Another rabbi pontificates (hmm. That's a bad word in this context; rabbis shouldn't "pontificate", by definition) about how utterly dreadful atheism is, and how glorious belief in a Higher Being is. As always, all that's keeping human beings from slavering at the mouth as they go on murderous rampages is the Fear of God. Oy! I'll just point my readers to PZ Myers' excellent rebuttal. He mentions the fun fact that only .2% of the population of U.S. prisons identify themselves as atheists, agnostics or "nonreligious". The same source he used for that shows that some 14% of the general U.S. population self-identifies in the same manner. Surely, if religion were the great panacea against slavering marauding human beings that the apologists claim, the number of self-identifiers in prison would be much higher than in the general populace? A long-time internet friend (who also happens to be an ordained minister!) was talking with friends about the cliché SF question, "If you could go back in time and murder/assassinate one person, who would you choose?" In the midst of the standard "Hitler"/"Pol Pot"/"Stalin" responses was one person who said, "Abraham". Now that is a very interesting response. I'm sure, though, that some other religious belief would have taken the place of the Judeo-Christian-Islam family in terms of how widespread and popular it ended up being. Still, it's an interesting thought. Before my more religious readers get their knickers in a knot, let me just say that I have nothing against religion in the abstract (even though PZ would beat me about the head for saying that). What I am against is the use of and belief in religion as (a) a moral crutch and (b) an intrinsic sign of moral superiority.

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No doubt, a highly religious person would not have passed on PAGent's YouTube music video diving. As I am not highly religious, I did; lo and behold, both Kent Newsome and bh were snared in the evil net. Har. My work here on earth is done.

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OmegaMom exits stage left, waving her arms and muttering about Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs.