Track Listing:

1. Black Licorice
2. Tranquilize
2. Nightshift
4. Snowdrift
5. Drift

Click here to view the accompanying art released with the album.

“Why is there something rather than nothing?”

it is just a poor and unproductive way to ask “where did everything come from?”

The problem with the question, “Why is there something rather than nothing?” is that it is presented in a way as though “nothing” is another something that could “be,” which is not what “nothing” defines.

Only “something” can “be.” There cannot “be” nothing, because “nothing” doesn’t exist, it isn’t something, and therefore there isn’t anything to nothing to “be.”

We can’t say “well, there is both something and nothing” because nothing “isn’t.” There isn’t an “is” to nothing. There can only be an “is” to “something.”

But the question asks for an “is” to nothing – “Why ‘is’ there something rather than nothing?”

They might as well ask “why are circles round but squares aren’t?” It is just as silly.

What they really want to lead you to is that we don’t know exactly how something (matter, or what have you) came to existence. This often leads to the question, “how can something come from nothing” The theist will argue that because we don’t have that answer, then therefore “god did it.” Of course with this they are committing a logical fallacy, particularly an “argument from ignorance.” And if you use there claim against them, that if “something cannot come from nothing” than their god couldn’t have come from nothing, they will say, “but god has always existed and is outside of time and space.” So they believe a supernatural all-powerful, all-knowing being, has always been, but they can’t believe that perhaps something natural has always been? Seems rather curious and self-serving.

Click play to listen to she will suffer

Click play to listen to she will suffer (Instrumental version)

It’s Darwin Day, and on these days I like to pay tribute to Darwin by creating an art piece in relation to him and his contributions. This year, 2010, I made Charles into a garden gnome. Yes, that’s right, a garden gnome. I’m sorry, I couldn’t help myself. Once I seen the resemblance, I couldn’t let it go. So there you have it, the Charles Darwin Garden Gnome. Here is a black and white version too.

The design features elements that one would typically find in propaganda material and goes so far as to suggest that a sinister superpower or organization called, “The Yellow Peel” is behind the widespread misinformation that bananas are good, refreshing, healthy food. Perhaps another item we can add to the list of things that fall under the agenda to, “teach the controversy,” since apparently, bananas also prove something. Pfft.

“But I want to say this: My God does not cause evil. God is not a vengeful and retributive being, waiting to strike us down; instead, God is in the very midst of this tragedy, suffering with those who are suffering. When evil strikes, it’s easy to ask, where is God? The answer is simple: God is suffering with those who are suffering.”

But does the Christian god really “suffer?” Given his characteristics, could he? And would he suffer over this? Let’s take a closer look.

Buddhists suggest that suffering is caused by ones attachments to things, to a person, to material objects, to our body, to an idea, to love, to life, to comfort, to how one thinks things ought to be, etc… And when these attachments are threatened, we suffer. When things don’t happen how we think they ought have, or ones attachments to things that they value are severed, we suffer. This seems to be pretty accurate to me. In the case of an omnipotent and omniscient God though, these threats are not there. The Christian god’s existence\life is never threatened since it is eternal, and since it already knows everything that is going to happen, it’s expectations are never let down. Everything that happens is part of its own master plan. Such a god must have always known about the Haiti earthquake, just as it must know about every other event that occurs including those that we would consider “tragedies.” But it is us that consider these events tragedies, it is relative to how we think things ought to be. We suffer because of this. But if we take our idea of how we think things “ought” to be out of it, then $hit just happens. To us, the earthquake was a new and unexpected event. But to the all-knowing Christian god, it is old news, it was just on the timeline to happen, and would cause him no strife.

Then there also the fact that even if the Christian god didn’t directly cause it to happen then he at least allowed the event to happen. He had the ability to prevent it but chose not to. He did not intervene. Christians hate to admit that their god could be held responsible in this way, so when presented with this argument they throw out the ol’ “god works in mysterious ways” or that god allowed it because it must have been in our best interest somehow, that it will cause a positive rebuilding of Haiti, or it will encourage people to help each other, or that it builds our character, etc… Hundreds of thousands dead, because their god wants to build their character! Yea, crazy I know. But I have heard it. Yet, they have no problem giving god credit for prayers that happen to come true, so-called miracles, etc…

If they want to cherry-pick, let’s cherry pick, maybe somebody prayed for an earthquake in Haiti, and god answered their prayer. Faced with this, again, they will argue that it must be good for us somehow, but If they put forward this argument, then why would their god suffer if he is just allowing an event to happen that he has always known would happen and since he allowed it, like all other events, he considers best? So it appears that there would be no cause for their god to suffer, one has to wonder if he would even have the ability to suffer. If not, then it is not omnipotent. Of course this is all as hypothetical as is the existence of a god in the first place, but it logically applies within the framework of the characteristic that Christians apply to their hypothetical deity. To suggest that their god suffers is just another way people personify their god that further demonstrates how men create gods, and not the other way around.