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Fishing, Boating, Diving & Relaxing
HomeOverviewReviewsMapGalleryCurley's HistoryRatesAvailabilityContactDive InfoFishing InfoNormal Fishing Season
The main house was purchased from a logging company back in 1938 by "Curley & "Thora" Couvelier. In this photo they both stand in front of the steps leading to the front door. They raised two children "Norma" & "Doug", both attended the old school building built on a bluff behind the resort Curley worked at as a logger. Sekiu was a very busy area for logging from the 1930's to the 1970's. There was a locomotive that brought logs from the Hoko logging camp on a flat car right in front of the house. Once there the rail cars were brought out on a pier and then then the logs were dumped into the bay.
In the 1940's, there was a ship that went aground near Sekiu point in which Curley salvaged much of the lumber and used it to build a couple of the cabins. These cabins were used to rent to for logging crews. As Sekiu grew as a great place to catch Big Chinook Salmon, other resorts followed on Front street bringing more and more fishermen.
The Motel's first floor was built in 1954 which had eight units that kept pretty busy. All the units had electric appliances, as you can see in the sign across the front. Four years later the second story was added, this kept the entire family very busy. Soon Curley's Resort grew as word got out. He then ventured into the rental boat business, where at one point, he had 35 boats to maintain, and rent to fishermen.
Busy Front Street and view of Sekiu 1961.
Slip Point Lighthouse 1905
Bloedel Donovan Lumber Mills #14
Tatoosh Island Cape Flattery Lighthouse
Lima 3 truck Shay (DETAILS)
On December 28, 1857, the Cape Flattery Lighthouse on Tatoosh Island begins operation. Built between 1856 and 1857 on a 20-acre bean-shaped rock at the northwestern-most point of the continental United States, Cape Flattery Lighthouse is the first of an evolving series of navigation aids on the island that will assist mariners in entering the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
Fog, Currents, Tides
The 12-mile-wide Strait of San Juan de Fuca leads to the protected waters of Puget Sound and its resource-rich waters and shores. But fog, strong currents, and treacherous tides at the strait's entrance can make approaching it hazardous. Fog sometimes totally obscures the entrance and at other times hangs over it in isolated spots. Strong currents can carry unwary or disabled ships north toward the dangerous western shores of Vancouver Island. Rip tides, created by the return flow of waves and wind-driven water, add to the maelstrom as do wind gusts that can exceed 100 miles-per-hour. English explorer Captain James Cook (1728-1779) wrote in 1778 of the area: "Beetling cliffs, ragged reefs, and huge masses of rock cut by the waves abound on every side."
Other than the area's Native Americans, explorers such as Cook, and fur traders navigated the strait prior to the nineteenth century, by the mid-1800s increased maritime traffic led to demands for navigation aids that would lessen its dangers. In 1850, the U.S. Coast Survey investigated the Oregon and Washington coastlines. Its investigators recommended placing a lighthouse on Tatoosh Island, off Cape Flattery on the southern side of the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Placing a light there would, the surveyors said, allow vessels to enter the strait at night. It would also assist them in reaching safe harbor at Neah Bay, about four miles inside the entrance. Congress adopted this and other advice of the Survey.
A Green Island
Tatoosh, a 20-acre island lying one-half mile off the cape, is actually an extension of that promontory, connected to it by submarine rock ledges. Rainfall on the rock averages 100 inches annually. Treeless, but carpeted in green, the island rises abruptly from the sea to a height of about 100 feet. It has only three areas suitable for landing boats, all hazardous and often impossible to use because of prevailing winds and tides.
The Makah Indians used Tatoosh as a summer village site, with several hundred tribal members living there from March through August. They ventured out from its shores to hunt whales and other sea mammals, and to take halibut and other fish. James G. Swan (1818-1900), a nineteenth century ethnographer who lived among the Makah for three years, recorded the Makah's name for the island as Chadi.
The island has had various other names. Spanish explorers called it Isla de Punto de Martinez for Juan Jose Martinez, second-in-command and navigator on Juan Perez's ship Santiago, which traversed this coast in 1774. English fur trader Charles Duncan labeled it Green Island in 1788. However, the name of the Makah chief Tatoosh, as understood by later English explorers, became customary usage for the rocky feature. Swan speculated that they named the island for Tatoochatticus, a northern (Vancouver Island) potentate "who, with Maquilla, and Callicum, two other powerful northern chiefs, held sway over the country in the region of the straits of Fuca" (Swan, 1971).
English fur trader John Meares (1756?-1809) in the Felice arrived at the island on June 30, 1788, and met the Chief Tatoosh of that era. "Canoes came out from the island with twenty or thirty men in each who looked very savage, with painted faces and sea otter cloaks. They were armed with bows and arrows with barbed bone points and large spears pointed with mussel shell. The group included the chief, Tatooche, whose face was painted black and glittered with sand" (Meares, 1790). Meares, who had named the entrance to Puget Sound after its original discoverer, John or Juan de Fuca, recorded the island as Tatooche or Tatoosh Island on his charts.
A Disputed Island
Nineteenth century American settlers believed that the Makah gave up their rights to Tatoosh Island and all of their other traditional lands except for a small reservation at Neah Bay in 1855 return for a $30,000 payment by the federal government. The Makah apparently did not see it that way. This may have been because in their treaty with the government, negotiated by Washington Governor Isaac Stevens in 1855, they retained rights to traditional fishing and hunting grounds.
Lighthouse construction began sometime in the next two years although Congress did not establish a lighthouse reservation on the island until June 8, 1866. The Makah resented the building and interfered with the work, so the builders, armed with 20 muskets, built a blockhouse before starting on the lighthouse.
Lighting the Sea
Contractors completed construction of the lighthouse on Tatoosh Island, known as the Cape Flattery Light, in late 1857. It consisted of a Cape Cod-style sandstone dwelling with two-foot-thick walls. Kitchen, parlor, and dining room were on the first floor. Four sleeping rooms were in the half-story above. A 65-foot brick lighthouse tower rose from the center of the dwelling. Because there was no fresh water on the island, the structure's gutters collected rainwater and drained it to a cistern.
The lighthouse occupied the highest point on the island, 90 yards from its extreme western point, 25 yards from the cliffs, and 97 feet above the sea. The iron lantern room at the top of the tower held the light. That light, a 10.5-foot-high first-order Fresnel lens built in Paris in 1854 by Louis Sautter & Company, showed a fixed white light visible at a distance of 20 miles. Cape Flattery first displayed its light on December 28, 1857. Winter storms frequently threw spray high enough above the 80-90-foot cliffs to coat the windows of the lighthouse with salt. Nearby, a fog bell sounded a warning when necessary.
First Keepers
George Garrish was Cape Flattery Light's first head keeper. He moved into the new lighthouse with three assistants. He and two assistants quit after two months, citing as their reasons hard work, isolated location, and danger from Indians. Franklin Tucker and two new assistants replaced them. The new arrivals left after three months, blaming low pay and fear of the Makah.
Little help was available to the keepers. In 1858, Isaac Smith, Light-House Agent for Washington Territory, wrote to his counterpart Indian Agent M. T. Simons, reporting that the Indians could not be kept out of the lighthouse, had broken into the light keepers' storehouse, had struck the keeper, and threatened to kill him. Simons replied that he had questioned the Indians, who had nothing to say. He said that should Smith arrest any Indians, he would confine them, but advised the keeper not to attempt any arrests "unless your force is sufficient to make it certain" (Simons, May 28, 1858).
In 1860, William W. Winsor arrived at Tatoosh as the third head keeper. Shortly thereafter, a visitor described trying living conditions at the lighthouse. Rain seeped in under the roof's shingles, wind drove chimney smoke back into the dwelling, and moss grew on interior walls. This state of affairs lasted until 1875, when authorities repaired the old keepers' quarters and also built a new, detached living structure.
Relations with the Indians had apparently improved by 1885. At that time Captain Henry Ayres, a Union Army Civil War veteran hired as an assistant keeper, arrived with his wife and young daughter, Jesse. Prior to this, keepers' families had been banned due to fears of Indian trouble.
Lighthouse Technology
Technological changes arrived as the years passed. In 1872, a $10,000 steam-driven foghorn replaced the original fog bell. In 1883, the Department of Agriculture established a weather station that would operate on the island until 1966, with a break in service only between 1898 and 1902. In October 1887, the keepers inserted a red panel in the Fresnel lens to cover the positions of Duncan and Duntze rocks, about a mile from the lighthouse, so that in those areas only a red ray was visible.
Other technological improvements followed. Keepers' duties were lightened, literally, when they no longer had to carry buckets of oil to the lighthouse lamp. Tubing from oil storage tanks below fed oil to the lamp. Plungers positioned above the oil forced it through the tubes as needed. Nevertheless, one keeper had to remain at the top of the lighthouse throughout each night to assure that the lamp burned properly.
By 1883, a telegraph line described as the longest hung cable in the world, stretched from the island to the mainland and connected Tatoosh with Neah Bay. When shipwrecks had to be reported it connected the lighthouse with a life saving station established at Neah Bay. The telegraph helped to prevent shipwrecks by providing outbound mariners with reports on conditions outside the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Daily reports went out and relayed via Port Angeles to Port Townsend until June 1898. In 1886, the Post Office Department designated Tatoosh a fourth-class post office and appointed Alexander Sampson as first postmaster. In 1902, the Weather Bureau reactivated its Tatoosh station, this time establishing buildings of its own with full time officials on the island.
Mail arrived at the island weekly by Makah canoe. When landings were impossible, the canoeist lobbed the mail to a keeper teetering at water's edge. In addition to mail, "firewood, people, cows, and even a piano were loaded at Neah Bay and paddled to the island in dugout canoes" (Nelson, 1998). Regular deliveries of supplies arrived once or twice a year on lighthouse tenders such as the Manzanita or Columbine. Derricks lifted supplies in boxes from ship to the top of the island. This is how passengers disembarked as well.
John Merrill Cowan, promoted from Assistant Keeper at Coquille Lighthouse, Bandon, Oregon, to Head Keeper at Tatoosh, arrived on the island with his family on May 16, 1900. He would remain until retiring in 1932. Stoic, he would recover from seeing a son drown when his boat overturned while coming back from an excursion to the mainland. Imaginative, he would build his children a Christmas tree from salvaged boards and branches cut from bushes on the treeless island's cliffs. In February of 1911, storm winds bowled Cowan over and blew him 300 feet. He was fortunate not to be injured or even drowned. The same tempest blew a bull off the island and into the sea, from which the animal emerged angry and alive.
In 1902, the same year the Weather Bureau arrived back on the island, a government ship wireless (radio) station began operating on the island. The Puget Sound Tug Boat Company operated the facility as a contractor. Service was open to the public for sending and receiving, but irregular. After a 1902 Christmas Day gale blew down the telegraph line, The [Port Townsend] Morning Leader said that the government would never be sure of its Tatoosh communications until it instituted better radio service. In 1904, Tatoosh also became a junction point for an undersea telegraph cable from Alaska to Seattle.
Electricity was necessary to the radio station and presumably provided by powerful generators. They must also have supplied the lighthouse with power, increasing the intensity of the beacon. The Lighthouse Service reported a white light of 13,000 candlepower and a red light of 4,000 candlepower.
By 1908, better service prevailed. Naval radio station NPD was operating from Tatoosh Island with 15 kilowatts of power on a wave length of 600 meters. Its low-powered signals could transmit and receive ship-to-shore traffic and distances of up to 1,000 miles. NPD relayed messages with more distant destinations to high-powered naval facilities in Puget Sound for retransmission. The radio service also enabled reports from the island of maritime casualties, derelicts, overdue vessels, and vessel movements.
Congress reinforced the island's naval presence in 1912 by specifying that at key strategic points such as Key West, Florida, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and North Head and Tatoosh Island, Washington, and San Diego, California, commercial messages would be handled entirely by naval stations. After radio direction-finding techniques were developed during World War I (1914-1918), Tatoosh Island facilities added this capability and also began to broadcast a radio compass beacon on 375 kilocycles.
In 1914, an oscillating light that appeared for intervals of four, four, and 16 seconds with two seconds of eclipse in between, repeated every 30 seconds, replaced Cape Flattery Lighthouse's fixed beacon. The steam foghorn emitted blasts of eight seconds duration every minute in thick weather, a signal later changed to two unequal blasts per minute. About 1932, however, the Lighthouse Service replaced Cape Flattery's towering first-order Fresnel lens with a much smaller fourth-order lens. The larger lens ended up in a crate on Seattle's waterfront and was broken up in the backyard of a local glass dealer.
Twelve families lived on Tatoosh Island in 1939. In addition to serving coastal and transoceanic shipping, the island's lighthouse and other navigation aids also assisted a growing fleet of small fishing vessels. During October 1939, the lighthouse keeper counted 436 trolling boats within five miles of the island.
The War Years and Beyond
World War II (1941-1945) brought the next major changes to Tatoosh Island. More naval communications ratings arrived. They set up an intercept station that searched the airwaves for radio signals of the Japanese Army and Navy. The focus of the island's radio direction-finding effort shifted from assisting navigators to tracking enemy ships.
Marines arrived to guard the naval station and the lighthouse.
Although Tatoosh's naval radio station closed after World War II, the war also brought to the island another navigation aid, LORAN (LOng RAnge Navigation), which continued to operate. Developed during the war to aid aerial navigation, the service was quickly adapted to assist mariners. Loran receivers, mounted on most ships and on many smaller craft in the postwar years, measure the time difference in receipt of synchronized electromagnetic wave transmissions from two or more transmitting stations, providing yet another means of fixing a vessel's position.
In the late twentieth century, Tatoosh Island retained its nineteenth-century lighthouse, its early twentieth-century radio beacon, and its mid-twentieth-century LORAN transmitter. By 1977 all, including the lighthouse, were automated, so that no keepers had to live on the island. In 1996, a small solar-powered optic replaced the fourth-order Fresnel lens installed in 1932, decreasing further the need for maintenance visits.
291 Front Street, Sekiu, Olympic Peninsula, United States 98381.
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Canada Scholarships • USA Scholarships
Microsoft Undergraduate Scholarships For Students In USA, Canada & Mexico 2022
by chidusky
Microsoft Undergraduate Scholarships For Students In USA, Canada & Mexico 2022: Microsoft is thrilled to announce that the Microsoft Scholarships Program for Undergraduate Students in the USA and Canada will be available in 2022. It is intended for undergraduate students enrolled in four-year bachelor's degree programs at institutions in the US, Mexico, and Canada.
By this notice, all eligible individuals are invited to apply immediately for this program. For a better understanding, please read the following article.
Microsoft Undergraduate Scholarships
Scholarship Level/Field
Eligible Nationality
Scholarship Number
Eligibility to Scholarship
Scholarship Application Method
Microsoft scholarships are tuition and conference scholarships that are given every year to encourage students in Computer Science and related STEM disciplines (Science, Technology Engineering and Math).
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Redmond, Washington. It designs, manufactures and licenses software for personal computers and consumer electronics.
The Microsoft scholarship program is awarded to those who have demonstrated a passion for technology, academic excellence and leadership in helping to propel the software industry forward.
Microsoft encourages underrepresented groups in STEM fields of study, as we value diversity and all perspectives. We are particularly committed to providing scholarships for individuals who may be historically underrepresented in technical fields through the Microsoft Student Scholarship.
Microsoft prioritizes scholarship applications that demonstrate exceptional leadership work in the promotion of diversity in STEM disciplines at their university.
Microsoft Undergraduate Scholarships for International Students are given to students from abroad who are currently enrolled in four-year undergraduate programs in, or closely related, the following Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics disciplines or computer science.
The Microsoft scholarship 2022 can be taken and hosted in the United States of America, Canada and Mexico. You can find the best scholarships available for international students who wish to study in America.
The academic year may offer partial or full scholarships. Full tuition scholarships will pay tuition for the academic calendar as determined by your college's financial aid office.
Microsoft will pay the school designated by them and they cannot be transferred to other institutions. The funds can only be used for tuition and not for any other expenses listed on your bursar bill, such as room or board.
Microsoft Scholarship 2022 is available to international and local students enrolled in study in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
It is unknown how many opportunities there are for the Microsoft Student Scholarship, 2022. This scholarship is merit-based. Selections are made based on exceptional leadership in the promotion and advancement of STEM disciplines at the university.
Candidates must meet the following requirements to be eligible for Microsoft Scholarships For Undergraduate Students
At the time of your application, you must be enrolled full-time in a bachelor's program at a university or college in the United States, Canada, or Mexico.
You will be able to demonstrate satisfactory progress towards a bachelor's degree in computer science, computer engineer, or another technical discipline like math or Physics.
Demonstrate an interest in computer science. The scholarship is merit-based. You must have a minimum 3.0 cumulative grade points average of a possible 4.0 or a maximum of 4.0 cumulative grade points average of a potential 5.0. The recipient will need to submit a copy their official transcript.
Applications are submitted via Online Application
Applications for the Tuition Scholarship are open from 13th November to 31st January anually. Please apply here. If you have any questions, contact us at scholars@microsoft.com.
Canada & Mexico 2022 Microsoft Undergraduate Scholarships For Students In USA
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Upcoming Scholarships For Canada 2022-2023 [Fully...
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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Checking In with Dr. Pedro Noguera
Sam Piha
Pedro Noguera has been an important voice in the areas of school reform, race, and poverty. He has been a dedicated warrior to address the inequity that young people face, especially low-income youth of color, in learning opportunities. Pedro worked with others to found the Broader, Bolder Approach to Education initiative.
Today, Pedro is a Distinguished Professor of Education at the Graduate School of Education and Information Sciences at UCLA. Prior to his moving to UCLA, Pedro served as a tenured professor and holder of endowed chairs at New York University (2003 – 2015), Harvard University (2000 – 2003), and the University of California, Berkeley (1990 – 2000). He was a member of the Berkeley School Board from 1990-1994.
Dr. Pedro Noguera
Pedro has been a strong advocate for the afterschool movement and a friend to the LIAS project. He was a speaker at our HKL II conference and provided a video interview on the LIAS principles. Below we asked Dr. Noguera a few questions for our LIAS blog. We were excited about his return to the west coast. Pedro will also be a speaker for our upcoming HKL V conference.
Q: You are returning to the west coast and will be an education professor at UCLA. Why did you make this move?
A: I'm making the move back to the west coast and to UCLA for personal and professional reasons. All four of my older children live on the west coast and I want to be closer to them. Additionally, I have many close colleagues at UCLA and I'm looking forward to working within a community of scholars rather than in isolation as I have at NYU.
Q: You will be presenting again at the upcoming How Kids Learn conference. Was there a particular reason why you agreed to return to address the attendees at HKL V?
A: I am a big fan of the How Kids Learn conference because I think it's focused on the right questions. Too often, we expect kids to adjust to the way schools teach, rather than adapting the instruction to their learning needs. By focusing more intently on the needs and interests of the learner, we could be far more successful at engaging them in powerful educational experiences. This is what I believe the conference supports and encourages.
Q: Can you speak to one or more of the LIAS principles that most resonate for you when you think about creating learning environments and activities for kids?
Dr. Pedro Noguera at our
How Kids Learn II conference
A: Meaningfulness, I think is really important, especially for kids who come from low-income communities, and kids who come from families where no one has gone to college. If they don't see the relevance and understand why what they're learning is meaningful and important, they're more likely to become disengaged.
Many times middle-class kids will learn something simply because they're told by adults, this will get you into college. But for someone who is not necessarily on a path to college, just saying you need this to go to college is not enough. You actually have to show them why learning something like algebra or biology or reading Shakespeare, why is that important? What does that have to do with their lives? And teachers who can't make those kinds of connections for their students, often fail in being able to address their learning needs.
I would say similarly that education always has to expand horizons for young people, to expand their sense of what's possible. One of the things we're constantly working against, again particularly with young men of color, is the negative and pernicious effect of stereotypes. Stereotypes which lead them to believe they have a better chance of being a ball player, or a rap star, than of being a scientist or a writer, or being an elected official or lawyer.
Part of expanding horizons means giving concrete experiences, which allow them to see and learn about how knowledge is applied in the real world, in professional settings, and why in fact that is a course of action and a career path that they may want to choose, and most importantly, what does it take to get there? So that kind of work, of expanding the sense of what's possible, of exploiting the stereotypes, and of tapping into that deeply seeded sense of identity is essential to the work of really capturing the imagination of young people.
How Kids Learn V: For more information and to register, go to www.howkidslearn.org.
Labels: HKL, HKL5, how kids learn, LIAS, Pedro Noguera
The "HOW" Versus the "WHAT"
Dependable Funding? It's Up To Us!


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Del. to get $45 million in BofA deal
Nichole Dobo
The News Journal
A national settlement with Bank of America over its role in the financial meltdown is expected to bring more than $45 million to Delaware, officials said Thursday.
The $16.65 billion settlement with Bank of America announced by the U.S. Department of Justice and six states stems from the sale of mortgage-backed securities before the 2008 economic crisis. It requires the bank to pay a cash penalty to government agencies and provide billions in assistance to help homeowners with troubled mortgages.
Delaware's share of that settlement includes $13.4 million in cash to reimburse state agencies for investment losses from mortgage-backed securities sold by Bank of America and companies it bought with the belief they were "low-risk," according to Attorney General Beau Biden's office. Another $31.6 million will be used to assist with state and local efforts to rebuild communities that suffered from issues such as vacant homes that increased after the housing crisis.
Homeowners in Delaware, Maryland and Kentucky will also share at least $150 million in benefits such as mortgage modifications and second-mortgage forgiveness, according to Biden's office. Consumers who believe they may be eligible for this assistance can call Bank of America at (877) 488-7814 or the Delaware Attorney General's Office of Foreclosure Prevention at (800) 220-5424.
The deal resolves government claims the bank and companies it bought misrepresented the quality of loans they sold to investors. Most of the problem loans were sold by Countrywide Financial and Merrill Lynch before Bank of America bought them during the 2008 financial crisis.
Former U.S. Sen. Ted Kaufman, who supported the 2009 Fraud Enforcement and Recovery Act, said the financial settlements are a step in the right direction, but they should not take the place of holding individuals working there accountable for their role in it.
"The problem is the fines are paid by the stockholders," Kaufman said.
"The managers don't pay any fines. And we know prosecution and going to jail is a real deterrent for white collar criminals."
The government said the civil settlement with Bank of America does not release individuals from civil charges. It also does not absolve the bank or individuals from being charged with a crime.
When the public sees no employees of major banks are charged with crimes it creates the impression that those who can afford hefty fines have access to a different system of justice, Kaufman said. Criminal charges also act to prevent future crimes because when people are sitting around in a room considering a possible criminal action they will consider the personal consequences it could bring, he said.
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan said in a statement the company believes the settlement "is in the best interests of our shareholders and allows us to continue to focus on the future."
The deal is similar to two previous deals announced by state and federal authorities. JP Morgan Chase agreed in November 2014 to pay $13 billion. And last month, a $7 billion settlement was announced with Citigroup. Delaware's share of the JP Morgan Chase deal is expected to bring the state $20 million, according to the Delaware Attorney General's office. The state's portion of the Citigroup deal is estimated at $17 million.
"The funds we have secured in these settlements are being put to work helping thousands of Delaware families avoid foreclosure, strengthening communities hit hard by the fallout from the housing crisis, holding banks accountable and reimbursing government losses," Biden said in a statement released Thursday. "Our work is not done."
Information from the Associated Press is used in this report. Contact Nichole Dobo at (302) 324-2281 or ndobo@delawareonline.com. On Twitter @NicholeDobo.
Homeowners in Delaware, Maryland and Kentucky will share at least $150 million in benefits such as mortgage modifications and second-mortgage forgiveness. Consumers who believe they may be eligible for this assistance can call Bank of America at (877) 488-7814 or the Delaware Attorney General's Office of Foreclosure Prevention at (800) 220-5424.


There are a lot of differences between the Chapel Hill killings and the Charlie Hebdo killings, but both demonstrate what hatred and demonization of "the other" can lead to. I would think we should all be able to admit this and condemn it—right? Wrong. I'm absolutely flummoxed by Sam Harris's insistence that crimes committed by atheists by definition have nothing to do with their beliefs.
To put it simply, atheists who are quick to blame terrorism committed by Muslim individuals on Islam and just as quick to excuse atheism from any role in atrocities committed by atheists are using a glaring double standard.
Unfortunately, I have a lot of personal experience with these sorts of double standards. I grew up in an atmosphere where Christian atrocities were dismissed through ample use of the No True Scotsman fallacy. In fact, I believed that by definition, a Christian would not commit atrocities, and that if someone claiming to be Christian did so, they must not be truly Christian. It was a very handy way to excerpt my in-group from criticism while eagerly lobbing criticism at everyone outside of it.
I, for one, am not eager to repeat that.
I didn't leave one tribe, with its demonization of other groups and tribes, ample use of the No True Scotsman fallacy, and insistence on valuing in-group loyalty above all else, to join another tribe doing the exact same thing.
Yesterday, in the wake of Christopher Harper-Mercer's killing spree, it was Ashley Miller's turn. Taking her cue from Chris Hitchins' book title God Is Not Great; How Religion Poisons Everything Ashley has written Atheist Tribalism Poisons Everything.
Ashley Miller writes for the collective "we atheists". I don't feel part of that collective identity because the atheists she is addressing are those whose approach to religion and the religious I have not fully shared.
I don't understand why atheists feel any need to "form a community". Since atheism is "not a philosophy or creed" I see no basis for a community — unless it is in some sense actively hostile towards non-atheists or non-atheism. In other words, unless it is "reactionary".
One thing my experiences in past religious lives taught me was just how much easier it is to be wrong than to be right. I understand why many people hold firmly to their religious beliefs. I was once one of them and it would be sheer arrogance to forget that.
I am well into reading Pascal Boyer's book, Religion Explained, a book I purchased about five or six years ago and regret not having started reading sooner. Atheists, or more specifically those identifying themselves as New Atheists who are in reality more anti-theists than simply atheists, who are vocal in their undisguised hostility towards all or selected religious believers, would do better to learn a little about religion and the human reasons for religious beliefs and behaviours. It is all too easy to ridicule the factual wrongness of religious beliefs and the illogical arguments and baseless assumptions — and to feel so smugly superior being a "Bright". The reality is, though, that such ridicule arises from ignorance about the very nature of religion and what anthropologists, psychologists and others have learned about how it works and where it came from and the functions it serves. The Brights are ignorantly blabbing popular misconceptions. So much easier, it seems, to learn about evolution than it is to learn anything new about human nature.
And so we read about Richard Dawkins and Bill Maher remaining baffled as to why some people think they are ignorant bigots: Richard Dawkins & Bill Maher Still Baffled Why So Many Liberals Think They're Bigots — Here's Why.
Posted on 2015-10-04 04:51:39 GMT+0000 by Neil Godfrey.	This entry was posted in Atheism. Bookmark the permalink.
Atheism/non belief and the chapel hill killings? To my knowledge there is none and I can't really understand how it can be. Non belief has no holy book, commandments or doctrine so how could it?
The "dictionary" atheist may be without doctrine or dogma, but this is not true for all atheists. . . . The antipathy toward religion that I often see in online atheist spaces suggests that for many people, atheism is more than simply lack of belief in a god or gods. This is where Harris's argument falls apart.
Harris's claim that crimes committed by atheists never have anything to do with their beliefs about religion is equally mystifying. To give only one example, Communist leaders in the Soviet Union worked for decades to eliminate religion because of their belief that religion was the "opiate of the masses." Sure, you could argue that atheism was not the only (or primary) motivation behind Soviet oppression, but then you'd have to admit that the same is often true of terrorism carried out by Muslims.
New Atheists could rightly argue that CPC's atheist rhetoric is a cover for maintaining the party's grip on power and for buying influence within the ruling elite. Yet their failure to recognize similar external and political influences behind acts of terrorism committed by individual Muslims is hypocritical.
One does not need a religion or indeed any ideology to dictate edicts to make people do horrible things. This is the popular ignorance I was addressing and that I have been addressing in my various posts on religion and terrorism. Moral imperatives more often give rise to ideological or religious rationalisation — it is not the other way around. Most religious and ideological believers reject extremist beliefs, but of those who do move to cognitive extremism most never take a step towards acting out their beliefs. We need to understand why most reject behavioural violence and why a relative few don't.
Thanks for your reply, and sorry for not reading the post more closely. I have read your blog for years and have enjoyed your writing greatly.
the crimes themselves was directly linked/caused by their Atheism. I think it dilutes the term if Atheism should be associated with all the actions of people would happen to be non believers, it's like all people with moustaches should be associated with the crimes of stalin (kind of, not a great analogy).
I agree with you about tribalism and some new atheist online groups (like free thought blogs for example) but not as New Atheism as a global fenomen, it way to diverse for that.
When I first saw the ad campaigns on buses and billboards promoting the idea that atheism was healthy — be good for goodness sake, there is no god so stop worrying and start living, etc — I thought it was all good, a nice change for the better. Then when I read Dawkins and Hitchens polemics against religion I had mixed feelings. Sure it's good to bring the debate to a wider public and attempt to demonstrate for the misinformed that atheism was linked to a depressing and negative life-stye, but some of their criticisms of religion struck me as naive. Bordering on intolerance and misunderstanding where many religious people are in fact coming from. Dan Dennet was somewhat more complex and I was content to leave a number of questions hanging after reading Breaking the Spell.
Sam Harris's The End of Faith was the worst read of all. It struck me as dangerously ignorant and bigoted. Jerry Coyne has jumped on the same bandwagon of smug ignorance and fanning popular prejudices.
My efforts to understand terrorism reopened my exploration of how religion works, what makes people embrace religious ideas and do the disturbing things they do, — and the works of anthropologists and social scientists started to make a lot of sense. At least their explanations were backed up by abundant research and interviews.
I recently came across Dan Jones's blog, Philosopher in the Mirror, and have as a result been drawn back into exploring religious beliefs from anthropological and psychological perspectives.
One thing is clear out of all of this. People don't just check their critical capacities at the door when they read a set of commands from a deity and go out and accordingly do weird things. Harris, Coyne and many others (at least from some of the comments one reads in response toHeather Hastie's post critical of something I wrote about cultish/tribal behaviours of "New Atheists" (by whom I mean those who are more hostile towards theism rather than mere atheists).
Harris has moved slightly on one point, it seems, since then — but he still remains hermeneutically sealed from any scholarly research into the nature of religion and beliefs and why people believe the things they do and become violent towards people who think differently.
I look forward to posting more on these questions — in both my religion and terrorism posts.
There is actually a lot of good literature on 'scientific atheism' in Russia out there, which Dawkins completely ignores.
Storming the Heavens: Soviet League of the Militant Godless by Daniel Peris is a good sarting point. Paul Froese has also done a lot of work on this subject.
I'm usually a fan of your writings, Neil, but I have to say I think you missed the ball this time.
Sam Harris happens to be perfectly right. Atheism is defined simply as a lack of belief in supernatural deities, and nothing else. Atheism is a singular belief that stands on its own, not a comprehensive creed or worldview. It is tempting enough to mistake it for the latter: given that atheism is often seen as the antonym of theism, which DOES very often constitute as a comprehensive worldview, it is a natural trap to assume that atheism is, too. But this mistake is made often enough already by theists without atheists ourselves contributing to this misconception as well.
It is true that the atheist is not dictated solely by atheism, but it is because that atheists are also human beings, not because atheism compels those other beliefs or behaviors. It should be, I hope, a patently absurd notion to attribute every single aspect of a Christian person to ONLY his or her belief in Christianity, and nothing else, and if you are convinced of this absurdity I hope it also becomes obvious that there is inherently more to atheists than pure, unadulterated atheism. The appropriate way to criticize atheism is by criticizing the principles that atheism actually encompasses (or, rather, "principle", since it is singular), not by those actions and beliefs of atheists which by definition have nothing to do with atheism.
What I deplore is the bigotry towards religion and the religious. We have seen this bigotry spawned in the name of atheism — e.g. "religion poisons everything". What I deplore is the stereotyping or even dehumanisation of the other, in this case the religious person (especially the Muslim).
If we are going to criticise violence (and of course we should) then we have a responsibility to be sure we really do understand the violence and not just fan public ignorance in our attacks. People like Harris, Coyne, Dawkins are scholars; they know the importance of informing themselves of the research and not be so smug as to think they don't need to learn from their peers.
The bloggers I spoke about in the post quite rightly identify the double-standard of those "anti-theists" (aka New Atheists).
There's nothing wrong with deploring bigotry, stereotyping, and dehumanisation. Nor was I objecting against that point.
What I was commenting on is the inaccuracy of thinking that atheism can be seen as a cause of bigotry, the way religion can. The funny thing about double standards is that they can be right 50% of the time. Regardless of the validity of their attacks against religion, the New Atheists are perfectly justified in exonerating atheism as a cause for violence, bigotry, or despotism, for the reasons I have explained above.
I don't think anyone has been criticising atheism per se – the criticism is of the way many New Atheists conduct themselves. There is a clear distinction.
Should we blame atheism for bigotry towards religion and religious people? No.
Should we blame New Atheism for bigotry towards religion and religious people? No – in principle, New Atheism isn't about bigotry towards religion and religious people.
Should we blame certain sections of the New Atheism movement for bigotry towards religion and religious people. Yes.
That's the point Ashley is making – that tribalism need not be limited to race, religion, politics, but that tribes can be formed along many different lines, including the line of promoting atheism in a bigoted manner.
Sure, and I'm 100% fine with that.
Again, I'm responding to the charge of double standard-ism, as though the New Atheists are expected to also see atheism as a cause for violence and bigotry, if they do so for religion.
If you agree that (New) atheism can't be blamed for bigotry, then you're helping me make my case. Regardless of whether the New Atheists are presenting a legitimate case against religion, the accusations of double standards don't quite make sense, because not blaming atheism is actually the perfectly right thing to do!
Something doesn't need to specifically instruct someone to do a particular action for it to be held accountable. Say there is a football club, and amongst it's supporters is a group that is very thuggish (as many hooligans were in the 70s and 80s), and this group amongst themselves are always dehumanising black people but at the same time are saying "but we shouldn't go and attack blacks".
Now suppose that one day a member from amongst this group goes and stabs to death a black person. Should this group from amongst the supporters be held responsible? Well, legally, no, after all, the group members said they should not attack black people, however, morally, the group has to share part of the responsibility for creating an environment where they let bigotry thrive which influenced someone to commit such a crime.
Her wording is sloppy – she is clearly referring to atheist movements which breed bigotry (e.g. certain sections within New Atheism), and not atheism per se. Just because New Atheists say there shouldn't be violence against religious people, it doesn't mean they can be morally absolved of any violence that is carried out by someone influenced by their bigotry, just like the group of racist supporters who said there should be no violence against black people cannot be morally absolved of any violence that one of them may commit against a black person.
The point I am trying to make is that New Atheism the belief cannot be held responsible for bigotry, however, New Atheism the movement should be held accountable for the hatred their bigotry is spewing – I was recently made aware of posts on atheist Facebook pages where some people were celebrating the deaths during the Hajj. When you are constantly dehumanising a group, painting them as intellectually inferior, prone to violence, less moral than you etc, then the natural conclusion will be that some members from within your movement will start treating these other people as lesser human beings, and will believe that violence against these people can be justifiable.
To return to the boring basics, there is a difference between treating human beings individually or as a collective as inferior, and responding to such bigotry or to violence when exercised by individuals or a group. This principle should be universal, not selective.
Now the problem is that the Qur'an contains expressions that appear to treat non-Muslims as inferior and to recommend violence against some non-Muslims; and a number of Muslims follow these expressions literally in militant action, whether provoked or justified, or not, today. Such actions in return lead to attacks on Islam, and on Muslims, and a cycle of mutual hostility is engendered.
As for atheism, old or new, it is at least as incompatible with Islam as it is with Christianity or Judaism.
I am not an expert on the Quran, but I believe disbelievers are at some point referred to as being like cattle, and of course, the Quran has a lot of verses about disbelievers going to Hell etc. However, even then I do believe that according to some scholars, it isn't as simple as not believing in Allah, but that disbelievers refers specifially to a certain type of people who do not believe.
Anyway, one criticism of religion is that religion encourages people to look down on those who do not share the same belief, so one would expect that critics of religion would not do the same to those who have a different belief to them (i.e. those who believe in a religion), yet we can constantly see large sections of the New Atheist movement mocking and in some cases, even dehumanising, religious people.
#1. It is clear that their beliefs do not include stabbing people to death.
#2. They speak up to condemn and distance themselves from the actions of their own members, when their members perform immoral, illegal, or atrocious acts that are not part of the club's beliefs.
As far as #2 is concerned, I am always interested in Neil's writings when he criticizes the arguments made by Harris et al, including this blog post. It is when he made the accusation of double standards when I think he misses the mark.
It is clear that the beliefs of the football club are odious enough even without its members stabbing anyone. But it should be equally clear that this doesn't automatically mean that the club or the club's beliefs are responsible for everything its members do, especially for things that are not included as part of the club's beliefs.
Let us compare your hypothetical scenario to the situation at hand. Your football club indulges in dehumanisation ("Act A"), and its members commit a stabbing ("Act B") which you assert that the club should be held responsible for. The New Atheists are allegedly indulging in dehumanisation ("Act A")… and that's it. There has been no argument made by Neil, as best as I can tell, that this "Act A" leads to an "Act B" that New Atheists are supposed to be held accountable for. So your scenario, while interesting, doesn't quite seem to effectively parallel the actual situation at hand?
First of all, the double standards quote was from another person, not Neil.
Secondly, I don't know whether Neil thinks there is a double standard or not, so I can't comment on that.
I was simply stating where the author that made the comment about double standards is coming from.
@ Yong: I don't think I anywhere that atheism itself was a "cause" of bigotry. Far from it. Not sure why you seem to have taken that interpretation of my post.
— (3) anyone who leaves their faith or disbelieves in their god must be killed.
Most people do not act on such texts even though they believe them to be from God and most members of the respective faiths even deplore those who do act on them. So what is it that leads others to respond differently?
Hasn't Jerry Coyne frequently condemned demonizing Muslims? You're attacking straw men. There is no double standard. Harris, Dawkins, Coyne, etc., are fair guys. They don't judge people simply on the basis of whether or not they're Muslims or Christians or Hindus or Buddhists.
I'm sure that when Ahmed flew to Washington, he was searched, his luggage was scanned, and he probably had to remove his shoes to have them examined before he was allowed to board the plane.
Isn't this dehumanizing people? Ahmed was treated as a potential terrorist before he was allowed to board a plane.
Zing! You make a lot of good ones here, Steven Carr, some so convincing, you can't tell if it's parody.
If you can explain to me why it is not dehumanizing treatment to be treated as a potential terrorist before you board a plane, as every single Muslim is, then I would be grateful.
It must be a troubled soul who feels dehumanized (whatever that means) undergoing such checks.
I regard airport security checks as dehumanizing – mainly because it treats people the same way it treats baggage. I'm sure they would prefer you to be inanimate while they scan you, just like your luggage is.
The others aren't as dehumanizing.Being asked who I am and what sort of person I am and what sort of people know me is not dehumanizing , at least not as much.
So you now agree that airport staff do not dehumanize passengers or treat them like baggage but only "would like to" treat them that way in your mind-game scenario.
It seems you also have two different meanings of the word 'dehumanization" and flip between them as it suits?
You have not at all compared the other situations I set out — the point is that NONE of them rely upon merely being asked who you are and what sort of person you are. That's the point — you are NOT taken at your word.
Interesting that you had to play a mind-game in which you yourself "dehumanize" the airport staff — imputing to them a wish to treat people like non-humans, like baggage — to try to justify your point.
But what is your point again? You have not given us an argument in relation to the post.
Granted we have recently seen Harris admit that he has modified some of his views in a way that no longer unhelpfully generalizes adherents of the Muslim religion, and that is commendable progress. Hopefully Coyne and Dawkins will move in the same direction, soon.
I don't think Coyne or Dawkins have ever unhelpfully generalized Muslims. But I freely admit I may have forgotten something.
What do you think of the point on which Harris has shifted his view? Do you also welcome Harris's change of perspective?
That Alternet article was fascinating.
Dawkins and Harris don't realise that Muslim violence is entirely and totally due to them being radicalised by Obama bombing Muslim countries.
That's what the likes of Dawkins and Harris don't get.
The article explains it very clearly and well.
'The US, just last week, reinforced its support for radical Wahhabists in Saudi Arabia as they continue their war of aggression in Yemen. America doesn't just incidently create radical Islamists with its bombings, it continues to fund, arm, and protect them.
Dawkins and Harris say almost nothing of the way it is America that creates radical Islamists by bombing them, funding them, arming them and protecting them.
That is why New Atheists don't understand why liberals regard them as bigots.
At first i was thinking this was a nice piece of sarcasm, but reading on i was amazed in realizing that no, you really appreciate that alternet article. As if what's going on as far west as Mauritania and as far east as Bangladesh had anything at all to to with Obama (or Bush). As if "colonialism" was the proper way to describe the unhealthy relationship between US and Saudi Arabia and didn't actually betray a deep misunderstanding. As if the country that dictates the oil price to the rest of the world, that paid 50 billions cash for the first Iraq war, the current third in the world in military spending couldn't raise money for their recent military intervention in Yemen without the US. And as if no so called "new atheist" ever criticized "our ally" Saudi Arabia and their abysmal human rights record. It's a bit like we live in a totally different world.
I think it is sarcasm.
I do not dissent from such criticism of US actions in the Middle East, but "radicalization" began even earlier in response to US-Israel collaboration. However, western foreign policy and also perceived moral decadence stimulated varied ideological resistance and "Lesser" Jihad based on Islamic religious traditions and historic experience. See e.g. the writings of Sayyid Qutb, the Hamas Charter, and Ayatollah Khomeini's "Green Book".
Have you come across The Myth of Religious Violence by William Cavanaugh?
means that any attempt to isolate religion from the political and social contexts of Muslim radicalism will fail to grasp the full reality of Muslim anti-Western sentiment.
I just thought I would bring this book to your attention as his views seem pretty aligned with yours with regards to religion and violence, and he also has a criticism of New Atheists and how their analysis of religion and violence distorts the reality.
Not yet, but I've downloaded it from bookzz along with a few reviews for future reading. Still have other works I'm in the middle of reading.
Anthropologists need their popularizers as the astronomers and evolutionists and other scientists have.
-Because there's no evidence the Chapel Hill shooting had anything to do with any beliefs other than being pissed off at poor drivers. Should we stop being pissed off at poor drivers, then?
-You'd do best by providing examples here, as well as a justification for your language.
-Enough with the innuendo. What cultish or fundamentalist types of behaviors? Questioning whether a murder would still have been committed if a guy was religious? That's your example of cultish and fundamentalist types of behavior? And what's "supposedly" doing here? Are we secretly worshiping Moloch behind park benches?
I consider myself an atheist and I am not quick to blame Muslims for anything. There are just way too many generalizations in this post. Not at all balanced. This "I blame you for blaming others" is rather counter-productive.
In my post I expressed the same feeling with respect to Ashley Miller's post. I do not accept that "we atheists" are all alike or are all guilty of the problem she is addressing. I don't really think Ashley thinks that, either. I accept that she intends her remarks to fit those for whom it is intended. Perhaps by the "we" she is hoping to bring pressure to bear from atheists in general.
"You Can Count Me out of Atheist Tribalism" .. me too. But you can count on me to join, fund and participate with groups who oppose those groups who would undermine our civil liberties and erode the US constitution in favor of their religious beliefs. You can also count on me to support groups who work to diminish and ameliorate that damage done to women and children in the name of their religions.
"I don't understand why atheists feel any need to "form a community". Since atheism is "not a philosophy or creed" I see no basis for a community." I agree with this completely. I don't choose to form a community around my lack of belief in deities. I am part of a community that supports others who are making a similar journey of escape that I went through. I am part of a community that advocates dogma free educational standards.
I read and admire Coyne, Harris, Dawkins, Dennett, Krause and Godfrey. Sometimes I agree, sometimes I don't. I am often informed by them about issues I care about. I appreciate the more extreme positions that each take because it makes me think. I am not part of any community led by any of these writers/thinkers.
And, I think that the problem of Israel will never be solved until there is a single democratic state inclusive of all, there is some right of return, and Jerusalem is protected providing equal access to all who find the place holy. This position is also informed by my atheism and I join and support communities that advocate for that.
I think that missionaries have done more harm than good and join and fund communities that seek to provide educational and medical assistance to those in need without the added burden of having to change culture and adopt religious beliefs. This position is informed by my atheism.
So yes, I am not merely an intellectual atheist who knows the arguments, I am an activist supporting causes informed by my atheism, but not communities centered only on a single lack of belief. Because of my bent toward activism I consider myself a new atheist and because most of what I work against is led by theists, I consider myself anti-theists. For those I work with in the causes above, most consider themselves similarly.
While I do understand the hostility toward my position on Israel that exists in Coyne's forum, I really don't understand the hostility toward my positions that seems to exists on this forum. Nevertheless, I learn a lot and look forward eagerly to each post on the history of Christianity, a topic for which I am not qualified to contribute, and more than qualified to keep learning.
Hostility toward your position? From me? I was unaware . . . .
There will have to be some compromise over Israel or there will be escalating war and suffering. The old ostensible aims of territorial ME Zionism are now impossible, even if they were ever practicable. Here is a suggestion from silly little unimportant Gentile European atheist me: (1) Partition approximately along the 1967 line, with a Jewish cultural state to the west, to which Jews from overseas may still come. (2) A multi-faith state to the east up to the Jordan, to which Palestinians may return. (3) Jerusalem a protected holy city for all three faiths, with the administrative capitals of the two political states elsewhere. (4) Gaza taken into Egypt. (5) The settlement guaranteed in military terms and assisted by economic aid by all the UN Security Council members, with UN general support.
Egypt would never accept Gaza, so it would have to be spun off as independent, or at least largely autonomous. Also, free movement for Palestinian Arabs going between Gaza and the West Bank, as before Oslo.
Well, a perfectionist, a Likudist and an Islamist, can always find a problem in any solution. Over the past 70 years there have been many unacceptable arrangements accepted, and many accepted arrangements rejected – Egyptian policy included. Any settlement now involves the safety of more people than Jews and Arabs, and the major powers will have to impose a reasonable settlement on the contested land between the Jordan and Mediterranean, before the irresistible force hits the immovable object, and we are all blown to kingdom come in a WMD Armageddon, courtesy of Pamela Geller and the Rapture Lobby.
Seriously, when Egypt ruled Gaza, it wasn't pretty. I don't think it ever let the Gazans freely emigrate into Egypt proper.
Tribalism is not just about a "Belief/non-belief (a world-view)—it is about identity. Identities are artificial constructs that separate one from the other and our first identity construct begins with our names.—John is separate/different from Sam….
As human beings—we cannot function without identity (naming things and people)—-our language is based on defining a thing by separating it from another thing…..
The identity construct here is that a person with a belief behaves and thinks differently than a person without belief.
This is an argument that both sides use—for example, some people who have a "belief" might claim that morality comes from a theistic world-view and without "belief" this aspect is lacking…those with non-belief may claim that a belief more easily justifies violence and without belief this aspect is less pronounced….
But human motivations are complex….Is "Justice" a desire, a belief, a justification for moral/immoral actions, or inherent human nature?…What aspects of belief/desire of Justice is universal or circumstantial?
To what extent are our artificial constructs myths or reality? To what degree do these constructs delude or instruct our understanding of human nature?
We have a tendency to impute our moral perspectives into our deity and interpretations of the holy books — it does not work the other way around. But I have more to read and re-read at this stage.
I wish Steven and E. Harding would point to anthropological and related research that supports their assumptions and inferences from what they read.
This sounds somewhat akin to Patricia Churchland.
—but, if New Atheists claim that morality is not based on belief then is it fair to say that immorality IS based on belief?….
On the other hand—must a "belief" be based only on a binary of theism/non-theism?—is "Justice" a belief? a desire or both? if so, to what degree does it effect our motivations? other desires such as anger, fear etc effects our motivations probably to a much larger extent than beliefs…..
It's not a New Atheists or any atheist claim but a finding of anthropologists and psychologists and "neuro-scientists" etc — (whether they are atheist or not I can't say). Our understanding of how the brain works is leaping ahead. Moral feelings (what's right and wrong and our feelings that are associated with those intuitions — both approving with good emotions the acts of sharing and cooperating and disapproving with anger those who cheat and those who fail to punish cheaters, etc — these are all identified as arising from different sectors in the brain and can be explained in terms of our evolutionary development.
It just so happens that the ways our brains have developed also and quite separately make them capable of imagining ideas of ghosts, spirits, gods, etc. and imputing into these beings a strong interest in acting in our communities with their own goals and interests. But this "religious idea" is a secondary product — we first of all have our own moral/immoral intuitions and dispositions (along with strong feelings attached to these moral/immoral intuitions) and we can see these in undeveloped stages in very young infants. Different societies and cultures will train or educate their members to express these dispositions slightly differently but the fundamentals will be the same throughout all cultures. Those fundamentals are acts and dispositions that enable us to get along, achieve our goals, punish those whose acts are against the common good, and such.
This is not explained very well; I'm still trying to grasp and synthesize the whole topic and still have much more to learn.
personally, I find "evolutionary development" an inadequate explanation—nevertheless, for the moment I agree with what you wrote (and with previous posts)….yet, If good/bad are a matter of disposition (not theism/atheism) then any argument that posits that theism makes people more violent and atheism does not…may be flawed?
I am not saying that "beliefs" do not impact behavior—I think they do have a degree of impact…but I also think beliefs are not necessarily just a binary of theism/atheism, irrational/rational, motive/neutral…or such….
In previous chapters I described various psychological aspects of social interaction: for instance, models of moral feelings as an adaptive strategy, and cheater-detection as a way of maintaining cooperation. In each case I made use of concepts that are constantly used in biology and psychology, such as "strategy," "signaling," "defection," "utility," etc. Now this way of describing social interaction strikes most people as rather alien. That is, we understand the arguments, in a fairly abstract and intellectual way, but what they describe is just not the way we feel when we are engaged in social interaction.
For instance, the principal strategy that social scientists observe among human cooperators is a mixture of positive moral feelings toward cooperation together with a very strong angry reaction to cheating, as well as anger toward people who do not punish cheaters. However, when we engage in cooperative endeavors with people we are not aware that we are adopting a conscious strategy; we just feel that they are intrinsically "good," "reliable," "nice people," or alternatively that they are "devious," "unreliable," "creepy," etc. We do not see our dispositions as a benefit-driven strategy, even in the long run.
To take another example, people tend to cluster in solidarity- based groups. In some societies this kind of group is given for free, as it were, in that you are born in a particular lineage or village. You then tend to cooperate with your kin and kith and mistrust outsiders. But we are not limited to such groups. In most large settlements or institutions, where thousands or millions are thrown together, people tend to recreate small-scale solidarity networks. After a few months or years in a company or in a town, people identify a number of people whom they talk with, whom they can trust in case of need, as well as a number of neutral outsiders and some potential enemies who should not be trusted. Sociologists now find that these networks are of the same size and involve similar emotions, regardless of the country, language, size of the institution or town, and other differences. Again, however, people often do not think of such networks as coalitions at all. They just find that in their institution, company, neighborhood, some people are intrinsically likeable and others less so, some people seem trustworthy and others do not. How all this is evaluated in terms of cooperation and trust is not quite accessible to conscious inspection.
Identity. You cannot choose your parents but you can choose your friends. Can human life, liberty and even the pursuit of happiness exist without variation in achievement, competition and conflict?
This is way OT but on my ipad especially, the comment boxes get thinner and thinner in a conversation tread until they finally get to a single line that is almost unreadable. Is this simething with the formatting of the blog or maybe some setting I need to change? Thanks.
You're not the only one, the other night I was in bed reading the posts on my phone, and managed to read an entire post where the message was just one character wide, I felt really prouf of myself!
That happened to me on my Android phone, but when I turned it sideways, it widened back out again.
I used to have this problem until I recently updated my IOS. Just now I had the problem on my laptop until I reset the screen size to a lower zoom/magnification. Do either of these steps make any difference to your situations?
On my laptop it's fine, it's just my phone, and to be honest, I usually use my laptop, it's just that when I am in bed and can't sleep sometimes do I start browsing.
I'll try Tim's suggestion of changing the view from portratit to landscape, maybe that will help.
This is also a problem with my WinBook TW700 when turned vertically, but not horizontally. I agree, the site's formatting needs work for vertical reading.
I agree with most of the post, except the last bit about forming a community. Communities are important to most people. From a practical perspective, having a community means having emergency babysitters, it means having casseroles brought during a health crisis, it means having support during bereavement, etc. Having a formal community means being able to move into a new area and feel comfortable walking into the existing community in that area, and being accepted, and having immediate access to the community perks, to a circle of friends, etc. These things are valuable, and they have very little to do with tribalism.
The problem is that most of these formal communities are, currently, religious in nature. Sure, people *can* form them ad hoc around anything, from a Spanish study group to a knitting circle, but it takes tremendous energy to create a community. And since most people don't realize the value of having a community until they are in need, they are by definition not in a good position to create a new one. It's much easier to simply be a part of an existing community.
And if most of those existing communities are currently religious, and therefore exclude atheists, then it makes sense for atheists to band together and form communities of their own. And this in no way requires cultish, in-group tribalism. It often leads to that, of course, because we're humans and humans are just awful, but it's not necessary, and there are things that forming communities can do to protect themselves from those tribalistic tendencies becoming central to the community (such as a clear statement of values, genuine invitations for community-less individuals who do not fit with the dominant group beliefs to join in, etc.).
Makes sense (as you yourself say).


Added by Jim Phillips over 2 years ago. Updated over 2 years ago.
Some test runtimes appear to scale as O(P) or worse, which makes tests useless for testing large machines. Test complexity should only scale as O(P^2) for small P, and then limit to O(P) complexity so that runtime is constant as P increases. If this is not possible skip the test for large P.
Warning> using Isomalloc in SMP mode, you may need to run with '+isomalloc_sync'.
Charm++> Running on 16 unique compute nodes (256-way SMP).
Megatest is running on 64 nodes 3840 processors.