On October 14th, 2010, the world’s first summit on Immersive Technology will be held at the Los Angeles Center Studios to showcase the pioneers of Immersive Tech and collaborate on themes of innovation, applications, and future development. Register here.

The Singularity Institute is pleased to host the Singularity Summit 2010, a rare gathering of thinkers to explore the rising impact of science and technology on society. The summit has been organized to further the understanding of a controversial idea – the Singularity scenario.

The first Singularity Summit was held at Stanford in 2006 to further understanding and discussion about the Singularity concept and the future of human technological progress. It was founded as a venue for leading thinkers to explore the subject, whether scientist, enthusiast, or skeptic.

Since 2006, the scope of this dialog has expanded dramatically. In 2008, the Singularity entered mainstream consideration. IEEE Spectrum, a sober and mainstream technology publication, issued a special report on the Singularity, and Intel CTO Justin Rattner remarked that “we’re making steady progress toward the Singularity” during his keynote to 2,000 people at the Intel Developer Forum. What was once a relatively unknown concept is now being discussed in corporate board rooms.

We invite you to join our extraordinary group of visionaries in business, science, technology, design, and the arts, as our community explores this exciting topic. Your participation offers a world of powerful ideas, a unique networking opportunity, and access to an exclusive directory of your peers.

We hope you will join us August 14-15th 2010! Register here.

Could the development of ars technica (the art of technology) be made to fit into a framework that would not only reflect the technological progress made by humanity so far, but also be reasonably accurate at predicting our future as a species? Of course, one could argue that anything can fit into a framework, provided you tweak the framework enough to reach whichever conclusion you aim for. But sophism aside, is there some predictability to be derived from the history of mankind’s command of technology? Here are five proposed stages of technological development.

The Garden of Earthly Delights by Jerome Bosch (detail)

The second is when mankind started controlling its own survival. The discovery of fire, in particular, allowed for greater control over predatory animals, a seat at the top of the food chain, and constant warmth; similarly, the development of agricultural techniques allowed man to achieve relative self-sufficiency; he started to control his own destiny to a significantly greater degree, but not yet that of other species. We shall call this the “self-reliance stage“.

Then came the bronze age and, centuries later, the industrial revolution, which allowed mankind to control its environment. Not only were humans able to further control their own destiny, they also started shaping their environment, triggering a period of unprecedented expansion of their earthly footprint, both in breadth (land and sea occupation) and depth (of environmental transformation). With these technological developments, of course, came the woes of pollution and other nefarious impacts for the other species, and for the whole planet as a habitat for all things living. While we may be aware of these adverse impacts (as we are today), we are capable of mitigating them at best but not yet reversing them and producing more positive externalities than negative ones. We shall call this the “fruition stage“.

The fourth stage is when humans start engineering both their environment and their own selves. They no longer impact the ecosystem as a (usually detrimental) byproduct of their technological development, but actually think into ways of improving our habitat and making our sophisticated lifestyles sustainable, not only for our benefit but that of all species. Similarly, this is the stage where technology allows us to shape our biological destiny, substituting evolutionary randomness for engineering of the human body to be more resilient and better suited to a wider variety of future-relevant purposes. Notions such as wildlife conservation, renewable energy, geoengineering, DNA engineering, implants, nanotechnology, etc. are no longer technological novelties or cutting-edge buzzwords but are universally mastered and consistently embedded in the fabric of our society. These characteristics belong to what we shall call the “integration stage“.

The fifth stage is the logical application of this full technological command of our environment and our own selves beyond our earthly habitat – namely, to space, starting with the Moon, Mars and artifical orbiting ecosystems and further expanding as far as space travel technologies will allow. This is the “swarm stage“.

Considering our current capabilities and the problems that we are facing in the first quarter of the XXIst century, this author thinks that mankind is nearing the last throes of the fruition stage; although whether closing this particular chapter will take a few decades or more is a matter of speculation. We are becoming increasingly aware of the impact that our development and growth as a species is having on the habitat that we share with millions of others. This, in turn, gives rise to a global conscience about the need to address sustainability issues, and drives the development of technologies geared towards the conservation of our habitat in ways that yet continue to benefit mankind. This is where win-win technologies, that benefit human development as well as Earth as a whole (or at least, that does not harm it) start coming to life: renewable energy, smart materials, biological agriculture, the rise of digital information as a valuable resource with a beneficial footprint, etc.

Where does this fit in the transhumanist roadmap? If one can consider that transhumanism is god-like control over the condition and development of mankind as a species, then it obviously has its place in the integration stage and beyond: a time when humans stop riding shotgun and start driving for the better the common destiny of all things living on Earth and beyond; in addition to having complete control over their own bodies and minds, free at last from the material conditions that drives unwanted suffering and mortality.

God does not play dice. Evolution does. For now

Transhumanism will be more than a mere improvement of man through technology; it is going to bring an end to evolutionary randomness, the fundamental principle which (coupled with natural selection) has driven the evolution of all organisms since the emergence of life on Earth (and quite possibly anywhere else in the Universe). Our genetic materials, like those of every living being, undergo minute arbitrary variations as they are being replicated; some are detrimental, some have no effect whatsoever, and others give the next generation’s organism a slight competitive advantage in the game of natural selection, yielding a higher probability that they will in turn propagate to its offspring.

While this process has been greatly effective at turning the early single cell prokaryotes into homo sapiens sapiens (among other species) and at giving rise to emerging properties such as sentience, culture or politics, it has also been very inefficient – being both extremely slow (3.5 billion years since abiogenesis, or the emergence of life from inanimate amino acids) and extraordinarily wasteful (only a fraction of the random genetic mutations are beneficial to the offspring, leading to the unnecessary death of countless organisms for the improvement of one).

As our mastering of technology grows exponentially, we will become increasingly capable of directing evolution in a way that is both effective and efficient. Our intelligence will allow us to engineer our own evolution (choosing which improvements, both mental and physical, we should bestow upon ourselves) and technology will allow us to execute it at a pace and an accuracy orders of magnitude higher than random evolution.

As a final digression, it is amusing to note that creationists could have been inadvertently having a point when talking about intelligent design – not that it has existed at any point in the past in some magical fashion, but in the way that it is likely to be part of our future and be driven by man himself. With the advent of transhumanism, we will essentially become the masters of our own evolution as a species, taking over a role traditionally assumed by deities; thus ushering in an era of post-theism, the next stage of mankind’s spiritual development that does away with the mental crutches of faith and religion.

The January 19, 2010 assassination of Hamas’ military wing commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in a Dubai hotel has turned into a remarkable PR opportunity for the local police. In just a few days, the investigative authorities of the UAE’s glitziest emirate were able to piece together the 19-hour-long chain of events that led to the killing, resulting in this riveting 30′ video that tells us a few things.

First, it provides a rare glimpse into a professional hit squad’s modus operandi. While we are mostly familiar with the methods demonstrated in spy movies a la Jason Bourne, we are very seldom made privy to the standard operations and procedures of real-life spooks. While one may remember the assassination of Georgi Markov in 1978 by the Bulgarian Darzhavna Sigurnost (secret police) using a ricin-coated umbrella tip, the Mossad’s abduction of nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu in 1986 with the help of a seductive female agent, or the botched sinking of Greenpeace’s trawler the Rainbow Warrior in 1985 by the French foreign intelligence services, most tactics used by these services’ special operations branches remain entirely unknown, or at best poorly documented. The Dubai tape reveals that the modern tactics are still rife with clichés — an operative enters a hotel’s restroom and comes out with a wig and glasses, another dresses up as a tennis player complete with racket and towel to look inconspicuous, etc. It also shows that they remain vulnerable to last-minute snags, such as an unexpected tourist making a stop at the floor where the murder is being committed. To a certain extent, it shows how much the upfront strategic planning of a hit remains sensitive to the inevitable role that luck and circumstances play in the tactical execution to make it a success or a failure.

Second, the footage reveals the added operational complexity brought on by ubiquitous surveillance cameras. The pervasive video monitoring of public spaces -both in the open and within the confines of stores and hotels- is a relatively recent development, and may not have been fully integrated into the planning of this particular operation; also, the quality of the footage reveals how technological development, and the associated commoditization of surveillance devices, have allowed all surveillance spots to be equipped with high-resolution, high-speed color captors that are lightyears away from the jerky, grainy black-and-white frames from previous generation cameras. Combined with the strong investigative capabilities of a state (which the hit squad’s planning team may have underestimated in the case of the Dubai police), this becomes an essential tool for documenting the detailed chain of events post-hoc but also a deterrent for close-quarters hit operations in public areas.

Taking this further, the advent of IPv6 will allow all these cameras -whether public or private- to essentially become standalone webcams and stream their feeds in real time to a police command and control center (as opposed to recording them on a local tape or hard drive, which requires investigators to seize the recording after the event). Of course, the centralization of streams puts a strain on the resources monitoring them; but it is only a matter of time (and computing power) before facial recognition software conducts blanket monitoring of all these streams at once, raising a flag whenever a “person of interest” shows up in the field of view of any of those cameras. Conversely, the police will be able to select a person from a video stream and rely on the software to track that person’s movements throughout the day, seamlessly switching from one stream to another as the person leaves a field of view and enters another (which is virtually impossible to do with human operators). If you fear that this is an Orwellian dream coming true, well, you’d better start getting used to it because every major city is either implementing the scheme or planning to. While the trend in itself looks rather unescapable, privacy issues can and should be mitigated by increasing the role of the judicial branch into the operations of such surveillance command and control centers, e.g. by establishing physical presence of judicial officers in those rooms to physically check and balance the increasing power of police and counter-intelligence officers (this, of course, does not apply in police states where judicial and executive powers usually blend). With regards to the subject at hand, it will be interesting to see how foreign intelligence agencies’ operational procedures adapt to the increased exposure brought on by surveillance cameras in their countries of operations.

The 11 first suspects in the Dubai assassination of Mahmoud Al Mabnouh

Third, the Dubai footage is a testimony to the fact that the assassination was both a tactical success and a strategic failure. Tactically, the hit squad managed to get the job done and escape with no collateral damage; but strategically, the physical identity (pictures) of the 11 members caught on tape has been made very public, which, for all practical purposes, strips them of any further operational value for their agency’s special ops branch. They can no longer be commissioned without running the unacceptable risk of raising a flag wherever they go; Interpol even issued a red notice, which calls for their provisional arrest and possible extradition, forcing them to remain within the safety of their national borders. Their future will most likely involve sitting behind a desk at their agency’s headquarters, processing foreign intelligence through the lens of their operational experience — not the best fit. No foreign intelligence agency in the world can afford to lose that many valuable operatives in a single operation, considering the cost and time it takes to recruit and train them. Furthermore, diplomatic and political repercussions from this strategic fiasco may be far-reaching as the investigation unravels, and evidence against the prime suspect -Mossad- builds beyond the circumstantial.

Was it all worth the value of the target?

Note: this post was contributed by guest writer Toxic Max from ToxicMemes.com.

While we may be tempted to look at humans as merely an evolutionary link from good mammals to greater artificial intelligence, one question remains, what’s our place in the post-Singularity world?

Some transhumanists argue that man will continue to hold a very central place in the great apparatus. While I agree that cyborgs may indeed be the future of AI, I disagree with the notion that cyborgs can be called humans. Once you have replaced your senses with sensors and upgraded your brain with faster computing power, your empirical experience of the world is unlike that of any homo homo sapiens. Calling cyborgs “humans” is akin to calling humans “chimps”… Of course we still eat/fuck/shit/fight all day but at least we don’t eat each other’s lice!

How will we human weaklings will appear to technologically superior, sentient robots?

In a world where we are the Subjects in the redefined study of humanism, a big portion of the research will be focused on how we were limited by our biological nature and the slow evolutionary process it entails. The research will focus particularly on the period that preceded Singularity, from the Renaissance or the Industrial Revolution to say, 2030. This period will illustrate best how the pace of change challenged the limits of the human minds – and the need for a higher form of intelligence. Don’t feel bad about it: we’re still doing a pretty good job at surviving in a world where the parameters are changing so rapidly, considering how ill-equipped we are for the information age:

• Hardware flaws: no wifi – stuck instead with this shitty comm device called voice; no memory card plugins – just some stupid peripheral called computer that we have to access by tapping a keyboard with our hands… laaaaaame
• Software faults: what drives us, how we recognize patterns, our conception of time, etc.

So its no surprise that most transhumanists are ready to turn the page, be done already, fuggetaboutit, and move on to a greater world where supercomputergeeks be kings (teedeepee included). I went to see Surrogates the other day, and while I wouldn’t recommend the movie, it succeeded in getting me a little nostalgic/emotive about our old human ways.  Got me thinking that transhumanists should enjoy the day, laugh at our own inadequacies, carpe diem, and live the “human experience” which is all that we’ll have left soon enough. Got me thinking that we should all emulate Isaac Isamov, who was such a brilliant scholar of human frailties.

September 1917. World War I has been ravaging Europe for three years when a 36-year old infantry medic by the name of Teilhard de Chardin takes part in the battle of Douaumont, France. There, knee-deep in the cold mud, exhausted from months spent on the battlefront, starved from weeks of short supplies, hundreds of thousands of men from both sides are waging the most epic and bloody battle of the Great War. 300,000 will lose their lives on this killing field over a matter of days, in a frenzy of deafening noise, blinding light and burning shrapnel.

Teilhard de Chardin

To anyone, this pandemonium of violence is yet another of those horrific setbacks to the progress of humanity; a useless tragedy that ought to be never allowed to happen again. To Teilhard, however, there is no such thing. Before his eyes, in the midst of one of the greatest manslaughters ever, something deeply meaningful is blooming, that can take place nowhere else. These men are well aware that joining the bloodbath will mean almost certain death for them, yet they refuse to stand down; they are pouring all their last energy into something greater than themselves. It is then that Teilhard has an epiphany: humanity is converging. Men from both sides are transcending their small selves, elevating their otherwise menial existence and becoming part of a larger purpose.

Only the truly illuminated can see the constructive power coming out of this wanton destruction. The peace that ensued was, in a twisted way, a disappointment; it meant going back to a trivial life, full of petty concerns and pointless feuds.

Christianity has long considered such occasional mayhem as a divine retribution for committing the original sin, or as the self-inflicted consequence of mankind’s constant straying from the path. Religion dictates that all earthly lives, because they are material, are bound to end in loss and grief. As to why God would tolerate such evil, religion would evasively (and conveniently) refer to the Lord’s “mysterious ways” and dismiss all human efforts, for good or evil, as puny and irrelevant to the some broader plan kept away from us. To Teilhard, they were anything but; he blamed preachers for failing to recognize “the truly admirable and growing reality of a large share of the human Effort”. During the war, Teilhard had witnessed the tremendous amount of energy that mankind can put towards an endeavor, and knew that this proud effort could be harnessed into something positive and hopeful, provided we stopped waiting for an unlikely signal from Heaven and began acknowledging the material reality around us.

Interestingly, despite coming from a person of deep faith, Teilhard’s view resonates with that of pragmatic agnostics: whether or not God exists is irrelevant, because He does not appear to intervene in the physical world anyway. This gives us humans the tremendous and exciting responsibility to take control of our lives and world, recognize our existence as material beings living in a material world, and act accordingly, to the fullest extent of our will and stamina, instead of using our inferiority to God as an excuse for inaction and apathy. It also gives hope in mankind’s capability to strive towards the Singularity as an end goal.

I killed 341 people tonight.

The first officer was a thirty-something I had never flown with before. He was a skinny guy with acne scars on his face – not quite the handsome type that would catch the stewardesses’ attention. With my salt-and-pepper hair neatly trimmed under my captain cap, the plain navy uniform that I had had custom-made and embroidered with the airline’s distinctive wings, and the suave demeanor of an experienced pilot who has seen it all in his thirty-plus years of flying, I am clearly the leader of the pack. The crew will go silent and listen intently when I speak during the pre-flight briefing; and my commands will go unchallenged at all times. I am the king of this castle in the clouds, thirty-three thousand feet over the Atlantic, cruising at mach .89 towards a destination that everyone on board still believe they will reach uneventfully.

As I rest my right hand thoughtfully on the engine quadrant, the first officer tells me he needs to go to the lavatory. I have been waiting for this moment since takeoff. I am cool and serene.

I call out the standard “I have controls and comms” and watch him as he unbluckles his harness, moves his seat back and gets up. He exits the cockpit, leaving its door ajar as per the airline’s standard operating procedures. This is to ensure that a pilot can return promptly to his seat in case of unforeseen heavy turbulence, or to prevent the “no-pilot in command” situation. Last year, on a transatlantic flight, the captain was taking a piss when the first officer walked out of the cockpit to get a refreshment from the galley. The cockpit door shut behind him and all first-class pax enjoyed a nerve-wrecking half-hour while the two pilots, livid, eventually succeeded at busting the door with the onboard fire axe, thankful that the autopilot was maintaining cruise altitude. Such a mistake would definitely not happen under my captainship. At least not unwillingly.

I count to five, get up and quickly reach for the cockpit door, closing it and making sure it is properly locked from the inside. I feel determined and peaceful. I return to my seat, not bothering to put the comms headset on. In a moment the radio will start blaring with the concerned voice of some air traffic controller, located thousands of miles away and staring in disbelief at his radar screen, as my glorious B773 starts losing altitude. The gray-blue panels of the cockpit are lit only by the dim flight displays and the waning moon outside, casting a white trail of light on the ocean far below. I cannot seem to hear the engine noise any longer, after all those years getting accustomed to filtering out the monotonous roar during long hauls. Soon the two Rolls-Royce Trent 892 powerplants, delivering up to ninety-two thousand pounds of thrust each, will go quiet anyway. Rarely have I felt so peaceful.

My right hand grasps the smooth curves of the engine quadrant, as I ponder for an instant. Breaking news will soon flood the tickers. Distressed calls will be made. Search and rescue efforts will be launched, only to turn into a recovery mission. Articles will be written, questions raised, investigations launched, and my life, just like that of the entire crew, will be dissected in a vain effort to understand the chain of events that led to this very moment. Thousands of people, from air crash investigators to grieving family members to news analysts and so-called experts, will throw all their brainpower into answering one single question – why? Certainly, a disaster of this magnitude should warrant a compelling explanation. Some logical -or at least comprehensible- reasoning must account for the deaths of so many at the hands of just one.

But I am ahead of the pack. They will boil the oceans in search of answers, when really there is none. Even I do not know how or why I have come to doing this. All I know is that I have never felt so good, so serene, so complete in my entire life.

I gently pull back the throttle on the engine quadrant and nudge the control yoke towards my lap, effectively disengaging the autopilot and slowly bringing the airspeed below the stall limit. It is now only a matter of seconds before the wings lose lift, the nose dives, and a terrified first officer struggles vainly to reach the cockpit door. Soon all thirty three thousand feet that separate us from oblivion will be eaten up; a fireball will light up the ocean surface, like a giant flare that stands for no living soul to see, an extravagant farewell to no one in particular.

What is this about?

This FAQ is intended to explain what atheism is, and what it is not, to believers of all faiths. It is about understanding atheism.

It is NOT intended to convince, disseminate or otherwise convert anyone to atheism. What you believe in is really your own private matter, and I have no business or interest in influencing you. This FAQ is NOT about helping anyone choose a belief over another, but if you are undecided and looking for information, this FAQ may at least help you make an informed decision whether to adopt or reject atheism.

Why did you write this FAQ?

As an atheist, I have often run across theists (believers) who had misconceptions about atheism; some believe that it is a dogma, just like any other faith. Others believe that it is nihilism or even satanism under a different name. Most are just genuinely wondering why someone would willfully choose not to believe in any deity. After several such encounters, I decided to put together a FAQ to address their misconceptions and answer their very valid questions.

Nota bene: this FAQ contains several occurrences of the lowercase spelling of “god”. This is not meant to disrespect the Christian God, the Muslim God, or any other god. It is simply used to refer to any deity in general (i.e. any non-descript god from the thousands of religions, cults and periods in human history). When referring to a particular deity, such as the Christian God, the FAQ uses a respectful, capitalized spelling as in “God”. In addition, the singular “god” can refer to the multiple deities that polytheists believe in, or to the half-god or god-like entities that exist in some myths and religions.

1. So what IS atheism?

Literally, atheism means “without god”. It is formed from the prefix “a“, which means “without”, and “theos“, which means “god” in ancient Greek. Interestingly, this is an ambiguous definition, which is accountable for much of the misunderstanding over what atheism really is. Indeed, “without a god” can be interpreted in two significantly different ways (we will try to bridge them later):

1. The lack of belief in god; in this case, the atheist is much like a “blank page” — in the same state as a newborn with regards to the lack of any particular faith. This is typical of atheists who are not hostile to the idea of a god, but lack either the intrinsic faith of believers or the factual knowledge that god exists. They cannot bring themselves to believe without factual, observable and non-refutable evidence (we will see why later), and therefore remain in a default state of “suspension of faith”. This is why they are often called agnostics — literally, “without knowledge” (note that one can be an agnostic in areas other than religion, based on that definition; if you’re undecided because you don’t know, then you most likely qualify as an agnostic).
2. The belief that god does not exist; in this case, the atheist makes an active non-religious claim. This position can be construed as illogical, because there is epistemologically no way of proving that a particular god does not exist (we will explain this later, and see how this position can still logically hold water). Some atheists place themselves in that second category, and because they actually hold a belief (the one that god doesn’t exist), they are sometimes more vocal and militant than their agnostic counterparts. As a result, it is understandable that many believers make the wrong generalization that all atheists are actively refuting the idea of a god.

So, next time you meet an atheist, do not just assume that he actively refutes your God — he may very well be merely undecided, and waiting for non-faith-based (i.e. rational) arguments to start believing.

2. So what about agnosticism?

As we saw earlier, agnostics are simply people “without knowledge”; in the context of faith, they do not not know whether god exists. Technically, they are not alone in this; nobody knows either (believers of all faiths included); for there is no factual, observable and non-refutable evidence of the existence of god. So what’s the difference between an agnostic and a person of faith? Precisely that — faith. Faith is the mental acceptance of, and confidence in, a claim as truth without proof to support it. Agnostics not only lack the knowledge that god exists (just like everybody else), they also lack the faith that believers need in order to believe in a particular god.

Interestingly, there are many other “flavors” of agnosticism. Weak agnostics simply observe that they lack enough knowledge about god to make a decision; strong agnostics not only claim that they don’t have the knowledge, but that they never will because knowledge is unreachable; agnostic theists (also called spiritual agnostics) believe that a god exists, but they don’t know which one; apathetic (or pragmatic) agnostics claim that the very question of god’s existence is irrelevant, because god does not appear to intervene in the physical world anyway; ignostics reserve their decision until a more meaningful definition of god (i.e. one not based on broad assumptions) is offered; etc.

3. So why not just adopt faith in god, even in the lack of knowledge?

From a believer’s perspective, it is sometimes quite baffling that agnostics and other atheists would not just choose to have faith, and therefore become believers, regardless of the lack of evidence that god exists (after all, god is all about faith). Faith, as it happens, proves to be a very difficult thing to acquire; in other words, either you have it (generally through a religious upbringing), or you don’t (generally through a non-religious and/or more rational upbringing). A few atheists may even claim that they would “want to believe”; to them, it would be awesome if there was some yet-undiscovered conscious force in the Universe which was responsible for all of nature. But “wanting to believe” or “choosing to believe” is not enough to actually believe. An atheist may pretend to believe, and even go through the rituals (e.g. praying, going to church or a mosque, etc.), but will not become a believer through these alone (this is a fatal flaw in Pascal’s wager, by the way — more on that later).

Lack of faith, and difficulty to choose faith over disbelief, is naturally a foreign concept for many believers. So let’s do a little thought experiment that is widely used when discussing atheism: pink unicorns (we will be reusing them throughout this FAQ). It may sound silly, and it actually is (on purpose). The idea is not to mock religions, but to invent a belief that nobody -believers and atheists alike- takes seriously (the existence of pink unicorns), and try to believe in it. Can you, no matter how hard you try? Of course not; you have not been raised with the belief that pink unicorns exist, and it is therefore very difficult for you now to decide to believe in them. You can pretend to, claim that you do, and perform the associated rituals, but that will not make you a true believer in pink unicorns.

Atheists can believe in god no more than believers can believe in pink unicorns. No matter how hard they try, faith does not work that way.

Side note: interestingly, some atheists become believers at some point in their life, i.e. they suddenly gain faith even though they have not acquired any new knowledge about god’s existence. This is usually the result of a major life-changing event, either traumatic (e.g. near-death experience, loss of a loved one) or ecstatic (e.g. birth of a child, an unexpected healing). This only goes to prove that some atheists can ultimately be receptive to faith, given the right circumstances.

4. So if not through faith, can knowledge turn atheists into believers?

Technically, if someone had knowledge (i.e. factual, observable and non-refutable evidence) that god exists, they would not be believers (remember, faith is belief without proof to support it). They would be the ultimate converts – the gnostics, a.k.a “those who know”. There are religious claims that gnostics existed; for example, many gods are said to have had magical interventions in our physical world, such as miracles. People witnessing these miracles, such as the multiplication of fish and loaves of bread in the Christian religion, would immediately gain knowledge of the existence of the associated god and ditch faith or undecidedness altogether in exchange for certainty.

Unfortunately, there is no factual, observable and non-refutable evidence available to this day that god exists, which means that atheists cannot use knowledge to follow a particular god.

5. But what about religious scriptures? Isn’t that knowledge?

No, no matter how sacred in the eyes of believers, scriptures are books written by fellow humans to explain the history and tenets of a particular faith. The fact that it was consigned into a book and passed on to us is irrelevant to whether that history is true or made up. After all, thousands of books have been written, either fiction or non-fiction; their existence as books is not by itself evidence of what they claim. Religious texts tell us about other people seeing evidence of a god, but it does not actually present us with the evidence (they may also provide spiritual and moral guidance, which can be useful but is not evidence of a god either).

Again, let’s use the pink-unicorn thought experiment. If a zoologist came back from Borneo with a written account of his encounter with pink unicorns, this would not constitute the type of evidence needed to take pink unicorns seriously. However, if the zoologist came back with a live pink unicorn, or the exact location where anyone could go to see pink unicorns for themselves, nobody could hold the default position that pink unicorns do not exist anymore.

6. Isn’t atheism the same as nihilism?

Just like atheism, nihilism spans several flavors, but none of them actually matches any definition of atheism. They are just different concepts. Broadly speaking, nihilists claim that nothing meaningful can be said about anything, because there is no objective solid ground on which to build not only faith, but also values, morals or purpose. Atheists claim either that they do not have enough knowledge about god to make an educated decision, or that god does not exist. That does not preclude seeing values, morals or purpose of things and lives as valid and meaningful.

7. How can one be moral without a faith?

Atheism does not promote immorality; atheists simply rely on their common sense and secular education rather than religious teachings for deciding what is moral and what is not. Most atheists are moral human beings, because they have integrated one important rule of thumb (which also happens to be a fundamental tenet of many religions): do to others what you would like to be done to you (sometimes expressed negatively: do not do to others what you would not like to be done to you). Keep in mind that this is an unwritten rule — there is no atheist’s equivalent to religious scriptures that tells atheists how to behave (i.e. there is no “Atheist Bible”). It is, however, in everyone’s interest, therefore including the atheists’, that we all treat each others with consideration.

Of course, there are exceptions and notably immoral atheists, just like there are notably immoral theists; this shows that immorality is a matter of character and upbringing, not of faith or lack thereof.

So, morality outside of faith is not only possible, it is actually such a vast subject that the “golden rule” stated above does not even begin to do it justice. I will not expand on it, because this FAQ is about atheism more than it is about ethics, but I encourage any person of faith to read more about secular humanism to understand the depth of historical thinking about morality in the absence of faith.

8. Atheism is just an easier and/or lazier position than faith.

One could think that those who subscribe to atheism do so because it is easier, or because they have not given faith much thought and have chosen a materialistic worldview (i.e. one that explains the world through natural, physical processes) over a spiritual one (i.e. one that involves one or more spiritual entity) out of intellectual laziness. Let’s explore both assumptions in that order.

From a believer’s perspective, the assumption that atheism is easier than faith is understandable. Having faith requires, at minimum, suspension of disbelief, which leaves the believer vulnerable to rational criticism and sometimes outright mockery and intolerance (including from believers of other faiths!). It also requires following a number of rituals that can be more or less taxing depending on the religion; for example, Islam requires Muslims to pray five times a day, go to the mosque on a regular basis, fast in daytime during the entire month of Ramadan, do a lifetime pilgrimage to Mecca, etc. Lastly, some faiths imply following a stringent code of conduct that forbids many earthly pleasures. Atheists do not share this burden, which could explain why they choose atheism over faith.

In reality, being an atheist has little to do with making a choice, whether easy or difficult. As explained earlier, atheists cannot choose to believe, no matter how hard they try; no more that believers can choose to believe in pink unicorns (see “So why not just adopt faith, even in the lack of knowledge?” above).

From an atheist’s perspective, the lack of faith is not easy either. Atheists cannot find comfort and solace in the belief that a supernatural being is looking out for them; that they will be anything but worm food after they die; that there is eternal afterlife bliss to reward their good behavior; that they will ultimately be rejoined with their loved ones, etc. They are essentially alone with their fellow humans in a vast, cold universe; their life is the only one they have; and they still share the burden of having to abide by a moral code of conduct (see “How can one be moral without a faith?”).

As for the second assumption (that of atheism being the by-default choice of the intellectually lazy), not believing in a god does not equate being intellectually disengaged from spiritual matters. Many atheists keep themselves awake just as much as theists on questions such as the meaning of life, read books on spirituality and philosophy, enjoy discussions with theists, and even spend hours writing websites on what it means to be an atheist. What the alleged “intellectual laziness” of the atheists refers to is, in fact, the specific notion of apatheism. As the name implies, it is characterized by a general apathy, or disinterest, towards the question of whether or not god exists, and towards god itself. Interestingly, apatheism can be a trait of both (intellectually lazy) atheists, but also of believers who define themselves as such when asked, but do not participate in religious rituals or take the time to reflect upon their god and faith.

So, atheism is not an easier position than faith, and intellectual and spiritual laziness is a trait that can be shared by some atheists and believers alike.

9. Can atheists disprove the existence of God?

Epistemologically, no; there is no known way of proving that a particular god does not exist. Unless we can come up with some unforeseen reduction ad absurdum argument, disproving god would require at the very least to analyze each and every Planck-length space in the entire universe for evidence of supernatural behavior, in the three spatial dimensions, the fourth one (monitoring over time) plus the unobservable six or seven remaining ones. Furthermore, because we do not know what shape or form a god would take, we would not even know what to look for. God might assume the form of a carbon atom, or a burst of gamma rays, an anvil-shaped blue sponge with zebra stripes, or the entire universe including ourselves. There is just no way to disprove, either logically or physically, the existence of god.

This, however, does not amount to a refutation of atheism. Consider the pink-unicorn thought experiment we used earlier: nobody can disprove the existence of pink unicorns either, and for the same reasons (even though we have an idea of what a pink unicorn might look like). This does not mean that not believing in pink unicorns is irrational, nor that believing in pink unicorns is rational — in fact, not being able to disprove something that cannot, by definition, be disproven, does not give any insight at all on whether this something exists or not.

So, atheism cannot disprove the existence of God, and that does not make atheism weaker just like it does not make faith stronger. Both propositions are just not logically connected.

10. If atheists cannot disprove the existence of god, then how can they rationally believe that god does not exist?

We’ve already dealt with the agnostic position: agnostics do not refuse to believe, they merely remain undecided because they lack evidence of god’s existence or non-existence. Other atheists, however, actively refute the idea of a god. How is that logical since they cannot disprove its existence?

This counter-intuitive position has perhaps best been explained by using the teapot analogy, which was invented by British philosopher Bertrand Russell. It goes like this:

If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is an intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time.

Bertrand Russell: Is There a God?, 1952

Or, to reuse our previous analogy: I can claim that pink unicorns exist, but the fact that you cannot disprove their existence does not make my claim any truer (or weaker). Because we haven’t been brought up to believe in pink unicorns, we all agree that their existence is not very likely; anyone thinking otherwise (a believer) is seen as oddly irrational. However, if we had been brought up to believe in pink unicorns, backed up by centuries of oral and written tradition, we would probably believe in them, and those who didn’t (the atheists) would be singled out.

From a logical perspective, the orbiting teapot or the pink unicorn can be explained in one of two ways: either they exist (which requires a lot of additional extraordinary claims to support this, such as a intelligent creator of space teapots, or the invisibility of pink unicorns which have never been seen on earth), or they don’t (which doesn’t require any additional mental gymnastics). This is where the law of parsimony (also known as Occam’s Razor) comes in: when two competing hypotheses fit the observations equally well, choose the one that makes the fewest assumptions. Why? Because each additional assumption adds to the overall unlikelihood of the hypothesis, and therefore weakens it.

Many atheists apply Occam’s Razor principle equally to space teapots, pink unicorns, and god: you can either rely on the simple, observable laws of physics to explain the universe, or you can choose the more complex set of assumptions that god exists, that it defies the laws of physics, that it has always existed, that it is invisible and immaterial, etc. In other words, while atheists cannot (from an epistemological perspective) prove that there is no god, they can make the reasonable assumption that the existence of god, just like that of space teapots and pink unicorns, is less likely than its non-existence.

11. I’ve heard about the Flying Spaghetti Monster. It is intended to mock god?

The Flying Spaghetti Monster

No — the Flying Spaghetti Monster is one of those purposely ludicrous inventions (along with the space teapot and the invisible pink unicorn) commonly used to explain why it is probabilistically sound to favor atheism over agnosticism (see question #11). Nobody can take a flying-spaghetti-and-meatball-monster deity seriously, however a true agnostic should, in all logic, give it just as much credit as any other belief or non-belief in a deity (since all are equally scientifically plausible and cannot be disproven). However, Occam’ razor tells us that, because the non-existence of a flying spaghetti monster is more likely than its existence (in that it requires less assumptions to explain), a rational person should favor non-belief in the flying spaghetti monster over belief in it. By analogy, non-belief in any other deity holds a higher likelihood of truth than belief.

12. Okay, so atheists don’t believe in god. But why do they have to be so vocal about it?

First of all, not all atheists are vocal about their position. Many are quiet people who just want to go through their day without causing a fuss, and keep their atheism to themselves. You might even know some of them and not be aware that they are atheists. Theists (believers in a god) are very similar in that respect; many are discreet about their belief, while others will actively engage others on the topic of religion and seek to confront different beliefs. Same goes for politics, social agenda issues, and preferences over football teams. It really is a function of how opinionated people are and it is not specific to religion.

There is, however, a rational argument for atheists to hold a more militant standpoint, i.e. refusing a conciliatory standpoint that gives equal respect to belief and disbelief in god. This is a reductio ad absurdum argument which British biologist Richard Dawkins presented like this:

if agnosticism demands giving equal respect to the belief and disbelief in a supreme being, then it must also give equal respect to belief in an orbiting teapot, since the existence of an orbiting teapot is just as plausible scientifically as the existence of a supreme being.

Of course, giving credit to the belief in a space teapot (or invisible pink unicorns) does not sound very serious, but from the logical perspective above, giving credit to the belief in god does not either. This is why militant atheists refute the conciliatory approach of agnostics who try and appease the debate by giving equal respect and attention to both theist and non-theist opinions (bear in mind, militant atheists normally do not disrespect the believers – only the beliefs themselves. While theists may seem a little bit odd and silly to them for carrying an odd and silly belief, this does not constitute a cause for ad hominem attacks).

Unless you have been spending the past week spelunking in a deep, uncharted cave, you most likely heard about a 33-year-old Southern California mother of 6, Nadya Suleman, who thought it would be smart to have six additional crotchfruit frozen embryos implanted in her clown car womb last year (at least that one deep cave has been well charted). By the magic of fertility treatment that raises the odds of having multiple pregnancies, she gave birth last week to eight reasonably healthy babies, raising her kids count to a staggering fourteen, close enough to forming a rugby team (if shrimps had such a thing as rugby teams).

Bon appétit

While we could care less all rejoice that the babies are doing well, this has sparked a row over the ethics of parenthood (see A bidding war and a row over ethics: how the octuplets story turned sour). I actually think this raises issues beyond that of white trash spawning more of itself irresponsible parental planning. It has private, societal and even environmental implications that I haven’t really seen brought up anywhere.

At a private level, the row stems from the obvious fact that a single, unemployed attention whore mother living with her parents in a modest three-bedroom house cannot do a decent job at caring for so many infants at once. Barring external help, these kids will lack space, attention, care and opportunities for a decent future (hey, we’ll still need people to serve our fries, right?). It is hard to see the decision of the mother as anything but incredibly selfish to both her kids and her own parents – which is highly ironic for a nutcase mother whose love of children is said to be pathological.

At a societal level, it was clear from the beginning that Miss Suleman counted on the welfare state to provide for her 14 kids (that, or she’s just braindead and did not give it a thought — I’m unsure which is worse). In other words, these kids will be raised on everyone else’s dime, even though no one but the mother had a word in the decision to go forward with this little trainwreck experiment. This violates the very principles of social solidarity, which is aimed at covering unplanned life events (sickness, job loss, etc.) and typical planned ones (reasonable childbearing, retirement, etc.). She made, after all, several unreasonable, deliberate choices by pursuing in-vitro fertilization on top of her 6 kids, and refusing the much-needed vacuuming embryo reduction that doctors advised when they found out about the unusual multiple pregnancy.

At an environmental level, this is a setback in the urgent effort to try and preserve our future as a species. What if thousands of mothers fucked up behaved as unreasonably as this particular one (actually, some do for religious reasons)? Anything above 2.1 child per female will keep pink goo world population growing at an exponential rate and increase the ecological burden in proportion. The single most effective way to combat global warming and depletion of resources is not fuel-efficient cars or solar power: it is killing all morons tackling the overpopulation issue. People who are not born have no ecological footprint whatsoever, which is still a lot less than smug eco-conscious people driving hybrids and recycling their trash. For decades this “elephant in the room” has been left unadressed by policy makers in the Western World, despite having its high-profile supporters and even its extremists (interestingly, the British government’s Sustainable Development Commission is about to report that governments must reduce population growth). China, on the other hand, notoriously pioneered the one-child policy in 1979, preventing at least 250 million births over the course of one generation while preserving economic growth and reducing poverty. Of course, their heavy-handed policy (resulting in infanticides and restrictions to individual freedom) might have contributed to keeping it out of the Western social agenda so far. This does not, however, have to be the case. Consider the following alternative policy for a moment:

The Duggar family and their 19 kids

“It is a fundamental human right for parents to have as many kids as they want. However they will receive state benefits (such as medical coverage, free schooling, parental allowances, etc.) only for two pregnancies that go to term, or two children, whichever comes first (see why below). Any pregnancy beyond that will be at the sole expense of the parents, in the form of additional taxes to cover services that society provides to their children.“.

How would this translate in real life? A woman could have one kid from a first pregnancy, and could choose to have a second one while retaining full benefits. If she had twins (or more) during her first pregnancy, all kids would receive benefits, but any subsequent pregnancy would not. If she had one kid from a first pregnancy and twins (or more) from her second pregnancy, all would receive benefits, but any subsequent pregnancy would not. Also, no fertility treatment or in-vitro fertilization would be provided to couples that reached the limit (as in the case of Miss Suleman).

This policy would have several benefits. At a private level, it would preserve the basic human right right of having as many kids as desired while giving a strong financial incentive to better parental planning. At a societal level, it would limit the financial burden of individual irresponsibility to the welfare state and help preserve the social fabric. At the environmental level, it would act positively (rather than opressively) to bring us closer to the desirable goal of Zero Population Growth.

But then again, maybe I’m just yet another douchebag misanthropic, malthusianist thinker. What do you think?

[UPDATE 12FEB09] the lady has set up a website to beg for cash and items for her family. I for one will send her a time machine and a rusty coat hanger absolutely nothing.