1. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #209131 by ItAintNecessarilySo on July 11, 2008 at 3:56 pm

Comment #209059 by JEdward

someone invites you into their house and asks you to take your shoes off. It is a basic level of courtesy to comply.

I agree James that civility requires (some) compliance with others customs. But there is an element of 'sacred' rituals, that the soccer game analogy, this analogy, and I believe any comparison to the secular world cannot capture. And that is: disrespect of the sacred deserves punishment without end.

If someone believes that anyone who takes communion unworthily deserves eternal punishment (and 1 Corinthians 11:29 tends to lead people to that conclusion: "For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily, eateth and drinketh damnation to himself, not discerning the Lord's body."), then what could any human do to a such a blasphemer that would come close to what they really deserve?

2. PLEASE WRITE IN SUPPORT OF PZ MYERS

Comment #209032 by ItAintNecessarilySo on July 11, 2008 at 2:13 pm

Comment #209018 by JEdward

Thank you for posting James. I was also a bit shocked by the crudity of PZ's response. But I think religious intimidation must be fought on all fronts and there is no code of decorum that all unbelievers must be beholden to.

Here is the letter I will mail:

Is Catholocism an intimidation racket? Once again?

Dear Mr. Bruininks,

I grew up going to church. We often played a game where we pretended to eat Jesus. This act, was made out to be SO sacred that to partake without being in the right frame, risked punishment that would never be stopped. There were numerous times as a child when I was terrified that I might have participated in this rite, while not quite right with God. After all, one could never be sure...

Like Islam, Christianity has been used to beat people into submission, with both real and imagined harm. PZ Meyers, and others, are finally giving us hope of putting an end to this abuse, by not buying into the charade that EVERYONE must treat with respect what one group holds as sacred. Members of a religion have no right to force everyone else to respect their beliefs.

Ayaan Hirshi Ali and others must live in hiding, with constant security protection, because the view has been fostered (and tolerated) that we have the right to retaliate against someone who has offended our views. This bullying behavior must be recognized and opposed regardless of what group it comes from.

You, Mr. Bruininks, have the chance to play a part in turning this tide, by supporting our right to express what we think, including what we think about other people's religious beliefs.

Respectfully (but not toadyly),

Greg
Chicago IL

3. Hints of 'time before Big Bang'

Comment #189537 by ItAintNecessarilySo on June 6, 2008 at 12:40 pm

Paul Steinhardt and Neil Turok have proposed a model of the universe in which the Big Bang was not the beginning of time, but the beginning of another expansion in a cycle of expansions and contractions.

Their theory fits the current cosmological data we have, including the WMAP, as well as the Big Bang model, but is much less of a patchwork (the BB model has had to be modified many times as new information has come in and some of it's assumptions seem uncomfortably close to magic).

I happened to hear Steinhardt give a lecture two days ago at Fermi lab on their idea and he said we are on the cusp of getting results that could decide between the two models.

Their book "Endless Universe" is a fascinating read and gives a thrilling view behind the scenes of physics in action, including gatherings where they were racing with Stephen Hawking to be the first with results.

http://www.actionbioscience.org/newfrontiers/steinhardt.html