30. An Atheist's Christmas Playlist

Nearly everything I have to say with regards to my favorite holiday was already stated in last year's post. So, to avoid repeating myself (and because I'm too busy to offer more just now), I'll instead use this space to torment you with some awesome yuletide tunes.






You'll notice they all press upon the same shared human desires; the universal need for closeness, comfort, remembrance, and love. Here's to you, dear reader, in the hope that your holiday season brings these each in abundance.

29. Put that in yer pipe.

Here's an amusing little tidbit...

In ASL (Sign Language), the word "belief" is conveyed by signing "thought" and following immediately into the sign for "marriage". Literally, "the thought to which you're married".

Divorce attorneys, look sharp.

28. *Insert Hokey "Method to Madness" Joke Here*

In keeping with the educational theme...

We're all too aware that our nation is falling further and further behind on the scholastic front. As schools continue to trudge through a lack of funding -- cutting programs, lowering wages, and reducing report cards and permission slips to advertising space for local businesses in an attempt to keep their heads above water -- it's distressing to think the problem isn't likely to improve anytime soon.

However, there is at least one area in which we can still claim to be competitive.

ScienceDaily (Feb. 1, 2009) — “A study of college freshmen in the United States and in China found that Chinese students know more science facts than their American counterparts (averages: 90% versus 50%) -- but both groups are nearly identical when it comes to their ability to do scientific reasoning.”

The silver lining sounds nice, right? Until you realize that both groups did relatively poorly on the reasoning end of things. And this is nothing new. Time and time again, studies have shown that students often pick and choose which set of facts to accept and which to ignore when it comes to dissecting a large body of information.

I often refer to the scientific method, but in researching our nation's educational standing it occurs to me that a too-large majority of students genuinely may be learning science purely as stand-alone facts, rather than learning the underlying procedure for reaching conclusions, which is the heart and soul of scientific thought.

So here it is, in a nutshell; the scientific method:

The above can be reduced to four basic steps.

Step 1: Characterization (Question)

This is where you define the subject. Measurements and observations, to the front. On the double.

Step 2: Hypothesis (Question)

This would be your wild-ass attempt to explain said definitions, measurements, and observations.

Step 3: Prediction (Question)

No, you're not going all wiggy on this one. If your hypothesis is correct, something should logically and predictably follow. Put away the Magic Eight Ball and break out the Holmesy deduction skills.

Step 4: Experiment (Question)

I believe this one speaks for itself: test, test, test.

Wash, rinse, repeat, and keep repeating. It's a continuing cycle, not a one-time recipe. And, as the parenthesized after-bits would suggest, question everything.

27. Dude, Where's My Edukashun?

I used to write poetry.

Don't laugh; this is a serious moment for me.

… I mean it. *Insert finger-wag and angry mother eye-squint.*

Most of it was… just terrible. Unjustifiably criminal, if we're being generous. Don’t worry, I’m in talks with an up-and-coming midlife crisis who assures me that this schmaltzy segment of my life is well behind me. Suffice it to say that some creative outlets are better left to random scenes in "Hotel Chelsea" and women with a questionable taste in hats.

But if you'll be so kind as to bear with me for a bit of disaffected spewing, I do have a point to make. Honestly.

In sorting the filing cabinet yesterday morning, I rediscovered this nugget of literary pyrite. It's dated nearly a decade ago, in the early years following my deconversion:

~ Doctrine of Deceit ~

Whispers dripping from the mouth in

Ghastly, honeyed clots.

Seduce the empty spaces in your head,

Between your thoughts.

Canonized and righteous.

Worshiped and renowned.

A desecrating piety

Enthralled within its crown.

What falsities are deified

By empty sight, ambition!

What sloughing off of hope and truth,

Turns Reason to contrition!

Consciously, your mind objects.

You cast its questions down.

Quietly, your soul reflects.

But peace will not be found.

Your searching hands are empty.

You know it will amount

To only bitter absence in the end.

In fealty to inconstancy,

You sacrifice your own.

The beauty of all life and truth

Debased before the thrones

Of impostors, thieves, and gluttons

Whose lies describe your cell.

They told you to believe.

And so…

You sacrificed your Self.

It's easy enough now to look back on the "poor me" sentiment with embarrassment. At the same time, I'd nearly forgotten ever having felt the emotions behind the rhyme: the anger, the disgust with yourself for your oh-so-human capacity to be sorely and solidly duped. Taken in by the Gestalt law of the whole, the dramatic imagery, you have difficulty avoiding resentment in learning that the big shebang is NOT greater than the sum of its parts. Many of you who've come down from the religious high will understand these feelings well, but for any who may be visiting from the other side of the river, I should maybe clarify that this wasn't anger toward a deity for any failing, real or imaginary. (To quote a good friend, "That's akin to being angry with Santa for not leaving a shiny new car beneath the Christmas tree.") Nor was my resentment directed at the well-meaning family, friends, and faithful tutors who'd raised me in the confines of a collective delusion. Rather, it was the recognition of what I'd lost to the religious method of reasoning. Namely... reason itself.

See, in my small-town school, topics like evolution, physics, and the role of government in civilized society were glossed over in favor of pseudo-religious mottos and a rather one-sided view of the most-touted constitutional amendments. The home ec. teacher read daily from a certain moral-filled compilation of short stories, sticking exclusively to the tales with a Latter Day Saint (Mormon) bent. The science teacher openly proclaimed that biological complexity was proof of a creator. The government teacher was (luckily) shot down in his desire to show graphic footage of a late-term abortion in class to support his argument that a god-based Republican viewpoint was the only justifiable position for any true American. Amusingly, the one teacher who succeeded in keeping religion wholly separate from the classroom is now a Mormon bishop. Abstinence-only programs were a given – so naturally, the district had an astounding per capita measure of teen pregnancies. And, apart from an ongoing argument over the sidelined inclusion of the words “natural selection” in our biology books, no one objected. We’re often alarmed when we hear of the legal battles over what can and cannot be taught in schools. But what’s more alarming is the awareness that there are many places in America where these battles should take place, but probably never will. Because the truth of the matter is that small-town life (at least in this section of the country) is driven by religious precepts. In a town of 400 farmers, ranchers, and missionaries, there was no such thing as a secular family. No left-of-the-aisle arguments, no open discourse, no counterweight.

I didn't attend college largely because I wasn't expected to. In this atmosphere, on a blunt day, college is for people with penises. And what little schooling I did obtain was marred in its scientific honesty by a faith that valued subjugation over intellectualism.

In short, I feel -- profoundly, and with the utmost sense of regret -- that I am less educated, and quite possibly less intelligent, than I should be.