Posts under ‘Uncategorized’

“For a fact, the Christians stole Christmas. We don’t mind sharing it with them, but we don’t like this pretense of theirs that it is the birthday of Jesus. It is the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun–Dies Natalis Invicti Solis. Christmas is a relic of sun worship.The customs of this time [...]

I am writing this on the shortest day of the year thinking of The Dead. James Joyce’s short-story about friends and family gathered for a holiday celebration in Dublin is one of my favorites. The main character, Gabriel, arrives at the home of his two aunts, who live with their younger niece. The three support [...]

Tony Norman wrote a nice piece about Jamy Ian Swiss in Today’s opinion section. Check it out at the Post-Gazette Web site. And don’t forget to attend Heavy Mental and the Science, Magic, and Skepticism workshop this Saturday.
Here is a write-up from the Trib: Workshop, show reveal how ‘mentalists’ work their magic

One Thing, Real Quick: Sarah Palin’s irrational beliefs are absurd. In this article (another version here), she tells James Dobson from Focus on the Patriarchy that “the election rests in God’s hands.”
Dobson asked whether Palin was discouraged by polls showing the GOP ticket behind. “To me, it motivates us, makes us work that much harder,” [...]

REMINDER: THIS MONDAY!
October 27 - 7:00 PM
Porter Hall, Carnegie Mellon Campus
Join Us for an Evening with
Toni Van Pelt
Director of CFI’s Office of Public Policy in Washington, D.C.
“Promoting Science & Reason in Law and Policy”
Scientific thinking is being challenged culturally in the United States today as never before. Despite the success of science and technology in providing us with unparalleled benefits, [...]

With Halloween just around the bend, this time of year brings to mind crisp cold weather, pumpkins and of course – ghosts, goblins and zombies!  As a rather sensitive person, I never really got too into scary movies or monsters.  I was (and still am a little) afraid of zombies -  It’s a completely irrational [...]

A recent comment on the blog asked an important question: What is Secular Humanism, and why do you adhere to it? One of our CFI-Pittsburgh members, Victor Benard, wrote an excellent essay about Secular Humanism, and I’m reprinting it here with his permission. Enjoy.
What is Secular Humanism? One Humanist’s View
It is a common pastime among [...]

Welcome back to Logical Fallacy Thursday: a brief look at inconsistent reasoning in moderate-to-well-known popular figures. This week, I’d like to examine a few quotes from David Ray Griffin, a leader in the 9/11 Truth Movement and author of two popular books on a supposed government conspiracy behind the September 11th terrorist attacks. I’m going [...]

I saw one of these in my neighborhood yesterday, and the plate frame prevented me from realizing it wasn’t a new kind of PA plate:

Thank the gods it’s Indiana–so far. Does anyone have specific thoughts on these? I understand that there are two major schools of thought about church/state interaction (the neutral view and the [...]

I recently came across this study from the October 3rd issue of the journal Science. It’s about how decreased control over life circumstances increases “Illusory Pattern Perception,” which is the tendency to see connections or meaningful relationships among random data where no such connections exist–basically, it’s apophenia caused by decreased control.
The “decreased control” part of [...]