The Geeky Atheist

I've had a great summer for astronomy. At some point last year when I began to grasp the universe's true age, it filled me with a sense of wonder. But when I look back, I think it must have been the winter vacation home my wife and I rented out in the mountains of Virginia. The moon wasn't out and with the nearest town miles away, the view of the stars was simply stunning. I point to that moment as being what rekindled my love of the stars.

I began listening to several podcasts about astronomy:

• AstronomyCast
• 365 Days of Astronomy
• Blueshift

I yearned to watch the stars. Back in February when Comet Lulin was becoming visible, I tried unsuccessfully to capture it on camera. I knew I needed a telescope to satisfy my desires.

Fast-forward to The Amazing Meeting 7, I was part of the winning group of the auction to have a private planetarium and observing trip with Phil Plait.

This was a great experience, and I learned a lot. We did see a few globular clusters, binary stars, Jupiter and Saturn, but the biggest disappointment of the night was that this observatory was next door to two baseball fields. Despite not having a game on that night, the lights were on. Overcoming the odds, Phil and the great people at the planetarium helped guide us to things we could still see. This was the first time I had actually looked through a decent telescope at the sky, and I got hooked.

Returning back to my humble summer abode, I've been hunting for telescopes when I finally decided to see if there were any astronomy clubs in Santa Fe. There is one, but their site is horribly out of date. However, in searching I found another person who has a great domain name: Cosmonut.org. And he has a 20" Dobsonian. I was sold.

Unfortunately my wife just wasn't going to have a chance to make it out there with me because of her busy schedule, so I booked a trip myself. I drove 45 minutes out into the desert/mountains and we were at a lovely dark sky spot. The only thing impeding the view was that it was a full moon.

Despite not being Phil Plait, Peter Lipscomb had a mastery of the sky and we saw nearly everything on my list. If it weren't for the brightness of the moon, we would have been able to check off "galaxies" from my list. With his scope, we saw clearly the bands of Jupiter (including seeing roughly where the red spot is, even though the color contrast wasn't good enough to actually make it out), four moons of Jupiter and a 5th impostor (it's in the constellation of Capricorn), several globular clusters, a few nebulae, and we even were pointed to where the Apollo 11 mission landed on the moon.

After the family of three left, I stuck around for a moment to try to take a few moon pictures, and Peter and I began chatting. I was picking is brain about astronomy, telescopes, and more. I wasn't completely useless -- I helped him load his scope into his truck. While we were chatting, I saw a meteor and he informed me it was one of the Perseids. I was a bit shocked because I thought it was too early. I asked him for his favorite, public dark sky spot, and he pointed me up the mountain through the Santa Fe National Forest up into Hyde Park. He was spot on.

I drove up there last night shortly after midnight. I arrived at the lookout point I had been to during the day two months ago. On the way up I was reminded I truly was in the forest. Deer lined the roads, and I could have sworn I saw a bear cub climbing up a hill as I came around a bend. I could have been mistaken, but the shape and proportions looked pretty spot on, but the darkness could have easily fooled me. Finally I arrived at the lookout point and stayed in my car. At first I didn't see much, and then a lone motorcycle came up and parked at the spot with me. It was silly of me to be scared, but honestly I was. I stayed in my car for a bit and noticed he was just standing off looking into the sky as well. I finally got out of the car and chatted him up a bit.

While we were chatting, I saw at least 30-40 meteors. It was beautiful. This was the perfect dark sky spot. Unfortunately in haste I left my camera tripod attachment at the house, and so I wasn't able to take any good pictures. I'm returning there tonight to try to get good pictures.

What amazed me was that with the roughly half-moon last night, I could see the faint cloudiness of the milky way in the sky. It was spectacular. Off in the distance I saw the lights of Santa Fe and then even further my new friend pointed out was the beginning of Albuquerque. The view was spectacular, not only of Santa Fe but of the sky as well. I want to experience this every night of my life.

I'm hoping to get some pictures tonight to share. Without the tripod mount, it was futile trying to take any pictures of the sky. If I get any good ones, I'll be posting them here. Hopefully I've inspired the itch to go look at the sky. I highly recommend doing it tonight, as the Perseids are in their peak. My personal viewing tips:

• Go out at least 15 minutes away from your nearest decent sized city. Light pollution is killer.
• Give yourself 20 minutes with no lights on for your eyes to adjust.
• Look into the north-eastern section of the sky.
• Do this slightly after midnight and watch for at least an hour. You'll see them.

Best of luck in your observing!

It's time to get back in the swing of things with my video Sundays.

• Hot off the presses, Potholer54Debunks has a new video debunking the creationist myth that the Grand Canyon had to have been formed in the flood.

• A look back at the classic "Mr. Show", their video The Limits of Science:

• That Mitchell and Webb Look take on the Abraham and Isaac story:

I'm going to be attending two conferences this year, maybe three if dates line up correctly.

First up is The Amazing Meeting 7 (TAM7) organized by the James Randi Educational Foundation. Through The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe Podcast, I came to realize how great of a meeting this was. With the potential to meet Penn & Teller, James Randi, Phil Plait, Adam Savage, as well as many other distinguished people, I made it a goal to attend this year. I finally booked my tickets about a month ago. TAM is from July 9 through 12 in Las Vegas.

Next, I found the Atheist Alliance International Convention with Richard Dawkins and Bill Maher headlining, and many other noted speakers including people I admire such as Jerry Coyne and Eugene Scott. I'm extremely excited about this conference and the prospect of potentially being able to see Dawkins speak in person. This conference is held in Los Angeles from October 2 through 4.

Lastly is the Texas Freethought Convention which is still being organized. If the date is the same as last year, I unfortunately will most likely be out of town. However, if I'm in town, I'll definitely be there.

For the past few months I've been monitoring for various speakers that I would love to see. The top of my list includes Dawkins, Hitchens, and Ehrman. It's incredibly hard to find a schedule for Hitchens -- I wish the man would put together a simple website. Hell, I would volunteer to post and host an official website with a calendar of events.

To illicit some feedback, I have a few questions for the few readers I get:

1. Are you attending any conventions this year, especially the ones above?
2. Who in the atheist/skeptic/freethought movements are you most interested in hearing speak?

Hopefully through these conferences I'll be able to put a face to many of the bloggers I've come to read and appreciate, as well as possibly meet some of the more influential public figures like Dawkins and Hitchens.

• Nikola Tesla: They tried to make the world forget his name: This is a great introduction to Nikola Tesla, a great mind that most of us don't recognize the accomplishments of.

• Pat Condell: Take your god and shove him: This relatively recent find on YouTube has a good grasp of funny analogies and metaphors. Plus, he has an English accent.

• Atheist Experience: Feeling one with the universe: I was sitting in the studio for the live recording of this episode. This call almost had me laughing out loud. With his dodging nature as soon as I heard the word "recreational" I knew where this call was heading. This was the call I referenced in my Getting Spiritual post. It's where Jen, the cohost, uses the phrase, "found God in a bong." Surprisingly, I've had more hits on this phrase from Google than any other phrase.

• Five minutes with Richard Dawkins: This new interview is in an interesting format: 5 minutes, uncut. Not a lot of new material, but interesting nonetheless.

• Hitchens Uncut: Unlike the above Dawkins video, I felt that this interview actually did cover some new material (at least for me). Especially the bit about the waxing. Unfortunately this video doesn't have a way to embed, so you'll have to click through to see it.

A huge breakthrough was announced today. Two essential elements of RNA have been made from scratch in a "primordial soup". This is an interesting feat for science and potentially understanding how we got here.

Quoting the article:

"By changing the way we mix the ingredients together, we managed to make ribonucleotides," said Sutherland. "The chemistry works very effectively from simple precursors, and the conditions required are not distinct from what one might imagine took place on the early Earth."

In other words, while we cannot guarantee that this is the way that we got on the path of forming RNA, it gives a scientifically tested theory as to how that might have occurred. This is a huge deal because provides us the empirical evidence to show that our theories about abiogenesis are possible, and we do not need a god to give rise to life.

The conclusion of the article is a great quote:

"Ribonucleotides are simply an expression of the fundamental principles of organic chemistry," said Sutherland. "They're doing it unwittingly. The instructions for them to do it are inherent in the structure of the precursor materials. And if they can self-assemble so easily, perhaps they shouldn't be viewed as complicated."

I love science.

One major change in my life after giving up my belief in God was my fascination with astronomy. I had always enjoyed astronomy, but what came with the acceptance of the age of the universe and big bang was a renewal of my interest in what lays beyond us. I've spent a lot of time reading and listening about astronomy.

For the new years my wife, dog, and I spent a little over a week in a log cabin in the mountains in Virginia. Without light pollution and at a little higher elevation, the night skies were simply amazing.

Unfortunately in Austin, TX, while you can still see stars, it's nothing like it was out in the Virginia mountains. I tried to get pictures of Comet Lulin, but I failed quite miserably.

However, I'm excited for this summer. We're going to spend it in Santa Fe, NM, and I am anticipating some wonderful viewing opportunities. The elevation there is over a mile above sea level, and there's lots of easily accessed areas in the mountains outside of Santa Fe. I'm having fantasies of grabbing my tent and spending some nights out in the mountains with my telescope and camera.

I have a penchant for astrophotography, which when reading about, is an idea I shouldn't try to bother with initially :-) But what do all the article authors know ;-)

Anyone else astronomy aficionados? I'd love to hear any anecdotes in the comments.

Last night my wife and I cuddled up and watched the documentary Flock of Dodos. Given the trailer, I was really expecting something much more over the top. It was actually a very well done movie that, while staying light-hearted, presented the filmmaker's hypothesis quite well.

The premise is that the reason that Intelligent Design (ID) is sticking is two-fold:

1. It has gained roots of creationists who see more "hope" in Intelligent Design being taught.
2. It has a clean message, promoted by friendly people.

The first point is rather easy to see: just look at the majority of folks who are behind the ID movement. These people appear to be in large part are the ones that used to push for creationism. While some people still spout creationism nonsense, there is little support for ID outside of Christianity.

The second point is a much more subtle point, and the main emphasis in this film. He drew the distinct comparison to what the 2004 Bush vs. Kerry election seemed to boil down to: which of the two candidates would you rather sit down and have a beer with? The conclusion of Flock of Dodos is that in large part, the representatives for ID are those same types of people: kind, generous, and lovable.

They have their talking points. How many times have you heard any of the following phrases come out of an ID supporter's mouth:

• There no transitional fossils
• There aren't enough transitional fossils [yet]
• Irreducibly complex
• Evolution is just a theory
• Teach the controversy

These phrases are easy to memorize, and they've caught on. Compared to that, can you name any catch phrases from the evolutionary viewpoint?

The point was illustrated beautifully when the interviewer posed this question:

So the catch phrase of the intelligent design movement now is "Teach the Controversy." What would you say is the equivalent catch phrase for the "evolutionary movement?"

His reply:

Well, I would say that people who are scientists who study evolution feel there is no controversy; that it's been manufactured by those who would like to...

The video gets overdubbed at this moment by another person expressing the point:

Scientists and professors are some of the communicators I know.

Beyond not having talking points, our scientists often seem arrogant. Scientists do not like to spend time combatting unscientific nonsense. In what the Kansas School Board calls EW2 (Evolution War 2), the scientists didn't even show up to testify for the school board and instead were represented by a single lawyer.

The conclusion of the film is that we need our catch phrases and people who are able to communicate well. Instead of just one Ken Miller, we need fifty of them.

Let me propose a few talking points:

• Teach the facts
• Teach the science
• Evolution is backed up my millions of fossils
• Intelligent Design is not science
• Modern medicine is owes a lot to the theory of evolution
• Science. It works, bitches.

I'm sure we can come up with others. Feel free to list a few in the comments. Finally I'd like to point out a great series of shirts aptly named Teach the Controversy. I have three of their shirts, and they've always been a conversation starter.

• Atheism - Religion - Dogma: This is an excellent video that debunks the common claim that atheism is a religion. It shows how the examples of Stalin and Marx actually do not get their ideals from atheism.

• Carl Sagan's Last Interview: This two part video is a great interview that covers topics ranging from god, skepticism, and science. This is one man I wish I had the opportunity to meet.

• Atheism: A Respectable Intellectual Position: The quote I loved in this video was, "They think I'm one of the most courteous savages they've ever met."

• 10 Stupid Creationist Questions - Ten Intelligent Answers: This is a two part video that offers rebuttals to a video that contained 10 questions. The clips this author gathers are a solid collection of atheism and science related videos.

• Kissing Hank's Ass - The Movie: This is a well-done reenactment of a classic analogy used to show how ridiculous the claims of Christianity can be.

That wraps it up for this week's video Sunday.

This week was different than most in that I encountered a lot of great, long videos. Therefore, I'm dubbing this week's video Sunday a marathon edition. Let's get started, shall we?

• God, The Universe, and Everything Else: This 6 part video features Steven Hawking, Carl Sagan, and Arthur C. Clark discussing various aspects of our universe, including the belief in a god. This video is older, around when Hawking first published, "A Brief History of Everthing," and the red-shift had yet to be confirmed by Hubble. A fascinating watch.

• James Randi Lecture at NASA: Another older lecture given by James Randi. This 12-part video features Randi talking about homeopathy, psychics, and general paranormal things he's encountered. He's humorous and has a great way of presenting.

• Bart Ehrman debates William Lane Craig on the Historicity of Jesus' Resurrection: This was a great debate. William Lane Craig from what I understand usually handily wins his debates because he's very well prepared. Ehrman, however, takes the cake in this one. Having seen a lot of Ehrman's videos and how he handles the Q&A sessions, I wasn't surprised. This video makes me really want to go see an Ehrman debate in person.

• Richard Dawkins presentation at American Atheists 2009: Dawkins talks about the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, Quote Mining, God as Science Fiction, and dealing with creationists. A great talk, with quite a bit of new material.

I've also been watching Cosmos, which is available freely on Hulu. Stay tuned for a regular video Sunday in another week!

Also from the "Was Darwin Wrong?" debate was a claim that life is optimized, which is a sign of intelligent design rather than evolution. Again, due to the format of the debate, this pretty much went on unchallenged in favor of other points of discussion.

There are two easy ways to debunk this. Firstly, this was part of a quote mine from Simon Conway Morris, which was actually misquoted in the process.

The full quote is this:

They write: 'the natural genetic code shows startling evidence of optimization, two orders of magnitude higher than has been suggested previously.'

That's right, it's not even a quote of Morris'! It's from a study Morris is quoting by Steve Freeland and several associates. But, wait, there's more:

This result, however, needs to be put into a wider context, because the million alternatives that Freeland and Hurst looked at is only a small fraction of the total number of possibilities [...]

In one way we should hardly be surprised at the efficiency of the genetic code. It is difficult to believe that the genetic code is not a product of selection, [...]

Now one could argue that I'm also quote mining since I'm removing some context. However, you can go read it on Google Books. Note that Morris also says plain as day:

Evolution is true, it happens, it is the way the world is, and we too are one of its products.

But let's go further and examine another way to debunk this claim that optimization does not happen with evolution. Selection is a very powerful force. Survival of the fittest. Let's take the case of a mutation:

• If the mutation is beneficial for survival
• • Advance to go, reproduce.
• If the mutation is harmful to survival
• • Most likely don't reproduce due to dying younger

Thus, genetic codes will tend to be "good" codes. Don't believe me still? Let's examine how we've used the notion of selection in computer science.

Genetic algorithms are used to solve problems that are best solved by trying a solution, modifying it (aka mutating it), taking the most "fit", and repeating the process. This describes exactly what nature does in the case of natural selection. And this is used all the time to solve computer science problems!

So I rest my case: our DNA is optimized, but not because it was designed. It's because the optimized DNA is the one that works the best. That alone can be explained through the selective processes upon which evolution is based.