Monday 27 November 2006

These things I don't believe (in)

Okay, let's get some basic facts sorted out from the beginning so you can work out right now whether or not to listen to what I have to say in this blog or immediately disregard everything just because I don't share your belief in X.

I am, as one label might be, a "rational materialist". I try to limit the irrational concepts I accept as far as possible. I accept the scientific process of discovering new and interesting facets about the world and the universe around us, but also accept that this process involves human beings and that errors can creep in. Much of often cited that the scientific process is "self-correcting", but this can take time and is often derided by critics who just want to point out science is wrong... usually because it disagrees with whatever fanciful idea the critic wants to believe in.

And so, I do not accept any of the following (not necessarily exhaustive list) as real (with the caveat of revising my opinion on the presentation of solid tested scientific evidence):

  • God/dess (of any kind and/or plurality)
  • Soul/Afterlife/Reincarnation
  • Free Will
  • Objective morality
  • UFOs/Alien abductions
  • Homeopathy / Complementary medicine (aside from placebo effects)
  • Chi/Life force
  • Psychics/Mediums
  • Bigfoot/lake monsters
Some people would say that this is a world view bereft of beauty. I think Lynne Kelly responded to that best in "The Skeptics' Guide to the Paranormal":
Some believers accuse skeptics of having nothing left but a dull, cold, scientific world. I am left with only art, music, literature, theatre, the magnificence of nature, mathematics, the human spirit, sex, the cosmos, friendship, history, science, imagination, dreams, oceans, mountains, love and the wonder of birth. That'll do me.

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