I don’t think Satan exists. My thesis that Satan wrote the Bible is for people who believe that God wrote the Bible or caused it to be written, that the Bible is the word of God. If you believe that, you should read what “God” says and does in the Bible. You believe that God gave you your mind; use it. Use it to try to understand the God and the Satan that you believe in. Don’t rely on what others (like preachers, rabbis, popes and the like) tell you about God. Don’t rely on what is said about God in the Bible. Go right to God’s actions and words and I think you will find an image quite different from the one you worship.

Neither Satan nor God wrote the Bible or had influence over the writing of the Bible. The Old Testament was written by men passing on stories that were created in the minds of men (and likely some women) to try to explain creation and the early life of the Jews to explain how they came into being and to lay down some rules of behavior so the species could get along and live good lives. Science has come a long way since then toward explaining creation and how we came into being. That some people reject what we have learned and cling to notions developed over 2,500 years ago is an indication of how powerful teaching beliefs rather than teaching open mindedness and how to think at an early age can be. For those who can use the minds that came with their bodies I suggest looking at the age old questions from a current day perspective.

As for creation scientists have reached back to the big bang which comes from evidence of what the universe is doing today—expanding at in increasingly rapid rate. They don’t know where the material came from that came together and then exploded—still a mystery. If you like the notion that God created the universe, why not have him do it with a clap of his hands, BANG! Or how about the notion that this is a virtual reality much like video games; the creation is this fantastic game that surrounds us wherever we go, whatever we do—it is us. We have been getting ever closer to creating virtual reality; movies, then 3D movies, surround sound, Imax and video games that keep getting closer to reality. Scientists have figured out how to stimulate nerves in amputees to give them feeling in prosthetic limbs. From that it is comprehensible that they will be able to stimulate all our nerves in a virtual experience. For me I’d like that to be a date with Sophia Loren when she was about 22.

Another way to look at this notion is to consider what we know about the makeup of matter. We are made up of atoms that have a nucleus and electrons spinning around them interestingly much like the planets spinning around the sun. These atoms are mostly space. Take out all the space and we would be reduced to a speck of dust. Science has got another thing going on that I don’t understand very well as it is too new for my brain but as I understand it they have now got us or everything reduced to wave lengths. From another reality looking in on us we might be holograms.

Might it not be a good idea to think about how we came into being (actually science has largely answered that one), the purpose (meaning) of life and how best to behave so our species can get along and live good lives with all we know now rather than hanging onto ideas developed before electricity, before computers, before we had any thoughts about a virtual reality?

The following is from a posting on the Daily Kos. I urge you to use the link and read the whole posting.

We’ve seen a lot of comment about a new twist on the right, a whole campaign (t- shirts, bumper stickers,  e-mails and more) all built on the biblical passage in Psalms 109 which says in part:

May his days be few;
may another seize his position.
May his children be orphans,
and his wife a widow.

Many have pointed out that this campaign seems to imply the urgent need to eliminate President Barack Obama at the earliest opportunity by any means necessary, (you can figure out the rest).

But what is Psalms 109 really about?

Phil Zimbardo’s book, The Lucifer Effect, Understanding How Good People Turn Evil, is fascinating regarding individuals. I may even have to modify my feelings about the existence of evil (I basically reject evil as a concept.)

The book got me thinking about what is going on right now in the United States with conservative talk show hosts and their guests finding nothing but fault with anyone who doesn’t agree with them. Actually it goes farther than that. If they listened to what liberals, those horrible Democrats, were saying or read what was being proposed; they would actually agree on some things but they reject totally anything that comes from the mouths or pens of those on the other side of the aisle.

Fomenting hatred can’t be a good thing. One wonders if a whole nation could be victimized by the Lucifer Effect or at least enough people to damage if not destroy democracy. Consider the disruptive tactic now being employed at town meetings across the country where democratic senators and congressmen and citizens who came to listen and to be heard are being shouted down. This tactic is praised by Fox News yahoos as free speech. Wait a minute good buddy. What about the free speech of the rest of the people in the room?

If you don’t think there may be a serious problem here, consider that 58% of republicans question the president’s birth certificate. There can be no conclusion other than 58% of republicans have shut down a thinking section of their brain.

PS I’m not a liberal but liberals don’t scare me. People who have stopped thinking do.

Conversations with Republican friends have brought me to the generalization that Republicans are more likely to be fundamentalists in their religious beliefs than Democrats. These were conversations on politics, not religion.

A recent conversation began with agreement that we would like to see both parties work together. Why couldn’t they approach the idea or proposal of the other with a positive attitude? Then I mentioned the vote on the stimulus package put forward by President Obama and how I admired the three Republican senators who voted for it.

“Oh, we’re on opposite sides of that!” my Republican friend exclaimed.

“But isn’t that an example of cooperation?”

“Obama was the one who wasn’t cooperating. He rammed that through too fast without giving Republicans a chance to have their input.”

“Hey, wait a minute. Wasn’t there an urgency to get something done? All the experts on both sides said this was ‘uncharted waters’. Nobody came forward to say ‘this is the way out of this. This is what we must do to revive the economy.’ Nobody! No one claimed to have the answer. Wouldn’t it be better to say, ‘OK Mr. President, we’ll go with your plan’ especially since the President had listened to Republicans and had put a significant tax relief in it.”

“No. He just pushed it through so quickly no one had time to look at it critically.”

“What about the financial bailout pushed through a couple of months before Obama took office?”

“What bailout?”

“Remember the three page legislation that put $700 billion it Paulson’s hands to pretty much do with as he pleased? Remember how urgent it was to push that one through? Paulson got down on his knees to Congress and Bush signed it a week later. One week! Wasn’t that pushy?”

Republican amnesia on that one.

Fundamentalists take their dogma without question. Republican presidents and legislators are always right even if what they say today is a direct contradiction of what they said a month ago. Similarly The Bible is God’s word no matter that it is filled with contradictions. Could it be that being brought up to believe the Bible without question prepares them to accept whatever Republican leaders say no matter how nonsensical?

One more dialogue:

“I can’t stand Slick Willy.”

“What do you mean?”

“All his slick real estate dealings. He’s a crook.”

“Ken Star spent nearly $40 million investigating his ‘slick’ deals and found nothing.”

“He was impeached.”

“Yeah, for lying about getting a blow job, not for any slick dealings unless you call ejaculating on a red dress slick.”