A journey into Apostasy – the beginning of the end

“Does Jehovah have as much delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of Jehovah? Look! To obey is better than a sacrifice.” – 1 Samuel 15:22

Watching your childhood toys being packed up invokes memories of an innocent age lost in a sea of time, preserved in a cardboard box. Presents from Christmas like the Millennium Falcon and X Wing fighters bought after watching Star Wars for the first time. Spectrum games given for your birthday where you fight valiantly against hordes of ghosts and monsters to save the damsel in distress.

I was still a child when such things were gathered, and what was chosen by an elder would be buried or burnt for all time. For those things above suggested a power beyond that of Jehovah, referencing the occult and satanic machinations. My mistake was playing one of my computer games where you collected a crystal ball during a visit by an elder. Even PAC man did not escape this moral maze. I was nine years old when childish things were put away.

The year before at school assembly we had thanked God for the rain. Which made me wonder, if God decided where the rain should fall, why was there drought and people starving as a result in Africa? If we were all God’s children we all deserved life giving water.

My mother did not have the answers. There were no science books at home, and the internet did not exist. That same evening there was a knock on the door by Jehovah’s Witnesses. She put the question to them, and their answer made her start a bible study with them.

By the time I was ten this study involved four meetings of two hours a week each, door to door ministry at the weekend and about 20 odd hours of personal study preparing for questions at meetings. At these meetings Watchtower and Bible Tract Society publications were read, and bibles checked to see scripture said what the publications referenced. My aim was to find the verse while the sound of rustling still resonated in the hall.

To prepare for the end of this system of things I was taught at home during high school. The aerial for the TV was removed to prevent watching subversive programming shortly after the first Iraq war. The end of days were clearly at hand were the mutterings of the faithful.

Not even one per cent of the population identifies as Jehovah’s Witnesses, and of all faith groups it has the biggest exodus of children once they are adults. My time came early having read subversively Douglas Adam’s Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy. It had been banned by the elders because it suggested an alien race built the earth, not Jehovah, and for mice not us. The humorous quotes a lodger mentioned made me want to read.

Hitchhikers made me think how would I prove God not aliens made the earth? Researching Society publications for this ultimate answer unearthed instead prophecies made that did not happen during the 1920s. My head swooned. The bible warns against false prophets and to reject them. Plus new editions of books I had read changed dogma while quoting different scriptures. Once, those destroyed at Sodom and Gomorrah would be given a second chance after Judgement day in an old edition. Now, the new edition said they had already been judged for eternal destruction. There was no acknowledgement of the change – it just happened.

I was fourteen when my mother and I decided to leave. Her doubts started because she would not say “only those that call on the name of Jehovah will be saved”. She felt it was for God, not man, to make such judgements. So she was not allowed to go door to door.

Wonder and curiosity – these are qualities that made me to want to understand the world and universe I live in. For me there is a greater comfort in knowing we are working to reduce suffering caused by disease than thinking God will end this but probably kill 99% of the living population in the process.

Those qualities are not childlike but essential qualities to go beyond unquestioned obedience and sacrifice.

I had gone from bible student to being regarded as an apostate. Despite the elders best efforts I found there was a richer world of knowledge, culture and humour than was imaginable in the Jehovah’s Witnesses.

For more on The Apostasy Project click here

Follow up blog: A Brave New World (on becoming an apostate)

Article written by John Sargeant on Homo economicus’ Weblog

Follow @JPSargeant78

God to Dawkins in Gradual Steps

I thought it might make sense to include in the page section of my blog how I ended up going from studying with the Jehovah’s Witnesses to being involved with the Richard Dawkins Foundation in its tentative first steps.

I first wrote this for the Dawkins website in 2007. Still evokes emotions re reading today.

To read just click here.

Or alternatively see the link “From Jehovah to Dawkins” on the top right hand side of the blog under Pages.

(Front row far right at the American Atheist International Conference 2007)

Don’t Forget Your Towel!

in celebration of the life and works of Dougals Adams people may be seen drinking fermented vegetable products while having about them towels. The braver among them may well be wearing a dressing gown. Should you encounter such carbon based life forms don’t panic. it is a homage to his work: “The Hitchehiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”.

More on towel day can be found here.

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Agency – The Long Dark Tea-time of the Soul

Tomorrow night (2 October) at 11pm Douglas Adams returns to Radio 4 with Dirk Gently, under the same director that brought The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy back to radio. Starring Harry Enfield as Dirk Gently and William Boyd as Richard McDuff.

When a passenger check-in desk at London’s Heathrow Airport disappears in a ball of orange flame, the explosion is deemed an act of God. But which god, wonders holistic detective Dirk Gently? What god would be hanging around Heathrow trying to catch the 3:37 to Oslo? And what has this to do with Dirk’s latest–and late– client, found only this morning with his head revolving atop the hit record “Hot Potato”? Amid the hostile attentions of a stray eagle and the trauma of a very dirty refrigerator, super-sleuth Dirk Gently will once again solve the mysteries of the universe…

It can only be Douglas …

Hear Douglas Adams discuss Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency

Listen to Radio 4 live

To help you listen to it live, here are the times around the world when it will be on (if you miss it you should be able to find the show on the listen to it again service here):

Addis Ababa	Fri 1:00 AM			Guatemala	Thu 4:00 PM			Nassau *	Thu 6:00 PM
Adelaide	Fri 7:30 AM			Halifax *	Thu 7:00 PM			New Delhi	Fri 3:30 AM
Aden	Fri 1:00 AM			Hanoi	Fri 5:00 AM			New Orleans *	Thu 5:00 PM
Algiers	Thu 11:00 PM			Harare	Midnight Thu-Fri			New York *	Thu 6:00 PM
Almaty	Fri 4:00 AM			Havana *	Thu 6:00 PM			Oslo *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Amman *	Fri 1:00 AM			Helsinki *	Fri 1:00 AM			Ottawa *	Thu 6:00 PM
Amsterdam *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Hong Kong	Fri 6:00 AM			Paris *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Anadyr *	Fri 11:00 AM			Honolulu	Thu 12:00 Noon			Perth	Fri 6:00 AM
Anchorage *	Thu 2:00 PM			Houston *	Thu 5:00 PM			Philadelphia *	Thu 6:00 PM
Ankara *	Fri 1:00 AM			Indianapolis *	Thu 6:00 PM			Phoenix	Thu 3:00 PM
Antananarivo	Fri 1:00 AM			Islamabad *	Fri 4:00 AM			Prague *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Asuncion	Thu 6:00 PM			Istanbul *	Fri 1:00 AM			Reykjavik	Thu 10:00 PM
Athens *	Fri 1:00 AM			Jakarta	Fri 5:00 AM			Rio de Janeiro	Thu 7:00 PM
Atlanta *	Thu 6:00 PM			Jerusalem *	Fri 1:00 AM			Riyadh	Fri 1:00 AM
Auckland *	Fri 11:00 AM			Johannesburg	Midnight Thu-Fri			Rome *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Baghdad	Fri 1:00 AM			Kabul	Fri 2:30 AM			San Francisco *	Thu 3:00 PM
Bangkok	Fri 5:00 AM			Kamchatka *	Fri 11:00 AM			San Juan	Thu 6:00 PM
Barcelona *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Karachi *	Fri 4:00 AM			San Salvador	Thu 4:00 PM
Beijing	Fri 6:00 AM			Kathmandu	Fri 3:45 AM			Santiago	Thu 6:00 PM
Beirut *	Fri 1:00 AM			Khartoum	Fri 1:00 AM			Santo Domingo	Thu 6:00 PM
Belgrade *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Kingston	Thu 5:00 PM			Sao Paulo	Thu 7:00 PM
Berlin *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Kiritimati	Fri 12:00 Noon			Seattle *	Thu 3:00 PM
Bogota	Thu 5:00 PM			Kolkata	Fri 3:30 AM			Seoul	Fri 7:00 AM
Boston *	Thu 6:00 PM			Kuala Lumpur	Fri 6:00 AM			Shanghai	Fri 6:00 AM
Brasilia	Thu 7:00 PM			Kuwait City	Fri 1:00 AM			Singapore	Fri 6:00 AM
Brisbane	Fri 8:00 AM			Kyiv *	Fri 1:00 AM			Sofia *	Fri 1:00 AM
Brussels *	Midnight Thu-Fri			La Paz	Thu 6:00 PM			St. John’s *	Thu 7:30 PM
Bucharest *	Fri 1:00 AM			Lagos	Thu 11:00 PM			St. Paul *	Thu 5:00 PM
Budapest *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Lahore *	Fri 4:00 AM			Stockholm *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Buenos Aires	Thu 7:00 PM			Lima	Thu 5:00 PM			Suva	Fri 10:00 AM
Cairo	Midnight Thu-Fri			Lisbon *	Thu 11:00 PM			Sydney	Fri 8:00 AM
Canberra	Fri 8:00 AM			London *	Thu 11:00 PM			Taipei	Fri 6:00 AM
Cape Town	Midnight Thu-Fri			Los Angeles *	Thu 3:00 PM			Tallinn *	Fri 1:00 AM
Caracas	Thu 5:30 PM			Madrid *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Tashkent	Fri 3:00 AM
Casablanca	Thu 10:00 PM			Managua	Thu 4:00 PM			Tegucigalpa	Thu 4:00 PM
Chatham Island *	Fri 11:45 AM			Manila	Fri 6:00 AM			Tehran	Fri 1:30 AM
Chicago *	Thu 5:00 PM			Melbourne	Fri 8:00 AM			Tokyo	Fri 7:00 AM
Copenhagen *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Mexico City *	Thu 5:00 PM			Toronto *	Thu 6:00 PM
Darwin	Fri 7:30 AM			Miami *	Thu 6:00 PM			Vancouver *	Thu 3:00 PM
Denver *	Thu 4:00 PM			Minneapolis *	Thu 5:00 PM			Vienna *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Detroit *	Thu 6:00 PM			Minsk *	Fri 1:00 AM			Vladivostok *	Fri 9:00 AM
Dhaka	Fri 4:00 AM			Montevideo	Thu 7:00 PM			Warsaw *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Dubai	Fri 2:00 AM			Montgomery *	Thu 5:00 PM			Washington DC *	Thu 6:00 PM
Dublin *	Thu 11:00 PM			Montreal *	Thu 6:00 PM			Winnipeg *	Thu 5:00 PM
Edmonton *	Thu 4:00 PM			Moscow *	Fri 2:00 AM			Yangon	Fri 4:30 AM
Frankfurt *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Mumbai	Fri 3:30 AM			Zagreb *	Midnight Thu-Fri
Geneva *	Midnight Thu-Fri			Nairobi	Fri 1:00 AM			Zürich *	Midnight Thu-Fri

OTHER BLOGS:

New Hitchhikers book “And Another Thing”

New Hitchhikers book “And Another Thing”

Douglas Adams will be stirring in his tea cup.

Eoin Colfer has been commissioned to write the sixth book in The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series. Just like Bond who was stirred not shaken back into life by Sebastian Faulks, Arthur Dent will be back, towel in hand cup of tea in the other, to find out more about the meaning of life, the universe and everything.

Colfer author of children’s books was said to be terrified to be following in Douglas’ footsteps. Whether fear rather than a Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster is the best source for humours inspiration we will find out next year in October when “And Another Thing” is published.

“Douglas Adams was an extraordinary writer, with an ability to come at the reader from the most unexpected angles, knock them off balance and make them laugh at the same time,” said Helen Fraser the Penguin managing director.

“Eoin Colfer is an inspired choice as Douglas’s successor… He is a huge talent and a fantastically funny writer, and this new book will bring as many new young readers to Douglas Adam’s work as it will introduce adults to the brilliance of Eoin Colfer.”

Will it be any good? There is an answer, but you are not going to like it …

Don’t Panic

In the mean time while it has been 16 years since “Mostly Harmless” was published the Hitchhikers Universe has played on – not just the long awaited film which people liked if they were used to the multi media formatted parallel universes that make up the dis jointed story as radio, books, TV and then film - but in a 21st century broadcast to its original incarnation as a radio series.

The surviving actors reunited 25 years after the original radio broadcast that first introduced Arthur Dent, picking off with him and Ford Prefect being stranded on prehistoric earth as the books had it starting with Life, the Universe and Everything. The Tertiary, Quandary and Quintessential Phases were broadcast on Radio 4 from September 2004 to June 2005. My advice is that you have not heard the definitive version of Douglas Adams till you have heard them.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/hitchhikers/media/hitchhikers_trail.ram

Thanks to Louise for alerting me to the story

Atheist dancing to Black and Gold

Maybe some people find it difficult to examine how music and stories that may go against your own inclinations can give you enjoyment. Dawkins was given a hard time for enjoying carol singing till he said that an inability to distinguish what is real and not real would mean a mentality that sends Christmas Cards to the Archers. He could and so enjoyed carols.

I trust that will not happen with my publicly stated enjoyment of the song “Black and Gold” by Sam Sparro:

Lyrics follow at the end of this blog. The song suggests that without a meaning behind existence there is no reason living, and that reality is based on human emotion responding to existence. The implied suggestion is that there is something you can get close to – otherwise existence has no meaning.

Which naturally I reject. Without a creator or an intelligent purpose behind it life would be worth living, the purpose driven life is that you have to find that purpose for yourself. Rather than be told what it is, in a nicely bundled up package and life manual. Self help books, plenty of them out there and I am sure they are very useful to people. We often have crises of purpose throughout our lives with trigger events – redundancy, break ups, set backs. They will happen because life has ups and downs.

I rather like how Douglas Adam puts it – in an experiment involving a fairy cake a person can experience the whole infinity of the universe and how they relate to it. With such a sense of proportion the human mind cannot function and would be destroyed (we are so small in relation to the universe). Some people claim that meditation allows you to do this for real, but that sense of scale is overcome by seeing the interconnectedness of everything.

Putting to one side whether there is or is not a god. Here we are. Yes we could just exist to replicate DNA from the past to the future – an intermediary in this process. Our purpose does not have to be based on our reproductive value. It really is down to you to make the most of your life in the time you have. With some odds being against or for you, in forms of chemical imbalances and genetic make ups, the environment you are in- it is not fair get over it no one is saying it is. You can grab life by the balls, you can find out what life is for you. See beauty in the stars, feel the vibe of the cosmos. It may not be here with you in mind, but you can get on with living.

This song actually reflects the main reason why you can throw all the fossils of intermediaries at creationists till your arms are aching, and weigh them down with empirical observations that validate the theory of evolution. There is a longing that existing has a function that validates their existence – they will not consider that something beyond the observable is not there. There has to be because they feel it. An entirely emotional response that will not be overcome by science, rationality, because it is not based on evidence but on feeling. I would rather find out about what can be observed – it allows me to appreciate the stars and life the more.

So I choose to dance to this song. Might be fun requesting it at an atheist disco but I like the melody. At any rate I would rather dance to this beat than Greydon Square. Why should theists have all the good music?

Mmmmmm

If the fish swam out of the ocean
And grew legs and they started walking
And the apes climbed down from the trees
And grew tall and they started talking

And the stars fell out of the sky
And my tears rolled into the ocean
Now I’m looking for a reason why
You even set my world into motion

’cause if you’re not really there
Then the stars don’t even matter
Now I’m filled to the top with fear
That it’s all just a bunch of matter

’cause if you’re not really there
Then i don’t want to be either
I wanna be next to you
Black and gold
Black and gold
Black and gold

Mmmmmm

I looked up into the night sky
And see a thousand eyes staring back
And all around these golden beacons
I see nothing but black

I feel a way of something beyond them
I don’t see what I can feel
If vision is the only validation
Then most of my life isn’t real

’cause if you’re not really there
Then the stars don’t even matter
Now I’m filled to the top with fear
That it’s all just a bunch of matter

’cause if you’re not really there
Then I don’t want to be either
I wanna be next to you
Black and gold
Black and gold
Black and gold

Black and gold
Black and gold
Black and gold

Ohhhhh

’cause if you’re not really there
Then the stars don’t even matter
Now I’m filled to the top with fear
That it’s all just a bunch of matter

’cause if you’re not really there
I don’t want to be either
I wanna be next to you
Black and gold
Black and gold
Black and gold

UPDATE 11 OCTOBER 2008:

Sam Sparro and Annie singing Black and Gold together (the feel my heart beat version):

A Weekend off!

Time is a precious thing – it comes round once in a linear like fashion, and often last orders happens but you were having such a pleasant time with someone that you fail to notice it’s passing before it is too late. You are without a glass in your hand, or a companion – who has been taken away while you were searching for liquid refreshment in a game called sexual selection that has it in for you- as you journey off in a not quite linear fashion.

However this weekend looks like time to be well spent. Off to London to attend a meeting on setting up Camp Quest in the UK (early stages of project). While discussing that my beloved team Aldershot Town FC could get promotion if they do better then Torquay and be in Division football for the first time since Aldershot FC when bankrupt in 1992.

Then Sunday probably session at gym, Sunday dinner and then Leicester Secular Society meeting about City of Sanctuary:

City of Sanctuary is a movement to build a culture of hospitality for refugees and asylum-seekers.

Our goal is to create towns and cities throughout the UK which are proud to be places of safety, and which include refugees and asylum-seekers fully in the life of their communities.

I may even get to do my spring cleaning. Where is a bulldozer and a Vogon Constructor fleet when you need one – though that may not be a lucky escape for Arsenal if they did come this Sunday. More about how this wholly remarkable book to the right changed my life course can be read here.

Break the Science Barrier – Video of with Richard Dawkins

Part One 

 

Part Two 

 

Part Three

Originally broadcast on Channel 4 in the UK (1996), Richard Dawkins looks at the wonder, and the discoveries of science as well as the challenges from certain quarters. Douglas Adams and David Attenborough feature.

Enjoy!

The debate between Vroomfondle and Magicthighs must end

Click for this part of the story

For me, it is the certainty that people have about religious convictions that annoys. This is like thinking you have a firm foundation on shifting sands. It is an illusion. God is necessarily a human concept, one created, along with many other ideas, to explain the underlying reason of everything: why we die, the earth goes round the sun, earthquakes kill thousands. The human intellect is wasted on who god is. For if such a being exists it is beyond our experience of him, and as our language is based on our experience we end up having a meaningless discussion, about something we do not know.

How I live my life, how the natural world exists at this present moment, is not dependent on this question. It is part of our childhood at the dawn of Homo sapiens. Perhaps we will soon start asking questions worthy of us having obtained consciousness.

Often on a journey, to make any headway, we need to discard unnecessary baggage. Let’s leave the discussion of god to Vroomfondle and Magicthighs (philosophers in Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy), for there are more pressing things to occupy our time. In short, the theist atheist debate is non-sensei cal and its conclusions unimportant to real problems of philosophy, the natural world and ethics.

Too many resources have been wasted before blood thirsty gods, and even a world renowned biologist is being forced to try and put faith back in its place instead of concentrating on the natural world. I agree with Sam Harris that it is depressing that in some ways we need to still discuss whether there is or is not a god – my point is that it is not the question to be asking! The debate should not be about whether God exists or not. You and I cannot talk about anything beyond experience. God as a concept is definitely outside of our experience, like the sound of one hand clapping or meeting a man that was not there. We have better explanations for life the universe and everything, the god of the gaps argument is narrowed.

Wittgenstein said: ‘Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must remain silent.’

With creationists the biggest refute is not the irrationality of their religious beliefs, but that their faith tells us nothing about the natural world. That only empirical adequacy as demanded by science is the way to explain natural phenomena. That “We don’t know yet but we are working at it” is an acceptable statement of now and potential for the future.If you really believe that Bush invaded Iraq because god told him too than you are as gullible as a young earth creationist. There is more to the machinations of man than can be contemplated in your philosophy. We must separate the (meaningless) debate of there is/is not a God from the important point of whether our belief, philosophy, and actions benefit humankind or not. That is the task of the philosopher; to understand how this framework to achieving this goal may be achieved.

Vroomfondle and Magicthighs are a side show to the main event. Do not become distracted; religion is irrational not because of the god concept, but the tenant of faith that is placed in man because man said this in the past.