Skip to Main Content (access key 1)
Skip to Search (access key 2)
Skip to Search GO (access key 3)
Skip to comments (access key 4)
Skip to navigation (access key 5)
Skip to top of page (access key 6)

Comments by RascoHeldall


52. Christopher Hitchens Is a Treasure

Comment #43289 by RascoHeldall on May 21, 2007 at 4:16 am

Suppose that the Creator God deliberately made a world of probabilities and failures, of waste and profusion, of suffering and hardships and frustrations. Suppose that He loved the idea of an unformed history, slowly developing (almost like an organism), nearly everything good won the hard way. Suppose that He loved chance, crossing chains of probabilities, freakish accidents, wild and unnecessary profusion, contingencies of every sort — to keep even angels guessing.


What frustrates me about such obvious apologism is that the line of reasoning so obviously fails when applied to anything else. Would Novak be so willing to defend, say, a Government that desired a "world of probabilities and failures, of waste and profusion, of suffering and hardships and frustrations"?

If such a warped being exists in the way Novak apparently believes, why on earth does he think anyone should want to worship it? Why isn't he appalled that so many millions of people complacently worship a creature that treats them with, at best, indifference, and worst, downright cruelty?

Why don't these people see what they are saying? If I genuinely thought that a God was responsible for the world as it is, I would be forced to conclude he was a misanthropic psychopath. (At least would be consistent with the God of the Old Testament, I suppose!)

53. Londonistan Calling

Comment #39119 by RascoHeldall on May 10, 2007 at 3:09 am

This is an imminent problem. How do we get rid of these insane religious people? Education is surely the best way...

Well it would be, but Blair-the-Idiot ballsed that one up good and proper!

54. Better God-fearing than sneering

Comment #38713 by RascoHeldall on May 9, 2007 at 2:27 am

Oh, you silly, silly woman!

Of course many people have a need to believe in fairytales, and while we should accommodate this weakness in as much as possible, that is not a reason for them to dictate how OTHERS should live their lives, and to get off scott free when they make claims about the universe that do not hold up to rational scrutiny. Drivel is drivel. It doesn't matter whether it is moral cowardice, ignorance or sheer stupidity that causes people to spout it, it's still wrong, and we're still within our rights to say it's wrong.

55. The moment a teenage girl was stoned to death for loving the wrong boy

Comment #38407 by RascoHeldall on May 8, 2007 at 3:12 am

I am opposed to the death penalty for humans. However, since these people are not human (in anything other than a biological sense) our normal rules of civilised behaviour surely should not apply.

I remember seeing video footage of a group of chimpanzees tearing the limbs of a hapless chimp from a rival group. This reminded me of that, the only difference being that it 'only' took about five minutes of agony and terror before the chimp died.

56. Interview with Christopher Hitchens

Comment #36470 by RascoHeldall on May 1, 2007 at 9:03 am

It all makes so much sense now. If you give an infinite amount of chimps an infinite amount of typewriters they may well come up with the works of Shakespeare. But if you give a finite amount of chimps some pen parchment and ink and a couple of thousand years they'll come up with the Bible.

Wonderful!

This is great, atheism seems to be getting loads of airtime in the States now - dare I say it is on the verge of becoming...fashionable?

57. The God Delusion

Comment #36437 by RascoHeldall on May 1, 2007 at 5:44 am

I like how Schmidt acknowledges the respect Dawkins pays religion in a strictly intellectual sense - that is, subjecting it to the same rigour commanded by any other school of thought.

The fact that, when scrutinised, religion fails miserably on almost every conceivable level (except, of course, in the art of pandering to cowardice) is unfortunate from the point of view of those invested in it, but theists would do well to apply the same level of intellectual rigour to their opinions that Dawkins does. Then, rather than taking offence and sounding off like babies who have had their dummy taken away, they may actually be able to respond in a way befitting someone of intelligence.

58. Richard Dawkins interviews the Bishop of Oxford

Comment #33465 by RascoHeldall on April 20, 2007 at 8:45 am

The Bishop of Oxford is a lovely man and the model of a thoughtful, civilised religious person. While his core beliefs are still ultimately nonsensical, he is sufficiently intellectually honest to not try and pretend that the Bible is consistent with the evidence from nature, or modern day human morality. Why does such intellectual honesty have to be such a rarity with theists?

Of course, he is ultimately wrong and his desire to attach unwarranted significance to human existence does suggest he is still motivated by the same sort of intellectual cowardice that appears to inform most religious delusion. But I feel no anger towards this man for expressing his beliefs, only a weary sadness that he is incapable of letting go of them.

59. Dinesh D'Souza says I don't exist: an atheist at Virginia Tech

Comment #33399 by RascoHeldall on April 20, 2007 at 2:55 am

What a wonderfully dignified response to a person who deserves nothing but contempt.

60. Genie shows barred by Islam, clerics say

Comment #32206 by RascoHeldall on April 16, 2007 at 7:26 am


Okay I will be frank. What I am asking is how the first gene came out? If I see a glass of hot water on my dining table, I would figure out that somebody put it there. This is what my reason and intelligence makes me think.

Well, presumably like all other things that have taken place, it arose as a consequence of the laws of physics. In this case, in the 'primordial soup' of organic molecules, a chance sequence of reactions formed a molecule with the property of self-replication. (Such spontaneous formation of self-replicating molecules has been observed in the lab, and the scientists are fairly certain God wasn't doing it.) This initial 'gene' then passed on its 'genetic' material to future 'generations', and through natural selection of chance beneficial mutations the lineage evolved the sophisticated copying mechanism we see today.

That do ya? Or do you have a better suggestion?



By the way if my comments are reaching out somebody out there and I am sure they will, I would serve my purpose; to prove that evolution theory is a delusional story, just a story which even the schools took out of their curriculum.

So are you saying that the mountains of corroborating evidence gathered over the past 150 years, that all conclusively support Darwinism beyond any rational doubt, are a figment of everyone's imagination?

Wow – that's some global conspiracy theory you've got going there.

61. Against God

Comment #32054 by RascoHeldall on April 15, 2007 at 11:05 am

I wonder what McGrath considers to be the "limitations of reason", because I have absolutely no idea what the **** he's talking about here.


Simple. The 'limitation' of reason is that it doesn't seek to tell people what they want to hear.

62. Kadra attacked in public

Comment #32051 by RascoHeldall on April 15, 2007 at 10:50 am

What will be the straw that breaks the camel's back?

How many more incidents of sub-chimpanzeean barbarism must the civilised world take before it starts to realise that unquestioning tolerance of this disgusting doctrine simply isn't working?

63. Genie shows barred by Islam, clerics say

Comment #31956 by RascoHeldall on April 15, 2007 at 3:36 am

"We don't want to promote a belief in the supernatural and in superstition, which we do not know about."


That, in one sentence, sums up why the Islam practiced in some countries poses such a threat to humanity. These Mullahs (or whatever they pretentiously call themselves) think their religious text is literal, historical fact, and they are so blithely unaware of the advances humanity has made, scientifically and philosophically, in the last 300 years that they are incapable of even seeing that there is an alternative to it.

For us to simply 'respect' this without further comment (especially when it comes to immigrants to our more enlightened shores) is to do a massive disservice to people with the misfortune to have been born in an intellectually and morally less-advanced area of our planet. ('National Fatwa Society' indeed!)

64. Nisbet and Mooney in the WaPo: snake oil for the snake oil salesmen

Comment #31947 by RascoHeldall on April 15, 2007 at 3:18 am

Mr. Mark wrote:

It's really simple: either the religous gods are strong enough to stand up to any assault made upon them, or their not. It's quite obvious that they're not at all strong.


Yeah. Why doesn't their God just reveal Himself and put an end to the argument?

Come to think of it, humanity could really do with the second coming happening right now. What's God waiting for?

65. As Religious Strife Grows, Europe's Atheists Seize Pulpit

Comment #31742 by RascoHeldall on April 14, 2007 at 4:02 am

"I've heard on the BBC that many young Muslims in England are actually more devout than their parents."

When I was at school in the sixth form (not THAT long ago) the students with Muslim parents would try and out-compete each other to be 'more' Muslim than the other - this even extended to affecting Indian-subcontinental accents which they didn't naturally have. Strange.

[ETA: Can someone explain how I box-out a quotation? Oh and how do I do italics? Thanks.]

66. For God's Sake

Comment #31554 by RascoHeldall on April 13, 2007 at 8:30 am

It strikes me that if this Claude Allen character was prepared to steal other people's property, it is clear that he didn't really believe in God. If he did, he'd be prevented from committing the offence by the knowledge that such an act would result in him going to Hell, and this would surely be sufficient deterrent against any crime. Speaking personally, I know that if I thought there was a possibility of my roasting in flames for all eternity when I died, I wouldn't so much as swear, let alone steal!

So it is obvious Allen, and presumably many others of his ilk, don't really believe in the drivel that they preach. So why do they do it?

67. Einstein & Faith

Comment #31518 by RascoHeldall on April 13, 2007 at 4:57 am

Cheshirecat wrote: "You can not believe in freewill and yet believe in God."

The two are logically exclusive and yet many (most) theists think somehow they are not. If you accept the basic premise that an intelligent creator designed the universe and set in place evolution on planet Earth with the specific intention of designing human beings, then you are OBLIGED to accept that every decision we have ever made, and ever will, has been laid out for us. There is no counter-argument to this, it is a logical fact (if you accept the ludicrous proposition that a God intended humans to evolve).

What gets me about this is that there are many theists, who say they accept the Darwinian explanation for existence, and yet still have the gall to use 'Free Will' as a get-out argument to explain why their supposedly benign God appears callous enough to 'let' murder, rape and the like happen! They are in effect saying that the forces of nature that have sculpted us (and therefore our actions and behaviours) somehow do not account for our actions and behaviours if we do something bad!

As a hypothetical example of the subtle but monstrous stupidity of this position, say Genghis Khan had killed every other man in the world and we were all his direct descendants. Would that mean God intended Khan to commit murder on a mass scale? Or was Khan exercising free will? If the former, God is a callous psychopath and anyone who worships him is a psychopath as well. If the latter, God has no control over human evolution and deserves no credit for our existence. Either way, belief that a benign God designed evolution is impossible.

69. Pope says science too narrow to explain creation

Comment #31379 by RascoHeldall on April 12, 2007 at 8:06 am

We wouldn't be interested on what the Pope had to say about other things he knows nothing about (rap music, say, or the works of PG Wodehouse). Why, then, are his uninformed, unresearched, bigoted opinions on evolutionary science considered worthy of even passing comment?

Does the very fact he is "The Pope" mean his views are automatically interesting to people, no matter how little he knows about the subject at hand? (On second thoughts – don't answer that one.)

70. Is God poison?

Comment #30862 by RascoHeldall on April 10, 2007 at 5:38 am

Bonzai wrote: "If there is a God I certainly would expect him/her/it to have better taste than to reveal him/her/itself through vulgar stories and incoherent drivels such as those one may find in the bible or the Quran."

Very well said, that man!

71. The Coulter Hoax: How Ann Coulter Exposed the Intelligent Design Movement

Comment #30813 by RascoHeldall on April 10, 2007 at 1:06 am

I'd put money on it, William P. It would be similar to the way creationists STILL use that clip of Richard to give the impression he didn't know the answer to a question (http://youtube.com/watch?v=zaKryi3605g), even though it has been a matter of public record for almost a decade that this was not the case.

Perhaps, one day, this sort of psychopathic behaviour on the part of reality-deniers will be viewed as mental illness and treated accordingly.

72. Even non-believers must recognise the moral necessity of Christianity

Comment #30635 by RascoHeldall on April 9, 2007 at 4:58 am

I knew Bruce Anderson was a bigot but I didn't realise he was a moron as well. I dread to think what the Independent pays this man for his worthless opinions.

73. Prophets of the new atheism

Comment #30436 by RascoHeldall on April 8, 2007 at 3:45 am

Humanist-cop wrote: "Now that's a term I like - we have "people of faith" - "people of colour" - I may just replace the self description of atheist with ..."I am a person of reason."

Yep, agree - that's a great idea. Sets out the intrinsic superiority of the position without undue arrogance or smugness, and is difficult not only for a theist to argue against, but to appear loftily superior to (as they always try to). I'm definitely going to use that from now on!

74. Prophets of the new atheism

Comment #30428 by RascoHeldall on April 8, 2007 at 3:15 am

"In the end, racked by despair at life's apparent meaninglessness, its members would return to more nourishing faiths."

It is rare for a theist author to wear their moral cowardice on their sleeves quite so plainly (normally they are sufficiently aware of it to try and skirt around it). Yet here Klinghoffer effectively exposes his theism for what it is: a defence shield against accepting the world for what it is. Like many other thiests, he feels the alternative to his faith - relinquishing the comfort blanket of his delusion and embracing reality - would be too emotionally difficult. The mistake he makes in assuming that this is necessarily the same for human society, which is not only easily rebutted (someone's already mentioned Sweden) but is actually a great insult to the millions of intellectually-contented atheists who don't share his paranoid, babyish fears.

75. Answers To the Atheists

Comment #30264 by RascoHeldall on April 7, 2007 at 11:07 am

"The problem with the neo-atheists is that they seem as dogmatic as the dogmatists they condemn."

Yes, but that's only because you don't own a dictionary, Mr Dionne.

76. Militant atheists: too clever for their own good

Comment #30188 by RascoHeldall on April 7, 2007 at 7:14 am

By Moore's logic, we should embrace the claims of flat earthers, since it would be sheer "arrogance" to assert our spherical earthist superiority over flat earthers' cherished views.

I can't believe such a distinguished figure has written something so appallingly stupid.

77. The Most Hated Family in America

Comment #29615 by RascoHeldall on April 3, 2007 at 3:40 pm

Why can't I help feeling that Phelps' psychotic hatred of homosexuals might have more to do with the repression of his sexuality than devotion to Christ?

79. Dawkins says religion is 'like sucking a dummy'

Comment #28378 by RascoHeldall on March 29, 2007 at 2:49 am

It is a harsh analogy, but as far as I can see, an entirely fair one. What other possible explanation can there be for the phenomenon of educated, intelligent adults clinging to such puerile mythologies, when all sense and reason would surely lead them to conclude such fantasies are obviously false?

80. Peanut Butter, The Atheist's Nightmare!

Comment #27931 by RascoHeldall on March 27, 2007 at 9:48 am

"Facts which contradict or disturb my beliefs about the world are not at all 'nightmares'. I wish the fundamentalists could approach the world with the same intellectual courage."

Exactly. They assume that, just because THEY are crying inside for mummy to take away the pain, everyone else must be as well.

81. Why there are almost no genuine atheists

Comment #24517 by RascoHeldall on March 7, 2007 at 3:08 am

Another fool who has inadvertently exposed his deep lack of genuine morality. His point seems to be, in a nutshell, that if there's no God, there's no need to care about anything other than oneself. If cowardly belief in a fairytale is the best reason he can come up with for being a good person, he really does have a lot to answer for.

82. Pope is warned of a green Antichrist

Comment #23912 by RascoHeldall on March 3, 2007 at 2:03 pm

Why does the civilised world tolerate such unmitigated idiocy?

83. If God is talking to you, too, Mr Cameron - don't listen

Comment #23497 by RascoHeldall on March 1, 2007 at 5:34 am

I think this is is a good article to be honest. It puts David Cameron squarely in the position where he is either going to have to confess that he doesn't really believe in fairytales, or confess that he really does - neither will paint him in a good light, but one is clearly the lesser of two evils.

If Cameron is pretending to be religious for political reasons this may be depressingly cynical, but ultimately a misguided folly that can be addressed. If he is ACTUALLY religious and using this for political reasons then this is just plain depressing and really does, as Portillo fears, open the way to American God-Squad type politics, and all the knock-on effects that this would have.

Hopefully this sort of commentary will continue and help to reverse the highly disturbing trend Cameron has kicked off.

84. Biology and Bullshit

Comment #23230 by RascoHeldall on February 27, 2007 at 3:06 am

I can't help feeling that Richard, Dan, Sam, and the present author and others are not giving sufficient attention to a fact that is staring them in the face. They all acknowledge that religions make claims which (if interpreted with sufficiently loose scrutiny) are comforting to those that believe them. But this facile observation appears to be, if not exactly dismissed, then not given half as much consideration as it really commands.



It seems transparently obvious to us, as atheists, that the claims of religion are untrue. And not just untrue in the same sense that, say, Lamarckism is untrue, i.e. a considered model of reality that provides an interesting, though ultimately false, explanation for a phenomenon, in this case evolution. Even things like flat-earthism or geocentrism would make a certain degree of sense on their own terms without the (now overwhelming) evidence to the contrary. Religious claims are different. They are blatantly, screamingly, astonishingly, obviously untrue. There is CLEARLY no such thing as angels. OF COURSE Mohammed didn't ascend to Heaven on a winged chariot. OBVIOUSLY there was no Garden of Eden. There is an embarrassment of overwhelmingly good reasons to dismiss religious claims as nonsense.



So what's going on? Why do the entirely reasonable arguments of atheists frequently have no effect? As an example - why is Sam Harris struggling so much to make Andrew Sullivan address any of his points? Why don't any religious people even ATTEMPT to spell out what is actually wrong with Dawkins' arguments? Why do we even need to have a debate at all?



The answer is surely cowardice. A cowardly refusal to face the world on its own terms, to accept the evidence of the natural world – that nature has no meaning, no higher purpose, that it just IS. I once had a conversation with a physicist who told me that letting go of his religious comforts was the most difficult thing he ever had to do. He remained religious long after he knew, intellectually, the cause was lost – the term he used was, as I recall, "partitioning". It was almost as if his subconscious emotions were fighting with his conscious intellect to hold on to the comfort provided by the delusion. It took real courage for him to overcome that hurdle, to go through the 'grieving process' as he called it. It does not surprise me that many people resist this process, if it is indeed so difficult (as a lifelong atheist I can't comment directly from experience). With this in mind, maybe there is indeed an evolutionary advantage to being deluded. A tendancy to be happy in the 'knowledge' that one's good behaviour will be rewarded in heaven could have clear advantages over misery at the realisation that the universe doesn't care about you one way or the other. That is not to say there aren't atheists that are fulfilled, or happy in their understanding of the world – just that it requires more work. It requires effort and intellectual courage to generate meaning for one's self, and to accept answers that provide no comfort – or indeed to accept that some questions just don't deserve answers in the first place. Perhaps some people simply can't, or won't, go through this process.



Of course, there will be millions of people who believe religious myths are literally true because they don't know any better. But for those privileged enough to have had an education, and the opportunity to learn about the established scientific explanations for why things are the way they are, continued adherence to religion surely represents a simple failure of intellectual courage. Maybe it is simply the case that atheists are atheists because they don't have a problem accepting the universe for what it is, and theists are theists because they do.

85. Faith

Comment #23043 by RascoHeldall on February 26, 2007 at 2:59 am

Another "Oh no! My complacent certainties are being attacked! Please don't destroy my delusions Mr Dawkins, they stop me from falling apart inside!" type.

Pitiful.

86. Interview With an Atheist

Comment #21976 by RascoHeldall on February 12, 2007 at 2:48 am

A nice summary of the usual lines theists will come up with in support of their prejudices, and the necessary counter-arguments to each. If only that would be the end of the matter!

I genuinely feel sorry for the sorts of people who, after being presented with such a barrage of common sense, continue to cling to belief in this rubbish idea, after all intellectual hope for it is lost. What are they afraid of? Why expose their moral weakness in this way? Why do they embarrass themselves?

87. God and gorillas

Comment #20255 by RascoHeldall on February 1, 2007 at 9:59 am

An interesting piece when talking about ape behaviour, though evasive and woolly when trying to talk about religion. Why do so few people have the bravery to admit that religion is bollocks?

88. Send The God Delusion to your MP

Comment #18998 by RascoHeldall on January 24, 2007 at 8:25 am

I'd love to (especially as I have previously corresponded with my MP on the subject of religion in schools) but can't really afford to buy another copy.

Perhaps Prof. Dawkins has some spares kicking around? ;-)

89. Halting progress

Comment #16917 by RascoHeldall on January 9, 2007 at 3:32 pm

A delightfully intemperate piece. Perhaps placing a reasonable, intelligent article like this alongside an unreasoned, unintelligent article in defence of theism is actually a smart move by the Grauniad, since it can only expose the latter's inanity!

90. Ancient religion may face extinction

Comment #16500 by RascoHeldall on January 7, 2007 at 1:17 am

It's weird, they're talking about the inevitable demise of this belief system almost in the same tone as you'd discuss an endangered species, as if it (and all religion) wasn't somehow intellectually extinct already.

91. Secular fundamentalists are the new totalitarians

Comment #16311 by RascoHeldall on January 6, 2007 at 3:26 am

Yet another rubbish article about religion finds its way into a respected newspaper. Further evidence that all sense of intellectual standards and robust argument go out of the window where people's irrational belief systems are concerned.

92. Not Yet The Majority But No Longer Silent

Comment #15524 by RascoHeldall on January 1, 2007 at 3:39 am

Rather than trying to promote an alternative name to atheist (it does the job fine IMO) I can't help feeling it would be a more effective use of our efforts to try to raise consciousness about the disgraceful discrimination that, for example, sees people barred from employment if they admit they don't believe in a made-up super-being.

I suggest the words "beliefism" and "beliefist" to describe the nasty way in which much American culture is openly discriminatory about people who don't share their worldview. The good thing about this word, too, is that it rather forces us atheists to remain politic in our quest to change attitudes - lest we suffer the same charge!

In the same way that racism was once institutionalised, and unthinkingly accepted by many otherwise good people, it is now known to be "a bad thing" (probably even by most of those who secretly harbour these views). If we could put "beliefism" in a similar intellectual space, half the battle would be won. Who knows, it may actually go the other way, with atheists' and their viewpoint being positively promoted to ensure fairness and consistency!

Well, gotta have a dream, haven't you?

93. The Only One in Step

Comment #14523 by RascoHeldall on December 23, 2006 at 2:12 am

"Well The second law of thermodynamics thing is way above my head I am afraid,but as for the Earth only being 6000 years old? what about COMMON SENSE. A tiny little example, the white cliffs of Dover. Please do not try and convince me that those tiny little coccoliths built the great thicknesses of chalk in a few thousand years!"

A but that's only because God made it LOOK as if they would take that long to build. Such is the majesty and wonder of our Lord's work!

I'm joking, of course! I can't even begin to understand what would drive a university professor to lie about his own field of study to promote a patently false medieval worldview. (Deep, pathological intellectual cowardice, perhaps?) All I know is that he is abusing his position and disgracing his university. That he has received support in this from a colleague is depressing. No-one is contesting the right to personal religious belief, but what must surely be sanctioned against in the strongest possible terms is people using the authority of their qualifications to perpetrate falsehoods defending them.

By the way, I never heard back from McIntosh after replying to his email to me last week (or from any of the heads of science I copied in).

94. Richard Dawkins on The Sunday Edition

Comment #13337 by RascoHeldall on December 17, 2006 at 6:05 am

I've never seen Benn make such simplistic, childish arguments - disappointing - still, Dawkins did seem to expose Benn's inherent lack of belief and thereby expose the pointless unhelpfulness of religious moderation.

95. Ken Miller on Intelligent Design

Comment #12567 by RascoHeldall on December 12, 2006 at 3:31 pm

While I find it bizarre that eminent scientists could also be deeply religious, it's undeniably a boon to have these guys on board in the war against creationist lunacy.

96. Sunday Sequence with William Crawley

Comment #12174 by RascoHeldall on December 11, 2006 at 4:31 am

McIntosh replied to my email this morning. Just sent this reply, copying in a number of heads of science at Leeds.

Mr McIntosh

Thank you for your reply.

I realise that people with no scientific knowledge maybe bamboozled by the language you use to craft your falsehoods, but anyone with a smattering of education knows that what you are saying is false. Which is why I assert you must KNOW it is false.

You will know, for example, that the various available radioactive dating techniques are mutually complementary and corroborate the age of the earth being billions of years old. You know this to be a fact because you are a professor in a related field. You also know that evolution doesn't violate the second law of thermodynamics. You know that energy is required to maintain and replicate DNA, and that this ultimately increases the entropy. The reason I know you know this is because you are a professor of, er, thermodynamics.

You then casually toss in the contemptible lie that "Scientifically the 2nd law without intelligence means evolution (strictly here we mean abiogenesis - the formation of life) is impossible." Let's unpack that, shall we?
1. Using the word "scientifically" does not make what you are saying scientific. What? You didn't think I'd notice?
2. Abiogenesis is not evolution. So "strictly" you are not talking about evolution AT ALL, and are merely using doubt over the exact mechanism of abiogenesis (a subject of vigorous study) to try and throw out the entire Darwinian theory. The disingenuity you display is breathtaking.
3. Just because abiogenesis is not yet understood doesn't mean that the ongoing research won't necessarily eventually work out how it happened chemically. You offer no argument as to why the default position should be that this was the work of an intelligence; you merely use scientific-sounding language which means nothing but which scientifically-illiterate people may find impressive (until they do a little bit of research, of course).

Your qualifications are simply incompatible with such falsehoods. Therefore the only plausible conclusion can be that you are knowingly perpetrating them. This is to the detriment of your university, the public understanding of science, and civilisation as a whole. I am copying in a number of your colleagues so that they are aware of the stain you are leaving on this great university.

You are nothing short of a disgrace.


--- Andy McIntosh wrote:

> You are not correct Mr. Hill in your assessment as
> to my position or
> motivation. The earth in some people's view is that
> old, but I do not accept
> this and for genuine reasons which we touched on in
> the program. We are
> moving at last to a genuine debate. There is coded
> information in the DNA,
> and the 2nd law is violated if one tries to pretend
> that the chemical bonds
> could arise without an intelligence behind it. The
> 2nd law otherwise would
> have them dissipate. Scientifically the 2nd law
> without intelligence means
> evolution (strictly here we mean abiogenesis - the
> formation of life) is
> impossible.
>
> I have many emails as I am sure you can imagine. I
> thank you for your
> interest in the debate on the science, and I am sure
> it will continue.
>
> Sincerely - A.C. McIntosh
>
> LEEDS

97. Sunday Sequence with William Crawley

Comment #12122 by RascoHeldall on December 10, 2006 at 4:56 pm

Go for it, Jack. The stupid thing is, to get to professor level this guy must be an expert in his subject. That he would (ab)use this knowledge to knowingly and deliberately construct such a sophisticated-sounding tissue of lies (especially when he blatantly lies about the 2nd law of thermodynamics - HIS OWN FIELD OF STUDY) really does speak volumes for the dehumanising effect religious conviction can have on people. What pitiful character.

98. Sunday Sequence with William Crawley

Comment #12119 by RascoHeldall on December 10, 2006 at 4:38 pm

Just emailed the bugger (thanks for the link, Eamonn). I wonder if he'll reply?

99. Sunday Sequence with William Crawley

Comment #12116 by RascoHeldall on December 10, 2006 at 4:23 pm

Andy MacIntosh: "Lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie lie."

Leeds University has been shamed.

100. Ministers to ban creationist teaching aids in science lessons

Comment #11840 by RascoHeldall on December 7, 2006 at 3:56 pm

Sometimes, just sometimes, New Labour do get it right. Praise where praise is due.