe the little lies”

Last updated on: April 9, 2012 at 12:48 am By Leah Libresco

For an explanation of what Weatherwax Wednesdays are all about, read the introduction post. This week’s quote builds on Monday’s post about the impact of the Santa Claus story on children. Unsurprisingly, in Discworld, Christmas is a little stranger. In Hogfather, Death must take over the duties of the Santa-analogue, after an attempt is made on his life. In the passage below, Death explains to his mostly-mortal daughter, Susan, why the Hogfather can’t be allowed to perish. (Note, in Discworld, Death... Read more

Two quick stories about Santa and Empiricism

Last updated on: April 9, 2012 at 12:46 am By Leah Libresco

I really appreciate the personal stories that were shared in the comments thread of yesterday’s post on Santa Claus. I’m going to be returning to some of the more philosophical issues that were raised tomorrow in my Weatherwax Wednesday post (luckily enough, Terry Pratchett wrote an entire book about the Discworld analogue of Santa, so I’ve got some great passages to draw on). For today, I thought I’d just share two stories about my own experiences with Santa growing up.... Read more

Is Santa Claus a Bad Influence on Christian Children?

Last updated on: April 9, 2012 at 12:38 am By Leah Libresco

Thanks to everyone for the lively discussion on last week’s post which necessitated a follow-up and set an agenda for upcoming posts. As always, if you’d like to respond to a Monday Call to Arms in longer form as a guest blogger, please email me at leah (dot) libresco (at) yale (dot) edu. — In my more cynical moments, I sometimes think Santa Claus is God’s greatest gift to atheists. I don’t that mean in the usual, anti-materialist way. The... Read more

Humanist Symposium #57

Last updated on: April 2, 2012 at 11:20 pm By Leah Libresco

Welcome to the Humanist Symposium, installment 57! And just as an fyi, 57 is both an idoneal number and also the smallest number with exactly 10 representations as a sum of 3 distinct primes (thanks, WolframAlpha!) Humanists and the Self Critiquing Humanity wrote a takedown of our modern culture of extreme individualism, which is posited as “one of the three basic unethical ideas which predicate almost all immorality in the world.” Leah at The Whore of All the Earth shares... Read more

7 Quick Takes (7/16/10)

Last updated on: April 9, 2012 at 5:15 pm By Leah Libresco

–1– Hello, visitors from Jen’s Conversion Diary! If you’d like a quick introduction to this blog, you may want to check out yesterday’s post giving a preview of upcoming topics inspired by back and forth with the commenters. Soon to come: why God is not like a hurricane! Why morality is kind of like a hypercube! Hope you stick around for the discussion. –2– I’ve got a new opinion piece up on the Huffington Post today titled “The Only Law... Read more

Coming up on Unequally Yoked…

Last updated on: April 2, 2012 at 11:13 pm By Leah Libresco

Sorry for the slow responses to your comments. I’ve been (foolishly) trying to reply to every point raised at once. To give myself a little time, I’m using this post to outline the major questions I’m going to try to address, and give you a very brief précis of the posts coming up on these topics. Sound off in the comments if I’ve left out a topic you’d like to get feedback on! What is your definition of God? Aristarchus... Read more

Weatherwax Wednesday prorogued this week.

Last updated on: April 2, 2012 at 11:11 pm By Leah Libresco

Due to the very interesting comment threads developing on the posts from the last three days (and since the Discworld quote I’d chosen was in no way relevant to the ongoing discussion), I’ll be substituting a post responding to some of the questions and challenges in the comments. It will go up sometime this afternoon/evening. While I’m doing housekeeping, I should add that I’ll be hosting the Humanist Symposium here next weekend. Check out the link for more information, and... Read more

God’s Place in a Supernatural Bestiary

Last updated on: April 2, 2012 at 11:11 pm By Leah Libresco

Commenter Aristarchus is pretty much in complete disagreement with my weighting of evidence for God in yesterday’s post. Aristarchus said: To be convinced that a god or gods existed, I would need to see some sort of proof of supernatural powers. If someone came to me in a dream and made very specific, unlikely predictions, that I wrote down and talked about at the time, and then those things happened, that would be evidence. (If the event was sufficiently unlikely... Read more

The handy dandy guide to converting me

Last updated on: April 2, 2012 at 11:08 pm By Leah Libresco

Thanks to all the theists who spoke up on last week’s post and told what evidence might convince them that their religion was false. As promised, this week’s challenge takes the opposite tack, asking what could convince atheists that a particular religion was true. As always, if you’d like to respond to a Monday Call to Arms in longer form as a guest blogger, please email me at leah (dot) libresco (at) yale (dot) edu. — While kneeling in the... Read more

“Here I Am, Dressing up as Christ”

Last updated on: April 2, 2012 at 10:56 pm By Leah Libresco

C.S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity was the first apologetic work I read, and two elements immediately rang absolutely true to me. The first is Lewis’s defense of an absolute morality (a law written on the hearts of Men) that is neither evolutionarily or culturally contingent. I am mostly in agreement with Lewis’s treatment of absolute morality (particularly his comment that the Law of Human Nature belongs, like mathematics to the class of real truths). I have frequently found that the... Read more