No. 0: I wanted to write these articles, not just for entertainment purposes, as angry e-mails are quite amusing, but I wanted people to be just a little more skeptical, to think just a little bit more and maybe make people doubt a little bit. I think we can all agree that there is too much controversy, too few facts and too much B.S.

We need people to be educated about their decisions and the society we live in. I’ve seen truly evil and malicious people who take enjoyment in exploiting the credulity of my friends. It wasn’t just the fact that my friend told me that he believed that the earth was 6,000 years old and that evolution was a lie, but the fact that he told me that he couldn’t be convinced otherwise was what irked me. The same people who have blatantly lied to my friend are the same ones who talk about this “plan” that God has, to which I ask, “What part of his plan involves my other friend who was raped, became pregnant, got into a car accident and had a miscarriage? To yet another friend of mine, what do I tell her, who was raped by her church pastor for four years?” And the biggest tragedy is that they both came to the same conclusion that they were supposed to be raped, and how should they think otherwise when they believe in this omnipotent, benevolent father figure? How could somebody look at all that has happened in the last eight years and have the incessant aristocratic belief that this was the best an all-powerful entity could do? The chiropractors, the clergy, the conspiracy theorists, the Intelligent Design people, the psychics and the faith healers aren’t interested in finding truth. They are more than happy to take people’s hard earned money and to perpetuate physical and psychological abuse.

I am a skeptic but I am no cynic, and it’s such a shame that a small number of bad people can exploit and hurt the rest of us who are just trying to make sense of this mysterious existence. I have written these articles because I know many of you have loved ones you care for and want to protect. And although physical harm is more or less avoidable, it’s much harder to protect against mental and psychological pitfalls. I am often surprised by the fact that so many people are uneducated about logical fallacies and how politicians, marketers and clergy can get away with these classic textbook fallacies. We must protect the ones we love, not by bullets or bayonets, but by reason and rationality; we must become guardians of rationality. It is the only way our civilization will survive and to ensure harmony on this pale blue dot of ours.

Science, reason, justification, evidence, doubt, logic and skepticism are all precious things to us and things we must protect. We live in an information age, and it should be no surprise that so much misinformation is floating around. Unfortunately this means that we bare the burden of this age. It is no longer permissible to be ignorant, to believe without reason, to vote without facts, and to judge without evidence. When we shut the door on science and reason, when we give up these wonderful tools, when we stop questioning and criticizing and asking for reasons, when we stop discourse, warfare and tyranny follow necessarily. Show me a society based on the principles of Spinoza, Einstein, Newton, Jefferson, Paine and secular principles, and tell me when it has led to tyranny (to those who think that Stalin and Hitler are good counterexamples, please do your research). As Napoleon put it, “Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet.” I’m not saying that these tools are the answers to peace, but it’s a start. I hope the words of Socrates, maybe not now, but someday, will touch at least a few of you: “The unexamined life is not worth living.” And with that, I thank all of you for giving me an audience. Thank you.

Ken Ueda is a senior math, physics and philosophy major. He can be reached for contact at [email protected].