1. My Argument With God

Comment #131755 by dialector on February 23, 2008 at 6:26 am

Article said: 10% of Americans are atheists, .2% of prisoners are atheists.

This statistic is questionable. There are more atheists in prison than that. In prison, if you want to optimize your chance of getting paroled early, you better pretend to be a Christian. All prisoners know this. I would retract this statement if all the prisoners were interviewed once they got out of prison and the numbers remained the same.

2. Dumb and Dumber: Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?

Comment #127876 by dialector on February 15, 2008 at 5:09 pm

“So, in governing, the wise (rulers)
Empty the mind
But fill the stomach,
Weaken ambition
But strengthen the bones,
Keep things free of
Desire and learning,
So the clever take no action.� - Tao Te Ching

In the US the people are being crushed by this ancient principle. I live here and know far too many people who are more interested in their over abundant entertainment distractions than in the real issues of the day. We have been too focused on our material prosperity and now the time is coming for us to pay the piper.

3. Loneliness Breeds Belief in Supernatural

Comment #116239 by dialector on January 26, 2008 at 12:11 am

I imagine that if secularists (including atheist, humanists, etc) were to spend all their energy in solving problems of lonliness, they would become 10 times the terror to religion they they are when they are simply debating the mundane topic of the existence of God. A secular solution to lonliness would destroy most of the base of religion in the human heart. God is actually irrelivent to the human condition. So much energy is wasted blathering about God. If secularists always demanded that the true depth of the sensitivity of the human condition be made a priority, then religion would fall like lightning from the sky (metaphorical reference to lucifer). The best argument we can have against the existence of the Gods of the religions is to stop talking about them. Refocus society's attention on the humanity. Meet the religious talk of God with the secular talk of humanity. Raise humanity to the status of respect normally reserved for Gods and we will solve most of the problems in the world.

4. Violence fear over Islam film

Comment #115416 by dialector on January 24, 2008 at 7:07 am

Sorry to be pedantic, but this attribution of all kinds of views to atheists is a hobby horse of mine.

There are plenty of atheists who don't believe in God, but do believe in the supernatural.

I think you may mean "rationalist" instead...."

5. Three Little Pigs 'too offensive'

Comment #115402 by dialector on January 24, 2008 at 6:49 am

about Comment #115286 by Goldy
In reference to the UK native culture being destroyed Goldy said:

"I think the US will be Spanish speaking long before Sharia is even considered for the UK."

Its different in the US. Europe has buildings a lot older than our country. The native population here was already slaughtered through genocide. Our current culture is a hodge-podge of all kinds of different people. We don't really have much in terms of native identity. So, ¡Bienvenidos, mis hermanos que hablan español!

6. Three Little Pigs 'too offensive'

Comment #115255 by dialector on January 23, 2008 at 7:58 pm

Wow. I am simply amazed by this. The three little pigs is a completely innocent 18th century fairytale based on an even older story. Im sure this new adaptation is just as innocuous. Oh, sorry Muslims, you don't like pigs? Then we will throw our whole civilization in the trash just for you. In the US such cultural groveling would be unimaginable. I know this sounds paranoid, but England seriously needs to start limiting Muslim immigration and consider exporting Muslims who are non-citizens back to wherever they came from. I know that sounds terrible, but if your government is just going to get down on their knees and start worshiping your new Muslim overloads, then your native civilization is doomed. At this rate Sharia law in England is inevitable. Good luck.

7. Violence fear over Islam film

Comment #114934 by dialector on January 23, 2008 at 7:52 am

about Comment #113905 by Roland_F
"Sorry wrong atheist view:"

Don't you really mean "Sorry, wrong Islamic view"?
Why should I bow to religious ignornace. Why should people with a more rational world view stoop to mimic religious ignorance? If a muslim does not know the real value of a book, then that is his problem.

Atheists do not impute sacred meaning to inanimate objects. Only religious people do that. It is the hight of folly to value wood pulp as much as or even over meaning.

By responding in kind of twisted respect that is held towards the Koran, we ligitimate their broken world view. Lets hold them to a higher standard.

So I would say that as far as atheist/humanist/secular views go, my view of the Koran is superior to the muslim view of the Koran. I don't care if it dissagrees with the Muslims views. In fact, I must be doing something right if there is dissagreement.

8. Islam in Europe

Comment #114694 by dialector on January 22, 2008 at 3:06 pm

The Muslims are amazingly bold in Europe. Here in the US we have the opposite problem. If they get too much of a public voice they have to worry about their saftey. So they are very quiet. It is overwhelminly oppressive for them here. I like not having to worry about the imminent outbreak of sharia law. But on the other hand there places in the US where the local governments are practically a Christian theocracy.

9. Mandrake: Charles's letter in support of Islamic 'fundamentalism'

Comment #113690 by dialector on January 20, 2008 at 10:39 am

"proper fundamentalism"

I am not sure if the word "fundamentalist" is contaminated beyond the phrase "religiously conservative" in terms of being prone to the negatives of religion. But I can say that it is possible to have very conservative religious people who are very positive in their relations to the world. I live near an Amish population in the US who are very conservative religiously (by todays standards). They are some of the most peaceful and respectful people I have ever met. I trust them to be decent people more than I would trust the average secular person. Perhaps they are the exeption that proves the rule.

10. Violence fear over Islam film

Comment #113677 by dialector on January 20, 2008 at 10:23 am

"who has threatened to broadcast images of the Koran being torn up and otherwise desecrated."

This is just peevish, infantile stupidity. You do not desecrate a religious book by tearing it up. That is desecrating wood pulp. A book is not the pages it is printed on, it is the meaning of the words on the pages. You desecrate a religious book by exposing it to the light of reason. And at that point you are not really desecrating a religious book, you are helping a religious people to be free of ignorance.

11. Britain cannot put its faith in religiously divided schools

Comment #113666 by dialector on January 20, 2008 at 10:12 am

"All religious faiths, without exception, are self-selecting minorities. They represent groups of people who have chosen certain beliefs."

This is not true. A great many people are born into a religion, and choice has little to do with it. Christianity has little interest in their subjects choosing anything. That is why the perjorative term "heretic" is used. It comes from a greek term "hairesis" meaning "the act of choosing".

If religious belief was truly an act of thoughtful choice, there would be much less religious people in the world. Or religion would be much different.

12. Pope's exorcist squads will wage war on Satan

Comment #104815 by dialector on December 29, 2007 at 2:09 pm

Here is a comparison pics between the Pope and the star wars emperor:

http://www.ptank.com/catsynth/images/palp.jpg

13. Survey finds most Americans believe Jesus born of virgin

Comment #102325 by dialector on December 22, 2007 at 11:03 am

I think the survey is bogus. You can make people answer however you want if you ask the question in the right way.

The Barna Group is a pro Christian organization. Of course their published surveys are going to support their cause.

I live in America and I don't know who those people are asking, but I do not know any atheists or agnostics who believe in the virgin birth of Jesus.

In a word, the survey is a lie.

14. Religious Freedom in Military Questioned

Comment #100935 by dialector on December 19, 2007 at 5:00 pm

I guess if you really integrated "Christian" values into the military it would have to become a pacifist organization. You know, "Love your neighbor as yourself", "Love your enemies" and all that non-violent stuff that Jesus supposedly taught. But then all the churches were never really all that much into Jesus.

15. What are your qualifications to question religion anyway? Just who are you?

Comment #98935 by dialector on December 15, 2007 at 12:06 am

My qualifications? I have studied Christian theology and the bilical text a 1000 times more than the average Christian. I have read the bible in Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic and latin. I can run circles around the average PhD in theology. But what are my qualifications to ask a question???

The only qualification that any human being needs to ask a question is ignorance. Anyone who insists that one must have "qualifications" to ask a question is horrendously deluded. If something does not make sense to me, I am going to question it. The very idea that we need to be qualified to ask a question is the stupidest thing I have ever heard.

16. World History

Comment #97992 by dialector on December 13, 2007 at 1:03 am

Quote: "The usual tactic is to note that Joseph Stalin was an atheist and thus insinuate that atheism leads to mass killing because there is no morality to it."

Joseph Stalin was very much influenced by Christianity and attended an orthodox theological seminary in Tiflis. His highly liturgical style of ruthless personality cult dictatorship, with its deadly categorical assertions was no accident. It was a product of a period of close association with Christianity, wherein he drew forth some of his most vile corruption.

The very idea that one could blame Stalin's violence on atheism is ridiculous.

17. Keith Olbermann talks about the Romney 'Religion' Speech

Comment #95623 by dialector on December 8, 2007 at 8:18 pm

AdrianB on December 8, 2007 at 12:20 pm

"What a nice scary country the US is evolving into. I really do feel for the sensible minority there. Thank FSM there are people like these two talking heads, and the fact that the sensible minority still adds up to a lot of people."

The word is "Devolve". The US has actually already "evolved" beyond that kind of thinking. If you go back to the 1950's the average sensibility on religion and state would have been worse than Romney's. By the 1980's you were thought to be insane to be a conservative religious person. By the 1990's religious people in the US used to be shy (relative to now) about stating their perspectives in public because they knew they would be precieved to be a fruitcake.

The US has been MUCH more religious in its past. Thinking like Romney's represent a regression to a less evolved state that has already been surpassed.

18. Why debate dogma?

Comment #92684 by dialector on December 1, 2007 at 8:13 am

Pat is doing a service for all those people who want too build bridges of dialogue and reach out to the religious. By showing the religious that there are people who can easily dismiss them in a most effective way, they (the religious) become all the more open to those who want to dialogue. All you atheists who think Pat's style is to harsh and doing damage, should actually thank him for making your modality of discourse easier and more effective. The idea that this or that mode of relating is entirely right or wrong is a logical mistake. The complexity of humanity demands different styles. And those styles are not mutually incompatible.

19. Study: Babies can tell helpful, hurtful playmates

Comment #90038 by dialector on November 22, 2007 at 1:18 pm

Here is a link to a video of the experiement.
http://www.youtube.com:80/watch?v=jgxMbx6RP0E

20. Romney's Mormonism is fair game

Comment #89419 by dialector on November 20, 2007 at 4:24 pm

If only we had as much historical evidence on the origins of Christianity as we have on mormonism.

21. Secular Fundamentalists: There is no such thing...and the AAI conference doesn't make atheism a movement, either.

Comment #88750 by dialector on November 18, 2007 at 10:14 pm

Russel, your post was a thoughtful one.

I know that the religiously specific connotations of the word fundamentalist are clear and with significant historical basis. However, just because the history of religious domination has a tendency to artificially restrict the semantic range of some of the words we use, does not make that restriction appropriate. The dictionary definitions of the term do include a wider range of usage that is completely independent of religion. And I do not believe that the religious should be allowed to own so many words as they seem to own.

This is an interesting comment:
"There is no one whose mere secularism locks her into a body of supposedly inerrant doctrine that he or she will believe dogmatically in the face of whatever is discovered by reason."

Are there no irrational secular or atheist people? Does irrational attachment need to have a body of inerrant, or otherwise sacred doctrine (like a bible or an Ann Rand?)

I do not believe that an explicit definition of principle is needed to articulate a concept of fundamentalist attachment. Anyone can have an irrational attachment to any idea, belief or world view. This phenomenon goes way beyond the subject of religion. You are just used to hearing the word in a religious context.

I'm sure there is at least one person in the world who is secular and very fundamentalist about her attachment to her world view. I would have simply pointed out that the label had a stereotyping quality that does not do justice to the diversity of secular humanity. Deciding that the label is an oxymoron is an arbitrary choice based on restricting the meaning of a term to only part of its semantic range.

22. Secular Fundamentalists: There is no such thing...and the AAI conference doesn't make atheism a movement, either.

Comment #88732 by dialector on November 18, 2007 at 5:50 pm

"The title alone is an oxymoron—would Mr. Dougherty mind explaining the fundamentals of secularism before he starts labeling us as adherents to them?"

The above is based on a fallacy. Words are so often misused and abused. Secular folks don't mind using the word "funamentalist" to describe overly zealous adherents to religious faith. Yet, in the Christian example, there are so many sects with so much diversity in belief that it is easy to find two conservative (fundamentalist?) christians who believe very different things. This raises the issue that fundamentalism has less to do with a common standard of world view than it does with attachement to the particulars of your own beliefs, no matter what they are. The semantic range of words used in association to religion are almost always larger than religion can contain. But we allow religion to dominate our use of language. That power needs to be taken away from them. Any person who is excessively attached to the particulars of their world view can legitimately be described as a "fundamentalist". The word fundamentalist is an adjective derived from the noun fundamentalism. This means "strict adherence to any set of basic ideas or principles". (from a dictionary) So any person, religious or secular, can be a fundamentalist with out creating an oxymoron. And this does not require that common standards be defined. The very idea of "Secular Fundamentalist" being an oxymoron is just semantic bluster.

23. Fox News Discussion on 'The Golden Compass'

Comment #85774 by dialector on November 7, 2007 at 4:34 am

Annie Laurie Gaylor was not prepared for an appearance on Fox news. Any atheist should know ahead of time that it is going to be a hit job. She was relatively slow in forming her words (a big no-no when you are being cut short on time already). She was also not able to make the sharpest comebacks. No surprise at the outcome.

24. The Turning of an Atheist

Comment #85160 by dialector on November 5, 2007 at 7:24 am

Here is an interview with Flew on the topic

http://www.biola.edu/antonyflew/flew-interview.pdf

25. A House Divided: Hitch at Georgetown

Comment #84749 by dialector on November 3, 2007 at 12:31 pm

"Given that the forces of darkness have always enjoyed a sufficiency of brilliant apologists like Bertrand Russell, Steven J. Gould, Carl Sagan and Gore Vidal,"

????

I am always dissapointed to hear the forces of rationality and humanistic enlightenment being portrayed as the "forces of darkness", or whatever other glip pseudo-evil designation, even when it comes by the voice of a friendly observer with tongue placed firmly in cheek. Are not the advocates of human thoughtfulness and rationality a force of light? Or does the church really have a patent on all things righteous and bright?

26. Was religion beneficial to the development of society? Is it now?

Comment #82046 by dialector on October 25, 2007 at 3:31 pm

Was religion beneficial to the development of society? Is it now?

Was beneficial? This is a poorly formed question. It is like asking, "Was being an embryo beneficial to the development of a human being? Embryos are good things in their capacity as embryos, but nobody wants to stay that way.

27. Crisis of faith in first secular school

Comment #72916 by dialector on September 23, 2007 at 1:58 pm

On the need for religious instruction in public schools:

"Secular schools can never be tolerated because such schools have no religious instruction, and a general moral instruction without a religious foundation is built on air; consequently, all character training and religion must be derived from faith ... we need believing people."
~ Adolf Hitler

28. Poll: Are Dawkins and Hitchens good for humanism?

Comment #72739 by dialector on September 22, 2007 at 3:00 pm

1. Comment #72707 by CDG1 "Thats like asking if TRUTH is good to advance the cause of Humanism...Duh."

We should be reluctant to make such an association. It is nothing like asking about truth. Reducing "TRUTH" to a person real or imagined, even in the soft form you stated it, is something best left for the religiously inclined. Lets spare Dawkins and Hitchins the ignoble honor of being "truth."

29. CNN Request for 'I-Reports' on religion

Comment #69000 by dialector on September 9, 2007 at 12:49 pm

I graduated from a Christian seminary with a Master of Divinity degree, but today I do not believe that Jesus is who the church said he was. Yet, my faith is stronger than ever. Jesus taught that the heart of faith is in love not doctrine. What you believe means much less than how you love. Faith has to do with the strength of your heart and mind to face the ambiguities and dangers of life without sacrificing your capacity for kindness. There is more true faith in loving-kindness than in all of the rituals, sacraments and theology in history. I have a meaningful, rich and abundant faith without religion.

30. We need a more intelligent religion debate

Comment #68756 by dialector on September 8, 2007 at 12:54 pm

It is true that the conversaion on god and religion is not as clear and intelligent as it should be. Both theists and athiests are not engaged in a real conversations about these issues, they are engaged in a political war over who will have more control over society. Much of the conversation about religion is just a sideshow to that war.

The fact is that the idea of god (in abstract - apart from any specific mythic representation of said idea) is a non-falsifiable proposition. As such science has nothing to say about it. Period.

On the other hand science does have much to say about what is and is not healthy in religion. God may be a scientifically inaccessible idea but human beings are not.

If the theists' devotion to their gods always translated into dignified, healthy, noble, altruistic and helpful human behaviors, the athiests still might smirk at the idea of god but it would be a much more light hearted smirk. They would probably actually like religion for all the good it did. In that case there would be no intense debate about god because there would be no war over who controls society.

I have lost the ability to track the amount of useless gibberish that is flows out of people's mouth on both sides of the argument.