1. We Urgently Need Your Help Now!!

Comment #195533 by ShavenYak on June 18, 2008 at 12:19 pm

Seems about as useful as writing letters to Bush urging him to stop the war.

2. Group wants Wi-Fi banned from public buildings

Comment #186313 by ShavenYak on May 30, 2008 at 6:14 am

Whenever I'm forced to spend time with Republicans, I get nauseous. I'm sure I'm not alone. Would anyone like to join me in a class-action suit against the Republican Party?

3. Huge hidden biomass lives deep beneath the oceans

Comment #185163 by ShavenYak on May 27, 2008 at 6:07 am

Seems hard to believe that a single cell could be 111 mil. years old.

When you're talking about an organism that only reproduces by dividing itself in two, how do you define age? For that matter, in a certain way of thinking, every living cell on Earth has been alive since the dawn of life. They are all the result of an earlier cell dividing in two (or, in the case of sexual reproduction, two living cells uniting).

4. The Stupidity of Dignity

Comment #178981 by ShavenYak on May 12, 2008 at 10:37 am

The mention of "dignity" always reminds me of a discussion of natural family planning that happened in my Catholic high school. Of course, it was explained to us that one of the reasons the Church forbids mechanical contraceptives but allows NFP is that contraceptives undermine the dignity of the procreative act. The teacher had no answer when I asked how it was that putting a piece of latex on a penis was a greater indignity than examining the wife's cervical mucus before intercourse.

5. Gene map proves platypus is part bird, mammal and reptile

Comment #176955 by ShavenYak on May 8, 2008 at 11:37 am

Wait a second. Synapsids (mammals and "mammal-like reptiles") are supposed to have diverged from diapsids (reptiles and dinosaurs, including birds) during the Carboniferous, 300 mya. How could bird genes end up in a platypus whose lineage diverged from the other mammals only 165 mya?

Something tells me USA Today has, as usual, dumbed down the reporting too much.

6. Pope's Views on Science Invoke Spirited Debate

Comment #165317 by ShavenYak on April 21, 2008 at 10:31 am

...the pope suggested that techniques used in artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, and embryonic stem cell research have violated "the barrier that served to protect human dignity."

He proposed that using human beings as "mere biological material" at their most defenseless stage calls into question the very concept of humanity.

A guy who shelters child rapists from justice has no standing to talk about human dignity.
"Using human beings" "at their most defenseless stage" - the irony is so thick you can cut it with a knife.

7. Happy Birthday, Richard Dawkins!

Comment #149961 by ShavenYak on March 26, 2008 at 11:12 am

Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday to you
You evolved from* a monkey
And the rest of us did too!

Seriously, thanks for everything. I hope you hang around with us for at least 67 more. Should be a cinch if we can get the luddites to quit opposing stem cell research.

* - "shared a common ancestor with" didn't fit the rhythm, sorry.

8. How to abandon your God

Comment #139571 by ShavenYak on March 6, 2008 at 5:48 am

Former Catholic here, too. There seem to be quite a few former Catholic atheists/agnostics. I think growing up being taught that 'The Church' is the exclusive source of truth, and then finding out it's actually full of crap, leads us not to switch churches but to drop out entirely.

The pedophile priests have driven a bunch of us away, sure, but let's not forget the election of Pope Nazi, the conservative Catholics' treatment of John Kerry, the insane bloviations of Bill Donahue... the list goes on and on.

9. An Altar Beyond Olympus for a Deity Predating Zeus

Comment #122490 by ShavenYak on February 5, 2008 at 10:48 am

Well, Devo, I know Sherri Sheppard claimed that nothing predated Christians.

But she was wrong. Lions predated Christians. ;)

10. God vs. Gridiron

Comment #121773 by ShavenYak on February 4, 2008 at 5:59 am

One thing I haven't seen anyone mention is the fact that the game is broadcast over the airwaves which are legally the property of the American people. If they want to have control over how the game is shown, they need to make it pay-per-view and require viewers to agree to their licensing restrictions. As long as it's broadcast free to air, and no one is making copies or attempting to profit from showing the game, I don't see that the NFL has a legal leg on which to stand.

11. Scientists want rewrite of Earth's time line

Comment #117563 by ShavenYak on January 29, 2008 at 5:48 am

Opisthokont: Quick, name a place that Europeans "discovered" and colonized after 1492 that was not already inhabited by humans.

Ole: We already have an epoch that began 10,000 years ago, the Holocene. That's why I don't like this Anthropocene idea... it seems to me that the way the other epochs are defined, a span of 10,000 years or so can be simply the transition between two epochs. The changes taking place since the Industrial Revolution aren't qualitatively different from those that have taken place since the dawn of civilization, they're just happening faster. In a big picture view, if someone looked at the Earth's history from millions of years in the future, the entire existence of humanity thus far would be just a blip. The huge numbers of species that humans have wiped out in the past 10,000 years or so would appear to be gone as suddenly and mysteriously as the dinosaurs, if not more so. Certainly future paleontologists or geologists wouldn't recognize any great difference between the Holocene and Anthropocene, and I don't think we should draw an artifical difference just because we're closer to it. Now if they want to divide the Holocene into two or more sub-epochs based on the state of human civilization, sure. But that seems more the province of anthropologists and historians than geologists and paleontologists.

Azven: Isn't the word "you" gender neutral as it is? What's the need for "yo"?

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I can't believe I typed all that only to have Jonathan post exactly the same things by the time I hit Submit.

12. Heath Ledger Death: Baptist Group To Protest At Memorial

Comment #115619 by ShavenYak on January 24, 2008 at 12:15 pm

Something I just thought about...

Is there, in the Bible, any actual citation anyone can point out indicating that homosexuals go to hell? The act is called an "abmoination", and there are plenty of injunctions to put the participants to death. But the closest thing I can find to "fags go to hell" is I Corinthians 6:9-10:

Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God.

Even this doesn't say they're going to hell, just that they won't inherit the Kingdom of God, though I suppose if there are only the two choices....

Notice one other group of people who are doomed, though? Revilers. To revile is "to assail with abusive language". Now, who do we know that does THAT regularly?

But the next verse goes on to suggest that all these groups of ne'er-do-wells are still welcome if they are washed, sanctified, and "justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of God". So I think Phelps even fails at understanding his own Bible.

13. New journal to target education in evolution

Comment #103763 by ShavenYak on December 26, 2007 at 6:14 pm

Don_Quix,

Evolution denial is actually relatively common among medical doctors, at least compared to scientists in general. Somewhere around 20% of them believe God created humans in their present form. See this article on the Panda's Thumb for more details and analysis.

14. Borders Tags Atheist Book with 'O Come All Ye Faithless' Cards

Comment #100279 by ShavenYak on December 18, 2007 at 12:56 pm

Lemme get this straight.

A card, which, if you really really stretch, might be considered to be mocking Christmas, is given away to people who are buying a copy of a book which forthrightly and unmistakably calls the Christian faith a delusion. The Christians get upset about the CARD?

I suppose it's because the card is at their reading level, and the book is too far beyond it. Heck, most of them barely bother to read the book that they believe God himself wrote.

15. Pupil defends teacher in Muhammad teddy furore

Comment #91528 by ShavenYak on November 28, 2007 at 1:57 pm

Unreal.

The fucking "justice minister" prosecuting this woman is named Mohamed, for fuck's sake. It just doesn't get more ironic than that.

Sorry for the language, but... fuck.

16. Monotheism was a con from the beginning

Comment #91059 by ShavenYak on November 27, 2007 at 5:57 am

Good point, Rtambree.

Here's the thing though - even if our alleged "immoral theist" turns out not to actually believe the dogma they preach, they are still using it to excuse their behavior. It's still the dogma itself that promotes or allows their immorality. Just imagine if Theresa had been able to reject her faith instead of having to continue to pretend to believe - she might have been able to actually do some good instead of just providing places for people to die.

As long as the argument is that theism (or any other irrational dogmatic belief system) leads to immorality, and not that the theists themselves are inherently immoral, it's immune from the paradox.

17. Monotheism was a con from the beginning

Comment #91058 by ShavenYak on November 27, 2007 at 5:57 am

Good point, Rtambree.

Here's the thing though - even if our alleged "immoral theist" turns out not to actually believe the dogma they preach, they are still using it to excuse their behavior. It's still the dogma itself that promotes or allows their immorality. Just imagine if Theresa had been able to reject her faith instead of having to continue to pretend to believe - she might have been able to actually do some good instead of just providing places for people to die.

As long as the argument is that theism (or any other irrational dogmatic belief system) leads to immorality, and not that the theists themselves are inherently immoral, it's immune from the paradox.

18. Monotheism was a con from the beginning

Comment #91057 by ShavenYak on November 27, 2007 at 5:57 am

Good point, Rtambree.

Here's the thing though - even if our alleged "immoral theist" turns out not to actually believe the dogma they preach, they are still using it to excuse their behavior. It's still the dogma itself that promotes or allows their immorality. Just imagine if Theresa had been able to reject her faith instead of having to continue to pretend to believe - she might have been able to actually do some good instead of just providing places for people to die.

As long as the argument is that theism (or any other irrational dogmatic belief system) leads to immorality, and not that the theists themselves are inherently immoral, it's immune from the paradox.

19. Monotheism was a con from the beginning

Comment #91054 by ShavenYak on November 27, 2007 at 5:51 am

Good point, Rtambree.

Without religion, you'd have good people being good and bad people being bad - but to get good people to do evil, that takes religion. Okay, it's a cliche - but it's also (sort of) the answer to the dilemmna.

Whether Mother Theresa actually believed the dogma she espoused is irrelevant. The fact is that she lived by its rules, and it was the overriding reason why she behaved as she did. If she had never been exposed to religion, or if she had felt free to reject it, perhaps she would have done things differently.

Hitchens' argument shouldn't be that theists are immoral - it should be that theism (or any form of irrational dogmatic belief system) promotes immorality. This argument can't be countered by claiming that the alleged immoral theists don't really believe. It's still the belief system and the things it is allowed to excuse that are the problem.