Advocatus Atheist

Seasons of Freethought is a special project I've been working on for some time. It collects the Freethought publications of G.W. Foote and puts them back into print in one affordable collection. But instead of just writing another sales pitch, I thought I'd share with you the new Introduction to this collected volume by yours truly. INTRODUCTION TRISTAN VICK S entenced and confined to a year in prison for the victimless crime of blasphemy, George William Foote did not let this little setback dissuade him from speaking out against the cruelties and absurdities of religion. In fact, having a year of his life taken away for the “offense” of blaspheming against the Christian God only made him more entrenched in his cause to dole out just criticism of religious injustice  hypocrisy, and cruelty all the while fighting for the noble causes of the freedom of speech, and of freedom of thought and expression. Publisher of the skeptic...

Does God exist? An answer to an age old question. The famous theological question “Does God exist?” presupposes the question need be asked in the first place.  Anyone who has thought about it should become uncomfortable with the question for the very reason that  we don’t ask if bananas exist.  Why not? Well, we happen to know for a fact that they do. Sure enough, I ate a banana this morning with my breakfast. Likewise, we don’t ask if oxygen exists. We happen to know for a fact it does.  Although we cannot see oxygen, we can measure it in terms of volume and pressure. After all, when one is blowing up a balloon, one does not pause to ask whether or not the air filling the balloon is real or not. We happen to know it is. We can see the evidence for it in the expanding balloon caused by the very real pressure of the invisible gas. Indeed, without oxygen in the air  we  would cease to exist.  Our reliance on oxygen and our inevitable de...

Okay, it's not related to this blog except that it happens to be something I am proud of. Part III to my character driven, survival horror, zombie series BITTEN is still a year away from completion (the manuscript for part 3 is only about 60% written) but I thought I would sneak the cover reveal out there early anyway!  It's another excellent design by Glendon Haddix and his company Streetlight Graphics .

Please think about this. I heard this the other day:  "To even ask the question "does God exist" requires one to make the a priori assumption that God probably does exist, otherwise the question doesn't make any sense to ask." Um.... no. That's not how it works, sorry to say. The assumption God exists is the theistic assumption. The assumption God doesn't exist is the atheistic assumption. The question simply is, which assumption (of the two) is right? If the theistic assumption was right, then God would be verified, validated, and belief vindicated by the evidence. Lacking all trustworthy evidence, as the case seems to be, it rather aligns with the atheist assumption of no God.  No God therefore no real evidence. So the burden of the proof to substantiate the claim "God exists" is always upon the theist to provide a proper demonstration of the evidence that can be checked by skeptics and non-believers of said God. If anyt...