Atheism and Agnosticism

Atheism and agnosticism deal with the concept "god" in different spheres. Agnosticism is about not having knowledge about god or its existence while atheism is about not having a belief in the existence of god.

Agnosticism = lack of knowledge
Atheism = lack of belief

I think that nobody has true knowledge of the existence of god. Therefore, everybody is ultimately and technically an agnostic. A form of weak atheism is also referred to as agnostic atheism. There is a middle ground between theism and atheism in the technical sense since there are those who are "undecided" and some of them prefer to call themselves among many terms as non-theist or post-theist or what-not. Agnosticism is not a middle ground between theism and atheism since agnosticism is present in the whole set. But in practice, those who are at the atheism end of the spectrum, live in a world where gods are not part of reality.

Earthquake

A series of small earthquakes with the strongest registering a magnitude of 6.7 in the Japanese scale hit the Kanto region of the main island of Japan. The epicenter is just north of Tokyo where it was felt as M5.0 in Ibaraki and Tochigi prefectures. My area is lumped together with the rest of Tokyo's 23 wards, where it's reported that we just felt it as M3.0 though I'm close to Saitama prefecture which in turn lies immediately south of the two prefectures earlier mentioned. Saitama felt the quake as M4.0 strong. It's my first time to be caught in this apartment with a moderate quake and while the stronger one lasts and frankly I felt scared with the doors and tables shaking and making noises. I work up earlier around 12MN because I left the idiot box on but couldn't sleep again. It's amazing how quickly the earthquake data is gathered here. The publicly funded TV network NHK flashes the data on the TV oftentimes while it's happening! It hope it's the last for this time. I plan to go to sleep now and forget about it.

Tiebreaker

Tiebreaker. That's what Clinton called Tuesday's primaries result where she won (by the skin of her teeth) Indiana with her 51% to Obama's 49% but lost in North Carolina by double-digit margin, (42% Clinton, 56% Obama). Only somebody in denial can call that a tiebreaker since Obama widened his lead in both popular vote and pledged delegate. She also reportedly lent another $6.4M to her campaign. The wisest decision she can make as a candidate in the coming days is conceding the race to Obama. More and more Clinton is appearing to be the desperate candidate.

Mojoey's Atheist Blogroll

This site is is now officially listed in Mojoey's Atheist Blogroll.

"The Atheist Blogroll is a service provide to the Atheist and Agnostic blogging community. The blogroll currently maintains over 650 blogs. Membership is limited to Atheist and Agnostic bloggers."

If you are maintaining an atheism or an agnosticism blog, please consider joining the atheist blogroll.

US, self-appointed global cop

This is a reply to a thread currently being discussed in the Pinoy atheists mailing list.

Do the neo-cons really believe in the Christian solution or is it only a card they they use to rally the gullible American majority into any war it fancy? Is McCain a religious nut just like Bush is? The greatest puzzle for me is why did the Americans voted that idiot TWICE into the White House. The Americans must really be proud of their president.

Just a curiosity, do you guys think that the neo-cons have not lost some credibility or do the majority of Americans still buy the fear that they manufacture? Will it more likely that they will vote for McCain or with the Democrat? How about Clinton, has she expressed an unequivocal commitment to a US pull-out if voted? I think Republican or Democrat, it doesn't really matter since the US will continue to be in Iraq indefinitely as much as can be possible. History is replete with examples including the Philippines. According to Dean Jorge Bocobo, the Philippines is the first Iraq. He's got a point. If not for Marcos - one of the good things that he did as president - who re-negotiated the "lease" of the US bases from 99 years to 25 years which expired in '92, and for Erap, one of the good things that he did as a senator who voted against its extension, the American "global cop" will still be in Subic and Clark and the US service-men out of reach of our courts. It's a complete disgrace to us as a nation that only a full-blooded Am-boy can accept. That's what the Americans want, if possible, from all the nations that host their bases. Unfortunately, the Philippines was too weak economically to escape the unequal "partnership". This is what will eventually happen with Iraq. The government will be handed over to the Iraqis but the US bases will stay. The Americans will do all the best they can to prevent an anti-American Iraqi president from being voted whether the US president be a religious nut
or otherwise.

Post-meet-up

I came back from the meet-up about two hours ago. It was as expected a lot of fun. I met two new people both Japanese. It's unusual in the sense that most Japanese people I suspect are not into religion and consequently irreligion should not be a big deal with Japan being a country teeming with heathens. All in all, seven people attended. I almost couldn't make it though as when I was leaving work, something urgent came up - a production problem. I was just too happy after I got hold of the morning support guy in the US to take over n look after the problem even if it's a Tokyo- local issue. I arrived at Gonpachi restaurant about five minutes past eight but it seemed that they haven't started yet. (It's supposed to be have started at seven.) Of course we talked about the evil of religion and how religion skews the view of reality of what otherwise appear to be normal people. Beers were drank and yakitori (焼き鳥) were eaten and ideas exchanged for 2 1/2 hours before we decided to call it a day. We parted ways at Shibuya (渋谷) station around 11:15 - just about the right time to catch one of the last trains of Saikyou line (埼京線) towards Saitama (埼玉県). It's 12 midnight at the station. Another interesting day has ended.

Sorry, no pictures about the meet-up.

On Tuesday we are planning to visit together the exhibit on Charles Darwin currently being held at the National Science Museum in Ueno (上野). Hopefully, I can take pictures.

Tokyo Brights meet-up tomorrow

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The Tokyo Brights Meetup Group!

Tomorrow I will be attending the Tokyo Brights Meet-up group. The group meets every third Thursday of the month except tomorrow which will happen on a Wednesday. It will be my second time to join the party. I joined last January but I failed to join the two succeeding meet-ups because I was out of the country. Again, it will be in Gonpachi in Shibuya. I like the place. They say it's the inspiration for the last scene of one of the Kill Bill movies but I've never seen any of them.

Re-learning Some Things

I am re-learning some of the things that I dropped. One of them is playing the guitar. I first learned the basics of guitar playing when I was a sacristan. I was about fourteen then. I had this friend who seemed to had been carrying all the problems of the world on his shoulders and the way he chose to cope with it was to turn a little into himself and learn the guitar in the kumbento. The first and only song I learned and used to play then was the older version of Santo, Santo, Santo which required only a small set of very simple chords and where the transitions between those chords are much easier. Whenever we had the chance on the guitars (I think there were two guitars which were not always idle), we'd start strumming that song. The elder sacristans and church choir members would tease us and they'd be right that we would be singing the same song over and over and over again. Years passed and my friend went on to have his own electric guitar gifted to him while I moved on to different things. He has progressed enough to playing his favorite songs on his guitar and even got to play with his own band while I almost forgot all about it. But I learned the guitar basics such that I never had to re-learn it again. From time to time, opportunity to play the guitar arose but it required developing the habit which I didn't. My younger brother bought his own guitar which I used to borrow and practiced with but I never really quite progressed beyond simple strumming. Eventually I had accepted that maybe I never really had what it takes to play it. I think I am better at singing than at playing any musical instruments so I envy those people who can really play well, like my cousin who could play well the accordion before he was able to read and write. Whenever I pick up the guitar to strum a few chords of simple songs, I'd listen to my playing and I wouldn't be satisfied to the point of frustration. Or I'd start singing and my chords will quickly deteriorate into abhorrent noise. Maybe I was consciously trying to play it rather than using more ouido. Some years later, I'd still be playing the same set of chords as Santo, Santo, Santo but this time it's the simplified chords of The One I Love by REM but whenever I do, I still remember my sacristan days. It was short-lived but I had plenty of good memories about it.