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This is a blog about philosophy, religion, politics, and suggestions on how to think about those things.

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Thinking Chimp

Thinking – It helps if you do it well. We are survival machines, as are other living organisms. But we have also developed, but not exactly mastered, the capacity to think rationally and to evaluate evidence. This section is some of that … what we are, how we got here, what we are to make of it all, and what tools we might use to figure it out.

Consciousness – More about the subsystem we use to do the thinking. What is consciousness? Do we have free-will?

Atheism – As an atheist, you might expect I have some opinions on atheism. I do. They are expressed here.

Religion – As an atheist, you might expect I have some opinions on religion too. I do. Some are expressed here.

Islam – Oh dear. Having an opinion on Islam, and expressing an unfavourable one, will see you branded as a racist or an Islamophobe, or both, as they are often conflated. There are racists that hate Muslims, of course. But the false charges are most commonly made to criticis of Islam, in order to shut down criticism of Islam; where ‘Hate Speech’ is the new blasphemy law. Islam has always been a problematic religion – as many Muslims have themselves made clear through the last 1400 years or so. In the 21st century it has burst out of ‘Muslim lands’ and started to become a pest in the West.

Social Justice WarriorsSocial justice is an admirable goal …, but these guys take it to a place once thought only inhabited by the religious. Typically from the left … the ever further left … they turn worthwhile causes into ideological hell, demonising everyone that disagrees with them. They’ll get you fired for saying anything that can be construed to be sexist, racists … or worse, Islamophobic (but knock yourself out abusing other religions). They will have you booted from your university course for wearing the wrong hair style – the US university campus is their breeding ground, where, miraculously, intellectually infertile pseudo-academics sprout intellectually stunted child student clones. If they have nothing on you they can always find someone willing to shout “Rape!”, and rather than call the police you’ll be subject to a kangaroo court of deluded and pitifully submissive administrators. And if they can’t eject you from your job or studies course, they’ll turn to violence on the streets – hi there, AntiFa (who consist of various brands of anarchists and communists and are not at all anti-fascists).

Racism – The reason I haven’t posted much on this is that racism was in decline, from when I became socially aware in the 60s and 70s. We in the West thought we were doing OK. But, it’s the 21st Century, and here we go again: racism raises its ugly head, and from some really strange quarters.