I bought a small eBook recently chock-a-block full of Sagan’s best quotes. I wanted to highlight some of my favourites. I haven’t read all of Sagan’s books (some 30-odd) but I haven’t yet met a Sagan book that I didn’t like… a lot! If anyone was ever going to be my hero, Carl Sagan would be one of them:
On argumentation:
(1) – “The cure for a fallacious argument is a better argument, not the suppression of ideas.”
On history:
(2) –“You have to know the past to understand the present.”
On evolution:
(3) –“Extinction is the rule. Survival is the exception.”
On drugs:
(4) –“The illegality of cannabis is outrageous, an impediment to full utilization of a drug which helps produce the serenity and insight, sensitivity and fellowship so desperately needed in this increasingly mad and dangerous world.”
Misc:
(5) –“You are worth about 3 dollars in chemicals.“
(6) –“We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and the depth of our answers.“
(7) –“The idea that God is an oversized white male with a flowing beard, who sits in the sky and tallies the fall of every sparrow is ludicrous. But if by ‘God,’ one means the set of physical laws that govern the universe, then clearly there is such a God. This God is emotionally unsatisfying…it does not make much sense to pray to the law of gravity.“
(8) –“The library connects us with the insight and knowledge, painfully extracted from Nature, of the greatest minds that ever were, with the best teachers, drawn from the entire planet and from all our history, to instruct us without tiring, and to inspire us to make our own contribution to the collective knowledge of the human species. I think the health of our civilization, the depth of our awareness about the underpinnings of our culture and our concern for the future can all be tested by how well we support libraries.“
I man-love Carl Sagan…
Favourites? Mine are (1) and (6). Has anyone read more than one Sagan book? If so, which one of those are your favourites? I can’t decide between Broca’s Brain and Pale Blue Dot. Both marvelous insights in science, skepticism, and astronomy with the added delight of them being beautifully written english.
This is sub-chapter #7, of Chapter 2, Philosophy, of my ongoing rewrite and open editing process Random Rationality: A Rational Guide to an Irrational World.
Would greatly appreciate any feedback, corrections, criticisms, and comments. If you want the MOBI, ePub, or PDF, then please let me know in the comments—if you provide constructive criticisms in return, and live in the US, UK, or EU, then I’ll ship you a paperback copy of the book free of charge when it’s published.
HEAVEN
For a moment, let’s say the Abrahamic god exists, and that depending upon your earthly actions you will be met with a heavenly eternity. You lead a good life; you help the poor, you follow the 613 commandments, you love thy neighbor, and upon your fortunate death, you are received at the pearly gates.
How will you spend your first year in heaven? Re-connecting with loved ones, perhaps? How about your first decade? Long walks on Cloud Nine, picking the brains of Jesus, Abraham, Mohammed, Elvis, perhaps even the big G himself, exploring the vast sanctum of his infinite knowledge using the heavenly version of our own Big G: Google (God = Gòógle?)
How about the first century? Trying all the experiences you were too scared to do while you were a lowly mortal, only to find the thrill is gone now that Death no longer lingers close by.
What about the next thousand years, and the million thereafter? And then the billion after, and the next trillion? Then what? I guarantee you one day, you’re going to want to not be there. What could possibly make eternity fun?
If you have ever eaten more than five chocolate bars in a row—like I foolishly have—then you probably know what heaven will be like. The first one tastes amazing. By the second, your taste buds are a bit desensitized, but it still tastes good. Ditto with the third and ditto a little more with the fourth. Finally you try a fifth one on for size, and it tastes like nothing. Just a bland paste as your mouth goes through the motions—add a sixth and you’ll want to vomit.
We all had this feeling as kids, and perhaps as teens for the sweeter-toothed among us, and even now for myself. But take that feeling, multiply it by a really, really large number, and you’ll get a taste as to how boring heaven would become. One day, it will be no different from death. Does the eternal darkness seem so scary now?
Many hold up the Near-Death-Experiences (NDE) as proof of an afterlife, but they are anything but. All they are proof of is the funny things that happen when a person’s brain receives faulty sensory information, or, embarks on the road to anoxia (oxygen death), as carbon dioxide creeps upwards, triggering dopamine-induced euphoric hallucinations.
There have also been several recent studies that have shown the rejection of evolution, and likewise, acceptance of Intelligent Design (ID) is closely correlated with existential angst. Namely, the fear of one’s mortality. In four studies, groups of people from all walks of life (including atheists and theists), were reminded of their own mortality and asked questions related to evolutionary theory and ID. After such reminders, all groups (even the most godless heathens) showed a tendency towards ID, and thus an afterlife. It was theorized this occurred due to a desire to find greater meaning and purpose, and evolution at first glance, seemingly provides very little. So belief in an afterlife is not at all correlated with its truth or validity, but rather in the hope it brings. That despair changed once people were told various ways of deriving meaning from what at first glance, appears to be evolutions nihilistic drive. It seems to me that people are only driven to such despair as they move from an edifice of externally derived purpose and hope, toward a self-derived edifice of meaning. Most people naturally pause in the chasm between these two separate cliff-faces, often looking back toward the safety and familiarity of ID instead of advancing into the indifference of evolution, little knowing that meaning would be theres to make as they will.
In another study, by the University of England, it was shown that belief in ID was highly correlated with one’s need of cognitive closure. That is, the need for definitive information no longer amiable to revision, as is ID, where the buck stops at God.
Heaven, at least as we have come to understand it in the West, seems as boring and unimaginative a concept as it is possible to conjure up, and seems to correlate highly with mortality, existential angst, and cognitive closure. I value the eternal darkness that is coming, for it reminds me to do all that I wish to do in this life here and now. (I also may never ever see that eternal darkness, but more on that in Future of Tech.)
“Yet if the transcendental world is vaguely assumed to be ‘timeless’ then we have to ask if we understand the difference between timeless existence and extinction, and I think the answer has to be that there is none.” ~ Simon Blackburn (Philosopher)
A somewhat amusing philosophical problem has popped into my brain, and I wish to explore it in this post. Amusing to me at least, whether it has occurred to others, I’m not sure because I haven’t finished reading the internet (one day, I might), but I’ll jump right into it. The physics of today points (not proves!) to a multi-verse. That is, if ever it is experimentally verified, our universe will not be the only universe that exists, but rather just one amongst an infinite number of universes. In essence, the copernican principle at its grandest scale. This theory, which goes by a few names; string theory and M-theory to name a few, is accounted for in some of our mathematical descriptions of the universe, and we maybe on the verge of paradigm-busting physical evidence to prove it. Now when I say accounted for, what I mean is that it is a logical extrapolation of theories that accurately describe the universe we are in. (The BBC’s “What Happened Before the Big Bang” is an easily digestible primer on this, or this TED talk by physicist Brian C. Greene). Again though, the multiverse is a logical extrapolation of these theories, so when you hear people saying scientists invented the multiverse theory to do away with God, they are mistaken. The multiverse is a prediction of a theory that set out to answer questions about our own universe.
Over the years, I have often debated on the nature of God and against religion. Over time, my arguments have become more refined (in a roundabout way), but today, a new thought popped into my head. In all my back-and-forth’s (which I’ve finally realized is futile, because people believe what they want, not what is true), I’ve always made my argument in a lack of context. The result being the sabotage of my argument, first by its lack of context, but further still, in its complexity.
Right off the bat, any argument instigated in such a way is crippled. So from now on, if I ever get into such a personal debate again (which I’m thinking not too), it will go something like this:
Since nothing can ever be thought of as certain, even in science, specifically quantum mechanics, which at its foundation, precludes absolute certainty (the highest is 99.9999…%), therefore, we are forced to deal with varying probabilities of certainty, and should tackle the question of God in such a way. So with that being said, and in light of my earlier contextual ambiguities and unnecessary complexity, I have boiled it down to these two questions:
In light of the recently proposed anti-blasphemy laws in the UN (which I think is bullshit), and the (misrepresented) furor of the Middle East in regards to that stupid film, Innocence of Muslims, I recently watched a debate on Freedoms of Speech with the late Christopher Hitchens and Shashi Tharoor. Their respective points summarized go something like this:
Shashi Tharoor – Against an anti-blasphemy law, thinks that statements should be said in retrospect to the opposing party, being unable to effectively envision their reaction, not that that condones the sporadic violent outbursts. As such, a censor of public opinion is unavoidable.
Christopher Hitchens – Speak your mind, first and foremost, always. Censorship is all or nothing. Exceptions here or there only serve to convolute and are divisive in nature, nor could any person, one or many, objectively do such a job of fair censorship even if it was to be required. Censorship of public opinion should always be ignored
Last week, among a gathering of friends, we ended up debating for many hours, the subject of creation, religion, and god. It was a lively discussion to say the least, and one I was ill-equipped for, after drinking 10 glasses of wine, and on many occasions, found it difficult to articulate my proper thoughts, much as I imagine, did many of my friends. One rather large mistake we made, was not stipulating a suitable foundation to base our friendly discussion upon, which led to us going around in circles for far too long, as well as relying, far too much on our inter-cranial intuitions, thinking that because we can think certain things, that they must then be granted validity of truth, even in the face of objectivity and even when experimentation says that is not the case. But I want to express what foundation is required for this kind of discussion in order for it to be relevant, to others, as well as any future discussions I get into on the subject, and, somewhat selfishly, articulate my proper thoughts from last night.
The title of this post may surprise you as rather odd. After all, what could religion and milk possibly have in common?? Well, surprisingly, one key factor, but I’ll get to that later. Most of us have been raised to drink milk to make us big, healthy and strong by way of the calcium, vitamin D and other nutrients present in cow-milk.
Late last year, I read online that an Ice Cream shop in London had begun using human breast milk in a select few of their ice creams. I was intrigued by the concept, and now and then, I would ask friends if they would ever try it. The usual response is a scrunched up face, following by something like, “How disgusting!”. I couldn’t see what all the fuss was about.
This is the third of my four-part series on being an Atheist in a Foxhole, to counter the naive thought that at the moment of death, Man always cries out for a higher power, based my own experiences. Here is the 3rd part of that series, which is much longer than the first two.
The day, was March 27, 2008. The US military had just begun an offensive in Sadr City a few days earlier. The Green Zone, where I lived, had the unfortunate luck of being situated right across the river from Sadr City, and the militants who couldn’t take on the US Army in a front on fight, decided to put pressure, or just take revenge by shelling the Green Zone every 30mins with anywhere between 1-8 mortars / rockets round the clock, where the politicians, generals, officers and unfortunately I lived. Without going into the ethics, and morality of people fighting for their own country against what could easily be called an ‘occupying’ force. This is what happened that day.
Before we get started, it is necessary to explain one thing. We were lucky enough to have what is called as a C-RAM; Counter-Rocket, Artillery, and Mortar. It is a device that gave us occupants of the Green Zone, a 6 second warning of any rocket or mortar attacks in our 4 sq. mile ‘paradise’. Once you heard the siren, you ran to the nearest bunker, and if it was further than 6 seconds away, you hit the ground and curled up into a ball. Ok, now that is established, we can begin the story.
My three friends and I were scheduled to head out on vacation on the 4th day of this shelling (thank goodness, because the shelling would continue for another 7 weeks). Our friend drove us to the helipad, to take a Blackhawk helicopter to Camp Victory, which is situated right next to the airport. Half way to the helipad, the C-RAM went off for the first, and definitely not last time that day, and we screeched to a halt, and ran into a nearby bunker as an explosion occurred several hundred metres away, and there we waited for the all-clear siren.
A few minutes later, we were back in the car and on our way to the helipad. As we arrived, we got our gear out and walked into the helipad to put our names down for standby (waiting for empty seats on available helicopters). 3 of us immediately walked over to the Burger King in the small shopping centre on the other side of the street, while 1 remained behind to call us if the chopper arrived.
On my way to Burger King
All the while walking past damaged cars, with broken windshields due to the dozens of explosions and their shockwaves.
Blowed up car
We even walked past a damaged bunker, which most certainly housed a few people, whom surely became deaf as a result of the deafening reverberations of a direct hit.
There would have been people huddling inside this bunker
We had just managed to buy our burger king meals, which still amuses me to this day, after dozens of explosions, and where being caught out in the open could mean your death, we needed a small slice of comfort food. Upon walking out of the store, the C-RAM went off again. We made a b-line for the nearby bunker, and got stuck there with a small continent of cool as chips US Marines, on their way home from the recent offensive in Fallujah (I can’t imagine what they went through). What we were going through was a walk in the park for them. We were stuck in that bunker for what seemed like 30 mins with them, shooting the shit as they told us of their recent exploits, and struggles being in Fallujah, and in the Marines. Eventually the all-clear sounded and we walked out, only for the C-RAM to immediately go off again, so we scurried back in like panicked dogs! While the Marines simply walked back in.
This time, the bunker filled up with dozens of people, including one woman who worked for KBR, who had her radio turned on. During the ensuing minutes, rockets and mortars landed extremely close by, mainly targeting the nearby American Embassy. Over the radio, we hear a frantic voice screaming “A mortar hit the living quarters…. *pause*…. THERE’S SOMEONE BEING BURNT ALIVE”. Everyone was unnerved, but only the woman spoke. “I’m fucken leaving this country tonight!” she said in a shaky voice, on the verge of tears.
There was a man burning alive in that fire
More explosions ensued, and eventually, the all-clear rung out much to everyone’s relief. I, and I imagine many others, at this point, had forgotten about the burning man, and looked only to our own peace of mind. I was wilfully forgetting what had transpired until I was in a calmer environment. We made it back across the road, and reconnected with our 4th comrade. The events from leaving the helipad, to our return clocked in at 2 hours. We were given a brief respite, as we sat around a picnic table throwing a nerfball around, and taking some photos. Our respite was short-lived, and instead of sitting around an open picnic table, we decided to get situate ourselves in front of the helipad front desk, closer to the bunker, but unfortunately, right underneath the C-RAM speaker, of which there were only 2 in the entire Green Zone, which should give you an indication of how loud they were.
Unbeknownst to us, we still had hours to wait before any helicopters were even cleared to show up, due to the constant bombardment, and the helipad waiting list grew ever longer. All the while, every 15-30 minutes, the bloody C-RAM would sound, sending us scuttling for the bunker 30 yards away in a mad dash with 40 other people. Let me tell you something, when you are in a crowd of people scurrying to save your own life, dignity goes out the window, as does chivalry. If there was someone in front of you, slower than you, you ran around them, there was no such thing as waiting, or bravery. Your life was in your own hands, and if you thought God was protecting you, then you were a fool. (The thousands of Iraqi’s who were killed/maimed in the explosions I heard everyday, would attest to that, if they didn’t have the self-contrived ‘comfort’ of religion hammered into them distorting their viewpoint from when they were old enough to talk).
Over the course of the next several hours, we had to scurry into that bunker between 1 and 2 dozen times, while bombs rained down destruction all around. It all remains a blur, though very peaceful in-between the rains, as odd as that sounds. You very quickly adjust back to normal (comparatively) once the all-clear sounds. I imagine having friends to shoot the shit with, helped a tremendous amount.
Worst day of my life
Finally, at long last, after several hours of agonising waiting, the choppers arrived, a few minutes after the last all-clear, and we had to line up in the open to board. The anxiety once again, begins to set in. What if the C-RAM goes off? Do we run to the bunker, or brave the chance to get out of this hell hole, which for all we knew, may be the only chance we get. We all board quickly, and as we lift off, the C-RAM goes off again. All hold their breath. Luckily, our helicopters aren’t hit. We take off, and fly over the war zone that parts of Baghdad have degenerated into as a result of the offensive.
The helicopters we eventually took off in
That night, we slept in Camp Victory before our flight the next morning, and I could still hear the explosions bombarding the Green Zone, 40 km’s away, and the C-RAM siren played in my head the entire night. We were only half way through our trials and tribulations of getting out of the country, but the horrible half was over with, and the 2nd half has nothing to do with God so I shan’t go into it.
My friends and I, went through 8 hours of hell on Earth, and not once, at least in my case, did God enter into the picture. I was as Godless as ever, getting mortars and rockets lobbed at me by others whom did have God in their mind, encouraging them, and by God, I mean their Ego.
I am an atheist in a foxhole.
Fun After-Fact:
The iPhone alarm sound simply titled ‘Alarm’ still scares the bejesus out of me to this day because of that C-RAM. When I need to wake up really early, say for a flight at the crack of dawn, that’s the alarm I set as it literally scares me out of bed, and gets my adrenaline racing, which ensures I don’t need my morning coffee or tea, I’m wide-eyed, tired but ready to go.
There is this silly and ridiculous notion out there that religious folk propagate about their being no atheists in fox holes, and at the moment of death, everybody cries out for a higher power. A silly proposition, and one that attempts to paint atheism with the same brush of irrationality that religion reeks of. Now, at this juncture, I could go on and on about people I’ve never met, and only read about it, and list how they did not pray in what they thought were their last moments, or speculate on atheists who died on what their last words were, but I think it’s better to tell my own near death stories, 4 in total, and how at the moment of truth, I didn’t look to God or even think of him. Not that this will stop religious people using the term, as it makes them feel good, and enlightened.
Due to the length involved of these stories, this post will be divided in 4 parts, so if you don’t want to miss any of them, sign up for email updates right there on the right…
The Road to Baghdad
The year was 2003, I was 18 years old, newly graduated from High School, and missing my formal (Prom) no less. My dad had worked in Baghdad for 6 months, and we were going to visit him. We landed in Jordan after a torturous 14hr flight, and our dad met us there with 2 drivers. We begun the 2nd leg of our journey, a 10 hour drive east to Baghdad. For hours, everything went swimmingly, we were catching up, talking, laughing, listening to music, and occasionally napping. About halfway into the trip, when we were close to the city of Fallujah, which would go on to become the bastion of resistance, and driving along the highway at 100mph (160kmh), I noticed a dark blue BMW making a u-turn from the opposite side of the road. I thought not much of it, but a few minutes later, I noticed my parents started to act nervously as I turned to talk, but I did not yet casually connect the two events.
Both my father and mother repeatedly turned to look backward, and I was at a loss as to why. Then I saw that same BMW speeding up to us and pull up alongside us with a bearded Iraqi man brandishing an AK47 telling us to pull over, and then pulling ever closer to us, effectively closing us in and forcing us to a stop. My first reaction in seeing all this, was to take off my headphones from my newly purchased Discman (I had just upgraded from a Walkman), and put it in the glove compartment for fear of losing it; the stupidity of my youth! I did however have the foresight to roll down my window so the guy wouldn’t break it with the butt of his gun.
So, there we are, in the middle of the Iraqi desert, on a lonely stretch of highway, with myself sitting in the front passenger seat, my parent’s in the middle of the SUV, and my two younger brothers in the back. I watch in slow-motion as the 2 armed, overweight men got out of the BMW, one brandishing an AK47, and the other a 9mm pistol. AKMan comes to my window, and sticks the machine gun against my throat, and pushes it in a little, just to scare me that little extra bit, as if I wasn’t scared enough already. 9mm Man goes to my dad and sticks his gun into his stomach.
This may make you laugh. AKman starts shouting at me in arabic, “eteinie flousek” which translates to “Give me your money!”. With my poor arabic, I heard “shismek”, aka “What’s your name?”. There I am, hundreds of miles from any kind of help, with an AK47 in my throat, being robbed, by an angry arabman yelling at me for my money, and I respond with my name… Repeatedly… “Fourat JANABI, FOURAT JANABI…. FOURAT JANABI!!!”. I wasn’t shouting, but it was not normal speech neither. My dad intervenes here, and tells them I do not speak arabic, and my parents proceeded to give up all our belongings.
The fat bastards even asked my 8 and 15yr old’s brothers for their money, of which they had none. After they had collected everything, they back up, but not before AKman had the idea to check the glove compartment and take my damn discman!! I was heartbroken, and actually got really angry here. I know, stupid, I think I already mentioned how dumb I was, but that’s what put it over the top for me. They left, and that was that. My heartbeat returned to normal after 30-60 minutes, and the event became a memory.
No god, no praying, just a blind primal fear unrelated even to the notion of death which did not occur, and then a materialistic anger over my discman (God my stupidity, but at least I can laugh about it now).
The very next day, I met my auntie for the first time, and we heard that the same men had robbed someone else, though he made a move and they shot him in the hand, took his car and left him there in the desert. My auntie started to cry as if she had known us our whole lives, at the time I was perplexed, but it makes sense now.
This is bonus material. The next morning, when we had travelled to visit our family, my uncle’s heard that a dark blue BMW had surfaced not 15mins away, with three male passengers. “Shit” we thought, and they asked us to go ID them so they could get our stuff back. We drive over there, two of my uncles with AK47’s of their own. My brother and I are shitting ourselves in the back thinking to ourselves, what if a firefight breaks out? Neither of us spoke to each other. We arrived after what seemed an eternity, and lo and behold, a dark blue BMW is there, with three men standing nearby, though we couldn’t get a good look at them. We stopped the car, and my uncles got out, but told us they wouldn’t do anything until we were sure. They opened our windows, and just stood next to the car blending in. We eventually see them, luckily, it was not them, and we went home, both breathing many sighs of relief.
That happened 9 years ago, just 1 year into my Atheism, and just before the country, especially that region descended into horrible and brutal violence.
That’s when I knew I wasn’t bullshiting myself, I was an atheist in a foxhole.
That was my first near death experience, and actually the least craziest one too. The next one shook me to the core, so stay tuned and I’ll get it up in a few days.
I am writing this, in the off-chance I will need to read it 50-100 years from now on my death-bed (if death even still occurs) and I have somehow become religious, as many a person has claimed I will eventually be in my old age. As I’m sure you remember, your 27-year-old self is an atheist, and I write this in the hope that you are too.
People have a habit of finding ‘God’ later on in their lives, in a recently released survey of my time, here in 2012; the older one was, the more likely they were to believe in a religious interpretation of God. In a separate study, the belief in that silly theory ‘Intelligent Design’ was linked to one’s own mortality. Even those who did not initially believe in intelligent design, were more likely to accept it when reminded of their mortality, clear proof not in the validity of ‘Intelligent design’ of which it has none, nor in God but in the self-serving delusions our brains create for us. Then there is again a study that showed that those with religious views had more of a need for closure.
We are easily fooled Impressionists, with an illusion of separation between us and all else. It is this false dichotomy, this illness as referred too by many great minds, mine not included, that is the foundation of that religious meaning that feeds on our self-contrived feelings, convincing us we are special, have meaning and that we entered this world with a purpose, and will leave with the fulfilment of that purpose, but these are clearly distorted belief systems, abused, twisted and designed to exploit our evolutionary purpose of groupthink that a few exploit at the expense of the rest.
Morale of the story, once an atheist, always an atheist. Anything else you’re telling yourself is a self-derived delusion, maybe it’s helpful delusion as I’m sure it is for many people, but a delusion none the less, and we are all born atheists. For me at this age, I prefer to live by the creed of Carl Sagan, and I hope that has not changed.
“For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.“
Random Rationality 
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