The Cookie Monster

OK, I’ve about had it with all this.  People have totally exhausted me who believe things that are not observable, not provable, not subject to measurement or observation that exist in conflict with the observable, provable and measureable.  There is no way to carry on an adult conversation with people who lack knowledge but use their attitudes, beliefs and opinions as the basis of their position.  And they talk to each other, forming a circle that remains immune to logic.  In fact, give them some facts and they will not only reject them, they will reject you and they become hostile.  There is no way to have an open conversation with a closed mind.

If you believe that there is a giant cookie monster in the sky who is responsible for everything and as long as you give homage to that cookie monster he or she is real because he or she has become real to you.  No one else sees the cookie monster.  No one can find the cookie monster.  No one can carry on a dialog with the cookie monster.  He or she does not show up on radar or long range telescopic scans, he or she is intangible but real in your mind.  There is no way to discuss the reality of the existence of the cookie monster with you.  You believe it and facts will not dissuade you.  When you see good things happen you believe it is due to the presence of the cookie monster.  When you see bad things happen you will say that’s the will of the cookie monster and the cookie monster’s will is mysterious.  The same is true if you think Obama hurt this country, the same is true if you believe what Donald Trump says, the same is true if you are convinced the problem in America is the American government (at least the terrorists agree with you), the same is true if you believe that the proliferation of firearms makes us safer; and if you believe these falsehoods then I am simply beating my head against a wall assuming that logic will prevail over attitude and superstition.  And in that, and only that, do we have evidence of the failure of American education systems where attitudes are promoted over knowledge.  If your cookie monster declares that women are inferior beings to men, that homosexuals are evil, that those who worship big bird are all wrong because cookie monster is right, and that the cookie monster demands that your beliefs be ordained in law, then you are the focus of my rant.  If we do not implement cookie monster policies does not mean we are persecuting followers of the cookie monster, any more than if we fail to implement the beliefs of big bird, or UFO believers or ghost believers or secret alien base believers.

And don’t tell me that faith is like love.  It is not.  If I love someone there will be tangible signs of that love on a daily basis.  I may write notes, send flowers, take her out to eat, go see a movie, fix her car, etc., etc. etc.  And most importantly, there will be a measureable response!  My love will respond one way or another.  After each of those actions I say I did this out of love.  I see no reactions that take place because you have faith.  You tithe, but you do not get notes or flowers.  You pray, but most times there is no evidence your prayer was answered much less heard.  Sometimes you get what you want and sometimes you don’t.  That can’t be faith.  That is random chance.  Though falling in love may be random, the observable behaviors surrounding love are not.  They are purposeful and observable, they can be measured using scientific techniques, and they follow the rules of human interaction.  None of that is true of behavior that is faith based.  If you could pray and part the Red Sea you would have my attention.  If you could pray that a sick friend with terminal cancer be healed and he or she is instantly healed you would have my attention.  If you were on the German Wings flight that crashed in France and on the way down everyone prayed to cookie monster to be saved and miraculously they were, then you would have my attention.  But the results of all those faith based actions is absolutely unpredictable.  In fact, many of those who practice faith-based actions practice forgiving cookie monster for not acting saying that it was not the will of the cookie monster to act.  Really?  Then why worship something that is going to do as he or she damn well pleases anyway?  Prayer is pointless at that point.  Why pray to cookie monster if the assumption is cookie monster knows best and will do whatever he or she is going to do to you despite your prayers?  If you pray for the healing of a loved one and they die, then why did you pray?  If your neighbor does not pray but their loved one survives then why pray?  Cookie monster is not dependable, reliable, believable or trustworthy.  If you buy that all that happens is part of cookie monster’s plan then your prayer should be why the hell is the cookie monster so mean?  Why must we constantly make excuses for his or her lack of action?  Why are we forgiving the cookie monster when the advertisement says he or she is forgiving us?  Makes absolutely no sense.  Might as well worship big bird or nothing at all.

Unless you do all that out of fear of some eternal punishment.  What a great scam.  No one knows what happens after death and there is no evidence that anything happens after death except for those folks who subscribe to paranormal investigations and the Ghost Busters.  Like all other living things it is most likely that when we die we are dead.  We are done.  We had our brief hour on the stage, take our bows or blows and exit.  It appears to me that believing in an after-life life is the main reason most folks worship cookie monster.  While there is no evidence of an after-life life and no evidence of the cookie monster such beliefs are tearing the planet apart. 

Human actions based on faith in the cookie monster or any other deity have been horrific.  We have the Crusades, the Inquisition, the KKK, Al Qaeda, Salem witch trials, and on and on.  We have waged war on fellow human beings in the name of the cookie monster or maybe big bird or maybe some other fictional character.  If that is what the cookie monster wants we should abandon him or her anyway.  If we somehow become convinced we are justified in attacking others because that is the will of the cookie monster then we have become one of the least moral and most dangerous people on the planet.

Don’t you and I know it would be unwise to appoint someone to head up NASA who believes the earth is the center of the universe and the sun rotates around us, it would be unwise to appoint someone as Surgeon General who believes that only the cookie monster can heal, it would be unwise to elect someone who thinks that the past is somehow better than the present or the future, it would be unwise to implement cookie monster beliefs that are in conflict either with science or other belief systems.  None of these positions are backed by science, facts and reason.  They are all subjective attitudes and beliefs. 

The cookie monster domain is shrinking.  At first we did not understand how anything worked and life was a mystery.  We needed a cookie monster to take credit for and explain all that we did not know.  But now we have learned a lot.  And the domain of the mysterious and unexplained shrinks leaving an ever declining number of cookie monster fans.  And it gets worse and worse for the cookie monster fans.  No, the earth is not 6,000 years old, it is not flat, it is not the center of the universe, humans and dinosaurs did not co-exist and there is no evidence of a world-wide flood or the parting of the Red Sea or burning bushes, or resurrections.  Those are beliefs perpetrated by texts written 4,00o to 2,000 years ago by illiterate Bronze Age superstitious peoples.  Hardly a worthy set of ground rules for today. 

Seems to me that if one goes to live after death with the cookie monster in never-never land we would have received some email, card, letter, sky-writing, message in a bottle, or something.  But nothing like that has ever, nor will it ever happen.  Dead men tell no tales.  Because they are dead.

It is my hope that someday we as a species reach a point where beliefs are informed by science, not in competition with science.  It is my hope that as a species we move forward based on facts, not fear.  We clearly are not there yet.