"Nope. Not Going To Write Again."

On the morning of Monday, the 30th of March, 2015, 27-year old Freethinker-blogger Washiqur Rahman was murdered (Bangla news account here) on the streets of Tejgaon industrial area in Dhaka by three machete-wielding Islamic extremists; two of them, in their 20s, were captured by some passers-by and handed over to the police. According to news reports (Bangla), the duo stated that they didn't know, or have any personal enmity towards, Washiqur. They were told that Washiqur had insulted Islam and the Prophet, for which his life was forfeited; they were supplied with machetes and Washiqur's photo, shown his house, and given detailed instructions. They carried out the horrendous act without remorse, believing it was their duty as Muslims.

I Ponder the Mystery of Physics... And Physicists

As a species, physicists baffle me. To my meager understanding, Physics - the study of matter, energy and the relationship between them - is the most fundamental of the natural sciences. Physics elucidates the properties of matter at level of the most basic structural units, and therefore, must necessarily underlie our understanding of the other branches of the natural sciences, namely, chemistry and biology. Therefore, I have always assumed - perhaps naïvely - the physicists' understanding of the natural world is firmly rooted in empiricism, in critical analysis of observed data - in other words, in the conscientious application of the Scientific Method.

C'est La Vie - At Fourteen: My Tribute to Malala Yousafzai

What was I doing at 14? Nothing of consequence. I was at secondary school, studying in Class VIII (possibly equivalent to the 8th grade or pre-high school or some such, in the US). I had changed schools, enrolling in a residential school away from my home city. So at 14, I was struggling to adjust to a new environment, new school and new faces, whinging a bit, eventually settling down to a humdrum life of mandatory study time, mandatory play time, and mandatory chore time, and - oh, yes! - trying to deal with raging hormones, inevitably doing something so stupid that I can look at those incidents only with sheer embarrassment and a shake of the head.

And by that same age of 14, in a different corner of the world, this amazing and courageous young woman, Malala Yousafzai, had already expressed the pain of her people through her words, written under the nom de plume of Gulmakai and published by BBC Urdu in 2009 (excerpts here); spoken out for children of her generation, articulating the need for education in her part of the world (see video below); and for all her efforts, she - all of 15 now - has been shot in the head - shot in the head! - by gun-wielding ignorant, religion-soaked, pathologically-misogynistic bastards collectively known as the Taliban. I know! Life of a teenager, right?

By virtue of valiant and skilful efforts of doctors and surgeons across two continents, military neurosurgeons in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, and trauma specialists at the Queen Elizabeth hospital in Birmingham, UK - no thanks to any effing god anywhere - she is going to be fine. Guardian reports today, she retains her higher neural functions, and will possibly make a complete recovery. She can't talk yet because of a tracheotomy tube, but is able to stand with help and write. She has expressed a desire to share with people her details and her gratitude for their support.

Questions to those who claimed seventeen Afghan lives in one night

By now, everyone is probably aware of the gruesome, violent incident in which seventeen persons, including two women, were beheaded in a nocturnal attack in the Kajaki district of the volatile province of Helmand, still partially under the control of the Taliban, in Afghanistan.

We humans, a violent species, live in a violent world, cherish and nurture violent tendencies, often engage in violent actions over meaningless and trivial reasons, and are exposed to expressions of violence on a daily basis, in the news, in the popular media, in culture and traditions and so forth - so much so that we, as a species, have probably gotten inured to violence by now. I, for instance, am not easily moved by depictions of extreme violence televised or projected onscreen, perhaps because I am never unconscious of the unreality, the make-believe, the clever and painstaking CGI that brings forth such gory effects to life. But the news of the beheadings - the horrific violence perpetrated in real life - bothered me, upset me, and shocked the normally garrulous me into silence on this, until now.

Brief Reflexions on Posterity's Chances

I have a question which has been tugging at the back of my mind for a while.
Does religion turn a person stupid, or does a stupid person feel attracted towards religion? Is it one, or both? Is there a chicken-and-egg scenario, or is it a feedback loop of some sort?

I am usually good at pushing such existentialist questions to the back of my mind. What prompted the return of this problem to the forebrain with renewed vigor today was the following situation.

The celebrated American Astronaut, Neil Armstrong, the first man to walk on the moon, passed away today, at 82 years of age. Intimating this piece of news in a post today, FreeThoughtBlogger Ophelia Benson - whom I read regularly - snarkily reminded her readers of a long-standing urban legend.

Education? Not the Panacea for Epidemic of Honor Killing

In certain societies with deeply entrenched misogyny, violence, sexual abuse and grievous assaults targeted at women are often perpetrated with impunity under the silhouette of tribal customs and traditions with their roots in religion. A despicably evil instance of such violence is what is rather sinisterly euphemized as 'honor killing', a ghastly practice in which families, who perceive that their daughters have disgraced them in some way (mostly by choosing to marry a man of their own, and not the family's, choice), 'reclaim' their 'honor' by murdering the said daughters. This practice is popular in various Arab-Islamic countries such as Pakistan, Afghanistan, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and others; although it is by no means restricted to Islamic communities and occurs in other societies steeped in a culture of patriarchal authority and perverted sense of honor (such as in certain parts of India), a staggering 91 percent of honor killings worldwide are committed in Islamic households, including those in Western nations (including the UK, Sweden and Canada), according to a 2010 study on worldwide trends in honor killings.

During any discourse on honor killings (what I like to term as (dis)honor or (dis)honor(able) killings, because there is nothing honorable about murdering family members guided by a perverted, warped sense of what honor is), it is customary to bring up the poor education and backward economic status of the perpetrators and their cultures/communities. It is generally considered that education would bring enlightenment and economic parity, which would pave the path towards a more moderate and humane understanding of life, essentially more nuanced interpretations of religious dicta that would be more egalitarian. But recent events provide evidence to the contrary; that insistence on bookish education can not be the panacea against the profoundly entrenched misogyny of religious, tribalist, patriarchal communities.

Bravo, Sanal! A Profile in Courage and Conviction

It has been a while since I had written about Sanal Edamaraku, the president of the Indian Rationalist Association, a small but growing Indian organization that strives to debunk instances of pseudoscience, superstition and mysticism. For those who are unaware of Sanal's many accomplishments and his relentless efforts to unmask religious preceptors, or Gurus, and self-styled godmen, who claim to perform mystical 'miracles', I recommend the excellent website of this organization, the Rationalist International, of which Sanal is the founding president. In 2010, Sanal was in the news when he took a Tantrik guru upon his words, challenging the guru to kill him using only his 'mystical' powers. Needless to say, the effort didn't work well for the Guru.

Freedom... You say that word a lot

... I don't think it means what you think it means, Ms. Nusrat.

Ms. Ayesha Nusrat, self-described as a 23-year-old Muslim Indian from New Delhi, recently wrote an Op-Ed in the New York Times, titling it "The Freedom of Hijab". In this essay, Ms. Nusrat described her transition to wearing a hijab following the tenets of her religion, Islam. According to Ms. Nusrat, this was her [I quote]"most liberating experience ever" [End quote]. Ms. Nusrat made a choice to exercise her prerogative to dress as she pleases. This is not, I repeat, NOT, a comment on that prerogative. However, the essay indicates that she intended to make a statement through this specific choice of hers. Since that statement is in the public domain via the Op-Ed, I would like to call the statement (and the judgement behind it) into question.

Religious Persecution: An exercise in insanity

Religious Persecution of Father in Iran Over Son's Facebook Posts in Holland: CNN's Brian Todd reports that the father of a young Iranian student in Holland has been imprisoned in Iran on the charge of supporting anti-Islamic activities, because the student dared to post some jokes and vids poking fun at a 9th century Shia Imam.

It's one of those things that make no sense to sane, rational folks anywhere - and yet, such outrage is perpetrated with impunity by religious fundamentalist regimes with no regard whatsoever for freedom of speech and expression, such as the one currently running Iran.

Think about that for a moment.

Musings on some oddly secular...

I am in a weirdly reminiscent mood this morning, dunno why. My final five years of schooling was with an institution run by monastic members of a Hindu missionary organization in India. Now, when I can look back rationally and dispassionately at those years - and am able to discern and discount the subtle and overt attempts at religious indoctrination - I am conscious of a few interesting ideas that I had picked up on the way, ideas that seem to have influenced my way of thinking greatly over the years. Even though I am an Atheist, and extremely skeptical of religious ritualistic mumbojumbo, I am not ashamed to declare that some of these ideas came from early Hindu philosophy, dating back to some four thousand odd years ago. Perhaps those were simpler times, perhaps those were indeed wise folks... Those certainly were times way, way before a philosophy was corrupted and subverted into an '-ism', the rabidly irrational and superstition -laden face of Hinduism that gradually took over India, the country as well as popular psyche. Sigh. I am going to share two such ideas, extremely secular despite their religious context, contained in few lines of verses, or as they are known, shlokas.

Underfunding of Basic Sciences in Arab world: does religion play a role?

Today's Nature Middle East published an interesting and thought-provoking commentary from Dr. Nidhal Guessoum, an astrophysicist and professor of physics at the American University of Sharjah, United Arab Emirates, entitled: Does the Arab world (not) need basic science?

The accompanying blurb nicely summarizes the main argument in the commentary.

The Arab world cannot afford to ignore curiousity-driven basic research in favour of applied research, if the different states hope to produce an enlightened science culture at home.

Belief does not human identity make

Man it's tough to hold a conversation over Twitter! Sometimes, the 140-character limit just doesn't cut it, particularly when there are multiple folks to include in the discussion. I was in a convoluted discussion with ScienceBlogger Josh Rosenau, philosopher Ophelia Benson, and my friend and fellow NatureBlogger Bob O'Hara. On Twitter. Needless to say, it soon became difficult to keep everything together. So here I am, hoping to make sense of it all.

Au contraire, Religion IS the problem

Philosopher and author Ophelia Benson shared on Twitter today an article about Ms. Sahar Taman, a founder of Journeys to understanding, a non-profit organization trying to open up the understanding of the Arab world amongst the rest of the world, especially the US. The article reported on an interview of Ms. Taman taken by the Connection Point blog of a non-profit organization, Peace X Peace; Ms. Taman talked about her work in Egypt, trying to promote what she terms as "interfaith dialog". According to her, this is about bringing a reconciliation amongst the practitioners of various faiths - Muslim, Christian, Jew, Hindu, Buddhist or any other - so that everyone can realize their essential humanity, and find common ground that way.

No doubt, a noble goal. But will this enlightened end justify the means Ms. Taman embraces, with her inordinate insistence on faith as the panacea? Ever curious, I left a few questions after the blog post, but it is caught in moderation for the past several hours. I don't have much hope of having it live, and so I decided to go ahead and ask the same questions in my post. The quotes in italic are from Ms. Taman, based on her interview.

Arrogance of Faith

James Taylor, 41, was quadriplegic and had severe developmental disabilities, requiring constant care and attention. His aged parents placed him in a group home for the developmentally disabled, near Schenectady, NY, hoping that he would receive that care. What is unfortunate is that these types of group homes, run either by the State or private entities, often fall far short of any reasonable expectation, as today's NY Times reports. Left unattended for 15 minutes in a bathtub, James Taylor, unable to lift his head, drowned in the water of his bathtub and died. The NY Times investigative report reveals that this is not an isolated incident. Apparently, "In New York, it is unusually common for developmentally disabled people in state care to die for reasons other than natural causes." It is disturbing and inhuman per se, a terrible state of affairs; the quality of care and advocacy for this marginalized group of human beings, people with developmental disabilities, is abysmal, and what's more, there is almost no or nominal redress after these tragic events. The Times investigation paints a general picture of apathy and lack of concern for these people on part of the caregivers, as well as the State.

And, as if this weren't enough to ruin the day, there was, of course, this abomination... this particular group of pious god-botherers that always manages to surface from the fetid depths of humanity, following any tragedy, in order to claim it as proof for their non-existent deity.

education, schmeducation! Tribalism rules.

What's the fucking point of your fucking education and your fancy PhD degree if every time you go out with your wife, you insist (or, your religion insists and you endorse it heartily) that she cover herself head to toe in a fucking symbol of unenlightened medievalism?

All right. That was a rant RAGE speaking.

The Curious Case of Two Indias

For a while now, I have been reading an interesting and engagingly written book by young British science journalist and author, Angela Saini, titled: Geek Nation: How Indian Science Is Taking Over the World. I would perhaps write a review of the book once I am done. In this post, however, I am going to share a few observations from the book that struck an immediate chord with me. I call it 'The Curious Case of Two Indias', referring to a strangely split personality of the country I was born and grew up in. India is, at once, progressive and retrogressive, modern and medieval, scientific and superstitious - a contradiction of existence; the book Geek Nation has ample illustrations of this dichotomy. I refer to a part that relates to my own experience.

Religious Factors & hippocampal atrophy or hypertrophy?

As a testament to humankind's everlasting quest for knowledge and understanding of the self, a number of scientific studies in the recent times have examined the elusive relationship between the human brain and that fountainhead of human emotion and passion, namely, Religion. There have been studies on neurological correlates of religious experiences and spiritual practices, such as meditation and prayer; many studies have looked at both acute and chronic effects of such practices in relation to brain function. A recent study along the same lines, published by Owen et al. of Duke University, in PLoS One on March 30, 2011, has attempted to link religious factors with changes in a specific brain region, the hippocampus, using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) techniques.

Fresh Saga of Apologists for Religion Falling Over Backwards

The Religious and the Faithful across the world are quite diligent in trying to spread their beliefs around. Clearly, their intellectual laziness (inherent in their stance embracing 'goddidit' as a single unifying explanation of all natural phenomena) does not dull their proselytizing fervor. As a result, every so often, studies spring up purporting to show how deep and inherent religious belief is to the human nature. Whichever way these studies are constructed, the conclusions - always delivered with a hint of smugness - often seem to be the same:
(1) Religion and religious belief are deep-rooted and universal,
(2) They ain't goin' away nowhere,
(3) Atheists, just deal with it.

A new study from Oxford University under the aegis of the Cognition, Religion and Theology Project (funded by none other than the John Templeton Foundation - of course!), brings forth more of the same.

On Burqa ban - part Deux: response to Margaret Nelson

Yesterday I wrote about "The Answer's 42" blog and its British author, Margaret Nelson, touching upon my disagreements with her secularist approach regarding the burqa ban in France (and proposed in the UK). Margaret had promised me a detailed rebuttal. Well, here it is, and look! It's a post with my name in the title! Awww! A post solely for me? I am honored, Margaret!

Wishy-washy Arguments in Support of Belief. Yawn.

Following a few heated exchanges between us on Twitter, a journalist friend of mine has decided to put up a blogpost defending the ultimate accommodationist position: Why can't we all just make nice-nice and be happy together?

Okay, that was taking a bit of liberty (strictly tongue-in-cheek, of course!) in paraphrasing her position, but basically she is questioning the source of belief and the lack thereof. In particular, she is examining those beliefs that are not evidential/ material/ cogent in nature (Hmmm... Is there any other kind?)

She starts with a valid question:

How do we know these exist, if we choose not to believe that they exist?

Most unfortunately, she considers this as a rhetorical question, and therefore, comes up with a simplistic, outlandishly puerile, answer:

The answer to this is also simple: we know they exist and therefore we believe that they exist.

I can't even begin to describe the logical fallacies in this circular argument, that a seasoned journalist should never have committed IM(NS)HO. When did journalism stop being about fact-checking, objectivity, logical consistency, integrity of reportage and all that jazz? Sigh.