1. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #164767 by Jamougha on April 20, 2008 at 5:03 pm

A letter? As in, on paper? Wow.

2. Launch of 'Atheists in Foxholes' Book Anthology

Comment #116240 by Jamougha on January 26, 2008 at 12:13 am

my impression is that there's a big difference between the motivations of the typical American and British soldier. Most Americans seem to join up and fight for the sake of their country and nationalistic pride. The British soldiers I've spoken to or read from seem to consider it a job like any other.

3. Shermer's 'Mind of the Market' Reviewed in L.A. Times

Comment #116237 by Jamougha on January 26, 2008 at 12:07 am

I'm biased against Shermer's position, but the review still seems biased to me.

4. Man and God

Comment #103632 by Jamougha on December 26, 2007 at 10:42 am

in the name of reason, they have heaped scorn and ridicule on those stupid enough to believe the myths and the obscurantist cosmology of religion. Believers, Dawkins asserts, are "malevolent... vicious, sado-masochistic and repellent... dodgy, perniciously delusional... sanctimoniously hypocritical... cockeyed".

Stopped reading about here.

5. Survey finds most Americans believe Jesus born of virgin

Comment #103331 by Jamougha on December 25, 2007 at 6:56 am

I imagine the 15% stat is simply the result of 15% of people having a bad sense of humour.

6. Al Qaeda: We're open to questions

Comment #101550 by Jamougha on December 20, 2007 at 1:53 pm

al-rawandi,

The Wahhabi theology would dictate that all Shi'a, Sufis, and several other variants are "disbelievers", worthy of death. You can't get a public statement to that effect.

Oh yes, but the Qutbist theology (which they appear to follow) should effectively mean that everyone outside AQ is currently an apostate. :)

7. Al Qaeda: We're open to questions

Comment #101405 by Jamougha on December 20, 2007 at 10:13 am

What I'd really like to know is, what proportion of Muslims they believe to be apostates. I doubt you'd get a straight answer to that one tho.

8. Three wise men just legend: archbishop

Comment #101398 by Jamougha on December 20, 2007 at 10:03 am

webb,

The problem of evil on the other hand is a very difficult one to get around. Some (including me) would say impossible. That's my proof that the Christian god does not exist.

I don't think evil is really inconsistent with the god of the Bible. :)

9. Interview with Richard Dawkins: On Christmas

Comment #100563 by Jamougha on December 18, 2007 at 11:07 pm

I think Jeremy was entirely in line. Perhaps some of the Americans here don't understand British etiquette for interviews - the interviewer is expected to be aggressive and challenging.

10. Creation vs. Reality

Comment #98814 by Jamougha on December 14, 2007 at 1:03 pm

That was fun. :) No idea how people could interpret it as anti-science.

11. U.S. Congress Recognizing the importance of Christmas and the Christian faith

Comment #98096 by Jamougha on December 13, 2007 at 4:29 am

staphenray,


We have an established church here in the UK but if we assigned a factor of 100 to the obsession with religion in US politics, the factor over here would be about 2.

I don't think it's a coincidence. If you want people to hate something, force it on them.

12. In the Beginning was the Song

Comment #97023 by Jamougha on December 11, 2007 at 9:44 am

notsobad,

useless for genes, not for people.

13. 'Boycott Worked': Compass Flops - Opening Weekend $26 Million; Narnia $63 Million

Comment #97020 by Jamougha on December 11, 2007 at 9:40 am

irate_atheist,

there is a difference - a fairly big one usually - between gross takings and profits.

14. Former Evangelical Minister Has a New Message: Jesus Hearts Darwin

Comment #95405 by Jamougha on December 8, 2007 at 9:35 am

I think we should support this guy (although very discreetly). AFAICT from the interview, he's preaching naturalistic pantheism. We can [i]definitely[/i] live with NP replacing current popular theology.

15. The Scientists Speak

Comment #89365 by Jamougha on November 20, 2007 at 12:19 pm

Andrew,

1. Doesn't the historical record say the CO2 levels increase after warming occured and thus may not have that great of a green house effect?

This is a half-truth that has spread pretty widely. the earth's climate is a set of positive and negative feedback loops. One of the positive loops is the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. When temperatures increase, this causes greenhouse gases to be emitted naturally; they warm the earth further, causing more warming, and so on. This is obviously a cause for concern, not complacency.

2. Doesn't the historical record show (to the best of our knowledge) that these warming spells happen routinely and do in fact happen over short and long periods of time.

The climate is in constant flux. Yes, it's still possible that the warming we've seen in the 20th century in mainly due to natural variation.

Realistically though, if you pump a lot of CO2 into the atmosphere it's going to change the climate. This isn't a real area of debate as it's basic physics. The question is, how much will the climate change for a given amount of CO2, and how? If we maintain 'business as usual' then the effects of global warming may be quite mild and manageable. They may also be extreme and near-catastrophic.

Unfortunately, if we wait around to find out then it will be far too late to change our minds. The best available climate models give enough probability to negative or highly negative outcomes that it seems to make economic sense to deal with the problem.

16. The good that comes from belief

Comment #87070 by Jamougha on November 11, 2007 at 6:20 am

"The Spirit of Generation Y project (2003-2006), conducted by Monash University, the Australian Catholic University and the Christian Research Association"

from http://www.monash.edu.au/news/newsline/story/971

Yeah call me a cynic...

17. Muslims tell Christians: 'Make peace with us or survival of world is at stake'

Comment #78410 by Jamougha on October 12, 2007 at 6:00 pm

'
OK. So how do they regard atheists/humanists? I think that is very clear, they threaten them with murder, and regard them as less than human, venomously describing them as "kaffirs", or "infidels."'

I don't think these people really grasp the concept of atheism. The Council of Ex-Musims of Britain was met with a 'What? Haha, whatever' type reaction.

18. Radical Christians in Iraq

Comment #71423 by Jamougha on September 18, 2007 at 6:30 pm

'they call themselves martyrs'

Yah no shit.

19. Who's Minding the Mind?

Comment #61284 by Jamougha on August 4, 2007 at 1:07 pm

'The best demonstration by Derren Brown I've seen is from his live show "Something Wicked This Way Comes".

At the end of the show he gets a few persons to make a series of choices which lead up to them selecting a word from a newspaper. Derren of course had predicted which word it was.'

I'm pretty certain that that was not done using psychological manipulation. He uses that as his patter.

Here is one that I believe is done using manipulation and it's a pretty stunning and powerful effect; http://youtube.com/watch?v=lW2yKlNFFuU

20. Floods are judgment on society, say bishops

Comment #53551 by Jamougha on July 2, 2007 at 2:39 am

I can hardly believe this...

Anyway, next time someone challenges Dawkins about his books not representing 'real' religion he can point them straight to this. No better example of religion producing ignorance and bigotry among well-educated, decent people.

21. Rival to evolution may enter schools

Comment #52850 by Jamougha on June 28, 2007 at 8:23 am

"I see, and how many people were surveyed, which demographics were chosen, what was the exact question asked?"

Why do people ask dumb questions when they have the internet?

http://www.ipsos-mori.com/polls/2006/bbc-horizon.shtml

22. Rival to evolution may enter schools

Comment #52736 by Jamougha on June 28, 2007 at 12:51 am

Oh fuck.

23. Messiah

Comment #52674 by Jamougha on June 27, 2007 at 5:30 pm

'I have a strong suspicion that whereas Uri Geller claims supernatural, Derren Brown claims psychological manipulation but both claims are false. I agree he does very impressive tricks, however, I suspect he has no more powers of psychological suggestion than I have (which is none, other than those every human probably has to some extent).'

He uses both. Certainly in many, probably most, of is tricks he uses classic magic and passes it off as psychology, but he also uses psychological tricks, and sometimes he uses both in one trick to achieve an effect. You can download 'The Devil's Picturebook' via bittorrent, which contains his card magic repertoire, and goes through from standard card magic to psychological 'forces' for specific cards.

24. Messiah

Comment #52622 by Jamougha on June 27, 2007 at 2:36 pm

Ppl who want info on how he does this stuff -- I'm no expert but I know a bit about his techniques, I'll try my best to give an idea.

Reading pictures in another room
As he says himself, if he can't know what the person has chosen and he predicts/reads it then it has to be a force. The editing removes too much of the trick to work out how the force is done, excepting the 'overboard' and 'sail' bit that someone already pointed out.

Instant conversion
This is basically just a normal stage hypnosis show, but instead of getting them to hop on one leg while quacking like a duck he gets them to say they believe in god. He uses enhanced suggestability, social compliance and hypnotic language. He's supposedly a very, very good hypnotist and used to do stage hypnosis for a living. Note that more than half the audience leaves before the really amazing stuff goes down - those are the people who are resistant to hypnosis!

Dream Machine
Standard cold reading. He's astounding at this and it's being heavily edited to make him look even better.

Medical History
Pay a private investigator, he gets their medical history from a bent employee at their insurance company. The thing about her not taking drugs is probably public knowledge. Heck all of it could be.

Mediumship
Like he says, cold reading. Plus some editing.

25. Dobson, Armageddon, and Foreign Policy

Comment #42316 by Jamougha on May 18, 2007 at 4:04 am

'Are there any secular nations that offer automatic citizenship to American refugees that are too rational to live here? I want to leeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeave!'

America is supposed to be the only secular nation. :)

26. A Split Emerges as Conservatives Discuss Darwin

Comment #40765 by Jamougha on May 14, 2007 at 11:23 pm

So Darwinism is right because they 'need' it? Because its 'is' suports the 'ought' of social darwinism? This is not much progress.