About

After a disastrous experience with wordpress.org, I decided to try my hand at constructing my own hand-coded site at mygodlesslife.com. Unfortunately, this took up way too much of my time, and began to stifle my output. Hence I was relieved when I noticed that Google had sorted out the issues I had previously faced with Blogger. There are still a few small things that need to be ironed out, but for the most part I find this interface perfect for the light style of blogging I hope to publish over the coming years.


I will never give up my domain, though. I have spent too long building up a persona around the name just to dump it for the convenience of a blogging platform that suits my current needs, so I shall be looking to change the focus of the mygodlesslife.com site away from it's current guise of a blog, to a site more suited to developing ideas and actions other than mere blogging. Quite what those ideas and actions will be, I have yet to decide, but it is nice to know I have another space, beyond blogging, into which new ideas and actions can grow.


My Google+ profile states that I am a secular atheist, sceptic (I am British, so I have spelt that correctly), pop philosopher and a writer. These descriptors probably deserve some exploration.


Secular atheist


The pope has, of late, let loose some blistering attacks on what he calls 'atheist extremism' and 'aggressive secularism'. I will defend both my atheism and secular natures to the death, because I will not be dictated to by a ridiculous clown like Joseph Aloisius Ratzinger.

The signing of the Reichskonkordat on July 20, 1933 in Rome. (From left to right: German prelate Ludwig Kaas, German Vice-Chancellor Franz von Papen, Secretary of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs Giuseppe Pizzardo, Cardinal Secretary of State Eugenio Pacelli, Alfredo Ottaviani, and member of Reichsministerium des Inneren (Home Office) Rudolf Buttmann)

He has the audacity to claim that atheistic and secular policies caused the moral collapse in his Nazi party that lead to the Holocaust, but is clearly impressed with the Catholic church's collusion with the National Socialist leadership, and that the Nazis were the church's preferred choice against an atheist and communist Soviet Union. 


It was the books of the Jewish and 'degenerates' that were burned in street pyres, not the books of a Catholic that were considered 'un-German' in nature.

It is as if Joseph Ratzinger himself were talking.

Seriously! Just what part of the Nazi movement does he think is atheistic and secularly inclusive?


Secularism is the only way people's consciences can be respected with no favour curried to one group over another; which has been practised by religions since their inception. It is just this religious privilege that the pope wishes to protect, despite having witnessed the very antithesis of it first-hand as a reluctant young Nazi conscript. One's conscience cannot be won, but it is not for the insistence of people like Adolf Hitler and Joseph Ratzinger who deem it suitable that their conscience is somehow better considered and more valuable than that of others that disagree with them.


My atheism has been with me since birth. I simply cannot conceive of a god or gods that makes any sense on any level.


I do not wish for my atheistic views on unrelated topics to have more weight in a political debate, than those who hold different opinions on either the existence of a god or on the processes underlying good national governance. Why should I? Unless I have an agenda which is antithetical to politics and good governance. Well, that should just be my tough shit, I guess. And if your god is swinging his political weight around in my vicinity, be aware that his rights to do that stop squarely at the start of my nose. That applies equally to his followers.


That is secularism, and I make no apologies for being aggressive about it. As I have said, I will fight with my life to ensure equal treatment for all, rather than return down the path of Fascism that shock the world half a century ago.


Sceptic


I question everything. Everyone should question everything. Why? Because most of the time people don't question anything at all, and we end up in situations that nobody knows why we started, leading to situations in which people do not want to find themselves, and no one has any idea how they got there in the first place, nor how to extricate themselves from such a situation because they do not comprehend well enough the situations, into which they have blundered, to deal with it effectively.


How is one supposed to know where one stands, if one does not question why you are standing in the first place?


'Pop' philosopher


My education lies closer to any number of the sciences, but none of them to any functional or academic use. As a philosopher, I am further limited by the fact that I have never received an education in the subject, beyond what I have picked up in my twenty-year study of religion. Hence the addition of the 'pop' (or popular) to the word 'philosopher'.


I enjoy reading more technical works of philosophy, but don't always understand them. I may, however, have been sufficiently moved to be inspired to apply what I did understand to more basic arguments. 


Most of what I write is philosophy in one form or another, but I wouldn't allow myself to be considered a philosopher in any other than an interested and intrigued observer and cogitator.


Writer


Contrary to my philosophical 'prowess', I have 'cut it' as a professional writer. Although, it should be said, I did not make much money writing financial blogs in Asia, and the one article I had published in the South China Morning Post was a rewrite.


I content myself, now, by writing this blog. I am my own boss, which makes up for the crappy wage I couldn't pay myself even if I wanted to. Hell, if you feel sorry enough for me, I'll set up a donate button.