1. Blogger spreads the gospel of science

Comment #189319 by Major Bloodnok on June 6, 2008 at 2:56 am

Comment #189299 by davorg

I wonder if PZ is a Kentish Man or a Man of Kent :-)

That all depends on whether there's a River Medway running through it.

I'm also a Man of Kent originally, from the Garden of England's compost heap (Chatham). Large parts of Kent do certainly have a sort of Miss Marple village charm, but it's too near the ravening monster that is London for my liking. I'll stick to Manchester and its environs.

2. Group wants Wi-Fi banned from public buildings

Comment #186248 by Major Bloodnok on May 30, 2008 at 2:38 am

B*gger. There I was, armed with a link to Ben Goldacre's articles on the matter, and the last comment before I could have triumphantly brandished them... links to Bad Science.

Ho, hum.

Regarding Richard's comment earlier - the lack of scepticism in journalism is endemic. There was a short article on the BBC's North-West news recently about sofas being recalled because some people (including a baby) had suffered rashes and "burns" after sitting on them. All quite plausible, actually - there's a fire-retardant chemical used that's normally well inside the sofa, but could have "escaped" to the surface. At no point in the article did anyone suggest testing for the presence of the chemical on the surface of the sofa (or even suggest that this had been done), yet much prominence was given to a mother's claim that her baby's skin problems were caused by lying on the sofa. She "blamed" the sofa, and this was deemed good enough. She may well have been completely correct - but it never hurts to test the claim. After all, if she was wrong, then getting rid of the sofa wasn't going to help.

And it's everywhere - you'll always get the report telling you what the "victim" (subject/whatever) thinks the problem (cause/solution) is, but never a follow-up that attempts to determine whether that unfounded opinion actually has a basis in reality.

Claim a causal relationship and you'll get reported, test that relationship and you'll be ignored.

3. Fleas on the Horizon: In Defense of God

Comment #138227 by Major Bloodnok on March 4, 2008 at 4:47 am

The atheists write with what Matt Baugher, v-p and publisher for spiritual growth and Christian thought at Thomas Nelson, calls "venom," stridently stating that religious belief is delusional and dangerous and the world would be better off without it.

Good grief. "Venom"? Leaving aside the gross misrepresentation of that quote, I've just finished reading Thomas Paine's The Age of Reason; if they think that Dawkins et al are being venomous, I dread to think what they'd say about Paine - and Paine wasn't even an atheist.

4. Sudan demo over jailed UK teacher

Comment #92466 by Major Bloodnok on November 30, 2007 at 2:57 pm

Whoever was ultimately responsible for this demonstration, I vote that we revoke their membership of the human race.

Jack Rawlinson: My thoughts exactly.

5. Hello Again, Michael Behe!

Comment #86363 by Major Bloodnok on November 9, 2007 at 4:34 am

Dunc-uk:

Why on earth does every mention of Michael Behe link to a picture of Lindsay Lohan? Am I missing something?

The answer's in the first footnote at ERV's site. It's got something to do with some film that I've never seen.

6. Help Counter the New Atheist Crusade to 'Evangelize' America!

Comment #79660 by Major Bloodnok on October 18, 2007 at 5:17 am

56. Comment #79523 by Veronique

Didn't McGrath say that god/jesus doesn't exhort anyone to do violence?:-). Sure Alistair, we believe you!

But note that the quote doesn't advocate drowning someone, it simply poses a hypothetical situation which is less bad than the alternative.

In the same way that "Nice place, squire. It'd be pity if it burned down, wouldn't it, Ron?" is simply expressing the disagreeable nature of a particular hypothetical event.

Or the way that "Fings can get broke, you know" is nothing more than an observation on the transient nature of material objects.

7. Teacher: I was fired, said Bible isn't literal

Comment #73511 by Major Bloodnok on September 25, 2007 at 6:36 am

The Wee Flea (#73385):

By the way -
Quine,

The old ones are the best ones! A version of this has been going the round for several years and is doubtless considered the height of with and wisdom by those of the atheist faith. It is of course never written with the intention of getting an answer. Who needs answers when you already know that you are right and everyone else is wrong.

Well, I don't know about the others, but I'd love to see some answers to the questions raised in that letter. Do you fancy giving it a go?

8. Censoring Sir David

Comment #69730 by Major Bloodnok on September 12, 2007 at 12:35 pm

drive1:

TGD will be a lot shorter if it gets this sort of treatment.

The God Delusion (revised edition)

"...[T]he existence of God ... has been proved ... by science. ..."



Mind you, they probably wouldn't be honest enough to out the ellipses in.

9. The smallest signs of retreat

Comment #68549 by Major Bloodnok on September 7, 2007 at 2:59 pm

Yeesh. There's some sloppy thinking around over there. At times like this I resort to the "Easter Bunny" transform - simply replace references to "god" with "Easter Bunny" and see if the argument still hangs together. For example:

Where is Dawkins' evidence that there is no god? As with every theory (whether it's atheism or religion) you need evidence to back it up and I haven't noticed Dawkins giving either of these. Why should a 'godbotherer' have to justify and explain his beliefs but an atheist doesn't? Simply saying "it's a ridiculous archaic belief system" is not an explanation - as Bunting said, it's a childish answer.

transformed, becomes:

Where is Dawkins' evidence that there is no Easter Bunny? As with every theory (whether it's abunnyism or bunnyism) you need evidence to back it up and I haven't noticed Dawkins giving either of these. Why should a 'bunnybotherer' have to justify and explain his beliefs but an abunnyist doesn't? Simply saying "it's a ridiculous archaic belief system" is not an explanation - as Bunting said, it's a childish answer.

10. Honest Mistakes or Willful Mendacity

Comment #68270 by Major Bloodnok on September 6, 2007 at 3:16 pm

Someone on another thread (sorry - can't remember who) has already flagged up the parallel with the wonderful Far Side cartoon:

That would be me. (Thanks for finding a link to the cartoon - you can't normally find Larson cartoons the interwebs.)

I can't help but wonder if they really do hear things the wrong way - that there are trigger phrases around which they build their viewpoint, whilst the surrounding context becomes just so much noise.

11. Review of Darwin's Angel: An Angelic Response to the God Delusion

Comment #66986 by Major Bloodnok on September 1, 2007 at 8:13 am

reading these sorts of reviews, is anyone else reminded of the Gary Larson cartoon "what we say to dogs; what dogs hear"?

What we say: the text of TGD.
What they hear: blah, blah, blah, no God, blah, blah, crusades, blah, inquisition, blah, blah, religion is bad, blah, blah, blah...

12. Another view

Comment #66216 by Major Bloodnok on August 29, 2007 at 11:08 am

#66192 (Northern Bright):

Richard, if you happen to be reading this, I'm so sorry to learn from this article of your inner turmoil and distress. But don't be alarmed (it's bad for your chakras): I'm sending you some cosmic healing, so you'll be as sane and balanced as Mr Russell before you know it. I'm sure you'll find that a reassuring prospect.

Its OK, he's got 12-stranded DNA, now.

13. God-Fearing People: Why are we so scared of offending Muslims?

Comment #60099 by Major Bloodnok on August 1, 2007 at 2:08 am

My immediate response to the headline was "because they're likely to go totally apeshit and start burning stuff and killing people over it". Nice to see that Mr. Hitchens comes to pretty much the same conclusion (albeit using lots more words).

14. In defense of dangerous ideas

Comment #58238 by Major Bloodnok on July 24, 2007 at 5:22 am

Do African-American men have higher levels of testosterone, on average, than white men?

Why does this question contrast "African-American" with "white"? What does the use of "African-American say about the author's inbuilt assumptions/world view?

15. A force for evil?

Comment #55125 by Major Bloodnok on July 10, 2007 at 4:20 am

rnewson:

"kindness needs no ideology". Nicely put.

And true. But I can't agree with the rest of the sentence:

ideologies (including religions, the prime examples of such) are required for unkindness, division, mayhem and murder.

unless you class avarice, jealousy and so forth as "ideologies".

16. Yes, the universe looks like a fix. But that doesn't mean that a god fixed it

Comment #53009 by Major Bloodnok on June 29, 2007 at 2:08 am

Comment #52911 by Bonzai

But "multiverse" is not even a scientific hypothesis. It is at the far speculative end of string theory, which itself is rather more like philosophy buttressed with esoteric math than physics(it has no testable consequence so far)

It was my understanding that string theory does have testable consequences, but that we currently lack the technology to do the testing.

17. Majority of Republicans Doubt Theory of Evolution

Comment #49520 by Major Bloodnok on June 12, 2007 at 8:58 am

Don't forget "tired of explaining that 'Law' doesn't just mean 'a better Theory', but is a completely different concept".

18. Those fanatical atheists

Comment #41969 by Major Bloodnok on May 17, 2007 at 11:29 am

Nonexistence proofs are very difficult, so much so that it is generally considered reasonable to instead say:
There is no existing evidence or consistent interpretation of existing evidence that would lead us to believe this to exist.

Agreed - ish (see below).

This is typically the position of atheist.

Yep.

If there is existing evidence or consistent interpretation of existing evidence then this statement is no longer valid.

Not necessarily. "Goddidit" is a consistent interpretation of any evidence. Because it's consistent with anything, it does not invalidate the previous position.

To invalidate that position, there must be a) evidence and b) an interpretation that is not only consistent with the evidence, but inconsistent with potentially different evidence (the requirement of falsifiability). Now, your UO may well be potentially falsifiable. Well and good, but I still have difficulty with your evidence that it's purporting to explain. I don't think it's true that nothing happens unless observed - David Deutsch seems to think that everything happens, and we're only aware of a single path through the multitude of orthogonal universes thus produced.

So, until you can demonstrate that the "nothing happens" interpretation is the correct one, then your UO becomes merely a potential explanation of a possible interpretation of the evidence.

19. Those fanatical atheists

Comment #41578 by Major Bloodnok on May 16, 2007 at 10:46 am

Consciousness is not a phenomenon. Consciousness belongs to an entirely different category.

You're going to have to provide some evidence for that assertion.

Another way to see that consciousness is not a phenomenon is this: If consciousness were a phenomenon there would be objective ways to find out whether consciousness is present in a physical system or not. But this appears to be impossible.

Well, I'm a physical system, and I have conciousness. Other people are physical systems and I can detect conciousness in them.

After all it's possible to conceive of a system that has intelligence but not consciousness, or else consciousness but not intelligence.

Is it? Can you give an example, please?

Trivially, according to the argument from consciousness, if God did not exist then consciousness wouldn't exist,[...]

You're going to have to demonstrate that, because I don't (yet) accept the argument. It sounds, as you say, very much like question-begging to me (and that conclusion is not dependent on my atheism).

If God exists then our experiential environment should be optimized for us becoming better people

Ditto - I need you to show the chain of reasoning from the premise to the conclusion, there.

If God exists then we should continue to have conscious experience beyond physical death. It's true that one can only make this observation only in death - but this is nevertheless a valid observation that if confirmed makes the existence of God more probable.

But it's the "if confirmed" that's problematic, isn't it?

So many people commit the double logical mistake to assume that as science is so successful in explaining physical phenomena it will be able to explain everything,

And they would be wrong

and to assume that as religion contains so many wrong beliefs all religious beliefs must be wrong.

And they would be wrong. So what? The "intelligence correlation" argument is not one that I care to use, for two reasons - the difficulty in defining intelligence and the simple fact that correlation is not the same as causation.

According to all that science teaches us we would expect that the universe should be swarmed with intelligent civilizations aggressively expanding.

Does it? I've seen plenty of scientific arguments to explain why we don't see that.

But the universe is dead silent. How can we explain that observation? There are several possible answers but I find them all highly unlikely (life is an incredible rare phenomenon; we happen to be one of the very first civilizations in the universe; we exist in some kind of protected cosmic zoo; all civilizations self-destruct; we live in a computer simulation.) By far the most probable explanation

Most probable? By what measure?

is that the universe is quiet because all civilizations (that do not self-destruct) evolve towards a spiritual and therefore humble kind of organization - evidencing that intelligence slowly but surely leads towards theism.

There is absolutely no evidence whatsoever for that assertion.

20. Those fanatical atheists

Comment #41182 by Major Bloodnok on May 15, 2007 at 3:26 pm

As far as coming up with experiemnts to disprove the assertion, this is really your part of the debate.

Erm, no, it's not. It's your hypothesis; you test it. Others may join in to either repeat your experiments or devise experiments of their own, but the originator doesn't get to just sit back and say "that's what I think, my job's done". After all, who's in the best position to understand the ramifications of the hypothesis and to predict the results of experiments using it?

21. Those fanatical atheists

Comment #41021 by Major Bloodnok on May 15, 2007 at 10:55 am

Dianelos Georgoudis:

So, we have an observed phenomenon - conciousness - and a hypothesis to explain it - God. Now, as hypotheses go, "God" could do with a bit of fleshing out, but let's skip that and go to the next stage of the scientific process - testing. Can you now come up with some experiment or further observation to test your hypothesis? That is, the result of the experiment should potentially be inconsistent with your hypothesis. If it isn't, fine, we need another experiment, and another and another, constantly refining the hypothesis to match the observations or finally discarding it if we do get an inconsistent result.

The problem is that it's hard to think of any experimental result that would be inconsistent with the God hypothesis. And if nothing's inconsistent with it, then the hypothesis has precisely zero explanatory power.

And the same question to mjr1007: if I grant, for the sake of argument, your proposition that nothing happens at the QM level without an observer, then how do we test your Universal Observer hypothesis to explain the fact that things do, indeed, happen? Again, we're looking for a result that is potentially inconsistent with the hypothesis.