It Is All Too Easy

I Was Confirmed At My Prep School At The Age Of 13.

Textbooks Describe Dna As A Blueprint For A Body. It's Better Seen As A Recipe For Making A Body, Because It Is Irreversible. But Today I Want To Present It As Something Different Again, And Even More Intriguing. The Dna In You Is A Coded Description Of Ancient Worlds In Which Your Ancestors Lived. Dna Is The Wisdom Out Of The Old Days, And I Mean Very Old Days Indeed.

I Am Trying To Call Attention To The Elephant In The Room That Everybody Is Too Polite - Or Too Devout - To Notice: Religion, And Specifically The Devaluing Effect That Religion Has On Human Life.

The History Of Science Has Been One Long Series Of Violent Brainstorms, As Successive Generations Have Come To Terms With Increasing Levels Of Queerness In The Universe.

If You Have A Faith, It Is Statistically Overwhelmingly Likely That It Is The Same Faith As Your Parents And Grandparents Had. No Doubt Soaring Cathedrals, Stirring Music, Moving Stories And Parables, Help A Bit. But By Far The Most Important Variable Determining Your Religion Is The Accident Of Birth. The Convictions That You So Passionately Believe Would Have Been A Completely Different, And Largely Contradictory, Set Of Convictions, If Only You Had Happened To Be Born In A Different Place.