A reluctant atheist?

I recently went to the cinema to watch Angels and demons. I enjoyed reading the book, which was a fantastic thriller, and enjoyed the movie, which is no less of a thriller than the book.

Cinematic emotions aside, I found it intriguing when Tom Hanks' character, Robert Langdon, gets asked by a priest "Do you believe in God, Mr. Langdon?"

His very diplomatic answer was "I am an academic... My mind tells me that I will never understand God." The priest then asks "And what does your heart say?" to which Langdon responds "My heart tells me I am not meant to...

In these days of personal domestic turmoil, my Angels and demons is stashed in a box out of reach so I could not inmmediately reference the dialog. But it seems that Langdon never uttered those words. Rather, it was CERN's scientist Vittoria Vetra who has a similar dialog in the book as you can see in this link. According to this article, Dan Brown is a believer which may be the reason his "atheist" characters are so reluctant to admit their lack of belief.

What Brown and the author of the article I am linking do not realize is that non-believers are many and are everywhere. As Richard Dawkins indicates in his http://www.outcampaign.org/ site "... atheists come in all shapes, sizes, colours and personalities. We are labourers and professionals. We are mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, sisters, brothers and grandparents. We are human (we are primates) and we are good friends and good citizens. We are good people who have no need to cling to the supernatural."

Given the current state of affairs, I can understand why so many atheists can be so reluctant to admit their non-belief. We are demonized every week in church by the priesthoood and are, very unjustly, blamed for the crime and evil in our world.

Nothing could be further from the truth. If anything, religion may be the real culprit.

I place a strong emphasis on good friends, good citizens and good people. And it looks like popular media is now begining to portrait atheists in a more favorable manner - check the popular TV series House and Bones, where the main characters are very strong atheists.

Like the Gay movement did many years ago, non-believers need to begin working on our image to change the perception that we eat babies for breakfast. We are good people. And we are many.

Join the Out Campaign. Or, if you are a believer, don't hold it against us.

Star Trek Rocks!

Although I am very aware that many of my friends in Guatemala are engaged with other concerns, I could not delay posting my thoughts on this latest installment of the Star Trek franchise, which I finally got to watch last night.

And it was AWESOME!

During the week I read Phil Plait's review of the movie and, after watching the movie, I do see Phil's points. Being a skeptic by nature it is sometimes difficult to suspend disbelief but this movie made it easy: it was so engaging it was difficult not to follow...

And (spoiler alert!) the "parallel timeline" premise in the movie was, I think, a stroke of genius by the writers! Not only it allowed the movie to break away from established canon in an unprecedented and fully trekkie-acceptable manner but it also left the door open for more non-canon trek movies where further exploits of Kirk, Spock and the gang can be explored in a whole new universe.

The full 126 minutos of this movie are trekkie-candy. I got to see (more spoilers ahead!) how Kirk beat the infamous Kobayashi Maru test, which as I told my wife during the movie, every trekkie knows he passed by cheating... And, yes! there is a bikini-clad green girl!

Go see the movie! And check this fun review!

New look for the Chapin Skeptic

Thanks to my good friends Adelou and Guillermo I have changed today the look of The Chapin Skeptic. The new layout allows for wider images and videos and (I think) looks cool as well. The picture above was sourced from the Wikipedia Commons and depicts, among other things, the Horse Head Nebula, which features prominently in one of good doctor Asimov's Foundation books.

Hope you like it.

Another one bites the dust!

Father Alberto Cutié from Hispanic on line

It was inevitable. Young, dashing, handsome father Alberto Cutié became a celebrity hosting his talk shows on Telemundo and EWTN, where he intelligently discussed everyday issues and gave catholic advice. He is perhaps the best known priest in Latin America and many tourists, myself included, have attended mass in Miami Beach at his charming little church. Newsweek dubbed him "father Oprah" which he preferred to "father Springer" and "father Cristino" (after Cristina Saralegui, another well known latin talk show hostess).

Just two days ago, pictures surfaced showing father Alberto kissing and getting his hand under the lower backside of his female companion's bathing suit. Bid scandal ensued. The paparazzi who took the pictures shopped them around, apparently asking as much as US$700,000, which apparently no one gave him. Finally he sold them to the mexican magazine TVNotas, which apparently is publishing them tomorrow, Thursday.

Unlike so many other priests involved in scandal, Father Alberto is too high profile not to punish. He has been removed from his parish and taken out of his church-sponsored media activities in radio and TV, as well as print.

His website http://www.padrealberto.net/ is featuring a public apology to all his fans. All other content has been removed.

I always liked father Alberto even if I did not agree with his catholic views. It is hard not to sympathize now, as so many of his parishioners have indicated. After all, he is just a man.

The point is, who is the culprit? Dogmatic catholics will indicate the man is the culprit. I submit that, with so many examples and cases of priest-related scandals, what is at fault is the system.

Celibacy is too much to ask of a young, healthy, personable and good looking celebrity priest. As I discussed with a friend today, a man like that does not find it difficult to get female companionship. I guess being a priest doesn't make it much harder.

Is obedience more important than chastity?

Picture from the Telegraph. Follow this link to read the article.

Is obedience more important than chastity? Ask Fernando Lugo, former priest and catholic bishop and, now, president of Paraguay.

Father Lugo has caused quite a stir, both in Paraguay and elsewhere, when in the last two weeks three women came forward claiming he had fathered their children. First one was Viviana Carrillo, 26, who got father Lugo to acknowledge the claim. Apparently she was 16 when the relationship started. Her son is two. (There are unconfirmed reports that she has moved in with the president). Then it was the turn for Benigna Leguizamón, who was 17 when she started working at the bishop's house and allegedly gave birth to Lugo's child, who is now 6. I can't help but notice that, because of their ages, father Lugo was carrying on with Benigna and Viviana at the same time. Both Benigna and Viviana requested parental support for their children.

As if that was not enough, just this week another woman showed up with a child. This time it was Damiana Morán. Unlike the other two, Damiana was not father Lugo's parishioner but a church activist and she was claims to have been dazzled by the bishop's personality and charm. Her son is a year and half old. Also, unlike the other two, she has no monetary claims on the president.

While the whole bruhaha does not seem to be harming father Lugo politically, since Paraguay is a very conservative and macho country, his opposition is latching on to the scandal to try to get some mileage for their cause. Even one of the cabinet ministers, Mrs. Gloria Rubin, who is the minister for women (an interesting title) is claiming she and her ministry will stand behind any other women who has any further paternity claims.

And rumour is, there will be more. This week, bishop Rogelio Livieres indicated that, as early as 2004, the church was aware of father Lugo's dalliances as two women presented written complaints to Monsignor Antonio Lucibello, the papal Nuncio in Paraguay. Apparently, this complaint prompted father Lugo's resignation from his post. As is usual in these cases, the priesthood quickly swept the trash under the rug and kept mum about the whole deal, as the offender was safely out of the way.

The Roman and Apostholic Catholic Church does not need any more scandals. Unfortunately for them, none from Pope Ratzinger down seems to notice or care. And father Lugo could easily have avoided this ordeal had he chosen to break both his obedience and chastity vows. It turns out that he was only delinquent on the chastity, as he obeyed his superior, the Pope, while committing the deed: he did not use a condom.

What is man?

Picture from SFbook.com. Posted under fair use policy. No rights implied or assumed.

The three laws of robotics:

1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.

2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.

3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.

Isaac Asimov. Runaround (Astounding Science Fiction, March 1942)

In Bicentennial Man (the story, not the Robin Williams movie which is a poor adaptation of the good doctor's work), Dr. Asimov tells the story of Andrew, an NDR series robot who struggles to become human and finally accomplishes it. Bicentennial Man is yet another fantastic tour de force by Dr. Asimov, a fantastic insight into what means to be human... even though the story is about a robot.

I found today another robot story that explores the meaning of being a man. Article of faith, by Mike Resnick (Baen's Universe, october 2008 and EP193 of Escape pod) goes into the tricky question of whether a robot has a soul. (Article of faith, by the way, is a 2009 Hugo Nominee. If you don't know what an Hugo award is, there is always Google...)

Regardless of whether a soul is an attribute of either man or machine, both Dr. Asimov and Mr. Resnick have hit the nail on the head: being man is not about shape or origin but about the ability to think and reason. Both Andrew (Bicentennial Man) and Jackson (Article of faith) while made of metal and with plenty of bolts and nuts, thought like a man and struggled to find their place in the universe; in both cases, that quest ultimately meant their demise: by choice, in the case of Andrew and by violence, in the case of Jackson.

Who knows if we will ever be able to generate artificial intelligence so capable that it may struggle with these deep questions. But science fiction is always at hand, to prod us into thinking and speculating on the possibilities.

And I just heard someone saying that impossible just means I don't know how to do it...

We are in good company

I got a link to the list of the 50 most brilliant atheists of all time. I recommend to read the list, it is a fascinating read. And interesting to know that we share our non belief with such distinguished people like

• Stephen Hawkins
• Steve Wozniak
• Warren Buffet
• Katherine Hepburn
• Jodie Foster
• PZ Myers
• Richard Dawkins
• Richard Leaky
• Sigmund Freud
• ... and 41 others

Years ago, I used to think that if almost everyone believed in God, God's existence must be real. Now that I know better I realize that this line of thought is an argument "ad populom" or, in other words, a generalization.

Truth is not a popularity contest but the concordance between our judgement and the facts; actually, as we all know, truth can be very painful and unconfortable...