Drink of my blood

Posted on February 22, 2009 by Michael

Just a notice people living in the Augusta area that there will be a blood drive on March 9. Here is the information. A few more results for the area (and other parts of the country as well) can be found here.

Penney Memorial Church 1038 Perkins Hall
35 Grove St
Augusta, ME 04330

Because giving blood is far more effective than pretending to drink it. UPDATE: Here’s a thought. PZ Myers had a whole big deal where he desecrated a Catholic wafer. It was to prove a point that nothing is sacred (basically). But instead of a wafer, how about dumping out some blessed ‘blood of Christ’ outside a donation location? It’d be especially poignant to do it outside a church. But this time the point wouldn’t be that nothing is sacred but rather that deep belief, prayer, and silly rituals* are far less effective than simply being a good person and doing good things (for example, like actually helping people by giving them real blood).

*To be fair, PZ surely mocked these things as well throughout wafer-gate.

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Good news for Maine

Posted on February 11, 2009 by Michael

A recent Gallup poll “asked representative samples in 143 countries and territories whether religion was an important part of their daily lives.” The United States, despite the religiously-driven anti-science movement, does not rank as having an especially high number of individuals who say religion is an important part of their lives. For all the countries surveyed, the median response was 82%. The U.S. came in at 65%.

This does not mean the U.S. is unreligious. The interesting thing about this survey is that it is strongly correlated with poverty. In nations where poverty is higher, so is the rate of positive respondents to the poll. That is, poor people cling to their religion. It makes sense that someone who has lost hope, or at least been placed in the dismal position of being desperately poor, would turn to mysticism as a last resort. Of course, this has not helped the people of Sri Lanka or Eygpt gain much wealth. Religion simply isn’t the helpful. In fact, it isn’t really helpful at all.

So what’s rather shocking, at least statistically, about this poll is America’s amount of wealth and rate of religiosity.

Social scientists have noted that one thing that makes Americans distinctive is our high level of religiosity relative to other rich-world populations. Among 27 countries commonly seen as part of the developed world, the median proportion of those who say religion is important in their daily lives is just 38%. From this perspective, the fact two-thirds of Americans respond this way makes us look extremely devout.

Of course, the obvious point to be made is that this seems to directly contradict the issue of correlation. In fact, it does not. This is because as poverty increases by state, so does religosity. Alabama, the slack-jawed center of the South, comes in at 82% answering positively. Mississippi, the well-established cesspool of stupidity, Mr. 50 in Everything Bad, as it were, comes in a smidge higher than the worldwide median, at 85%. These two poverty-rich states are roughly equal to Iran with their rate of response.

It should be of little surprise, then, that all six states of New England fill out the top ten. In fact, the top four are, in order, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, and Massachusetts. Tending toward less general poverty, these states also tend toward less religiosity. Of course, it’s important to also consider the more liberal, more moral, less evil leanings in this area as well. Such people – the ones concerned with reality – often have a liberal bias. Freed from the shackles of sheepdom as wrought by religion, these states have generally better standards of living and education. No big news there.

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Gay marriage in Maine

Posted on January 15, 2009 by Michael

People seeking an end to bigotry are pushing for the passage of a bill that would allow homosexuals to marry in Maine, making it one of the few states which does not illegally discriminate on the basis of gender.

“Some have asked if this is the right time,” said Sen. Dennis Damon, D-Trenton, the bill sponsor. “To them, I say, this legislation is long overdue.”

The bill would define marriage as the union of two people, rather than one man and one woman. It would allow any two eligible people, regardless of sex, to be issued an application for a marriage license.

This should put an end to the ‘if you allow gay marriage, you should allow beastiality’ argument. It won’t. But it should.

Essentially, “two eligible people”, as far as the secular Maine government is concerned, are two people of age who are capable of consent. That means 18 and with an understanding of the terms of their secular marriage contract – in other words, non-human animals are not eligible since they cannot consent to or understand the contract. Of course, that’s the legal argument. The more interesting argument is that there is no good reason to deny homosexuals a certain set of rights. There is, however, the good reason of allowing two harmless individuals the right to a complete and happy life.

Gov. Baldacci isn’t so sure.

And while several Democratic legislators stood with gay advocates for the announcement, Gov. John Baldacci released a statement saying he hasn’t yet made up his mind on the issue.

“This debate is extremely personal for many people, and it’s an issue that I struggle with trying to find the best path forward,” Baldacci said. “I’m not prepared to say I support gay marriage today, but I will consider what I hear as the Legislature works to find the best way to address discrimination.”

The man has made up his mind. He’s a politician, though, so he needs to be careful with what he does. Maine is in the better part of the country politically, so he does have the advantage of having a fairly liberal constituency, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty of bigots, especially in the north. (To give you an idea of the northern Maine bigotry potential, Sarah Palin campaigned there due to Maine splitting its electoral votes. The McCain campaign thought they had a shot up there. They didn’t, but the fact they even tried is disconcerting.)

090114-1147951279

Carla Hopkins and Victoria Eleftheriou, of Mount Vernon, who brought their toddler, Eli, to the Statehouse to participate in the event, said they want a secure future for their son.

“The state discriminates against his family and it affects our ability to care for him in very real ways,” Hopkins said.

For example, she said after Eli was born, they had to fight with an employer to get him covered under a health care plan, something that would have been automatic if his parents were married.

This is just one of the differences between marriage and civil unions. Aside from being insulting, they prevent parents from being able to care for their children robustly.

Bob Emrich, a Baptist pastor who leads the Maine Marriage Alliance, said he hopes for a respectful debate on the issue. The alliance wants a constitutional amendment to ban same-sex marriage.

He said the gay marriage bill is “really bad for society.”

Whoa, back up the irony train. You want to be respectful? Don’t say bigoted things that aren’t true because a piece of literature claims the currently most popular god endorses that bigotry. Then you might have a shot at being respectful. Until then, you’ve done nothing to earn any respect accept insofar as a literary critic deserves respect.

“It’s changing the very foundation of our society,” he said. “It’s going to have a major impact on children. It says something about the importance, or lack of importance, of fathers and mothers.”

Yes, your god forbid children have health insurance and their parents have more complete relationships to reinforce their love. How dreadful.

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Sigh. McCain.

Posted on January 9, 2009 by Michael

So John McCain is at it again. Not satisfied with the sending of his inept running mate out into the big evil world of science and reality a few months back, McCain has decided to wade in to the pool himself – and he’s just as over his head as Palin was.

On Wednesday, McCain himself grabbed for the fruit-fly swatter at a press conference to unveil his new anti-earmark legislation.

After a long takedown of research into lobsters by the University of Maine that involves a “Lobster Cam,” McCain, a Senator from Arizona, turned on the fruit flies, saying, “also, there’s one in Paris that — yes — $212,000 for Olive Fruit Fly research in Paris, France.”

It’s pretty well established how important fruit fly research is in science. Given his lack of familiarity with the field, his election would have been as devastating to science as the past 8 years. But now he has decided to pick on lobster research, in my home state, no less. Personally, I’m not a fan of these sea cockroaches. However, I do enjoy the boost they give to the Maine economy. McCain apparently does not. He apparently believes citing a lobster cam shows how much of a MAVERICK!!! he is about pork-barrel spending. The truth is much more interesting.

This research by the University of Maine is done through its Lobster Institute, an organization devoted to the health of the Maine lobster industry. It is through this organization, not the $188,000 grant, that the lobster cam is funded. The grant money, on the other hand, goes toward “research of microbial diseases that devastate lobster stocks”.

I don’t know about any other readers, but I personally prefer politicians from Arizona to stay out of vital sectors of my state’s economy. More importantly, I prefer them to stay out of science if it is only utter ignorance they are able to profess.

Lobster Institute

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Simply lovely

Posted on December 21, 2008 by Michael

While I love to see the bare geological history of a mountain in the summer, Shawnee Peak will be quite lovely tomorrow, especially since there’s a convenient chair to bring me to the top.

wcsh_event1

Credit to WCSH6.com for the image.

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More Michael Heath mumbo

Posted on December 19, 2008 by Michael

He’s full of mumbo. Jumbo, too.

A lot of teenagers are unable to speak with their parents about sex. Either it’s awkward or they’re made to feel bad about their desires because of the irrationality of religion or some other shallow thought. But, of course, Michael Heath of the Maine Family Policy Council embraces shallow thought. He favors changing the current law in Maine concerning parental consent for birth control and other sexual reproductive health issues.

Maine law has allowed minors contraception without parental consent for more than 30 years, but the issue was brought back to the forefront last fall when the Portland School Committee voted to allow contraceptives to be given to girls at the school as part of the services offered at a city-run health center in the school.

…

Mike Heath, executive director of the Maine Family Policy Council which supported Smith’s attempts to limit the confidentiality law last session, believes Family Planning is working to hard to protect the current law because it fails to align with public sentiment.

“The public knows the Maine Family Planning Association is wrong,” Heath said this week. “The MFPA is holding the public forums because they are selling something the public has no interest in buying. The public knows that good laws honor the nobility of sex inside of marriage and the danger of fornication.”

(The MFPA is sponsoring public forums on the issue.)

Oh, Mikey. The state has no business “honoring” sexual practices within the purely legal, purely secular contract of marriage. As such, it does not do this. What’s more interesting here, however, is how childish Heath’s views on sex really are. By denying minors the right to their reproductive health, “the danger of fornification” is actually increased. What’s more, Maine law allows for a person as young as 14 to consent to sex as long as the other person is within 5 years of age. At the age of 16, a person may consent to sex with a person of any age, from 14 to 140, it’s legal. So if Heath is right (his track record says he isn’t) and minors need to get parental consent for their reproductive health issues, then that undermines Maine law. That is, Maine law states a person is responsible enough, in the eyes of the state, to engage in sexual activity at that aforementioned age levels. Forcing consent would imply that, no, these people are not responsible enough. Essentially, the freedom to engage in sex within the prescribed laws would disappear because the sexual activity of a 17 year old would become the responsibility of his or her parents.

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Vermont rated healthiest state; Maine 9th

Posted on December 4, 2008 by Michael

Vermont tops states in health, Louisiana ranks last.

It was the second straight year that Vermont topped the rankings. It was followed by Hawaii, New Hampshire, Minnesota, Utah, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Idaho and Maine.

Louisiana fell from 49th to 50th, replacing Mississippi. Rounding out the bottom 10 were South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Florida, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Nevada and Georgia.

California, the most populous state, ranked 24th and New York 25th.

Vermont, with the second smallest population of any state, had the third-highest public health spending and an obesity rate of 22 percent, four points below the national average.

It also had low child poverty and violent crime, a large number of doctors per capita and good high school graduation rates.

Hawaii had similarly low obesity, the highest public health spending, little air pollution, low rates of uninsured people, a low rate of preventable hospitalizations and low rates of death from cancer and cardiovascular disease.

Mississippi led the nation in obesity at 33 percent of the population, while Colorado was lowest at 19 percent.

22% is the obesity rate in the healthiest state. That’s absolutely absurd. But let’s keep outspending every nation combined on our military. Health certainly isn’t relevant or important to life.

By the way, is it any surprise the South makes up the whole of the bottom 10?

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Determined beliefs at birth

Posted on November 19, 2008 by Michael

George Smith of the Kennebec Journal recently wrote an editorial prattling on about the state of the Republican party in Maine. He lists some of the recent failures of the Republican party and even invokes some of the older ones, a la Nixon. This is standard for George Smith. But then he goes on to say this.

Having switched from Republican to Democrat to vote for Adam Cote in the Democratic congressional primary last June, I told a friend on Election Day that I had not switched back because I wanted to be on the winning team.

But in truth, I remain a Republican regardless of what is recorded on the town voter list, just as I am a hunter, angler and Methodist. These things were determined at my birth and I remain true to the path of my parents.

Well, isn’t that just an awful reason for holding a position? This is actually a rather serious issue, not just in America, but among most civilizations. People believe A, B, and C because their parents happened to also believe A, B, and C. That isn’t ignorant or stupid or inane. It’s silly. It’s plain silly.

George Smith, as usual, is offering up evidence as to why he isn’t interesting in thinking. Mommy and daddy believed in a magic skyfairy and so does he. More over, he believes very specific things about this skyfairy – the very same specific things as mommy and daddy. Can you imagine if science were conducted this way? We’d still be stuck believing the world was stacked on turtles or flat or specially created just for us. Okay, well, a large number of people are actually arrogant enough to believe they are so important that they were specially created and have an entire planet, nay, a whole universe, which was created specially for them and their like kind. Fortunately, the best way of knowing, science, is doing its best to combat such insanity.

What George Smith needs to do is stop and actually invest some thought into a topic. I presume he’s being rather tongue-in-cheek about angling and hunting, but it looks like he’s waded too deeply and come to discover himself lost in the woods of silliness by just blindly believing in but one of thousands of religions simply because mama and papa believed this one, too.

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Maine religious leaders get it right

Posted on November 15, 2008 by Michael

A collection of religious leaders across Maine recently held a news conference advocating that Maine end its current policy of active discrimination.

BANGOR — Religious leaders across the state held news conferences Thursday to urge Mainers to end marriage discrimination against gay and lesbian couples, and called for the state to create same-sex civil marriages.

“We feel a moral obligation at this pivotal time to raise our voices on behalf of Mainers who are denied that most basic human right — the right to marry and form a family with the person of their choice,” said the Rev. Mark Doty, pastor at the Hammond Street Congregational Church, United Church of Christ, in Bangor.

It’s refreshing to see some of the semi-rational religious leaders of Maine finally get their voice out there (there are still religious leaders, hence the “semi”). Of course, with the semi-rational leaders come the crazies.

“I [Marc Mutty, director of the Office of Public Affairs] don’t think [the coalition] represents a great majority of the religious community in Maine,” he said. “They represent marriage as a civil right and believe that anyone that meets certain criteria should be able to marry.

Of course they don’t represent a majority of the religious community. They aren’t bigots.

“Marriage is the building block of society and includes procreation,” Mutty continued. “Without procreation, and same sex couples can’t, they’re missing out on a huge piece of the puzzle. The argument is not any more complicated than that.”

It’s beyond me why someone thinks this is a valid argument. It is not required that one have children or even touch one’s partner upon obtaining a marriage license. Intent or ability to procreate is irrelevant when the state issues a marriage license.

Unfortunately, one of the semi-rational leaders had to go and reconfirm the need for the “semi” before he stopped speaking.

“I cannot fathom a God who would discriminate based on gender, sexual orientation or ethnicity,” she said. “My Universalist tradition believes that God loves everyone equally. Why then should we deny anyone who loves the right to make a lifelong marriage commitment?”

I can fathom a god who is misogynistic. It isn’t very hard. I can also fathom one that discriminates based upon sexual orientation. In fact, the particular Christian god feels sodomy is a capital crime.

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Did you know evolution leads to autocracies?

Posted on November 4, 2008 by Michael

Yes, that’s right. The more states improve their school systems, the more scientists become effective at conveying their fields, the more the facts of evolution are known, the more and more we will head to an autocracy. At least that’s what crazy ol’ Rev. Dallas E. Henry thinks.

Secular humanists cling to the theory of evolution as truth. If mankind is nothing more than a highly adapted animal with this life being all there is, then there is no higher moral law with which to concern ourselves. With only human laws, people will risk the odds in getting caught to engage in abhorrent behavior. If this life is all there is, people can do whatever they feel like and the only authority they have to answer to is other people. If enough people live by this philosophy, either anarchy or an autocracy (government by a single individual ruler) will be the result.

So in other words, if a nation becomes too secular it will fall into utter chaos. Or it will fall in line under the strict control of a single individual. Yes, that’s right. Rev. Dallas Cowboys believes that the more people come to understand science, the more government will become one particular way. Or the more it will become exactly the opposite way. Whatever. Let’s not parse words. It’s just important that we all realize that evilution will lead to something bad, even if Rev. Cowboys is incapable of putting forth a coherent argument toward that point.

Oh, and it isn’t just evolution. It’s all of science.

Paul wrote to the Romans, “although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God…” Secular Humanists and atheists rely totally on science to explain everything. In reality, natural law has become their God. Natural law is a description of what has been observed to happen when certain conditions occur i.e. the law of gravity states that if something falls from the sky it will eventually hit the ground. Anything contrary to that defies natural law and therefore cannot be true. Science is anti – God; it is a gift from God. But when man’s knowledge begins to take precedence over God’s eternal power, “they became futile in their thoughts and their foolish hearts were darkened.” These people refuse to allow room for anything supernatural to exist. If it cannot be explained logically, it can’t be true.

Carl Sagan put it best when he said, “You can’t break the laws of Nature; there are no penalties for doing so. The real world…is merely so arranged that transgressions can’t happen.” It does not matter if Rev. Cowboys thinks something contrary to gravity or the speed of light can occur through the magic of his particular god. I return to Sagan here, “The Universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition.” And that’s exactly what Rev. Cowboys is espousing – his ambition. Sure, he has it all gussied in this whole god-guise. But it’s still his ambition, likely instilled in him since birth, or perhaps through some personal experience which he incorrectly attributed to the predominant god of his culture. His ambitions and anti-science spewing vitriol will always pale, however, in comparison to the work of scientists, just as the ugliness of his horribly evil teachings based upon his horribly ugly god contrasts so starkly with the beauty that is revealed through science.

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