Confession time: I happen to love the series Law and Order. Always have. In fact, if you were to ask me, I could recite for you its opening lines (“in the criminal justice system, the people are represented by two separate yet equally important groups…”). I blame my fascination on my involvement in high school mock trial teams, and the fact that I nearly became a lawyer.

So, when I saw that L&O has crossed the ocean to the UK, you know I had to check it out. Imagine my surprise to find that the actor who plays Lee Adama on BSG (Jamie Bamber) is one of the series’ stars!

I haven’t finished watching the episode yet, but if you want to try it out for yourself, it’s up on TvShack.

let all go-the
big small middling
tall bigger really
the biggest and all
things-let all go
dear

so comes love

ee cummings

via

Via a twitter friend, here’s a link to coupon codes for $10 off a $40 purchase — with free shipping!

Because, who doesn’t need MORE books in their library?

Do you think of yourself as an atheist? Agnostic? Freethinker? Humanist? Spiritual Nontheist? … If you don’t fit the stereotypes, you’re in luck. Probably all you have to do to start messing with people’s categories is:

1. Find a kind, matter-of-fact way to let people know you lack a god concept.
2. Be yourself.

If you do fit the stereotypes, please — get some help. And try to take a little break from kicking puppies between now and that first therapy appointment.

Seriously, a key quality of stereotypes is that the more dramatically wrong they are, the easier it is to violate them.

Godless? Come Out and Mess with a Stereotype or Two
Valerie Tarico

One reason why I don’t mind being called an “atheist” is that I’m out to break those stereotypes that religious folk put on that “A” label. “Atheist” is mean to be a slam and judgement on a person’s character. So part of me feels that by accepting this label, I’m also forcing the people that know (and love) me to reexamine their initial, visceral reaction to the word itself. [plus, who wouldn't want to reclaim a scarlet letter as their own?!]

That said, however, I’m actually not that attached to the word or label of atheist. I tend to prefer calling myself an atheist rather than an “agnostic,” if only because so many religious people tend to think you’re one step closer to conversion if you take the “I don’t know” position. But, I can also see Sam Harris’s point of view when he writes in “The Problem of Atheism”:

I think that “atheist” is a term that we do not need, in the same way that we don’t need a word for someone who rejects astrology. We simply do not call people “non-astrologers.” All we need are words like “reason” and “evidence” and “common sense” and “bullshit” to put astrologers in their place, and so it could be with religion.

I get that.

I guess that leaves me not knowing “what” I am — other than someone who doesn’t need a labeled ideology or a god to give me an identity.

What’d you score?

Amidst all this vibrant global piety — atop the vast swelling sea of sacredness — Denmark and Sweden float along like small, content, durable dinghies of secular life, where most people are nonreligious and don’t worship Jesus or Vishnu, don’t revere sacred texts, don’t pray, and don’t give much credence to the essential dogmas of the world’s great faiths.

[...]What are societies like when faith in God is minimal, church attendance is drastically low, and religion is a distinctly muted and marginal aspect of everyday life?

Many people assume that religion is what keeps people moral, that a society without God would be hell on earth: rampant with immorality, full of evil, and teeming with depravity. But that doesn’t seem to be the case for Scandinavians in those two countries. Although they may have relatively high rates of petty crime and burglary, and although these crime rates have been on the rise in recent decades, their overall rates of violent crime — including murder, aggravated assault, and rape — are among the lowest on earth. Yet the majority of Danes and Swedes do not believe that God is “up there,” keeping diligent tabs on their behavior, slating the good for heaven and the wicked for hell. Most Danes and Swedes don’t believe that sin permeates the world, and that only Jesus, the Son of God, who died for their sins, can serve as a remedy. In fact, most Danes and Swedes don’t even believe in the notion of “sin.”

[...]It is a great socioreligious irony — for lack of a better term — that when we consider the fundamental values and moral imperatives contained within the world’s great religions, such as caring for the sick, the infirm, the elderly, the poor, the orphaned, the vulnerable; practicing mercy, charity, and goodwill toward one’s fellow human beings; and fostering generosity, humility, honesty, and communal concern over individual egotism — those traditionally religious values are most successfully established, institutionalized, and put into practice at the societal level in the most irreligious nations in the world today.

The Virtues of Godlessness
PHIL ZUCKERMAN