So, what exactly is a free thinker? Someone who thinks freely. That explains that. OK, that wasn’t very helpful, but in my defense, when has a blog I wrote ever been helpful? A freethinker is basically someone who is an agnostic, atheist, humanist, skeptic, and/or a deist (in some definitions). Freethought/freethinking is a kind of catch-all name that encompasses many different groups. From the fifteen seconds of research I did (this is the second most research I have ever done in a blog), I found that freethinking is basically adogmatic with a strong scientific bent. Freethought is based on following where the evidence leads.

In my first post I discussed the difference between atheist and agnostic, but because I am too lazy to go back and read what I wrote, I don’t expect you, the reader, to do it either. So, here’s a quick overview to refresh your memory.  An agnostic makes a claim of knowledge: we can’t know there is or isn’t a god, so it’s not worth dealing with. An atheist makes a belief claim: there is no evidence of a god, so I believe there isn’t a god until such time that there is sufficient evidence. Do you believe in god? No, then your an atheist. Yes? Then you are a theist. It’s really that simple.

So why be a Freethinker, then? There is a very simple reason and it’s the reason that I use the term freethinker except when I am with people that are “in the know.” The term “atheist” carries a bunker full of baggage. You tell someone you are an atheist and immediately they are most likely on guard and not receptive to anything you have to say. You tell someone you are a free thinker and chances are they think something to the effect (affect? I still don’t know the right one to use and I always forget to learn the difference) of “oh, ok, then we can have a good conversation because at least you will listen.”

Freethinker is really a great term to use because 1) it doesn’t have the same negative connotation as atheist, 2) it encompasses both the relgious side (atheism) and the scientific side (skepticism) of rational thought, and 3) it just kind of sounds warm and cuddly like a puppy that’s just glad to see you.  I think that calling our little group “Bloomington/Normal Freethinkers” is a great idea because it is more accepting of non-believers (atheists, agnostics, skeptics, secularists, humanists, etc) than just the term “atheist.” *

*BNFree, while allowing Jay Pea to post his silly little blog, does not endorse or even recognize the validity of his statements. It’s members, officials, and people who just happened to have passed by a meeting one day do not neccessarily agree in whole or in part, with any comment made. If anything he has said offends you please direct your comments and complaints to the site administrator.

So, what is Hell exactly? Is it a firey pit where you will spend eternity in torment, having worms crawl through all of your orifices and crows pecking at your eyeballs? Is it merely the absence of God? Or maybe it’s just an eternity of being forced to watch the movie Junior starring Arnold Schwartzenegger over and over (I cried the next day when I realized that I had actually paid money to see the movie the night before). At any rate, Hell is whatever any particular religion tells you it is.

Hell has one purpose and one purpose only: fear. It’s the main motivator in converting people to religion. If you can scare someone bad enough, they will do whatever it takes to avoid the fear. However, in an odd twist, fear is also what keeps people in check and isn’t that what religion is really about, fundamentally? To avoid hell you have to accept Jesus into your heart and that’s all you need to do! Oh, well, I forgot to mention that you also have to do good works, go to church every week (don’t forget to give 10% of your income), stop sinning (remember, lusting after someone if you are married is adultery and hating someone is murder, so you’re basically screwed), and follow all the rules of the bible. Or you don’t. Just the New Testament. Actually, you just need Jesus. Oh, wait, you also have to follow the Golden Rule. Or…you know, it’s just a hell of a lot easier to just ignore it all together. As an atheist, all you have to worry about are local and federal laws and those are convoluted enough as it is without adding 600+ biblical rules.

Skeptical Rationalist and I were having a discussion about this very topic, some weeks ago, on a trip to  a skeptical conference, when he brought up a very good point. Eternity is long, really, really long. It goes on forever. It will never end. Ever. SkepRat said (I am paraphrasing here), “Hitler is responsible for roughly twenty-five to thirty million deaths if you add Russian, gypsy, French, Polish, and homosexuals to the Jew total. So, when does  Hitler pay off those deaths? At a year a death that’s thirty million years. At one hundred years per death that’s three billion years. But three billion years is just a couple of seconds to eternity. Let’s say there is a good person who is very kind, helps people, works at the homeless shelter, takes in stray cats, and doesn’t download songs illegally but is an atheist. This person is doomed to the same fate as Hitler. That’s the basical premise of Hell.” I must admit that I probably took some liberties with SkepRat’s wording (I am sure he said it more succinctly that I have), but his point makes a lot of sense. According to Christianity, Hitler is going to be down in Hell with most of the people he is responsible for killing.

Hell is just a religious tactic.

I am not afraid of Hell for two very important reasons. Number Uno, I am an atheist and there is no evidence that there is actually a hell. Number II, I ate at Taco Bell and at Arby’s in the same day and late that night/early the next morning I was living in hell. No woman can tell me I don’t know what it’s like to be pregnant*, because I swear to Pretend God that I had something in my stomach kicking and punching and making me cry in pain. I almost prayed to Pretend God just to make it stop. I was camped out in the bathroom that night, even had a little fire going so I could tell myself ghost stories just to take my mind off of the excruciating pain.**

One last note about Hell. Why is it considered a swear word? It’s a “place”, yet it’s a no-no to say. You don’t hear people going “Oh, Pittsburgh” when something doesn’t go right and you don’t hear people saying, “Just shut the San Diego up!” when some is talking to much.#

*I apologize to all women if this has offended you, but dammit, I was in a lot of pain that night.

**This actually did happen, though parts of the story have been embellished. I did eat at Taco Bell and Arby’s in the same day and I did spend the evening in the bathroom.

# BNFree would like it to be know that it’s officers are currently looking into the legal aspects of having Jay Pea committed to a mental institution. BNFree makes no claim of agreement with anything said in this blog. If you are an atheist, sketpic, freethinker, or a thinking person and find yourself agreeing with any aspect of this blog seek professional help.

I read through the pamphlet like six times before I rushed out and bought myself a Great Books of Wonderous BIFF. The pamphlet made me realize that, alone, I am not good enough, but with BIFF by my side, I will always have a friend looking out for me wherever I go.

The pamphlet quoted a passage from Letters 6:9 “And BIFF say unto thee ‘ In thine house, thou shalt be comfortable, wearingeth no pants, thy shall be free.’”

What powerful words. BIFF loves us so much, that he instructs us to go without pants in our house so that we will be comfortable. It almost brought me to tears. If BIFF cares about such a seemingly trivial thing, then he must care a great deal about the big things.

I am going to quote a few verses that stuck out in my mind while reading through the Great Book of Wonderous BIFF, but I am not going to comment of them because I want you to be able to feel the power as the words flow through you.

Lactations 8:8-9: “If a man loveth a man and a woman loveth a woman, he shall be with him and she with her  for she and she and he and he may findeth a flame that he and she or he and she may noteth ignite.”

First Confrontations 5:15: “Thou shalt wash thine hands after thy business is done for thateth is where germs caneth be passed to others.”

The Gospel According to Gary 47:1-3: “Eateth of thy bread for it is good. Drinketh of thy wine, heavily, for it may blotteth out thine memory of thine personal encounter of the night before. Thateth may be a memory thou shalt not want. Buteth, if thy drinketh, heavily, then ye may find thine hip pocket lighter than thou expected.”

I don’t think I can add anything to the power of those words. Every time I read them I just want to rejoice and shout out “BIFF, you are an awesome BIFF, from Somewhere you are good!”

The pamphlet did say that when telling others about the power of Biff, I should be very pushy to point out the Seven Suggestions and the Seven Proofs. So, LISTEN CLOSELY OR BIFF WILL CRY!

The Seven Suggestions (Secretions 42: 42-57)

1. Do not kill anything, not even the smallest insect, for all life is equal
2. You must pay homage to me
3. You may not have any gods before me, but you may have no more than three after me
4. Once every seven years you must slaughter an entire village and wash yourself in the blood of the innocent to cleanse yourself from evil
5. Only conscious beings capable of reason are important, you must sacrifice a lesser being once a day
6. During worship, you must nail rose petals to the walls and drink a glass of walnut juice while scattering a fistful of goat hair on the floor
7. You  must do stretches before going out on the hunt, for a pulled muscle will hurt

In my readings I also found something that, to my knowledge, has never been done by a god before. BIFF has  also give seven proofs that he exists. This list is from Galoshes 3:16-30

1. I am perfect, therefore I cannot lie. I say that I exist and since a perfect being cannot lie, I exist
2. It would be illogical for me not to exist and this is a logical universe, therefore I exist
3. I exist, therefore I exist
4. People believe I exist, therefore I exist
5. I have proved I exist, therefore I exist
6. To prove that I don’t exist would cause the universe to cease to be, but since the universe is still here it is impossible to prove that I do not exist, therefore I exist.
7. Come on, you know I exist, therefore I exist

I realize that I have only give you a few snippets of the true, awesome, majestic power of BIFF and I know that I am not doing BIFF justice, and for that I can only ask of HIM his semi-eternal forgiveness. I am still very new to BIFFism and I so desperately want to make HIM proud. I have asked BIFF to do me a solid and he suggested that I just throw out a few more verses because HIS words are more powerful a tool than anything I could come up with, so I shall leave you with two more passages and then leave you until next month.

Libations 4;5: “When thou looketh at thy neighbors house, do not thinketh of thy neighbors house as better than thou’s, for thine abode is a fine dwelling if only thoust would cleaneth it once in awhile.”

The Gospel According to Marvin 90:15: “Eat, drink, and be hairy.” *

*This blog is solely the fault of its author. BNFree makes no claim to anything said, in whole or in part. This is not endorsed by BNFree, its members, or anyone who can feed themselves. If any of the blog makes any sense, it’s author suggests that you seek professional help.

So, I figure in this blog post I would expound on my last blog post and maybe explain the meaning of “Jay Pea’s Indefinite Suspension”. First of all I should point out that I am not an “intellectual” atheist. I’ve been told that I’m a smart (ass) guy, but I’m not very good at discussing evolution or debating the many arguments for the existence of God. What I can do, however, is make less sense than the person I am talking to and I have found that if you make negative sense people just assume you know what you are talking about because the human brain did not evolve to deal with that sort of thing. I guess that explains the spread of Scientology. Now, having said that, I am going to do my best to explain myself with the intellect that Pretend God gave me.

At certain work places and schools if you do something really bad or do many small things wrong, you can be indefinitely suspended from work or school until such time that the powers that be determine that you can return. That’s kind of how I view my lack of religious belief. I was a Christian, but because there is no evidence to the contrary I no longer believe. If, at some point, irrefutable evidence should arise, I will give it serious thought and return to belief. I feel I am in no danger of that happening, but I, Jay Pea, have been Indefinitely Suspended from religious belief. So that’s the meaning of that.

Now, on to greater concerns. Who Is This God Person Anyway (Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy reference)? Is god a pissed off deity who has people killed for picking up sticks on the Sabbath and seems to be creepily preoccupied with the sexual activities of his creations? Is he into genital mutilations, filicide, and genocide? Or is he a kindly old grandfatherly type who just wants to see you do well and all he asks in return is your unquestioning loyalty and obedience? Or perhaps he created the universe as one long ass reality TV show where he constantly says things like “Oh no he didn’t”,  “What’s the deal with Tom Cruise anyway?” and “I can’t believe it’s not butter!” (I guess he watches the commercials, too). In my opinion, people worship the god that fits their beliefs. Are you the kind of person who hates homosexuals, abortion, and any form of individual thoughts? Then you probably worship a fundamentalist Christian god. Hate homosexuals and blacks, but like the idea of having four or five wives complaining that you don’t do enough around the house? Then you probably worship a Mormon god. Like the idea of making yourself look like a jerk by jumping up and down on a couch on national television and continually getting movie roles despite your limited acting ability? Then you probably worship an alien god from a far off planet. You get the point.

My beliefs basically boil down to this: do what makes you feel good as long as it is not illegal and does not impede upon someone else’s ability to enjoy life. I consider myself to be a pretty open-minded, laid back guy and I, personally, don’t care if someone wants to worship god, just keep it at church or in your house. Don’t bring it to work and especially don’t bring it to my doorstep. If you do come knocking on my door, I will let you in, but I will make damn sure that it’s going to be one of the most uncomfortable experiences of your life. There ain’t nothing worse than a shirtless chubby guy sitting in front of you picking his nose and seeing how hard he can fart before he does something more than just fart. If that doesn’t work, I can also use the restroom without closing the door and have a screaming match with my wife about whose turn it is to sacrifice the goat.

So, to sum everything up: Pretend God is a jerk, mind your own business, and I am not normal and have wayyyyy to much time on my hands.#

*That didn’t really happen. It’s called an apocryphal story and is used to prove a point, though,  I really don’t know what that point could be.

#These views are not necessarily the views of BNFree, it’s members, atheists, well adjusted people, or anyone who has any semblance of sanity. If you are offended by anything in this blog post, please send your comments to the adminstrator who will put Jay Pea in a time out and explain to him why he’s in trouble. Thank you.

But, that’s not possible, is it? An agnostic is just the middle ground between an atheist and a believer (for the sake of simplicity I will refer to theists, those who believe in some form of a god as “believers”), so you can’t be in the middle and on the end, right? In spatial terms, this would be correct, but when dealing with philosophical concepts, nothing makes sense.

I grew up in a Christian household and accepted Jesus into my heart at a pretty early age and then did it again in my mid teens. And again in my early twenties. I may have been raised in a Christian household, but that doesn’t mean they taught me anything. I guess I thought I could lose salvation, but I have come to find out that you can only lose your salvation if your denomination says you can. What I did learn was that atheists were bad, agnostics didn’t know any better, and Christians were good. The point in relaying this information is that, while I have no doubt that my parents loved me and had only my best interests in mind, they didn’t really teach me anything about the faith. I think that’s why not many people understand what agnosticism is, even those who grew up in an atheist household. I would assume anyway.

In the interest of full disclosure, I did some research at Wikipedia and learned a few things. See, even someone who took a few classes at a community college can get learnt.

The term “agnostic” was coined by T.H. Huxley (Darwin’s Bulldog) in 1860, though the concept predates that by thousands of years. The term “agnostic” refers to knowledge of a god rather than a belief in a god. To explain this further, I will define a few terms.

Strong agnosticism- The view that it is impossible for humans to know whether a deity exists or not. Basically, since a deity is supernatural the deity would be on a plane of existence that humans do not have access to, therefore, knowledge of said deity is inaccessible to humans.

Apathetic agnosticism- This refers to the belief that it doesn’t matter whether a deity exists or not because said deity doesn’t concern him/herself with the affairs of humans or the universe. This makes the question basically unimportant. While not quite the same, this belief is similar to deism.

Weak agnosticism- Those who subscribe to this belief take the view that it is currently unknown whether a deity exists, but evidence could one day point to the existence of a deity, so it is best to reserve judgment until we have all the evidence

Agnostic theism- The view of a person who doesn’t claim to know whether a deity exists, but one should believe anyway. This is similar to Pascal’s Wager (basically “it’s better to believe in a god and be wrong than not to and be wrong).

Agnostic atheism- The view of someone who doesn’t claim to have knowledge for or against a deity, but does not believe in any deity.

Those definitions are basic in nature and are a mere snapshot of fairly involved philosophical beliefs, but it had to be done. It is my hope that throughout my blogging career (which I am sure will be short, if this first one is any indication) that readers will at least learn something. Or perhaps argue amongst themselves. I am good either way.

The goal of listing the definitions of several agnostic belief systems was twofold: first, it took up space to make my blog look longer and two, perhaps someone will have a better idea of what they believe. As I stated early on, I consider myself an agnostic atheist. I do not claim to know that “God exists!” nor do I claim to know that “God does not exist!” but choose to believe that no deity exists. I am of the mindset that there is no evidence and because of a lack of evidence I choose to believe that there is no deity. If one day there is evidence, then I will seriously reconsider my belief system. I realize that what I just said kind of sounds like weak agnosticism, but if you refer back to the definitions that I so painstakingly supplied, you will realize that I have not reserved judgment. I am saying that “I do not believe in any deity.”

*This blog does not necessarily express the views of BNFree, any of its members, or any half wit in general. These comments are the sole beliefs of one individual who has been given permission to let the voices in his head have there say. Please direct any complaints to someone who cares. Thank you.