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

Comment #68161 by Series of Tubes on September 6, 2007 at 9:15 am

I've also just watched the McGrath interview. It's fascinating - at right around the 50 minute mark, you can actually see his head (metaphorically) explode, as Dawkins pins him down and tries to force him to give a straight answer on the question of whether or not God intervenes directly in the world. The look of sudden panic in McGrath's eyes is amusing, as is his attempt to weasel out of answering by looking away to the production crew and telling them he's already covered that, even though he very clearly hasn't, which they point out. His subsequent stumbling, freaked-out attempt to provide a straight answer to a simple question... and total inability to do so... is yet another highly convincing argument in favour of the nonexistence of God. Dawkins' bemused reflection that they're not going to get any further on that point is also fun. I am, however, impressed by McGrath's apparent immunity to the ravages of cognitive dissonance. Classic stuff.

2. What do these atheists understand of religion?

Comment #67290 by Series of Tubes on September 3, 2007 at 2:53 am

Is this a parody? It reads like something from one of The Onion's pseudo-columnists.

3. Man to die over insult

Comment #47158 by Series of Tubes on June 3, 2007 at 7:52 am

I vote all liberal western democracies remove their ambassadors and cut off all diplomatic ties with or treated with the tiniest bit of respect. Pakistan until these blasphemy laws are revoked. States that execute citizens for making derogatory comments about religious figures do not deserve to be included at the international table.

4. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41175 by Series of Tubes on May 15, 2007 at 3:16 pm

I don't generally take delight in the news of another person's demise, but... this is great. An inarguably fantastic piece of news. I'm extremely, extremely, extremely glad the man's dead. You'd be hard pressed to find a more vicious, vacuous, vile, venal, vapid, vomitous little odious gasbag of a person. Between this and Paris Hilton going to jail... life's looking brighter.

5. Sam Harris in conversation with Oliver McTernan

Comment #38778 by Series of Tubes on May 9, 2007 at 7:12 am

McTernan presented nothing but an especially whiny and petulant version of the courtier's reply.

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2006/12/the_courtiers_reply.php

Really appallingly feeble stuff.

6. Religion & Culture Panel

Comment #36295 by Series of Tubes on April 30, 2007 at 9:04 pm

Very interesting panel. And yeah - what was the deal with the dude they had security haul out?

7. Boxmind E-Lectures

Comment #35754 by Series of Tubes on April 28, 2007 at 7:29 pm

Looks like Boxmind somehow lost control of their domain name. Maybe they forgot to renew it.

8. NEXT MONDAY: Bill O'Reilly interviews Richard Dawkins

Comment #33250 by Series of Tubes on April 19, 2007 at 5:18 pm

Just wanted to chime in to agree with those who think this is a bad idea that no good can come of. Agreeing to appear on his show does nothing but encourage and validate O'Reilly, and if there's any single human on this planet who shouldn't be getting any further encouragement or validation...

Going on Olbermann would definitely be much more sensible.

9. The questions science cannot answer

Comment #21708 by Series of Tubes on February 10, 2007 at 6:00 pm

Could the moderator(s) please stop posting articles from this McGrath asswit? He's a complete waste of space.

10. Taking the fight to Islam

Comment #20578 by Series of Tubes on February 4, 2007 at 1:55 pm

Really brilliant woman. I wish there were 10,000 more of her.

I found this critic's position slightly odd:

"No doubt Hirsi Ali's critics would find the comparison hard to stomach. Spinoza was against religious persecution, whereas Hirsi Ali, say her opponents, is an arch exponent of Islamophobia. One such critic has written a stinging attack on Hirsi Ali in this month's Times Literary Supplement. Maria Golia, an Egyptian-based academic, writes: 'Hirsi Ali seems far more interested in indicting Islam than helping damaged women, whose horror stories she conveniently trots out whenever she needs to bludgeon home a point.'"

Seems a false dichotomy - Islam itself is the primary cause of the damage inflicted on Muslim women. Ali is providing them the greatest possible help by cutting directly to the core of the problem.

Also - what's wrong with Islamophobia? Islam seems, to me, to be a religion worth being quite very phobic about.