WASPS - World Atheist Science PeopleWASPS - World Atheist Science PeopleWhat is WASPS? World - anyone, anywhere. Atheist - the supernatural does not exist. Science - acquiring knowledge based on the scientific method. People: people of science not people of faith Articles
Emory Brain Imaging Studies Reveal Biological Basis For Human Cooperation
2007-07-12 07:25:00 via RichardDawkins.netby Science DailyThanks to Amy Karls for the link.Reposted from:http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases /2002/07/020718075131.htmScience Daily — Functional MRI scans have revealed a "biologically embedded" basis for altruistic behavior, with several characteristic regions of the brain being activated when players of a game called "Prisoner's Dilemma" decide to trust each other and cooperate, rather than betray each other for immediate gain, say researchers from Emory University. They report on their study in the July 18 issue of the journal Neuron, published by Cell Press.For many years, evolutionary biologists, behaviorists, economists and political scientists have attempted to understand why cooperation exists between human beings, even though that cooperation may not result in a direct or immediate reward. This unselfish behavior called "altruism" is almost uniquely a human trait.Up until now, almost all brain imaging experiments that have studied the social b... More About: Studies , Cooperation , Human , Brain , Imaging
Darwin Fish Exposes Christian Privilege
2007-07-11 19:58:00 from Atheist Revolution by vjackI like the Darwin fish. To me, it is a healthy pro-science statement. Of course, I acknowledge that it also carries an anti-religion connotation for some people due to its design (i.e., borrowing from the Christian design which came first) and the inevitable conflict between religion and science. I'm also aware that some people view displaying a Darwin fish as an act of symbolic aggression. More than just being an interesting symbol that is interpreted in diverse ways, the Darwin fish exposes the scope of Christian privilege and says volumes about the plight of nonbelievers.I do not have a Darwin fish on my car, but I would very much like to. Why? I perceive it as one of the rare symbols which conveys both a pro-science and an anti-superstition sentiment simultaneously. Since I am both pro-science and anti-superstition, it is an unusually accurate symbol for my worldview. But the main reason I'd like to have one because of how it makes me feel when ... More About: Fish , Pose
Secular Terrorist
2007-07-11 09:48:00 WASP: World Atheist Science People More About: Terrorist , Secular
When is a bishop like a suicide bomber?
2007-07-11 09:19:00 by Thomas Sutcliffe, Independent via RichardDawkins.netReposted from:http://comment.independent.co.uk/col umnists_m_z/thomas_sutcliffe/article27304 65.ecePublished: 03 July 2007On the face of it, the Bish op of Carlisle and the young man who staggered blazing from that Jeep at Glasgow Airport on Saturday afternoon don't have a lot in common. The Right Reverend Graham Dow is a grey-haired man with a twinkling smile, rarely armed with anything more lethal than a crozier.That wannabe martyr - his 72 expectant virgins currently tapping their fingers impatiently in Paradise - had a head wreathed in fire and a Molotov cocktail in his hand. The Bishop of Carlisle is a diocesan bishop in the Church of England, not a sect commonly associated with acts of terror, while the as-yet-unnamed jihadi is, one guesses, an adherent of Wahabi Islam, a sect which very much is. And yet, on a spiritual level, it seems that they do share one thing. They both believe in a vindictive God.We already... More About: Suicide , Suicide Bomber , Bomber
Environmentalism: the new death cult?
2007-07-03 20:39:00 source: GuardianThe New Atheists are a gaggle of writers wielding a literary cudgel against religion. From Richard Dawkins' The God Delusion to Christopher Hitchens' God Is Not Great, it has become positively fashionable to be a member of the anti-God squad and to ridicule the religious.Fair enough. I'm as atheistic as they come, so I won't be shedding a tear for Christianity, Islam, Judaism or the other superstitious sects that now find themselves under attack by intellectuals. And yet, I can't help feeling that the new atheists are rather spectacularly missing the point.They are going after religions which, in the west at least, are in terminal decline, and whose influence is miniscule bordering on non-existent. At the same time, these atheists tend to buy into the cult of environmentalism, which is rehabilitating old religious pieties with a dangerously dramatic success rate.Forget fundamentalist Christianity or Islam: environmentalism is by far the most influential death cu... More About: Cult , Death , Environmentalism , Iron , Envi
The spread of terror
2007-07-03 20:30:00 Blaming terrorism on some unspecified evil within the Muslim community may please warmongers, but it won't help us defeat the violent extremists.source: Guardian WASP: World Atheist Science People More About: Terror , Spread
Inferior Design by Richard Dawkins
2007-07-02 09:52:00 I had expected to be as irritated by Michael Behe's second book as by his first. I had not expected to feel sorry for him. The first — "Darwin's Black Box" (1996), which purported to make the scientific case for "intelligent design" — was enlivened by a spark of conviction, however misguided. The second is the book of a man who has given up. Trapped along a false path of his own rather unintelligent design, Behe has left himself no escape. Poster boy of creationists everywhere, he has cut himself adrift from the world of real science. And real science, in the shape of his own department of biological sciences at Lehigh University, has publicly disowned him, via a remarkable disclaimer on its Web site: "While we respect Prof. Behe's right to express his views, they are his alone and are in no way endorsed by the department. It is our collective position that intelligent design has no basis in science, has not been tested experimentally and should not be regarded as scientific.... More About: Design , Richard Dawkins , Richard , Dawkins , Inferior
Richard Dawkins talks about Darwin and his visit to the Galapagos
More articles from this author:2007-07-02 09:47:00 source: Richard Dawkins .netWASP: World Atheist Science People More About: Darwin , Richard Dawkins , Visit 1, 2, 3 |
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