Rather than post a video today, I have decided to do a quick post on free thought. I have a few posts in the works that I will try to get out after my move is done, but they are proving difficult to fine tune to the level I expect of myself and that I know that you expect of me.

Looking back on my transition to atheism, I started to make the switch to free thought early in my year at the seminary. This was accelerated by the term paper for my “Inspiration and Revelation” class that I did trying to justify the authority of scripture in discussions with non-theists and the seminar on Gnosticism where I was the only one who focused on trying to understand the beliefs and rational of the author of the text we were studying as opposed to using Christian dogma to point out where they were wrong.

Once I started trying to look at things from outside the box of free will Protestant systematic theology, I started to notice how everything fits together so well but only through some very foundational circular logic. The best example of this is the fact that the only support for the authority of the Bible is from from texts within the Bible. It is true because it says its true. When you start looking beyond just that one issue, you begin to see a very interwoven web of logic that is all contained within a ring of circular logic. If you cut one link on the outside ring, then it all starts to unravel. 

In the term paper I mentioned, my goal was to be able to link at least one point in the outer ring to something outside of itself. I actually tried on three or four points, but failed. The end product was a 10 page paper that got an “A” and a 20 minute presentation in class that got a few dozen “amens” from my classmates and a standing ovation from the entire class when it was done. I was amazed at the response for essentially telling them that we had nothing to work with.

Each time I took a step back, it allowed me to see more and more of the picture of how this logical web actually related to the rest of the world. With each step I came closer and closer to free thought. By the time I left the church the place in my epistemological view held by dogma, authority, and tradition had been replaced by science, logic, and reason.

What’s really interesting though, is how this has impacted my life. I’ll give you the most unrelated, yet very natural product of this. About four months ago I made the switch to Open Source. I had already been using Linux for about six months (I started playing with it a little 10 years ago), and finally decided the time had come to dump Microsoft’s authority and be free, so I switched my last computer to be running Windows to Ubuntu Linux. A few days ago I took it a step further and dumped my iPhone and Apple’s draconian control and got the new Droid 2 running the Linux 2.6 kernel.

Yes, in every part of my life, I seek to be free!