1. Comment #80386 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 3:27 pm

*Gets a vomit burp at the back of the throat at the very sight of D'Souza's name*
B-(

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2. Comment #80392 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 3:46 pm

Ooo, he's gonna debate Hitchens next, now THAT I can't wait to see.
B-)

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3. Comment #80393 by Vinelectric on October 21, 2007 at 3:56 pm

Good debate. Both men well spoken. Worlds apart from the cheap show put up by Lennox, don't you think?


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4. Comment #80396 by dazzjazz on October 21, 2007 at 4:03 pm

I had to turn D'Souza off - he wasn't answering the question as far as I could tell.

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5. Comment #80399 by Inoculatedcities on October 21, 2007 at 4:23 pm

Dinesh D'Souza is absolutely insufferable. Remember this is a man who wrote that 9/11 was caused by American liberals' (whom he says includes Hillary Clinton, Britney Spears and Noam Chomsky) "aggressive global campaign to undermine the traditional patriarchal family." The subtext being, of course, that 'we deserved the attack because we weren't as fundamentalist as our enemies'. Just another extreme right-winger who views the world through a Fox News prism where the cultural left is responsible for every ill in the world. Utter nonsense.

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6. Comment #80402 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 4:33 pm

And don't forget how his poison fangs came out after the Virginia Tech shootings.
(I was lurking the site when that went down)

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7. Comment #80405 by Duff on October 21, 2007 at 4:37 pm

9/11 caused by Hillary and Brittany Spears???

I think by now it is clear to everyone who has any knowledge of 9/11 that those towers were brought down by Brittany and Brad Pitt!! If you don't believe that, then just ask yourself; where were Brittany and Brad in the weeks leading up to 9/11?? No body knows!!! That should be proof enough.

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8. Comment #80406 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 4:42 pm

Well, I know if I caused the worst domestic attacks in American history, I'd drown my guilt in alcohol, exstasy, cystal meth, possibly crack, and collapse into emotional and moral decay...heyy, wait a minute...

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9. Comment #80407 by OhioAtheist on October 21, 2007 at 5:00 pm

And don't forget how his poison fangs came out after the Vermont Tech shootings.
(I was lurking the site when that went down)

I can only assume you mean Virginia Tech.

Also, I can't comment on this post without adding: D'Souza is an odious, stupid, and utterly absurd pseudo-intellectual. There. Glad that's out of my system. :)

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10. Comment #80409 by Russell Blackford on October 21, 2007 at 5:14 pm

The scary thing is that our culture (or at least American culture) gives D'Souza oxygen at all. I can't even take his views seriously, though I loathe their political implications. The man lives in another universe.

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11. Comment #80411 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 5:20 pm

OhioAtheist-

Yeah...*forehead smack*

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12. Comment #80412 by Donald on October 21, 2007 at 5:59 pm

Dinesh D'Souza is a menace to clear thinking. He is a eloquent purveyor of slick non-sequiturs, just like so many preachers and theologians (ugh, I shudder to write that word).

Here is the section that had me hitting the pause button:

After some contentious claims, including that Christians were the force that overthrew slavery, he proceeds to claim that Christianity is the "soil" from which the abolition of slavery and democracy grew. According to D'Souza, Christianity is the enabler of Science as well. I'm getting very uneasy by now, but he hasn't yet done more than expressed some opinions I disagree with.

Then he says the reason that science has developed as it has because "science is based ultimately on an assumption, that can only be described as theological." [Eh!?] He goes on: "In fact, not one, but three" (holds up three fingers) "theological premises, all derived from Christianity" (holds up one finger). [Sigh, looks like we've got a seriously deluded nutcase here.] "(1) The universe as a whole is rational, i.e the universe as a whole follows laws. (2) The universe is comprehensible in the language of mathematics - how does an electron know what to do - how do inanimate objects know how to follow rules - we have matter behaving as if it was purposeful." [This is getting much worse than I thought.] "(3) The laws of the universe are compehensible to us."

I stopped there.

He has it completely backwards. He is quite wrong to assume that science starts with those 3 assumptions. Science starts with observations, generates copious theories, most of which are discarded because they do not match some of the observations. Science keeps only theories which match all the observations, and make predictions that can be tested with more observations. Then science, as a conclusion has been able to announce "hey, how about that, the universe consists of matter which moves according to these mathematical formulas!"

D'Souza also misuses key words. He does not understand the difference between "laws", "obey" and "rational" as used in colloquial language, and their use in physics.

D'Souza's thoughts are like those of a man standing on his head, wondering why water flows uphill. He is seriously crazy. His thoughts are faulty, and he is spreading faulty thoughts into others.

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13. Comment #80413 by papavb on October 21, 2007 at 6:03 pm

And don't forget how his poison fangs came out after the Vermont Tech shootings.
(I was lurking the site when that went down)
t

I can only assume you mean Virginia Tech.

the only thing being shot in Vermont is probably a bottle of delicious maple syrup.

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14. Comment #80414 by jaytee_555 on October 21, 2007 at 6:04 pm

.
I hate to admit this, but purely in terms of who "came off better" in the debate, the answer in my view has to be that De Souza did.

This is not because he was right, but simply because he was more fluent and confident than Shermer and a better debater. Shermer had all the best arguments but was was simply not up to the job of getting them across. De Souza's arguments were pretty pathetic but Shermer could not find a form of words incisive enough to expose them. He even read about 80% of his opening comments directly from notes and bored the arse of everyone, then in the later sessions he allowed De Souza to take control. Shemer knows the answers - I know - I've read quite a bit of his stuff (which is excellent) but in this exchange, he didn't deliver. Debating successfully requires particular skills, and unfortunately, being right is not enough.

The only consolation is that DeSouza mentioned he'll be debating with Christopher Hitchens soon, and I predict that Hitch will eat this odious little squirt alive and spit out the bones.

JT (UK)

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15. Comment #80418 by Quine on October 21, 2007 at 6:38 pm

The completely erroneous statements from D'Souza came so fast and were so numerous I just gave up on keeping track. I would like to continue the line of points made by Donald to remark that science does not assume nature is comprehensible. Science simply uses its method to keep finding another piece of nature that is comprehensible. No faith of comprehensibility is required; we just look and see.

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16. Comment #80420 by Russian Freethinker on October 21, 2007 at 6:49 pm

I found it interesting that D'Souza argued that belief in justice in the afterlife somehow makes this life more moral. I find the contrary to be true. If you believe that there is reward for the hurting and punishment for the evil in the afterlife, you do not need to intervene and fight for justice in this life. If, however, the only justice is what you get here, your life is the only chance to make the world a better place. In other words, belief in the afterlife supports the status quo and causes passivity whereas rejection of the afterlife inspires protest and active participation in the here and now. It's too bad Shermer didn't make this point. I agree that he was an inferior debater.

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17. Comment #80421 by eric.malitz on October 21, 2007 at 6:49 pm

i dont know much about d'souza except whats written here, but shermer is an idiot. Hes a supporter of all things science UNTIL science has something negative (implicit or explicit) to say about religion. I havent watched this debate yet, but thats what Ive gathered from him several times before.

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18. Comment #80422 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 6:52 pm

The Hitchens one is gonna be way better, I'm sure of it.
*Rubs hands*

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19. Comment #80424 by Russian Freethinker on October 21, 2007 at 6:53 pm

Also, I was frustrated with D'Souza's arguments for the Christian origins of science, equality and so forth. I kept wanting to scream, "But if these things came out of Christianity, why did the Church not get it for over a millennium???" Why did all of these things develop AFTER the Renaissance and the Englightenment when Christianity began to lose power, and not before? Shermer really didn't take advantage of so many opportunities in this debate. :-(

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20. Comment #80425 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 7:05 pm

Well, he kiiiinda addressed it with his example of gay rights, saying how the church will inevitably relent, and then rewrite history, and take credit for it.
But he kinda had it as a ready scripted point of his own, and didn't chase after D'Souza's argument with it.

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21. Comment #80426 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 7:33 pm

Posted by Donald

"D'Souza's thoughts are like those of a man standing on his head, wondering why water flows uphill. He is seriously crazy. His thoughts are faulty, and he is spreading faulty thoughts into others".

He dated Anne Coulter for awhile.
Says it all.
;)

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22. Comment #80427 by oxytocin on October 21, 2007 at 7:33 pm

I must say that I am NOT a Shermer fan at all. I find his debating skills wanting. This was particularly evident in a debate you can find on YouTube between Shermer and Dr. Dino himself, Kent Hovind. Hovind charmed the audience with his psychopath-like smarminess, and proceeded to out evangelize Shermer with his pre-fab answers that rolled out instantaneously.

I think the nadir of this debate was when Shermer commented that it "didn't matter" how many times homosexuality was mentioned in the bible after insisting throughout the rest of the debate that it did [i.e., only mentioned once, therefore it's of little importance to xian theology]. Even though I was sitting here by myself, I think I actually blushed in embarrassment for him.

Shermer was at his best when citing the literature on the nastiness that is correlated to high levels of religiosity. Sadly, he didn't bother to take advantage of the vast majority of lunacy that spewed forth from D'Souza. Did anyone else have a problem with his argument that the church rationally commented on Galileo's "lack of evidence" and lovingly encouraged him to find some so that they could change their beliefs? What about the trials? What about the threats of death? Great Scott!

In the end, I think that D'Souza was likely perceived to be the winner of this debate, not because he marshaled the forces of reason, but because he's so much better at debate and articulation.

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23. Comment #80429 by AppliedMootist on October 21, 2007 at 7:43 pm

As Hitchens has pointed out many times, Martin Luther King did not develop non-violent protesting from his biblical values, but rather from Henry David Thoreau. Contrary to the both debaters, Henry David Thoreau derived non-violent protesting from the Sophocles' immortal play Antigone. Dinesh D'Souza is lucky that Michael Shermer is the anti-religion movement's great disappoint – apparently he wants desperately to liked at any cost. D'Souza won't be so lucky when he meets Hitchens is a real knife fight.

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24. Comment #80430 by Russell Blackford on October 21, 2007 at 7:47 pm

I haven't looked at this yet, but from what y'all are saying D'Souza does have serious debating skills even though he's a total wingnut. I guess the best thing we can do is learn a lesson about what works in live debate and what doesn't. His debate with Hitchens should be interesting.

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25. Comment #80431 by Quine on October 21, 2007 at 7:58 pm

D'Souza is, obviously, a master of the weasel school of debate.
He is adept at rephrasing a point for the opposition so that it sounds like (although is not) a point for himself. That was a masterful recasting of the context for Galileo and quick words placed in the mouth of the (then) Church to make it all look like an honest little error. You can also see him ramble along packing in several outrageous falsehoods, but not hitting a conclusion, until he has something to tack on the end that is hard for you to answer: "Hitler ... Stalin ... millions dead ... but are you saying you don't love your mother?"

It is especially bad when scientific experts try to take on one of these, so I am glad it is Hitch, not Richard who is going to have a go at him next. Hitch will not suffer weasel wording gladly, and I hope he is in a 'take no prisoners' mood when he gets there.

EDIT:
I am sure he would have stood there with a straight face and used this same Galileo defense to show that when they burned Giordano Bruno at the stake, it was just "a small misunderstanding."

D'Souza writes about the upcoming debate with Hitch here. It is expected to go up as video (shortly after conclusion) here.

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26. Comment #80432 by discipline on October 21, 2007 at 7:59 pm

D'Souza's latest book is hilarious. Check it out at:

What's so great about Christianity
http://www.dineshdsouza.com/books/christianity-jacket.html

In it "D'Souza reveals:

* Why atheism is a demonstrably dangerous creed—and a cowardly one

* Why Christianity explains the universe, and our origins, better than atheism does

* Why Christianity and science are not irreconcilable, but science and atheism might be

...and so on.

However, it would be a serious mistake to dismiss him with a snide remark, as is so often done on this site. In the U.S., people like him are very influential and need to be attacked effectively and repeatedly. Hopefully, Shermer's valiant attempt will be followed by many others.

> He dated Anne Coulter for awhile.

Now I'm nauseous. Seriously.

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27. Comment #80433 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 8:00 pm

EDIT- in reply to Quine.

Well, he did work for the Reagan administration.
*Sly smirk*

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28. Comment #80438 by hotshoe on October 21, 2007 at 8:49 pm

quote D'souza "universe as a whole is rational, i.e the universe as a whole follows laws"

Actually, this is exactly how science does work; ie start with the premise that the universe follows laws. State hypothesis, propose experiment(s) to test it, collect data, deduce the laws of nature thus revealed. But without such a premise, what could ever be the point of hypothesis or experiment? One would never expect to see answers, nor even correlations, or agreement between one field and another.
Thus in fact this is a direct contradiction of his credit for Christianity. What are the laws which the whole universe would have to follow under the reign of the omnipotent god of the Christian bible? Why none, of course.
Unconstrained by principles of biology, all the kinds of animals of a planet can fit onto one boat. Unconstrained by the principles of physics, Joshua can blow a horn and destroy the walls of a city, Prayer can produce miraculous results, which by definition are not in accordance with the laws the whole universe follows. Absolutely anything could happen due to divine influence. A world ruled by god is an irrational world.

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29. Comment #80439 by AJ Rae on October 21, 2007 at 8:54 pm

That's a lot of nonsense from D'Souza. Give him credit, he actually makes points, unlike some faithheads, however ridiculous they are. When pressed he gives the justification that it's a "matter of faith", and he can't "use reason to persuade someone else".

Is he seriously going to try to argue that a lack of belief is motivation for secular ideologies? Like Marxism, Capitalism, etc... I lack a belief in tooth fairies that has motivated my economic ideology.

Newton wasted much of his life predicting the second coming and whether unicorns are white or silver*. That completely vindicates theology, because Newton was a scientist too? Hold up, Newton dedicated a lot of time on alchemy, and his work on calculus, light, and gravity doesn't vindicate alchemy, even if it led to assumptions that helped him think differently about apples.

Some people believed things through faith that correlate with science, that doesn't support the faith claims. If people believe the Earth is round because God likes round things, and created it that way, it's still irrational. It's like saying you have to believe in invisible flying pixies to use and have confidence in the science about gravity. How many pixies does it take for Jupiter and Mars to move around the Sun?

a) 3
b) 616
c) 42

I would say that he can't use reason to persuade someone else about any of his points in the debate. So he resorts to whatever the hell that was.

*Possibly true about the second coming, most probably not about the unicorns

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30. Comment #80440 by CruciFiction on October 21, 2007 at 8:54 pm

Boy, I really want to see Hitch take no prisoners on Monday. This guy needs his head handed to him!

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31. Comment #80443 by monkey2 on October 21, 2007 at 9:24 pm

It was only last month that Michael Shermer wrote a strange article in Scientific American entitled 'An open letter to Messrs. Dawkins, Dennett, Harris and Hitchens' It was a gentle reminder to religious skeptics to be cautious about irrational exuberance. He suggested that they should raise their consciousness one tier higher. What he meant by this was not entirely clear.

If this debate was intended to display his control of exuberance and his higher tier of consciousness then the result is not a good one. There really is no excuse to lose a debate with a Christian any more. Messrs. Dawkins, Dennett, Harris and Hitchens have cut the ground from under them.

They say you can't teach old dogs new tricks. After such a long and distinguished career as a skeptic Michael Shermer is a bit of a puppy when it comes to debating. If only he could display some of the exuberance of my favourite Rottweiler.

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32. Comment #80444 by Dr Benway on October 21, 2007 at 9:24 pm

Seems Christianity is responsible for all good things - science, freedom, Aristotle, and my ass. Did you know Jesus made my dick bigger than everyone else's? Surprising, but true. Praise His name.

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33. Comment #80445 by ketandev on October 21, 2007 at 9:45 pm

Desouza is taking on Hitch next?
hahahahah
RIP in advance DeSouza!

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34. Comment #80446 by Quine on October 21, 2007 at 9:53 pm

Comment #80438 by hotshoe

quote D'souza "universe as a whole is rational, i.e the universe as a whole follows laws"

Actually, this is exactly how science does work; ie start with the premise that the universe follows laws.

Please be very careful with the way you use the word "law" in this context. D'Souza intensionally conflates this with the word "law" used in scripture to push the idea that science is demonstrating the works of his deity. The word was there before we started constructing models of Nature, so it was easy to add a new meaning in this new context, but D'Souza has turned that against us. We can never prove that that there are any "Laws of Nature" but we put them in our models of Nature when we can demonstrate they have predictive value, and throw them out of the models when we find counterexamples.

Another problem can come with the word "rational" which was fine back in the days of Newton, but experiments in quantum preclude the use of this word in its general meaning. Again, it turns out science does not have to be rational, it just needs to be able to reliably make testable predictions. Einstein did not want to hear this, either, but we need to be honest and not claim something we can't deliver. Remember, if religion could reliably make testable predictions from scripture, no matter how irrational, we would have nothing on them.

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35. Comment #80449 by BAEOZ on October 21, 2007 at 10:05 pm

Dr. Benway:

Did you know Jesus made my dick bigger than everyone else's? Surprising, but true. Praise His name.

Of course you have empirical backing for this claim?

The claim that Jesus exists....

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36. Comment #80450 by mejdrich on October 21, 2007 at 10:05 pm

I'm sorry, listening to this guy repeatedly claim Christianity as the source of all morality ... and not getting called out on the complete absurdity of that arrogant claim ... is really really pissing me off.

Atheists need to stop being so F'ing polite or we'll never get out from under these guys.

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37. Comment #80452 by mejdrich on October 21, 2007 at 10:14 pm

Grr! It's so frustrating! When he's asked questions, he doesn't answer. When he's supposed to be asking questions... he goes on a 5 min monologue before getting around to a question! Where is Hitchens when you need him!?

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38. Comment #80454 by Dr Benway on October 21, 2007 at 10:18 pm

BAEOZ:

Of course you have empirical backing for this claim?

My dick is so big it won't return Jesus' calls.

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39. Comment #80455 by Diacanu on October 21, 2007 at 10:25 pm

Who else was like me, and couldn't make it through the whole thing?
D'Souza literally made my bile rise. I hung in there for about 6-8 minutes, but I finally fastforwarded to Shermer, and I was able to listen to him a bit longer, but he was such a passive fluffball I gave up and turned it off, and tried to start in on the second part, but by the vibe of each of them I just intuitively knew how it was going to go.
Couldn't make it.

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40. Comment #80456 by mejdrich on October 21, 2007 at 10:26 pm

AHHHH! The longer I listen, the madder I get! Hilter wasn't a Christian!? And he lets him get away with it! He's picking his eye while Darwin is practically called a Nazi!

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41. Comment #80457 by mejdrich on October 21, 2007 at 10:30 pm

Right on, Diacanu. This was a disgrace. Atheists from YouTube would have done better. *sigh*

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42. Comment #80458 by Dr Benway on October 21, 2007 at 10:38 pm

I made it to the part where the Church invented Aristotle. Then the gravitational pull of my dick somehow caused a warping of the time-space continuum and my computer went tits up.

At the start of the video, D'Sousa looked something like Brad Pitt. Then bam! I'm looking at a deeply tanned version of Mr. Rabbit from Pooh Corner.

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43. Comment #80459 by notsobad on October 21, 2007 at 10:43 pm

Christianity has nothing new to say.
It's pointless to watch Christian apologists after you saw a few already because still have the same lame arguments. For that matter, it's pointless to watch the same atheist speakers debate with them.

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44. Comment #80463 by notsobad on October 21, 2007 at 10:52 pm

In addition, Dinesh D'Souza is an ID advocate. Debating such kind of idiocy is beyond pointless.

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45. Comment #80464 by headcold on October 21, 2007 at 10:53 pm

The joke Shermer does about the Gideon Bible striking him in his bullet is an old Woody Allen joke from his stand-up days. As a comic I would have preferred that he credit the joke instead of using it, albeit well, to bolster his likability. I like Shermer and buy Skeptic when I can find it, but, Michael, don't steal jokes in professional settings. Hire a writer.

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46. Comment #80474 by Fanusi Khiyal on October 21, 2007 at 11:43 pm

Oh, it's _this_ asshole, again. Yes, yes Western Cultural decadence is 'why they hate us'. The same shit in different cans.

This is insane. Why, then, are jihadists killing Tanzanian Christians, some of the most straightlaced people in the world? Or Ethiopian Christians? Or Buddhists in Thailand? Or Sikhs and Hindus in the subcontinent?

This is nonsense. It's the same crap as Michael Moore and Noam Chomsky keep spouting, in different forms.

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47. Comment #80476 by daryll strawberry on October 21, 2007 at 11:59 pm

D'Souza seems to spout off with some good points but overall all he is talking about is really circular. He talks about knowledge transcending from a divine entity but only goes so far as that. As if knowledge is only limited to some dude creator that never wants to be identified but only metaphorically interpreted.

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48. Comment #80477 by Zakie Chan on October 22, 2007 at 12:07 am

Shermer seems like an odd choice for this debate. I would have expected someone more like Sam Harris.

Shermer even has said in his book, How We Believe, something to the extent of "for every terrible act done in the name of God, a thousand good acts done in the name of God go un-noticed." Maybe he changed his mind?

Oh well, at least D'Souza will be debating Hitchens-- who is a far better choice for this topic.

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49. Comment #80486 by AdrianT on October 22, 2007 at 1:14 am

Would you buy a used car off D'Souza - he's a slick talker I'll give him that!

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50. Comment #80501 by Roger Stanyard on October 22, 2007 at 2:12 am

I suspect that there is an exceedingly good case that the growth in knowledge, the development and the spread of democracy and our high standards of living are a result of the rejection of Christianity.

I dunno if there are any authoritative recent books on this issue but I suspect that the current Zeigeist calls for one.

It seems to me that the core of the renaissance was the rejection of the medieval, religious, universities at the time and the revival of the stud of non-Christian works from classical Greece.

Indeed, in the United Kingdom, the rejection of religious fundamentalism after Cromwell's death and the containment of religious belief by the Church of England (the sweet mediocrity of our native church) were the seminal events that allowed the English Age of Enlightenment, the formation of the British Empire, the development of democracy and the invention of the modern world through the industrial revolution.

Most of this was done despite Oxford and Cambridge and their control by Anglican clergy.

Much of the history of Western Europe over the last five centuries or more has centred on the curtailment of the power and influence of religion.

Indeed, the growth of the USA as an economic super-power seems to me largely to rest on the separation of church and state. Had that not occurred, I suspect that North America today would consist of a collection of Latin American style economic minnows.

Moreover, one of the big intellectual driving forces of the last couple of centuries has been liberal Judaism. Jews were surpassed for centuries by Christianity and the escape from the ghetto mentality and that Christian anti-Semitism unleashed an intellectual whirl-wind.

Methinks there is also a very strong case that Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union were products of Christianity. Hitchens is very good on this issue.

Moreover, the 21st century is likely to see East Asia become the dominant economic powerhouse – thanks not to Christian missionaries but to the forces of economics, reason and rationality. The very things that the Age of Enlightenment gave us the understanding of.

There is also a good case to argue that the USA has now lost the plot because of its religiosity. The place is riddled with beliefs in pseudo science such as creationism. Its politics look to be stuck in the 1930s and are far to the right of any other Western democracy.

Roger Stanyard

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