1. Groundbreaking Research Has Scientists Talking With Apes

Comment #46567 by Makido on May 31, 2007 at 4:45 pm

What's interesting from the video, and I haven't read any of the relevant literature, is the tone with which the news anchor pronounces key words. He emphasizes them, makes them distinct from the rest of the sentence. "Can you touch.. ICE?.. ICE?.. ICE?" That alone made me pretty skeptical of this. What they should do is A) emphasize all of the words in the sentence B) emphasize no words in the sentence and then C) emphasize random words in the sentence, making sure all of the words are equally spaced. I'm willing to bet the chimp wouldn't be able to pick out relevant keywords unless they were emphasized. There's also the possibility that the chimp is reading lips, which wasn't mentioned.

2. Christopher Hitchens Explains It All for You: Move over, Sam Harris; another atheist wants the pulpit

Comment #41467 by Makido on May 16, 2007 at 6:48 am

@jonecc

Exactly. They apportion less controversy to doubt over whether a virgin gave birth than to doubt over the authority of authors whose origins are questionable, motives are even more questionable, and claims seem just made up.

Doubting that a widely-esteemed 2000-year-gone thinker wasn't crazy or lying makes you irrational, apparently.

*rolls eyes*

3. Christopher Hitchens Explains It All for You: Move over, Sam Harris; another atheist wants the pulpit

Comment #41462 by Makido on May 16, 2007 at 6:42 am

"Christopher Hitchens is wrong. Intellect by itself cannot save us."

I'm at a loss as to why he put these sentences last. It's as if he's trying to convince us he didn't assume them first, and then derive his whole argument from there. Clever fellow.

4. Better God-fearing than sneering

Comment #38771 by Makido on May 9, 2007 at 6:55 am

"...so they no longer believe that a man should stone his wife to death if she is not a virgin."

Here's the problem with the "New Covenant" argument. It insinuates that at one time it was absolutely moral to stone your wife to death if she wasn't a virgin.

Sorry, but it's never right to stone your wife to death. Ever. Covenant or no covenant. Virgin or no virgin. Unless your wife is trying to kill you, and a stone is all you have to defend yourself, I would say, no, that's pretty barbaric.

5. Hey Mom, I'm an Atheist

Comment #31004 by Makido on April 10, 2007 at 3:12 pm

All of my siblings, including me, are atheists. Our parents are Catholic, but could care less.

I guess I'm relatively lucky.

6. The God Delusion

Comment #21887 by Makido on February 11, 2007 at 12:57 pm

I don't buy for a minute this argument that religion or theology are much more sophisticated and subtle than Dawkins or anyone gives them credit for. Philosophers discuss the possibility of the existence of a 'god' entity. Theologians presuppose the existence of a 'god' entity. One is founded on a notion of possibility, and one is not. If the assumption of theologians is flawed, then anything they derive from that assumption is necessarily flawed as well. It really is as simple as that. No matter the prose or clever arguments, it's a question of the fundamental validity of the underlying assumption. But theologians do not want to argue about that assumption, they want to argue about their creative, pseudo-logical meanderings about god. Just because Dawkins' or Dennett's works lack such meanderings doesn't make them implicitly less sophisticated. Indeed, it makes them all the more clear.

7. A Christmas thunderbolt for the arch-enemy of religion

Comment #14996 by Makido on December 28, 2006 at 1:27 am

@Binx Bolling

"Intellectual hubris, the presumption that one has vanquished all of one's opponents by sheer force of reason, should be a warning sign."

On the other hand, presuming that any idea, however absurd, is equally intellectual is naive and dangerous. Is it hubris to say, "I have evidence, you do not"? Hardly. All monotheistic religions are revelatory, meaning we have to believe whoever said the things about the religion. But since when have human beings exactly been the most trustworthy of people, especially since people who see visions are likely insane (according to present assumption) or otherwise damaged in the noggin? Name a single instance of RD or any rational atheist claiming to have the absolute truth, as religion does so overtly. The very fact that there's so much disagreement here stresses how wrong you are. As Dawkins quotes rather regularly, "Organizing atheists is like herding cats." Your assumption that people are simply falling in line with RD assumes that the population of commentors on this site comprises the majority of atheists and disbelievers. You make this assumption because it suits your argument. Don't call the kettle black, Mr. Pot; tell me which authors you read who agree exactly with you! Does that make you a fundamentalist agnostic (or whatever you are)? Certainly not. The reason you read and, I assume, agree with such authors is that you find their points convincing. It likely has nothing to do with who they are, what they've done, etcetera. You're trying to establish the RD personality/hero cult, and you don't even like the guy.

RD has no more intellectual hubris than any person convinced of their ideas, including you.

8. A Christmas thunderbolt for the arch-enemy of religion

Comment #14994 by Makido on December 28, 2006 at 1:07 am

@John Phillip

"However, even assuming that any atheist, RD included, know nothing about theology, why is it necessary to know anything about it to dismiss the existence of a god based purely on the evidence, or rather lack of, presented so far."

What's totally mystifying is how anyone can use "Dawkins knows nothing about theology" as an argument. It's like criticizing someone for saying Sauron is fictional just because they've only ever read, and not studied, the Lord of the Rings or Tolkien's other works. Theology is the study of "god", but it might as well be the study of leprechauns. You can't claim leprechauns don't exist until you read all of the mythology on leprechauns?

9. Talk in Class Turns to God, Setting Off Public Debate on Rights

Comment #13831 by Makido on December 19, 2006 at 3:29 pm

@madpatriot

I completely agree with you. I went to a private Catholic high school (albeit in the Washington D.C. area) and only in religion class did instructors become raving buffoons. All the other classes kept strictly to their subjects (except, of course, that we had to pray at the beginning of each class; after that, though, not a single mention of god). In fact, we had a chemistry teacher who was Iranian (and Muslim), and several Muslim and Hindu students. Now, obviously this isn't the norm (nor do I suspect your school was, either), but nonetheless my school (despite being parochial) did allow a lot of intellectual freedom, probably (as you mentioned) a lot more than most public schools. I really suspect that a lot of my teachers weren't really Christian, just from talking to them. It's the whole "belief in belief" thing.