1. Manliness is next to godliness

Comment #49223 by Cholmonedeley on June 11, 2007 at 4:15 am

If anything is more annoying than blatant religiosity, it's phony masculinity. I think there's something to be said for reasserting the value of males in our society, especially these days when men are so often depicted as broken women, but this stuff is just dumb. These guys need to learn real values, like reciprocity--if you "lay down the law" for your wife, she can lay down the law for you, too. A happy life, in my opinion, only comes through living philosophy, and Christianity is very much a blight on philosophy's belly.

2. How to defend your faith with an electric wheelchair

Comment #30442 by Cholmonedeley on April 8, 2007 at 3:55 am

Sometimes all I think the world needs is to just stop giving a sh*t. Go about with your lives, you crazy religites.

3. Christian Socialists head for more radical Labour territory

Comment #27739 by Cholmonedeley on March 26, 2007 at 12:57 pm

Soo...on their pamphlets, Jesus has a big Marx beard?

4. He Calls Himself God

Comment #19735 by Cholmonedeley on January 29, 2007 at 4:45 pm

So, in the Information Age, when information can be broadcast instantaneously across tens of thousands of miles and into the houses and minds of billions of people, and people believe this nonsense?

More importantly, given stories such as this, why is it so implausible that the original Jesus might not exist, or that his followers were lying about his "miracles"?

5. Young, British Muslims 'getting more radical'

Comment #19728 by Cholmonedeley on January 29, 2007 at 2:37 pm

Re: savroD

Sorry, I didn't mean to misrepresent you, but I can only go with what you give me, and what you gave me wasn't very positive, nor did it seem to me to have anything to with how you explained it. It's like this:

Person A (you): "I think we oughtta kill everyone! People don't deserve freedom."

Person B: "What?! Are you crazy? That's completely sociopathic!"

Person A: "Don't take me out of context, you idiot. I clearly meant we should not let people attack us without retaliating."

Yes, I know it's not what you meant, but the way you said it, without much explanation, was how it came out in my eyes.

6. Young, British Muslims 'getting more radical'

Comment #19705 by Cholmonedeley on January 29, 2007 at 11:04 am

savroD said:

I have no moral issues with exterminating those who choose to even threaten us with violence.

I have no problems with Huxley's savage reservation from Brave New World, for the fundamentalists.

So since you advocate removing my freedom in order to meet the vague moral good of "ensuring human survivability," is it O.K. for me to kill you? I mean, since you're basically advocating fascism, it should be alright for me to murder you, correct?

7. Young, British Muslims 'getting more radical'

Comment #19700 by Cholmonedeley on January 29, 2007 at 10:45 am

Re: Janus #26

"Why is it all right to knock a guy out when he's brandishing a knife at you?"

Because he is aggressing against me physically. But how does an ideology equate to a direct physical threat?


"The majority of Muslims aren't just deluded. My aunt who believes in astrology and homeopathy is deluded. My (extremely liberal) Catholic grandmother is deluded. Most Muslims are deluded AND dangerous; perhaps not as individuals (except for extremists), but certainly as a large group."

So when was the last time a muslim brandished a knife at you? Do you have to avoid them on the streets, lest you be attacked?

"In any event, I fail to see the violence involved in banning faith schools. If there is violence, it will come from our dear Muslim friends."

And if someone tries to keep their faith school open, what will happen then? The police will come to shut it down, and if they try to defend their property, they will be physically assaulted. If they are fined, and refuse to pay the fine, the police will come to kidnap them and take them to one of the hot-beds of anal rape known as modern prisons, and if they try to defend themselves, they will be physically assaulted. This is how government works: violence. And if you think it isn't, see what happens when you don't pay your taxes.

"The same goes for putting a halt to Muslim immigration. How any atheist who even remotely agrees with what Dawkins and Harris are saying can disagree with the implementation of these two measures, I can't understand."

I think the faith mindset is dangerous, but I don't think that expanding a government's power in order to suppress a certain ideology is any kind of productive answer, because:

a) it is immoral
b) any power you give to a government to do for you, it can use to do to you. So if in the future, the halls of power decide that atheists are too rebellious...

"I would perhaps offer an incentive for Muslims to go back to their countries of origin, and focus on integrating those who will stay into our countries. The banning of faith schools would be a step in the right direction to accomplish that goal, that's for sure."

Will this incentive come out of your pocket, or the government's treasury? If the latter, why do I have to be forced to pay to support your plan?

And I'm not sure banning anything would be a step in the right direction. Given the nature of government, it will surely work to aggravate the situation, leading of course to the further acquisition of power by the government.

8. Young, British Muslims 'getting more radical'

Comment #19671 by Cholmonedeley on January 29, 2007 at 7:37 am

-TheCodeCrack- llustrates what I feel is the only problem with atheism: get rid of god without getting rid of the State, and the State becomes your god. So if the Statists on this board could answer me one question...

Why is it alright for the government to engage in the violence involved in banning faith schools or ejecting millions of people from a geographic area, but it is not okay for people to engage in violence in the name of their religion?

If you're going to embrace violence as a means towards an end, you may as well respect principled violence, n'est-ce pas?

9. Homophobia, not injustice, is what really fires the faiths

Comment #17298 by Cholmonedeley on January 12, 2007 at 6:59 pm

I can stand these homophobic fundies as little as any other lurker on richarddawkins.net, but by the same token I can't abide these laws. I know the children aren't suddenly going to be "turned" gay by some homosexual proselytizer who's been forced upon these "innocent", good christian groups, but if someone wants to discriminate on whatever grounds I say that's their right. I say, let the free market get rid of all this religious nonsense: those who discriminate who they provide their services to will undercut their own profits by defining out a great deal of their potential customers, and the tolerant rational people of this world will see their businesses boom as good people flock away from the fundies. We don't need laws to stop discrimination and religious zealotry: they will just become too unprofitable.

10. The God of the Bible is No Delusion!

Comment #16572 by Cholmonedeley on January 7, 2007 at 12:06 pm

Pardon me for interloping, I know I haven't been a part of the discussion, but I've read the prophecies Mark Taunton cites and I'm not convinced.

For one thing, the prophecies you cite supposedly in support of example A, Israel's treatment by Rome, are extremely unconvincing. Nowhere do we find any specific mentions of the Romans or any other details giving the identity of the people supposedly punishing Israel at the behest of God. "Mighty men" from "an ancient nation" could easily mean any number of different groups, say, the Spartans for instance. If you have to "interperet" a prophecy at all, it ain't a prophecy. All of these prophecies really seem to be stern warnings against spiritual infidelity: a land-based culture that promotes marrying within the "tribe," it's easy to see why someone might try to frighten them by saying that what they have been raised to value will be upset by irreligiosity.

Israel's treatment by Rome is hardly against "all human expectations," either. Rome wanted to dominate the world: the Jews wanted political independence. Therefore the Jews were broken up by Rome to weaken them. This kind of behavior on the part of empires is not uncommon throughout human history: the Inca empire did it, for one, and it had happened to the Jews previous to the Romans, so it wasn't like they couldn't expect it. They may have even thought that their punishment would happen at the hands of the Babylonians, back when that prophecy occurred.

What you need to do is demonstrate the correlation between whatever infidelity these prophecies refer to and the assaults on the Jews by various rival states, not just that the prophecies' dire predictions came true (given the brutality of the ancient world, it's improbable that such things wouldn't come true). I think you would probably find this very difficult. Therefore these prophecies were more likely warnings against irreligiosity (note the Bible's command to raze any village with even a single unbeliever in it) than an accurate prediction.

As far as example B goes, give me a break! The Jews re-forming Israel is by no means "beyond all human expectations." Their religion demands that they hold certain lands holy: therefore, like computer programs, they gravitate towards that land. It's like saying that Evangelical Christians proselytizing, 10th century Muslims conquering new lands for the "fold of Islam," or Tibetan Buddhists not violently resisting the aggressions of foreign nations is an unexpected event. No, it isn't: it's their programming! It's like inventing a religion based on space travel, making a prediction about reaching another planet, and then looking back at that prediction and thinking it means something! Any of the events "prophesied" in the Bible could be reasonably expected with a general knowledge of Judaism and a knowledge of the behavior of nation-states, all without referring to any of the actual prophecies.

And as others have pointed out, other religions have their prophecies, as well, many of which have come just as true as any in the Bible. There has long been a Tibetan Buddhist prophecy, for instance, that the 14th Dalai Lama would not live in Tibet. Guess what? The current Lama is the 14th, and he doesn't live in Tibet. Strengthening the probability that this was actually an accurate prophecy, this happened not because of internal affairs in Tibet but because China forced him out--and it's not like China would want to validate his status as a "divine being," would they?

You have three logical options, in my opinion. Either accept Tibetan Buddhism, because it made a clear and accurate prediction, whereas the Bible makes none; accept that all religions are valid and that there are actually many gods, because every religion has had many of its own "predictions" fulfilled; and your own god is simply an egotistical tyrant; or reject all religions and say that there is something to the act of prophecy that simply doesn't have anything to do with whether a religion is correct or incorrect.

11. Without God, Gall Is Permitted

Comment #16359 by Cholmonedeley on January 6, 2007 at 8:33 am

Dear Sam,

In your article, you wrote the following:

To a lot of atheists, the fate of civilization and of mankind depends on their ability to cool--or better, simply to ban--the fevered fancies of the God-intoxicated among us.

I am unaware of anyone among the prominent "New Atheists" who have suggested that the State be given the power to ban religion. I find this to be a very meanspirited misrepresentation: I have never heard it expressed in months of cruising in sites such as richarddawkins.net and other similar forums. Therefore I ask that you either provide some documentation showing that this is a widely held sentiment, or qualify this to show that it is a minority opinion, or apologize for this very extreme accusation.

12. Without God, Gall Is Permitted

Comment #16352 by Cholmonedeley on January 6, 2007 at 8:01 am

Scooternyc said:
"Actually, I disagree. I understand faith as a "new atheist" as I was raised catholic, went to catholic school for 10 years and I was raised religiously. It was in the 3rd grade at the age of 8 that I discovered for myself the ridiculous nature of religion. A year later I gave up Santa Claus, as well. If I didn't believe in god it made sense then that Santa didn't exist either. I suspect that there are many like myself who grew up understanding faith and then abandoned it. "

Forgive me for overgeneralizing. My general impression remains, though: throughout my life, most people I have known have either been atheists or I simply have never known their religion, so I may be biased by my experience.

13. Secular fundamentalists are the new totalitarians

Comment #16347 by Cholmonedeley on January 6, 2007 at 7:26 am

Having seen the horrors wreaked on private individuals by religious legislation in the U.S.--the criminalization of sodomy in Texas, for instance--this article strikes a hollow note with me. Things might be different in Europe, I don't know, but in America it's the diametric opposite of the situation he describes. He complains about those who see no difference between a crime and a sin (please, I'm a libertarian!). I think we have more to worry about from those who want the two to be the same than from those who don't want others implementing neurotic legislation based on the personal use of one's genitals.

14. Without God, Gall Is Permitted

Comment #16241 by Cholmonedeley on January 5, 2007 at 5:07 pm

Schulman makes plenty of factually accurate points: No, the "new atheists" don't understand faith, and he's probably correct in that most don't believe in the way they are represented; and No, this new generation isn't the same as the old days, for many of us weren't raised religiously. I would also join with Schuman in warning against the equation of atheism with intelligence (although he thinks it's more widespread than it probably is): all are born atheists, so it doesn't really reflect on one's intelligence. Rationality, when faced with the appropriate evidence and arguments, but not intelligence. On a side note, some might also find Harris's views aside from his atheism on, say, torture or ESP.

I find much to object to, however, namely some very serious misrepresentations. What popped out at me were the following:

A new generation of publicists for atheism has emerged to tell Americans in particular that we should be ashamed to retain a majority of religious believers, that in this way we resemble the benighted, primitive peoples of the Middle East, Africa and South America instead of the enlightened citizens of Western Europe.

That's pretty arrogant, and unless I see some quotations otherwise I'd say he's rather projecting his own biases onto those he dislikes.

To a lot of atheists, the fate of civilization and of mankind depends on their ability to cool--or better, simply to ban--the fevered fancies of the God-intoxicated among us.

Personally, I feel that the assertion of individual rights--and the basic wrongness of aggression against others--is far more important than proselytizing unbelief alone, which is why I detest this blatant Straw Manning. Moreover, few if any of us want to expand the government's power so that it can literally ban a personal belief. We recognize that anything the government can do for us, it can do to us (although we aren't monolithic: so "poo poo!" to those who do want to ban it). This part alone practically makes this article qualify as propaganda.

15. No religion and an end to war: how thinkers see the future

Comment #15864 by Cholmonedeley on January 3, 2007 at 11:43 am

I'm not sure that this:

"This final scientific enlightenment will deal an overdue death blow to religion and other juvenile superstitions."

will ever happen. A Theory of Everything, for one, seems to me to be beyond the reach of human knowledge. Every time we say we're onto it, another thing is discovered--Newtonian physics, then the Theory of Relativity, Quantum physics, String Theory, M-Theory--and then we say that we're finally almost onto the Grand Theory. In this layman's mind, there will be new things to take into consideration until the end of the human species through cataclysm.

Second, we'll never really get rid of faith: there are people who think that Harry Potter is a real person and Rand Al'Thor really is going to fight the Dark One in another few ages.

That's not to say neither pursuit is worth it, as we've come very far in science and in beating back the lions associated with religion in just a few hundred years of effort, but some things, like uncertainty about the true nature of reality and the human tendency for faith, seem to me to simply be inherent facets of our world.

16. If they preach the cause of the poor, they're my people

Comment #15862 by Cholmonedeley on January 3, 2007 at 11:33 am

I like how Mr. Lawson equates a hostility to capitalism with moral superiority. I think this article reveals the common line between the economic Left and the religious Right--a hostility to the notion that "individual freedom [is the] fundamental value to which all others must be subject." They're not talking about preventing people from murdering others and calling it an exercise of individual freedom: it's an embrace of equality for the sake of equality--it offends them that some people just have more stuff than others. This is borne out by this absurd passage:

"If their surrender to the nostrums of neoliberalism denies them moral purpose, then they will attack those who are prepared to stand with the poor and denounce the culture of greed at institutions such as Goldman Sachs.."

Goldman Sachs? An investment banking firm? This is as important as the Iraq war? Has the company been going around pillaging and raping? Has it decided it is owed taxes, and started holding people up at gunpoint?

Basically what Lawson is saying is that he likes religion because religites more consistently want to "shave the peaks to fill the valleys," to coin a phrase, whereas politics leaves him unsatisfied because his favored party can't execute this goal. Yes, it's shameful that government is in the thrall of big business, but that's what happens when you let people force others to give them money: the Law of Parsimony, the general tendency of human nature which states that people will satisfy their needs and wants with as little exertion as possible, comes into action, and companies will seek to get in on the free flowing money that comes from mass robbery.

17. Left Behind: Eternal Forces on The Daily Show

Comment #15509 by Cholmonedeley on December 31, 2006 at 10:37 pm

Luckily, like games based on DragonballZ, these games will never be good enough to appeal to anyone besides their pre-established fan bases. Their makers are made lazy by the guaranteed money that comes with such marketing ploys--the fans will buy anything with the right label.

18. A Christmas thunderbolt for the arch-enemy of religion

Comment #14729 by Cholmonedeley on December 24, 2006 at 7:37 pm

G_D said:
" Did you never learn that Marx, who characterised religion as the "opium of the people", conjured up a dream of the perfectibility of humankind according to mechanical laws that operate like those of the natural sciences."

Here's the full quote, for your consideration:

"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people." --Karl Marx

I hate defending Marx, but the last bit of that quotation is often taken way too far out of context. Maybe, in between castigating Mr. Dawkins for not doing his research and offering only arguments from effect concerning religion, he should have done a little background research.

And although the article contains a good refutation of the notion that Hitler was a Roman Catholic, it dwells just a bit too narrowly on the beliefs of the "top dogs." It's ironic that such an angry defense of religion should include these gems, right next to each other:

"Hitler cynically played fast and loose with religion, to manipulate the German people."

Conveniently exonerating the German people for going along with Hitler. Maybe if religion were as beneficial as the LORD thinks, it would have taught them to be more free-thinking.

"Whenever and wherever he deemed religionists a threat to his own self-idolatry he persecuted them and purged them."

And when they helped Hitler and Stalin, they were rewarded. That religion was on the wrong end of the bayonet was a coincidence of politics and ideology, not inherent opposition to tyranny.

I also took issue with this little bit:

" There is no more powerful incentive for universal respect than the proposition that all without exception are children of God and find their ultimate destiny in Me."

A) The LORD again assigns qualities to religion which are by no means innate to it.
B) That's a matter of opinion. Personally, I think the principle of Self-Ownership is pretty good.

I really never thought that G_D would dance around the question of its existence so thoroughly. But I guess when you can't answer a question, you're already limiting yourself to people who already agree with you, so it doesn't matter.

19. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14505 by Cholmonedeley on December 22, 2006 at 9:27 pm

Blaine said:
"I recommend that people consider who funds all of the positive talk about absolute free trade (including Friedman)-- people and corporations who make millions of dollars now, and whose money will completely own our governments if free trade is not controlled.

Rich corporations and individuals are the only people with the power to decide who our government leaders are, and what our laws are. This is un-democratic. It is just getting worse as the accelleration of lobbying continues. In America, every powerful politician is rich, or is controlled by corporations. The food industry controls the laws that control the food industry. The largest companies are changing laws so that they can get around the laws made for the very purpose of restraining them. Current news says that the major airlines may collapse from about 8 to about 4 next year."

As Edutheria already said, discrediting the people who propound and benefit from an idea does not reflect on the idea itself. Your argument is basically Ad Hominem.

However, you do raise good points, but I draw the opposite conclusion from them: it is the government, not free trade, that needs to be limited.

Take this example:
"Current news says that the major airlines may collapse from about 8 to about 4 next year."

I, like most Texans, and indeed many throughout the American midwest, have put up with a great deal of frustration at the antics of airline companies in recent times. Along with subsidies, airlines have been on the benefitting end of many protectionist policies which limit competition, such as the deal made some 15-20 years ago which closed off Dallas's Love Field airport to certain airlines. Why has this been happening? Is it just the perils of the free market, wreaking itself on the proletariat?

No.

All of these problems have stemmed from the policies of the government. It is the government which insists that our airlines need to be given subsidies, helping those companies keep afloat while they overcharge passengers and use the horribly inefficient "hub and spoke" system. Without the government's interference, the one profitable major airline, Southwest, which offers decent prices if not classy traveling conditions, would be not an exception but the rule.

Your analysis looks in entirely the wrong direction to solve our problems, and only succeeds in creating more of them when put into practice. More socialism won't cure the ails of socialism, Capitalism will. Certainly, politicians make money off of giving favorable policies to companies, and that is despicable, but giving them even more power to decide who gets ahead and who doesn't won't help anything or anyone but those who would abuse the (bloated and gargantuan) powers that they already have.

20. The problem with secularism

Comment #14442 by Cholmonedeley on December 22, 2006 at 1:09 pm

A bunch of unsupported, un-backed statements, posited with arrogant certainty that is not reflected in their actual philosophical or factual merit. They may as well just be arguing "well, the fundamentalists aren't real christians/muslims/hindus." (As though they are in a position to objectively decide what is.)

The explanation of this article lies in their review of TDG as "barely literate." How we can expect anything but unsupported bollocks from people without the mental nuance to give a pro and con assessment of a like-it-or-not important book.
How this statement came about, I'll never know:

The trouble is that this supposition sounds more bizarre than religion. Moreover, to posit this paradigm leads to the Matrix hypothesis that we are actually only a virtual simulation run by other universes more powerful and real. So religion finds itself in the strange position of defending the real world against those who would make us merely virtual phenomena.

Say what? A Matrix, being "run" by other universes? Can you find a more absurd and vaguely anthropomorphic statement in the annals of philosophy? And what about religion prevents us from being simulations in the mind of a god?

They're arguing from their conclusion, as made apparent in their final paragraph:

In the new, post-secular world, religion cannot be eliminated and, properly figured, is in fact our best hope for a genuine alternative to the prevailing extremes.

The argument from effect. No support about how we're going to objectively answer the question of the existence of god/s. Apparently they think the benefits of answering why "moral absolutes exist and why they care about us" are to be found in just making up the source. If they want an answer to this question, I recommend them to "For a New Liberty," by Murray N. Rothbard, or the writings and podcasts of Stefan Molyneux. We don't need to make up ghosts to tell us why we need to be good*, we can observe the real world and make decisions based on objective criteria, such as whether someone has a forebrain or not. Indeed, I think the only thing we really need in the area of morality is the doctrine of Self Ownership.

This is just another piece angrily reacting to atheism with the blanket insistence that religion is just plain better than not believing. With the tone and general sophistry of this article, they may as well be saying "Na na na na, boo boo."

*this only answers the question of what the moral laws are, not why they are good or bad or even whether we can objectively identify them: with the strange doctrine of "progressive revelation," in which god gradually changes morality over time, I would think these guys would be tearing their hair out and lambasting Christianity over this question.

21. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14277 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 9:38 pm

Re: JohnC #51

1) Homeschooling as "extreme individualism": I think that your view of what qualifies extreme individualism is more revealing about your own views than what individualism is. One of these things is not like the other:
Brainwashing children
Punishing dissent with the threat of hell fire
Individualism

That we should all be required to participate, and required to subject our children to schools we find ideologically or educationally objectionable, smacks to me of collectivism at its worst. Unless the parents are beating or detaining them, I see no reason why we must assign the police to kidnap the parents and coerce them into conformity. In a free market, this silliness will wash away of its own accord as more rational societies excel and irrational societies are left behind on their farms. Furthermore, the establishment of state-controlled schools was a terrible thing for the world. Aware libertarians see no small coincidence in the fact that the generation that fought WWI was also the first to have its education funded by the government.

2)"This is the fundamental error of American libertarianism and its kindred ideologies that deny the "civilizing" role of the state, which is itself an expression of a social contract of its mutually interdependent citizens."
States are not necessarily civilizing--there are several examples of healthy, propserous stateless societies-- and I don't recall sigining any social contract. This social contract seems to me to be completely involuntary, and in fact an invention of government-oriented thinkers. Of all the examples of states created in the previous several centuries, I have seen absolutely zero evidence of the "social contract" being put into place. An interesting analysis of this is (what else) "The State," by Franz Oppenheimer.

Franz Oppenheimer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Oppenheimer

"The State" available online:
http://www.franz-oppenheimer.de/state0.htm

22. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14273 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 8:25 pm

Re: JohnC #46

I don't think anybody thinks that the United States doesn't have problems, probably requiring dramatic solutions. However, I find your analysis of the roots lacking. As an American, I am well aware that these people are by definition not individualists: they want the government to ban gay marriage; they accuse opponents of the war in Iraq of out and out treason; they demand that we "love [America] or leave it," an entirely Communistic/Fascistic sentiment. These people are not independent-minded, they are in posession of authoritarian personalities. Authoritarian personalities are a constant in just about any society: in the U.S., the number of people who posess them number roughly 30% percent. So they may be a product of our society, but they aren't products of individualism.

I would also like a more concrete definition of "extreme individualism," as it seems something of a vague term.

Re: JohnC #47:
Can you define "social responsibility"? Why do I have a responsibility to give up my money to alleviate the problems others have caused? Given that my country has been waging "wars on poverty" on and off for the last forty years, I think that it is in fact irresponsible to continue along the same failing path.

Here is an interesting article on socialized medicine from the Mises institute:
http://www.mises.org/story/2424

I'm not sure who's debating the correlation between religiosity and crappy social conditions, or the dangers of patriotism.

23. I love the commercialisation of Christmas

Comment #14264 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 7:00 pm

Jiten said:
" the long answer has been more than adequately provided by Marx and I wouldn't be able to match his eloquence.His critique of Capitalism is still very relevant today.The evidence is all around you."

I would say that Marx's predictions about Capitalism have fallen flat. In fact, a few of his criticisms of Capitalism may even have been projection: for instance, he once had an affair with, and impregnated, a woman who worked for him. He threw this woman out on the street when she became inconvenient. More broadly, his basic idea that Capitalism would just keep putting more and more people out of work, resulting in an inevitable revolution, has fallen flat, with even nominally capitalistic countries standing on their feet long after the failure of most Communist countries. To quote a joke used widely by Russian economists surrounding the collapse of the USSR, "Communism is the long road from Capitalism to Capitalism."

"Why do you assume that any alternative to Capitalist society will result in an erosion of economic freedom or for that matter the freedom of ideas? Is it because of what went on in the former USSR?"

Systems other than capitalism tend to breed uncertainty about property rights, thus requiring a central hegemonic force to maintain order. However, the decisions are inevitably arbitrary, limiting economic freedom, and of course very inefficient, leading to ever stricter measures (and thus more opportunities to abuse power, limiting freedom of ideas) to maintain the situation.

24. I love the commercialisation of Christmas

Comment #14217 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 2:03 pm

It seems to me that Christianity today is facing the same problem they did when they first decided to celebrate Christmas over Saturnalia. The tradition of festivities and gift-giving at the most dreary time of the year is just too appealing to leave to one religion alone. One wonders how they ever got so many people to convert in the first place.

Jiten said:
"Edutheria asks what is wrong with commerce.The short answer is Capitalism.It is destroying this world."

What a pity that one of the greatest advances in human interactions is so often considered disease upon the planet. I suppose seeing the burning rivers left behind by the Soviet government after it collapsed aren't enough to convince people that the government can't really stop pollution or alleviate social problems.

If we were in a Capitalist system, things would look very different. However, the word that better describes our current (domestic and international) systems is Mercantilism, which is use of companies by the government, to put it shortly. The government doesn't place a zillion advertisements out for Christmas, but the real problems such as pollution and war are directly attributable to the influence of the government. That they use companies to assist in their self-destruction is coincidental.

25. Now we know how to make the IDists dance in their petticoats: blaspheme.

Comment #14072 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 3:48 am

Here is where Dembski posts his "challenge" to Dawkins on his blog:

http://www.uncommondescent.com/archives/1884

You'll notice an unusual amount of Christian theology (even a little bit of Christian chauvanism) in the content of the posting and the comments for a blog devoted to a purportedly scientific topic. It seems to me that adherents to I.D. are rather like other conspiracy theorists: its adherents seize on small, in the long run either explainable or inconsequential, inconsistencies and then claim that the whole picture needs to be turned upside down for those tiny inconsistencies--a bit like insisting that an elephant should trip over a pebble. Never do they look at the fact that the current theory arose from times when most people believed exactly what they believed, and indeed when there was great pressure not to accept the theory of evolution.

26. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14066 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 3:16 am

JohnC said:
"Greyed: "Religion, especially Evangelical Christianity, is about giving up one's individualism to... God."

Nope. You can't give up anything to an imaginary being."

I don't see why it's so important that god is imaginary. The idea is about obeying god, and isn't that what matters? Most people here have never seen the "War on Terror" taking place, and in fact you can't fight a war against a tactic in the first place, but then again a lot of people have strong feelings about the ideas surrounding the term, don't they?

27. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14064 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 3:05 am

RE: JohnC #29

1. I've also heard that the homicide rate is higher in Australia, 7%, than in the U.S.. I'd love to see hard numbers, but from everything I have heard and read over the years, societies with more gun owners are by and large safer than those with fewer gun owners. Maybe, if a few more aussies owned guns...? Also, why do Australians find American gun culture disturbing? You're an ocean away: stray bullets won't get you!

2. Not sure how #2 relates to individualism. I'm also not sure about the social limits to individualism, aside from the fact that we must be presentable and seem sane in order to survive (comfortably) in most societies.

28. The Trouble with Atheism

Comment #14062 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 2:52 am

RE: David A. Robertson

A "troll" is one who starts meaningless conflicts on message boards, chatrooms, or any other medium involving internet communication. Given the contentless and adversarial nature of your first post on this thread, you were labeled a troll.

You're right to call me down on this:
"First, I'm not sure how good tolerance in the face of irrationality is."
We should take great care to avoid dogmatism: the example I give of Ayn Rand in her later years is just the danger you cite. Humility with respect to the truth tends to have very good effects, and the opposite attitude bad effects.

However, what I think I meant earlier is that I see no innate value in tolerance, per se: we don't have to be tolerant of misrepresentations of ourselves, or intolerance in general.

I did make a few other points in my response, however, and I note that you only deigned to descend from your mentally healthy ivory tower to attack the very weakest of my arguments. Given that you took issue with a statement halfway through my post, I'm assuming you saw the link to the article concerning Hitler's religiosity. Anything to say about that? Since this is so often a point of note in debates over the value of religion, and indeed you cite his purported atheism in your own articles, I would like to know if there are any conclusive proofs (by induction or evidence, I'm not terribly picky) one way or the other concerning his beliefs.

29. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14055 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 2:19 am

Aussie said:
"Don't you think for example that the right of any individual to carry a gun encroaches on the safety and peace of mind of other members of the community?"

1) I don't think that peace of mind is a right. Peace of mind can be disturbed by any number of things, and is not limited to the potential of danger to oneself or loved ones.

2) I don't think it encroaches on the safety of others to carry a gun, unless the person carrying the gun is mentally unstable (in which case, giving the person the gun is as good as firing into the air). Where it begins encroaching on the rights of others is when the gun is used in either an irresponsible manner (firing into the air) or for malicious purposes (mugging, etc.), neither of which are rights because they endager others unnecessarily and involve coercion, respectively.

JohnC said:
"But arguably this intense polarisation is itself a side-effect of extreme individualism, where the "right" to hold any idea - however loony - takes absolute priority over the content of the ideas."

Who decides what ideas are permissible to hold? You are wading in dangerous waters. How this translates into "extreme individualism" is lost on me.

30. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14049 by Cholmonedeley on December 21, 2006 at 1:56 am

RE: JohnC

I don't see how individualism is the problem. The idea that obedience to someone is a precondition of goodness, which these people by definition espouse, would seem to me to be the very opposite of individualism.

31. CBC Segment on Evangelist Christians

Comment #14036 by Cholmonedeley on December 20, 2006 at 11:52 pm

derwent said:
"If that's ALL your country was doing, I don't think there'd be a problem. Besides, nobody wants to take away your right to "think weird things", but a line must be drawn where someone attempts to inflict their weird thoughts on others.

This knee-jerk patriotism and paranoid obsession with individual "liberties" at any cost is not healthy. Some people just don't seem to understand that, when taken to extremes, the rights of one individual inevitably encroach on the rights of other individuals.

The language you've used here is much like some theists would use to defend their indoctrination techniques - "You can't tell me how to raise my children! You can't tell me how to do ANYTHING because THIS IS AMERICA!" It's a selfish, petulant attitude and I think the teenager metaphor is quite apt."

How do individual liberties inevitably encroach on the rights of others? Or, what are these extremes you are talking about? I don't think that the rights of any individual encroach on the rights of other individuals, because you don't have the right to encroach on the rights of others.

And by "inflicting" views on others, are you referring to things like the "christian movie workshop" featured in the video, or the "sermon" where they showed the "every time you masturbate, god kills a kitten" video? If that is the case, can you show me anyone being held against their will? I agree that it's unethical to indoctrinate children, and that the U.S. government engages in unscrupulous activities, but I find your apparent hostility to individual liberties somewhat alarming.

32. The Trouble with Atheism

Comment #13864 by Cholmonedeley on December 19, 2006 at 8:41 pm

David A Robertson said:
"It's amusing to watch how you fundamentalist atheists react whenever your faith is attacked. You really should let me write your posts for you. It's the usual comments - Straw men - AD hominem - Hitler was not an atheist - and my personal favourite 'Communism is not atheistic' (a bit like arguing Christianity is not theistic). And I also love 'atheism is not a dogmatic belief system'. Yeah like this website just oozes non dogmatism, rationalism and tolerance. "

Anything to say about the comments made-- are they logically or factually correct or incorrect? Or were you just making an observation? Here are my questions for you:

"Communism essentially atheistic": I don't see the connection. Marx himself called religion "The heart in a heartless world...it is the opiate of the masses." I have also read that Soviet Russia in fact supported the church during the second world war, the rationale of the government involving the words "unity" and "patriotism" as was their wont. The relationship between Communist governments and organized religion is that of any country, including religious ones, seeking totalitarian dominance over their subjects: they demand absolute obedience, and the degree to which organized religions try to hog the loyalty of the people, the two institutions will clash. That religions tend to oppose the totalitarianism of governments is to their credit, but then again they have often behaved in the same manner as those tyrannies. Furthermore, I myself am a libertarian anarcho-capitalist, the exact opposite of a communist, and I am atheist as well (and know many others who share those two labels), so if you want to draw a direct line between atheism and communism, it is looking increasingly difficult to do so.

No, Hitler wasn't an atheist: http://www.secularhumanism.org/index.php?section=library&page=murphy_19_2
Now quit whining about the predictability of the claim, and rebut it!
A few facts of note concerning the religious habits of tyrants: Both Stalin and Pol Pot attended Catholic school--Stalin almost became a priest and Pol Pot was raised Catholic.

"Yeah like this website just oozes non dogmatism, rationalism and tolerance."—First, I'm not sure how good tolerance in the face of irrationality is. Also, people here tend not to like irrational arguments against things like I.D. or God, etcetera. They find plenty of holes in articles that present weak arguments for their positions. You'll also notice that this website has posted countless negative reviews of The God Delusion and attacks on atheism in general. I would love to see freechurch.org publish a chapter of T.G.D. or articles from infidels.org challenging the rationality of the triune god or the substitutive sacrifice that is the basis of your whole religion. You do have a point, though: people can be self-righteous and emotionally fervent about just about anything, regardless of whether it's rational or not. Just look at how Ayn Rand got towards the end of her life. The key to turning these feelings into a "crusade," however, is a unifying philosophy that atheism in and of itself cannot provide. The God Delusion was written as a criticism of religion, not of the glories of atheism, after all. The people of the Soviet Union let Stalin starve millions for the sake of Communism and totalitarianism (the tool by which Communism must usually be implemented), not for their lack of belief in god, and the German people let their government march into Poland because they believed in National Socialism, not for atheism. Atheists are so varied in their other philosophies, most of which (Communism, itself an economic religion for all its faulty premises, anarchism, socialism, laissez-faire-ists, what-have-you) do not necessitate atheism to begin with, that I think it is inappropriate to give "atheism" a capital letter, something which many, including Mr. Liddle, feel very eager to do.