10 random beliefs

I did this post originally for dmk's "St. Aidan to Abbey Manor" blog, someone over their tagged him to list a set of 10 things you believe, ethical, philosophical or theological. I thought that was an interesting proposition, since we rarely commit these kinds of things to paper (or blog!) and accepted the challenge. Anyway, here are my 10 things; I did find this quite difficult, not so much the capturing things in words part but the deciding what should be in the list, its fun, I encourage you to try it!

1.Basic Human morality is innate; however we must add to and evolve the basics as we learn more about ethics and endeavour to reduce suffering in the world.

2.All human beings share the same set of emotions and feelings, for example love, hope, fear, wonder, awe, transcendence and human solidarity etc. our differences are much less than our similarities.

3.Planet Earth is it; we just get one life, it defies probability that we are even here at all, we are the lucky ones.

4.We make our own purposes in life, it’s up to us to take responsibility, grasp the nettle and make the most of any potential we have.

5.Sexuality, like race and gender are continuums, not binary and driven by genes; we don’t understand all the mechanisms yet but we shouldn’t fear any of them.

6.The fewer reasons there are in the world to divide people the better.

7.Knowledge cannot be gained by tradition, authority or revelation, it requires effort!

8.Our universe is utterly awe inspiring; our most beautiful, most complete and most reliable explanation for it comes from the natural sciences.

9.Reason is our species most valuable ability (by far) and evidence is the ultimate arbiter of the truth of our beliefs.

10.Dave Gilmour rocks and Luc Besson is a genius.

Now over to you!