This is a documentary about Bill Maher’s take on the current state of the various Religions of the world. He interviews tons of people from various various religious background as he travels to numerous destinations. Due to his own ignorance and lack of certain knowledge, he does make a few statements about Islam and its propagation that are inaccurate. In general its an interesting and hilarious documentary.
For more info visit http://www.lionsgate.com/religulous/
‘THE BIGGEST DAMAGE RELIGION DOES IS BRAINWASHING CHILDREN’
Richard Dawkins is amongst the most provocative thinkers of our times. The Oxford University geneticist has waged a blazing intellectual war on religion, calling for the rule of science and rationality. At the recent Jaipur Literature Festival, Dawkins spoke with Vineet Gill about why he prefers science over faith, whether he is an ‘atheist fundamentalist’, – and issues such as immortality:
What are your views on moderate religion today? You’ve earlier called this ‘a seedbed for extremists’?
I have said that…I fear it’s true that if children are taught, however moderately, that faith is a virtue, that you don’t need evidence to believe something, then that paves the way for a minority to be extremists. Everybody has been indoctrinated with this view that if it’s their faith, you can’t argue with them. I think that is pernicious. If children are taught they don’t need to defend their beliefs with evidence, that paves the way for extremism…the biggest damage religion does is indoctrinating and brainwashing children.
You believe passionately instead in science – but what happens when science gets it wrong?
Science doesn’t actually claim to know all the truth. It works hard by getting closer and closer to the truth, but of course science learns by its mistakes and advances by disproving hypotheses and getting things wrong. One of the virtues of science is that it is prepared to change its mind when the evidence warrants it. Public sharing is an important part of science. No scientist will ever say – ‘Oh, it’s true for me, it may not be true for you.’
Science gets space for research and development – why can’t we look at religion too as a living laboratory with people developing their thoughts, rather than just dismissing it?
It would be very nice to study religion in anthropological and psychological ways. By the way, i do think children need to be educated about religion. They just shouldn’t be told you belong only to this or that religion. They should be told, there is this religion and that religion. And when you grow up, you may – or may not – choose to join any of those.
If science were to triumph over time, would you like to become immortal with its help?
No. I think if there’s something frightening about death, it is eternity. And it’s equally frightening whether you’re there or not. Actually, it’s more frightening if you are there. Just imagine billions and billions and billions of years – terribly boring! I prefer to spend eternity under a general anaesthetic – and that is exactly what’s going to happen.
Stepping out of science, how do you explain the powerful effect faith has on people?
It is fascinating. What is it about faith that can make somebody kill? Patriotism is another one – people believe my country is right or wrong. In the World Wars, people were perfectly able to shoot other people just because they belonged to the wrong country, without ever asking what their opinions were. Faith too is like that.
Rejecting belief outright, are you an atheist fundamentalist?
The term ‘fundamentalist’ means you stick to a holy book and never change your mind. I will change my mind whenever the evidence warrants it.
Finally, your thoughts on your friend and legendary fellow atheist, the late Christopher Hitchens?
Christopher Hitchens was a great warrior, a magnificent orator, a pugilist and a gentleman. He was kind, but he took no prisoners when arguing with idiots.
Source: Interview – The Times Of India (Bangalore Edition – January 25, 2012); Photograph: Sutton-Hibbert / Rex Features
It’s time to start getting caught up!
The last set of images I posted to Flickr were from a shoot I did April. My plan is to use this “blog” to start getting caught up. Look for about 10 shoots worth of photos over the next few weeks.
We’ll start out with some of my favorites from my shoot with Sam Rose, AKA Frak Attack (yep, roller derby strikes again).
Zeitgeist: Moving Forward [2011] by director Peter Joseph is a 162 minute film work which continues what the prior two films of the Zeitgeist Film Series started: a critical look at the “Zeitgeist” or ‘Spirit /Awareness of the Time’. A prominent underlying thesis of the Film Series is that a great many notions, beliefs and practices currently engaged in today and assumed as “presupposed”, “given” or seemingly empirical to our societal approaches and values are not only intellectually/historically incorrect but highly detrimental to our personal and social progress and sustainability.
Zeitgeist: Moving Forward focuses on the very fabric of the social order: Monetary-Market Economics. While the majority of the world today have slowly come to see some basic flaws in the economic system we share, as large scale debt defaults, inflation, industrial pollution, resource depletion, rising cancer rates and other signposts emerge to bring the concern into the realm of “public health” overall, very few however consider the economic paradigm as a whole as the source. The tendency is to demand reform in one area or another, avoiding the possibility that perhaps the entire system is intrinsically flawed at the foundational level. ZMF presents the case that it is, indeed, the very foundational mechanics of this system that generates the patterns of behavior and unsustainable methods of conduct that are leading to the vast spectrum of detrimental consequences both personal, social, and environmental and the longer they go on, the worse things will become.
For more info visit http://www.zeitgeistmovingforward.com/
Zeitgeist: Addendum was born out of public interest in possible solutions to the cultural issues presented in Peter Joseph’s first work, Zeitgeist: The Movie. Building upon the topics of social distortion and corruption, Addendum moves to also present possible solutions.
For more info visit http://www.zeitgeistaddendum.com/
Zeitgeist: The Movie is a 2007 documentary film by Peter Joseph. Split into three parts, it deals with the origin of christian faith, how American banks have seized world power at the beginning of the 20th century and how these two are related to the wars fought in the 20th and 21st century.
For more info visit http://www.zeitgeistthefilm.com/
I spent my afternoon cleaning my room and getting rid of a few things that should have been thrown away a long time ago. In the process, I found something I had misplaced. I don’t remember when I did. It is a deck of WWF trading cards. Back when I was in middle school, it was it still known as World Wrestling Federation. These cards were a rage among most kids in school including me. It sounds stupid now, I know. In the seventh grade, all Catholic students had to prepare for a district-level Catechism exam conducted by the Bangalore Archdiocese. Since the school was run by nuns, we were pushed hard to study well for that exam, even though no intelligent individual needs more than a few readings to memorize a few prayers and other Christian teachings. Not only did we have to recite prayers and other teachings that was part of the course, we were also taken to the forest behind the school every week for an hour or more to study without distractions. (Yes, there’s a big dry forest where the school is situated and a small part of it is used by the Army for weapons training. The Army station is close by.)The Principal came with us every time too. During one of those study sessions in the forest, the Principal, who was a nun, saw a group of kids playing with the trading cards. She confiscated those cards and later told us she was repulsed at the thought of us playing with them. For any rational person, there’s nothing wrong with those cards. But the nun had a problem that was very specific. CLEAVAGE!
Each deck included a few cards that featured the beautiful WWF divas of that time – Sable, Debra, Chyna, Tori, Ivory, Molly Holly, Lita and a few others. Every wrestling fan knows that a female wrestler’s attire is revealing and the show of cleavage is obvious. Not that it’s a problem, but the nun thought its immoral to play with such so-called “vulgar” cards, which was no surprise. She was, after all, a woman of the cloth. She loved using that word. Almost everything normal was “vulgar”. She questioned all of us and tried to find out how many students played with WWF cards (non-Christians included). She then proceeded to lecture us about the dangers of offending god. Word got around fast and before I knew it, most kids voluntarily gave their cards away to the nun out of fear and guilt. I say most kids because I’m not so sure if every single kid that owned a deck or two gave away his/her cards. There must have at least one to two kids that chose to ignore the Principal’s request. I know I did. When I was questioned, I simply told her that I gave mine to the boy who was in charge of collecting them from the non-Christians. Even back then I knew that considering the natural human form to be vulgar is too fucking stupid.
What did she do with the cards? 
That’s where things get really weird. The next study session in the forest that followed was cancelled. I think. A different plan was worked up that still needed our presence in the forest. In this case it was during the lunch hour. Any student that wished to go was welcome to do so. I chose to stay behind and eat my lunch in peace away from the religious loonies. So a group of kids along with the Principal went over there, dumped all the cards on the ground full of dry leaves and burned them. During the next Catechism class, she couldn’t contain her happiness and told us all how proud she was that her students chose the path of righteousness rather than sleaze and sin. There I was wondering how I ended up with a whole bunch of sore losers. However, remembering those times do involve a lot of laughs.
© 2012 Pratik Bruno. thoughttrippingomlsd.wordpress.com (All Rights Reserved)
This a sketch of me done by my friend May. He’s from Cambodia. He came to Bangalore 4 years ago to complete his Bachelor’s degree.
He is one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet. He loves graphic designing, web designing and animation. He hopes to start an Animation company back home in Cambodia.
A week ago, an altercation took place between two families outside their homes in the middle of the road at 12.30 AM. There was a lot of name-calling, swearing, collar-grabbing and shoving that almost led to a fist fight. For the sake of simplicity, I’m gonna call them Family A and Family B.
Family A, a married couple, found it extremely difficult to sleep late at night because their neighbors who seemed to be having a family get-together and talking and laughing late into the night without showing any consideration to anyone around them, while completely ignoring the time, were so loud and noisy that they were disrupting the night time peace and calm in the neighborhood. (This wasn’t the first time such a problem had occurred. There have been many instances in the past where words were exchanged between these families for similar reasons. Family B has always been impolite and uncooperative. I know one of the family members personally. She was my one of my classmates in school. Let’s call her Sally for now.) On this particular night, the husband (Bob) who was going crazy with all the noise decided to give them a piece of his mind. He found Sally’s mom outside locking the gates of her home. He pleaded with her to ask her family to dial down the noise and show some civility. She went back in and told her family that he had called her a whore. What followed next was the inevitable showdown between both families where Family B justified their behavior by claiming that it was their house and they had the right to be as loud as wanted to be no matter what time it was. Their swearing was damn colorful too with no self restraint whatsoever. The law states that between 10.30 PM and 6 AM, decibel levels need to be below a certain limit, depending on the area. Finally realizing that Sally and her folks don’t give a rat’s ass about anybody’s comfort but their own, Bob decided to call the Police. A formal written complaint was filed a day later. To Family B’s surprise, Sally’s dad’s best friend took Bob’s side and signed the document as a witness to the fight without telling them. I don’t know where all this is gonna lead but it was a trivial issue could have been handled with a little bit of restraint, respect, consideration and rational thinking. I’m pretty sure this problem will occur again.
I’ve lived in India all my life and the one thing I can say with absolutely certainty is that most people here have no civic sense. (But they have a lot of interest for completely irrational moral policing). They do what they want, when they want. The traffic rules don’t apply; they drive on the wrong side of traffic; they urinate in public; they spit on the roads; they’re ill-mannered and have complete disregard for other people and their concerns, opinions, comforts and difficulties. They don’t care if their behavior negatively affects the people around them. The small percentage of people who do act and behave according to the accepted norms of civil society get a bad name because of the sweeping generalizations.
There exists a desperate need to educate people about social etiquette. Restraint is a virtue that everybody should cultivate and master. It’s not just about following traffic rules and keeping the roads clean. It could be anything – opening the door for a lady instead of pushing through; paying attention when spoken to; switching off the cell phone in a movie theatre or in a meeting; respecting the other person’s boundaries and so on. They need to understand that society functions efficiently only when social, cultural and environmental ethics are strong.
Photo Courtesy: Anger Management (2003), © Sony Pictures Digital Inc.
© 2012 Pratik Bruno. thoughttrippingomlsd.wordpress.com (All Rights Reserved).
Theoretical Physicist Michio Kaku talks about the existence of parallel worlds and the possibility of crossing over to one.
