​I was invited to speak at a Hindu Temple in Charleston on Sunday, Jan.15, which held an Interfaith Forum on the topic: “The Purpose of Human Existence (Why are we here?)” There were 8 other speakers from  a variety of religious faiths. Here’s what I said.   I’m an atheist and secular humanist, and I’ve been asked for my ideas about the purpose of human existence. I think there’s no innate, biological purpose beyond surviving and reproducing. Humans are the fortunate result of billions of years of evolution. The more we learn about our natural world, the less sign ..read more

​https://www.ftsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/Januray-February-2023-Ezine.pdf    More than a third of the world’s countries have blasphemy laws that ban criticism of religious beliefs, symbols, and figures. In several countries, the penalty is death. Blasphemy laws supply a false legitimacy to those who commit acts of murder and terrorism. (Think Salman Rushdie.) Not only do blasphemy laws harm atheists and humanists, but also any dissident or minority faith. Surprisingly, a number of predominately Christian countries still have blasphemy laws on their books, including Australia ..read more

https://www.postandcourier.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/letters-respect-charleston-s-history-culture/article_7f659402-6ffd-11ed-942b-531cf8433add.html    Respect all rights  I thank The Post and Courier for publishing the Dec. 4 Associated Press article by Peter Smith about nonreligious voters wielding clout at the ballot box.  Yes, we do tilt heavily Democratic, especially with the increasing influence of white Christian nationalism in the Republican Party. I am proud to be a member of the Secular Democrats of America. We work to protect the separation of religion ..read more

​  When I was about five-years old, I learned a game called “War.” Two players are dealt 26 cards face down. Each then simultaneously shows the top card, and the player showing the higher value takes both exposed cards and places them at the bottom of his or her stack. If both cards are of equal value, there is a “war.” Each combatant places the next three cards face down, and the fourth face up. The card showing higher value captures all the cards played and puts them at the bottom of his or her stack. The war ends when one person has all 52 cards. I was very good at “War,” or so I thoug ..read more

https://in-sightpublishing.com/2022/11/15/neighbour-2/ ​ Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Are there any civilizations or periods in which humanist beliefs were simply not present in any way? Dr. Herb Silverman: I think Humanist beliefs and values have always been present in every society, long before Humanism was defined. Many people have been and are humanists who hadn’t heard of Humanism. I used to be one of those people, as I suspect most Humanists were. Unfortunately, Humanism has not and does not dominate most cultures (think Nazi Germany, and authoritarian regimes today).  Jacobsen: It ..read more

​https://www.ftsociety.org/wp-content/uploads/November-December-2022-Ezine.pdf   It has been said, with some justification, that philosophy is questions that may never be answered, and religion is answers that may never be questioned. But some questions in philosophy have been answered—by science. Branches of science sprang out of philosophical questions, many of which were once thought to be empirically impossible to test, like the idea of an atom propounded by Greek philosopher Democritus. Ancient Greek philosophers concerned themselves with deducing what matter is made from, what ..read more

​    https://secularhumanism.org/2022/10/letters-to-the-editor-october-november-2022/ Here is a Letter to the Editor I had in the most recent Free Inquiry magazine, October/November 2022. On Agnosticism   Jack May’s article (“On Agnosticism,” FI, June/July 2022) seems to imply that we are too arrogant when we call ourselves atheists, instead of agnostics. I used to call myself an agnostic because, as a mathematician, I could not logically prove whether there was a god, though I thought it highly improbable. When I learned that an atheist is simply without a belief in any go ..read more

https://www.postandcourier.com/opinion/letters_to_editor/letters-bidens-student-loan-forgiveness-plan-would-be-costly/article_cc960952-1c9f-11ed-b892-3b925cddf920.html ​ Politics and religion Washington Post columnist Kathleen Parker’s fawning commentary on Aug. 24 about U.S. Sen. Tim Scott and his new memoir full of “miracles that shaped him” said almost nothing about his political issues. Being told about his devotion to Christianity and Jesus Christ impresses me no more than being told of another politician’s devotion to Allah or the Flying Spaghetti Monster. We are a secular demo ..read more

I participated in a roundtable discussion on Wednesday, May 11, at Oxford University in the Oxford Union in England. The topic was about mixing politics with religion. See https://oxford-union.org/event/interfaith-panel/ Here were my opening remarks, ​ Mixing politics with religion is fraught with danger. We all know theocracies, where leaders govern by the will of an infallible god. Openly defying the “correct” faith is called blasphemy and leads to harsh punishments, even death. I thinkeveryone should have the right to practice any religion o ..read more

​My article “Where Did Bible Stories Come From?” was published in The Humanist.      https://thehumanist.com/magazine/spring-2022/fierce-humanism/first-person-where-did-bible-stories-come-from    ​We know that the Bible is mostly fiction, but did you ever wonder how some of the incredible stories got into the book? As a child, the story of Noah made no sense to me. Why would a supposedly loving God commit a genocidal holocaust by killing all humans on Earth except for one man and his family (a wife, three sons, and their wives)? The answer was that this perfe ..read more