1. Reading of The God Delusion in Philadelphia v2

Comment #282821 by William1w1 on November 12, 2008 at 7:27 pm

I thoroughly enjoyed listening to Richard Dawkins in this two-year-old video. I wonder why more people don't watch these older videos later on. Perhaps they just don't leave comments.

2. Pascal's Wager

Comment #269187 by William1w1 on October 22, 2008 at 5:59 pm

A wise man once said, "What if you're wrong about the great JubJub at the bottom of the sea?"

3. Memories Selectively, Safely Erased In Mice

Comment #269173 by William1w1 on October 22, 2008 at 5:34 pm

This will open up a lot of doors. I'm sure if they are able to discover exactly how memory works, there will be plenty of new insights into things like amnesia.

I wouldn't get any of my memories erased though, no matter how scary or boring they are. If they go away, then I'm not me anymore. But what about the stuff I already don't remember...? I can't remember what I had for supper eight months ago... So, it's kind of like that meal never happened...

4. Afghan student gets 20 years instead of death for blasphemy

Comment #269165 by William1w1 on October 22, 2008 at 5:23 pm

This is utterly insane. Aren't there an assortment of countries' militias there right now? I know Canada's is. Shouldn't this be the kind of thing they should be putting a stop to? I mean, even if it stirs up some big raucous, you can't just sit around while some guy gets death or 20 years in prison for printing off some papers.

5. Religion out of medicine, a new message for Ontario doctors

Comment #232518 by William1w1 on August 18, 2008 at 9:01 am

I don't understand how someone could be for the privatization of health care. Everyone in a society should be looked after and treated as an equal when it comes to his or her health and safety. Suggesting that we Canadians should privatize health care is akin to suggesting that we privatize police or fire service. Imagine you're about to be murdered by your neighbour, and you dial 911. Before the operator sends help, however, she asks first if you have adequate insurance/funds to cover the police service. This is obviously ridiculous, as is refusing help to a terminally ill child because of a lack of funds.

Americans may indeed have better and speedier health care for those that can afford it, but here we strive to treat everyone equally in the same way that preference would not be given on who to save if two houses were burning down.

6. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #214377 by William1w1 on July 20, 2008 at 10:55 am

I don't know if this issue was necessarily resolved earlier, but I saw that some people felt that we could perhaps see farther away than 13 or so billion light years. We cannot; the light has not yet reached us from beyond this point. Our telescopes look farther and farther back in time towards the Big Bang. We cannot see past the Big Bang. What we can do is surmise that there must be more galaxies than we can see right "now." In a billion years, there will be a billion more light years worth of young galaxies that look the way they did when the universe was young and we were right next to them.

7. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #214154 by William1w1 on July 19, 2008 at 7:08 pm

Comment #214149 by Styrer

The difficulty of testing for an omnipotent, omniscient god who designed everything so that we would not believe in him is that it would be impossible to disprove his existence. Any evidence we find would have been designed just to throw us off. But I must again state the ridiculous nature of the proposition of such a god.

I was, of course, joking about the cuts and bruises thing. If anyone throws a rock at me, then there are certainly going to be some criminal charges, and I will not be very impressed.

8. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #214142 by William1w1 on July 19, 2008 at 5:34 pm

Comment #214133 by Styrer

A universe with a creator would be different than one without unless that creator made everything with the specific purpose of testing our faith (arrangement of fossils in the ground, universal redshift, etc...). But this is obviously such a ridiculous notion that we can count it out, especially since it is so easy to show how human minds would invent such a creator. I'm quite certain that everyone here would likely agree with my above statement. A lot of people, even Dr. Dawkins, seem to be dancing around semantics. If you proposed to Dawkins that the cosmos has a creator who makes everything look like there is no creator, then he will probably look at you like you have a mental problem, but I doubt he would say that a universe with this creator is any different than one without.

As for the shirt, I have not yet gotten it in the mail, but I do imagine that the occasional stone will be thrown. I will bear my bruises and cuts with pride.

9. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #214130 by William1w1 on July 19, 2008 at 4:23 pm

"There's a few more than 40 RD videos on YouTube - I just did a search and it's 3,670 if you search for "Richard Dawkins"..."

This was one of the first comments on the article, and I thought I'd respond. I don't want to look like too much of a moron.

I haven't really done much responding to articles specific to Richard Dawkins on this site because I'm relatively new here. Since joining, I have not seen much of anything NEW that is specific to Dawkins. I didn't respond much to old articles because I figured that no one would likely read my comments. I did comment on the one about the crow with the hook though. That was really cool.

This is the first comment-leaving-site thing that I've ever been a part of. I now see the point. Many people leave messages and then respond to people only minutes later so that arguments and discussions can happen. I like this idea, and I shall have to try it when I have time on my hands.

Now, to deal with the argument that's going on at the moment.

Probability is an important part of any measurement. I wouldn't say that galaxies farther away than we can see are not worth talking about. For as far as we can see, the universe is relatively uniform. Thus we can assume that there are likely galaxies beyond what we can see. If we do not assume this, then the entire theory on the Big Bang could be wrong. This is essentially Hubble's Principle. The Big Bang Theory holds only with Hubble's Principle. There could be billions of stuffed animals just beyond the observable universe. My point is that we can still infer things we cannot observe or detect from what we can. If we didn't do this, then many leading ideas on many natural phenomena would simply be rejected on the basis that something has to be assumed.

On an entirely different note, I just purchased an RDF t-shirt. I'm quite happy about it.

10. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #213716 by William1w1 on July 18, 2008 at 8:09 pm

I always try to comment about the article that I've read, so I'm glad that I can finally talk about Richard Dawkins.

I've always been an athiest, well at least since I could ask the question of why we're here. Throughout school, from roughly grade two onwards, I would try to convince people of the ridiculousness of believing in God. I must say that I often felt quite alone. Even when I found other atheists, they generally felt that religions deserve more respect than anything, even scientific inquiry. I often felt bad because I lost respect for people based on their beliefs. It was not until later that I realized that if someone believes something so massively stupid, then it should indeed be difficult to respect him or her.

And then I read 'The God Delusion.' Every argument Dawkins made resounded with perfection. He left no basic argument out of his book. I felt wholly satisfied because he had touched on everything that I wanted him to. Perhaps what was best was the realization that there are other intelligent and liberal people out there who find that religious people do not deserve respect for such ludicrous beliefs.

Richard Dawkins is awesome. I'm an 18-year-old man, and if I saw him I'd probably scream and then babble like a schoolgirl meeting her favourite pop-star... I don't think I'd ask for an autograph. I've never understood the importance of a signature. I would definitely take a picture if I had a camera though.

11. Ten Commandments' of race and genetics issued

Comment #213239 by William1w1 on July 18, 2008 at 10:25 am

The suggestions of the article are definitely overkill. Let science find out whatever is true.

12. Fury at funeral songs ban

Comment #211327 by William1w1 on July 15, 2008 at 6:59 pm

It's the family's fault for having the Catholics host the event. You can't expect those crazy Christians to behave rationally.

13. MnIndy interview: Unrepentant science-heathen PZ Myers still intends to prove 'this cracker is nothing'

Comment #211088 by William1w1 on July 15, 2008 at 1:44 pm

I can see your position Steve Zara, but I'm afraid I have to agree with Irate. Besides, if covertly stealing a cracker can get this kind of response, then it has to be done, and often. That way, maybe the Catholics will loosen their firm hold on 'crackergods'. It's the same idea as ridiculing Islam excessively in order to hopefully modernize a lot of them. Hitchens made a good point about the whole thing in one of his speeches about the issue (that issue being the Muslims, not the crackergods).

14. Ants, terrorism, and the awesome power of memes

Comment #210548 by William1w1 on July 14, 2008 at 7:19 pm

I don't even know what a strawman is. Can someone explain it to me?

Also, does anyone else notice the EXCESSIVE USE OF CAPITAL LETTERS that religious people use when they make arguments? It's so aggravating, I CONSTANTLY HEAR YELLING IN MY HEAD, followed by softness, AND THEN MORE ANGRY YELLING!!! They must yell to make up for their lack of any substantial arguments.

15. Church Cancels Teen Gun Giveaway

Comment #210532 by William1w1 on July 14, 2008 at 6:50 pm

sseldogmai:

I think my argument about the mortars holds. Just because the criminal on Main Street has one doesn't mean you should.

I remember I saw news reports on the Virginia Tech shootings. A bunch of people were actually suggesting it would have been safer if more students had guns to stop those doing the killing. Obviously, that's ridiculous. I believe the same idea applies to a society.

I agree that America is likely one of the better places in the world to live. Canada is most certainly not the best either. I think Sweden or some similar nearby country would be the best just based on everything I've heard and read about.

I understand that you never saw a violent crime involving a weapon. That's good. But your constitution says you can own a handgun, and that makes me uncomfortable. If this makes me a sissy, then I guess that's what I am.

16. Church Cancels Teen Gun Giveaway

Comment #209877 by William1w1 on July 13, 2008 at 1:10 pm

I think the the right of citizens of the United States to possess weapons is obsolete. That law was made when the worst thing that someone could have owned was a musket. If you never change a constitution, then as the years go by and society changes, old laws seem more and more absurd. There's a reason the United States have far more gun-related deaths than here in Canada, and it isn't thanks to differences in the movies we watch. It's because of the accessibility of guns and the way the public views them in general.

To all of you claiming that knives and bats are dangerous too, it's a question of where to draw the line. Certainly, no one here would endorse the right of citizens to own mortars, that would be insane. But if buddy down the street has one, then shouldn't you too? No! All this would do is make everyone scared and more likely to kill or be killed.

By the way, we aren't even allowed to carry knives with blades longer than an average palm size, basically limiting us to pocket knives, and as well it should be. All your gun rallies and arguments that people should have guns frankly scare the hell out of me. It's the major reason that I never want to visit America. For all I know, the guy next to me on a bus could have a gun. Yes, that could happen here too, but it's far less likely, and if it were reported or seen the person with the gun would be arrested.

I mean I would be TERRIFIED down there.

17. When too much Rapture is barely enough

Comment #204571 by William1w1 on July 5, 2008 at 9:25 am

Harris is completely right. Anyone who holds convictions like the man in the video should most certainly not be involved in politics. I'm glad I live in Canada where it isn't quite so bad.

18. Hints of structure beyond the visible universe

Comment #191642 by William1w1 on June 11, 2008 at 11:39 am

LUCASWB:

It would seem to me that it would be just as difficult to imagine an infinite universe as a universe that came from nothingness. If something caused the universe to commence, then that thing must have had a cause as well if we only use our natural sense of time. In either case, we must drop our common-sense notions of time and space.

Steve Zara's comment seems to be well in league with many quantum mechanical writings that I have read on this subject. I've read something too about how, because of virtual particles and entropy... or something, the net energy of the universe may be less than zero. Because of this, it would make more sense for the universe to exist than for it not to. I'm pretty fuzzy on the details though. Grasping Relativity is child's play when compared with trying to comprehend some of the ramifications of quantum physics.

19. Hints of structure beyond the visible universe

Comment #191407 by William1w1 on June 10, 2008 at 9:24 pm

rebelest:

Your argument would make sense were it not for Einstein's Theory of Special Relativity. There are no absolute points in space; there is no aether.

Let's imagine galaxies instead of spaceships. Now, let us say that there are 3 galaxies in a row: galaxies A, B and C. Galaxy A is on the left, galaxy B is in the middle, and galaxy C is on the right. From our reference frame, we will claim that galaxy B is "stationary." Galaxy A is moving to the left at 60% the speed of light (c), and galaxy C is moving to the right at 60% c.

A man in galaxy A wants to send a message with radio waves (a form of light) to galaxy C. However, based on your logic, his transmission would never catch up with galaxy C because he would see galaxy C moving at 120% c. Instead, the man decides to send the message first to galaxy B, which in turn can relay it to galaxy C. AHH, but herein lies the flaw in your logic. If the message could go from galaxy A to B at 100% c, and another message could move at the exact same speed from galaxy B to galaxy C, then actually we can take galaxy B out of the entire system and the radio transmission STILL MAKES THE JOURNEY.

The reason this is possible has to do with time dilation and length contraction based on relative velocities of different systems. Read up on the Special Theory of Relativity, specifically the clock paradox. It will blow your mind.

20. Hints of structure beyond the visible universe

Comment #191291 by William1w1 on June 10, 2008 at 2:04 pm

King of NH:

What you have suggested is possible. The thing to remember about science is that it does not make assumptions without evidence. We assume that the universe is similar to what we can currently see and that it is relatively uniform. In fact, one of the principles that you must accept in order to give credence to any version of the Big Bang theory is that the universe is uniform. Frankly, you might as well jump to the conclusion that some supernatural being created everything we can see if you're going to assume that there was something before the universe that we have no evidence for.

21. The Stupidity of Dignity

Comment #188734 by William1w1 on June 4, 2008 at 12:39 pm

This is a very well-written and insightful article. I was also going to attempt to invalidate many of Bobby G's arguments, but that has already been done to good effect. Thus I will make only one point. Bobby, and many other people, give way too much credit to philosophers. All philosophers do is philosophize, that is, create scenarios in their own minds and try to reason them out without anything remotely like scientific experimentation. Also, due to the nature of their work, their conclusions will always be influenced by biases within their own minds. Aristotle was ahead of his time, but that was a long time ago. Science now trumps philosophy in every regard.

Additionally (I guess I'm making another point), all Pinker needs in order to have a valid opinion on this matter is a mind of his own, since we all have our own ethical values. Do you really think that someone with a degree in philosophy would have more insight here? Pinker is most certainly not 'out of his depth.'

22. School bars same-sex partners at formals

Comment #188678 by William1w1 on June 4, 2008 at 11:28 am

RobDinsmore:

Where I live in Canada, if someone were anti-gay enough in the school I attended to try to ban same-sex partners at a dance, he or she would run the risk of being persecuted by the rest of us. The tables have sort of flipped. In fact, there was this sports team outing where one of the guys was homophobic, and the rest of the team members kept getting in bed with him and feeling him up to teach him a lesson. This was done in the hotel rooms they were staying at. I think they actually got in pretty serious trouble for sexual harassment.

23. A New Step In Evolution

Comment #188187 by William1w1 on June 3, 2008 at 10:20 am

To those of you who have said that the creationists will still deny macro-evolution, just tell them the story about the lizards on the island. Thirty years and they develop a new organ. At long last, when creationists complain that we do not see macro-evolution, we can point out the lizard experiment. They will finally see the flaw in their ways... Of course, they still have that bullet-proof "God is testing our faith" argument.

24. When two worlds collide: threat of class warfare over faith-based schooling

Comment #187808 by William1w1 on June 2, 2008 at 6:00 pm

This article seems to me to be a little haphazardly written. Also, it feels like the narrator changes stances at the end. Am I supposed to be revolted by the earlier statements? They make perfect sense to me.

25. Physicist Claims First Real Demonstration of Cold Fusion

Comment #187804 by William1w1 on June 2, 2008 at 5:49 pm

I'm sure they probably took whatever precautions necessary to avoid radiation poisoning. They must have had at least some belief that what they were doing would work.

26. Town moves against Islamic school

Comment #185034 by William1w1 on May 26, 2008 at 6:26 pm

To feel a need to stop people of a certain religion moving into your community seems wrong to me. After all, I'm sure many of the inhabitants of Camden are equally as delusional as the Muslims since it's likely that many of them are Christians. Of course, religion-based schooling in what is supposed to be a secular society simply should not be allowed. If the debate were about whether or not a mosque should be built, then I would grudgingly have to support the construction of yet another religious building... This reminds me that a church will likely be erected on my road... sigh...

27. Animal Science Without Evolution

Comment #185022 by William1w1 on May 26, 2008 at 5:48 pm

I'm quite thoroughly disgusted.

28. Richard Dawkins on The Alan Colmes Show

Comment #184375 by William1w1 on May 24, 2008 at 10:05 pm

I can imagine that Dr. Dawkins would become very upset indeed when people say that there are no transitional fossils. He has devoted his academic life to studies of evolution and biology. Thus, such criticisms would hit especially close to his heart. I have heard people use this argument. In another article on this site someone complained of a lack of evidence for a "half-man-half-ape". Clearly, these people have never heard of australopithescines.

29. The amazing intelligence of crows

Comment #184373 by William1w1 on May 24, 2008 at 9:52 pm

The moment the crow began to bend the wire, I was immediately struck. I have long held to the notion that to manipulate an object for some sort of use is the ultimate in cognizance; all things that come afterwards are merely details. In a brief flash, that brilliant crow seemed no different to me than any human being (save for the feathers). Never have I felt such comradery with another species.