Camp Inquiry to be featured today on NPR

Today, on National Public Radio's daily program All Things Considered, there will be a story on Camp Inquiry, the summer camp in Holland, New York that provides a friendly, accepting environment for young atheists and agnostics, and teaches the virtues of personal responsibility and critical thought. The camp is for children aged 7-16 and runs for a week in the middle of July, during which time campers can participate in the following workshops:

Monsterbusters & Mythmarauders

Campers will use a variety of methods to investigate claims of the paranormal, urban legends, and UFO sightings.

In the Footprints of Darwin

Experts in the natural sciences will guide campers in understanding the evolutionary model as counter to claims of creationism and intelligent design.

Sleights of Hand & Tricks of the Eye

A professional magician unravels the mysteries of illusion.

Human Expression

Professional artists and teachers lead campers in creative self-expression through the visual and performing arts.

Expressly Human: The Ethical Life

Campers will participate in conversations and activities designed to address the changing global community, diversity, and the need to act as a responsible moral agent.

The Character of Character

Through discussions of film and literature, campers will consider moral and ethical dilemmas faced by both fictional and familiar folks.

Imagination & Science

Campers will discover the fascinating science behind imagination, and find out that the two realms aren’t as far apart as they seem.

All Things Considered airs at 4:00 PM EST (at least it does in Michigan, YMMV).

Dan's Invisible Clothes

So my new friend, Dan, who claims he can debunk me and my rational friends, presents me with a link to all my questions. Now, this is almost like the whole, "through that door is the hottest, most beautiful woman you have ever seen". Excited, I turn the knob, push the creeking door open, and standing there before me, in leather and lace, is......Pastor Ted Haggard... if you follow his link, this is how it begins:


Pretend with me for a moment. Let's just say that I stump you all with powerful arguments, using archaeological and scientific evidence. I have even intellectually dwarfed you.

Now all I have to do is convince you that Noah actually built an ark and brought in the animals two by two, that Jonah was swallowed by a whale, that Samson killed a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass, that Daniel was really in the lions' den, that Moses really did divide the Red Sea, and that Adam and Eve ran around naked...and ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Do you really think I can prove all of that to you?

You want me to "pretend with you", and then you ask me, like it's my fucking hangup, "Do you really think I can prove all that to you?". Yeah, you are right, how ridiculous of me to ask you for some rational justification of a belief which you claim may determine an infinity of pain or pleasure after our physical death. Whatever, right? It's all just willy-nilly flim-flam believe it cause I say it, asshole!!! Pastor Ted, emperor, sir, you have no clothes on....is this too blunt?

I think this is a fun start to debunking the debunker of atheists.