1. Poll: Should the motto 'In God We Trust' be removed from U.S. currency?

Comment #230545 by LochRaven on August 14, 2008 at 8:41 pm

48% YES/52% NO as of this post. The gap is closing.

2. 'Major discovery' from MIT primed to unleash solar revolution

Comment #223506 by LochRaven on August 2, 2008 at 3:04 pm

The true efficacy of this development will be revealed by correlation with how vociferously the fossil fuel industries bad-mouth it and call it useless. No squawking from them, no meat to the "breakthrough".

3. Vicar supports Life of Brian ban

Comment #222520 by LochRaven on July 31, 2008 at 1:48 pm

"Making fun of Jesus Christ, whom I love more than my wife, in a film is going to offend me."

I see this disgusting type of comment and attitude a lot. Along with those who state they love Jesus more than their own children and will put God before any human, no matter how close. What a sad way to live, for them and their family members.

And people wonder why I'm an antitheist...

4. Church Cancels Teen Gun Giveaway

Comment #210097 by LochRaven on July 13, 2008 at 11:35 pm

Sorry folks...when I submitted that link I didn't intend to start a firestorm about gun ownership in general, it was the circumstances in this particular case that outraged me.

5. Obama Wants to Expand Role of Religious Groups

Comment #203112 by LochRaven on July 2, 2008 at 11:28 am

If a great enough percentage of the voting public believed in the tooth fairy, Obama (or any other candidate) would have himself fitted for a pair of wings and a six foot tooth brush. Nothing to see here, folks....move along....

6. Evangelical Christians sign up to a 'Church within a Church'

Comment #203104 by LochRaven on July 2, 2008 at 11:22 am

You know, sometimes innocently, sometimes on purpose, I will throw out a controversial question to a group of friends and then just shut up and watch how the discussion progresses (ok, I'm naughty sometimes). But I'm beginning to wonder...is this the way God gets his jollies too?

7. Aliens need Christ's redemption, too

Comment #201567 by LochRaven on June 29, 2008 at 8:10 pm

"I am a science fiction writer by trade, and, until recently, a lifelong atheist. This Easter I joined the Roman Catholic Church."

Is this an apology for all the utter nonsense that precedes and follows this admission? Am I the only one a bit suspicious of people who claim to go from atheism to Christianity in mid-life?

Seriously...whom do I see about getting the last 15 minutes of my life back?

8. The End of Theory: The Data Deluge Makes the Scientific Method Obsolete

Comment #199856 by LochRaven on June 26, 2008 at 12:34 pm

"There is now a better way. Petabytes allow us to say: "Correlation is enough." We can stop looking for models. We can analyze the data without hypotheses about what it might show."

Is it just me or does this almost have a religious analogy to it? How about this?:

"There is now a better way. The Bible allows us to say: "God is enough." We can stop looking for models. We can analyze the scriptures without hypotheses about what they might show."

Maybe I'm just being paranoid.

9. Galaxy map hints at fractal universe

Comment #199530 by LochRaven on June 25, 2008 at 10:52 pm

Oh, c'mon folks...the answer to whether or not the universe has a fractal structure at extremely large scales won't be forthcoming from science...it'll come from God...as soon as he decides what He likes better, California wine or Italian wine.

10. Christianity 'could die out within a century'

Comment #197352 by LochRaven on June 21, 2008 at 8:23 pm

In light of this, I suppose someone needs to break the news to God that he only has 100 years left to get off his ass, come out of hiding and start showing himself.

11. New discovery proves 'selfish gene' exists

Comment #197213 by LochRaven on June 21, 2008 at 11:24 am

Hmm...only one sentence devoted to anything new.

"Working with Peter Oxley of the University of Sydney in Australia, Western biology professor Graham Thompson has, for the first time-ever, isolated a region on the honey bee genome that houses this 'selfish' gene in female workers bees."

I would like to hear more details on this statement alone. I'm surprised not more was mentioned about what is really the meat of the story.

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

Comment #197016 by LochRaven on June 21, 2008 at 12:05 am

I fail to see why the DI is so incredulous about criticism of the LSEA coming from people outside the borders of the United States. Does this somehow, to them, lessen the legitimacy of such criticism? Or are creationists organizations just really getting scared of Dawkins and other outspoken rationalists? Let's hope it's the latter.

13. Behe's Empty Box

Comment #193114 by LochRaven on June 14, 2008 at 4:01 pm

EvidenceOnly - Just to add to that, my bowels aren't empty either, but we all know what they contain. :-)

14. Reverse Engineering The Brain To Model Mind-body Interactions

Comment #192563 by LochRaven on June 13, 2008 at 11:50 am

Don't worry, zeroangel..."Big Al's Cyborg Emporium coming soon to a location near you!" Well, maybe not that fast, but one never grows tired of reading about scientific advances...although some do seem to prefer "older" writings, don't they? ;-)

15. Hints of structure beyond the visible universe

Comment #191824 by LochRaven on June 11, 2008 at 11:32 pm

I'm wondering if this 10% difference in the density of matter, and hence the 10% increased "mottled" appearance from one side of the observable universe to the other, might make sense in light of theories that our universe "bubbled" off of a larger parent universe. It seems this bubbling would have had to occur in a specific "direction", for lack of a better term, and we are seeing the increased matter density on the part of the bubble that first expanded.

16. Prayer to feed the hungry

Comment #190159 by LochRaven on June 8, 2008 at 1:18 pm

As the saying goes, "Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; teach a man to fish and he will eat for a lifetime; give a man religion and he will die praying for a fish."