A new Symphony of Science was released today! I love this lovely ballad featuring Neil deGrasse Tyson, Brian Cox, and Carolyn Porco. When I listen to this series, I feel a swell of inspiration and excitement about the future of our species. Thank you, science.

P.S. Happy birthday, Carl Sagan! We miss you and your vision and your passion. Thank you for taking our minds and hopes beyond this pale blue dot.

Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere.
- Carl Sagan

adaptation of Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling by Tom Blackwell

J. Anderson Thomson is a psychiatrist at the University of Virginia. In a recent LA Times opinion post he expounds on the biological reasons we humans created the idea of God in the first place, and what role that belief serves psychologically.

I find these reasons for faith fascinating, and I see how they have been present in my own life.

Like our physiological DNA, the psychological mechanisms behind faith evolved over the eons through natural selection. They helped our ancestors work effectively in small groups and survive and reproduce, traits developed long before recorded history, from foundations deep in our mammalian, primate and African hunter-gatherer past.

For example, we are born with a powerful need for attachment, identified as long ago as the 1940s by psychiatrist John Bowlby and expanded on by psychologist Mary Ainsworth. Individual survival was enhanced by protectors, beginning with our mothers. Attachment is reinforced physiologically through brain chemistry, and we evolved and retain neural networks completely dedicated to it. We easily expand that inborn need for protectors to authority figures of any sort, including religious leaders and, more saliently, gods. God becomes a super parent, able to protect us and care for us even when our more corporeal support systems disappear, through death or distance.

Among the psychological adaptations related to religion are our need for reciprocity, our tendency to attribute unknown events to human agency, our capacity for romantic love, our fierce “out-group” hatreds and just as fierce loyalties to the in groups of kin and allies. Religion hijacks these traits.

In addition to these adaptations, humans have developed the remarkable ability to think about what goes on in other people’s minds and create and rehearse complex interactions with an unseen other. In our minds we can de-couple cognition from time, place and circumstance. We consider what someone else might do in our place; we project future scenarios; we replay past events. It’s an easy jump to say, conversing with the dead or to conjuring gods and praying to them.

I know (quite acutely, in fact) that I have a great need for attachment and a sense of another authority; I also possess a tendency to be intuitive or over-analytical about what someone else is thinking and feeling. I have certainly assigned motives and reasons to events that have no human agent.

All of these factors only encompass what I know consciously about myself and how faith has played a role in my life in the past. The chemistry of my brain and the more subtle evolutionary reasons for belief–well, those cannot be controlled. I can only use my reasoning and understanding to choose a different reaction when confronted with the concepts of a great “Other” or supernatural events.

“God”  and faith are crafted to fulfill some of our needs and natural inclinations. They are presented to us as a catch-all solution to these inborn “problems.” Do you need love and someone to care for you? God will do it! Do you have a tendency to cling to a group and fear the “others?” Religion is perfect for you!  Do you get that tingly feeling that someone is in the room with you when you meditate? That’s a god!

This, of course, doesn’t mean gods are real, but it does illustrate that we have a desire to answer questions and fulfill needs that come naturally to us. When we supply imaginary beings as the answer to the human condition, we’re doing ourselves and our descendants a disservice. It’s much more difficult to see the world objectively and accept the fact that we’re on our own, but it’s empowering and spurs on positive change in society. Why take personal responsibility when it’s much more comforting to know someone else is in charge of the rules who wants us to succeed? Because we will be a better, more altruistic society if we take charge of our actions and how they affect others.

We can be better as a species if we recognize religion as a man-made construct. We owe it to ourselves to at least consider the real roots of religious belief, so we can deal with life as it is, taking advantage of perhaps our mind’s greatest adaptation: our ability to use reason.

I agree!

To devote our lives to understand this universe using science and reason is a profoundly high calling.

Make sure to view the rest of these wonderful videos here.

Bonus Quote:

‎”Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality.” – Carl Sagan

Do you agree?

Calamities of Nature comic - July 20, 2011. Click to enlarge.

[source]

Nothing like a comic to drill-down something complex into four (funny) panels.

Page 202 from the book, Feynman.

Like a blind man in a cluttered room, we’re bumbling around blindly knocking our shins into coffee tables in the dark trying to figure out how this universe works. But as we wander and experiment we continue to discover small pieces of it that we can understand, eventually building up our knowledge of the confusing space enough to avoid the tables and construct a map of how the space fits together.

Robert Krulwich of PBS writes about Richard Feynman and this messy universe:

We think great scientists know so much, but really, they know very little. “Science,” said the physicist Richard Feynman, “is the belief in the ignorance of experts.”

Feynman told his audiences, even though the subatomic world looks so messy, so unintelligible, bit by bit, we are learning some of its secrets. They don’t add up yet. The rules Feynman and others discovered don’t even work all of the time, the parts don’t coordinate, but scientists learn to stay humble, roll with new information, we will learn more.

The key, he says… is accept the universe as it is. We must instruct our minds to live with the facts we discover.

The facts don’t make sense at first. They may never make sense, but hey, this is our universe. We’re stuck with it. We don’t have another one, not yet. So the best we can do is try to fit our minds to universe we find.

Isn’t this what we skeptics joyfully espouse? There is a humility and wonder in science that allows us to both embrace the unknown and mold our minds to the discoveries made along the way that help us explain this amazing  reality. It may not be a perfect understanding—in fact, I’m sure it isn’t. But just because it all seems jumbled at first doesn’t mean the solution is to dream up a supernatural puzzle piece to fit in where science has yet to tread.We should not be afraid of  neither the mess nor the mystery.

Dimidium facti qui coepit habet: sapere aude (“He who has begun is half done: dare to know!”) -Horace

Rarely does a simple youtube video re-invigorate my imagination and stir my emotions like this great compilation of the NASA Space Transportation System (STS) program by nature video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

From the summary:

The Space Shuttle fleet delivered the Hubble Space Telescope, the International Space Station, and dozens of satellites, space probes, crew and supplies. Two Shuttles were lost: Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003. The touchdown of Atlantis at Kennedy Space Center marked the end of an era, after 135 missions. This video shows all of them in chronological order. http://www.nature.com/spaceshuttle

As the great astrophysicist Neil DeGrasse Tyson put it on July 8, the day of the final shuttle launch:

neiltyson

(Neil deGrasse Tyson)

Many lament the shuttle era's end. But that's misplaced sentiment. Lament instead the absence of an era to replace it.

On 8-7-2011 13:30:35 from TweetDeck

Where do we go from here as Americans? Where do our dreams lie, if not in the great universe around us? Russia and China continue while we stop. What’s next? What will the next generation dream about as children? Will space be a thing of science fiction or a reachable, accessible experience to them?  Will space travel be a product of business? I am completely ignorant of all that lies ahead.

Thank you, NASA, for the Shuttle program. It was grand.

For those of you with Netflix Streaming, clear some time to watch The Nature of Existence, a fabulous documentary by Roger Nygard! I had the pleasure of attending a screening of The Nature of Existence here in Chicago.

Roger Nygard travels to the sources of the world’s major philosophies and talks to everyone from physicist Leonard Susskind to Ultimate Christian Wrestling founder Rob Adonis to answer the questions, Why are we here and what are we supposed to do? Spiritual leaders, scholars, scientists, artists, pizza chefs and the guy next door inform this humorously enlightening documentary about the nature and meaning of life.

The film raises many questions about the nature of life, religion, the universe, morality, and our relationships to one another. I especially loved seeing many cultures and perspectives represented in this snapshot of the diversity of ideas. What an adventure and privilege to interview such amazing people. Lucky Nygard; I’m jealous! You can watch a trailer and read more about this film here.

Check it out on Netflix!

photo by Joe McCarthy

When you meet someone new or are just enjoying discussions with other people, are you ever surprised when you find out they don’t share your views? I keep having this experience! Tonight while at dinner with a group of women, one of them mentioned her pre-teen son being baptized at their church since he just “got saved” and how excited she was. During her story, I kept expecting a punchline—as if she would suddenly laugh and tell a story about going skinny dipping in the baptism dunk tanks. But no, she was totally serious, and nothing’s wrong with that.

It made me wonder: Do we assume the people with whom we get along are going to think the same ways we do? I think I do! For instance, I’m skeptical about the paranormal; I do not believe ghosts exist. A friend of mine gabs constantly about ghost hunting and the supernatural, and all the while  I laugh and think she must be joking because, hell, who honestly believes in ghosts? Well, she does. Why am I so surprised? Is it my ego?

I remember feeling this way as a Christian as well; If I met someone who wasn’t a believer, it was like a trip into a different world. They were strange, foreign, and mysterious. How could they not believe in Jesus? Of course, Christianity is so popular that it’s sometimes difficult to find people who openly identify with something else—at least in my area. So why am I walking through life as part of the atheist minority assuming everyone else thinks Satan is silly and God is a figment of our imaginations? I have no idea! I guess I think I’m normal!

And then my mind was blown. He is so much more.

My flat mate introduced me to this man’s passion for the paranormal and love for conspiracy theories. He’s even a Hollywood spokesperson for The Mutual UFO Network (MUFON).

Did you know Dan Aykroyd made vodka?

Click here to view the embedded video.

This video was the sole reason we bought Crystal Head Vodka. We just could not contain our mirth. The bottle is now sitting on our bookcase, and the vodka is actually rather tasty.

For all you Netflix members, there’s an interview-posing-as-documentary on Netflix Streaming called “Dan Aykroyd Unplugged on UFOs” that is just as hilarious as any UFO believer raving on about the topic—except this is Dan Aykroyd being serious, which makes it even more funny to me. The description on Netflix reads: “Skeptics beware!” So obviously, skeptics should grab the popcorn and enjoy this failure of a documentary. I can’t even describe the terrible narration by the interviewer, cheap camcorder production value, and the graphics. Glorious.

I think Aykroyd might just be the most entertaining rambler of all time:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Many atheists state that one of their primary objections to the existence of God is that there is no evidence for it that would stand up to the scientific method.

So the question is, are there things that are real but that reality isn’t supported by results of scientific testing.

So, in what sense is love real? Does it exist? If you believe someone loves you, what would you say if someone asked you to prove it?

I was recently asked this same question by my mother, and I’ll admit I hadn’t thought it through very well and was feeling defensive at the time, so I didn’t have a good answer for her. In fact, this comment sounds so creepily similar to the words my mother said to me that I wonder if Roofwoofer is my mother or if they get their debating points from the same source. Maybe this is a more common argument than I realized?

How would the atheist community answer questions like this one?