1. Man Sues Church Over 'God Injury'

Comment #209968 by Tack on July 13, 2008 at 4:32 pm

I message frequently on a BlackBerry and it's trivial to configure it to autocomplete shorthand for you. In fact, I'm pretty sure it autocompletes the usual suspects (r, u, ur, etc.) by default.

2. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #209477 by Tack on July 12, 2008 at 11:52 am

@eellerto: before you snail mail it, you might first replace all occurrences of "Meyers" with "Myers." :) (Don't feel bad, I nearly made the same mistake.)

3. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #208885 by Tack on July 11, 2008 at 10:50 am

Wrought: weird that our introductory paragraphs are identical in structure. :)

4. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #208882 by Tack on July 11, 2008 at 10:49 am

One more email to get lost in the mix:


Dear Dr. Bruininks,

No doubt by now you have received innumerable emails either condemning or supporting PZ Myers for his recent harsh criticism of Catholic dogma.

I myself have spent a large portion of my professional career in academia, and I have come to understand (and genuinely believe) that intellectual and social progress can come only through unfettered free expression.

Dr. Myers has not incited violence against any person or group. The blog post in question certainly had its share of vitriol, but it would also be impossible not to notice the irony, which irony is frequently used by him (and other critics) to demonstrate the absurdity of all kinds of beliefs that may inform actions which are at best silly and at worst disastrous.

In this case, the belief he criticized was that of equating damage to a cracker with a hate crime. You may disagree with the specific manner in which he expressed that criticism, but I do ask you to recognize the necessity of free inquiry and expression and to extend this not only to Dr. Myers but all those under your employ. Paraphrasing Rosa Luxemburg, "The freedom of speech is meaningless unless it means the freedom of the person who thinks differently."

I understand that his blog may be linked from a website under the university's purview, but any sensible person can easily recognize that it is a separate site and that the views and opinions posted there are those of Dr. Myers and not necessarily the university's.

Dr. Myers is among the rare few who have sparked in me an interest and curiosity in biology, which I sadly neglected in my formal education. I live in Ontario, Canada, and he has, in short, put the University of Minnesota on my mental map of the world. I feel strongly that he is a great asset to your university not in spite of the incident which prompted me to write this letter, but in no small part because of it.

Sincerely,
[name and address removed]

5. Did newborn Earth harbour life?

Comment #203605 by Tack on July 3, 2008 at 8:24 am

I understand that C-14 dating is only accurate within some tens of thousands of years.

Is it the case then that the method they used (examining the ratio of C-12 to C-13) can be used to gauge age in the order of billions of years?

6. Non-voters: It's all in God's hands

Comment #200284 by Tack on June 27, 2008 at 8:51 am

If non-believers are more likely to be liberals, and believers are less likely to vote, then why do republicans keep getting elected?

7. Ben Stein 1, Yoko Ono 0 in 'Expelled' copyright spat

Comment #188164 by Tack on June 3, 2008 at 9:40 am

I haven't seen Expelled (and won't until I can find a way to see it without paying money), but as much contempt as I have for the film and its thesis, if the song was used as described in the article, I agree with the judge's decision.

"Intellectual Property" is being taken much too far nowadays, and fair use (or fair dealing for us Canadians) is one of the few remaining bastions. We must fight for it even when it's used to promote a message we oppose.

8. Richard Dawkins discusses Einstein's new letters

Comment #179770 by Tack on May 13, 2008 at 5:30 pm

It seems to me one could make a plausible case that Einstein was a deist:

His [the scientist's] religious feeling takes the form of a rapturous amazement at the harmony of natural law, which reveals an intelligence of such superiority that, compared with it, all the systematic thinking and acting of human beings is an utterly insignificant reflection. [The World As I See It]

9. Research Volunteers Needed

Comment #175407 by Tack on May 5, 2008 at 11:00 am

Most interesting question: "If I ruled the world it would be a much better place." I had to honestly answer "Agree" there, even if I recognize that might not be the most optimal governance for the planet. :)

10. Science Debate 2008

Comment #161044 by Tack on April 14, 2008 at 5:26 pm

We've heard the statements many times over the past few years: In less than five years something like 90% of all scientists and engineers will reside in Asia, [...]

11. Richard Dawkins on The Big Questions

Comment #157166 by Tack on April 8, 2008 at 3:46 pm

Richard, where do you find the strength? It was unbearably frustrating just watching this, I can't even imagine your restraint doing this live.

I would have liked to have seen Christopher Hitchens handle this crowd. He pushes back a lot harder (sometimes, regrettably, against his own side) conversationally, and he evinces his arguments from an uncanny reservoir of historical and political knowledge.

12. Discussion on PZ Myers being expelled from Expelled

Comment #148150 by Tack on March 22, 2008 at 7:42 am

The idea of protesting outside theaters previewing Expelled smacks way too much of Christian fundamentalism. These people are laughed at, and rightly so. (Kevin Smith in 'An Evening With Kevin Smith' recounts his terribly amusing experience while going under-cover pretending to be a fellow fundamentalist picketer at his own film Dogma.)

Please, let's not become them. We are above that.

13. Richard Dawkins' US Tour begins this week

Comment #138310 by Tack on March 4, 2008 at 7:29 am

Like mikkala, I was also disappointed by the lack of Canadian appearances. Please, Professor Dawkins, do not forsake us in the north. Even though we are less religious than the US, we still need your good sense.

University of Toronto may be a good venue. However University of Waterloo would be absolutely perfect for me. :)

14. How he was sentenced to die

Comment #133076 by Tack on February 25, 2008 at 3:11 pm

@rod-the-farmer:

I also emailed my MP (Andrew Telegdi), in early February when I first heard of this story, and I got reasonable response a few days later:

Dear Mr. Tackaberry,

On behalf of Mr. Telegdi, I would like to thank you for your email
alerting our office of this case. I have shown your correspondence to
Mr. Telegdi along with the information contained in the link you sent
and he completely agrees with you that this is indeed a terrible
situation. Mr. Telegdi has instructed me to send a letter to the Hon.
Maxime Bernier, Minister of Foreign Affairs to request Canada's
intervention.

Sincerely,
Rachelle


Rachelle Cyr-Kelderman
Special Assistant
Hon. Andrew Telegdi, P.C., M.P.
[...]

Hon. Maxime Bernier, P.C., M.P.
Minister of Foreign Affairs

Dear Minister,

On behalf of the Hon. Andrew Telegdi, P.C., M.P. for Kitchener-Waterloo,
I am forwarding to your attention an email from a constituent who is
concerned with the fate of Sayed Pervez Kambaksh , a 23 year old
journalism student who has been sentenced to death in Afghanistan. This
case has sparked pressure from international groups who have started a
petition to Afghanistan's President asking him to repeal the death
sentence.

Mr. Telegdi is appealing to you to contact President Karzai and ask him
to overturn this sentence. In Canada, the abolition of the death penalty
is considered to be a principle of fundamental justice and we have
played a key role in denouncing the use of capital punishment at the
international level.

I would like to thank you in advance for your attention towards this
very serious issue and look forward to being copied with your response
to Mr. Tackaberry.

Sincerely,
Rachelle Cyr-Kelderman
Special Assistant
Hon. Andrew Telegdi, P.C., M.P.
[...]

15. DLD08 - Life: a gene-centric view

Comment #130651 by Tack on February 21, 2008 at 5:19 am

@robotaholic: was it a BlackBerry? I was looking carefully and I couldn't quite tell. Either it was wearing a rubber skin, or it's not a BB. In any case, I was quite curious as I work at RIM. :)

16. DLD08 - Life: a gene-centric view

Comment #130365 by Tack on February 20, 2008 at 12:22 pm

Direct link: http://data55.sevenload.com/i/aq/bu/dkn1r57/49u.flv

17. The argument from oranges

Comment #128290 by Tack on February 16, 2008 at 5:16 pm

@notsobad:

And you just know that after the hearing, they all gathered into The Pile.

18. Hitchens and Boteach Debate on God

Comment #125631 by Tack on February 11, 2008 at 6:13 pm

I felt a bit sorry for Boteach in the last minutes, flailing his arms like a helpless infant, frenetically trying to recover what he must have realized was a grueling defeat, only instead to be cinching the intellectual noose around himself with every utterance. Such a sad sight.

I did find it disconcerting that he brought up frequently that he and Richard Dawkins were "dear friends." Surely the good professor is more discriminating than that?

19. Sentenced to death: Afghan who dared to read about women's rights

Comment #120879 by Tack on February 2, 2008 at 5:54 pm

More information about the reversal:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/lifeline-for-pervez-afghan-senate-withdraws-demand-for-death-sentence-777188.html

20. Morality and the 'new atheism'

Comment #119649 by Tack on January 31, 2008 at 5:57 pm

Why be good if you are a christian. You can just do evil and then ask forgivness and accept Jesus and you are home free.

21. Sentenced to death: Afghan who dared to read about women's rights

Comment #119150 by Tack on January 31, 2008 at 10:57 am

@Son.of.God (76):

No foreign talk talk talk intervention is going to change his death sentence.

22. Sentenced to death: Afghan who dared to read about women's rights

Comment #119135 by Tack on January 31, 2008 at 10:41 am

agn, are you by any chance hitting reload after you post your message? (Perhaps to see if there have been any replies?) If so, don't, as that's what's causing the multiple posts.

23. Sentenced to death: Afghan who dared to read about women's rights

Comment #119022 by Tack on January 31, 2008 at 9:15 am

Here is the email I sent to my MP. My thanks to Opisthokont (#36) for some useful points and sound bites.

Dear Mr. Telegdi,

Please permit me to direct your attention to a recent ruling of Afghan courts and upheld by the country's highest authority:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/sentenced-to-death-afghan-who-dared-to-read-about-womens-rights-775972.html

To summarise: a 23-year-old journalism student was charged with blasphemy and sentenced to death for distributing literature which argued that the oppression of women misrepresents the views of the Muslim prophet Mohamed.

There are several grave injustices which compel me to write this letter to you:

1. The crime: blasphemy is a thought crime, and has no place in a country purporting to have established democratic rule. Clearly Afghanistan remains a strong theocracy.
2. The punishment: a death sentence for this student's actions is a blatant violation of human rights and is a manifestation of fundamentalist repression.
3. No due process: the student was not given legal representation and his sentence was issued in a secret trial.
4. Most importantly, this concerns Canadians: Canadian troops are risking and in many cases giving their lives to maintain this so-called democratic establishment.

24. Interview with Richard Dawkins

Comment #116729 by Tack on January 27, 2008 at 9:01 am

Dawkins' utter pwnage of the last caller was so delightfully entertaining that I have transcribed it (as I emailed it to some family and friends):

Host: It's John on the line from Middleton. Hello John. You're a fundamental Christian?
Caller: Yes, Liz.
Host: All right, em, Professor Dawkins is here, what would you like to ask him?
Caller: Umm, he said that evolution is basically a proven fact as far as he's concerned.
RD: Yes, umm, uh ... I want to be a little bit careful here because scientists don't on the whole prove facts, what they do is fail to disprove them. Um, but all the evidence -- every shred of evidence, and there's a massive amount of it -- points in the same direction that evolution is a fact.
Caller: *incredulous sigh* Dear me.
RD: *annoyed* What do you mean 'oh dear me'?
Caller: The one question then is: if there are lots of -- well, I would say there are hundreds and hundreds of different types of animals -- where are all the transitional animals between, uh, fish and amphibians, amphibians to reptiles --
RD: -- they're in the rocks, they're fossils.
Caller: They're fossils?
RD: Yes.
Caller: So why aren't there any half-fish/half-alligators?
RD: *laughs* God what a naive question. Look, way back then in the Devonian era, there were intermediates between fish and amphibians --
Caller: -- Yeah --
RD: -- you can find fossils of them to this day. Why would you expect them still to survive now?
Caller: I can't expect them to survive. I want to see the fossils. There aren't any.
RD: I'm sorry but there are --
Caller: -- where? --
RD: go to the museum.
Caller: Where?
RD: In museums! You have been reading Creationist literature which simply tells bear-faced lies when it says that there are no intermediate fossils. That is a lie! Go to a museum and ask to see for example tiktallik.
Caller: *awkward pause* ... Okay?

25. Sam Harris debate with Rabbi David Wolpe

Comment #107567 by Tack on January 4, 2008 at 6:57 pm

beders: I was also wishing Harris would bring up Sweden et al, and luckily he did, at 1:32:50.

26. Sam Harris debate with Rabbi David Wolpe

Comment #107527 by Tack on January 4, 2008 at 5:13 pm

Direct link: http://tinyurl.com/3957ud

(Preview the URL at http://preview.tinyurl.com/3957ud , in case you suspect I am directing you to goatse. :))

Rename the resulting mess of a filename as you wish. If you're a Linux user:

wget http://tinyurl.com/3957ud -O Sam_Harris_vs_David_Wolpe.flv

Cheers.

27. A War On Science

Comment #105515 by Tack on December 31, 2007 at 7:49 pm

Dawkins made me laugh more in this show than any other time I've heard him speak. When he called IDers "yapping terriers of ignorance" I almost ejected through my nose this fine Australian Shiraz, which I happened to have been sipping at the time.

And this is priceless: "[Intelligent Design] is getting ahold only among those parts of the population who don't know anything."

28. THE FOUR HORSEMEN - Available Now on DVD!

Comment #99205 by Tack on December 15, 2007 at 11:17 pm

Fantastically interesting. Two hours of my life well spent. I will most certainly be ordering the DVD.

My sympathies to Dan Dennett who seemed like he had some terribly insightful things to say, particularly during the last 15 minutes of the discussion, but Hitch was simply oblivious to the others attempting to interject. Dan, you're too much of a gentleman. I wanted to hear of your many disagreements with what Hitchens was saying!

Please do more of these!

29. The empty myths peddled by evangelists of unbelief

Comment #97178 by Tack on December 11, 2007 at 3:19 pm

Rtambree says:

Political ideologies are secular religions. Whether it's left-marxism or right-fascism, they have all the trappings of religions: sacred symbols such as flags and holy texts such as manifestos, the promise of a future utopia if you obey and subjugate yourself to the cause, prophets to be revered, aversion to empirical evidence, the elevation of an abstract ideal above the individual, and the consolidation and perpetuation of centralised power.

30. Keith Olbermann talks about the Romney 'Religion' Speech

Comment #95627 by Tack on December 8, 2007 at 8:53 pm

This quote from Olbermann is on point: "Did he not recognize the hypocrisy in that? He called secularism a religion, then called it wrong, ostensibly while given a speech asking for religious tolerance.""

31. Evolution and Texas

Comment #94087 by Tack on December 4, 2007 at 6:26 pm

If you're able to overcome the overwhelming urge to gouge out your own eyes and tear at your hair, have a look at the comments in the article linked by DavidJGrossman's post above. The level of ignorance and cluelessness is as prevalent there as ever -- creationists still trumpeting on with the tired and beaten irreducible complexity argument, and such.

32. Daniel Dennett Debates Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #92941 by Tack on December 1, 2007 at 7:42 pm

Sigh. Another "what if you're wrong" question from the audience.

I have to say, Dennett's reasoned answer gave the question far more validity than it deserves. Dawkins' approach to the same question was so much more satisfying. And entertaining.

33. Daniel Dennett Debates Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #92923 by Tack on December 1, 2007 at 6:54 pm

D'Souza's incessant hollering was so aggravating that I found I could no longer tolerate watching him, so I began skipping over his ranting. I don't quite need to take it on faith that I'm not missing anything interesting.

Sadly although I was very happy with Dennett's opening, his first rebuttal was pretty woefully lackluster. I hope he finds his groove. (Only on part 8.)

34. Interview with Christopher Hitchens

Comment #89417 by Tack on November 20, 2007 at 4:17 pm

@Eventhorizon

Seconded on both accounts. Hitchens kept his composure well enough in spite of the interruptions and seeming disinterest of the interviewer.

35. 'Root of All Evil? The Uncut Interviews' Released on DVD

Comment #68012 by Tack on September 5, 2007 at 3:41 pm

I'm quite disappointed to hear we won't be able to see more of Haggard's arrogant inanity. Nevertheless my copy's on order. :)