Why I am an Atheist

On freethoughblogs' Pharyngula, it's author, the embryologist PZ Myers, asked for submissions for pieces under the title 'Why I am an Atheist'. I've been reading for them for awhile now, and it only just occurred to me that I should probably contribute, rather than just consuming everyone else's contributions. I'm submitting the piece to the blog, but I thought I'd post it here too. Here it is.

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My mother told me that at a fairly young age,perhaps 4 or 5, I asked whether God was real, and I was told that no one knew, I had to decide for myself, that there was no need to rush a decision, and I shouldn't worry about it. It is only recently that I really came to appreciate the significance of their decision. It is one of the things I am most grateful to them for, amidst a mix of other love and support-based decisions they made in raising me, or perhaps it would be better to phrase that as: in helping me grow.

The reason I give for being an atheist is the base logical statement all interested atheists develop: there is no evidence to suggest there is/are a god or gods. However, I was an atheist long before the matter had been so completely clarified in my own mind. In preparation for writing this I tried to track back the steps, to figure out what exactly caused this position in the original instance.

I live in the UK, and unfortunately British government schools are inextricably married to religion, as a recent entry here attests, with the Conservative-Liberal coalition government sending Bibles to schools. In Primary schools each half of the day begins with prayer, and in both Primary and Comprehensive the day begins with an assembly which is required to contain some Christian-brand religiosity, although in my memory this often amounted to tacking a token prayer to the end, though still requiring pupils to close their eyes, bow their heads and do the hand-clasping prayer gesture. My teenage years were fairly empty of rebellion, and perhaps this is where it snuck out; during prayer I would keep my eyes open and stare around the hall, hoping to catch the eye of a teacher willing to berate me for not joining in. I am a rebel and I showed them. It was very interesting to me, and possibly heartening, to see a number of teachers also not partaking in these displays of public wishing.

Remembering back to other instances, I didn't hold on to a New Testament which was given, by which organisation I'm not sure, to all first year students in Comp (around age 11/12), nor was I very respectful of bibles on a school trip the same year. All school trips I've been on that includes a group of students sleeping at some camp or similar come with their own spooky myths. The myth of this particular location, the University of Lampeter, was that there was a bible in some rooms, and that if you looked in the bible, 3 lions would jump out of the book and eat you. Easily disproved. I made friends with everyone in the corridor by pretending that the Bible was eating my face off, though I am uncertain as to whether this technique holds it's friend-earning potency in adult life.

In my casual observation it seems that the most fervent opponents of religion are those who have been under its thrall at some point, which is odd as debate of this nature is my favourite pastime. I absolutely love talking about religion and atheism, though it seems I never really Believed, nor was I ever told to. I suppose at a push the British education system is still riddled with Xtianity, but the school I personally attended observed their requirements in the most casual way, with very little apparent sincerity. Religious education (R.E.) was a class on the curriculum, but was largely considered a joke subject, with most pupils viewing it as a free lesson, where they misbehaved horrendously. I eventually took the subject as an A-level (age 16-18) where we mostly covered Islam and Ethics. At that level the class was utterly fascinating.

Religions have a lot of hateful opinions, and their justifications for them are, thankfully, spurious and illogical. As far as I can remember I have not personally been noticeably subjugated, mistreated, bullied or coerced religiously at any point. However, a huge number of people have not been so geo-culturally fortunate, and are suffering horrendously because of inherently unsupportable, and therefore illogical, claims, and while that isn't why I am an atheist, that is why I see the importance of making the effort to be as robustly vocally atheist as I can.

How I Learned to Stop Worrying

After a long bout of laziness and transport hang-ups I finally started attending Skeptics in the Pub again. For anyone unfamiliar with these types of event they are casual / enjoyable / laid back lectures and presentations on a variety of science and sceptical-based topics, the ones I previously attended discussed alternative medicine and psychic conmen.

The talk on Monday was titled ‘Progress in Astronomy’s Big Questions or How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the 21st Century’ and was presented by Chris Lintott, an astronomer who works on the BBC’s Sky at Night. Chris was personable and engaging, and made what could possibly be very tricky information understandable and clear. The talk touched on a lot of topics within astronomy, which was great for an astropleb like me, though anyone more familiar with the subject may not have learned much, but that is the risk with any talk, I suppose.

Physics, with astronomy in particular, have a weird effect on me. This effect is characterised by i) existential dread, which then morphs slowly into being ii) seriously chilled out. Had I gone expecting this ‘drop tower’-style ride of emotion, I would not have been disappointed.

Some of the current theories and hypotheses of astronomy seem custom made to blow minds. The observation that only around 4% of the Universe is made from regular matter is deeply, deeply odd. It also suggests that use of the term ‘regular matter’ is ill-advised, given that since it’s in the minority that kind of matter is actually highly irregular. It is currently thought that 23% of all stuff in the Universe is dark matter, which is stuff that we cannot see, but whose effect is observable on ‘regular matter’. That is to say if a certain planet should be moving in a perfectly circular orbit (illustrated here O) and it isn’t, it follows that there is some invisible matter whose gravity is affecting it. Having climbed up to this level of understanding, it is then necessary to make another difficult clinb. We have matter: stuff we can see, dark matter: stuff we can’t see, and then in order to make calculations work in simulations, we get dark energy. We cannot directly observe dark matter, and from my understanding we don’t even know where or what dark energy is, how it works or where it’s coming from. However, when factored into calculations, we end up with models that correlate almost entirely with the Universe we see, which strongly suggests that dark energy is in fact there, and it makes up over 70% of what makes up the Universe.

It is this sort of information that leads to what I mentioned in point i). How am I meant to shield myself from complete intellectual meltdown when the vast majority of the Universe is made from something no one understands? I dabbed at my ears with a kerchief to stem the flow of brain (there’s little more embarrassing than rogue brain matter in a beard) and continued to listen as the topic changed.

So, according to Google the speed of light is 299 792 458 m / s, and I have no reason to distrust Google, after all it knows everything, and is my friend. And, of course, as we all know, nothing can go faster than the speed of light, right? Wrong, apparently. By this time my poor kerchief is aflood with grey matter, so fully has my brain been blown. According to observations, distant galaxies are moving away from us very fast indeed, of this much I was aware. However, I was informed, these distant galaxies are in fact moving away from us at around 40 times faster than the speed of light. I would have thought this would have been a problematic observation, but the solution to it is akin to stepping outside of the Matrix. The speed of light is not the fastest that anything can travel. The speed of light is the fastest that anything can travel THROUGH SPACE. The answer is that because space itself is expanding, this is contributing to the speed at which those distant galaxies are moving away. The speed at which space is expanding is not subject to the same limitations as are things moving through space, so it seems that it can expand however fast it bloody well wants to. At this point I’ve run out of brains and it is the actual structure of my skull that is now crumbling.

So with all the factors contributing to seemingly insurmountable levels of i), how does astronomy bring it back around?

The answer is stunning pictures and videos. Since Chris is a working astronomer, some of the talk was able to focus on very recent research, footage and images. He talked of the Sloan Survey Telescope in New Mexico which created a 3D map of large tracts of the local areas of the Universe, and we were also treated to images from the Hubble Deep Field telescope, which are always a delight. It is in these images that I find myself becoming ii). Such a simple technique, a pull back and reveal, applied to these pictures of such enormous complexity and depth, is so immeasurably soothing. As the picture pulls out, revealing layer upon layer of blips, swirls and clouds of light, each individually a galaxy, and as you focus on the foreground all the galaxies we have previously passed form a majestic, near infinite cloudscape in the background. Stunningly, stunningly beautiful. So, why does this in particular chill me out so much?

Perhaps the most fallacious component in the human psyche is our own inflated sense of self importance. It is very difficult for us to view any state of affairs from anything other than an anthropocentric vantage point. This is where all religion comes from in my opinion. We look at the world and from our observations we see a world, and in fact a universe, that doesn’t care about us at all. Humans indiscriminately die for no moral reason, simply due to the chaotic nature of things. This is an unpleasant situation to consider, and so there is no end of imagination and wish-thinking that we will go to in order to convince ourselves that this isn’t the case. For me, the deep field astronomical images are the perfect remedy for this problem. When confronted with this reality, it is impossible to countenance our wishful thinking. It isn’t negative to be freed from our fantasy in this case, for while it strips us of the false comfort of eternity and supernatural protection, the simple vastness of the scope of the Universe, for me at least, is an incredibly comforting thing. In my life I worry about a lot of things. Some of these things it makes sense to worry about: whether there is enough food to eat, a place to sleep, people around that I can rely on and whose company I enjoy. However, there are a large number of things I worry about that aren’t of any use. Wandering around alone in public I find myself very self-conscious, though in attempting to define the exact nature of that anxiety I find it difficult to actually explain. Am I anxious about people watching me, judging me? I think that is part of it. Also, days are filled with numerous unimportant encounters which, if you allow them to, can colour your life, bogging you down in petty concerns. These are the anchors which those images cut loose, for me anyway. I am vastly cheered by those pictures, because I can go about my business far happier, for a short while at least I am possessed of a fresh perspective which allows me to discount events and concerns for which there is no reason or function in allotting any importance.

I have been really cheerful ever since Monday, because I spent some time bathing in images of other galaxies.

Also I learned a little about the Universe where we live, in the company of pleasant people, and it only cost £3. All in all, time, money and effort well spent.

I believe a talk is planned for December if possible, though none is currently booked in. The next talk on the books of Cardiff Skeptics in the Pub is on Monday, February the 20th and is titled ‘Why Nothing Matters’. That sounds like I’ll be so chilled out afterwards I might need assistance leaving the building.

http://cardiff.skepticsinthepub.org/
http://www.facebook.com/groups/123642454331540/

Some More Wales Shark

It's been about two months since the last video, so I thought I'd share my newest one here aswell.