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Comments by Geoff


701. Richard Dawkins on The Big Questions

Comment #120836 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 4:46 pm


They often can not tell the difference between "what is and what should never be"
and "stairway to heaven"

702. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #120835 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 4:41 pm

Well, if he exists, surely he's taking the piss?

703. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #120825 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 4:23 pm

@ ianmkz #127 I did mean to add a smiley; it was meant to be a light-hearted bit of pedantry...hope you took it as such?

@ LorienRyan #128 That's kind of getting into "Extended Phenotype" territory; perhaps the only one of RD's books I really struggled with.

704. 'Irrational Atheist' trounces God-deniers

Comment #120795 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 2:43 pm

Annabanana: what Diacanu said!

Encore!

705. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #120792 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 2:37 pm


the trouble with missing links is that every time you find one, you make two more.


One more.

706. God vs. Gridiron

Comment #120738 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 12:14 pm


I'm surprised churches would want to be connected with needless violence.


You mean when they're not perpetrating it?

Regarding football, though (which I do enjoy, even as a Brit!) - Pre-match, both coaches are quite happy to say that god is on their side... post-match only one of them mentions it.

707. Documents detail church coverup

Comment #120731 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 12:01 pm

A better acronym would just be
Milwaukee Arch Diocese

708. God vs. Gridiron

Comment #120730 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 11:56 am

There's something about this on Pharyngula as well.

709. Documents detail church coverup

Comment #120721 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 11:33 am

Absolutely right, epeeist, and furthermore wouldn't be allowed to work with children again.

It makes me wonder if religious people (in the UK) are exempt from the requirement for an "enhanced CRB" check.

710. Creationists plan British theme park

Comment #120713 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 11:20 am

More news today on the theme park!

http://www.wigantoday.net/wigannews/Religious-theme-park39s-warning.3735490.jp#2438371

and a link to AHtrust's website

http://www.zebraagency.co.uk/hall/7ica.htm

Edit:
http://www.zebraagency.co.uk/hall/7news.htm

PRESS RELEASE

The Church in this country is in crisis, and many Church Leaders living in Australia, America and Canada have openly proclaimed that God has left the Church in England. A view which we find amusing and disturbing. Evolution has falsely become the foundation of our society and we need
the television studio to advocate Genesis across this land in order to remove this falsehood which
presently is destroying the church foundation.

711. Morality and the 'new atheism'

Comment #120672 by Geoff on February 2, 2008 at 9:25 am

Art:


Pink unicorns and FSMs may reveal themselves to our fertile imaginations, but they do not reveal themselves in the way that God does.


On what basis do you assert that? You've admitted that your god is totally subjective, how can you then blithely dismiss equally subjective assertions about other fictional* beings? There is exactly the same internal argument for their existence as there is for your god, ie none*.



(*except for FSM, obviously)

712. Pope says some science shatters human dignity

Comment #120456 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 5:08 pm


So I take it the pope has no problem with necrophilia?


I think that's where he brings this bit into play:



...respect for the natural transmission of life through sexual intercourse.


Same reason contraception, sodomy, masturbation, fellatio, bestiality etc etc etc are all sinful.

And he still looks like the Emperor.

713. Morality and the 'new atheism'

Comment #120434 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 4:20 pm

Art:

You should really read "The selfish gene", or at least the above link from Melomel, which covers, and expands on, much the same concepts.

714. Pope says some science shatters human dignity

Comment #120423 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 4:03 pm

Prosthetic Head:

Signed, thanks for that!

715. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #120419 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 3:58 pm

Teratornis:

I think the idea is not that evolution shouldn't be debated, but rather that people like PZ and RD have much better things to do. As we saw in particular in this 'debate', it's using a sledgehammer to crack a nutter. Half the people on here (not me, I hasten to add, but the likes of Steve Zara, epeeist, annabanana, Paula, to name but a very few) could have shot that guy down almost as well as PZ did.
If PZ spent all his time debating the fleas, we wouldn't get Pharyngula; if RD does the same, we won't get "Son of god delusion" or whatever is coming next.

The "big guns" are wasted on fleas.

716. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #120307 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 12:09 pm

Simmons was so weak, it was cruel to set PZ up against him. Just about anyone on this board has seen his tired points destroyed time and time again.

Just a theory!
Descended from monkeys!
Gaps in the fossil record!
No transitional fossils!
Argument from design!

and that's just his opening!

717. Pope says some science shatters human dignity

Comment #120297 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 11:47 am

So much crap!

I'd prefer to see it called "blastocystic stem cell research"; they might find it a less emotive topic then.


...the Church was not against scientific progress but wanted it based on "ethical-moral principles".


Which doesn't sound all that bad, until people realise that what he really meant was Catholic "ethical-moral principles".

All together now:

"Every sperm is sacred.
Every sperm is great.
If a sperm is wasted,
God gets quite irate."

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=9002085385040727366

718. Richard Dawkins on The Big Questions

Comment #120037 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 7:44 am

Darwin's shitsu:

Apologies for pedantry, but it's Chester, not Cardiff.

Similarly, in York, it's (quite rightly) legal to shoot a Scotsman with a bow and arrow (except, for some reason, on Sundays..).

but I digress...

719. Morality and the 'new atheism'

Comment #120031 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 7:22 am

Numbers can represent a concept, but they aren't a concept in themselves. I think it was Gauss who said that what matters is "not notations but notions" Of course, maths has to use symbols, but they're analogous to musical notation, or an alphabet, rather than the music or language that they represent.

Like epeeist, I disagree with MPhil about irrational numbers, pi being a good example, but there's also the "golden number", phi, so often fond in nature, and the "most irrational" of them all.

720. Morality and the 'new atheism'

Comment #119988 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 4:21 am

BAEOZ: Absolutely, but in common usage the two have become interchangeable. Unless I'm talking to another mathematician, I'll say "number 3" rather than "cipher 3" - which also removes the ambiguity of using cipher = 0.

721. Morality and the 'new atheism'

Comment #119969 by Geoff on February 1, 2008 at 4:06 am

Hmmm. Numbers as a concept, or numbers as symbols to be manipulated?

Certainly the numbers themselves may vary (most trivially, for example, depending what base is used).

If you think of "mathematics" rather than numbers, that might make it clearer. Certainly, humans "made up" mathematics as a system for recognising and exploiting patterns, but the numbers themselves are arbitrary, and in any case form only a subset of maths. (NOTE: "maths" not "math", without apology to the denizens of the US, which would be an abbreviation of "mathematic") ;)

I'm conscious of not explaining myself very well here. Can anyone put it better?

722. 'Irrational Atheist' trounces God-deniers

Comment #119185 by Geoff on January 31, 2008 at 11:34 am

Well, I don't know about you people, but I need beer!

I confidently anticipate this thread being in the kilocomments range when I get back, and please make allowances for several pints of Old Peculier when reading/ignoring anything I post after midnight (GMT).

Wonder if that downloadable [presumed] tripe will be available by then?

723. 'Irrational Atheist' trounces God-deniers

Comment #119152 by Geoff on January 31, 2008 at 10:59 am

I'm rather enjoying this (with a big box of popcorn to hand...)

Anna (and perhaps Steve, although you appear to be already very familiar with the concepts), I'd also like to suggest anything by Robert Forward, either his fiction or non-fiction. Especially relevant to this thread (inasmuch as anything can be) is "Indistinguishable From Magic", written in 1995, but little, if at all, overtaken by events.

724. 'Irrational Atheist' trounces God-deniers

Comment #118876 by Geoff on January 31, 2008 at 5:30 am

I was in the pub while most of this was happening!

Strangely, I don't regret missing it.

And, if we may digress slightly, I doubt I'll be reading the Irrational Atheist either, but I'll await its destruction by those on here who can be bothered.

725. Happy Birthday Josh Timonen!

Comment #118814 by Geoff on January 31, 2008 at 2:51 am

Happy Birthday Josh!

726. Scientists discover way to reverse loss of memory

Comment #118812 by Geoff on January 31, 2008 at 2:49 am

Fascinating stuff. My mum suffers from Alzheimers, although this procedure has probably arrived too late to help her (she's in her 80's).

I wonder, though, what (if anything) was done to verify whether his "park" memory was accurate.

727. Atheism and Violence

Comment #118083 by Geoff on January 30, 2008 at 10:05 am

Art:

Try Christopher Hitchens' challenge. No other theist has manged to provide an example.

"Name one ethical statement made, or one ethical action performed, by a believer that could not have been uttered or done by a nonbeliever."

Examples of the converse, are of course, trivially easy to provide.

728. Dawkins is third most prolific internet Briton

Comment #117664 by Geoff on January 29, 2008 at 10:40 am



Haha, take that ozzy!



No, you're thinking of Robbie Williams. Ozzy was Black Sabbath.

729. Math Religion Trouble

Comment #116818 by Geoff on January 27, 2008 at 2:20 pm

e is the base of natural logarithms (The "e" is generally thought to refer to Euler, although it's sometimes confusingly called "Napier's constant")

2.718, approximately.

Not often I get a chance to bring my specialist subject into a predominantly biology forum!

730. Interview with Richard Dawkins

Comment #116816 by Geoff on January 27, 2008 at 2:14 pm


You can't parody local radio phone-ins. They are just too awful.


Which rather reminds me of something else that's beyond parody.

731. 'Telepathic' Genes Recognize Similarities In Each Other

Comment #116795 by Geoff on January 27, 2008 at 12:52 pm

The use of "telepathic" (even in quotes, as they did) annoyed me, too. The article does go on to explain that it isn't anything to do with telepathy, but how often to we see the god-botherers fail to raed past a title? Their criticisms of, for example, The Selfish Gene demonstrate that pretty well.

Fascinating article otherwise, though.

732. Math Religion Trouble

Comment #116793 by Geoff on January 27, 2008 at 12:42 pm

Firstly, it's "maths" not "math".

Good article, though, I shall be buying that book.

I'm currently re-reading a book called "nature's numbers" by Ian Stewart; I can recommend it.

733. Ore. Court: Boy Has Say in Circumcision

Comment #116670 by Geoff on January 27, 2008 at 3:05 am


I wish I had my foreskin.


I'm glad I've still got mine; I'm rather attached to it.

734. Interview with Richard Dawkins

Comment #116524 by Geoff on January 26, 2008 at 5:34 pm

RickM:

No, no, no, yes and I suspect it's all gone by now...

735. Interview with Richard Dawkins

Comment #116500 by Geoff on January 26, 2008 at 4:15 pm

Elcristoph



Science makes no claimes about the supernatural...



...except to point out that there's no evidence for its existence?



if someone has a good education they will be non religious...


Statistically true, though of course there are exceptions.

Edit: Steve beat me to it!

736. Ore. Court: Boy Has Say in Circumcision

Comment #116365 by Geoff on January 26, 2008 at 10:16 am


why? because some priest tried to drown me as a baby when i had no say? the church neither knows or cares about me. I'm not up there every sunday giving them money ye see.


Easy: so they can still count you as part of their "flock" when they play the numbers game.

"x million Catholics can't be wrong..."

737. Loneliness Breeds Belief in Supernatural

Comment #116249 by Geoff on January 26, 2008 at 3:02 am

Hmmm. I wonder if social networking via the internet would serve the same purpose?

Got religion? Need a cure? Join Facebook!

738. The real danger in Darwin is not evolution, but racism

Comment #115360 by Geoff on January 24, 2008 at 5:03 am

@ irate_atheist


I'm not entirely sure the debunking is necessary; if all the various myths are put forward, with equal treatment, they'll eventually see that there's nothing "sacred" about their own. Of course, it needs to be stressed that they're all fiction, but I don't see the point of debunking them all, and debunking ID alone would surely give it some sort of spurious credibility compared to the others.

739. The real danger in Darwin is not evolution, but racism

Comment #115341 by Geoff on January 24, 2008 at 3:43 am

One other strawman he sets up that I don't think has been commented on:


Many who support the separation of church and state say that the intelligent design theory of creation ought not to be taught in public schools...


Not true, we simply say it shouldn't be taught in science classes (or as science).

Most of us, AFAIK, don't have a problem with it being taught in a comparative religion class (preferably alongside all the other various creation myths that have emerged).

740. Three Little Pigs 'too offensive'

Comment #115334 by Geoff on January 24, 2008 at 3:18 am


47. Comment #115107 by Synchronium on January 23, 2008 at 3:10 pm

I think it's offensive to builders to suggest that a builder might be offended by it.

Builders don't sit around reading kids books.


Perhaps not, but many of them read the Sun (or whatever the equivalent newspaper is in other countries), which is at a similar intellectual level.

741. Violence fear over Islam film

Comment #114979 by Geoff on January 23, 2008 at 11:14 am

I know we're getting kinda stuck in semantics here (and, no, you're not being annoying; I love pedantry too!), but:

http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=religion&sub=Search+WordNet&o2=&o0=1&o7=&o5=&o1=1&o6=&o4=&o3=&h=00000

(n) religion, faith, religious belief (a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny)

(n) religion, faith, organized religion (an institution to express belief in a divine power)

To me, a "supernatural power" or "divine power" is a god. Maybe not necessarily an interventionist god, but one nevertheless.

While I take your point about Buddhism, I'd call it a philosophy, rather than a religion, by the above definitions. Similarly, I think the use of the word "sacred" when describing the Tripitaka, for example, are using a somwewhat more secular definition than the familiar: "concerned with religion or religious purposes"; "made or declared or believed to be holy"; "devoted to a deity or some religious ceremony or use"; "worthy of religious veneration" (again from WordNet).

I know a lot less about Buddhism (and much else!) that I'd like to, and certainly stand (well, sit, in this case) to be corrected, but I'm not sure that Buddhists would have the same objection to copies of their texts being "defiled" in the same way that devotees of the Bible or (more so) the Q'ran would.

Do, please, continue to..errrr..pedantify? pedantulate? There should be a verb!

742. This Week's Flea

Comment #114974 by Geoff on January 23, 2008 at 10:46 am

Diacanu & TonyA:

There's good topic!

Did religions evolve by the natural selection of random mutations of memes, or was it "intelligently designed"? The latter is certainly true for L. Ron's cult, but what about the other, older ones?

743. Violence fear over Islam film

Comment #114968 by Geoff on January 23, 2008 at 10:29 am



Atheists do not impute sacred meaning to inanimate objects.


Sorry to be pedantic, but this attribution of all kinds of views to atheists is a hobby horse of mine.

There are plenty of atheists who don't believe in God, but do believe in the supernatural.

I think you may mean "rationalist" instead....


I'm struggling to think of anything supernatural, but not involving a god/s, that might be considered sacred, by the definitions I'm familiar with.

Sacred seems to me to imply religion, which implies a god.

744. Stop revisionist Christian nation House Resolution 888

Comment #114967 by Geoff on January 23, 2008 at 10:15 am


113. Comment #114723 by Steve Zara on January 22, 2008 at 4:04 pm

Mr. Zara,

Read The Selfish Gene.



I have, from cover to cover. I don't recall any description of believers as mentally ill. Perhaps you could give the page number.


I asked him the same thing two days ago (comment #41)...not holding my breath for a reply.

745. Life-Forming Chemicals Found in Distant Galaxy

Comment #114854 by Geoff on January 23, 2008 at 3:57 am

48. Comment #114775 by al-rawandi on January 22,

Nubile women are OK, but they become less so and more naggy with age




Hence the massive quantities of beer!


http://www.secureonlineshopping.biz/wychwood/products.asp?recnumber=65

- one of my favourite T-shirts!

"Six pints of bitter, and quickly please, the world's about to end."

746. Stop revisionist Christian nation House Resolution 888

Comment #114455 by Geoff on January 22, 2008 at 8:31 am

Nicely written, Anna! Do please let us know if they deign to reply with anything substantial.

747. Florida in the process of approving new science standards

Comment #114408 by Geoff on January 22, 2008 at 6:54 am


7. Comment #114264 by fatcitymax on January 21, 2008 at 4:45 pm


I'll have you know that Florida produces the best football...players in the country!


Go Dolphins!

748. Mandrake: Charles's letter in support of Islamic 'fundamentalism'

Comment #114165 by Geoff on January 21, 2008 at 1:26 pm

Let's see now: we get Charles' head on our money, the Yanks get "in god we trust" on theirs.

Hmmm, tricky choice.

749. Gay Jesus play blasted by bishop

Comment #114093 by Geoff on January 21, 2008 at 11:10 am

Enough of this crap about "blasphemy". Why the hell should their delusions have such a special privilege? And why the hell doesn't their imaginary friend do something about it if he's really so touchy, instead of relying on them to whinge about it?

[/rant]

750. Stop revisionist Christian nation House Resolution 888

Comment #114090 by Geoff on January 21, 2008 at 10:59 am


Comment #114010 by Shmeezers on January 21, 2008 at 8:01 am

Mr. Zara,

Read The Selfish Gene.



I have read TSG many times, both the 1976 and 1989 editions (as I'm sure Steve has), and I fail to remember any such quote. Can you be more precise?

In fact, the book has very little to say about faith, except in the "memes" chapter.

Deluded, misinformed, brainwashed, certainly, but none of these indicate either stupidity or mental illness.

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