This is just a quick follow-up to my previous post about Scientology moving into Sandy Springs. Last night the city council of Sandy Springs approved letting Scientology move into the office building at Glenridge and Roswell Road by a tiebreaking vote. Despite this, the saga isn’t quite over.

The Scientologists are planning on filing a religious liberty lawsuit against the city because they will not be allowed to add a fourth floor to the building, but are stuck with what’s already there. They will probably end up getting what they want considering the money and horde of lawyers they have backing them.

Another lawsuit may be coming from the other direction as some home owners in the area are convinced the building in question does not have enough parking and will make traffic in the area worse. I personally doubt this will go anywhere. It looks inevitable that the Georgia headquarters of the Church of Scientology will be moving into my potential backyard.

I was visiting my mother in the hospital a few months ago – nothing serious; she reacted badly to anesthesia during an outpatient procedure – and I happened to glance over at the rolling cart they put the meals on that extends over the bed. There was a tube of HeadOn. (For those of you unfamiliar with HeadOn, it’s a tube of wax that you rub directly on your forehead to relieve headache pain.)

“Mom? HeadOn? Really?”

“Don’t start. I know it doesn’t work, but it works for me.”

Well. There you go. The power of the placebo illustrated in one short sentence. It effectively stopped the conversation. Could I argue against it? Should I? I just changed the subject.

» Continue reading “The Power of the Placebo”

As skeptics it’s very easy to become bogged down with certain things. For example, the entire debacle over Ray Comfort and his version of Origin of the Species was probably taken more seriously by skeptics than by the general public or even the college students Comfort was trying to reach. We, myself included, spent a lot of energy worrying and trying to act against something that most likely had very little impact.

Two days ago, New York state became yet another state to reject gay marriage, and I know personally I had no idea a vote was even happening. Brian Thompson (a.k.a. the Amateur Scientist) discusses this in his latest blog entry. In it he puts forth the idea that while the reasons against gay marriage are typically religious, there has been a history of middle-of-the-road religious people who are willing to put aside ideology in support of the things they believe to be “right:”

Last year, California voters struck down marriage equality by passing Proposition 8. This would seem like a damning statement about the harmfulness of religion, but the numbers tell a different story. 47.76% of voters chose to preserve the civil rights of gay people by voting against the measure, according to the official election results. But only about 20% of California’s population identifies as non-religious. This means that a large percentage of voters who fought for gay rights at the ballot box were religious people. Like the scriptural ban on eating shellfish, they were able to put their compassion and reason above dogma. If this means reinterpreting scripture, so be it. The effect is the same.

Continue after the break:

» Continue reading “Priorities”