Mailvox: atheists are thankful too

MD drops a note:

Although we don’t have thanksgiving here, I admire the sentiment so I must give thanks to you for (although often infuriating; & even just sometimes plain wrong) relieving the tedium of the working life. Although I disagree with you at least as much as I agree with you, you are at least (& rarely for most of the media) both clever and interesting and free-thinking. Anyway, us Brits don’t do love-ins, so that’s enough til next year.

Clearly someone needs to set him straight about this being an atheist-hating, anti-science echo chamber of stupid Christards waiting for Round Two…. The truth is that I’m always glad to see intelligent and well-educated critics participate in the discussion and challenge my views, either privately or publicly, so long as it is in a straightforward and intellectually reasonable manner. I don’t expect anyone to agree with me on everything; my family and my best friends never have, so why would you or anyone else?

No one gets it right all the time. Certainly not me. Religion doesn’t claim to contain all the truth – now we see as though through a glass darkly – and any honest scientist is open about the limitations of science. How can we, who are mere mortals, possibly think to either know it all or even possess a proper understanding of what “all” means?

But I would encourage MD to give thanks to God rather than to me. Even if he doesn’t believe in Him… especially if he doesn’t believe in Him. After all, if He doesn’t exist, then what could be the harm?