NY Nerd recommends...

Never thought I'd hear myself saying this but I'd like to take a moment to recommend you all download a rap record. Greydon Square is a black, atheist, skeptic, hip-hop artist. I first heard an interview with him on The Skeptics Guide to the Universe podcast (which I also highly recommend for anyone interested in science and/or skepticism).

Raised as a legal orphan in the Department of Children & Family services system of southern California, Greydon Square is a native of Compton, grew up in gang life and is an Iraqi war veteran among other things. Greydon, born Eddie Collins, left Compton in May of 2001, to enlist in the United States army. Then a theist, he served in operation Iraqi Freedom in 03/04 even attending online classes that would help him become a better Christian and even teach the word of god. Greydon left the army to attend school as a Physics major in Arizona. It was while attending college he learned about the logical inconsistencies of a god, why one isn't necessary, and the fallible nature of the bible in which he was raised to believe in. He started an online series of video blogs on youtube.com entitled "Atheist Nation", where in the 3rd video he performed a song live that he had written called "Extian" which made the front page of digg.com, and Richard Dawkins website as well.

I'm not a big rap fan - mostly because I think the lyrics to virtually every rap song I've ever heard are stupid and insulting - to me, to women, to anyone with an IQ over 80, to anyone who doesn't worship the "gangsta" life. But then I heard some of Greydon's songs. Check out these lyrics from "A Rational Response":

To battle me you need to reason clearly
Now I'm not sayin fear me
But at least be versed in punctuated equilibrium theory
Grand unified fields, quantum mechanics and dark planets
With logic that's sharper than a blade of d'Artagnan's
To destroy arguments of creationists who cant stand it
Then they try and hit me with the wager
Who? Pascal's wager. Who? Pascal's wager.
Now that's a fool's bet
And against the intelligent it's used less
Really? You bet
This aint nothing new, they use it on kids
But for those who don't know it goes a little like this
Wouldn't you rather believe in God and be wrong
Then to not believe in God and be wrong
If you believe in God and your wrong you've lost nothing
But if you don't believe and you're wrong its all suffering
The problem is you can try it on anything
Switch the Gods around and apply it to anything
The Flyin Spaghetti Monster, Zeus, Amin, Ra
Krishna, Odin, Baal and then Allah
Which one of em's our God?
None of em all false
And blame it on the Atheists its always our fault
Except it never is
So don't get mad at us we just showin ya'll the evidence

Find me a song from The Game or Jay-Z that includes the words punctuated equilibrium theory.

You can check out more - and download his album, The Compton Effect, at his MySpace page or his website.