by Carl Howard | Nov 15, 2012 | Blog Topics, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Philosophy, Science and Skepticism
Often modern debates between religious and non-religious people end up hinging on the meaning and use of why questions. Consider a fake dialogue between A and B: A: Science may be able to say tell us how things are but it will never explain why things are. B: Like...
by Carl Howard | Aug 16, 2012 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, History, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Science and Skepticism, Society
A few weeks ago, I was out with 3 friends and the conversation turned to the increasing prevalence of technology especially with smartphones being so common. I believe that all three of them agreed that this was a definite negative. People would turn increasingly...
by Carl Howard | Feb 13, 2012 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Medicine, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Science and Skepticism, Sex, Society
…is (in my opinion) a ridiculous organisation at whose core is sex-negative pseudoscience. I can’t remember how I stumbled onto their website, I think it was from looking at the keywords used to find the blog. But it’s quite shocking to see a viewpoint that’s so...
by Carl Howard | Jan 12, 2012 | Blog Topics, Language, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Science and Skepticism
It’s very common to mention Orwell’s 1984 when criticising a tyrannical/repressive/linguistically manipulative government/corporation/individual. This is often followed by praise of Orwell and how wise and prophetic his 1984 was. I find these comparisons ridiculous...
by Carl Howard | Jan 4, 2012 | Atheism and Religion, Blog Topics, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Science and Skepticism
The news are full of cases where very religious people do extremely ridiculous or cruel things. For example, there’s Javon Thompson, a 1 year old starved to death by his cult member family because he did not say “amen” during mealtime. Or more recently, a 7 year old...
by Carl Howard | Aug 15, 2011 | Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Charity and Philanthropy, Mind, Psychology and Consciousness, Resources, Food and Environment, Science and Skepticism
In 2009 I set up a recurring (monthly) donation to the World Food Program. In mid 2010, I decided that I’d be quitting my job in early 2011 and taking a year off. As part of that I began to wind down some expenses to save up a bit more. One of the things to go was...
