| About Me |
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Name: Roya
Home: sydney, Australia
About Me: I went from looking for god to finding him evil to finding he does not exist, all before turning 14. Now, I can proudly say, I'm a libertarian, an anarchist, and a free thinker.
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May 2006
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| Electric Fish In Africa Could Be Example Of Evolution In Action |
| Saturday, May 27, 2006 |
 I love it when the science papers and news are all filled with evidence and examples of Evolution. This one is especially interesting.
Although these fish look alike and have the same DNA genetic makeup, they have very different electrical signals and will only mate with fish that produce the same signals. Cornell researchers believe that these different electrical signals are the fishes' first step in diverging into separate species.
When he (Arnegard) joined Hopkins' lab, the team was about to publish descriptions of two separate species. But when Arnegard decided to take a genetic look at these particular fish, he couldn't find any differences in their DNA sequences.
"These fish have different signals and different appearances, so we were surprised to find no detectable variation in the genetic markers we studied," Arnegard said.
Because all of the 20 or so species of mormyrid have distinct electric signals, Arnegard believes the different impulses of the fish he studies might be their first step in diverging into different species.
"This might be a snapshot of evolution," Arnegard said.
Understanding how animals become different species, a process known as speciation, is a major concern in understanding evolution. Arnegard's fish may allow researchers to test if a specific type of speciation is possible.
One common type of speciation is geographically dependent. Animals diverge into separate species because they become physically isolated from each other. Eventually, genes within each group mutate so that the groups can no longer be considered to be of the same species.
Another type of speciation, which many scientists have found harder to imagine, involves animals that live in the same geographic location but, for some reason, begin to mate selectively and form distinct groups and, ultimately, separate species. This so-called sympatric speciation is more controversial because there have been few accepted examples of it to date.
"Many scientists claim it's not feasible," Arnegard said. "But it could be a detection problem because speciation occurs over so many generations." These Gabon fishes' impulses, however, can change very quickly in comparison. So Arnegard suspects that the different shapes of the electric impulses from these mormyrids might be a first step in sympatric speciation.
Science daily |
posted by Roya @ 12:45 AM   |
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| 10 Things I Hate About Commandments |
| Tuesday, May 16, 2006 |
You cannot miss this.
A comedy 3,000 years in the making...
Lol! Now I'm a believer!
All these bible studies was for nothing. In less than 2 minutes and I got what the hell all these fighting for god was about. It was about. . . getting the girl! |
| posted by Roya @ 10:41 PM |
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| Deland Man Gets 30 Years For Sexual Battery on Teen, Used Bible to Convince Teen |
| Monday, May 15, 2006 |
Thanks to Stupid Evil Bastard, I came across this article.
A Deland man convicted of sexual battery on a teenager will spend 30 years behind bars. Authorities say 61-year-old Charles Balfe used the bible to make the 15-year-old victim believe his actions were OK.
The self-proclaimed evangelist also was sentenced yesterday to 30 years probation. Balfe says he's innocent. The victim, now 21, says she still suffers nightmares from the incidents.
Balfe faces two more trials on charges of sexually abusing two boys in DeLand. A spokeswoman for the Volusia County Attorney's Office says dates for those trials haven't been set.
So did he shave her hair and wait for thirty days before raping her? |
| posted by Roya @ 2:17 AM |
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| New genes have often been created through the duplication of existing genes |
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Many times, I have heard from theists, that it is hard to understand how evolution can create such complex beings. Here's an answer that makes this HOW much easier to understand.
As scientists piece together the genomes of more and more life forms—from fruit flies to humans—they're finding ample evidence that new genes have often been created through the duplication of existing genes. Of the more than 40,000 genes in the human genome, for example, about 15,000 appear to have been produced by gene duplication. Evolutionary theories assert that some of these duplicated genes may acquire new functions and take on new roles. But exactly how do these changes occur?
Read more |
| posted by Roya @ 1:29 AM |
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| Ahmadinejad Animation |
| Sunday, May 14, 2006 |
I found a very funny animation of Ahmajinejad on YouTube. Unfortunately it's in Persian, so accept my apologies if you're not familiar with the language.
There was also a video on which he talks about "The Art of Defence". It shows how crazy he really is. It has English subtitles so there's no problem there.
These are some of what he said:
“Art reaches perfection, when it portrays the best life and the best DEATH.”. . . .
“Is there art that is more beautiful, more divine, and more eternal, than the art of MARTYRDOM? A nation with martyrdom knows no captivity.”
“The message of the (Islamic) Revolution is global, and is not restricted to a specific place and time. It is a human message, and it will move forward.”
Not that I didn’t know him but the confidence that he shows makes it clear he is not just a talking idiot. He is prepared!
Now, how can anyone say Islam has nothing to do with this? It is only religious nonsense that creates people like him. |
| posted by Roya @ 2:10 AM |
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| Koroush rest cause I'm alive. |
| Saturday, May 13, 2006 |
The first recorded version of a human rights declaration dates back to 570 BCE and Cyrus the Great of Persia. His Charter of Freedom of Human kind recognised the right to liberty, security, freedom of movement and residence, right of property, freedom of religion, right to work and the prohibition of slavery.
Some hundred years later, an Arab called Mohammed delivered an ultimatum to the Sassanid Emperor of Persia - to convert to Islam or face death. Persia did not give in. The Arabs from the deserts of Arabia, invaded, killed, distroyed persia’s rich culture, and riped the benefit of it’s prosperity.
13-14 hundred years after that, the children of Persia, learn in their classrooms that their ancestors were barbarians with no culture, who came to enlightenment with the help of Muslims. They do not learn about their customs and traditions, but that of their invaders. A man who if he lived today would have been called a pedophile, for marring a nine year old girl, is now the prophet of 1 billion people, including my homeland.
I feel like crying. |
| posted by Roya @ 1:58 AM |
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| Evolution by Human Selection |
| Friday, May 12, 2006 |
Given that dogs come in every shape, size and colour, it is strange to think they are all wolves under the skin. According to DNA studies, domestic dogs owe their origins to a wolf cub that probably fell into the hands of humans some 40,000 years ago somewhere in Southeast Asia. Over the course of thousands of years, they were shaped by humans for hunting, guarding and herding into the 400 or so modern breeds. "It's incredible what you can do with selective breeding," says Alice Dowswell, exhibition curator at the Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum in Tring, Hertfordshire. "Originally, according to DNA samples, it would appear that the domestic dog is most closely related to the grey wolf. Point-two-percent is the difference between domestic dog DNA and grey wolf DNA, whereas the difference between coyote DNA and dog DNA is 4%. So the grey wolf is by far the closest match." BBC So how can we explain this if we reject evolution? This is just one of a small number of scientific articles on evolution (out of the far more extensive amount out there) that get their way into the mainstream media. |
| posted by Roya @ 7:32 AM |
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| Contradictive Theistic Arguments |
| Thursday, May 11, 2006 |
Bellow I have listed some arguments by creationists that I have always had problems with, even when I wasn’t an atheist.
The first problem:
1. Everything has a beginning.
2. Therefore the world also has a beginning.
3. The cause of that beginning is god.
Let’s say the first premise is true. The second premise would be a derivation of the first premise. Let’s also assume that god is the cause of the universe. Now, from the first premise, god also needs to have had a beginning. So who created god? And who created the one who created god? And who created the one who created the one who created god? This goes on forever and ever.
The second problem:
The world is so perfect that it needs to have been created by some perfect being.
If perfection is an indication of creation, then god as a perfect entity, needs also to have been created by a perfect being, who also needs to have being created by another perfect being who….
Gosh, this sounds so much like the Plato’s forms.
If god does not need a beginning, then why does the universe needs one? And if god as a perfect being didn’t need to be created then why the universe does?
There is so much double standard in religious believes. The bases of many religions are in themselves a contradiction to the religious believes that are derived from them.Labels: Morality, Philosophy, Religion |
| posted by Roya @ 6:14 AM |
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| Dolphins 'have their own names' |
| Wednesday, May 10, 2006 |
More evidence that we are not as unique as we think we are.
Dolphins communicate like humans by calling each other by "name", scientists in Fife have found.
The mammals are able to recognise themselves and other members of the same species as individuals with separate identities, using whistles.
St Andrews University researchers studying in Florida discovered bottlenose dolphins used names rather than sound to identify each other.
The three-year-study was funded by the Royal Society of London.
Dr Vincent Janik, of the Sea Mammal Unit at St Andrews University, said they conducted the research on wild dolphins.
He said: "We captured wild dolphins using nets when they came near the shore.
"Then in the shallow water we recorded their whistles before synthesising them on a computer so that we had a computer voice of a dolphin. Then we played it back to the dolphins and we found they responded. This showed us that the dolphins know each other's signature whistle instead of just the voice. I think it is a very exciting discovery because it means that these animals have evolved the same abilities as humans. Now we know they have labels for each other like we do."
The research was conducted in Sarasota Bay off Florida's west coast.
The findings are published in the US journal the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
BBC |
| posted by Roya @ 4:50 PM |
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| What do you think? |
| Tuesday, May 09, 2006 |
Imagine there is someone in a hospital that needs blood transfusion to survive. He needs to get blood for nine months constantly without any stop. However he has a rear blood type and you are the only one who has the same blood type as his. As he would die without you, you are forced to give blood constantly to him. You would loose a lot of nutrition and your body would not look as young as it would if you did not have to give your blood. You would also have more chance of osteoporosis (later in old age) and of a more severe type. However, your act would give life to someone else. Should you be forced to do so?
I'm curious why no "pro-lifer" ever advocates such things except when it comes to abortion? Why aren't we forced to give blood or a kidney or to adopt street kids, if these are needed to save lifes? Why do they pro-lifers have a problem with bringing a new life to this world to save an existing life?
I also have found another version of the same problem, which you may like better. |
| posted by Roya @ 5:28 AM |
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| I'm an egoist? |
| Monday, May 08, 2006 |
I found it on My Case Against God blog. It's from OKCupid.
The Egoist
You scored 92% individualism, 60% fatalism, 4% hierarchy, and 48% egalitarianism!
You adhere to both the Individualist and Fatalist cultures. You are suspicious of anyone who asks you to sacrifice for the good of society. "Look out for number one" is your motto.
My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:
You scored higher than 99% on individualism
You scored higher than 99% on fatalism
You scored higher than 99% on hierarchy
You scored higher than 99% on egalitarianism
Why is it I always get ranked to be on the top 99%. Am I that radical? |
| posted by Roya @ 2:16 AM |
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| Morality (Part II) |
| Sunday, May 07, 2006 |
As I mentioned earlier in Morality (Part 1) post, I was made to believe, that morality is a religious issue. However, when you look at religion (and I would like to emphasis on Abrahamic religions), you won’t see them talking about morality.
What has been perceived in holy books to be about morality, are a mere sets of rules that are dictated to be followed, if one does not want to be punished by the dictator who made those rules. However, morality is anything but following blindly.
Secondly, these rules themselves are not necessarily good either.
When centuries ago, people said, “All men are created equal”, they did not meant equality among all human beings. In fact equality only applied to white heterosexual men which were not slaves themselves. Not even a majority!
Similarly, when religions dictate, for example, “thou shall not kill”, what they really mean is that a believer of our own religion should not kill another of our believers, accept if they act against their religious teachings. Killing of nonbelievers is not bad at all.
The Abrahamic religions actually contain very horrific details of murder, torture and genocide at worldwide level, many of which are written like stories, for educational purposes. However, they are not teaching how wrong such acts are, but how strong god is, and how one should therefore be very careful not to make god angry or else be ready to pay for it. Is this morality?
Many theists may argue that these are just stories and their religion tells them to be good. But what is this good? Is it about equality? Freedom? Tolerance? Not harming ANYONE? The answer is NO. All these are values (not necessarily new values), came to be accepted as a result of The Enlightenment Age in opposition to religion. The so called good that religion teaches only comprises of believing, doing as one is told to be god’s dictated rules and spreading the word of ones’ dictator by any means. That’s it.
Morals, as my mini Oxford dictionary defines it, is, concerned with goodness or badness of human character or behavior, or with the difference between right and wrong; virtuous in conduct.
Now, how do we find an act to be moral or immoral?
The morality of an action can’t be defined based on the end result of the act. Otherwise, a dog, that saves a human could be said to be moral. However, a dog is neither good nor bad in character as they do not recognize the difference between good or bad acts. The same applies to retarded individuals.
A moral act could not have its bases on emotion either. If I take care of my kid because I love her but would do different if she was not my kid or didn’t love her, then my good act of caring for her is conditional. That is, I love you, and that is why I’m caring for you. This cannot be called a moral act, even though it is a good act (only) for what it achieves. Otherwise, one would act immoral if there were no emotional bases for acting good.
The bases of a moral act lie on its reason. That is one should reason as to whether an act is good or not, and through acting upon one’s own understanding of what is good, that one can be said to have done a moral act.
This is why a religious person (one who follows gods’ word) is not a moral being as they do not act based on their own reasoning of what is good or bad, but follow what they’re told in order to achieve something entirely different. Mainly to go to heaven and avoid hell, to make life simple for themselves and not having to find out for oneself what is good or bad and the emotional satisfaction of having someone taking care of them. Now, is this morality?
If we as atheists are to promote morality, we have to redeem what is inherently secular from the religious ideology (theology is a better word).
My definition of morality was based on Kant’s moral philosophy, if you want to read more on him. I couldn’t talk about him much, as the post is already long. |
| posted by Roya @ 6:18 PM |
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| Atheist Test |
| Friday, May 05, 2006 |
There is an atheist test on okcupid, which I found on The Atheist Jew blog.
The Ardent Atheist
The results are in, and it appears that you have scored 80%...
You are an atheist, pure and simple. You think God is just one big lie, and consider religious people to be both annoying and beneath you. Ardent atheists will argue tooth and claw for their position, and have no truck with people that won't listen. You think being an atheist is the only way to lead an honest life, and see no reason to accept the pleas of faith. Ardent atheists are the backbone of atheism. Be proud.
How you compared to other people your age and gender:
You scored higher than 99% on pentagrams. |
| posted by Roya @ 11:32 PM |
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| Morality (Part I) |
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I have been asked many times by people of god/s, what are my morals? And what I usually would say is, to do as one wishes as long as one does not harm others. To me the emphasis on liberty is really important as this distinguishes my response from a religious response. Words such as doing good and not bad, has been used by religious people to mean praying and not having sex before marriage, so I dont usually use them.
However, the first time I was questioned on this, I first replied that I had no morals. Don’t be surprised. I didn’t know much English and the only times that I heard that word was from religious people, usually Christians and Muslims, when referring to abortion, gay marriage and the like. To me, these issues were not a matter of good or bad and only concerned liberty. Based on these, I concluded that morality really means believing that personal choices that do not affect others can be bad if god says so.
The shocked faces that were staring at me, asked me, as to whether I believed it is OK to do anything that one wishes? I tried to explain that I believed one can do as they wish as long as one does not harm others. The faces became friendly again.
Bellow is my response to Raen on atheists’ morality, on God is for Suckers.
Raen: “So, how does one define “good” and “bad” if all of her beliefs come from empirical data?”
This is the simplest answer I could come up with.
Good acts: doing good to others, eg. charity.
Bad acts: doing harm to others, eg. killing.
Neutral ones: neither good nor bad, eg. what you wear.
“It seems to me that everyone thinks that her own desires / wishes are good.”
Not so. And I don’t remember anyone here say that.But desires in themselves can not be bad. It is only in acting upon those desires that result in harm to others, that one can do wrong. Even thinking of murder and rape are not bad, as they do not harm others.(others may disagree with me however)Now, sex before marriage, gay sex or marriage and the like, do not harm others, so they cannot be seen as harmful and therefore not bad.
“I’m sure that Hitler thought that ordering the deaths of 6 million Jews was a good thing to do. On what basis can you say that is wrong?”
Death of 6 million or even one person is act of inflicting harm to others, therefore it’s wrong/bad/immoral. However, he used xianity to justify his actions. So much for religion, hey?
That’s my moral code.
The biggest problem that I see religion is creating, is that you need to be told what is good and bad from someone that does not even live among us. Morality did not exist before humans. It is a man-made instrument designed in order to allow for co-existence of human beings in communities.
If god and religion are taken aside, there are no moral wrong doings in acts that do not involve harming others. Putting it simply, all the personal choices, such as, wearing short skirts, or being gay, can not be seen in anyway as wrong, but only as personal and private life matter, that is no ones business. What religion does is to decide for you on what you can do or not, even on the most personal matters imaginable, when it does not involve anyone else.
Religion is and has always been against liberty.
I’ll talk about morality in more details next time, mainly on how a religious person is not a moral agent with reference to Kant and how religious people have hijacked the word morality. |
| posted by Roya @ 8:30 PM |
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| The start |
| Tuesday, May 02, 2006 |
After browsing the blogworld for the last few months I have decided to start a blog of my own.
I will be posting soon. |
| posted by Roya @ 6:01 AM |
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