Not so anymore. I’ve just started reading the decision in Newdow v. Rio Linda today, in which the 9th Circuit ruled that the current wording of the pledge is perfectly constitutional. I don’t have much knowledge of the law, but there are some things that stick out at me about this.

One, the decision holds that the words “Under God” don’t violate the Establishment Clause because the purpose of their inclusion was “to foster national unity and pride.” In other words, because the purpose was not to establish a religious viewpoint, the phrasing does not violate the Establishment Clause. But the Lemon test has two parts: purpose and effect. While the government’s purpose in adding the words “Under God” to the pledge may not have violated the First Amendment, its effect is certainly to discriminate against those who hold no theistic belief. If the purpose is to foster national unity, but the effect is to imply that only God-believers are true patriots, how is this not an establishment of religion?

Two, the decision holds that “not every mention of God or religion by our government or at the government’s discretion is a violation of the Establishment Clause.” The decision goes on to mention some decisions by the Supreme Court to uphold such actions, such as the display of the Ten Commandments at the Texas State Capitol. The decision goes on to claim that, were we to focus on the religious aspect of government actions, we would have to overturn these actions on the basis of the Establishment Clause. Not only would we have to remove “Under God” from the Pledge, but we would also have to strike the Ten Commandments monument, and the Nativity scenes on public property, and the explicitly Christian prayers outside so many police stations. To which I say: It would be about time! All of these are unwarranted uses of public funds to favor one religious view over another. The Supreme Court’s position that they are valuable for their “history” is laughable, given how divisive they are.

Finally, the decision references the Founding Fathers’ belief that “people derive their most important rights, not from the government, but from God: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.’ ” Well, the Declaration of Independence might refer to a Creator (not necessarily to a God), but it is not the highest law of the United States. The Constitution has that honored place, and it makes no mention whatever of a God. A cursory glance at the Preamble reveals that it is We the People, not God, who endow ourselves with rights, among them freedom of religion.

This is a bad decision in a long line of bad decisions in Establishment Clause cases. For the foreseeable future, at least, it looks like I will be dragging my students through a Pledge that divides this Nation right down the middle.

I just read a delightfully curmudgeonly piece by everyone’s favorite curmudgeon, PZ Myers, in which he lambastes Thanksgiving for its mindless direction of gratitude at a cold, unfeeling universe. The point seems to be that, since there is no sentient being out there to receive this gratitude, the gratitude itself is a pointless exertion of energy. After all:

We’re all doomed. We are currently survivors by luck, sustained by selfish processes, and I don’t thank luck, because she (if she were an autonomous self-aware agent, and she isn’t) will turn for me or against me without concern for my feelings. Nature is not appeasable, get over it.

He goes on to imagine how unlucky turkeys would feel this time of year, if unlucky is something they know how to feel. It’s difficult to argue that.

I think he misses the point, though. Why should gratitude be pointless just because it’s not directed at anyone in particular? Isn’t the feeling of gratitude itself a pleasant thing? Doesn’t it help to teach us not to take our existence for granted? When I feel gratitude for someone, I generally want to return the favor, or at the very least, make sure that the generosity at which the gratitude is directed does not go to waste. Certainly a cold, unfeeling universe is incapable of generosity, but the fact is that we live in a tiny blip of oasis in a yawning, roaring chasm of quenchless unlife. It’s the only such blip we know about. Perhaps if people felt more grateful for its existence, more would be interested in protecting it.

Besides which, there is a different between gratitude and groveling. Gratitude feels good. Groveling doesn’t. It’s perfectly possible to feel warm, wholesome gratitude at the fact of being alive, without groveling before some imagined supernatural benefactor.

Daniel Dennett put it best: Thank Goodness! He, of course, was referring to the goodness of human beings, but I don’t think it needs to stop there. There’s no shame in feeling grateful at being alive in a universe which, as inhospitable as the better part of it may be, is staggeringly beautiful, and endlessly wonderful.

Thank goodness for that.

Walla Walla is not an especially friendly place for LGBT people. Referendum 71, Washington’s “everything but marriage law,” received about 6,000 votes for and 9,000 votes against here. For that reason, it was with some trepidation that I marched holding one side of the Walla Walla PFLAG banner.

Some, but not much. I firmly believe that equal rights for LGBT people is one of the great civil rights causes of our time, and I was prepared to face any kind of opposition in standing up for it. I held one corner of the banner in one hand, and a smaller sign reading “Don’t ask, who cares?” in the other. I smiled and waved good morning at everyone we passed on the way, whether the answer was a stony-faced silence or a warm-hearted wave in return.

When our group was announced at the center of the parade, a small but vocal smattering of spectators raised raucous applause. Certainly many of them, if not all, were a part of the 6000 I mentioned earlier. For this reason, the smile I wore through the march lasted long after, even as my rain-soaked clothes continued to dry.

I carried two flags today, representing two entities in which I believe absolutely. One is participatory democracy, in which any group of people, if their cause is just and their will resolute, can bring about change. The other is equal rights for all, and no rights withheld from any minority provided they do not clash with the rights of others. Both causes were represented in force today on Walla Walla’s Main Street. May that ever be so.

In Star Wars costume.

Here I am waiting to see Kirk and Spock pummel each other (like in the trailer), and I see Jar Jar Binks, Luke Skywalker, and Princess Leia sit in front of me, waving their cheap plastic light sticks at each other. I almost tapped one of them on the shoulder to remind them what movie they were about to see.

I mean, what’s with that? Can’t we all just live in peace, without provoking each other with antagonistic cosplaying? They’re lucky I didn’t have my phaser. I would have set it to “melt fanboys.”

I just returned for an unhoped-for opportunity to see Star Trek before its ostensible opening day tomorrow. Being a huge Star Trek nerd for as long as I can remember, I’ve been looking forward to this movie with an uncomfortable mix of excitement and trepidation for well over a year, and while I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, it was definitely not what I expected.

What I expected, at the least, was a sort of analog of the recent superhero movies: an introduction to the characters, against an impending calamity that introduces them to each other. This it was, right down to John Cho as the slightly less baritone but kickass younger version of Sulu. Also on par with my expectations, and awesome, was the look and feel of the film. Unlike the six movies starring the original cast, much of the visual and sound design was clearly inspired directly by the original TV show. That, and the ludicrous hand-to-hand fight scenes.

As much as the film was true to the source material, however, it mangled up canon in an enormous way. I won’t say much more about it, because if you care enough to be reading this post, you’ll be seeing the movie anyway, but trust me. J.J. Abrams and the lot mean a lot more than you think when they call this a “franchise reboot.”

Lest I confuse, I loved the movie, and I’ll likely be seeing it again. Having said that, I wouldn’t be a true fanboy if I didn’t rant for a while about some minor glaring inconsistencies with canon and reality for a few paragraphs. You’ve been warned!

First off, I wonder if I’m alone in thinking that Spock’s dialogue was a bit wooden. Of course Spock has always spoken in a formal manner, but with precision and a characteristic distinction. Either this was missing with Quinto’s Spock, or I’m just not used to the new voice and I want to make more of it than that.

Next, red supergiants go supernova. Big, big stars that have already depleted their fuel. Not pristine, yellow stars in the primes of their lives.

Third, what in the heck is an “inert reactant?” Didn’t anybody tell the set designers that that’s an oxymoron?

Fourth, I don’t know the requisite mathematics, but I would think that a black hole massive enough to devour an Earth-sized planet in under a minute would have a larger event horizon than the one in the movie. But I could be wrong.

And lastly, what’s with that thing that hangs around Scotty?

That’s enough for now. I’ll probably pick up more things to bore you with when I see it again, as I inevitably must. Let’s hope the next one has them boldly going where no one had gone before Picard came along.

A lot of it is cute little stickers and temporary tattoos of Darwin, but at the heart of the effort is a push to get evolution taught to young children. Purrington advocates what every education expert should already know: children are perfectly capable of understanding evolution, and the only reason they do not learn about it is indoctrination in their early years and the delay into high school of the introduction of the concept. As Purrington says:

The notion that young kids cannot understand evolution is a myth perpetuated by those who don’t want kids to understand evolution.

I’ll be starting a unit on evolution soon in my high school biology class, and I’ll certainly be using some of these materials. (I should be right in time for Darwin Day!) Check it out; it’s wonderful, and the author’s self-effacing humor is quite charming.

Jeff’s comment was completely unrelated to that post. Instead, it was a self-styled “critique” of a speech Forrest apparently gave at a Southern Methodist Church. In the interest of promoting good science, and because I have little better to do, I have deleted Jeff’s comment and reproduced it here. I have attempted to counter his specious and often ludicrous arguments with some semblance of objective rationality.

It’s long. I hope you have too much free time as well!

A Critique of Barbara Forrest Speaking at Southern Methodist
Video found at Littlegreenfootballs.com

7:33 – 7:37

Here is the set-up by Ms. Forrest. Her claim is that the proponents of I.D. are trying to -

“…wedge into the public mind that science requires a supernatural designer, that it requires God.”

She has skewed the argument from the very outset. It is not “science” but life that requires a supernatural designer. That she would say this makes sense as the notion that “evolution is science” is often expressed by adherents to Darwinism – and it is simply wrong. This tactic, equating evolution with science, is understandable – if one dares to dissent from Darwin, then it follows: he is antiscience and his arguments can be dismissed as a religious zealotry. This tactic provides for the end of all dialogue and any further serious consideration of your opponent’s position.

Never mind that no Intelligent Design theorist has ever published original research that establishes the need for a supernatural creator. Never mind that ID has no theory, no data, no predictions, and no practical applications. Never mind that there is not a shred of scientific validity within a parsec of ID. It’s obviously science, and obviously anyone who disagrees is a slavering brand-wielder in the Darwinian Inquisition.

I hope the rest is this comical!

Ms. Forrest makes it clear: those questioning and critiquing the claims of Naturalism are engaged in “Stealth Creationism.” Ms. Forrest, however, then goes on a lengthy critique of the ideas she opposes and the message is clear: Critique of Darwin is inherently sinister, based on “stealth” (secret and subversive) motives. Extensive critiquing (her words) of Intelligent Design Theory (or any other theory) is fair play. Questions can be asked in one direction but not the other.

Note that Jeff doesn’t provide any quotes here from Forrest’s speech. We just have to rely on his gut reactions to Forrest’s words. Since many creationists tend to be paranoid conspiracy theorists, this is no surprise.

The truth, as all rational people know, is that evolutionary theory is not only open to critique, it is under critique constantly. This is why new ideas are so hard to introduce, and why the truly powerful ideas, the ones that survive such intense scrutiny, are able to catch on with such verve. Evolution by natural selection is a champion in this struggle. Intelligent Design is a featherweight, and is only still around because of the whinging litigiousness of its proponents.

Is this how science works? Sadly, yes – this is a common attitude and approach among Naturalists.

It gets even sillier than this, I promise.

15:30
In her critique of Behe’s irreducible complexity, Ms. Forrest says dismissively that he presents in “stylized fashion” the flagellum as a little outboard motor, but then goes on to concede that he draws the information from a “legitimate science textbook.” She then condescendingly remarks “he just kind of adopted it” and “the bacterial flagellum is not really a motor.” No kidding? It’s not really a motor, Ms. Forrest? To quote someone famous, it is obvious she is “…straining at a gnat…”

Forrest corrects a bit of Behe’s overzealous enthusiasm over bacterial flagella, and Jeff sees it as “straining at a gnat.” What?

In fact, Behe didn’t discover the bacterial flagellum. The scientist who did, however, was perfectly aware that, as complex as it is, it has “all the earmarks of something that arose through evolution.” In fact, it resembles very closely a simpler structure of a mechanism that other bacteria use to inject toxins into the cells of other organisms. This seems to suggest that a similar structure was co-opted by evolution to produce the flagellum.

Such “exaptation” of existing structures for new purposes is common in evolution. Jeff would know that if he were willing to open a real science textbook.

16:17
She shows a clip “from a legitimate scientific organization.” One has to ask – What legitimizes a scientific organization, their adherence to accepted conclusions?

What legitimizes a scientific organization is their adherence to scientific practices, not conclusions. The organizations that support ID, such as the Discovery Institute, are conspicuous in their complete lack of scientific practices.

Recall that she admitted Behe used illustrations from a legitimate science textbook – though he just “adopted them.” While the video from the “legitimate” Protonic Nanomachine Project shows a flagellum, that, good golly gosh, they have illustrated to look like a motor, with gears and such, Ms. Forrest then says –

16:30
“I’m just showing it to you because I think it’s just really pretty.”

Jeff accuses her of calling opposition to “Darwinism” wicked, and didn’t provide a post to support his claim. Now he’s taking her to task for saying the bacterial flagellum is pretty? I think it’s pretty too, Jeff! So what?

She is showing it to us because she thinks it’s pretty? This is a woman who authored a book on a subject about which she testified in a court of law, a woman from the scientific community who is attempting to persuade her audience to her position, and she is showing us this video clip because she thinks it’s pretty?

How many scientists do you know, Jeff? By the complete lack of understanding of science you demonstrate in this post, I’m going to guess it’s a small number. Scientists are generally quite passionate about the beauty of the order inherent in the universe. Again, so what?

17:20
After stating Behe’s position on irreducible complexity using the mousetrap metaphor, she then draws from Kenneth Miller’s material to refute Behe.

Miller’s “research”

An ID advocate, scare-quoting “research?” That’s the best laugh so far.

consisted of him asking his students to come up with all the things they could do with a mousetrap if they began removing parts, and they arrived at the following: – nose ring, fish hook, toothpick, tie-clip, refrigerator clip, clipboard holder, doorknocker, paperweight, kindling block, catapult, and nutcracker.

Noticeably missing from this list is MOUSETRAP. How does this fact escape an educated person involved in a scientific critique of an idea? The argument from Behe was if you take away the parts, you do not have a functioning whole…which is what Miller’s “research” proves. This is a perfect example of dogma getting in the way of common sense and clear thinking. The statement on the slide says:

“Individual parts of a supposedly irreducible (sic) complex machine are fully functional for different purposes.”

Who would begin to argue that a functioning, purposeful object would still serve as a functioning, purposeful object after it has been stripped of its parts? Ms. Forrest does! -

It is you, Jeff, who is missing the point. A structure can evolve from pre-existing structures, even if the original structures served an entirely different purpose. The feathers that birds use to fly evolved from fluffier, downier feathers possessed by dinosaurs, and these in turn appear to have evolved from scales. The legs that all tetrapods use to walk on land evolved from the fins of fishes. The list goes on forever, Jeff. What’s your excuse?

What Ken Miller’s analogy shows is that the parts of Behe’s much-touted mousetrap serve a long list of purposes in isolation. There is a series of functional intermediates from a plain wooden board to a useful mousetrap. It does not take much imagination to see this.

17:43 – 17:53
What Miller’s “research” shows is that – “Even Dr. Behe’s analogy doesn’t work.”

“I mean, you know, you can take parts off a mousetrap and it still works. Some (stammering speech) you (stammering speech) could work as a mousetrap, or it could work as something else, like a tie-clip.”

As at the outset, a false argument is being attacked. The argument is not that individual parts can’t be used for something else, but that the whole has a specific purpose and does not work without the parts. Let’s be clear, this is no refutation of Behe. To simply state that parts of a mousetrap can be fashioned for some other purpose is no refutation of irreducible complexity, and it certainly is no proof of Naturalism! Intelligence (the students) were sought to determine FUNCTION and PURPOSE for the parts, just as intelligence and design was needed for the mousetrap itself. There was nothing “random” about it!

Again, you’re missing the point. The irreducible complexity argument is meant to show that there are structures that could not have evolved by natural selection, because all parts need to be in place for the structure to function. No such structure has ever been demonstrated to exist. The mousetrap is only functional as a mousetrap with all its parts, but the parts themselves are useful for all sorts of other purposes. That means there is a sequence of functional intermediates between a plain board and a mousetrap. Behe is refuted. So is Jeff.

To finish the quote from someone famous, Ms. Forrest has “…swallowed a camel.”

Maybe Jeff will enlighten me as to who this “someone famous” is.

Moving on to her critique of Dembski, Ms. Forrest is even less persuasive. She states her opponent’s position, remarks that the position has been critiqued by so and so, and then shows pictures of some plants.

21:31- “…but, this (Dembski’s argument) has been scrutinized by many, many capable people…”

How do we know that the people are capable? What are the criteria? It is important to ask these things!

Yeah, it’s important to be able to see people’s research.

(Crickets from the ID camp)

As the slides of flora are shown, the only thing offered is the names of the people who looked at it, found it in a grocery store, and the names of the plants. No evidence or explanation is offered of how Natural processes alone brought these organisms about; just the statement from Ms. Forrest that it happened! The only thing proven is that Ms. Forrest believes that Naturalism can explain what only has “appearance of design.” 22:28

22:30
“…so, Dembski, of course, has been shown to be wrong…”

If he was, it was not in her presentation.

You have not demonstrated that she failed to refute Dembski. You haven’t even noted what she said about him. If, however, you want to know what’s wrong with Specified Complexity, it isn’t hard to find critiques online.

After dismissing Dembski for the same (21:42), Ms. Forrest simply applied her own preferred “conceptual framework” to get the result she wanted. Without any evidence or explanation to the contrary, just on her word alone and those of other “capable people,” we are to believe her.

Folks, this is not science.

Jeff, don’t be silly. Critiques of Dembski are available everywhere! The information is free for the taking! The free exchange of ideas emphatically is science. It is only because of the free exchange of ideas that ID tripe is allowed to persist.

I watched this video until the 35 minute mark and had to leave it alone due to time constraints. It became clear to me what Ms. Forrest’s real argument is, and it is not science. This debate is about the influence of Religion in our educational system with the “foothold” being the open critique of the Naturalist/Materialist view of life.

So you wrote a critique of her presentation, without having watched the whole thing. Classy. Telling, too.

Many, like Ms. Forrest, have accepted a view of science which has left them incapable of free inquiry. A Naturalistic/Materialistic view of life does not open people to new avenues to discovery – to the degree that these views are held dogmatically – it limits them.

Guess what, Jeff? No one is stopping people of a supernaturalistic (whatever that means) bent to do research of their own. So why aren’t they? Why aren’t ID theorists blowing away the scientific establishment with the evidence of the existence of God (whoops, the “Intelligent Designer”)?

Is it because they have no research?

Is it because they have no idea what such research would even look like?

Face it, Jeff, the emperor has no clothes, and his genitals look ridiculous.

The powers that be have declared the acceptable view of Reality. All who dare to question or interpret differently are branded “heretic,” or worse.

What evidence do you have of this? You have not shown that anyone has been persecuted in any serious fashion for espousing ID. Again, no one is stopping them from doing research, and there is certainly a windfall of funding available to anyone willing to try. The Discovery Institute certainly could dig up some funds.

Galileo, anyone?

As a free public service, Jeff, I am going to list the ways in which the ID cronies are not like Galileo.

• Galileo did actual research.
• Galileo’s findings followed from rigorous observation of the natural world.
• Galileo was persecuted because his findings contradicted with religious dogma, not verifiable findings of legitimate science.

In summary Jeff, think about this. Not fifty years ago, it was still illegal in many states to teach evolution. No where would you find ideologues saying “Evolution is one theory, but here’s another.” Creationists opposed evolution because it contradicted their religious beliefs and offended their sensibilities. The ID pushing hypocrites oppose evolution for the same reason, but they’re too bound up in their own attempts to circumvent the Constitution to see it.

The ID camp has bought its own hype, Jeff. You’ve been suckered in by the Wedge strategy. You’ve been hoodwinked into believing that ID is science, when anyone who takes the time to look it up can see in moments that it’s a sham. How does that feel?

The advertising campaign has cost around stg £100,000. It was all started up by — predictably — Professor Richard Dawkins, the neo-Darwinist scientist and atheist campaigner. He put down a deposit of some £8,000, and the rest came from public contributions — mostly from readers of The Guardian newspaper, in which the campaign was publicised.

It says something about the affluence of Guardian readers that, in a time of recession, they can contribute £90,000 to a bus campaign dissing the notion of God.

One note: Richard Dawkins did not begin the campaign. It was started by the Guardian. I thought fact-checking was still a part of journalistic practice. Another: It’s true that over 100,000 pounds were raised, but it is also true that over 8,500 people donated to the campaign. That’s about 15 pounds each, on average. That must count as affluence to this deluded person.

I’ve never yet met an atheist with a sense of joie-de-vivre (unless, in the case of one well-known public atheist, a certain drunken cordiality) most of them seem to be miserable blighters.

How many atheists does she know? Perhaps more pertinently, how many religionists does she know? What does sexual repression and subjugation of women do for people’s happiness? After all, most of the world’s believers live under such conditions, or worse. Have I hit her problem on the head?

Well-meaning folk might suppose that atheists are simply searchingly honest persons who, doubting the tenets of faith and committed to reason and logic, conclude that they just cannot commit to faith.

There may be some of this ilk, but militant atheists, in particular, are deeply unpleasant and caustically intolerant. Any time I have written about this subject, I have received offensive e-mails from militant atheists. While professing themselves to be campaigners for “freedom of thought”, “reason”, and “logic”, their main tool of argument is often personal abuse; they quickly start shrieking that believers are simply “stupid”, or, in the case of a female believer, “a stupid cow”.

“Caustically intolerant”? She must have forgotten what “caustic” and “intolerant” mean. She would have remembered if she had read her own writing. And she wonders why she gets offensive e-mails?

Now, we all know that believers of this particular stripe find the very existence of atheists offensive. The very fact that we are not daily struck by lightning, or found grovelling in leprous huddles in our own filth, is an affront to their worldview. But that does not excuse the use of truly offensive language in countering their delusions.

That said, I feel entirely justified in saying that Mary Kenny, the author of this deeply offensive and profoundly ridiculous column, is stupid.

She is a stupid cow.

(Here’s a nice letter to the newspaper in question that politely puts Mary Kenny in her place.)

My first impression is that six months is an uncomfortably long time to wait. I’m a Star Trek fan, after all. I’d go see this thing if it were titled Star Trek: Klingons on Ice! (Come to think of it, that sounds pretty awesome.)

My second impression is one of trepidation. I’m of course not alone in this. The makers of this film are in a position to manhandle the very heart of Star Trek canon. By recasting the original characters and setting the film in their pre-Enterprise days, they are in a position to completely undo the foundation of the original stories, or even to start Star Trek over from scratch. (The former is known in Nerdish as “retconning.” The second has become known to those prone to fan-rage as a “reboot.”)

From what I’ve seen, J.J. Abrams and the rest don’t intend to let this happen. They intend to stay true to canon. And to their credit, the cast they’ve assembled so far seems to fit with that intention. None of them looks badly out of place in the shoes they’re trying to fill. (Except perhaps for the young James T. Kirk, but no amount of handsome young faces are going to fill those shoes.)

I like what glimpses of the design of the film I’ve seen. They have the bright, clean feel of the original series, with the high-tech gloss that a 1960′s TV budget couldn’t bring to bear. The starship design manages to be new and interesting, while also true to the aesthetic of the show. I’m nothing but excited by the design so far.

That leaves me with one last point of concern. I’m just old enough to have lived through about ten years of Hollywood revisitations of 1960′s and 1970′s TV shows. I’ve sat through enough Brady Bunches, Beverly Hillbillies, Dukes of Hazzard, and even Rocky and Bullwinkles to know that no decade of television is safe from being realized on the big screen, if the whiff of profit is on it. I fear that Star Trek will see this treatment. I fear that there will be too many moments of “Ooh, look how nice the Enterprise looks now!” too many CG-powered space battles, too many strings of technobabble (and “bairns”) and not enough attention to advancing our understanding of the original characters. This is not a rational fear, but I feel it nonetheless.

In any case, I’m extremely excited about this movie, and I’ll be first in line to see it when it opens. Maybe even in uniform. I’ve been known to be precisely that nerdy sometimes.

You’ve probably read about the atheist ads being purchased on buses in London and Washington, DC. The one in London reads, “There’s probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” The one that will run on DC Metro buses reads, “Why believe in a god? Just be good for goodness’ sake.”

Predictably, a lot of religious folk are already screaming “War on Christmas!” Said American Family Association Tom Wildmon:

It’s a stupid ad,” he said. “How do we define ‘good’ if we don’t believe in God? God in his word, the Bible, tells us what’s good and bad and right and wrong. If we are each ourselves defining what’s good, it’s going to be a crazy world.

Said Matthew Staver, chairman of the Liberty Counsel:

It’s the ultimate grinch to say there is no God at a time when millions of people around the world celebrate the birth of Christ. Certainly, they have the right to believe what they want but this is insulting.

(Both quotes from this Fox News article.)

So, we have the tired “how can you be good without God?” crap, and the notion that suggesting that there might be no god is insulting. OK.

If this ad should be insulting to Christians, then what am I to make of Gideon bibles in hotel rooms? Are they insulting to us non-believers? What about church billboards? What about people standing on the street preaching for Jesus, or handing out tracts? Are they offensive enough to warrant being shut down?

To my mind, the response to the DC Metro ad demonstrates why these campaigns are necessary. As long as some people are comfortable in declaring that atheists have no grounds for morals, that their very attempts to express themselves are offensive, that their very existence is offensive, than forms of expression like these ads will be needed to show them why they’re wrong.

No one needs God to be good. God is more than sufficient to make some people bad. Can’t we just leave Him (or Her, or as I prefer, It) aside, and be good for goodness’ sake?