You suck. (We'll see how stupid stupid stupid our species is after your bout with prostate cancer. That's not JC inside the bottle.)

Wow. You do suck.

I am not a bright. I do believe in God and I do follow the tenets of Christianity.

However, I will admit to being something of an idea hamster. Ouch. Thanks. I needed that.

r

Ian, please relax, you'll need your strength continue to suffer the slings and arrows as you inevitably grow older.

Excellent post! Puncturing liberal, elitest smugness is truly god's work. Amen, Brother Ian.

Oops! I meant Amen, brother Van der Leun. My apologies.

"...one Daniel C. Dennett (Identified as "a professor of philosophy at Tufts University,..."

That's a bit like saying "...one Patrick Stewart, identified as a movie actor..."

I think you've missed the gentle satire of Dennett's piece.

Cool! We've already got detractors.

I see nothing that you wrote that is any less "smug, self-satisfied and stupid" than this idea of "brights". Apparently, the idea that people can be equally moral, ethical and generally socially acceptable without a belief if fairies and other invisible friends is offensive to you. Sorry.....but get used to it. One thing that you are correct about, though, is that to hold elective office, you have to espouse the belief in these things. Kind of a sad statement on the reality of Christianity in the U.S. - espouse tolerance but don't live it.

Why do discussions about religion tend to devolve into us vs. them arguments? It’s not enough for the ‘brights’ to define their own beliefs – territory has to be marked. The world has to be divided into people who believe what we do and people who don’t.

Even supposedly tolerant religions are opposed to ‘them’ – don’t get a Unitarian started on the subject of Catholicism, he’ll be spitting nails. An atheist will defend his beliefs with the fervor as a fundamentalist. Now we have the brights, who say that anyone who doesn’t agree with them isn’t. Don’t get them started on the subject of American Christianity…

This is not what the world needs - another group saying my beliefs are right and yours are not. If the brights really were, they would say 'Love each other as yourself', admit that they are like the rest of us, just a bunch of idea hamsters, and drop this whole campaign. That would be the tolerant thing to do.

Mary,
I don't think you could be more wrong.
The Brights don't seem to be creating another belief system to contrast with others. They're trying to spread acceptance and tolerance-
They're attempting to create a new term for those who don't believe in God. If you think about it, why is one worldview socially accepted while the other is chastized by God-believers in the media? Why can't national politicians be openly agnostic? I think it's a good idea for Brights to be more socially accepted. And if this movement can cause a dozen people to re-think their views of atheists, rationalists, or whoever, then it's probably worth the effort.

"Sigh. What is one to do with such manifest detritus? Dennett goes on ad nauseum about his little club of closet Mensa addicts, but he never, for one iota of a scintilla of a jot, acknowledges what most really smart people know, i.e. deep down we are all stupid. "

Absolutely apt, humorous criticism of the Brights movement. While I question whether you actually read Dennett's books, it's irrelevant to appreciating the subject at hand.

I am not a Bright, either.

Here are my communications with Mynga Futrell -

Mynga Emails

She is one of the founders of the term "Brights". After hearing a bit about the movement on Wisconsin public radio, I thought it was, in fact, a good idea for us non-religious to stand up and be counted. God knows (hehe) that the religious have no problem spouting their beliefs.

Although I consider myself a "freethinker" and "Agnostic", I have been informed by Mynga that I cannot be a bright because I, as an agnostic, leave open the possibility that certain supernatural occurences could be real... and this from personal experience... therefore, I am a bit too magical of an agnostic even for them...

Then she dissed me for holding magical beliefs out of desparation... that, in her experience, people retain these notions because they can't deal with the fact that existence consists of 80 years, then nothing, and is pointless. (see comments in story - she apparently visited my site as well).

I suspect that the "Brights" of Columbus's day would have told him he is crazy because it was not scientifically proven that the world was round, therefore it wasn't true. yikes. Everything has to be scientifically verifiable to be true for a Bright? I asked her about certain mysteries in quantum physics where separate particles seem to communicate with each other... an unexplained phenomena... she didn't touch that.

Well, I say F the Brights. I am going to start "The Brighters". Anybody in?

Jim
www.creepo.net

Whole paragraph quote:
"I suspect that the "Brights" of Columbus's day would have told him he is crazy because it was not scientifically proven that the world was round, therefore it wasn't true. yikes. Everything has to be scientifically verifiable to be true for a Bright? I asked her about certain mysteries in quantum physics where separate particles seem to communicate with each other... an unexplained phenomena... she didn't touch that."

First sentence: Actually it was well known to brights in the classical greek era that the earth was round, but that knowledge was popularly lost due to christian dogma (http://www.zum.de/whkmla/period/disc/flatearth.html)
, and you might have found yourself on fire for saying so.
Second Sentence: key word: 'verifiABLE', better word: 'falsifiable', and actually yes :)
Third sentence: quantum entanglement is falsifiable, a 6000 year old Earth is 'falsified'.

I just read Jims suggestion about the "brighters"

Also..looks as if there is no room anywhere for an agnostic if what he says Mynga told him is accurate. Also...why not respond to the quantum physics question..I do not know the answere there...can science explain that? I just hate to see you go to the absolute insistence that you must be absolutely correct. 80 years?bev wilson

The term 'agnostic' carries much baggage, that is one of the reasons why the term 'brights' came about. Clearly, the term 'brights' is not meant to be wishy-washy. The definition is fairly clear. Of course anyone can create neologisms, i.e. 'brighters'. When you say "...there is no room anywhere for an agnostic...", I do not really follow what you are trying to say. There is room for the agnostic as an agnostic, whatever that means. The term 'brights' is for, to use the negative, non-supernaturalists.
I did respond to the QM question, but I can elaborate. The question for 'brights' is not to explain quantum entanglement, but to put questions like this into a framework that seeks an explanation that does not rely on magic or divine forces. Physicists come up with mathematical models to explain and predict other physicists' experimental outcomes. Are you trying to charge with your question that if Mygna cannot explain so you 'understand' quantum entanglement, then 'science' should be abandoned for mysticism? I think the "...absolute insistence that you must be absolutely correct..." comes not from science, but from elsewhere. Science is ever-changing, self correcting with new experiments, seeking more general and more precise models of things found in the world (universe).
Eighty years is probably some average lifespan estimation.
I am quite happy to be excluded from the astrologers 'club' because my beliefs conflict with theirs. Where do you draw the line? Well, I draw it in the only place that makes sense to me, no supernatural.
I do think the term 'brights' is a little unfortunate partly because there are many bright people who believe in the supernatural, and there are probably 'brights' who are not that bright. I do understand this is a new word, but the confusion is inherent in the new term.
There is also arrogance on both sides.

Dear Creepo... I read your blog, and it wasn't worth the click.
With Mynga you decided, in your pseudo-intellectual "style", to personify the unexplained behavior of particles (both real and only as yet imagined - such as the graviton in string theory) and then call your fantastical interpretation {or more likely that of others more scholarly but equally irrational as yourself} an atempt on the part of the paticles to "communicate with eachother". This is what left Mynga Futrell unable to meaningfully communicate with you on this or any other topic. You're a mystic. The mystery here, though unrelated to the term Bright, is how you or any other rational person can posit something irrational as an explanation for a confusing observation, and at the same time beg for an explaination of your newly invented "phenomena"... and expecting others to presuppos your make-believe interpretation.

Futrell was more than gracious with you, but I'll spare you the consideration... you're a f-ing jerk. Be it an act you impose upon on others for the sake of you web site or merely a sad personailty defect, you need help.

BTW, I personally have hope for a GUT or some form of superstring theory to answer a lot of questions, but WHY must so many consistantly fall back on mysticism when the empirical is lacking. Just grow up and admit the Tooth Fairy doesn't exist and that you don't know all the answers yet.

Eek.

I deplore the term "Brights" to designate myself and people like me. How dare they try to coin a term and make it stick. I am an Atheist, for over twenty years---end of discussion. The term Bright has a snotty elitist, snobby leftist, white ivory tower feel to it. I won't join, fund, support, or associate with Brights.

I am both a bright and a Christian, and I commend Dennet's and others' work. The above article would be the one to make Jesus weep, not Dennet's. Sure, Jesus believed in God, but he also believed that truly believing in God meant that you were to work for the oppressed, the scandalized, the outcast (and a whole host of "others")--even (perhaps especially) those with whom you have no reason to ally yourself with. I see the "bright" term as an attempt at liberation and affirmation, and am compelled both by my Christianity and my naturalism to support it. Kudos to those with enough courage to love.