1. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #208590 by phaseshift on July 11, 2008 at 4:04 am

I'm at a university in Switzerland, and I just sent a paper letter with the official university letterhead. Hope it helps!

Dear President Bruininks,


It was with great astonishment and dismay that I read about the affair Mr. Bill Donohue and others have gotten Dr. P.Z. Meyers - and by association, your university - into, over the "kidnapping" of a Eucharist wafer.

Many of us in Switzerland and the rest of the secular world are watching such stories develop, and hoping fervently that the people in positions of authority will react swiftly and appropriately. While it is clear that such a situation is an unpleasant one for any institution - much less a respected university - it is one that needs to be handled all the more firmly given the very nature of such a place of learning.

I urge you to take a strong and immediate stance against the "hate campaign" launched against Dr. Meyers. Such a case serves as test of the integrity of the university, and an indicator of the health of democracy in America at large. We in the rest of the world would like to see the Good and the Rational prevail. When fear and ignorance begin to control our ability to practice free thought, it is surely the prelude to the destruction of democracy. Even an "absurd" case as this can cause a crack in the wall, and hasten the downfall of reason. Your clear and rational reaction to this latest "test" is critical....!


Yours Sincerely, (real name)

2. The Science of Religion and the Religion of Science

Comment #202188 by phaseshift on July 1, 2008 at 2:37 am

Abhishek: you ask about the case where a child would choose to call itself a muslim/catholic, etc. Well, I think the question is best answered with another question: what if a child decided it was ready to vote? Or to have sex? I think you get the point. There's a reason that kids have restricted rights until a certain age: they can't be assumed to have enough information and experience to make complex judgements.

Sure - many adults don't either, but we can all agree that they SHOULD be in a better position to make good decisions! Even if education is lacking, at least all adults have had more time to collect life experiences and to figure out who they are and what they want. A child who hasn't had the time to do the same can't be expected to be fully responsible for its claims.

In the case of a child who would claim to be muslim, etc. it's clear that it's simply associating itself with its parents or peers, not really deciding for itself that that's what it believes. Again - many kids grow up without questioning their early beliefs, but at least they should have had the chance to - and kids haven't yet.

3. Richard Dawkins on The Alan Colmes Show

Comment #144945 by phaseshift on March 17, 2008 at 4:42 am

Crikes, a lot of you seem to think this interview was a blast, went well, etc. It doesn't give me a good feeling personally to hear how idiotic and stubborn a few of these callers were. It's frustrating at best, scary at worst. It reinforces the impression that many people simply will never understand how to reason, and even more - their emotional reactions scare me a bit. If I were Richard I'd be a bit freaked out. I hope he makes it through many more years of these sorts of interviews without some freak shooting him down or whatever.

That said, kudos to him and others for bringing the topic into the public arena in a positive way.

4. Are Darwin's Theories Fact or Faith Issues?

Comment #122256 by phaseshift on February 5, 2008 at 2:42 am

AAAAAHHHH! Yikes, what a frustrating display of inanity. Poor PZ...in the little time that he has, he's forced to spend most of his time correcting the good "doctor's" claims instead of talking about what he knows.
It's like being invited to talk about calculus, and instead being forced to repeatedly refute your opponent's insistent claim that 2 plus 3 equals 6.

Cheers to you, PZ

5. Daniel Dennett Debates Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #93515 by phaseshift on December 3, 2007 at 10:31 am

briancoughlanworldcitizen: again, I have to disagree...I don't think Dan was floundering at all. I thought he gave answers that were to the point, and he even commented on most of Dinesh's most nonsensical points as they came along.

6. Daniel Dennett Debates Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #93514 by phaseshift on December 3, 2007 at 10:24 am

Lagomort: what do you mean - Dennett certainly did NOT suck! I saw the whole thing and I think Dennett was perfectly reasonable and (given the time constraints) quite complete in his responses.

Dinesh's voice was bordering on hysterical in his tone, compared to, say, his debate with Shermer. Maybe that's because Dennet's arguments are so much more complete and "sensible" sounding...!

7. A new website addition: Debate Points

Comment #81777 by phaseshift on October 25, 2007 at 7:00 am

Another debate point: Why should we CARE if others want to believe? Why are we getting so worked up? Or, as D'Souza so bluntly put it, "I don't believe in fairies but I don't go writing a book about it!"

The answer is, of course, that we rightly feel increasingly attacked via the dumbing down of television with silly pseudoscience, the prevention of stem cell research, the attempt to introduce ID into schools, Islamic terrorism...
So we're so passionate at the moment because we feel rationalism is under attack...AND because we care about the truth, as Richard so often says.

8. A new website addition: Debate Points

Comment #81774 by phaseshift on October 25, 2007 at 6:53 am

AN IMPORTANT DEBATE POINT THAT'S MISSING: What about the moderates? After all, most types we're likely to encounter (and that includes people we love!) are perfectly reasonable, likeable people.

Debate point: SURELY the average gentle believer has nothing to answer for, right?

9. War in Heaven: Hitchens Meets D'Souza on Home Turf

Comment #81133 by phaseshift on October 24, 2007 at 8:09 am

Guys, for those who haven't seen it yet: the debate between D'Souza and Hitchens is finally up here:
http://www.tkc.edu/debate/

It's quite a relief to see that Hitchens is up to D'Souza's level as faras debating skills go. It's much more fun to watch than the debate with Shermer. D'Souza remains frustrating but Hitchens isn't fazed the way Shermer was.

Cool stuff!

10. Debate between Michael Shermer and Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #80851 by phaseshift on October 23, 2007 at 7:41 am

Last Man In Europe: I would put it this way concerning the Hitler et al question:
Religion contains *instructions*, it has *content* - whereas atheism doesn't, by definition. Atheism is not an ideology with content, with a book on how to NOT believe in God. Therefore it's easy to see that NOT believing in God cannot be used to rationally justify violence, since something with no content can't "lead" to any conclusions.

In other words, Hitler and Stalin's ideology was just that - their OWN ideology (Sam Harris would talk about dogmatism), but not atheism. They may have raved about atheism, but the point is it can't be said to have been the CAUSE of their madness, since it has no content(!) There's nothing *in* atheism that could lead any rational person - even a crazy one - to become a mass killer.

In the similar way I could CLAIM that my non-belief in fairies caused me to go into a school and kill 20 people, but I would be WRONG, because it simply doesn't follow. Any good psychiatrist would see that fairies have nothing to do with it: I would simply be crazy.

I repeat again: IF Hitler and Stalin truly claimed that their atheism played a *causal* role in their worldview, they were simply mistaken.

To me that's the argument that needs to be made in rebuttal, at least the crux of it.

11. Debate between Michael Shermer and Dinesh D'Souza

Comment #80825 by phaseshift on October 23, 2007 at 6:13 am

Ouch. I sympathize with Shermer because he reminds me of myself: his (and my) problem is that we can't think quite fast enough to come up with the bombshell-retorts that are required when debating someone like D'Souza. Not everyone can process information so fast - which says nothing about the quality of the results! Some of us are simply more thoughtful; we don't know the answers as soon as we've heard the question. Of course Shermer is correct, but as people said - not the best debater. I wonder what a written debate would have looked like.