Shaw TV Interview with Richard Dawkins

51. Comment #175222 by mordacious1 on May 5, 2008 at 12:08 am

I thought that the interviewer sucked. Richard, of course being used to this by now, was able to make it an interesting interview in spite of her. My favorite part was toward the end, where she asked where he goes for solace if there is no god. His answer was good, but I myself (at least when my invisible gnome friend is busy)turn to science. I can get lost in a book on QED or something that makes you feel life is worth living and it takes your mind off what is bothering one.

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52. Comment #175223 by mordacious1 on May 5, 2008 at 12:18 am

ASM What a long winded bloke you are. You remind me of someone passing gas after an exceptionally bad burrito.

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53. Comment #175225 by Rawhard Dickins on May 5, 2008 at 12:31 am

ASM ..

What makes you think the holocaust didn't happen?

(Note: this is supposed to be a clear-thinking oasis)

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54. Comment #175227 by mordacious1 on May 5, 2008 at 12:36 am

He doesn't "think" the holocaust didn't happen, that would be an oxymoron.

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55. Comment #175245 by Ian on May 5, 2008 at 2:02 am

Tearsintherain:

...why base our life on evidence?

Civilisation is sharing, living up to the agreements - formal and tacit - that are what make it possible for people to live in families, communities and nations. Evidence is reason/s to believe something that is open to scrutiny and therefore, binding. Living in harmony with the evidence brings you into harmony with others who also follow the evidence and helps you avoid living in bad faith with them.

Why is the scientific approach better than a faith approach?

The scientific approach generates evidence, so when you meet someone who has a different opinion to you, you can use evidence to come to agreement and spread the community of good faith.

In the sense you use the word, faith only means conformity, so when you meet someone who will not conform there is no basis of agreement and the issue becomes a trial of strength. This is why religion and other dogmatic approaches lead to violence.

Are somethings just not a question of science?

It's impossible in advance to tell in principle what things are amenable to the scientific movement, because scientific knowledge is cumulative. In my opinion, there are two criterior which influence what a scientist will study:

1. Prior interest in the field of research.
2. Apparent amenability of the subject to investigation.

So science is human and there is little to be afraid of. It is also hugely rewarding and can lead to insights which are nothing short of profound.

Regards,

(-: Ian :-)

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56. Comment #175249 by gd_edi on May 5, 2008 at 2:20 am

That is a rather pedantic thing to say, especially given that Richard is clearly talking as a scientist here (i.e. the evidence for the existence of subjective consciousness in humans is overwhelming, in other animals less so) rather than as an abstract epistemologist (i.e. absolute knowledge of subjective phenomena in others is impossible). To take that as a serious argument against the existence of extra-personal human consciousness in the real world is much akin to the "well you can't disprove the existence of god" line we usually get.

I know I was being a bit pedantic, it's what I do!

It is really an assertion though. I don't think there is any evidence for subjective consciousness at all, not in the sense that we can actually test to see if it's there. And I'm not sure if we can even make a probability assessment like we can for god either, because a being with consciousness shouldn't appear any different to a robotic automaton with the same behaviour.

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57. Comment #175250 by AllanW on May 5, 2008 at 2:27 am

Re; Comment #175245 by Ian

Another good post, mate. Thanks.

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58. Comment #175252 by MPhil on May 5, 2008 at 2:44 am

gd_edi,

I would have thought that one's own self is the only entity we 'know' to have subjective consciousness, with all others being automata of various degrees of complexity.

Groan - solipsism?

Bertrand Russell once received a letter from a woman praising solipsism and saying that she was wondering why not more people were of the opinion that solipsism is true.

because a being with consciousness shouldn't appear any different to a robotic automaton with the same behaviour.

That old discussion?

If that is your position, it is merely a matter of semantics. Why not say "If it passes the Turing-test, it's conscious"? If it is indistinguishable from consciousness, it is consciousness.

If you want to be a complete skeptic, that's fine with me, but it won't get you very far. We necessarily adopt the intentional stance towards entities that behave in a certain way.

From a very strict epistemological position, there can be no 100% certain knowledge about anything about the "outside world"... but as many philosophers, including Dennett and the Churchlands have successfully argued - we can't be too sure about our own mind, either.

Also, total scepticism and Berkleyian solipsism suffers from the same problem that the brain-in-a-vat thought-experiment suffers from. The statements of that position cannot refer to something real, because the meaning of the terms are identified in the conceptual scheme of mind-world.

Once we allow for heterophenomenology, and take care not to make unwarranted inferences from the results, there is no problem at all.

Consciousness is a property that certain complex multi-level signal monitoring and processing systems with the capability for self-modification based on this monitoring on processing and a certain fixation to the outside world can have.

Perhaps you were rather talking about qualia?

In any case - I recommend Dennett's "Consciousness Explained" and Paul Churchland's "A neurocomputational perspective"

:)

Cheers,
-Mike

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59. Comment #175253 by MPhil on May 5, 2008 at 2:58 am

Just recently, I was talking to a person who, when the discussion came to the point of religion being a source of violence, and the scriptures recommending violence and other unacceptable things, said:

"Well, it's all a matter of interpretation"... the dialogue then went as follows:

Me:"Of course it is. The only reason European Christianity doesn't torture and kill people anymore is because they assimilated to the moral Zeitgeist. Look at the Islamic theocracies - they haven't had to do that so far."

She:"Right. As I said, you have to interpret scripture correctly, and some are just closer to the truth."

Me: "You're not seriously claiming that just because the interpretation of their holy books of moderates conforms to our ethical standards, it therefore must be closer to a so called 'true interpretation'? How would you know that? What makes you think there is such a thing. Where is the evidence?"

She: "Does everything have to be provable?"

Me: "Not 'provable', but every statement about alleged matters-of-fact about the world has to be testable."

She: "But why?"

Me: "Why? Because otherwise no claim to correctness can ever have any epistemic justification. None at all. I might as well claim that there is an invisible pink unicorn standing right behind you."

She: "Yes, you cannot disprove that!"

Me: "Aside from the fact that I can on logical grounds (No entity can at the same time be 'invisible' and 'pink'), that's the point. There can be no evidence for it. I say it is so - why don't you believe me? Just because of that. If there are statements about alleged facts that need no evidence, what justified your rejection of any such claim. It's all just arbitrary then."

She: "But... but you can't compare god to an invisible pink unicorn."

Me: "Really? Why not. I just did - works great. Now if you'd excuse me - I need a drink."


Needless to say I didn't get through to her.

It's sickening, really.

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60. Comment #175257 by riandouglas on May 5, 2008 at 3:21 am

MPhil: In any case - I recommend Dennett's "Consciousness Explained"

Finally a comment which doesn't require me to buy another book, as I already have it...

and Paul Churchland's "A neurocomputational perspective"

Oops, I spoke too soon :-)

Me: "Really? Why not. I just did - works great. Now if you'd excuse me - I need a drink."

How dare you compare fictional, non-existent entities to an IPU! Shame on you Mike :-)

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61. Comment #175258 by Robert Maynard on May 5, 2008 at 3:21 am

lol
A Holocaust denialist in the hiz-ouse!

Move along, nothing to see here..

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62. Comment #175261 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 3:32 am

Said Goldy:

ASM, if you do get the proof you're asking for, would you believe the Holocaust happened?

Of course I would.

But isn't that a rhetorical question to create the make-believe feeling that obvious proof exists and I'm the one acting in an irrational way by ignoring it, while you carefully refrain from sending me any concrete evidence that you fear might be demolished by a minimum of logic, common sense and historical knowledge?

Let me give you two examples of what I mean:

1) If you gave me incontrovertible proof that the body of Jesus physically ascended to heaven, of course I would have no choice but to believe the body of Jesus physically ascended to heaven.

I would also be deeply demoralised by the loss of trust in the power of reason, probably feeling lost and angry at the Great Outside (the Devil, since we are at it?) for the conspiracy of appearances aimed at tricking me into believing reason led to truth, indeed that the concept of truth made any sense at all.

2) If you gave me incontrovertible proof that the crematory this model represents was a magical one, provided with a magical underground morgue with magical vanishing holes on its roof and magical walls that showed no iron and cyanide compounds in spite of intensive contact with Zyklon B, besides magical coke cremation ovens with magical performance levels producing magical smoke, of course I would have no choice but to believe that too.

I would also be deeply demoralised by the loss of trust in the power of reason, etc. etc. (as above).

As a denier, you don't believe all the documentation available that show the Holocaust did occur.

What I'm told is available is not the profuse documentation you imply.

I'm told the available documents are very rare, since the conspiracy to exterminate the Jews was a secret one, the rare documents that exist are said to use "coded" phrasings that mean the opposite of what they actually say, and the extraordinarily few allegedly "coded" documents where "revealing blunders" -- or "criminal traces" as Pressac calls them -- are claimed to exist are extraordinarily unconvincing.

Even a Jewish scholar like Arno Mayer who believed in an attempt at literal extermination, was reduced to concede that "sources for the study of the gas chambers are at once rare and unreliable."

Quote from the review of Meyer's book by Faurisson:

http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v09/v09p375_Faurisson.html

Arno J. Mayer says that he believes there was a policy to exterminate the Jews and that the homicidal gas chambers were a reality, but at the same time he writes pages of text and makes observations with which many revisionists would agree. Furthermore, in his bibliography he even mentions two Revisionist works: The Lie of Ulysses by Paul Rassinier (in the edition published by La Vieille Taupe in Paris in 1979), as well as Arthur Butz's masterly study, The Hoax of the Twentieth Century.

According to Mayer there is no trace of any plan for the extermination of the Jews and, as regards the gas chambers, he includes, in his chapter on Auschwitz, the following sentence, which is quite astonishing coming from a friend of Pierre Vidal-Naquet: "Sources for the study of the gas chambers are at once rare and unreliable" (p. 362). He adds:

"Most of what is known (on this subject) is based on the depositions of Nazi officials and executioners at postwar trials and on the memory of survivors and bystanders. This testimony must be screened carefully, since it can be influenced by subjective factors of great complexity (pages 362-63)."

Would it not be more correct to say that people must be suspicious of the so-called statements, confessions, and eye-witness accounts that the Exterminationists so shamelessly make use of.

Then the author adds, regarding the above-mentioned sources: "there is no denying the many contradictions, ambiguities, and errors in the existing sources" (p. 363). One would like to see Arno J. Mayer review some of these contradictions, ambiguities and errors; no doubt he is thinking about the "sources" that the same Exterminationists have used for more than forty years.

He mentions the "gassings" at Chelmno, Belzec, Sobibor, and Treblinka but those references are fleeting and are swept up in a flood of considerations foreign to the subject.

Generally speaking, throughout the book the central subject, the supposed genocide of the Jews (here called "Judeocide") and the supposed gas chambers, is buried under a mass of digressions on such things as the anti-Semitism of the Middle Ages and Hitler's campaign in Russia. This is what professors complaisantly call the study of the context; I would prefer a study of the text or, in other words, of the subject.

Perhaps unlike yourself, I have read Mayer's book from first to last page and I fully agree with the description Faurisson makes of it. More on the problem of the gas chambers and Pressac's "criminal vestiges" here:

http://vho.org/GB/Books/anf/Faurisson1.html

You also do not bellieve survivors of said event.

I have repeatedly asked for the indication of an eyewitness survivor, any eyewitness survivor, that you felt deserving to be trusted. Should be the easiest thing in the world if they were as many as claimed. But no, not a single name has been sent to me. Only implicit recrimination for not accepting as sufficient evidence the archetypal Truthful Eyewitness Survivor who lives in heaven, with no terrestrial biography and no narrative of any precise events.

I repeat my request. Send an eyewitness name and I will be glad to explain why I am probably familiar with his testimony and haven't found it convincing. Of course, it will unfortunately take me some time and effort to locate each one in order to cover each claim, so please don't name several at once. Let's discuss each one that will occur to you before proceeding to the next. I would appreciate it if you briefly stated what claims exactly you found the most convincing. Alas, I cannot dedicate my whole life enlightening the true believers if they refuse to minimally cooperate.

What would change your mind?

Proof, as you correctly suggest above, or at least careful consistent evidence in accordance with the degree of improbability of the claims.

***********************************************************************************

Said 3519273540:

For any holocaust deniers, I know of no better source than Raul Hilberg's 3 volume, unemotional study The Destruction of the European Jews.

http://www.amazon.com/Destruction-European-Jews-Set-Third/dp/0300095570/ref=ed_oe_h

Thanks for you recommendation. Probably unlike yourself, I have read not only Hilberg's book but also its revisionists critics. In fact I've followed closely what in all honesty I can only describe as the revisionist utter demolition of Hilberg's work.

I would suggest to you the following book that you'll be able to read on-line or download the PDF files here:

THE GIANT WITH FEET OF CLAY:
RAUL HILBERG AND HIS STANDARD WORK ON THE "HOLOCAUST"
by JÜRGEN GRAF
http://vho.org/GB/Books/Giant/

***********************************************************************************

Said Rawhard Dickins

ASM ..
What makes you think the holocaust didn't happen?
(Note: this is supposed to be a clear-thinking oasis)

Precisely.

The short answer to your question: the absence of consistent evidence in accordance with the degree of improbability and the strangeness of the claims, since what motivates belief or disbelief in a rational person is simply the perceived quality and degree of consistency of the evidence.

If you're interested in more, follow the sequence of my comments to get a general idea that I cannot possibly condensate in a single post:

http://richarddawkins.net/userComments,page1,38300

Other Comments by ASMarques

63. Comment #175266 by Thanny on May 5, 2008 at 3:55 am

It took me a while to figure out why the interviewer was asking barely coherent (or downright incoherent) questions, and had a strangely puzzled look on her face as Richard responded.

But at about 27 minutes in, it became clear. She's as thick as a sequoia. Do the genes heal the body? Does she have any notion of what genes are? Shouldn't she have spent two minutes looking it up before interviewing a biologist who wrote a book entitled "The Selfish Gene", about which she planned to ask a question?

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64. Comment #175268 by BNCbright on May 5, 2008 at 4:05 am

Nice interview - fairly standard stuff. I do find it odd why RD brings up the idea of there being billions of other universes in order to invoke the anthropic principle. Surely all we need is POSSIBLE other universes, which don't have to be ACTUAL. From a philosophical and physics perspective it's interesting to posit/assume them - but for someone trying to advocate reason and science, for the mainstream, sticking to something a bit more 'certain' might be better.

BNC

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65. Comment #175270 by bachfiend on May 5, 2008 at 4:26 am

ASM, I know that the Holocaust happened, because it was only 66 years ago, and there is documentary proof that it did happen, with photos of emaciated corpses, piles of dentures and other personal items, etc and personal memories. I know that god doesn't exist, because the utter implausibility of his existence would require very strong evidence in support of it. It's the difference between some evidence (the bit not disposed of by the perpetrators) and absolutely no evidence.

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66. Comment #175273 by Ole on May 5, 2008 at 4:33 am

I think it is a bit unfair to hope that a TV journalist like Ms Shaw should be on the level of our own Paula Kirby or that the talk should be like the one RD had with Krauss.

Ms Shaw gave RD a lot of "space". All, in all I think people who saw this show got a very good first view of "The God Delusion" topic.

Ole

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67. Comment #175278 by bachfiend on May 5, 2008 at 4:55 am

Turkey isn't as moderate as you think, Goldy. I was in Istanbul last September, and for amusement I was looking at the "Expelled" blog, when I came across some comments by the Reverend Paul T Hipple, and I laughed so much that I had to attempt to log onto his home page, and access was BLOCKED by some Turkish authority, for being dangerous. [Actually perhaps they were right: I've just looked at his website, where he says that he will try to post an interblog everyday, now that "...I am on parole" (????) and the first 2 entries on his comments section are:
GOD Says:
August 15, 2007 at 7:03 am
You, my sad little talking ape, are fucking insane.

Hipple, Rev. Paul T. Says:
August 15, 2007 at 7:20 am
I know you are not God. I prayed to God and asked Him if He said these things to me on my interweb. You are using God’s name in vain, and must cease and desist.
He did mention that YOU, and your hateful and sinful attitude are causing tears to fall down the cheeks of the loving Baby Jesus His Son Christ.

(I wish I hadn't looked at it, I think I've pulled a chest muscle laughing).

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68. Comment #175283 by The Smart Patrol on May 5, 2008 at 5:11 am

Thanny Wrote:

"It took me a while to figure out why the interviewer was asking barely coherent (or downright incoherent) questions, and had a strangely puzzled look on her face as Richard responded.

But at about 27 minutes in, it became clear. She's as thick as a sequoia. Do the genes heal the body? Does she have any notion of what genes are? Shouldn't she have spent two minutes looking it up before interviewing a biologist who wrote a book entitled "The Selfish Gene", about which she planned to ask a question?"

Indeed, although she revealed her stupidity long before the 27-minute mark. Just after Richard had explained his position regarding labelling children as having the same beliefs as their parents, her considered follow-up was, and I'm paraphrasing, "Yeah, it's just like a US presidenial candidate being referred to as a Mormon." Um, wrong! It's got absolutely nothing to do with what grown adults choose to call themselves- Richard has just been explaining for the last 30 seconds about why it is wrong to label CHILDREN with the views of their parents, not grown adults who have the ability to make up their own minds, and this woman has quite clearly either not been listening or is just too stupid to understand.

I'm not sure how this woman ever got onto television in the first place.

Other Comments by The Smart Patrol

69. Comment #175285 by AllanW on May 5, 2008 at 5:27 am

I'm chuckling to myself here while reading the last few comments about this interviewer. The points are well made but the tone is of injured frustration. What standard of thoughtful and intelligent interview are you expecting? This it television, in the daytime!

This lady's job is to present entertaining, superficial topics while most people are out at work; I think the final comments we see are revealing as to what market the programme is aiming at; go back and see what the upcoming segments address :)

I thought she did a better job than most American stations have done in allowing RD to get his points across without skewing the questions in an obnoxious way (you prefer Fox's blatant prejudice?), better than most of the UK programmes that RD appears on (the risible 'debate format' studio ones are cringe-making) and as measured as it's reasonable to expect from a mass-media outlet.

RD did a good job here in the circumstances but I expect nothing more from this kind of format other than introducing the topics to a wider audience.

Other Comments by AllanW

70. Comment #175293 by gd_edi on May 5, 2008 at 6:08 am

MPhil, that's the second time I've had that book by Dennett recommended to me. I have to get my hands on it. I haven't read any philosophy at all which is probably why I have not too much idea about those concepts you talk about. Anyway I think I should read more before starting arguments!

If that is your position, it is merely a matter of semantics. Why not say "If it passes the Turing-test, it's conscious"? If it is indistinguishable from consciousness, it is consciousness.

Well what I was trying to point out was that it doesn't really mean anything for Richard to say that he suspects animals other than humans have subjective consciousness. Scientifically it's meaningless.

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71. Comment #175296 by Peacebeuponme on May 5, 2008 at 6:15 am

gd_edi

Well what I was trying to point out was that it doesn't really mean anything for Richard to say that he suspects animals other than humans have subjective consciousness. Scientifically it's meaningless.

No its not. Its a very interesting question.

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72. Comment #175297 by The Smart Patrol on May 5, 2008 at 6:26 am

AllanW wrote:

"I thought she did a better job than most American stations have done in allowing RD to get his points across without skewing the questions in an obnoxious way (you prefer Fox's blatant prejudice?), better than most of the UK programmes that RD appears on (the risible 'debate format' studio ones are cringe-making) and as measured as it's reasonable to expect from a mass-media outlet."

You're right of course; the woman did indeed come across better than most, and I am in agreement that I'd prefer to hear Richard being allowed to answer questions on his own, as opposed to his participating in some dodgy Sunday morning tripe with Nicky Campbell and Ann Widdecombe. However, the point remains valid as to how the heck someone who is apparently incapable of following a basic line of thought can have their own television programme in the first place! And it's not as if Fanny Kiefer is a spring chicken either! Perhaps she was more on the ball in her formative years, but it's perplexing that someone who can get things so spectacularly wrong can have had such a long career in television. OK, maybe I'm just being a tad naive here!

Other Comments by The Smart Patrol

73. Comment #175298 by apaeter on May 5, 2008 at 6:27 am

I thought the interview was okay. Much better than most TV interviews in fact. I had the impression that she knew basically what the Professor is about, and she set him up with "provocative" questions so he could explain his views. Maybe I'm giving her too much credit, but I think it's better to let someone comment on "Many people believe homosexuality is a sin" than using the Charlie Rose method of answering every question himself before actually asking it.

Oh, and:


Hi ASM,
maybe you should visit the beautiful country of my birth, see a couple of camps and documentations yourself. There's gonna be photos of at least a couple of tens of thousands of corpses (as much as anyone can take in a single sitting), a lot of quite evil-looking infrastructure (think Hostel), eye witness accounts, etc. It's quite interesting, in a scary-as-hell kind of way. Whatever you might have been lead to believe, it's not Club Med.
Then, please feel free to report back and tell us how these are not extermination camps and who built them for what reason. Maybe then you can go on a quest to find the Aliens who abducted Elvis.

Also, have a look around here:
http://nuremberg.law.harvard.edu/

Other Comments by apaeter

74. Comment #175305 by AllanW on May 5, 2008 at 6:50 am

Comment #175297 by The Smart Patrol

'perplexing that someone who can get things so spectacularly wrong can have had such a long career in television. OK, maybe I'm just being a tad naive here!'

In comparison to someone hanging around this site with an open mind and an interest in the topics raised, most other people will not have the data or viewpoint to feel comfortable.

As for being a tad naive, I wouldn't be so harsh on you :). However I've not bothered wasting my time with mass-media outlets for about ten years now and feel I'm much better briefed as a result. It takes effort and diligence but there are good news sources out there with commentary that is thoughtful and intelligent on any topic you care to take an interest in.

In retrospect, all I'm doing is recreating for myself my own news channel or newspaper that is respected, thoughtful and stimulating; you know, like television or the broadsheets used to be before journalistic standards dropped so far.

Don't forget; any source or site must be evaluated frequently. I fell into the trap once of rating a site as worthwhile but over time its quality deteriorated; just a friendly warning :)

Other Comments by AllanW

75. Comment #175307 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 7:11 am

Said Robert Maynard:

Move along, nothing to see here..

Classic irony. I couldn't have put it any better myself...

Said mordacious1:

You remind me of someone passing gas after an exceptionally bad burrito.

Do I recognise a familiar obsession with scatological matters?

Said dlitt

This crackpot takes the cake!

Would you rather eat it and keep it, as Van Pelt does with his "yes and no" holes?

Said bachfiend:

I know that the Holocaust happened, because it was only 66 years ago, and there is documentary proof that it did happen, with photos of emaciated corpses, piles of dentures and other personal items, etc and personal memories.

Would you mind giving me a definition of the "Holocaust" that you would feel to have been vindicated by the level of evidence you mention?

Did the emaciated corpses at Andersonville prove the Confederate States were out to exterminate the Northern population during the American Civil War?

Did you actually see any "piles of dentures" anywhere? If you mean you saw limited numbers of golden teeth on trays, you would probably be right about their having been extracted from corpses before cremation, and no one ever denied it to my knowledge, but how does that prove anything about any gas chambers, or any attempted racial extermination, or the alleged 6 million murdered Jews?

And what about the personal items? Did you think the suitcases, the shoes, the clothes, the personal objects the internees turned over when they received their standard equipment on arrival just evaporated into thin air?

As to the personal memoirs, can you point out a single one that you trust? I keep asking this, but no one seems to deposit sufficient trust in any memorialist survivor. Well, maybe you suspect more than you let me know...

Oh, and...

Said apaeter:

Oh, and:

Hi ASM,
maybe you should visit the beautiful country of my birth, see a couple of camps and documentations yourself.

Hi apater. Another Jew from beautiful Palestine?

There's gonna be photos of at least a couple of tens of thousands of corpses (as much as anyone can take in a single sitting), a lot of quite evil-looking infrastructure (think Hostel), eye witness accounts, etc. It's quite interesting, in a scary-as-hell kind of way. Whatever you might have been lead to believe, it's not Club Med.

Or perhaps more shrunken heads out of Germany? Think German taxpayers in line. I can hardly wait.

Also, have a look around here:
http://nuremberg.law.harvard.edu/

Sure. Take a peek yourself. I agree it's quite interesting, in a scary-as-hell kind of way:

http://www.cwporter.com/partone.htm
http://www.cwporter.com/parttwo.htm
http://www.cwporter.com/partthre.htm
http://www.cwporter.com/partfour.htm
http://www.cwporter.com/pg368.htm

Maybe you should go on a quest to find those aliens you mention...

Other Comments by ASMarques

76. Comment #175308 by al-rawandi on May 5, 2008 at 7:14 am

All,






Just trust him.... come onnnnn.

Other Comments by al-rawandi

77. Comment #175315 by PLAYBALL on May 5, 2008 at 8:08 am

MPHIL said:

Me: "Not 'provable', but every statement about alleged matters-of-fact about the world has to be testable."

She: "But why?"


Is she serious? Because otherwise you're not teaching what it means to know something. What a frustrating conversation. I might have needed a drink as well.

Anyway, I very much enjoyed the interview. I think some here are being needlessly critical. I wish I could see something like this on TV here in California.

Other Comments by PLAYBALL

78. Comment #175318 by gd_edi on May 5, 2008 at 8:25 am

Peacebeuponme,

No its not. Its a very interesting question.

It is interesting, I never said it wasn't. But unless you can test or otherwise observe it, it remains scientifically meaningless.

Other Comments by gd_edi

79. Comment #175321 by Quine on May 5, 2008 at 8:31 am

Comment #175268 by BNCbright:

From a philosophical and physics perspective it's interesting to posit/assume them - but for someone trying to advocate reason and science, for the mainstream, sticking to something a bit more 'certain' might be better.

Yes, this is also a concern I have. It would not be good to make statements that can be spun around (like the aliens ref in Expelled) by calls for "Evidence?"

There is experimental evidence that (at least some parts) of the Universe behave in accordance with mathematical models developed by physicists (that is their job, after all). However, it does not follow that the numeric quantities in the models have some kind of independent existence. Someone can always come up with a different mathematical model that happens to give the same results in the experimental conditions we can test, and then claim that their numeric quantities are the real determiners of the Universe. Also, just because one can independently manipulate the value of a quantity in a model, there is no evidence that the corresponding thing (if there is one) in the Universe can be, or could have been, different, and there is no evidence that it could have been different without other changes having to go along with it.

Just stick to the evidence.

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80. Comment #175384 by TearsInTheRain on May 5, 2008 at 10:34 am

Hi

Thanks to those who replied to my questions. I think I came across in the wrong light, maybe I was playing Devil's advocate a bit.

I have read God Delusion, I am a huge fan of RD, I come from a science background, I believe in an evidence/logical/rational approach to life, I was sincerely just wondering why those questions were never asked.

Other Comments by TearsInTheRain

81. Comment #175408 by The Soilworker on May 5, 2008 at 11:03 am

Holocaust denial is just as stupid, if not moreso, than the denial of evolution. In fact, I can understand if fundies can't see that the evidence of evolution is around us but requires more grey matter to process. Holocaust evidence, on the other hand, is definitely tangible and immediate (dont get me wrong, evolution evidence is too). Why don't you pro-Palestine fuckers go the hell away and just admit that you hate Jews and you want to squabble over that chalky, arid shithole for millenia. I'm no Jew sympathizer or anything, but the denial of the Holocaust is simply asinine. All forms of internment camps and forced submission and captivity are terrible - no one is playing favorites. Jews and Palestinians are equally retarded for fighting over a veritable wasteland. Why don't we just stick to the topic at hand which would be the above video/interview and at least leave the squabbling to the forums.

Other Comments by The Soilworker

82. Comment #175425 by Teratornis on May 5, 2008 at 11:42 am

Comment #175253 by MPhil:

Just recently, I was talking to a person who, when the discussion came to the point of religion being a source of violence, and the scriptures recommending violence and other unacceptable things, said:

"Well, it's all a matter of interpretation"... the dialogue then went as follows:

Me:"Of course it is. The only reason European Christianity doesn't torture and kill people anymore is because they assimilated to the moral Zeitgeist. Look at the Islamic theocracies - they haven't had to do that so far."

She:"Right. As I said, you have to interpret scripture correctly, and some are just closer to the truth."

At this point the discussion veered in the wrong direction: toward generalities rather than specifics. Anybody can (and does) imagine scripture says anything generally.

Anchoring the discussion firmly in specifics gives less wiggle room. At this point you might have opened your Bible (or her Bible) to some specific passages, and then asked her to interpret those passes. Exactly how does she interpret this passage, for example:

http://www.ocupc.com/Bible/1Timothy.html
Chapter 2
8 I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.
9 In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety; not with broided hair, or gold, or pearls, or costly array;
10 But (which becometh women professing godliness) with good works.
11 Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection.
12 But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence.
13 For Adam was first formed, then Eve.
14 And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression.
15 Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety.

Does the woman you spoke to wear jewelry? Does she style her hair? Does she wear nice clothes? Does she teach men or have authority over any men? Does she vote for any women candidates? Does she learn in silence with all subjection?

How does she interpret this passge to mean anything other than what it plainly says, and what Christians down through the centuries understood it to mean?

The only way out for the modern woman is to reject that passage (and other similar passages) of scripture as thoroughly as the modern homosexual rejects the passages against homosexuality. But that raises the question of how do we know which scriptures to reject, and which to keep? Is everyone free to reject whatever scripture they don't like?

Also, whenever someone talks about interpreting away the bothersome bits of the Bible, quote:

2 Peter 1:20, "Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation."

Talking about scripture generally without quoting any specific scripture is like walking a dog on an infinite leash. One might as well have no leash.

Me: "You're not seriously claiming that just because the interpretation of their holy books of moderates conforms to our ethical standards, it therefore must be closer to a so called 'true interpretation'? How would you know that? What makes you think there is such a thing. Where is the evidence?"

She: "Does everything have to be provable?"

Me: "Not 'provable', but every statement about alleged matters-of-fact about the world has to be testable."

She: "But why?"

Ask her how much money she could scrape together by liquidating all her investments, selling everything she owns, and borrowing from everyone who trusts her.

Ask her if she will lend you all that money. Promise to pay her back double in one week.

Does she require some evidence that your investment plan is sound before she trusts you with all her money?

Before she gets on an airplane, does she require some evidence that the airplane is well-maintained, and someone is checking to make sure the crew is well-qualified to fly, and is not drunk?

If she is waiting to board an airplane, and she sees each of the ten airplanes ahead of hers crash and explode on takeoff, one by one, will she still board her airplane? (This is hypothetical, because the airport would shut down after the first crash, but suppose the airplanes just kept taking off and crashing. Most people would probably start to think twice about flying that day.)

You could promise that regardless of what she may think of you at the moment, if she consents to have sex with you, you will give her the best sex of her life. Will she believe you and immediately rip off her clothes, or will she treat your claim with some skepticism? Most women tend to be skeptical of a man's claims of sexual prowess - at least when I try it. Perhaps next time I will remember to ask, "Does everything have to be provable?"

The real question is not "Does everything have to be provable?" but "What does not have to be provable?"

With a little reflection she should realize that most people either demand proof for anything with real-world consequences, or they later regret failing to demand proof before getting suckered.

Me: "Why? Because otherwise no claim to correctness can ever have any epistemic justification. None at all. I might as well claim that there is an invisible pink unicorn standing right behind you."

She: "Yes, you cannot disprove that!"

Me: "Aside from the fact that I can on logical grounds (No entity can at the same time be 'invisible' and 'pink'),

That depends. "Invisible" is a subjective property, so it's not clear that "invisible" means "invisible to everyone" as you seem to imply. China, for example, is invisible to me right now, because I'm sitting on the other side of the Earth, but I have no reason to doubt the existence of China, because I get a lot of indirect evidence about it. It's hard for me to imagine a sufficiently vast conspiracy which could have fabricated all the information about China I have received indirectly through wires, airwaves, and the personal accounts I have heard from people who claim to be from China or to have visited it.

China may be visible to lots of people, but it is invisible to me right now.

Invisibility in the narrowest sense would mean a given observer cannot see an object now. In the broadest sense, invisibility might mean no observer can obtain any information from the object. Not even God could be that invisible, because if God was that invisible, nobody could claim to "know" God. We can only "know" things we can receive information from, either directly or indirectly. Thus we can only "know" things that somehow exchange energy or particles with the Universe.

Even back when the far side of the Moon was invisible to humans, humans could still reliably infer its existence by observing the gravitational effect of the Moon on other objects, which fixed the Moon's mass, and therefore fixed the possible dimensions of the far side of the Moon. Humans could not directly see the far side of the Moon, but they could obtain some information from it.

that's the point. There can be no evidence for it. I say it is so - why don't you believe me? Just because of that. If there are statements about alleged facts that need no evidence, what justified your rejection of any such claim. It's all just arbitrary then."

She: "But... but you can't compare god to an invisible pink unicorn."

Me: "Really? Why not. I just did - works great. Now if you'd excuse me - I need a drink."

What she really means is "You can't compare the emotions I have been conditioned to associate with the word 'God' to the emotions I have been conditioned to associate with the word 'unicorn'."

Your challenge is to get her to become consciously aware of her emotions. It might help if she could understand her emotions do not exist just outside of her skull. For most people that is a huge leap of inference they have yet to make.

Needless to say I didn't get through to her.

It's sickening, really.

Why is this sickening? Richard Dawkins frequently mentions how wonderful the universe is, how much wonder and awe he experiences by observing and trying to understand it. This woman is part of the universe. Don't you find the (mal?)function of her brain as wonderful as the function of the stars, galaxies, and nebulae that we see in photos from the Hubble telescope?

We are able to appreciate the way the stars look because we don't approach them with the expectation that they should look any particular way. Imagine if we insisted the stars must spell out the words "Hello, world!" Then we might get angry and frustrated at the stars for failing to cooperate, insuring continued need for drinks. But if we just let the stars be stars, and try to figure out why the stars are the way they are, then we don't have to get so angry at them.

Why would we divide up the universe into things we think are wonderful, and things we think are deplorable? Why can't it all be wonderful when we use science to understand it?

Rather than be disturbed by human thinking, why not be fascinated by it? There are scientists who try to explain how people such as this woman come up with the words they string together, just as there are other scientists who try to explain how planets come to exist. People, planets, both are wonderful subjects for scientific study. The potential payoff from studying people is probably orders of magnitude higher than the potential payoff from studying distant astronomical objects - which means people are even more wonderful than the stars.

Frustration comes from not knowing what to do in a given situation. An ignorant savage must feel lots of frustration, because the world seems like a confusing, capricious place. An educated person is able to make a bit more sense of the world, knowing something about what the weather may do tomorrow and so on. With more understanding comes less frustration and more efficiency.

If you're going to lock horns with people who don't think like you do, then you need to know why they think the way they do. Science isn't quite all the way there yet, but it's made some useful headway. You might start by reviewing:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases

and pretty much everything linked from:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Thinking

For example, everybody (including the woman you spoke to) finds they are unable to get past someone else's cognitive biases from time to time. Perhaps this woman was unable to persuade one of her friends to do something that was clearly better than what her friend did instead. It's perfectly clear to everyone that everyone else departs from logic routinely, with bad consequences. Get someone to recognize this, and maybe they will recognize that they, too, have some garbaged thinking in their heads.

Then try to make them aware of some belief they hold which is the result of one of these cognitive biases. Don't go straight for the heavily-defended God belief. Instead, follow Sun Tzu's advice to attack where the enemy is weakest, in this case, some invalid belief the person holds which doesn't induce too much hysteria when they analyze it. The goal is to get a person to recognize the inherent difference between truth vs. emotional certainty. It's possible to be 100% sure of things that just aren't so.

A common example is when we trust another person completely, and they betray us. All the emotional certainty we had about that person turned out to be completely worthless. In fact, our misplaced certainty itself created the harm, by making us vulnerable to a reality smackdown.

Ask this woman if she ever had the experience of being very sure about something and then finding out she was very wrong about it.

Other Comments by Teratornis

83. Comment #175449 by mordacious1 on May 5, 2008 at 12:46 pm

ASM If I had an obsession with "scatological matters" I would go back and read the rest of your posts on this site. I don't, therefor I won't.

Other Comments by mordacious1

84. Comment #175453 by al-rawandi on May 5, 2008 at 12:54 pm

the Soilworker,




Don't be so stupid as to equate support for Palestinian statehood, or sympathy for their suffering to Holocaust denial.


ASM is the most repellent of people, but don't think for a second his position is the same for "All you pro-Palestine fuckers".

And use of the term "Jew sympathizer" is equally offensive to the mind. Perhpas you should reserve yourself to posting on matters where you can control your intellectual flatulence.

Other Comments by al-rawandi

85. Comment #175464 by Elli on May 5, 2008 at 1:21 pm

I have interviewed numerous survivors of concentration camps. When I was in my final year of high school, there was a living historian program we undertook where we interviewed numerous holocaust survivors and documented the details of their testimony. According to ASM I take it they must have all been liars.

ASM is a prime example of how powerful brainwashing and indoctrination can be, even in spite of overwhelming readily available and contemporary evidence. Scary, to say the least.

I am a supporter of Palestinian statehood, and I am the daughter of Jewish Israelis. Suffice to say, I am thoroughly offended by ASM's ignorant and unintelligent remarks. What a fucktard.

Other Comments by Elli

86. Comment #175474 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 1:32 pm

Said The Soilworker:

Holocaust evidence, on the other hand, is definitely tangible and immediate
[...]
the denial of the Holocaust is simply asinine.

I wonder what "Holocaust" and "Holocaust denial" mean to you. You're probably one of those people who think it's respectively "the incomparable suffering of the Jews" and "denying the existence of concentration camps"...

*Sigh*

I'll tell you what amazes me the most. It's the degree of alienation from reality that most people indulge themselves in when they go on talking forever about what in their usage becomes strictly a meaningless Newspeak word, without noticing in the least that making any precise debate impossible is precisely its purpose.

Think about you own choice of words like "tangible" and "immediate." How can a concept like the "Holocaust" be "tangible" and "immediate" unless it has become a shapeless one, consisting of pure emotional impact devoid of any precise meaning?

Why don't we just stick to the topic at hand which would be the above video/interview

In case you didn't notice, pay attention to Dawkins at (04:14) of part 1:

"The evidence for evolution, for example, is absolutely overwhelming. And so you may hear tones of exasperation in a scientist's voice when meeting flat denial. It's a bit like Holocaust denial... hem... when meeting flat denial. But that really isn't absolutism. That's always backed up by evidence."

So both allegations -- to proceed with the odd comparison -- are "always backed up by evidence," but unfortunately when it comes to specifying what exactly might that evidence be, it's all right in the case of the perfectly understandable scientific grounds that lead to Evolution, but the cat eats your tongue if it's the all-purpose amoeba-like usage of the shapeless "Holocaust" concept that is being pinned down, restricted to its definition as "extermination, gas chambers, approximately 6 million murdered Jews" (any other precise definition you might propose, in case you haven't been living on this planet?) and denied as the enormous hoax it is...

Have you noticed how Dawkins -- obviously an intelligent man that can't help but noticing when he is spewing out propaganda nonsense -- specifies "flat denial," as if "not so flat denial" might be a different sort of thing?

Think about it. Why is he implying the "Holocaust" -- and apparently even Evolution by contagion -- is really a free concept that can be denied flatly or not so flaty? Here is why, in my opinion: in his bright holy of holies he does recognise the "Holocaust" idiocy, even from his insuficiently informed point of view, is highly doubtful as a historical event. However, he also feels it's a super-charged emotional concept highly dangerous to grapple with, so he comes up with this odd solution to the annoying matter of a semantically void word: perhaps a tiny bit of denial is not really a mortal sin; it's flat denial I cannot abide by...

What a sham this endless nauseating "Holocaust" drivel is. Truly Orwellian stuff. Everybody seems to assume the word is a meaningful one, as indeed should be done -- and would be done with any other allegedly historical event designated by a proper noun -- but then, when it comes to discuss any precise meaning, it's simply wriggling out of focus and crying for a change of subject...

Other Comments by ASMarques

87. Comment #175479 by al-rawandi on May 5, 2008 at 1:41 pm

ASM,





Did you ever answer me when I asked why it seems to only ever be the racists, discredited, bigoted, mentally ill, and pathetic who ever manage to discover the Holocaust fraud. Not one person who has any legitimacy. Not one person that doesn't have a website that looks like it was designed by a 10 year old. Not one person not aligned with some whack job or racist movement?

I don't think you did.


You were queried for evidence and citations, to which you replied "trust me".

There is no issue of incomparable suffering. Everyone here rejects that kind of thinking. The issue is your case sucks.


You need to answer Elli:

I have interviewed numerous survivors of concentration camps. When I was in my final year of high school, there was a living historian program we undertook where we interviewed numerous holocaust survivors and documented the details of their testimony. According to ASM I take it they must have all been liars.

You, like the flat earth theists, refuse to answer pointed questions, because the only answer you can give makes you look stupid. So do enlighten us on how the malicious Jews have conspired to get all these stories out of European Jews who were presumably rounded up and sent on a nice vacation by the Nazis...

You simply cannot answer the question, how is the worldwide conspiracy maintained?

Other Comments by al-rawandi

88. Comment #175548 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 3:03 pm

Said Elli:

I have interviewed numerous survivors of concentration camps.

Have you never asked yourself how come those super-efficient Germans were so inefficient with their alleged extermination? I mean, it's practically a new miraculous survivor a day. The latest Auschwitz child to be revealed made yesterday's news: it's the Jewish guy who is currently training Chelsea, the British football team. I mean, children were supposed to be exterminated at Auschwitz, but apparently a collective miracle of devastating statistical impact occurred and more than sixty years after they are everywhere like mushrooms...

When I was in my final year of high school, there was a living historian program we undertook where we interviewed numerous holocaust survivors and documented the details of their testimony. According to ASM I take it they must have all been liars.

Should I assume that, according to Elli, when it comes to physically impossible claims, the human psyche by itself is the most dependable avenue for the validation of those claims?

May I ask how many of those you interviewed claimed this laughable surrealistic idiocy was physically possible at all?

And by the way, have you ever interviewed witnesses to any other religion's miracles? Are you familiar with the work of Elizabeth Loftus concerning the amazing innacuracy of eyewitness testimony, er, I mean when it doesn't come to "Holocaust" testimony? Let me suggest you read this perceptive review of her book:

WITNESS FOR THE DEFENSE by Elizabeth Loftus and Katherine Ketcham. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1991. Hardbound. 288 pages. Illustrations. $ 19.95. ISBN: 0-312-05537-4.
Reviewed by John Cobden

http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v11/v11p238_Cobden.html

Eyewitness testimony is the cornerstone of the Holocaust story. Much more than physical or documentary evidence, the accounts of "Holocaust survivors" have been crucial in convincing people that millions of European Jews were systematically exterminated in gas chambers during the Second World War.

What few realize is that such "eyewitness" testimony is notoriously inaccurate, biased and, in many cases, blatantly and demonstrably wrong. Jewish historian Samuel Gringauz, for example, once pointed out that:

... most of the memoirs and report [of "Holocaust survivors"] are full of preposterous verbosity, graphomanic exaggeration, dramatic effects, overestimated self-inflation, dilettante philosophizing, would-be lyricism, unchecked rumors, bias, partisan attacks and apologies.

The inaccuracy of Holocaust testimony is not unique, of course. Defective memory and false testimony occur in all aspects of life. It is to this fascinating subject that Dr. Elizabeth Loftus has dedicated her career. As she relates in Witness for the Defense, what began as a research project at Stanford University became her life-long calling:

The study of memory has become my specialty, my passion. In the next few years I wrote dozens of papers about how memory works and how it fails, but unlike most researchers studying memory, my work kept reaching out into the real world. To what extent, I wondered, could a person's memory be shaped by suggestion? When people witness a serious automobile accident, how accurate is their recollection of the facts? If a witness is questioned by a police officer, will the manner of questioning alter the representation of the memory? Can memories be supplemented with additional, false information? (p. 7)

This passion led Loftus to a teaching career at the University of Washington and, perhaps more importantly, into hundreds of courtrooms as an expert witness on the fallibility of eyewitness accounts. As she has explained in numerous trials, and as she convincingly argues in this absorbing book, eyewitness accounts can be and often are so distorted that they no longer resemble the truth.

[...]

Loftus was confronted with a dilemma. She was one of the world's leading authorities on the crucial aspect of human memory and eyewitness accounts. She knew from her own research and experience that Israeli methods were corrupting the testimony of their witnesses, and that the evidence presented by the Israelis was emphatically not enough to convict Demjanjuk beyond a "reasonable doubt." An innocent man's life was a stake. She had been willing to testify on behalf of accused murderers, rapists and child molesters. Was the case of this Ukrainian immigrant and retired auto worker really any different?

[...]

In the end, Loftus decided not to testify on behalf of a man she believed was very possibly innocent because she didn't want to offend her relatives, her friends, Jewish survivors and Jews everywhere. In short, as she acknowledges, Loftus put her Jewishness ahead of her regard for truth and justice.

[...]

Loftus struggled with her dilemma. Would she betray her sense of honor and integrity out of loyalty to her "heritage" and "race"? She sought advice from a close relative:

"Uncle Joe tried to be reasonable. He cautioned that I must think about Israel, for 'what is good for Israel is paramount (p. 229)."'

Loftus went to Israel to sit in on the Demjanjuk trial and see the defendant for herself. She recalls how, when one eyewitness "pointed out Demjanjuk, many of the five hundred spectators stood up and applauded," as if watching some great play (p. 230). She heard "eyewitness" Gustave Boraks identify Demjanjuk, but then have trouble remembering the name of his own child. Boraks, who had come to Israel from Florida, was asked if he could remember how he had made the journey. He told the stunned audience that he had come "by train (p. 230)."

Instead of feeling sympathy for the hapless defendant, Loftus empathized with the eyewitnesses, who were doing everything in their power to send Demjanjuk to the gallows:

I could picture O'Conner stalking Gustave Boraks' aging memory, pouncing, holding it up like a deflated rubber ball and declaring with a victor's smile, "See this old thing? It's no good anymore!" And I could picture Mr. Boraks sitting there defeated and devastated as he watched his mind being held up to ridicule, as he endured the shame of forgetting the name of his youngest son. (p. 231)

As Loftus sat in the courtroom watching the trial, a friend asked her, "Why aren't you up on the stand?" She paused a moment before replying:

It took me a few seconds to pull my answer together. As I looked around the audience filled with four generations of Jews -- little children, their parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents -- I tried to explain to Margreet that it was as if these were my relatives, and I, too, had lost someone I loved in the Treblinka death camp. With those kinds of feelings inside me, I couldn't suddenly switch roles and become a professional, an expert - I could not have taken the stand and talked about the fallibility of memory without every person in that audience believing that I was indicting the specific memories of the survivors. I would have been perceived as attacking their memories. I couldn't do it. It was as simple and agonizing as that. (p. 237)

In other words, Loftus put her sense of Jewishness above considerations of truth and justice, and above John Demjanjuk's right to a fair trial. In the end, she heeded her uncle's advice and put "Israel" first.

In American trials of murderers and child abusers, Loftus had been quite willing to call into question the memories of the many victims, and to put her sense of professional duty above any concern she might have for their feelings. But she could not bring herself to similarly challenge the dubious memories of Jewish witnesses -- because they were Jewish.

By refusing to testify, and thereby passively helping to sentence a man to death whom she herself believed was very possibly innocent, Loftus is perhaps more culpable than the elderly persons who bore false witness against the defendant. For unlike the aging witnesses who were no longer able to distinguish truth from falsehood, and who had come to believe their own false testimony, Loftus knew better.

Many readers of this book will doubtless sympathize with or even approve of Loftus's decision not to testify in the Demjanjuk trial. But how many of these "understanding" readers would be as tolerant of Ukrainians, Poles or other non-Jews who might make similarly ethnically-motivated decisions?

This is a valuable and eye-opening book, not just for the revealing story of one persons's crisis of conscience, but for what it teaches about the fallibility of supposedly solid "eyewitness" testimony -- a lesson with important social import.

Read on, this is just a very incomplete quote. And then look for the book itself and do humanize Jews: their memories are no different from everybody else's, though the hateful religious heritage of Judaism may to some measure have been unique in its historical impact to this day.

ASM is a prime example of how powerful brainwashing and indoctrination can be, even in spite of overwhelming readily available and contemporary evidence. Scary, to say the least.

And why, Elli of the beauteous avatar, beholdest thou the mote in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam in thine own eye...?

I am a supporter of Palestinian statehood, and I am the daughter of Jewish Israelis. Suffice to say, I am thoroughly offended by ASM's ignorant and unintelligent remarks. What a fucktard.

Glad to see you're not an anti-semite, Elli. And, of course, I love you too.
;^)

Other Comments by ASMarques

89. Comment #175551 by al-rawandi on May 5, 2008 at 3:08 pm

ASM,




Eichmann was wrongly convicted? Despite his admission that he did these horrible things, but only while following orders?

Maybe Eichmann was a Jewish agent...

Other Comments by al-rawandi

90. Comment #175553 by mesomodel on May 5, 2008 at 3:13 pm

Elii said:

I have interviewed numerous survivors of concentration camps. When I was in my final year of high school, there was a living historian program we undertook where we interviewed numerous holocaust survivors and documented the details of their testimony. According to ASM I take it they must have all been liars.

Check out the Shoah Foundation. The goal was to document via video the survivors of the holocaust that were still alive. You can see them all on-line.

http://college.usc.edu/vhi/

Other Comments by mesomodel

91. Comment #175560 by Goldy on May 5, 2008 at 3:38 pm

But isn't that a rhetorical question to create the make-believe feeling that obvious proof exists and I'm the one acting in an irrational way by ignoring it, while you carefully refrain from sending me any concrete evidence that you fear might be demolished by a minimum of logic, common sense and historical knowledge?

No, it was a question asking you if the evidence presented to you was good enough you would actually believe it. Bringing Jesus and the resurrection is neither here nor there. You can show someone that a dead person generally remains dead, that parthenogenesis always results in females and that H. sapiens is not able to reproduce by this method. One can point out all the mythology surrounding Jesus is that of the area and had appeared many times before - doesn't matter because people still believe what they want to believe themselves. That is why I asked you the question I did.

Have you never asked yourself how come those super-efficient Germans were so inefficient with their alleged extermination?

Silly comment. Germans are no more or less efficient than anybody else. And they did manage to remove pretty much all of middle Europe of significant numbers of Jews - 6 million in, what, a handful of years isn't that bad going, especially when you add all the other "undesireables". And they lost the war...and the one before that too. The recent case in Austria also highlights the fact that German efficiency isn't as great as one makes out - after all, how can a man hide his daughter for a quarter of a century along with three of her seven surviving offspring without anyone, not even lodgers and family, noticing?
So, where did all those Jews go? I know things get bad in war, but a significant portion of Poland's Jews gone?
Oddly enough, the NZ Herald had this story today..
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10508119
Makes one think, doesn't it?

Edit - I don't refrain from giving you evidence, carefully or otherwise. I'm a technician at a university, not a genocide historian. There are things I like to consider truth and things I consider untruth (not lies - that implies malevolence. Just things that are believed but are not what I consider true). As a participant in this "oasis of clear thinking" I just like to engage in debate and try and consider all viewpoints given to me. I reserve my splenetic outbursts for those I feel have crept into foolishness.

Other Comments by Goldy

92. Comment #175568 by alan baylis on May 5, 2008 at 3:54 pm

Comment #175548 by ASMarques


Looked up John Cobden and surprise, surprise, he's another holocaust denier associated with the journal of historical review et al.

Other Comments by alan baylis

93. Comment #175575 by Peacebeuponme on May 5, 2008 at 4:04 pm

Mitchell Gilks - I just accidentally tagged your post #175113 as "offensive". Sure nothing will happen, but have seen comments moved to the Alt. thread by accident before, so apols if it does!

Other Comments by Peacebeuponme

94. Comment #175579 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 4:19 pm

Said alan baylis:

Looked up John Cobden and surprise, surprise, he's another holocaust denier associated with the journal of historical review et al.

How clever of you. How in heaven did you manage to click the mouse button all by yourself?

Oh, and by the way, shall we get the wood and prepare the stake, just in case Cobden gets caught?...

Said mesomodel:

Check out the Shoah Foundation. The goal was to document via video the survivors of the holocaust that were still alive. You can see them all on-line.
http://college.usc.edu/vhi/

I guess that proves the extermination...

Other Comments by ASMarques

95. Comment #175589 by DetpackJump on May 5, 2008 at 4:40 pm

ASMarques.

You're argument is to just shoot holes in the available evidence about the holocaust. It's not clear where you exactly stand on the issue.

So, lets go to the basics. In 500 words or less can you please describe what you DO believe about the holocaust. What do you think really happened? You seem to well read on the subject, so you must have an opinion as to what really happened. Please share it with us.

For example, do you believe the number is, say 1 million Jews instead of 6 million. Or maybe just 10,000, or maybe none? Do you believe that the pictures of dead Jews from the camps that we can find on the internet and in museums are completely fake, or do they just show that only some Jews were executed, not the full 6 million?
You have an issue with the gas chambers, so do you think they are completely false, or do you think that they were used to exterminate some Jews, just not as many as stated.

You should get my point here. Again, I would like a baseline to know what you believe, not what you don't believe.

Other Comments by DetpackJump

96. Comment #175593 by Goldy on May 5, 2008 at 4:49 pm

ASM, would I be correct in thinking this is your stance?
http://www.zundelsite.org/english/basic_articles/nutshell.html

Other Comments by Goldy

97. Comment #175601 by ASMarques on May 5, 2008 at 5:03 pm

Said Goldy:

So, where did all those Jews go?

Russia, the United States, Canada, Israel, the World...

I know things get bad in war, but a significant portion of Poland's Jews gone?

Out of Poland, certainly. Of course, some died as a result of a war that killed millions. But many retreated with or were deported by the Soviets into Russia (Menachem Begin was an example), and many others were deported by the Germans into camps and emigrated to other parts of the World after the War, rather than staying and camping in the ruins of Central and Eastern Europe.

I would recommend to you a book based on the Jewish data itself that is a true eye-opener: The Dissolution of Eastern European Jewry by Walter N. Sanning. But I'm afraid it may be out of print.

Oddly enough, the NZ Herald had this story today..
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/2/story.cfm?c_id=2&objectid=10508119

Makes one think, doesn't it?

Sure does. It really opens one's mind to the usefulness of the "Holocaust" hoax.

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98. Comment #175603 by Goldy on May 5, 2008 at 5:13 pm

Russia, the United States, Canada, Israel, the World...

Not too sure many places were so welcoming as you'd care to suggest. Certainly Russia was no great lover of Jews and given that pogroms were relatively recent history, I can't see why Jews would want to go there. And there's just something that tells me the numbers involved would have made a bigger impact than they did in other countries - look how Italians shaped America, as well as Jews. One would have thought a large influx of Jews into Australia, NZ, South America, etc would have resulted in some sort of Middle European impact in said countries.
Given the subsequent ability of humanity to slaughter itself by defined groups (ex Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Soviet Russia, Mao China) why is it hard to imagine that Europeans could not perform the same acts, using modernised mechanical and chemical methods, on a reviled ethnic group?

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99. Comment #175613 by bachfiend on May 5, 2008 at 5:33 pm

I am now convinced. Not only didn't the Holocaust occur, but also Charles Darwin was directly and personally responsible for it, as I have it on PZ Myer's authority:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/04/i_am_persuaded_that_darwin_kil.php
He also provides a good link to John Wilkin's site proving that Darwin was also responsible the persecution of Jews over the prior 1600 years:
http://scienceblogs.com/evolvingthoughts/2008/04/stein_is_right_darwinism_cause.php
I had some slight hesitation in accepting their word, partly because both were dated April 1, but then I found a blog from the Reverend Paul T Hipple saying that they are right.
http://protoplasm.wordpress.com/
The Reverend Paul T Hipple also provides a marvellous review of a special screening of "Expelled": "Furthermore, Christian Souls are placed at great risk by the mere act of unwittingly sitting in a dark theater nearby a Dark-sided soul, such as that of an Atheist, Satanist or secular Biologist." (such as Richard Dawkins) " Also, there are numerous reports coming in from the field that these uninvited characters are disrupting the screenings, by yelling out catcalls during objectionable scenes, arguing with the Discussion Leader, asking stupid questions, cursing, spitting, making loud farting sounds" (hopefully this isn't referring to Professor Dawkins?), "and worst of all, refusing to turn their cell phones off" (well, at least he's got a sense of proportion).

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100. Comment #175614 by mordacious1 on May 5, 2008 at 5:34 pm

I don't think we should reply to ASM any longer because he is obviously some nut who surfs the web looking for some site that allows him to spew his warped vision of history and facts. He probably lives in a one room cabin in the woods in Montana writing his manefesto. If we ignore him he'll go elsewhere. Hopefully, to New York where some holocaust surviver will give him a drubbing.

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