251. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #171194 by Cartomancer on April 28, 2008 at 11:06 am

I don't think that gays fit into the picture of an ideal America. He drapes himself in the flag which is a privilege that is not earned cheaply and he uses it for his ways.

Why don't gay people fit in to your "ideal america" then? What is it about attraction to one's own gender that does not fit? What harm does it do? And why should your version of "ideal" automatically trump everyone else's?

And why should the wearing of flags and symbols be a privilege? If that were so then you wouldn't be able to buy the things in just about any shop you care to name. What's so special about a bit of cloth with some spangles on it?

252. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #171188 by Cartomancer on April 28, 2008 at 10:58 am

No response? Oh, please, do tell me what you have against the use of flags in homoerotic imagery. I am fascinated by the workings of such a mind as yours...

253. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #171164 by Cartomancer on April 28, 2008 at 10:43 am

Might I ask precisely what is wrong with the use of flags in homoerotic imagery? Do you have a similar animus against their use in heteroerotic imagery too?

I am intrigued as to where your homophobia stems from. It is rare that I get a homophobic individual to question on these matters - the information you provide may prove most fascinating...

254. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #171142 by Cartomancer on April 28, 2008 at 10:30 am

And besides, if you think that's a homoerotic picture of the US flag, you could barely dream of some of the exciting things I've got stored on my hard drive...

255. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #171129 by Cartomancer on April 28, 2008 at 10:23 am

And our proud forefathers didn't die so a fag like star spangled eagle could drape the flag like a fagrobe...

My ancestors fought for that flag and now people like him are using for their homoerotic pics

Oh look, we have another homophobic troll here now. Well, half-troll anyway. Some trollish blood to be sure. How is Far Harad this time of year?

Would you like to apologise for those vile comments please: they are incredibly offensive to all right-thinking human beings.

256. Science leads to killing people

Comment #170817 by Cartomancer on April 28, 2008 at 4:04 am

So... let me get this straight. Science leads to killing people, and the only solution to this danger would be to flood the world with millions upon millions of belligerent jackbooted american squaddies. Sorry, millions more of them. Makes perfect sense I'm sure...

Universities are full of nonsense, whereas churches and synagogues, presumably, are not? Legislation has no bearing on morality and social conduct, but fanciful fantasies of supernatural goblins are at its heart?

Day is night and night is day, the truth is a lie and the lies are true. 2 2=5. Welcome to the crazy mixed-up world of Ben Stein. Big Brother loves you, it's just the rest of the world who think you're a drooling idiot.

257. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #170110 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 11:47 am

What is that from? Because it's excellent. I used to write a lot of (bad) poetry before I got into philosophy.

From the heart dear boy, from the heart... (*blushes*)

Traditional Japanese love stories almost always have an unhappy ending, so my brother tells me. Rather like the Greek tragic theatre. Life imitates art here I suspect - in my case at least...

258. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #170083 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 10:53 am

as I understand it one is trapped between their desire to touche their friend, and move it into that next step, but also the fear of ruining the friendship, and losing them forever. So they are trapped within a buffer of where they are close, but not nearly as close as they want to be, and afraid to get closer because they might lose the position they already occupy.

Cruel the fates who wove me were when setting forth my heart,
To long for what I cannot have now touched by cupid's dart.
They made a boy of golden hue and set him near to me,
Then stirred my soul to seek from his a love that cannot be.

Ganymede, Adonis and Apollo fall behind,
To the beauty of his body and the candour of his mind,
His virtues and accomplishments are myriad and great,
Allow me the indulgence that a few I might relate.

In every scholar's discipline he masters all he tries,
Such kindness and compassion true are carried in his eyes,
To matters of this life we live he comes with great elan,
A paragon, a prodigy, the noblest son of man.

He's everything I want to be and all that I admire,
Is it so strange that, given this, to hold him I desire?


How dearly would I cleave to him should all the stars above
Accede to my desires and admit him to my love,
But ceaseless is their tyranny, and though I burn with flame,
His heart is held for different stock and ne'er will feel the same.

I can, it must be freely said, approach him as a friend,
Among the truest and the best on whom I can depend,
And so I staunchly stoic stand and watch, consumed with strife,
As passion for another so invigorates his life.

Oh how I wish it could be me who takes that happy place!
And my designs that spark the smile upon his golden face,
Alas of these emotions, felt so strong, I cannot tell
Lest the very act of telling loses me a friend as well.

So silent is my agony, and thus it must remain,
Lest friendship falls to foolish fears and Fosters further pain.


Had I but the pen which tempted Faustus into sin,
Or the wedding gift of Discord which did Troia's war begin,
I would gladly bear their torments, diabolic or divine,
If for but a single moment I could say that he was mine.

Alas my first and only love I'll never have nor hold,
Whatever curse I cry amidst the darkness and the cold,
Lachesis, Clotho, Atropos ignore my bitter tears,
And carry on their baneful work with spindle, loom and shears.

So where am I to go from here, resigned to callous fate?
Condemned to leave my love behind and find another mate?
To wish such pain upon my friend, or break if I do not?
To reconcile my burdens and be happy with my lot?

I know not what the answer is, nor even where to start.
Confound the fates who wove me and the boy who broke my heart.

259. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #170068 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 10:34 am

excuse me while I go and google shirtless pictures of the guy to drool over. I might be away from RD.net for some time...

260. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #170066 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 10:29 am

Don't worry Sharon, the delightful Rafael Nadal fits in very nicely with my my sexual interests - it's on topic for me at least!

(though of course men as attractive as him should be prevented from wearing any kind of t-shirt at all in my opinion)

261. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #170057 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 10:16 am

Generally speaking, if you want to look at how features arose in a species, you look at the more closely related ones. We are most closely related to Bonobos. I would say that it shows!

True, but I generally avoid places where I've seen human beings masturbating each other in trees before. Somehow that makes for a rather uncomfortable social situation. I still can't quite bring myself to venture back to that particular corner of the University parks again...

262. Does science make belief in God obsolete?

Comment #170040 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 9:52 am

I didn't notice this was a Templeton Foundation piece at first. Hmm, I smell bias too now - if only because they'll all have to pack up and go home if they come to the correct answer - which is yes.

263. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #170031 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 9:37 am

We're talking about the fruit, right?

In a very particular manner of speaking, yes!...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fruit_(slang)

After those uncomfortable moments, we go back to pretending the reverse.

That's the difference between cats and dogs. Dogs have owners, cats on the other hand only have staff.

264. Does science make belief in God obsolete?

Comment #170029 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 9:33 am

I think that's where Shermer and Dawkins are using different definitions of "god". Shermer is taking the "creative ability" as the defining characteristic, Dawkins the "uncreated" status. I must say I think Dawkins is closer to what we in the West at least generally think of as the defining characteristic of a god, but it's pretty much a pointless semantic argument anyway.

265. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #170023 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 9:26 am

What does a gay man bring on the second date?
Second date - what is that?.

Second date? second date? I've never even managed a first date before. What are they like?

So I do consider lovers and friends to be very different relationships. Though I understand that other people are different, and have extremely close friends.

What happens if you fall in love with a very close friend but can't have a sexual relationship with them because they've got someone else? Oh yes, that's right, four years of treatment for clinical depression - how silly of me to forget.

I see it more like calling a pet a family member.

I'm with upsidedawn on this one. My cat Wednesday is far more important than anyone else in the family, including me.

266. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169951 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 5:40 am

They are just like people, only more complex. They can do things like multitasking and remembering precise details from 20 years ago.

Sounds frightening. Real people are far too complex for my poor little brain to comprehend, let alone these strange new female ones...

267. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169937 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 5:24 am

my fumbling attempts to initiate relationships with women when I was younger ended up with me as close friend.

Funnily enough my fumbling attempts to initiate relationships with men generally end up with a new person who won't talk to me ever again...

268. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169925 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 4:59 am

Trusting your mind is capacious enough to give mind to both, may I ask if your doctorate thesis is in any way taking in notions of atheism as to be evident in your final piece? Or will your final D.Phil success indicate no such atheistic ideas as you hold?

An intriguing question, and one I had not really thought about before. I guess the answer is that my atheism hardly comes across at all in my thesis, or indeed any of my academic writing, because the questions I am addressing don't really have any bearing on the existence or otherwise of god.

Now, most of the time I find myself discussing theological concepts and philosophical ideas of a heavily theistic bent. My concern, however, is not to discuss whether these ideas are true, rather, it is do discuss why they were held by the people who held them in the first place, what factors influenced their adoption and transformation in societies, how they developed over time and who they influenced later on.

I suppose that, were I a christian, a muslim or a jew, I might feel compelled occasionally to introduce theistic reasoning into my account ("as it says in leviticus, the soul only enters the body after forty days or so. Alfred of Shareshill is therefore clearly wrong here, and shouldn't have been so reliant on Aristotle and the medical tradition for his information. Perhaps his faith wasn't strong enough to see the truth, or maybe the devil tempted him from it"). I doubt there are any serious theistic historians of ideas who would do such a thing though. Admittedly, in order to understand and extrapolate ideas it is sometimes necessary to inhabit a theistic mode of thought, or to entertain the internal logic of a philosophical system to which I do not subscribe.

Were I actually writing about medieval atheism directly, as a fellow supervisee of my supervisor is, then I expect it might be a lot harder to avoid personal comment. As it is I take the view that the thought of the Middle Ages must be understood on its own merits, and an injecion of modern atheism would be deeply ahistorical.

The one sop to my atheism I do maintain is that I refuse point blank to capitalise "bible", "scripture", "god" or the pronouns referring to that entity unless it is in quotations or translated quotations. I don't go as far as I do on here and deliberately refuse to capitalise any religious term as a mark of scorn (which is why it is muslims, jews and christians above, rather than Muslims, Jews and Christians) - scorn is not considered an appropriate stylistic device for formal academic writing, and I capitalise Aristotelians or Avicennists or Platonists, so I can't really avoid extending the same courtesy to theistic philosophical schools.

269. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169909 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 4:32 am

I had an attraction to girls, but it just never worked.

Now that I do find interesting. I can't say I have an awful lot of stories to compare my own experiences to - I only really know one other gay person - but for me girls were simply never on the agenda. I only really knew I was gay at about 14, but I've sort of known ever since I can remember that I certainly wasn't straight - I've always been starkly aware that, in this way and others, I am just not like most people. During my long years of denial I absolutely could not bring myself to tell anyone that I liked men, but I simply could not even begin to pretend that I liked women, even as a facade. I am somewhat baffled by the feminine gender to be honest - I've never really had more than one female friend (who was always rather tomboyish, indeed she is an engineer in the navy these days) and find most women very hard to relate to most of the time. The whole "gay men get on well with straight women" stereotype is very far from my experience indeed.

My experience growing up seems to have been rather more like Steve describes until I hit my twenties, but changed rapidly after that to become more reminiscent of what Mitchell discusses. I didn't really have the points of reference or the role models to confirm the validity of my sexuality either - all the people I looked up to were fictional characters who didn't really have a sexual aspect to their natures. In the end I forged my personal image in the mould of a disinterested asexual and tried not to think about it at all, though that was also triggered by my desperate need to suppress the burgeoning first (and only) love I felt (and still feel) for my best friend. Suffice to say the issue was a complex one indeed, and the pressures on me came entirely from societal depictions and images rather than any direct bullying or confrontation.

270. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169901 by Cartomancer on April 27, 2008 at 4:07 am

Cartomancer suggests in comment 169770 that people, especially teenagers cannot control the results of their emotions at the moment and so shouldn't be expected to. I'm sad that he seems to imply that humans cannot improve themselves either individually or in aggregate.

Now there's an exaggeration and a half! Of course human beings can change and improve themselves, but not indefinitely, not in all things and not uniformly. Human beings are not and cannot be emotionless, coldly logical, Vulcan-like beings - it's simply not possible given the structures of our brains and hormonal systems. It would also be hugely undesirable even if it could be achieved - the mechanisms of insult, offense and sympathy are vital parts of our social structure.

Why should we be teaching the victims of abuse how to tolerate the abuse rather than teaching the abusers that their abuse will not be tolerated in a civilised society? Since when did victims become the ones at fault here - that's a very dangerous and unworthy thing to argue indeed. There is a line that can be crossed between mere ad hominem insults and implicit attacks on someone's right to exist - people should be held to account for causing psychological harm to others, even if it was reckless and unintended.

I can see the benefits of encouraging people not to break down and cry at any little thing, but that's not what we're talking about here. Even those with the strongest mental resolve, if they lack self-confidence and societal support, can be massively damaged by bullying and sustained insensitivity from all directions. It's an immutable part of human psychology. Furthermore, the T-shirt issue is not about whether the slogan on the front is offensive to gay people (it undoubtedly is), but rather about whether the school places absolute freedom of expression above making a statement that it will not tolerate bigotry, narrow-mindedness and discrimination. If schools are for anything in our society it is to educate the young in what is acceptable and what is not - they have a positive duty to clamp down on homophobia in all its forms.

271. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169799 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 8:46 pm

Oh dear oh dear oh dear...

I sense a well-meaning individual here, and politeness is always a pleasant surprise from the theistic crowd, so I shall try hard to downplay my scorn for this one.

Unfortunately everything she says is just unsubstantiated assertion by fiat.

It truly is peace from God, it passes all understanding, truly it does.

If it passes all understanding, how come you can understand it? That statement is blatantly self-contradictory.

I've gone through a divorce, deaths in the family, many things in my life, and without my relationship with God, I would probably be a suicidal statistic.

That's evidence for the stability and tenacity of your own mind - it has no bearing on the existence of your imaginary friend. I am sure you do believe it exists, but that's all that's required for psychsomatic phenomena. People all over the world have the same experiences thanks to beliefs in thousands of different gods or none at all.

I have a good feeling most of you have never read the entire Bible, let alone studied it.

That's where you're wrong. Most people on this site seem to have a very good understanding of this particular antique text, not to mention many others. I myself have read the whole sordid collection of fatuous inanities from cover to cover, including the apocrypha, in both the King James and the Vulgate versions, and I've looked at passages from the Vetus Latina and the Septuagint. It's because we've read these kinds of texts with an open mind that we realise how painfully derivative and of a kind they are with other mythical stories. Truly dispassionate study of the bible cannot but lead to this conclusion - only a willfully ignorant person, or someone so enwrapped since early childhood with the fantasy it is anything else could come to a different appraisal.

Hell is a very real place, and the worst part about Hell is that it is the complete absence of God, which is something no man has ever experienced

Evidence for this assertion please...

That's all He wants, people, is just for us to come to Him, love Him, get to know Him.

Evidence for this assertion please...

The complexity of DNA assures me that my (and your) mind will never comprehend how extremely intelligent our God is.

But we do understand how complex our DNA is. Not very as it happens, with only four nucleotide bases and big heaps of junk DNA which don't actually do anything. And what does DNA have to do with gods? The complexities of life and the universe can be explained fine well without recourse to such ideas as gods - they're a spectacularly unparsimonious hypothesis to posit.

Christianity is not a religion. It's a relationship and a way of life. It's a way to be free from sin and destruction of our lives, from addictions and chaos.

Funnily enough I've heard muslims, hindus, sikhs and even one marxist say pretty much the same thing. It was only a matter of time before a christian tried it. For a start, all religions promise the same thing and none of them delivers, yours is no different. Secondly "sin" is a meaningless concept and entirely superfluous to ethical debate, it has no more relevance to the real world than magic does. Thirdly, the quiescence and well-being you feel are entirely self-generated: it's the wonderful complexity of your own brain - an evolved biochemical system - that's doing it. Isn't that a much more wonderful thought than having it all put there by a big sky tyrant on a whim? All the things you are currently chalking up to god are really the workings of mankind - little old us, all on our own. You can still be amazed and heartened and awed at it all, you just don't have to pretend it's caused by a silly supernatural character from a fairytale, and that makes it all the more wonderful.

I'm living in light of the God who CREATED science and all there is left to discover out there! He wants us to discover it. It all points to Him.

How do you know this? Do you not realise how circular this reasoning actually is? If you assume in the first place that it was caused by a god, you're bound to come to that conclusion in the end. How, might I ask, would you falsify that conclusion? What would prove to you that it is not true? If you cannot falsify it, it is a meaningless statement, and thoroughly unscientific.

Here is my challenge: point to a scientific FACT (not a theory or hypothesis) that does not clearly point to God

How about all of them? Every last one. Gravitation, evolution, tectonic plates, quantum phenomena, covalent bonding of atoms, the haber process, the mating habits of dolphins, osmosis, the hydrological cycle, sickle-cell anaemia, radioactive decay, pulsars, the refraction of light, homosexual behaviour in sheep, the atomic weight of boron, game theory...

None of these things "point to god". The existence or not of a god is entirely immaterial to these facts. We understand them, and there is nowhere that we have uncovered a phenomenon which would be demonstrably different were such a creature to exist. I think you need to read The God Delusion, or Bertrand Russell, or indeed anything that challenges your somewhat narrow world view.

Another challenge: call me out on anything you think about or within the pages of the Bible

Why should I want to do that? What is so special about your bible anyway? I've read it several times and it is nothing more than an entirely unremarkable and very badly edited anthology of middle eastern folk myths. The Iliad is much more exciting and much better written, and Sophocles, Aristotle and Cicero provide much more weighty matter for ethical and cultural debate.

The devil is the best deceiver there is

Evidence for the existence of this character please...

272. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169770 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 6:08 pm

The way to handle verbal abuse is quite simple: don't feel insulted. Just ignore the ad hominem irrelevancies, resist the temptation to succumb to the style over substance fallacy, and focus on whatever objective claims the other person is making. Cultivate sangfroid.

I disagree. It is rarely possible to stifle or limit one's natural emotional responses through the sheer application of cold, dispassionate reason - Plato's charioteer is a passable, but fundamentally flawed model of the human mind. For vulnerable, hormonally-charged teenagers it is next to impossible to do this. Furthermore, the best way to give teenagers the confidence they need to confront bigoted idiots like this one is to show them that the society of which they are a part does not put up with his sort.

I also think it is essential that we do feel offended at things which are genuinely offensive. The more we try to denature ourselves to our emotions, the less effective those emotions will be as guides to the conduct of our lives.

273. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169764 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 5:52 pm

I don't even see a problem in saying "this is so gay". I wouldn't think most people who say that are raving homophobes, it's just an expression.

I have had this discussion with my students before. I will admit that it is hardly the most damaging slur one could come up with, but I still think that ignoring the association of "gay" with "frivolous", "feeble" or "lame" is a mistake. The underlying origins of the term are too prominent to make me feel entirely comfortable there. I will be happy letting it go when I have heard gay people themselves using it in this way without taking it as a slur on their orientation.

274. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169757 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 5:36 pm

Ah, now bread pudding is an entirely different animal from bread and butter pudding. A well-made bread pudding will keep a family of miners alive for months, and can be used in emergencies for plugging holes in a sinking ship.

275. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169754 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 5:32 pm

Most of my opinion (or insight, depending on your view) comes from having a younger brother who is gay

It is always harder with the people we know and love. There is so much more invested there to lose. When I was in closeted denial I feared my identical twin brother finding out more than anyone else (even the best friend who I had fallen in love with). Indeed, when I finally did come out to all my friends, it took me another nine months to pluck up the courage to tell my brother, and it was still very difficult.

I still haven't actually told my parents. I expect they've probably figured it out by now though.

276. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169753 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 5:28 pm

The nature/nurture argument about the causes of homosexuality has been a highly politicised one for decades. I think I said something about this a while back. Let me see... ah yes, here it is

http://richarddawkins.net/articleComments,2380,Gods-cure-for-gays-lost-in-sin,SMH,page6#148402

I'm not sure, however, that the biggest implication of the "late onset" of homosexuality is the illusion it gives to some people that it is a chosen behaviour. In my experience the fact that teenagers have only recently become aware of their sexuality and the fact they have the option of trying to hide and suppress it makes for a cruel and interesting interplay.

Suppression of one's feelings can lead to all sorts of psychological damage. Especially when you feel the need to suppress them from yourself. I don't think my self-confidence has ever recovered from the years I spent as a teenager trying to hide who I was from my own consciousness, not to mention the awareness of everyone around me. It wasn't fear of bullying in my case, but rather the expectations I had of how my friends and family would think about me if I revealed that I was gay.

277. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169743 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 5:02 pm

I think Zeke has the measure of it. Certainly sounds reminiscent of some of my school experiences.

278. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169739 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 4:48 pm

The bread and butter pudding is one of my favourites. Most people think they should be made using slightly stale bread in order to use it up, but it tastes much better if, instead of bread, you use croissants. Preferably reasonably fresh ones rather than the ones you get in sealed bags at the supermarket. Break them up, put in a shallow pyrex dish and intersperse with shredded chunks of white chocolate. Then prepare the custard mixture from three whole eggs, the yolks of three or four more eggs, a little milk or cream, vanilla essence and sugar. You might like to add a bit of whiskey or some such to the custard if it is your wont. Pour over the croissants and leave to soak in. Sprinkle with sugar for a slightly crunchy brown crust and put in the oven to bake until golden brown for 20-30 minutes at about 200 celsius. Remove, leave to cool and serve with cream or ice cream. Also delicious cold.

The walnut cake is a little more involved, but the secret behind that one is dark muscovado sugar and flavour the mixture with a little almond oil. Oh, and don't chop the walnuts too finely. And use at least four eggs to about 200g of flour, most people use far too few. Contrary to popular belief I do not get royalties from the British Egg Marketing Board.

The people of my village don't call me the Queen of Puddings for nothing!

279. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169732 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 4:37 pm

Well, if others think there is a constituency for that kind of thing as humour then who am I to reject it out of hand? It never ceases to amaze me just how different some people's sense of humour is from mine. A salutary lesson in human diversity perhaps...

Could I ask Remnant where people like me who don't drink alcohol at all fit into the theory though? Actually, scratch that, the less encouragement we give him the better...

280. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169724 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 4:28 pm

I read it as a huge 'distraction' piece.

Hmm, maybe you're right. It's certainly stopped me thinking about his pettifogging religious inanities. Something of a foot-shot perhaps in that now we're wondering quite what sort of mind resorts to that as their smokescreen, but I guess there are mysteries beyond the ken of science after all...

Is it baking night on RD.net now then? Shall I share my special recipe for walnut cake or bread and butter pudding?

281. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #169713 by Cartomancer on April 26, 2008 at 4:12 pm

I really am baffled as to what Remnant was hoping to achieve with his very strange post about liberals, conservatives and beer. Surely it's some kind of joke? The phrasing seems consistent with an attempt at humour, but what it says isn't actually funny. Not in the slightest. It isn't really offensive, because it's too silly to be offensive, but it isn't funny either. It seems to serve no purpose whatsoever.

Now, don't get me wrong, I have encountered this brand of boorish philistine americana before. Usually it conveys the impression of having been written by a lumpen, semi-literate maniac who has to stop to wipe the spittle from his keyboard every five minutes. But Remnant's piece seemed to be entirely lacking in such marks of childish frenzy. I might almost have thought it a satirical piece, but it was so devoid of wit and cleverness - even crashingly poor attempts at wit and cleverness - that I am all but compelled to abandon the notion. I can't bring myself to believe that anyone with opposable thumbs would take such a tract seriously either - even someone like Remnant, whose idea of ethical debate is the competitive regurgitation of bible quotes.

And why was the second part essentially an abridged version of the first part with a couple of extra sentences tacked on? That really is very confusing too.

Perhaps I simply lack the analytical tools with which I might understand the workings of such a tiny mind. Perhaps there is nothing there to understand at all. Perhaps I should just take the Alovrin approach, pretend it's meant in all seriousness, and laugh along anyway...

282. Student's 'Be Happy, Not Gay' t-shirt ok

Comment #169324 by Cartomancer on April 25, 2008 at 7:11 pm

I don't really get this. Surely the school is entitled to have any dress code it wants? If the problem is "stifling freedom of expression" then surely the regular school uniform worn on all the other days would be prohibited, because pupils must wear it and therefore are unable to express themselves sartorially to the fullest of their ability. Likewise, teachers could be fired for telling pupils to shut up or sit down, because talking and standing up are modes of self-expression too. What about the pupil who chooses to spray graffiti on the walls - surely he's only expressing himself and should be legally protected from anyone trying to stop him doing so?

283. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #168239 by Cartomancer on April 24, 2008 at 7:27 pm

Oops, God debunked your source as well.

Such a shame for you that Mr. Pratchett actually exists, whereas your god character is just a poorly-written work of fantasy fiction. Pratchett has written far more convincing gods than all the bronze-age tribes of the middle east put together. Men like him created your god all those years ago, so if anyone deserves respect and veneration from an admirer of such characters it is he!

Would you like to stop begging the question with your fatuous circular reasoning and give us something intelligent to comment on now?

Seeing, contrary to popular wisdom, isn't believing. It's where belief stops, because it isn't needed any more.
- Pyramids

284. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #168232 by Cartomancer on April 24, 2008 at 7:18 pm

Sorry but you prayer theory was debunked by God.

Unfortunately for you it is amply confirmed by a much greater authority - that of Terry Pratchett himself:

There were all sorts of ways to petition the Great God, but they depended largely on how much you could afford, which was right and proper and exactly how things should be. After all, those who had achieved success in the world clearly had done it with the approval of the Great God, because it was impossible to believe that they did it with his disapproval... But there were always the improvident, the stupid and those who, because of some flaw or oversight in this life or the a past one, were not even able to afford a pinch of incense. And the Great God, in His wisdom and mercy as filtered through his priests, had made provision for them.

- Small Gods, p. 67

There. My authority is better than yours, so I win!

And to finish on another pearl of wisdom from the writings of the Great Man himself:

Gods don't like people not doing much work. People who aren't busy all the time might start to think.

285. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #168219 by Cartomancer on April 24, 2008 at 7:00 pm

Modern science was birthed under Christianity with many of the fathers of many disciplines people of faith.

"Birthed under" is a very curious phrase to choose here. I was "birthed under" the Margaret Thatcher government, but does that mean I owe her anything? Am I, as a product of 1983, a vicious uber-capitalistic Conservative vampire? Is Thatcherite Conservatism any good for my continued well-being today? Does it not, rather, work actively against me and the general well-being of the society it so crassly denies?

286. Lying for Jesus?

Comment #168209 by Cartomancer on April 24, 2008 at 6:43 pm

One can't help but wonder just what this remnant character is actually a remnant of. The Middle Ages perhaps?

I'll still pray for her. You can't do a thing about it little man.

What about if he prays even harder for you to stop praying? Surely if prayer has any efficacy then that would work? And if it doesn't then why are you doing it in the first place eh?

287. Is religion a threat to rationality and science?

Comment #167564 by Cartomancer on April 24, 2008 at 7:03 am

yuck.sounds like a quote from a member of NAMBLA.

Sigh... I get that quite often. It is rather irritating, and pretty offensive when you think about it - being lumped in with paedophiles because of my entirely normal and entirely legal sexual preferences for the younger man.

I get the feeling that a straight 24 year old male who expressed a preference for 18 year old females would not be chastised nearly as often. C'est la vie...

288. Is religion a threat to rationality and science?

Comment #167548 by Cartomancer on April 24, 2008 at 6:48 am

Facial hair makes men look like men rather than boys. I can't understand why this isn't considered something attractive. I do think Dennett's beard is rather excessive though.

De gustibus non disputandum est... (and now I'm going to ignore my own advice)

I can't stand facial hair on men myself, and I don't like body hair either. Much prefer the smooth, boyish look. I guess it's a question of taste, but facial hair (especially white or grey facial hair) generally makes men look a lot older - and youth is something that most societies have considered sexually attractive. Testosterone levels are generally highest in men from about 18-25, so it makes a kind of sense that this is when they should be at their most alluring. At least that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it!

Dennett's beard makes him look like he's well into his nineties. A good look for appearing wise and grandfatherly, but not something to stir the blood in a sexual way I fear...

289. Russell T Davies: Return of the (tea) Time Lord

Comment #167535 by Cartomancer on April 24, 2008 at 6:36 am

It doesn't follow that homosexuals are unable to or unwilling to have offsprings. I think you are mistaking cultural attitude as biology.

While homosexuality may have a biological factor, the gay identity is a rather recent cultural construct. I am annoyed whenever I read so and so (fill in the blanks for your favourite historical personality) was gay. The concept didn't exist then.

Yes, but homosexual behaviour in animals is not affected by the cultural factors which affect humans, and there are plenty of examples of animals - and humans throughout history - that only indulge in same-sex mating behaviour. It is even possible to create them in the lab with hormonal treatments and surgery during early development (in rats at least). In order to explain the occurrence of homosexuality you have to do it in animals first, and cultural factors cannot be a part of that explanation.

Have there actually been any studies done on the sexual orientation of the children of homosexual or bisexual parents? I can imagine that, until recently, there simply wouldn't have been any reliable way to gather a sufficient sample of such individuals. I do recall, however, that studies have been done which find a much greater incidence of homosexuality in the maternal families of homosexual men than those of straight ones - surely that's strong evidence of a genetic component.

And, even though I am living proof that identical twins can be of differing sexual orientations, the twin studies do show that a very significant number of identical twins share the same sexual orientation, whereas non-identical fraternal twins do not to nearly the same extent. There is really no other explanation for that than a genetic one.

290. Mecca should become core to measure time zones: scholars

Comment #167222 by Cartomancer on April 23, 2008 at 6:18 pm

I actually own a couple of anticlockwise-turning clocks. They're nothing new. I bought them from a specialist left-handed shop a few years back - I just find it much easier for my heavily left-handed brain to fathom the time when it's going in that direction (though I much prefer digital ones to be honest).

And to think that the Islamic world was at the forefront of mechanical engineering and scientific endeavour a millennium ago...

291. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #167199 by Cartomancer on April 23, 2008 at 5:57 pm

Dance we now our merry dance,
the steps laid down so long ago,
we wait for any tiny chance,
that evidence will be on show.

Gavotte, recline, in double time,
as yet another takes the floor,
you know your parts, take up your arts,
his arguments are just as poor.

We waltz, we spin, he twists and turns,
we cry so plaintive, ask for proof,
he weaves, he ducks, but ne'er returns
with facts to firmly face the truth

We wail, we cry, he blinks his eye,
then points it out for all to see,
he laughs, he jeers, and through the tears,
says "can't reduce complexity"

We shake our heads, try not to shout,
confront and educate the feller,
And once we've pointed that one out
he brings up protein-based flagella.

He slips, he trips, away he chips
no theories of his own to test
predictions none, away he runs,
the truth is not his interest.

On and on we tread the stage,
cavorting to the same refrain,
no substance, only facile rage,
the same old stuff warmed up again.

292. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #167142 by Cartomancer on April 23, 2008 at 4:59 pm

Looks like I missed out on the sport again. Natch. Oh well, this one seems to be one of those terribly humourless self-important types who deals in little more than soundbites and other people's footnotes. Not a flattering characteristic when combined with the usual creationist inability to respond to questions and a penchant for focussing on irrelevant tangential minutiae.

He'll wear his scissors blunt and run his paste pot dry long before he ever comes up with an original thought. So very disappointing...

293. Investigating Atheism

Comment #167126 by Cartomancer on April 23, 2008 at 4:34 pm

I knew it would all end in tears when we let them escape and found their own university out in the marshes in 1209. Possibly a bit late now to revoke their independence and recall them all to Oxford where we can keep a close eye on them, but worth a try I feel.

To do my bit for the reclamation of the wayward Cambridge Loons I can put up a couple of theologians on my floor in Summertown, and maybe there's room in the wardrobe for a small deacon if he takes his hat off. Anyone else want to volunteer and help out in the cause of academic freedom?

294. Lynchings in Congo as penis theft panic hits capital

Comment #166619 by Cartomancer on April 23, 2008 at 10:46 am

This sounds like something straight out of a cultural anthropology textbook or an egyptian magical papyrus. How intellectually backwards can these poor benighted people be?

Still, penis theft does sound a rather amusing idea. I wonder what it is that the Congolese sorcerers need all those penises for? Maybe I'm in the wrong magical profession - all I get to play with are these boring old tarot cards...

295. Russell T Davies: Return of the (tea) Time Lord

Comment #166142 by Cartomancer on April 22, 2008 at 8:00 pm

jac12358 -

For a start I think it would help if you stopped conflating everything that I say with everything that Steve Zara says. You and he have had your disagreements on other topics, and clearly you feel somewhat aggrieved at the way he has argued against you in the past. This does not mean that I or anyone else should be lumped in with your criticisms of him - we might both be gay and, coincidentally, agree on many issues, but that does not mean we are both part of some big conspiracy and therefore singing from the same hymn sheet.

Similarly, I cannot be held to task for "misrepresenting you" by only bringing up those points you make which I disagree with. If someone wants to find out precisely what else you have said they can go back and look at it in your own posts - they do not have to rely on my responses to piece together your arguments. If I do not mention something you said, it is usually because I do not think it worth commenting on - I might agree with it, I might not, but there is no onus on me to mention it simply because you did so.

But here, at least, the way to change things is through debate and then voting on that change. As I am in the majority and you the minority, you quite rightly are the one advocating change, and to accomplish this you must bear the burden of advocating your point of view.

But I'm not the one advocating change. You are. I'm quite happy with the increasing presence of gay characters and storylines on TV - you're the one who wants to change that. Also, this isn't a legal or political issue we are discussing - it's a cultural one. Unless you really do want to impose strict statuary censorship on all aspects of our TV output? Culture is not democratic, and it certainly is not ochlocratic - in fact the generation of art is among the most individually-driven phenomena in human society. The body concerned is the BBC, which has its own agendas, its own funding and its own creative rationale. It is not tied to audience figures or sponsorship because it is funded by the license fee - and that, combined with its decades of experience and ethic of professionalism, is what makes it such a peerless broadcasting service: easily the best in the world by miles.

To label (or suggest) me (incorrectly) as a homophobic ignoramus does nothing to further your cause NOR convince me, and as such bears a resemblance to what some view Dawkins does in alienating religious people by insulting them rather than trying to persuade them.

It wasn't me who suggested you were homophobic - it was the tone and content of your postings themselves which gave that impression. By merely underlining the way you came across I could have achieved one of two things - if you were not really homophobic then you would be encouraged to examine the way you put the arguments across so as not to appear that way next time, or if you were out-and-out homophobic then you would be exposed as such and I could safely ignore and ridicule you because I would know that you would not be willing to change your mind. I like to think I have achieved more of the former than the latter, but I'm still not entirely convinced.

No, no. Good try with: democracy = mob rule. For the minority to exert any form of rule over the majority would require brute force, mandated ignorance and an establishment of a self-elected elite few who "know best."

If you look at what I actually said, I did not make a bald equation of democracy with mob rule. In fact I said that you seemed to be espousing one and not the other, which cannot but be interpreted as implying that there is a difference. "Democracy" as we understand it involves rule by and on behalf of ALL the people, majority or minority, whoever they happen to be. A huge part of that is sensitivity to minority issues. You're right that for the minority to rule over the majority, such that the majority have no say at all, there has to be some kind of elaborate power structure in place. You are also right that this structure would have to be maintained by complex social, economic and military conditions, and that this is not democracy. But the rule of the majority over the minorities in a similar way is not democracy either. All that requires is a simple exertion of numerical strength - mob rule. It's very easy to achieve indeed, often without thinking, and so it happens remarkably frequently. A truly enlightened form of government, one which deserves the name of democratic, takes the needs and interests of everybody into account and does not value one group above another. Often the best way to achieve this is very much NOT to put the issues to a public vote - because all that would do is reinforce majority prejudices. As a matter of fact we do rely to a massive extent on people who "know better" in our governmental systems - all those select committees and government ministers and experts who draft the legislation, all those ranks of civil servants who enact it. To use a particularly apposite example, if the recommendations Wolfenden Committe Report had been put to a public vote in 1967 then do you think we would have legalised homosexual sex two years later? With public feeling in Britain being what it was about gay people, not a bloody chance! It is precisely in situations such as these that we NEED to follow the guidance of people who know better than the majority.

For this reason romatic kissing is best left for soap-operas and dramas. Kids don't need to witness erotic behavior of any kind. If they see it in passing, fine, but one should not endeavor to contrive a situation where they are being captively entertained and then suddenly exposed to it.

Well, as long as you realise this is an entirely separate debate from the homosexuality issue, you have a legitimate suggestion that can be discussed. My personal opinion on this (entirely separate) issue, however, is that deliberately keeping children away from depictions of sexual behaviour is probably a damaging thing for them in the long run. If we grow up thinking of sex as something taboo, forbidden, sordid, improper and to be avoided then we will have all sorts of problems and neuroses about it when we finally come to an age where we naturally want to explore it. Look at the terrible mess Victorian sexual mores turned out to be. Look at how high the teenage pregnancy rates are in European countries with this kind of repressive taboo attitude toward exposing children to the idea of sex (Catholic Ireland and post-Victorian England to name but two) as opposed to more open places (such as Scandinavia and Holland) where sex is much less of a big deal to children and adolescents. I know I suffered terribly, and to some extent still do, from growing up thinking that sex was the sort of sordid adult thing, like drinking, smoking and drugs, which good little boys simply didn't get involved with. Combine that with an almost total lack of exposure to positive gay role models in the media when I was a teenager and I ended up with nothing I might use to disabuse myself of this notion until I was into my twenties.

But if sexual activity is what I'm suggesting we avoid showing to kids, then what is left to show to them? What is left is "a person." The label "gay" becomes irrelevant because the behavior the label implies is not going to be publically viewed.

What about social partnerships such as marriage or boyfriend / girlfriend relationships? I refer you back to my Paddington Bear example - we don't see Mr. and Mrs. Brown having sex, or even kissing, but the very fact they are a married man and woman living together as a family implies inescapably that they are heterosexual. The fact they have children implies inescapably that they have actually had sex at least once! Do parents write in complaining that this suggests improper sexual content to their children? Of course not. If it were Mr. and Mr. Brown living together it wouldn't suggest any more sexual content either - but it would make the idea of gay people living together in society as partners seem entirely normal and unremarkable - as it very much should be. To use your own example of policemen and soldiers, the equivalent would be to include them as characters but never let them wear uniforms or do anything to indicate that they actually are policemen or soldiers. A soldier can march around in uniform and help out with sandbagging against a flood - he doesn't have to bayonet people or take over oil-rich Middle Eastern states on screen for us to know he is a soldier. Likewise two gay men can simply hold hands or walk down the road arm in arm - they don't have to be buggering each other for us to know that they prefer the company of their own gender.

Hence, when I generously and cautiosuly err IN FAVOR of my "opponent" by a margin on 200% AND AM STILL criticized, then I am at a complete loss. For some, whatever you do is never good enough, give an inch and they expect a mile, etc...)

How many times do I have to point this out: the statistics on this issue are not a matter of taking sides. They are a matter of scientific inquiry. Saying that there are more gay people than there actually are is not "erring in my favour" - It might be easier for me to find a boyfriend if a higher percentage of the population were amenable to my advances, but misrepresenting the statistics does not make it so. The way to improve things for a minority is not to make that minority bigger (impossible in most cases) but to start taking its particular minority needs seriously. Numbers are utterly irrelevant - it is about societal well-being and provision for personal equality. The only fair percentage for representation of gay people on television is "whatever percentage is necessary to deal properly with their issues in the current cultural climate", something which cannot be pinned down or forced into narrow numerical limits. It might take 5%, 10%, 50% or even more to get the job done at some point, so just doubling the population statistic is no answer at all. Effectively what you're saying with that "solution" is that it should be done entirely on percentage of the population anyway, and we should double it just to be sure we don't go lower than some of our estimates for that figure. This still bases it on census data, which is inadequate and inappropriate.

296. Sexpelled: No Intercourse Allowed

Comment #162880 by Cartomancer on April 17, 2008 at 4:04 pm

But I've had sex literally several times, and never once have I had babies.

This new stork theory seems pretty convincing to me...

297. Russell T Davies: Return of the (tea) Time Lord

Comment #162828 by Cartomancer on April 17, 2008 at 2:11 pm

Well then, off to the priesthood for me it is...

298. Russell T Davies: Return of the (tea) Time Lord

Comment #162819 by Cartomancer on April 17, 2008 at 2:01 pm

That is a probably a bit above the level at which selection can work.

I thought it sounded a bit tenuous to be honest. Shows what happens when you let intellectual historians speculate on biology - or rather turn amateur anthropologist and then speculate on biology!

But maybe the priesthood thing is a cultural adaptation grounded in this sort of evolved non-reproductive child-rearing behaviour? Possibly the advent of agricultural societies made it less necessary to have non-reproductive individuals in each family, but they were still knocking around thanks to their evolved genetics and had to find something else to do to make themselves useful? Doesn't seem too much of a big step to me from helping close relatives deal with their problems to helping society at large (even if it is through the expedient of well-meaning goat sacrifice and the wearing of silly hats in public).

299. Victims: Pope Benedict Protects Accused Pedophile Bishops

Comment #162812 by Cartomancer on April 17, 2008 at 1:47 pm

I think the fact that the catholic priesthood attracts both homosexuals AND paedophiles has led to a lazy (or wilful in many cases) confusion between the two.

(oops, seems Al-rawandi has already said as much while I was typing that)

300. Russell T Davies: Return of the (tea) Time Lord

Comment #162804 by Cartomancer on April 17, 2008 at 1:38 pm

Thanks for that Steve, I knew you'd be able to say it far better than waffly old me ever could.

I am made to recall, however, some idle musings I had a while back on the subject, thanks to the conflation of several things I had read about tangentially.

First, I heard somewhere that there have been studies done which correlate fairly precisely the size of primate brains and the size of their normal social groups. Extending this calculation to humans reveals that we are predisposed to tribal groupings of about 150 individuals - which tallies quite nicely with the archaeological evidence we have for prehistoric human settlement (and the social networks of most pre-modern humans).

Secondly, the most common and up-to-date statistics I have managed to track down for the incidence of human homosexuality state that roughly 5% of males and 0.7% of females are thus configured. I shall assume that these proportions have not changed significantly since our earliest socieites, though I may be wrong in doing so.

Thirdly, my interest in the history of the occult has led me to note that there is a strong link made in many cultures, going back to the earliest writing and even pictorial representations, between homosexuality and the magical, the spiritual or the otherworldly. Many iron age cultures seem to have had lesbian priestesses and gay priests for instance (the term dyke may even come from the Greek dike meaning justice, suggesting some kind of arbitrator role as well). Being outside the reproductive cycle has often afforded individuals a similar status outside normal social hierarchies.

Now, assuming that this kind of priestly / shamanistic / magical behaviour emerged directly from social structuring activities in increasingly specialised primate populations, it might be possible to link all this information together and come to a tentative explanation for why the incidence of human homosexuality is at the level it is.

In the standard human social group of 150 individuals you would typically have one lesbian and about three or four gay men. This seems to me a pretty reasonable priestly caste, counselling service, organisational committe and all-purpose civil administration for an early human tribe of such a size. Maybe the lesbian would act as the high priestess or chief's advisor, while the rest of the population would be split between the auspices of the gay men with each one ministering to say thity-five individuals. Intermarriage between the tribe's lesbian priestess or gay priests and another tribe's homosexual contingent could help to foster good relations further afield - and might avoid succession issues that would accompany royal marriages between heterosexual chiefs.

I am reminded that several cultures have legends of prehistoric female rulers. Minoan legends tell of how, before Minos and the line of "historical" kings, Crete was always ruled by two queens together (hence the use of the Minoan labrys as an identifier symbol by modern lesbians). Some Japanese legends also make reference to a pre-imperial time when the islands were ruled by a dynasty of mysterious shaman queens.

So is this kind of social structure an evolutionarily stable strategy for managing the affairs of human tribes? Might it have evolved that way? Is that the kind of group selection up with which we loyal Dawkinseans will not put?