Transcript Famous Atheists and Freethinkers

Amazing Atheists
and Freethinkers
Paducah Secular Society
July 21, 2012
•Does “Any Goodness Comes From God”?
“God alone = good. Man = naturally
depraved – any goodness comes from God.”
Comment from Julia Gwinn in my blog
rarebible.wordpress.com.
• James 1:17 Every good and perfect gift is
from above, coming down from the Father of
the heavenly lights, who does not change
like shifting shadows.
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•Science and Technology
From Atheists and Freethinkers
Definitions For This Presentation
Freethinker – Thoughts not bound by dogma
• Atheist – Does not believe in god(s)
• Agnostic – Does not know if god(s) exist
• Deist – God created but is not personal
• Pantheist – God is nature
• Theist – Believes in personal god
• Antitheist – Active opposition to theism
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•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
• Light
bulb
• Record player
• Movie projector
• NY Times, Oct 2,
1910
• The Columbian
Magazine, Jan
1911
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
“There is no more reason to believe that any
human brain will be immortal than there is to think
that one of my phonographic cylinders will be
immortal. My photographic cylinders are mere
records of sounds which have been impressed
upon them… Yet no one thinks of claiming
immortality for the cylinders or the phonograph.
Then why claim it for the brain mechanism or the
power that drives it? Because we don’t know what
this power is, shall we call it immortal?... This
speculative idea of immortality needs but be
analyzed to fall wholly to the ground.” - NYT
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
“Nature is what we know. We do
not know the god’s of the religions.
And Nature is not kind, or merciful,
or loving. If God made me… He
also made the fish I catch and eat.
And where do his mercy, kindness,
and love for that fish come in?” NYT
•Thomas Edison – Antitheist
“No; nature made us – nature did it all –
not the gods of the religions. And nature
did it mercilessly; she had no thought
for mercy for or against it. - NYT
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
"Religions? They are nothing but
formalities and side-issues…When the
churches learn to take this rational view
of things, when they become true
schools of ethics and stop teaching
fables, they will be more effective than
they are to-day… I seriously doubt if
Christ, the greatest moral teacher of
them all, laid claim to actual divinity. “ Columbian
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
"The criticisms which have been hurled
at me have not worried me. A man
cannot control his beliefs. If he is honest
in his frank expression of them, that is all
that can in justice be required of him.” Columbian
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
“Professor Thomson and a thousand others
do not in the least agree with me. His criticism
of me… charged that because I doubted the
soul's immortality, or 'personality,' as he
called it, my mind must be abnormal,
'pathological,' in other, words,
diseased…What he said about my mind did
not disturb me. I try to say exactly what I
honestly believe to be the truth, and more
than that no man can do. I honestly believe
that creedists have built up a mighty structure
of inaccuracy…” - Columbian
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
“I have never seen the slightest
scientific proof of the religious theories
of heaven and hell, of future life for
individuals, or of a personal God…The
thing which most impresses me about
theology is that it does not seem to be
investigating. It seems to be asserting,
merely, without actual study.” Columbian
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
“The fact that man, for ages, has
superstitiously believed in what he calls
a God does not prove at all that his
theory has been right. There have been
many gods - all makeshifts, born of
inability to fathom the deep
fundamental truth… Not one of all the
gods of all the various theologies has
ever really been proved.” - Columbian
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
"But now we are becoming more
inquisitive, far more insistent in our
search for the Real Things. We do not,
now, as easily as our forefathers did,
accept things upon faith. And our
children will be still more skeptical of
mere unproved assertion; their children
more than they will be. “ – Columbian
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
“The days of miracles have passed. I do not
believe, of course, that there was ever any
day of actual miracles. I cannot understand
that there were ever any miracles at all. My
guide must be my reason, and at thought of
miracles my reason is rebellious. Personally, I
do not believe that Christ laid claim to doing
miracles, or asserted that he had miraculous
power.” - Columbian
•Thomas Edison - Antitheist
“Life goes on endlessly, but no more in
human beings than in other animals, or,
for that matter, than in vegetables. Life,
collectively, must be immortal, human
beings, individually, cannot be, as I see
it, for they are not the individuals - they
are mere aggregates of cells… There is
no supernatural” - Columbian
•Alan Turing - Atheist
Father of Comp. Sci. and A.I.
• First stored computer program
• War hero – Decoded Nazi Enigma
Machine
• PhD Princeton; Royal Society
• Turing Machines and Turing Test
• CAPTCHA is reversed form of Turing Test
• Guilty of homosexuality, 1952
• Chemically castrated to avoid prison
• Suicide, 1954
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•Bill Gates - Agnostic
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Microsoft Windows is world’s leading PC operating system
Internet Explorer is world’s leading web browser
Microsoft Office and other software are used world wide
“I’m not somebody who goes to church on a regular basis. The specific
elements of Christianity are not something I’m a huge believer in. I take
a fairly scientific approach to why things happen and how they
happen. I don’t know if there’s a God or not…” – David Frost interview,
1995
[When asked about the divine human soul] "I don't have any evidence
on that," answers Gates. "I don't have any evidence of that."
He later states, "Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is
not very efficient. There's a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday
morning." - Time, January 13, 1996
www.billgateswindows.com lists him as agnostic, not atheist
•Steve Wozniak
Atheist
Apple Cofounder with Steve Jobs
• “I am also atheist or agnostic (I don't even
know the difference). I've never been to
church and prefer to think for myself... Steve
Jobs may be an informal fan of Eastern
religions but it's never obvious in him and I
never heard of him regularly attending a
church. That's only a guess.” – Response on
his website
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•Steve Jobs
Freethinker
Zen Buddhist
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Mac computers, iPod, iPhone, iPad
At age 13, Jobs asked the Lutheran pastor of his
parents' church if God knew about starving children.
"Yes, God knows everything," the pastor replied. Jobs
never returned to church, refusing to worship a God
who allowed such suffering. – USA Today
Attended Zen Centers
Believed Zen meditation taught him to concentrate,
ignore distractions, and trust intuition and curiosity
over analysis and preconceptions – USA Today
•Albert Einstein
Deist/Pantheist of Jewish Heritage
The word god is for me
nothing more than the
expression and product of
human weaknesses, the
Bible a collection of
honourable, but still
primitive legends which are
nevertheless pretty childish.
No interpretation no matter
how subtle can (for me)
change this.
- letter to philosopher Eric Gutkind
•Francis Crick - Atheist
Nobel Prize Winner, Co-discoverer of the structure of DNA
A knowledge of the
true age of the
earth and of the
fossil record makes
it impossible for
any balanced
intellect to believe
in the literal truth
of every part of the
Bible in the way
that
fundamentalists
do.
- from his
autobiography What
•Neil Degrasse Tyson - Agnostic
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Prefers no labels
Self described agnostic on Point Of Inquiry
“I simply go with what works. And what
works is the healthy skepticism embodied in
the scientific method. Believe me, if the
Bible had ever been shown to be a rich
source of scientific answers and
enlightenment, we would be mining it daily
for cosmic discovery.” The Sky Is Not the
Limit, p. 188
When asked if he believed in a higher
power, Tyson responded: "Every account of
a higher power that I've seen described, of
all religions that I've seen, include many
statements with regard to the benevolence
of that power. When I look at the universe
and all the ways the universe wants to kill
us, I find it hard to reconcile that with
statements of beneficence." – YouTube video
•More Atheists in Science
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Alfred Nobel – Dynamite and Nobel Prize
Neils Bohr – Atomic structure, Nobel 1922
Pierre Currie – Radioactivity, Nobel 1903
Paul Dirac – Quantum Mechanics, Antimatter, Nobel
1933
Richard Feynman – Quantum Electrodynamics, Nobel
1965
Francis Crick – DNA, Nobel 1962
James Watson – DNA, Nobel 1962
Linus Pauling – Nobel Chemistry 1954, Peace 1962
Peter Higgs – Physicist predicted Higgs boson particle
Craig Venter – Sequenced human genome; 1st
synthetic genome
Many more atheists and agnostics!
•National Academy of Sciences
93% of the National Academy of
Sciences do not believe in a
personal god.
-Nature, 1998, vol 394, p 313
•Human Rights
From Atheists and Freethinkers
•Robert Ingersoll The Great
Agnostic
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Famous attorney – his defense
helped discredit blasphemy
laws
Popular orator in 1800s
Promoted abolition
Promoted women’s suffrage
Promoted agnosticism
Promoted humanism
Influenced religious people to
end slavery and support
women’s suffrage
•Elizabeth Cady Stanton - Atheist
• Leader of Women’s Suffrage
• Seneca Falls Conference, 1848
• Abolitionist
• Worked with Susan B. Anthony
• National Woman Suffrage Assoc., 1869
• The Woman’s Bible, 1895
• Harsh critic of religion
• Written out of history due to strength of
her position against religion
• Recently receiving credit she is due
•Susan B. Anthony - Agnostic
• Abolitionist, Women’s
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Suffragette
Met Stanton in Seneca Falls in
1851
Friends for Life
Arrested for voting, 1872
Agnostic by the 1880s
Fined $100, never paid
Merged NWSA with moderate
AWSA to form NAWSA in 1890.
Radicals like Stanton became
marginalized
Worked with religious people
better than Stanton
•Susan B. Anthony - Agnostic
The religious
persecution of the
ages has been
done under what
was claimed to be
the command of
God.
-from Rufus K Noyes, Views of
Religion
•W. E. B. DuBois - Agnostic
• Cofounder of the NAACP, 1910
• Opposed Atlanta Compromise
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of Booker Washington
The Souls of Black Folk, 1903
Self described agnostic
Refused to lead prayers
"When I became head of a
department at Atlanta, the
engagement was held up
because again I balked at
leading in prayer ... I flatly
refused again to join any
church or sign any church creed
“ - Autobiography
•W. E. B. DuBois - Agnostic
Cofounder of the NAACP
Half the Christian
churches of New
York are trying to
ruin the free public
schools in order to
replace them by
religious dogma.
- “A Vista of Ninety Fruitful
Years," from W E B Du Bois
Writings
•W. E. B. DuBois - Agnostic
Cofounder of the NAACP
The kind of sermon
which is preached in
most colored
churches is not
today attractive to
even fairly
intelligent men.
- "On Christianity," an essay
published posthumously in Against
Racism
•Jane Addams - Agnostic
Nobel Prizewinning Social Activist and Author
The very word woman in the
writings of the church fathers
stood for the basest of
temptations.... As women were
lowered in the moral scale
because of their identification with
her at the very bottom of the pit,
so they cannot rise themselves
save as they succeed in lifting her
with whose sins they are weighed.
-"A Challenge to the Contemporary Church"
•Charles Chilton Moore – Ky Atheist
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1837 - 1906
Blue Grass Blade 1884 - 1910
Agnosticism
Women’s Suffrage
Convicted, Mailing Obscene Literature
Trial focused on blasphemy
20-Year sentence, 1899
Commuted by Pres. McKinley after 5
months
2009 – Ky’s Most Hated Man
2011 – Letters From An Atheist Nation
www.bluegrassblade.net is active today
•American Heritage
From Atheists and Freethinkers
•Thomas Paine - Deist
• Author, Common Sense
• Author, The Age Of Reason
I do not believe in the creed
professed by the Jewish
Church, by the Roman
Church, by the Greek
Church, by the Turkish
Church, by the Protestant
Church, nor by any Church
that I know of. My own mind
is my own Church.
-The Age of Reason
•Thomas Jefferson - Deist
• Author of Declaration of
Independence
• Third President
Question with boldness
even the existence of a god;
because if there be one he
must approve of the
homage of reason more
than that of blindfolded
fear.
-letter to Peter Carr, August 10, 1787
•Thomas Jefferson Describes 1st
Amendment as Separation of
Church and State
I contemplate with sovereign
reverence that act of the whole
American people which declared
that their legislature should
'make no law respecting an
establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise
thereof,' thus building a wall of
separation between church and
State.
-letter to Danbury Baptist Association, CT.,
Jan. 1, 1802
•Thomas Jefferson - Deist
Christianity neither
is, nor ever was a
part of the common
law.
-letter to Dr. Thomas Cooper, Feb 10, 1814
•Benjamin Franklin - Deist
I have found
Christian dogma
unintelligible.
Early in life I
absented myself
from Christian
assemblies.
- Toward the Mystery
•Benjamin Franklin - Deist
He [the Rev Mr.
Whitefield] used,
indeed, sometimes
to pray for my
conversion, but
never had the
satisfaction of
believing that his
prayers were heard.
- Autobiography
•Ethan Allen - Deist
Founding Father
• War Hero
• Founder of Vermont
• Capture of Ft. Ticonderoga
• Reason: The Only Oracle of Man
• “I have generally been denominated a Deist,
the reality of which I have never disputed,
being conscious I am no Christian, except
mere infant baptism make me one…”
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•Abraham Lincoln – Vampire Hunter
•Abraham Lincoln – Deist or Atheist
16th President
• Freed slaves
• Never joined any church
• Never baptized
• Friends Willie Herndon &
Ward Lamon published
biographies describing Abe
as deist or atheist
• Numerous friends claim
Abe was not a Christian at
death (Six Historic
Americans, 1906)
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•Ulysses S. Grant (1822-1885)
The 18th US President (1869-77)
Grant was never baptized
into any church (wife was
Methodist).
“Leave the matter of religion
to the family altar, the church
and the private school
supported entirely by private
contributions. Keep the
church and state forever
separate.”
- address to the Army of the Tennessee,
Des Moines, Iowa, September 25, 1875
•Artistic Contributions
From Atheists and Freethinkers
•Mark Twain - Atheist
In all the ages the Roman
Church has owned slaves... Yet
now at last, in our immediate
day, we hear a Pope saying slave
trading is wrong... The texts
remain: it is the practice that has
changed. Why? Because the
world has corrected the Bible.
The Church never corrects it; and
also never fails to drop in at the
tail of the procession -- and take
the credit of the correction.
- Bible Teaching and Religious
Practice
•Mark Twain - Atheist
"Faith is believing
what you know ain't
so."
-- Following the Equator,
"Pudd'nhead Wilson's New
Calendar" (1897)
•Wizard of Oz Atheist – Yip Harburg
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Wrote word of every song in
Wizard of Oz
Somewhere Over The
Rainbow – greatest song of
20th Century by RIAA
Brother Can You Spare A
Dime
April In Paris
It’s Only A Paper Moon
Oscar for Wiz of Oz and
Cabin in the Sky
•Gone With The Wind Atheist Butterfly McQueen
"As my ancestors are
free from slavery, I am
free from the slavery
of religion."
Life Member, Freedom
From Religion
Foundation
•Star Trek Atheists – Gene Roddenberry
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“We must question
the story logic of
having an allknowing all-powerful
God, who creates
faulty Humans, and
then blames them for
his own mistakes.”
Free Inquiry, autumn
1992
•Star Trek Atheists - Shatner
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William Shatner (James Kirk),
when asked if he has religious
beliefs: “No. I don't. Emotionally
I would like to believe there is a
life after death. Intellectually . .
. I cannot accept the idea. . .
as for myself, I have finally
come to the conclusion that life
is here and now . . . and
nothing more.“ TV Picture Life
interview, 1968.
•Star Trek Atheists – William Shatner
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"My belief system is that
when this is over, it's over.
That you don't look down
from heaven and wait for
your loved ones to join you.
There may be some soul
activity, but I'm not sure
about that. But what I am
sure about is that your
molecules continue and in
due time become
something else. That's
science." Associated Press,
2006
•Harry Potter Atheist - Daniel Radcliffe
• "I'm
an atheist, but I'm
very relaxed about it. I
don't preach my
atheism, but I have a
huge amount of
respect for people like
Richard Dawkins who
do. Anything he does
on television, I will
watch.“ Esquire
Magazine, July 2009
•Katherine Hepburn - Atheist
I'm an atheist, and
that's it. I believe
there's nothing we can
know except that we
should be kind to each
other and do what we
can for each other.
October 1991 Ladies'
Home Journal
•Andy Rooney – Outspoken Atheist
• Boston
Globe,
May 30, 1982
• FFRF “Emperor
Has No Clothes
Award”, 2001
•Andy Rooney – Outspoken Atheist
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Sincerely, Andy Rooney, 1999:
• "I
don't differentiate
much, except in degree,
between people who
believe in religion from
those who believe in
astrology, magic or the
supernatural."
•Andy Rooney – Outspoken Atheist
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Sincerely, Andy Rooney, 1999:
• "We
all ought to
understand we're on our
own. Believing in Santa
Claus doesn't do kids any
harm for a few years but it
isn't smart for them to
continue waiting all their
lives for him to come down
the chimney with
something wonderful.
Santa Claus and God are
cousins."
•Andy Rooney – Outspoken
Atheist
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Sincerely, Andy Rooney, 1999:
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just wish this social
institution [religion]
wasn't based on what
appears to me to be a
monumental hoax built
on an accumulation of
customs and myths
directed toward
proving something that
isn't true."
•Andy Rooney – Outspoken
Atheist
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Sincerely, Andy Rooney, 1999:
"Christians talk as though
goodness was their idea
but good behavior doesn't
have any religious origin.
Our prisons are filled with
the devout."
• "I'd be more willing to
accept religion, even if I
didn't believe it, if I
thought it made people
nicer to each other but I
don't think it does."
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•More Celebrity Atheists!
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Lane Armstrong
Isaac Asimov
James Cameron
(Titanic)
John Carpenter
Rodney Dangerfield
Jodie Foster
Ernest Hemingway
Penn Jillette
Billy Joel
Hugh Laurie
Bruce Lee
John Lennon
Bill Maher
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Bill Maher
Barry Manilow
Rafael Nadal
Randy Newman
Jack Nicholson
James Randi
Ron Reagan, Jr.
Rob Reiner
Keanu Reeves
Adam Savage
Howard Stern
Julia Sweeney
Teller
Pat Tillman
And hundreds more!
•Science and Technology
Summary
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Light bulb
Record Player
Movie Projector
Computer Program
Windows PC
Mac
iPod
iPhone
iPad
DNA Structure
DNA technologies
Nobel Foundation
Nuclear Power
Much More!
•Human Rights Summary
Abolition of Slavery
• Women’s Right to Vote
• NAACP
• Civil Rights
• Robert Ingersoll
• Elizabeth Cady Stanton
• Susan B. Anthony
• W.E.B. DuBois
• Jane Addams
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•American Heritage Summary
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Thomas Paine
Thomas Jefferson
Ben Franklin
Ethan Allen
Abraham Lincoln
U.S. Grant
Robert Ingersoll
Elizabeth Cady Stanton
Susan B. Anthony
W.E.B. DuBois
Many more!
•Arts Summary
• Mark
Twain
• Wizard of Oz (Yip Harburg)
• Gone With The Wind
• Star Trek
• Harry Potter
• Numerous Musicians, Writers,
Actors, etc
•Difficulties in Categorizing
People
Example of Christian Claims:
The Wright Brothers
•Wright Brothers are Creationists?
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http://bible.org/illustration/wright-brothers
Thrilled, they telegraphed this message to their sister
Katherine: “We have actually flown 120 feet. Will be
home for Christmas.”
http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/cm/v13/n4/w
right
Wilbur’s plans to attend Yale College and become a
clergyman like his father were dashed when he lost
most of his teeth in an accident while playing ice
hockey.
The Wright brothers used intelligence, experience, and
ingenuity to design their aircraft. They allowed chance
to play no part. From studying God’s creation in the form
of bird-flight, they were helped to develop their own
creation of a better aircraft.
•Wright Brothers from other sources
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http://www.adherents.com/people/pw/Wright_Brothers.ht
ml
The Wright Brothers were the sons of a minister for the
United Brethren Church. They themselves may have been
merely nominal Protestants as adults.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/wright/wrights.html
Being a bishop one would expect he at least would be
rather conservative in his views on religion. He had books
in his library by popular atheists and agnostics of the
period. The young boys got into the library and they were
reading this and someone made a comment that
perhaps you shouldn't allow this. And it was the bishop's
idea that you needed all the information before you
could make an accurate decision.
•Wright Brothers from other sources
• http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essa
y/Wright_Bros/wright_family/WR1.htm
• Although his facial injuries healed (he
had lost a few teeth), he developed
"nervous palpitations of the heart" and
digestive problems. His illness derailed
his plans to enter Yale College and
become a teacher.
•Wright Brothers from other sources
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http://airandspace.si.edu/wrightbrothers/who/1859/
wilbur.cfm
Wilbur was unable to complete his courses and
graduate. Hoping to attend Yale and become a
teacher, he enrolled in several college preparatory
courses at Central High School in Dayton.
“I have always thought I would like to be a
teacher.… It would be congenial to my tastes, and I
think with proper training I could be reasonably
successful.”
•Email Errors Are In This Report to
[email protected]
•Goals of Atheist Organizations
Protect Separation of Church and State
• Promote Proper Science Education & Skepticism
• Promote General Acceptance of Atheists
• Educate Others About Atheism
• Provide Community for Non-Believers
• Promote Values of Humanism
• Organize at National, State and Local Levels
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