Frederic’s most powerful winds lasted five hours, which my family spent holed up on our hallway with a radio, water, blankets and pillows. We tracked the storm’s longitude and latitude on a map, which is how we knew when the eye was over us.

Mobile lost power and water for nearly three weeks after Frederic, whose name is now retired along with the names of other killer storms like Camille, David, Andrew and Katrina. I learned to respect the power and the unpredictability of these storms and have had a fascination with tracking them as they evolve out in the Atlantic.

This chart by Unisys shows the history of Atlantic Tropical Storms by year. It’s interesting to compare the quiet years, like 1913 with the more active years, like 1926 or 2005.

I hope everyone in Gustav’s path takes heed and gets out if they are close to the coast.

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They also have strong interests in philosophy, psychology, current events, economics and art. And, I think you will find they lean further to the Right than I do…

Enjoy.

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To understand the magnitude of his “seditious proposal,” you have to know that Harris is considered one of the leading public voices for atheism — along with Christopher Hitchens, Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett — but, therein lies his point — you cannot be for something that is by definition simply an absence of belief.

He called for anyone using the concept “atheist” to reject it forthright:

We should not call ourselves “atheists.” We should not call ourselves “secularists.” We should not call ourselves “humanists,” or “secular humanists,” or “naturalists,” or “skeptics,” or “anti-theists,” or “rationalists,” or “freethinkers,” or “brights.” We should not call ourselves anything. We should go under the radar — for the rest of our lives. And while there, we should be decent, responsible people who destroy bad ideas wherever we find them.

His entire lecture is worth reading, whether you use any of these labels or are just intellectually curious. You can find a full transcript of it at Washington Post online.

Sam Harris is one of my favorite writers. He is currently pursuing a doctorate in neuroscience, and I look forward to reading his books in the years to come. He is an extremely honest intellectual, and he is not afraid to go where the evidence takes him.

He gets criticized by fellow scientists for his desire to explore “spirituality,” despite his lack of religion. I admit, I am sympathetic to his soul-searching. I agree we can learn much about the human mind and experience by exploring phenomena usually associated with the mystics — meditation, hypnotism and the power of prayer, to name a few.

He makes a fascinating point about what we can learn from the mystics, or “contemplatives”:

Leaving aside all the metaphysics and mythology and mumbo jumbo, what contemplatives and mystics over the millennia claim to have discovered is that there is an alternative to merely living at the mercy of the next neurotic thought that comes careening into consciousness. There is an alternative to being continuously spellbound by the conversation we are having with ourselves.

Most us think that if a person is walking down the street talking to himself — that is, not able to censor himself in front of other people — he’s probably mentally ill.

But if we talk to ourselves all day long silently — thinking, thinking, thinking, rehearsing prior conversations, thinking about what we said, what we didn’t say, what we should have said, jabbering on to ourselves about what we hope is going to happen, what just happened, what almost happened, what should have happened, what may yet happen — but we just know enough to just keep this conversation private, this is perfectly normal. This is perfectly compatible with sanity. Well, this is not what the experience of millions of contemplatives suggests.

I think he may be on to something — something that could add to our body of knowledge about health and well-being.

In any event, as a result of Harris’ lecture, I will cease using the term “atheist.” I have only used that term in the last few months, and, oddly enough, I was emboldened to use it after reading Harris’ book, End of Faith.

But, he is right. It is intellectual honesty and reason that need to be brought to the forefront of the current conversations.

For what it’s worth, I have been without organized religion for nearly 20 years now, yet consider virtue and pursuit of the good paramount. While I am non-religious now, my past is a mosaic of religious, mystical and philosophical pursuits.

I was raised Southern Baptist, attended Catholic masses during middle school, converted to Lutheranism in high school, dabbled in tarot and delved into Buddhism before finally letting religion go altogether — but only in exchange for psychology and philosophy.

There were too many religions to explore, and what I was always after was simply inner peace. I have found the best way to inner peace is living virtuously, or taking the “right action,” as Abraham Maslow called it. And, the idea of living virtuously brought me full circle to Aristotle, who had come to that conclusion in the 4th Century B.C.

My whole path could have been a lot shorter had I been taught Aristotle’s philosophy in high school, but they don’t teach philosophy at that level anymore, at least not at public schools.

And, the few brave souls who take philosophy at the universities today are lucky if they avoid brain damage. They don’t generally emphasize Aristotle at colleges either. (I learned about Aristotle and Epicurus indirectly, through my study of art history.)

Modern philosophy (post Kant), as taught by academics, can be summed up as follows: You can never know anything for certain because you cannot perceive reality directly; and, therefore, there is no reality.

If you laugh at this statement, then you have not studied philosophy at the college level. I assure you, if you do, you will be taught this at some point. And, yes, it is egregious. It’s even scarier when you realize that there are people graduating from Ivy Leagues who actually believe this nonsense, and scarier still that they are running our country.

Do not make the mistake of thinking that philosophy is useless or esoteric. It is, as I learned from Ayn Rand, an inescapable influence that shapes our lives and ultimately the course of human history.

Epicurus said it well:

Let no man be slow to seek wisdom when he is young nor weary in the search of it when he has grown old. For no age is too early or too late for the health of the soul. And to say that the season for studying philosophy has not yet come, or that it is past and gone, is like saying that the season for happiness is not yet or that it is now no more.

And, in our quest for answers, we would all be better off if we we follow Harris’ lead, going only where the evidence takes us, correcting our errors along the way.

(hat tip: Joseph Stewart)

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Phil Donahue once questioned Ayn Rand about her atheism. At the time, she was still grieving the death of her husband. She answered that if for one minute she could truly believe in an afterlife where she could see her husband again, she would kill herself immediately. Of course, she could not and did not.

No one knows what happens after death, even though many people claim to know. Religionists have wielded great power over men with promises of “everlasting life.”

Religion is showing its dark side in the world again and dragging everyone down. I attended a lecture by J. Anderson Thompson last week on the psychology of suicide bombers. Dr. Thompson reported that these men — (mostly men) — who strap bombs to their bodies and detonate them to murderous ends will go to great lengths to protect their genitals during the explosions. They do this so they can enjoy “virgins” in an afterlife.

This is insanity. Enough of worshiping death to overcome our fear of it. If there is anything we know at this point in human evolution, it’s that religious theocracies are a bad and deadly idea. You can practice whatever religion you want on your own time, but leave others to believe or not believe as they will.

I think people want to be fully rational. They have both feet in a rational world that they can see, hear, taste, touch…yet, they cling to belief in the unknown and unknowable.

Sam Harris writes of our fear of death in End of Faith:

We are terrified of our creaturely insignificance, and much of what we do with our lives is a rather transparent attempt to keep this fear at bay…We doubt the one thing that is not open to any doubt at all.

What one believes happens after death dictates much of what one believes about life, and this is why faith-based religion, in presuming to fill in the blanks in our knowledge of the hereafter, does such heavy lifting for those who fall under its power. A single proposition—you will not die—once believed, determines a response to life that would be otherwise unthinkable.

It is paradoxical that believing you will not die can lead to hell on Earth. I’m sure many people will read this sentence and think Christianity is exempt from this statement.

But these same people conveniently ignore the deaths of tens of thousands “heretics” murdered by men of the cloth. They ignore the grisly symbol of a dead man on a cross. They ignore the anti-Semitism inherent in their religion—(Zechariah, 14: 1-9: Behold, a day of the Lord is coming, when…I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city shall be taken and the houses plundered…). Indeed, many Christians look forward to the destruction of Israel as a sign of the Second Coming of Christ.

Thankfully, the Founding Fathers went out of their way to use the vague term “Creator” in the Declaration of Independence and to build a wall between church and state.

Despite the Religious Right’s claims that America was founded as a “Christian nation,” the first Bill of Rights is clear:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

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I briefly met Ayaan Hirsi Ali last week at a book signing event hosted by The Secular Coalition for America and The Atheist Alliance. She is a tall, beautiful, intelligent woman. I was saddened to see her shadowed by bodyguards.

Because she speaks out against Islam and religious oppression, she has to live with death threats from radical Islamists — like the one who murdered her friend, Theo van Gogh. She warns it will get worse here for everyone if we don’t have a New Enlightenment soon.

“Islam is coming,” she said almost matter-of-factly, before disappearing into the crowd.

She hopes her speaking out against Islam will give more people the courage to do the same and to fight for a rebirth of reason before it is too late.

I blog because I don’t think it’s too late. But, I do think when writers (and cartoonists) of our age have to live with death threats for speaking their minds, time is of the essence.

[Below, two paintings I fell in love with at the National Gallery of Art, Washington.]

Cattelya Orchid and Three Brazilian Hummingbirds (1871), Martin Johnson Heade, , 1819-1904.

Giant Magnolias on a Blue Velvet Cloth, c. 1890, Martin Johnson Heade.

Author’s note: The title of this article was changed.

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But, he just sent me this link that says Allison Taylor will be the new President on 24 next season! That definitely trumps my cartoon alter ego.

I’ve been catching up on 24 these past few months via Netflix, since last season was my first. I’m into the 3rd season now, and I’ve heard the 4th is even better…

If you have never seen Kiefer Sutherland’s Jack Bauer in action, you are missing out what my friend Anne calls “one of the great heroes of television history.”

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Incidentally, blogging has been slow these past few weeks as I adjust to longer days at work…

I’ve been researching conspiracy theories and reading Sam Harris’ End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason—an excellent read for anyone interested in learning about how faith is threatening the modern world.

Re conspiracy theories: I impulsively purchased a book a few months back called The Last Days of Democracy: How Big Media and Power-Hungry Government Are Turning America Into A Dictatorship by Elliot D. Cohen and Bruce W. Fraser.

I was interested in reading this book because I was familiar with Elliot Cohen’s work on using logic everyday to improve thinking and reduce stress. After reading it, however, I imagine Dr. Cohen is a pretty stressed out guy.

Some of the more egregious, conspiratorial claims made by the authors include:

• The U.S. masterminded the 9/11 terrorists attacks and uses “terrorist tactics…to strike fear into the hearts and minds of millions of innocent Americans.”
• We now live in a “matrix where freedom is largely an illusion.”
• The minds of Americans are “being polluted and programmed with propaganda and disinformation.”
• The Mainstream Media (MSM) is predominantly run by the Right, (including the New York Times and CNN.) There is apparently a conspiracy to tarnish the “liberal ideology.”
• The election of 2004 was rigged.

There are too many conspiracies mentioned in this book to list them all…but, I think they can be summed up fairly well by this statement on page 62: “We are all pawns of a politico-corporate media machine that has betrayed the American trust in order to amass power and wealth.”

(Wow. Think about that the next time you’re drinking your decaf mocha from Starbucks and talking on your Apple iPhone…)

If you get through the book, you find out the authors’ biggest fears are (gasp!) “global corporate privatization,” “deregulation,” and “globalization.” In other words, free market capitalism.

To be fair, I don’t think any system on the planet is a truly laissez-faire system, so what the authors are identifying is partly a hodgepodge of government regulatory controls and lobbyist agendas that are leading to more and more corruption as businessmen vie for favors, deregulation and tax cuts. When government does get in bed with an industry nothing good comes from that twisted union.

The Federal Government and many states, for example, are working fast to help “commercialize” the ethanol industry, regulate agriculture and legislate in favor of the “green” industries, which I predict will have disastrous results. We’re already seeing steep price increases in food.

But, getting back to the matrix of the “politico-corporate media machine”—what do Cohen and Fraser say we should do about it? For one, we should remember that we have the right to peaceful assembly and that sometimes civil disobedience may be necessary. The Bill of Rights should be our “guiding light.” That sounds great.

Then, they suggest that journalists should become unionized (!) and that no one should watch or listen to any MSM, which pretty much includes every media outlet except for the “alternative media” outlets.

(I guess you can tell which outlets are “alternative” or “indie” because they talk about the conspiracies and the politico-corporate media machine that rules everyone. I should mention, as of this writing, CSPAN is a safe media outlet, according to the authors, but PBS and MSNBC are suspected to be infiltrated.)

I’m trying to figure out the premises of the conspiracy theorists—who I think are largely Marcusean followers of the neo-mystic socialist Left. I’m wondering if this is a purely modern phenomenon.

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I want to write about Zimbabwe, too—yet another socialist experiment gone horribly astray. Marx fan, Mugabe, and his Zimbabwe African National Union had high hopes for engineering a “socialist pattern” for their economy…but, judging by this image of man escaping under barbed-wire, they failed miserably.

I’m sure the neo-mystic socialist Left will say that Mugabe’s socialist revolution wasn’t really socialism.

Anway, enough depressing talk…I’ll leave you with an image of corporate privatization, globalization and deregulation…Hong Kong.

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One glimpse into the dialog between a mystic and a rationalist can be read in the letters exchanged between Sam Harris and Andrew Sullivan – two highly literate men, who decided to engage in this battle of ideas for all the world to read. Their debate has been bandied about the blogosphere for months, but I found the most complete report of it here. http://www.beliefnet.com/story/209/story_20904_1.html.

If you haven’t read their letters, you’re missing out, no matter which side you’re on. You’re missing out on profundities like this one from Andrew Sullivan (the mystic): “I do not believe in the spaghetti flying monster. I believe in Jesus of Nazareth.”

Or, Harris’ politely restrained responses:

If God loves the world, he has a terribly noncommittal way of showing it. Why rig a silly game in which only the poorly educated and mentally unbalanced are perfectly tuned to glimpse the truth of your existence, while smart, well-adjusted, and well-educated people (like yourself) must wrestle with doubt, barricade themselves behind euphemism, and cling to spurious “mysteries” to keep from tumbling into unbelief?

I personally doubt whether any person of faith can be convinced to let go of religion through such a debate, and I doubt that any person lacking faith can be convinced to abandon logic and embrace deities.

It seems to me that most people wrestle with these questions at early ages and, as with all questions of morality, must determine the outcome for themselves. In the end, as Ayn Rand reminded us, reality is the final arbiter.

Still, I think it’s a debate worth entering, if only because so many people of faith are rarely asked to defend their positions intellectually. The faithful have long asserted that their inner dialog is enough to “prove” the existence of an invisible, inexplicable “higher power.” Andrew Sullivan’s points are no exception. In the end, he believes because he believes.

Such blatant subjectivism is what ultimately leads thugs to force their own religious beliefs at the point of a gun, but this fact does not deter the faithful “moderates,” who assure us that their versions of faith could peacefully co-exist with reason and science, if only…if only what?

If only those pesky fundamentalists would stop insisting on a consistent adherence to the religious texts? If only they would use the right religious text? If only the moderates could have their Bible (or the Qur’an) and logic…if only there was a spaghetti flying monster — (or Zeus or Allah or Jehovah)…if only wishful thinking could make it so…

Or, my own wishful thinking — if only people could see the beauty in the world without needing supernatural revelation…

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