Amidst the craziness that is “work”, I have managed to find the time, not only to build one website (this one), but TWO! Behold, The Ten Secular Commandments. It’s still in the works, but it’s there, and functional.

Why?

Well, it started when I heard about the Richard Dawkins Foundation Social Media Contest… or Video Contest… I don’t know what they’re officially calling it. The idea came after seeing one of the promotional videos, which described the contest as an effort to come up with a new version of the Ten Commandments. So I thought, who am I to develop ten commandments that govern anybody? It makes much more sense that these commandments be constructed collaboratively – this is the “age of the interface” after all. So it seemed natural that I use one of my primary skills to help… web development.

Quoting from the about section of the website,

The Ten Secular Commandments is a living document, giving the free-thinking community a forum for creating moral guidelines that draws on mankind’s greatest innovation: the scientific method. It allows people to collaboratively suggest, discuss, and continually tweak a set of commandments so as to create a moral framework that isn’t derived from doctrine.

These commandments can change, as new evidence is uncovered about the human condition and how best to maximize well-being.

They are participatory, obliging no one to be governed by any rules they could not help create.

They are peer-reviewed. Users can make critiques, suggest modifications, or recommend/disagree with posts and suggested commandments submitted by others.

They will not be policed. We hope that a framework will emerge that is generally appealing to everyone to follow.

It would be nice to win… but I more hope the website gets used and proves to be a productive effort for a cause I care about.