Skip to Main Content (access key 1)
Skip to Search (access key 2)
Skip to Search GO (access key 3)
Skip to comments (access key 4)
Skip to navigation (access key 5)
Skip to top of page (access key 6)

Comments by alexmzk


1. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #213831 by alexmzk on July 19, 2008 at 2:22 am

i like the included photo of Professor Dawkins saving a wee dog from a bear.

2. Anti-Darwinists turned away by Israeli academia

Comment #212471 by alexmzk on July 17, 2008 at 8:46 am

hey, so long as they keep finding faults with Darwinism, they might bring themselves up to speed with actual modern evolutionary synthesis.

- you'd think.

3. 'Condoms won't change HIV rates'

Comment #212380 by alexmzk on July 17, 2008 at 6:00 am

A SOUTH African Catholic cardinal says the rampant HIV infection rate in Africa would not change if the church ordered its faithful to use condoms during sex.

this is where his thinking goes wrong. he seems to be suffering under a dichotomy where the church either does nothing, or bosses people around. provide condoms, and don't forbid people to use them. no ordering people around, no unnecessary further demeaning of people.

4. The Return of Religion

Comment #211821 by alexmzk on July 16, 2008 at 10:21 am

didn't read past the first couple of paragraphs. for the record, in all the debates i've watched, all the tv programs i've seen, all the talks i've been to, i have never once heard Dennett or Dawkins raise their voices. i don't know enough about Harris or Hitchens to say the same for them, but i suspect they too are less than violent.

5. Man Sues Church Over 'God Injury'

Comment #209786 by alexmzk on July 13, 2008 at 10:42 am

The Sevier County man said he was asking God to have "a real experience" while praying at church.

God: "take that you ungrateful wretch".

6. An Irishman's Diary

Comment #208866 by alexmzk on July 11, 2008 at 10:25 am

i often verb nouns.

7. Weak US dollar hits papal profits

Comment #208862 by alexmzk on July 11, 2008 at 10:22 am

phew, looks like the Vatican was only just saved from the cardinal sin of Obscene Wealth (tm). close shave!

8. Religious bigotry upheld in court

Comment #208636 by alexmzk on July 11, 2008 at 5:24 am

one would think that if she had so much conviction in her religious beliefs, she would have actually executed the gay couple in question, as instructed in the relevant verse. how inconsistent of her.

9. The BBC announces a major season marking the life and work of Charles Darwin

Comment #207266 by alexmzk on July 9, 2008 at 12:14 pm

o god i hope they get Dembski on board, it'd be hilarious. maybe Behe if they were really desperate for some light relief.

10. Tablet Ignites Debate on Messiah and Resurrection

Comment #204894 by alexmzk on July 6, 2008 at 5:34 am

Much of the text, a vision of the apocalypse transmitted by the angel Gabriel, draws on the Old Testament, especially the prophets Daniel, Zechariah and Haggai.


WTF?

11. Muslims outraged at police advert featuring cute puppy sitting in policeman's hat

Comment #204893 by alexmzk on July 6, 2008 at 5:23 am

Josh, can we stop having articles by the Daily Mail please? the paper has approximately as much relevance and quality of writing as wayne rooney's autobiography.

thanks.

12. Prayer refusal pupils 'disciplined'

Comment #204645 by alexmzk on July 5, 2008 at 12:35 pm

hey, on more than one occasion, my classmates and i were made to pray to jesus when i was at school.

13. Does the Pope wear Prada?

Comment #204534 by alexmzk on July 5, 2008 at 6:01 am

Benedict has also brought back the ombrellino, a small umbrella used to symbolise the pope's temporal powers.

"slightly too small and impractical to be of any real use"

14. Jesus and Mo on Militant Atheists

Comment #202015 by alexmzk on June 30, 2008 at 3:38 pm

ah, jesus and mo is consistently fantastic.

15. Faith schools undermined by 'Government witch hunt'

Comment #201735 by alexmzk on June 30, 2008 at 7:49 am

Some 7,000 primaries and secondaries in England - around one-in-three - are faith schools, with many performing above the national average. Two-thirds of the top-rated primaries in recent league tables were Anglican, Roman Catholic and Jewish schools.

that's an impressive bit of statistic sleight-of-hand right there.

16. Stephen Hawking's explosive new theory

Comment #201730 by alexmzk on June 30, 2008 at 7:45 am

lovely. as a complete ignoramus in this area, i wondered a wee bit about how quantum physics tied in with the early state of the big bang.
very nice.

17. Charles Darwin was not the father of atheism

Comment #201724 by alexmzk on June 30, 2008 at 7:39 am

Less happily, there will doubtless be jolly parties with themes like "The Death of God", at which Professor Richard Dawkins will appear in human form alongside his apostle, Christopher Hitchens, to the rapture of his atheistic disciples. Sinful bishops and rabbis will be forgiven, so long as they repent, and secularists will move among the people, with Darwin's sacred text to guide them, singing "Happy Birthday to Reason."

...yuck.

18. Christianity 'could die out within a century'

Comment #197729 by alexmzk on June 22, 2008 at 2:54 pm

More than half of Britons think Christianity is likely to have disappeared from the country within a century, according to a survey.

the rapture, yeah?

"At Aish we know that Judaism provides real meaning and enrichment to one's life.

there are many ways to enrich one's life and provide meaning - plenty of ways that do't involve judaism at all.

19. 'I despise Islamism': Ian McEwan faces backlash over press interview

Comment #197728 by alexmzk on June 22, 2008 at 2:49 pm

But his words in the Corriere interview are far stronger, although they do fall short of the invective deployed by Martin Amis.

and, indeed, short of the invective deployed by the Islamists themselves.

20. Science teacher dissed evolution

Comment #197054 by alexmzk on June 21, 2008 at 2:09 am

Freshwater told investigators the marks were X's, not crosses.

i don't think that matters one bit - he could have been burning portraits of the Dalai Lama on their arms and it'd still be assault on a minor.

21. Should Strident British Atheist Richard Dawkins Dictate Education Policy to US States? Barbara Forrest Apparently Thinks So

Comment #197053 by alexmzk on June 21, 2008 at 2:06 am

Newsflash for Richard, we're not a British colony anymore.

woo, you go girl!

22. Oystein Elgaroy - the Christian defender who became an Atheist

Comment #195347 by alexmzk on June 18, 2008 at 5:26 am

congratulations, Øystein. i wish you all the best.

I cannot possibly justify spending time on answering all of "clearthinker"'s remarks.

don't try to. if Rev. Robertson genuinely wanted to understand any of the other ideas he uses to prop up his wobbly viewpoint, he'd probably go and actually read up on anthropology or the like. his continuous attempts to win over the atheist population requires the use of his ignorance as ammunition (and you don't want to run out of ammunition if you're set on winning).

23. Rare dinosaur mummy's arm and tail unveiled

Comment #194740 by alexmzk on June 17, 2008 at 8:17 am

People from across the country and even England
!

24. Rapture site sends unbelievers their last chance ... via email

Comment #194738 by alexmzk on June 17, 2008 at 8:16 am

And for the bargain price of $25 per year, I would like to offer rapture insurance. In the event of rapture, I will pay all policyholders $1000, to be distributed to those friends and relatives left behind.

really, you could easily afford to offer a pay-off of several million - the odds are greatly stacked in your favour.

25. Vatican bans Dan Brown film Angels & Demons from Rome churches

Comment #194661 by alexmzk on June 17, 2008 at 6:33 am

you could understand if they were blocking it on the grounds that it's going to be a really shit film - but offensive to Christianity? pah, there's been worse.

26. Breaking the Silence

Comment #194320 by alexmzk on June 16, 2008 at 3:43 pm

extremely admirable.

27. As the world becomes smaller, the need to understand each other's faith grows

Comment #192909 by alexmzk on June 14, 2008 at 7:54 am

rod-the-farmer:
Did he display this sort of nonsense when running for office ? ... improvements in health care has allowed the birthrate to climb dramatically in parts of the world where education is not provided to the children.

before Blair was elected, he was running his campaign on the motto "Education, Education, Education".
truly a ripe, rich crop of irony right there.

28. As the world becomes smaller, the need to understand each other's faith grows

Comment #192879 by alexmzk on June 14, 2008 at 5:44 am

i could respect this if it was emphasising strong links between different countries, or even different cultures, but the idea of using exclusively religious groups to work together is narrow-minded and adverse to the clearly noble goal Mr Blair believes he is aiming for.
it's like he's planning a blockbuster film with a cast comprised entirely of young children, old people and animals.

29. New British Petition: Stop the Nightmares

Comment #192490 by alexmzk on June 13, 2008 at 7:16 am

Heretic:
I see what you did there. You're going for the "I don't like what your sayin' but I support your right to say it" freedom of speech line.
But, I really think you don't understand the issue here. It is not simply parents talking religion at their kids, it is the mental abuse caused by what is being preached to the child. It is very real abuse of children, and if you really understood the problem, you wouldn't be "fighting for their right to tell their children about hell".

of course i understand the issue. i find it horrific that parents tell their children such things are real. however, i will not support a legislation that imposes a law on what parents may or may not tell to their children. of course if i came across parents that raised their kids on Hell, i would argue the fuck out of them and do my best to convince them why they should not be doing so. but i would not remove their legal right to do so.

edit: what's needed is support for the children, someone to tell them why Hell is not true - advice for parents and so on. bear in mind the parents really think they are doing a good thing here, and simply banning what they're doing is not going to be positive at all.

30. Saving Us from Darwin

Comment #192473 by alexmzk on June 13, 2008 at 6:18 am

very nice indeed. i know a good few people who would benefit greatly from reading this, if they had the patience.

31. Intelligent people 'less likely to believe in God'

Comment #192219 by alexmzk on June 12, 2008 at 2:57 pm

his conclusion's far too simplistic. if he's looking at academics, then he should take into account that as well as generally higher IQs, other factors come into the equation.

32. New British Petition: Stop the Nightmares

Comment #191693 by alexmzk on June 11, 2008 at 1:11 pm

i won't sign this.

in fact, i'm against the idea of making this a law. of course i don't respect the idea of parents teaching their children Hell, but i will fight for their right to do so.
i will also fight for my (and everyone else's) right to tell the parents why they must stop doing such a needlessly immoral thing, and i'll fight for the rights of those parents to try and justify their reasons for doing so.

i will also fight for their right to PARTY, should the issue arise.

33. Court Claim: Chimps Are People, Too

Comment #191177 by alexmzk on June 10, 2008 at 10:19 am

i think there's a petition for the great apes to receive basic human rights. it's being endorsed by Richard Dawkins and Jane Goodall among others, i signed it a wee while ago. should be relatively easy to find online.

34. Loyal to Its Roots

Comment #191173 by alexmzk on June 10, 2008 at 10:15 am

that's fantastic, someone ring CS Lewis quick.

what? he's busy doing the next Narnia film?

35. Logical Proof of the Existence of a Divine Creator, Why Atheism is Not Logically Sound

Comment #190698 by alexmzk on June 9, 2008 at 12:06 pm

it's like his entire proof for God's existence is one extremely protracted case of hands-in-the-air-going-"pffffffffffffff!"

36. Holiday in Hellmouth

Comment #189976 by alexmzk on June 8, 2008 at 2:47 am

Have you ever bought a CD or gone to a concert? If your statistics are correct then approxximately 1000 children died during your listening of that CD. That money could have been spent on the poor, and the time used to campaign for the poor -

Does that make you
a) a music lover
b) a bastard
c) ?

you think God is subject to the same physical restrictions as us?

37. The day of judgment

Comment #189731 by alexmzk on June 7, 2008 at 5:20 am

wonderful article.

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

Comment #188454 by alexmzk on June 4, 2008 at 5:39 am

Science advocate PZ Myers argues that greater science literacy would "lead to the erosion of religion," and expresses the hope that religion would "slowly fade away." The narrator, Ben Stein, asserts that Myers' ideas aren't original. Rather, he is "merely lifting a page out of John Lennon's songbook."

The viewer is then treated to a clip from John Lennon's "Imagine," with the lyrics "Nothing to kill or die for/And no religion too." The music is accompanied by black-and-white footage "of a military parade, which gives way to a close up of Joseph Stalin waving."

ouch. i am a student. i want to see this. it makes Rocky Horror sound tasteful.

39. Karma comedians

Comment #186858 by alexmzk on May 31, 2008 at 1:09 pm

it's a pity, because Buddhism, at its most economical, contains a lot of very good philosophy. i read an interview in which the Dalai Lama himself said something like "If new scientific findings contradict what the Buddha said, then the Buddha was wrong" - something which i can hardly imagine, for example, Rev. Ratzinger saying.

sadly though, Buddhism comes with vast amounts of Woo attached - the most common forms of the religion, even among the "enlightened" monks, seem to focus more on the knee-bending aspect of Buddhism than on the deep thinking. a great pity.

40. Animal Science Without Evolution

Comment #184708 by alexmzk on May 26, 2008 at 2:45 am

Many children and parents alike will appreciate the chapter dedicated to dinosaurs

what is it with creationists and dinosaurs? why not any of the other countless major extinct species?

41. Huge hidden biomass lives deep beneath the oceans

Comment #184481 by alexmzk on May 25, 2008 at 1:13 pm

Huge hidden biomass lives deep beneath the oceans

bloop!

42. Non-religious summer camps develop niche

Comment #184272 by alexmzk on May 24, 2008 at 9:03 am

science, evolution, compassion and critical thinking.

strange turn of phrase. it never ceases to amaze me how little the majority of Americans (i do realise this is Canadian...) seem to "get" evolution.

43. MPs reject calls to cut abortion limit

Comment #182996 by alexmzk on May 21, 2008 at 7:48 am

As MPs prepared to vote on abortion - hours after they increased access to IVF treatment for lesbian couples - O'Connor said: "The country as a whole [is] becoming aware that 200,000 or so abortions a year is not only sad but also somehow very wrong."

this is like saying that it's sad that so many people in Britain are undergoing chemotherapy every year. mourn this by all means, don't protest their right to medical care.

44. God and Science Collide in Nation's Capital

Comment #181720 by alexmzk on May 18, 2008 at 4:03 am

Hoodbhoy thinks that God can be seen as operating within the laws of physics, tweaking outcomes in small ways that have big impacts by relying on phenomena we have observed already in the universe, such as the butterfly effect (in which the flapping of a butterfly's wings alters the atmosphere in a way that ultimately alters the path of a tornado).

is it just me, or is the butterfly flapping its wings scenario just a philosophical thought-experiment? has anyone observed a butterfly altering the course of a tornado?

45. Gimme that Old-Time Irreligion

Comment #181702 by alexmzk on May 18, 2008 at 2:04 am

a foul-tempered misanthropy that is forever giving voice to searing disdain for a species that is so nasty and foolish as to delude itself into religious fervor.

???

46. These dim-wits believe in anything but God

Comment #181548 by alexmzk on May 17, 2008 at 12:20 pm

he's disagreeing for entirely the wrong reasons. religious studies is an important subject that allows young students to view each major religion in comparison to each other, learn the key traits, belief systems and so on. it is a very healthy way to look at such a major topic.

it is by no means being instructed "in the spiritual" like some sort of Harry-Potter-esque non-subject.

i think that it should remain compulsory until a certain age (i found it deathly boring in my own school time, but nonetheless a useful frame of reference in a Christianity-biased, prayers-and-visiting-ministers school). but not for fear of destroying children's sappy credulity, as seems Mr Pitcher's reasoning.

47. Group finds Starbucks logo too hot to handle

Comment #180858 by alexmzk on May 16, 2008 at 1:21 am

someone get a burka on that mermaid quick! she'll catch a death of cold.

48. 'Spiritual' dentist fined $10,000

Comment #180298 by alexmzk on May 14, 2008 at 2:11 pm

He said his Highton practice was booming because "we successfully deal with the spirit of fear that oppresses so many patients".

just goes to show - everyone loves a good gimmick.

49. Vatican: It's OK to believe in aliens

Comment #180087 by alexmzk on May 14, 2008 at 7:52 am

i can't wait til the Catholic Church proves the existence of aliens and everyone converts to Scientology.

50. The Neural Buddhists

Comment #179661 by alexmzk on May 13, 2008 at 1:38 pm

Over the past several years, the momentum has shifted away from hard-core materialism. The brain seems less like a cold machine. It does not operate like a computer. Instead, meaning, belief and consciousness seem to emerge mysteriously from idiosyncratic networks of neural firings. Those squishy things called emotions play a gigantic role in all forms of thinking. Love is vital to brain development.

Researchers now spend a lot of time trying to understand universal moral intuitions. Genes are not merely selfish, it appears. Instead, people seem to have deep instincts for fairness, empathy and attachment.

Scientists have more respect for elevated spiritual states. Andrew Newberg of the University of Pennsylvania has shown that transcendent experiences can actually be identified and measured in the brain (people experience a decrease in activity in the parietal lobe, which orients us in space). The mind seems to have the ability to transcend itself and merge with a larger presence that feels more real.

this is such a bad section, it really makes it sound like he doesn't understand what he's talking about. mostly he just contradicts himself, but also he completely misconstrues several of the main issues he's trying to address. sloppy.

More Pages: 1 2 3 | Next