College 92 to 96 on GI bill while working full time and raising 2. This was a very tough time, where I started challenging my perceptions of everything; and trying to be grateful for my opportunities.
Moved my growing family around the eastern US challenging all of us to new environments during a crazy but rewarding career.
Awarded the honor of “PAPA”!
Still eagerly and stubbornly seeking new challenges!

CAREER: Currently happily employed Engineer.

Uncle that survived WWII in the pacific and returned with an atheist perspective was a big influence in my early years.
Favorite Philosophers: Voltaire, Spinoza, Socrates
Favorite quote: “Doubt is not a very agreeable state, but certainty is a ridiculous one ” Voltaire
My interpretation of Voltaire is that I don’t need to choose any defined position, or to apply any classification to my opinions.
I try to learn.
I try to listen to competing ideas.
I try to weigh the ideas I’ve learned and incorporate or reject them fairly, even when they push me outside my comfort zone.
Rinse and repeat.

I am the ever changing product of this process where my position evolves over time. This evolution is seen as fickleness by some, which can be interpret as moral weakness by many. I consider it weakness to stand on a position that you internally reject for the sake of pride. Sometimes I take myself to serious, sorry.

If I had to classify myself it would be agnostic
My conclusion based on existing evidence is NOT that that there is no god. My conclusion is everything that has been attributed to god is easily falsified.

FAVORITE DISCUSSION SUBJECTS:
Physics
Ancient Mediterranean History from Cyrus to Augustus
Philosophy
Bragging about my grandkids.

EARLY RELIGION POSITION:
Early religion was developed when people started becoming creative to satisfy the questions that naturally came with that gift .IMO before 77k BCE?)

We had to wear this yoke of religion to get though a threshold so we could apply our creativity to rational ideas.(domestication, agriculture,… )

Wearing this yoke has hindered human progress to rational thought and made us vulnerable to charismatic leaders both benevolent and caustic.(writing, politics… )

Individual leaders have shed parts of the yoke overtime to influence their society in palatable increments. (My favorite Voltaire, but as early as Socrates, probably even earlier)

There have been long periods of idleness, along with short bursts of creativity and repression.

Many people assume that there is a Path, which implies a goal. This concept should be rejected! Our development is very similar to the process of natural selection with periods of selective breeding. This is a imperfect analogy but it’s the best I have to convey my position.

I hope we can shed the yoke completely someday, but I’m not sure it’s possible. I imagine the future holds a point of diminishing returns where we have another long period of idleness with a vulnerability to retrograde, but we’ll see.

I have not developed a firm position on the benefit of religion. I consider it a necessary threshold that had to be endured for development, like puberty.

POLITICAL PRIORITIES:

Enfranchisement of all citizens. The concept of everyone waking up with the attitude “I own my future” is not just a benefit to the individual, but to all of us.
Compromise on legislation doesn’t mean compromising your principles. Stop electing people who are incapable of working with other people. This goes for both parties.
Facts are not negotiable. People need to learn to be more skeptical of the information they receive, especially from individuals with motives to influence them.
I’m not simple minded enough to align myself with either political party. If there was a party committed to compromise I may be interested. I think a 3rd Compromising Centralist party could be a healthy experiment for our toxic condition.

I like eggs.