1151. Evidence can't shake your faith if your faith excludes it as evidence

Comment #132770 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 7:39 am

David EldenThe question is, based on the 'clever alien' argument, shouldn't we be agnostic about Genesis 1:1?

Well I'm not absolutely sure that Genesis 1:1 is a strictly deist claim. It's clear from what follows that "God" means something very specific, and not a creator at large. It also posits the existence of heaven, for which not an iota of evidence, other than the book itself, has been put forward. (Interesting that God appears not to have thought of making hell at this point. But I digress.)

Insofar as there may ultimately have been a creator, I personally don't think it's a sufficiently interesting question to bother having an opinion on. If the creator / clever aliens stopped there, it has no bearing whatsoever on what we do with our lives. I'm happy to concede the possibility to theists and say "Now what?" Does that count as agnosticism?

1152. Church is paying a high price for its celibacy rule

Comment #132759 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 7:27 am

Slightly more seriously, it appears to me that the whole celibacy thing is a big red herring.

Irish boys used to be pushed into the priesthood because of the status it brought to the family. Now that the RC church has squandered its status, you'd only become a priest if you have some kind of call to ministry and you don't mind people thinking that you're a bit odd. Father Dougal Maguire, of irate_atheist's avatar fame, is a recogisable figure, but doesn't fit any more.

Not even the religious in Ireland are shedding many tears for the demise of the church. In fact, putting the boot in is something of a national pasttime. It would almost make me feel sorry for it. Almost.

1153. Church is paying a high price for its celibacy rule

Comment #132752 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 7:21 am

Four priests defect to the Church of Ireland ... that's sure to mean much better ministry for the remaining 17 people in the congregation.

1154. How he was sentenced to die

Comment #132719 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 6:52 am

bucketchemist - I would agree, although due process is a concept inherent in US and UK law, but I'm not sure it features in Afghanistan, I would suspect not.

I have no idea whether it features explicitly or not. The point is that the rule of law does require it. This is not simply a question of whether the law is a just one or not. In other words, I don't think you can jump straight to your question 3.

1155. Evidence can't shake your faith if your faith excludes it as evidence

Comment #132717 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 6:48 am

David Elden - How can the idea of a creator be a scientific hypothesis if no evidence can support or refute it?

That probably does support NOMA, as far as it goes.

The problem is that it only deals with Genesis 1:1. By the time we get to Genesis 1:2, the bible is making falsifiable scientific claims about earth and water existing prior to light. And this is, well, false.

1156. Evidence can't shake your faith if your faith excludes it as evidence

Comment #132713 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 6:43 am

Steve Zara - I am afraid I just can't think right now of a single piece of evidence that would convince me that an Abrahamic religion-type God exists.

Dr Benway raised an interesting possibility back when he was still posting regularly. It involved every autopsy one day showing an inscription on the femur of the deceased, saying somthing along the lines of "It's all true. Signed Yahweh."

Of course, that still wouldn't tell us how to reconcile the various contradictory bits of the bible.

1157. How he was sentenced to die

Comment #132652 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 4:46 am

bucketchemist - That's an odd interpretation of the rule of law.

Most jurists would say that at the very least, it also includes the concept of due process. This doesn't just mean that the procedures are laid down in advance, but also that there's some reasonable opportunity to put your case. A four minute hearing, without access to a lawyer or opportunity to speak, doesn't constitute any meaningful standard of due process.

1158. Fleabytes

Comment #132647 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 4:33 am

Not even anything about soil, chickens, seven layers of protection and snowflakes. He isn't really trying, is he?

1159. Fleabytes

Comment #132646 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 4:31 am

Praise to Quetz. Not only does our deity not leave us with instructions we can't properly understand. He even works out what other people are on about. Beat that, Yahweh.

But ... no actual evidence, then. How surprising.

1160. Fleabytes

Comment #132641 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 4:20 am

Sorry, got to post 600 and I can't take any more.

Is it safe to assume that clearthinker hasn't come up with any evidence for the existence of God, yet?

1161. Evidence can't shake your faith if your faith excludes it as evidence

Comment #132581 by hungarianelephant on February 25, 2008 at 2:06 am

Bonzai (132541) - "No believer will find his faith shaken by evidence that is evidence only in the light of assumptions he does not share and considers flatly wrong."
To the extent that this is true, it is an observation about the mindset of the believer rather than a demonstration that "evidence" has no meaning.

Agreed, but it's also fair to say that people generally will hold tightly to an established belief system, taking any ambiguous facts as evidence for their own position and shouting down anything to the contrary. It even happens here in the oasis of clear thinking occasionally, as I'm sure we've all seen - though having said that I can't think of any other group who would readily challenge statistics favourable to their point of view, as in the "atheist prisoners" discussion on another thread.

Campos sounds like a law professor who has spent more time than most in a court. Huge amounts of legal time and energy are devoted to creating "impressions" in the jurors' minds, which it is hoped will create the framework for them to build a mental picture. It's become the fashion for the prosecution case to begin with a mountain of prejudicial stuff of marginal relevance, which often should never have been admitted in the first place. If you simply concentrate on presenting evidence on behalf of your client, you will be acting in the finest legal traditions. You will also probably lose.

This stuff carries on well beyond the courtroom. Most white Americans believe OJ did it. Most black Americans don't. How could this be, when they heard the same evidence? (Clue: what if only the parts that favour your prejudice count?)

1162. Don't blame Islam for terrorism, expert says

Comment #131357 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 10:23 am

Well I should point out that I didn't say it would be smart. And even if it were, I have no doubt that the Pentagon could find a way of fucking it up.

You see a similar pattern with Christianity as well. Even the supposedly uniform Catholicism has a very different flavour in Ireland, France, Columbia or the Philippines. And yet all of those cultures are strongly coloured by Catholicism.

The question I'm posing is why anyone should assume that Arabs have the monopoly on deciding what is and is not Islamic. The Malaysian Muslims I have met have some pretty wacky notions, but they're a lot easier to live with than the former. Why shouldn't they get to decide? Can't we bung them a few dollars to set up madrassas competing with the petrochemical funded ones?

[Edited for weird Friday grammar]

1163. Don't blame Islam for terrorism, expert says

Comment #131349 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 9:53 am

Arab tribal ethos it may very well be, but Islam has been very successfully exported to non-Arab countries, including Afghanistan.

Take Islam out of the equation in Afghanistan, and what have you got? A war of independence against the Soviets, which no Arabs have any business ever being involved in. No Taleban, no Al-Qaeda training camps, no 9/11.

I sometimes wonder if the West's military interests might best be served by stirring up anti-Arabic feeling in non-Arab Muslim countries. Not that I'm advocating it, but I could see it coming. Just as I sometimes wonder in my cynical moments whether the real plan in Iraq isn't to create a situation in which the Sunni and Shia kick seven shades of shite out of each other, spread the conflict throughout the Middle East, and let us sell arms to both sides.

1164. Moral thinking

Comment #131339 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 9:22 am

Thanks, Cartomancer. I'd assumed that to be the case outside the context of the inter-war dictatorships, which seem to be all that get taught in schools these days.

It seems to be your view - forgive me if I am missing the subtleties - that it's the stability or otherwise of the society that leads and the liberalism or otherwise that follows. If so, that has important implications for policy-making, as it suggests that (assuming that we can all agree that Freedom Is A Good Thing) the most important thing a government can do is to try to create stability, or at least not to upset it. And conversely, that if you want to start a dictatorship, first create instability within the society.

(I wondered if this was a little off topic, given that it has nothing at all to do with Star Trek. Oh well.)

1165. Moral thinking

Comment #131309 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 8:13 am

Cartomancer - We historians have known about the tendency towards liberalism and freedom of dissent in stable societies for ages!

Is there any observed converse tendency, viz. unstable societies => illiberalism and suppression of sedition?

1166. Fleabytes

Comment #131235 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 5:15 am

The churches have a membership that runs into millions.

Well, possibly. In my experience, this is the most spookily accurate portrayal of the vitality of the largest church in the UK: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dDrwcWqpP4

1167. Fleabytes

Comment #131232 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 5:04 am

So, still no evidence, then.

1168. Fleabytes

Comment #131213 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 4:08 am

irate 447 - Now THAT's humour.

1169. Fleabytes

Comment #131210 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 4:06 am

clearthinker - I'm certain that I don't speak for everyone here, this being a place of disparate views, but I can think of nothing more boring than reading your response to Paula's long review of your book replying to Prof. Dawkins' critique of religion. Except maybe golf.

However, what I'd really like to see is some evidence that a supreme omnipotent deity exists, or that there are serious reasons to doubt materialism.

You claim to have this. Why not post it here? You might or might not win any converts, but your approach so far hasn't been very successful, so isn't it worth a go?

1170. Fleabytes

Comment #131205 by hungarianelephant on February 22, 2008 at 3:56 am

I don't actually know why I was banned - four times!

Oops. There goes no. 9 again.

1171. Fleabytes

Comment #130787 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 9:28 am

Bye bye David.

Just remember that it's Queens as in The Queen, not as in gays. So don't go off with your homophobic stuff. You'll be wasting your time. The DUP is already on that case.

Oh, and if you're worried about losing your posts, why not type it up using a word processor and keep a copy on a hard disk? Just a thought

1172. Fleabytes

Comment #130777 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 9:16 am

Tyler - You have more confidence in Eddie than I do, then.

1173. Fleabytes

Comment #130746 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 8:22 am

Am I missing something here or what?

Robertson is posting that he wants to be unbanned. How does he think we will hear him if he's banned?

Oh, that's right - there's one alias that isn't banned.

So he could post under that.

Unless of course this is all another attempt to quote mine. But it couldn't be that, could it? He sounds so reasonable.

[Edit - Well that was redundant, coming two and a half seconds after ForestMist's post. Oh well.]

[Edit 2 - I personally have not the slightest interest in reading his response to Paula. I'm sure that if it contains anything remotely novel, someone will wake me up. Don't let that stop you posting it though, David. As if it would.]

1174. Feb 12th: Happy Darwin Day!

Comment #130740 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 8:10 am

TonyA - Please! I'm trying to work here. How am I supposed to do that when I'm rolling on the floor crying with laughter?

1175. Why Darwin matters

Comment #130680 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 6:38 am

Yes, but what you've missed is that the something made of nothing that became human is the offspring of the original something made of nothing, while there's also an unexplained something made of nothing which is necessary to interact with the something. Oh, and they are all the same, and always have been.

Everything clear?

1176. Fleabytes

Comment #130655 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 5:41 am

ArtfulDodger - What I am saying is that if evolution is indeed indifferent, if it neither knows nor cares, then it is meaningless to expend our energies in defense of the weak and vulnerable. The "survival of the fittest" theme will always have the last word. Human dignity is of no more importance than the dignity of compost.

That is nonsense.

Evolution is descriptive, not prescriptive. In no way does it suggest that it is a bad idea, or meaningless, to look after the weak and vulnerable.

At the most basic level, my baby daughter is weak and vulnerable, but if I don't expend my energies in protecting and nurturing her, my genes have a vanishingly small chance of being passed on further.

You can argue all day long that the concept of human dignity is meaningless, but that won't make our evolved instinct to protect the weak and vulnerable go away.

1177. Fleabytes

Comment #130645 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 4:39 am

Vaal (228. Comment #130636) - Richard Leakey argues, persuasively in my view, that a feedback loop leading to the evolution of ever-more intelligent beings was indeed inevitable, once a species emerged that was principally reliant on its intelligence. I'm paraphrasing and probably not doing his argument full justice. The Sixth Extinction is a cracking read and I highly recommend it.

Of course that doesn't mean that humans were inevitable.

I find it's good fun to try to get fully paid-up religious types to explain to six-year-olds that the late Flopsy Bunny isn't going to heaven because she didn't have a soul. This has the dual merit of (a) sorting out the a la carte religious (which in Ireland at least is nearly everyone) from the fundies, and (b) really irritating the fundies.

1178. Why do we believe in God? 2m study prays for answer

Comment #130642 by hungarianelephant on February 21, 2008 at 4:12 am

Steve beat me to it.

Please don't apologise and please don't stop.

My one and only regret about studying law was that I had to pass up the chance to study maths and philosophy. Maybe when I retire and need to be kept out of my wife's way.

1179. Why Darwin matters

Comment #130323 by hungarianelephant on February 20, 2008 at 9:57 am

The Bishop - Just had one of my parishioners knock at the door ...

Bishops don't have parishes.

Perhaps you are a different kind of bishop? Chess, perhaps, since you only seem to be able to move diagonally.

1180. Why Darwin matters

Comment #130291 by hungarianelephant on February 20, 2008 at 8:16 am

al-rawandi - Sorry to steal your thunder.

It's so hard to believe that anyone would fall for it that I couldn't resist.

1181. Why Darwin matters

Comment #130283 by hungarianelephant on February 20, 2008 at 8:04 am

Hey, Bish. Whose computer are you using? Not yours, surely.

1182. Why Darwin matters

Comment #130258 by hungarianelephant on February 20, 2008 at 7:47 am

So to summarise The Bishop's posts thus far:

• The Bible was written by humans


• It is self-contradictory


• Unbelievers are blinded by their modern gods


• Science has created the means to cause mass killing

I think I can see where this is going.

1183. Feb 12th: Happy Darwin Day!

Comment #128864 by hungarianelephant on February 18, 2008 at 5:52 am

Snowflakes.

Surely wooter's strangest argument yet. I don't know where you can possibly begin with someone who thinks that "God" is a better explanation for the differences in snowflakes than chaos theory. That would not pass muster with my four year old godson (don't ask).

Honestly, if you were a religious type, how could you carry round in your head the idea that God spends his time designing snowflakes and deciding how many will fall, but cannot be arsed to cure a child of leukaemia?

Wrt the "debating with fundamentalists" question, I'm generally in favour of letting them run. It's always useful to see what people are really thinking. We're probably never going to get any of them to believe something different. But I'd guess there are visitors here who are genuinely curious to learn something, especially about science. I have great admiration for some posters - you know who you are - with the patience to keep responding to the likes of wooter. S/he won't learn anything, but the rest of us might.

That said, it's about time that wooter was booted off this site. S/he is contributing absolutely nothing but the same old, grammatically malformed arguments (in the loosest sense of the word), all of which boil down to "I don't understand this, therefore God exists". S/he refuses to engage in discussion, and simply ignores any counterpoints, only to bring up the original "point" again in another stream of consciousness 200 posts later.

Time to send the woot back to writing manuals for questionable Malaysian electronic equipment.

1184. Murder plot against Danish cartoonist

Comment #126833 by hungarianelephant on February 14, 2008 at 10:00 am

DavidJMH - The whole point as some of you have pointed out is to stop criminals re-offending and you don't achieve that by coddling and pleading.

That is possible. But what you are presenting is a binary choice between modern "soft" punishment, and something much harder.

There is another way. Do some research on the Danish prison system. You may find it a little too "liberal" for your tastes, but rates of reoffending are significantly lower than those in Britain or the US. So by the measure that we all say we agree upon, it works.

Prepared to give it a go?

1185. Council pays psychic for exorcism

Comment #126710 by hungarianelephant on February 14, 2008 at 2:44 am

Bear in mind that £60 is the official cost to the council, so you can imagine how much it actually cost.

1186. Why multiculturalism must be abandoned

Comment #125956 by hungarianelephant on February 12, 2008 at 10:24 am

It is an interesting question, but what do we then do with these 'non-citizens'?

I don't fully know.

If we put the religious issue on one side for a moment, there's another precedent for this.

The standard Irish republican line about Bloody Sunday - and I'm not just talking about the Shinners - is that the British government gunned down 14 of its own citizens (the unstated conclusion being that it therefore has no moral authority over anything).

This is technically true. The British government is responsible for the actions of its army, who may or may not have started the shooting but certainly finished it, and the dead would be regarded in international law as British citizens.

But they would not have regarded themselves as British citizens. They were Irish, and the Brits were, in their eyes, an occupying power.

Does this give the British army the right to shoot them?

Of course not.

Is their citizenship really relevant to the moral questions about what happened that day?

Not really.

It's a piece of linguistic propaganda. There's a long tradition in these islands of the rule of law, equal protection and rights against the government. It didn't always happen, but the aspiration still resonates. The air of England is too sweet for slaves to breathe. Britons never never. And all that. Result: the concept of citizenship appears to trump all other considerations, at least as far as a person's rights are concerned.

This is fallacious reasoning. All people are entitled to some rights by virtue of being people. Other expectations of a citizen are, surely, contingent on the acceptance of expectations from a citizen.

The trick is to work out which is which.

If for no reasons other than practical ones, we can't easily deport these people, although we could strongly suggest that they remove themselves to somewhere more in keeping with their aspirations. But I think we're justified in saying, off the top of my head: no, sorry, you can't import wives just so you can keep them as second class citizens. No you can't have Islamic schools even if we keep the Christian ones. No you're not entitled to have your mad clerics preaching hate. And no, you can't wear a burqa, or make anyone else wear one.

1187. Why multiculturalism must be abandoned

Comment #125943 by hungarianelephant on February 12, 2008 at 9:52 am

Steve Zara - But you can't say "leave" to people who are fellow citizens

On the other hand: Some of these people are "British" only by an accident of birth. They are not British by any other meaningful standard. 40% of British Muslims wish to see sharia introduced, and another 20% "don't know". A quarter think the killing of British troops in Iraq is justified, and a similar number supported 9/11, the same as the number who think Abu Hamza's treatment was unfair. A tenth say they have no loyalty to Britian whatsoever, and some 7% - that's 200,000 British citizens - say that Western society should be brought to an end, including by violence if necessary. When you don't consider yourself to have the responsibilities of a citizen of your country, why should you be considered a citizen?

I'm not advocating compulsory deportation, but I don't think we can hand-wave this issue away.

In the meantime, the practice continues of importing wives from some desolate part of Pakistan, because the British-born women are insufficiently Islamic, i.e. they tend to get uppity about being second class citizens. Does anyone really think this is a good idea?

1188. Sharia law in UK is 'unavoidable'

Comment #124080 by hungarianelephant on February 8, 2008 at 9:56 am

Dinah - Excuse me, but I believe some hard-line clerics in mosques in Britain are suggesting exactly that 'kind of nonsense'.

Of course they are. But this has absolutely nothing to do with the Archbishop's proposal, woolly and ill thought out as it is.

And if certain aspects of Sharia law were to be introduced, there would soon be pressure to introduce others.

Why? How does that argument go? "You allow sharia banking, therefore you must allow stoning."? Why would anyone think that was a good argument?

No one ever suggests that when we implement some provision of US or French or Spanish law (which happens regularly), that it's dangerous because there will soon be pressure to introduce other aspects. If there is anything in the difference here, it's that it's in the nature of Muslim representatives to keep demanding more, as loudly as possible.

While I don't favour appeasement as a general policy, I also don't see the need to resist every single push for change, just because it's made by Muslims. I'd prefer to examine proposals on their merits. And if anyone can explain to me how sharia resolution of property disputes is different from submitting the case to the American Arbitration Association, I'm all ears.

1189. Sharia law in UK is 'unavoidable'

Comment #124038 by hungarianelephant on February 8, 2008 at 7:52 am

Because his responsibility as a leader of that denomination is to lead.

Well then that's a matter between him and his sheep flock. It should not concern you or me.

As to weddings in religious places, that's their party and they can invite who they want. You can go and get married somewhere where they don't discriminate against people for being gay. I've been to weddings in castles and even a football stadium which were legally binding. That's perfectly possible for a gay couple as well, except that they call it something else. Though come to think of it, you might not want to try it at Anfield for a few years.

It only starts to matter when the churches start interfering with what goes on outside their churches. Which of course they do with boring regularity.

1190. Sharia law in UK is 'unavoidable'

Comment #124031 by hungarianelephant on February 8, 2008 at 7:35 am

I know what the Archbishop said was a lot milder than has been reported, but he has a responsibility to not be so naive and incompetent as to talk like that in public.

Why?

Btw I think I picked up the marriage point. It's stupid that Anglican church weddings (and I think Catholic weddings) are automatically recognised and others are not. But what would be the big deal about allowing it in a mosque?

1191. Sharia law in UK is 'unavoidable'

Comment #124029 by hungarianelephant on February 8, 2008 at 7:27 am

I hope I have been as vociferous as anyone about Islam. Except Diacanu, obviously.

But.

I have to agree with Cartomancer (123861). This is a very big storm in a very small teacup.

No one is suggesting introducing stoning for adulterers and gays, or forcing women to wear the veil, or any of that nonsense. Whatever else he throws into his speech, Williams is talking about specific aspects of civil law, and allowing consenting adults to decide how they want to resolve disputes on certain issues.

We already do this. It's called "arbitration" and "ADR". I don't remember anyone ever telling me that they are "wrong". I don't see why it suddenly becomes wrong when the arbitrator is an imam, and there's a background body of rules from an old book. If people want to engage in stupid, inefficient transactions because Allah forbids interest, then I'll think they're idiots, but it's really no one's business but theirs.

Some of the comments here are just plain silly. The US has fifty one different legal systems, but has somehow managed to avoid "balkanising" the country. The UK has six. Obviously there has to be one system which has precedence over any other. No one is suggesting otherwise.

I would have thought that many people on this site, of all places, would see the merit in detaching marriage law from central control. Once that's done, it becomes untenable for the government to tell people that they're not allowed to get married just because they're both of the same gender. Personal relationships are no business of the state anyway and marriage is only a legal concept because of the religious history behind it.

1192. Female Muslim medics 'disobey hygiene rules'

Comment #122241 by hungarianelephant on February 5, 2008 at 1:28 am

al-rawandi - You are far from an idiot just because I can't make my point clearly enough.

The US Constitution says nothing about abortion. That doesn't make for a very interesting case, of course, so the plaintiffs made up an analogy between the "privacy" right against illegal search and the right to the "privacy" of a woman's body. And the US Supreme Court bought it. The right to dispose of a first trimester foetus is "like" the right not to be searched (Qiyas?), much as driving a car is presumably "like" doing anything else involving personal freedom in a strict interpretation of Islam.

Dworkin would call this "incremental jurisprudence". I call it "making it up". Chief Justice Rehnquist's dissent is a model of clarity, brevity and principled objection.

Of course, if you express a view like this, it's generally assumed you're a rabid, conservative and probably religious anti-abortionist.

Back on topic, presumably there must be some Muslim doctors who are involved in abortions and other unIslamic acts. I wonder if this is more about women.

1193. Female Muslim medics 'disobey hygiene rules'

Comment #121896 by hungarianelephant on February 4, 2008 at 10:01 am

Just trying to stir up a row about abortion by comparing Sharia jurisprudence with the US Supreme Court circa 1973. Never mind.

1194. Female Muslim medics 'disobey hygiene rules'

Comment #121873 by hungarianelephant on February 4, 2008 at 9:31 am

Ah, so the same principle that gave us Roe v. Wade, then. *ducks for cover*

1195. Female Muslim medics 'disobey hygiene rules'

Comment #121869 by hungarianelephant on February 4, 2008 at 9:23 am

al-rawandi - That is possible. Another poster in another thread suggested that it was the application of colonial government at home, which also rings true. Either way, it would be nice to think that Muslims could be treated as citizens rather than as children who need the class bully to speak for them. We might then hear less from the class bully.

Slightly off-topic, I'd be intrigued to know which part of a 7th century document forbids a woman from operating a car.

1196. Female Muslim medics 'disobey hygiene rules'

Comment #121855 by hungarianelephant on February 4, 2008 at 9:00 am

At the risk of stomping into a minefield, then ...

The biggest troublemakers do seem to be immigrants, particularly in the form of clerics and self-styled community leaders. Quite why the British govt continues to try to engage with these people is quite beyond me.

1197. God vs. Gridiron

Comment #121776 by hungarianelephant on February 4, 2008 at 6:18 am

ShavenYak - I'm afraid that's just wishful thinking and has no basis in intellectual property law. The churches got it right this time. Except the bit about not committing crimes in the name of Christ. That was obviously meant to be a joke. I think.

1198. God vs. Gridiron

Comment #121702 by hungarianelephant on February 4, 2008 at 2:29 am

Russell Blackford - It's a matter of principle, not of rooting for whichever organisation you happen to like for some other reason. You can't take one attitude on such a matter if the organisation affected is a church and another if it's the local atheist society.

I agree. The NFL is entitled to control how its product is distributed. And if the Walnut Street Baptist Church wants to prevent its services being shown in football stadia rented out for the purpose, I would support its right to do so also.

1199. Pope says some science shatters human dignity

Comment #120132 by hungarianelephant on February 1, 2008 at 9:33 am

This speech is actually cannier than might at first appear.

Outside the confines of this site, science has a lousy public image. Many people are deeply uncomfortable with what it seems to offer, and in particular with the delivery of technology without regard to the consequences and their apparent treatment by science/scientists as units rather than as people. And like many public images, there is a kernel of truth.

Ratzinger is seeking to align his own perverted vision of the world with something that many people haven't yet properly conceptualised. He knows he's not going to get anywhere by banging on about abortion, so specifics are hidden within a list of what some will consider Frankenstein science.

We are not the target audience here.

[Edited to put html back in. Wtf is up with this?]

1200. 'Irrational Atheist' trounces God-deniers

Comment #117532 by hungarianelephant on January 29, 2008 at 4:10 am

epeeist - I don't disagree with any of what you say. I just don't see why it's a problem.

Most people don't just change their views when encountered with a counter-argument that they can't immediately deal with. This was why the "Changing My Mind" thread was worthwhile, and it's why religiosity persists in less "knowledgeable" theists. You can do some further research, enlist the help of thinking atheists, apply some sceptical thinking to the arguments presented, or, perhaps most likely, simply ignore them. I don't see that many people are likely to be picked off by the religious just because they haven't thought about it much.