Was just listening to the latest podcast of The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe in which the gang talks to Spencer Weart about global warming, among other topics. They also raised a question about young skeptics, so I sent them the following message:
I've been enjoying your Skeptic's Guide podcasts for several months now. They remind me of the bull sessions I used to have during my college days, except you guys don't have a Resident Idiot or three like we had back then. Keep up the good work.Posted by jt at January 14, 2007 02:21 PM
You asked for examples of skeptical children, so I thought I'd offer up my little story. While I don't claim to have been a full-fledged skeptic as a child, I was trying to ask questions at a pretty early age. In fact, I remember being about six, or possibly seven, when I first started asking the question to which I've still never heard a satisfactory answer (at least from religious people): If god created the world and the universe, where did god come from? Whenever, I raised that question, I was told not to ask such dumb questions.
So I largely went through my childhood and teenage years with a lot of questions that I soon learned not to talk about. You see, I grew up in a very small town (population 1300) in central Pennsylvania, and well, there just weren't any godless people around to serve as role models. Actually, around the age of fourteen, I went through a period of taking a lot of paranormal claims very seriously, but that was chiefly due to the influence of a teacher, Mrs. Messerchmidt, who was perhaps the first adult who treated me like an adult. But I digress...
By the time I went to college in the fall of 1967, I probably would have had a hard time defining exactly what I believed in, but then a life-changing event occurred: I read an essay by Isaac Asimov.
I had long been a fan of Asimov's science fact and science fiction writings, but this particular article really made a deep impression on me. He enumerated a list of "Security Beliefs" that were prevalent in our society and discussed his reasons for rejecting each of them. At last I had a solid role model for rejecting superstitious beliefs, and I've been happily godless ever since.
For the record, here they are:
1) There exist supernatural forces that can be cajoled or forced into protecting mankind.
2) There is no such thing, really, as death.
3) There is some purpose to the Universe.
4) Individuals have special powers that will enable them to get something for nothing.
5) You are better than the next fellow.
6) If anything goes wrong, it's not one's own fault.
The essay was entitled "Knock Plastic!" and was published in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and was republished in the book Magic--The Final Fantasy Collection, a book which sadly seems to be out of print.
It's worth tracking it down because it's just as relevant today as it was then.
--JT