1. Daniel Dennett Debates Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #93005 by Denevius on December 1, 2007 at 11:45 pm

D'Souza did perfectly well for the audience he aims for when speaking/writing. The fact that Dennett kept saying, "And if you go read a book, you can find the correct answers to these questions" shows the Achilles heel of his worldview. And usually it's not just one book you have to read, but multiple books.

People like Dennett and Dawkins can complain all they want, but religion is here to stay as long as intelligence and knowledge isn't coming in easy to take pill form.

I often wonder what these people are realistically trying to accomplish.

2. Interview with Richard Dawkins

Comment #92520 by Denevius on November 30, 2007 at 5:17 pm

TonyA said: "Dawkins' point is that non-religious mechanisms which enhance survivability also make it easier for people to be unwitting carriers of religious beliefs. This is because we have a built-in, "trust your parents/leaders/elders" mechanism in our brains. That this mechanism also allows us to be fed superstitions and lies is an unfortunate, but understandable consequence. It is difficult to "breed out" the misfeature because it remains valuable when used for its original purposes."

My point, however, is that even if the mechanism is there, why has it allowed religion, in particular, to continue to thrive in human consciousness?

I would assume, and someone can point out otherwise, that there have been other manifestations borne from this mechanism in our brains. Do you agree or disagree with this?

If you agree, how do you explain the fact that the other manifestations are no longer around, but religion persists from generation to generation?

TonyA: "This is faith-based reasoning. Replace "religion" with "the common cold" or "ignorance" to see the folly."

I'm not a scientists, but I thought illness was needed to build up the immune system? Would not the common cold have had evolutionary benefits? Seems like by the fact that it's still around, it had to have been part of the biological combination to keep humans surviving over the generations.

And I don't see how putting "ignorance" in the stead of religion makes a good point at all.

3. Papal encyclical attacks atheism, lauds hope

Comment #92405 by Denevius on November 30, 2007 at 12:50 pm

Mark Till: "I'm coming round to Sam Harris's view that the term "atheism" is becoming more of a curse than a strength to us in the cause of rationality. It has been, and is being, twisted and misrepresented as an ideology or belief system in its own right, rather than a mere lack of ridiculous belief. Worrying."

I'm actually most concerned when I hear an atheist say atheism isn't an ideology.

The reason why atheism is an ideology isn't because of Sam Harris or Richard Dawkins. It's because of all the people who are not very rational but have led themselves to believe that they are because they call themselves "atheist".

I have had many discussions with atheists who have no real understanding of the arguments they're repeating, and who live very irrational lives. Yet'll they will swear until they're blue in the face that they are rational because they are atheists.

4. Interview with Richard Dawkins

Comment #92398 by Denevius on November 30, 2007 at 12:32 pm

As always, most of Dawkins answers were great. I do think, however, that further explanation was needed with the question of the evolutionary importance of religion to human survival.

To simplify the survival-of-the-fittest argument, it seems like once upon a time in human development, there were those who were not persuaded by "religious/spiritual" belief, but that those died off, and what we're left with is a world full of people who believe in religion.

Now, it can be argued that, today, this belief needs to die off, and that the best case scenario is that those without such religious inclinations are the ones who'll survive.

But if religion persists in being a part of humankind, and humans, despite the seeming odds, continue to survive and not kill each other off, then there may be more to religion than Dawkins and other atheists wish to admit.

To compare it to a virus doesn't seem appropriate if humans keep surviving, growing, multiplying with this virus.

5. The Transcendental Argument for God

Comment #87122 by Denevius on November 11, 2007 at 8:56 am

This has been an interesting discussion.

The one thing I find truly disheartening is that, on the surface, Dianelos Georgoudis sounds like he/she's making really valid points. It probably has a lot to do with the fact that he/she truly believes their argument.

But then, this individual will take this well thought out, but ultimately exceptionally flawed, way of thinking to very unsophisticated people, and will whelm them into accepting these irrational statements as valid arguments.

There simply are not enough Steve99s out there to counter Dianelos Georgoudis' particular brand of irrational statements because, to be honest, Dianelos Georgoudis would have wiped the ground with most of you others who responded here if he had just debated you.

Thanks Steve.

6. American kids, dumber than dirt: Warning: The next generation might just be the biggest pile of idiots in U.S. history

Comment #82211 by Denevius on October 25, 2007 at 9:53 pm

This is a funny article, and in general I agree with it. I only wonder what are the "smarts" of the world going to do. Are you going to roll up your sleeves and plunge into the stupidity around you in order to make a difference? Or are you going to keep to your own, complain, and basically let the world go to hell on a coaster of ignorance?

7. Debate between Christopher Hitchens and Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #81504 by Denevius on October 24, 2007 at 9:03 pm

I don't think Hitchens lost the debate at all. I was actually there, and what I felt more than anything else from him is boredom. He seemed totally disinterested, and slightly distracted. He basically gave his argument word from word from previous arguments, and I think one of the reasons why D'Souza seemed like he gave a better performance is because we who follow these debates don't get to see him as often as Hitchens. However, even D'Souza gave the exact same argument that night as he had on the evening he debated Micheal Shermer.

I think Hitchens should take a break for a year so that he doesn't sound like such a recording anymore. He's a great thinker, but now he's just repeating himself.

8. Stretching the Search for Signs of Life

Comment #79312 by Denevius on October 16, 2007 at 9:44 pm

It's interesting how upset you sound, Rational_G. These are all just words. It's not like Teratornis is saying this stuf specifically to annoy the h*ll out of you.

Actually, Teratornis is arguing a very narrow point about the costs of the SETI research. He/She does not seem to argue whether or not aliens exists/do not exists, nor does he/she seem to care all that much.

Personally, I don't know enough about SETI or its resarch to say whether or not it is worthwhile or worthless depending on whether it discovers an alien signal in one year or a hundred years.

But as I think has been said, if the technology is used for other relevant functions, then why not continue with it? Sure, the paltry sum of millions that goes to it maybe could go to Global Warming, but how much difference does that money make in the end to such a huge, expensive problem? If billions and billions and billions was being spent on SETI, that would be one thing. But I think in the grand scheme of things, the SETI research is spending pennies in comparison to the amount of money going towards the issues Teratornis thinks are important.

9. Stretching the Search for Signs of Life

Comment #79006 by Denevius on October 15, 2007 at 8:02 pm

Teratornis, those were some excellent points you raised. I'm neither a tech guy or a science guy, but if computers keep getting smaller, how do you know that an advanced civilization isn't using machines that we cannot detect, and that perhaps these machines have already swarmed our planet?

I know how the atheist loves to compare humans to complicated machines, but if biology can be reduced in such a way, then you never know what is capable; or how an advanced civlization may manipulate and "program" tiny living organisms to perform certain tasks that aliens may deem important, but that we'd think are so bizarre that we simply aren't looking in that direction. Yet.

The SETI telescopes may be looking for the wrong signals altogether. But that definitely shouldn't mean that we give up our search for life beyond the Earth, if only for the fact that along the way we might discover something besides alien life that's really useful to us.

10. New age therapies cause 'retreat from reason'

Comment #62353 by Denevius on August 9, 2007 at 11:20 am

I applaud the atheist when they challenge religion with reason. When this article talks about the dangers of "new age healing," the author makes some good points.

But I think attacking people like the "angel therapist" takes the atheist perspective too far. Yes, if you like, you can challenge the woman on whether angels exist. But I think that if the insannity plaguing the angel therapist enables her to help other people live more productive, happier lives, than what difference does it make if she wants to attribute her gift for gab to angels?

If she's giving bad advice,than she's giving bad advice, and she should be denounced for that. The article doesn't exactly say that's the case, however.

But if she's giving good advice based on a belief that angels are guiding her, than I think that trying to convince her that angels don't exist might make it more difficult for her to help others. And yes, reason would have won, but at what cost?