I guess you shouldn’t always trust your doctor

Especially if that doctor is associated with Physicians For Life, an organization of ideologically warped doctors who abuse science to justify anti-abortion screeds. In one article, they carry out a set of weird calculations to trivialize pregnancies from rape. They go through a series of calculations to throw out most rapes (the woman is too old or too young to get pregnant, for instance…which should set off your alarms right there. Child rape is less of a problem simply because they won’t get pregnant?), and then comes to this weird excuse:

Finally, factor in what is certainly one of the most important reasons why a rape victim rarely gets pregnant, and that’s psychic trauma. Every woman is aware that stress and emotional factors can alter her menstrual cycle. To get and stay pregnant a woman’s body must produce a very sophisticated mix of hormones. Hormone production is controlled by a part of the brain that is easily influenced by emotions. There’s no greater emotional trauma that can be experienced by a woman than an assault rape. This can radically upset her possibility of ovulation, fertilization, and implantation.

Does that sound familiar? Missouri congressvermin Todd Akin recently echoed that sentiment, claiming that ‘legitimate rape’ rarely causes pregnancy (and it’s not just Akin — right-wingers everywhere parrot that claim).

Dr Jen Gunter speculates that Akin got his misinformation from Physicians for Life, and also takes apart their claim.

The Physicians for Life site quotes 3 sources, only one is original research. The one article was authored by Goth and published in the New England Journal of Medicine, 1977 (yes, 1977) and in NO WAY SUPPORTS THE NOTION THAT RAPES ARE RARE OR THAT THE STRESS RESPONSE LOWERS THE PREGNANCY RATE. It is an article about sexual dysfunction among rapists. Put another way, the Physicians for Life have not provided a single published article to support their claims. Interestingly, Physicians for Life also promote the long disproven claim that abortion causes breast cancer.

It’s based on nothing but air and lies, in other words.

That’s not an experiment

Only a theist could come up with this one. It’s the Atheist Prayer Experiment; they’re recruiting atheists to say prayers. It’s an amazing pile of sneaky, devious, theological nonsense.

Here’s what we’re supposed to do:

We are asking each atheist who wishes to take part to pray for 2 to 3 minutes a day for 40 days for God to reveal Himself to them.

We would like any reflections, reactions, or revelations (positive or negative) experienced during the experiment to be recorded by participants. This may be video/audio Journal, blog, on a dedicated Facebook page, sent in by email etc.

Any participants need to be willing to record a radio interview about their experience of the experiment, though not everyone who takes part will necessarily be asked to do this.

This isn’t an exercise in appealing to a deity. It’s an exercise in psychology. If you tell yourself something every day over a fairly long period of time, will it affect how your mind works? I suspect the answer would be yes. Just the act of making a commitment to a religious belief and reinforcing it with daily rituals and reflection is going to fuck up your head. Most of us atheists have defenses against it — I couldn’t go through this without grumbling to myself that this behavior is bullshit, and it would probably end up making me even more disgusted with religion (if I bothered to do it, which I won’t) — but it could affect somebody who is gullible and impressionable. There’s nothing in this ‘experiment’ that could provide evidence of a god, but there is plenty of stuff to show that plastic minds exist…which we already know.

So why are they doing this? It’s based on a philosopher’s rationalization for prayer.

The experiment is based on the paper by Oxford philosopher Tim Mawson titled Praying to Stop Being an Atheist. In it Mawson argues that, on balance, it is in the interests of those atheists who don’t think it’s absolutely impossible that there’s a God to investigate the issue of whether or not he exists by ‘the experimental method’ – trying to ask him. Those interested in participating will be sent a copy of the paper.

I haven’t read the paper, and I’m not particularly interested. I did look up the abstract:

In this paper, I argue that atheists who think that the issue of God’s existence or non-existence is an important one; assign a greater than negligible probability to God’s existence; and are not in possession of a plausible argument for scepticism about the truth-directedness of uttering such prayers in their own cases, are under a prima facie obligation to pray to God that He stop them being atheists.

If a god actually existed, it would be an important matter; the fact that in millennia of searching no one has found reasonable evidence of such a being is empirical evidence that there isn’t one. This philosopher doesn’t seem to realize that atheists don’t believe in any gods at all; the reason we are overtly godless is that there are so many people who do. We believe in god-belief, not gods, and we also are pretty damned sure that believing in things that don’t exist is bad for you.

Personally, I assign a zero probability of “God’s” existence, because no one can define specifically what it’s attributes are. Every god that is defined semi-specifically — say, the Catholic god or the Lutheran god — contradicts known aspects of the universe and doesn’t exist. The vague deist’s deity only has a minuscule chance of existing because nothing is specified about its nature, so they reserve the right to label just about anything that does exist as “god” (I also reject that approach — I think it’s dishonest.)

We all have plausible arguments for skepticism: the absence of evidence for this being, the inconsistency of definitions for a deity under different faiths, the godawful nebulous handwaving of believers, and the incompetence of sophisticated theologians in being able to generate reasonable tests for the truth of their beliefs. That Mawson even thinks there is good cause to not be skeptical discredits him.

I am under no obligation at all to practice this guy’s weird magic rituals. Every religion has its own strange practices that believers are quite sure are essential to maintain their relationship with whatever gods they think are floating around; am I obligated to follow every random cult’s beliefs for some period of time? Is he?

Now look at the procedure they expect us to follow:

The question of how an atheist should pray is an interesting one. [No, it’s not.]

Tim Mawson has some suggestions in his paper: the prayer should be kept as open as possible, e.g., rather than ‘God of Christianity; if you’re out there, turn this water into wine for me’, ‘God, if you’re out there, reveal yourself to me’ would be better.

We only ask that anyone taking part commits themselves to finding a quiet meditative ‘space’ and praying there for two to three minutes each day as earnestly as they can for any God that there might be to reveal himself/herself/itself to him or her, and that he or she remains as open as possible to ways in which that prayer could be answered.

As expected, the rule for theologians to keep the story as fuzzy as possible, and to accept any unexpected result as evidence for their specific belief. It reminds me of those idiotic ghost hunter shows that infest television right now: send some people off with night vision cameras and microphones and have them wander about in some dark and crumbling relic of a building, and every odd noise and glitch and cold draft and emotional tremor is frantically reported as a sign of unusual paranormal activity.

That is not an experiment. An experiment would have a clear hypothesis, would define the parameters of the procedure precisely, and would set specific criteria for success or failure of the experimental test. See any of that above? No. It’s just another set of wackos building a pseudo-scientific rationalization for their delusions.

Why I am an atheist – Andrew

I am an atheist,

  • not because I am angry at God.

  • not because I’m rebelling against organized religion.

  • not because I enjoy sinning.

  • not because I’ve been brainwashed by college.

  • not because I’ve been possessed by the devil.

  • not because I like offending people.

  • not because I’m any less of a good person than I was.

  • not because I’m just going through a phase.

[Read more…]

Where are all the Free Inquiry readers?

You know, I’m a regular columnist for that magazine, and if you open up the August/September 2012 issue, you’ll find my latest article, titled Atheism’s Third Wave…which is really eerie given Jen McCreight’s recent post. I don’t think she read it first, I’m pretty sure she’s just psychic…either that, or a whole lot of us are converging on similar ideas right now.

I’ve got a contract with Free Inquiry so I can’t just post it here, but I’ll ask Tom Flynn if he’ll give me a special dispensation, because I think it is part of an important trend in atheism — we need more people speaking out for an atheism that heeds social concerns. If he doesn’t, well, why aren’t you people subscribing?

(Also, take a look at the other articles in that issue…it’s full of stuff about broadening the reach of atheism.)

The Point on Atheism

I was asked to prime a panel discussion on The Point, so I sent them a 2’30” video on whether we should be criticizing Romney for his religion, and then they just cut loose for 15 minutes. James Randi and AJ Johnson and also contributed questions; Michael Shermer, Sean Carroll, and Edward Falzon chewed ’em over, with Cara Santa Maria leading the conversation.

I’ve decided that Sean Carroll is right about everything.

A freethought conference in Dallas

On 15 September, you could attend the Feminine Faces of Freethought Conference in Dallas for only $20. Check it out!

Women of Reason–Dallas presents Feminine Faces of Freethought, a conference featuring women speaking about topics that affect the freethought community as a whole.

Join us for a day of talks by

Panels include

  • Secular Parenting,
  • Diversity in the Freethought Movement,
  • and What Atheist Women Really Want.

We welcome people of all genders.

Childcare will be provided. Please reserve childcare while purchasing your tickets.

Missouri screws up

I don’t know whether it’s by design or fortuitous incompetence, but creationists are masters of the fuzzy statement that opens the doors to all kinds of new opportunities for ignorance. Missouri, for instance, just passed a law giving themselves the freedom to pray (a freedom they already had, which is not in peril) and at the same time, just had to toss in this lovely and dangerous clause: no student shall be compelled to perform or participate in academic assignments or educational presentations that violate his or her religious beliefs.

Raise your hand if you think you can spot the potential problem there.

Missouri has just passed a law declaring that students can opt out of any part of the curriculum that they find objectionable to their faith, and we all know what that means: evolution and climate change are all now optional. And you know that that’s what this clause will be used for, to shut down big chunks of science that contradict religious idiocy.

And look at this. This is why I can’t tell sometimes if creationists are just incredibly stupid or incredibly cunning.

Mike Hoey, a supporter of the amendment and executive director of the Missouri Catholic Conference, thinks that Rosenau is “overanalyzing” the language in the amendment. “I don’t think this will affect science in the classroom in any significant way,” he says. “I think the vast majority of students will want to participate in all units of their science classes.” The amendment makes no mention of providing an alternative curriculum, Hoey adds. So any student who opts out of a biology lesson, he says, “will need to face the consequences” of missing those lessons.

Right. So putting that ‘objectionable’ material on the exams and making grades dependent on learning it will not be considered a way to compel students to perform or participate in work that goes against their religious beliefs? Nonsense. Hoey is being disingenuous here. Of course it will affect how science is taught. There are students who will, even in the absence of deep religious belief, use this clause to exempt themselves from difficult bits of their classwork.

Not only will it affect science teaching, its proponents intend for it to cripple instruction in evolution and any other science that crosses their benighted worldview. Hoey is either a liar or so brainless his eyes probably roll back into his cranium every time he looks up.