1. Degrees of religion

Comment #205994 by LaTomate on July 8, 2008 at 2:34 am

I thought the article was ok all round, except for the last phrase:

It may not be a highly insightful or revolutionary philosophy but if a few more of us believed it, there would be far less pain, conflict and terror not only in the city of London but all throughout the western world.

Sounds like a threat (as usual). As usual what they want is respect (no criticism). No books, no drawings, just act like nothing's happening when they painfully circumcise their women (which are also our sisters, since they are British), insult our homosexual brothers and sisters, fight for the ruin of our values and our education system, force our sisters to wear tents, etc...

I have no problem with the author, who seems like a decent person (my parents who are Muslims are decent people too).

I have no intent on "insulting" her personally by any means. But people like her ought to stop acting as a shield for those who deserve criticism and insult, and join us in fighting them.

In most countries in the Muslim World she would not have the right to write whatever went through her mind (and I know, I spent 17 years there), and many of those extremists wish it were the same here - and here she is supporting their claims.

With or without the support of those like her, free speech is one of the rights our forebears have fought and died for and we should not give it up just because some people feel "insulted". If their belief is incapable of taking criticism and requires a judicial prop to survive then it is weak and insignificant.

2. Crack annoyance squad wanted

Comment #203583 by LaTomate on July 3, 2008 at 7:49 am

To get a look at what these people do, just search youtube (or just click here for your convenience).

The evangelicals one is quite amazing :)

3. Muslims outraged at police advert featuring cute puppy sitting in policeman's hat

Comment #203089 by LaTomate on July 2, 2008 at 11:09 am

What a load of cock.

I live in Dundee, too.

:/

4. Richard Dawkins on Doctor Who

Comment #201017 by LaTomate on June 28, 2008 at 7:07 pm

I saw the episode, and was pleasantly surprised!! I wasn't expecting to see the professor on there.

Nice one :)

5. God hates Mars

Comment #199403 by LaTomate on June 25, 2008 at 5:38 pm

From the original article:

I am not calling for socialism, but helping people in real need is money better spent. I would rather give people in Africa fresh water, than find fresh water on a desolate planet that offers us nothing in return but wasted time, resources, and money.

Oh but people like him never selflessly give anything to Africans or anyone else for that matter. When they give anything it's in the hope of enticing people to convert to their stupidity.

6. Richard Dawkins Public Lecture - Liverpool 08

Comment #197825 by LaTomate on June 22, 2008 at 6:00 pm

Hmmm, true it IS a different lecture. Watching...

HourglassMemory: I agree. I have loads to say about this, but I just wanted to share the vid (I don't know how to submit new articles and videos to be posted here). I did not want to hijack the thread :)

7. Richard Dawkins Public Lecture - Liverpool 08

Comment #197804 by LaTomate on June 22, 2008 at 5:37 pm

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jg8lCLumByw

That's one I wanted to share :)

8. Only a Theory

Comment #193436 by LaTomate on June 15, 2008 at 3:34 pm

True, Ken Miller is a deist, but he's a very good scientist and a great speaker.

Check out his talks, "God, Darwin, and Design", if you haven't done so yet:

http://youtube.com/view_play_list?p=FF5EA2BF6382BC08

9. Behe's Empty Box

Comment #193044 by LaTomate on June 14, 2008 at 1:51 pm

Isn't Michael Behe the one who testified in Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District in favor of creationism in front of a conservative judge and lost?

Why isn't the word out about that? Why would anyone want to listen to his explanations anyway after that?

What a sad state of affairs. They lose and yet keep coming back to waste everyone's time and effort with their rubbish.

10. Reality wins in Texas!

Comment #189919 by LaTomate on June 7, 2008 at 4:21 pm

As many say, it's strange that the polls in the US say one thing while the actions of the electorate say another.

Creationists continually lose. In Dover they lost, remember? Not only the court case, but the vote too.

Same here. Hopefully this will continue. Bravo Texas :)

PS I'm not in the US and have never been there, but I still think this is important.

11. A New Step In Evolution

Comment #188186 by LaTomate on June 3, 2008 at 10:19 am

I must admit I was kind of hoping he'd knock all of those flasks over in the vid.

I know, it's mean.

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

Comment #187460 by LaTomate on June 2, 2008 at 7:02 am

Wow... just listened to this off the archives. What an idiot Simmons seems to be. He seems to try to trump P.Z in his own field of study.

Shame, since I'm sure he's pretty smart, being a physician.

P.Z is brilliant, as usual :)

13. The Challenge of the New Creationism

Comment #187325 by LaTomate on June 2, 2008 at 12:25 am

Cool talk.

I know the bananaman vieo. I laughed so much I almost cried.

Then I cried despairingly that some idiots could believe that bollocks.

14. Synthetic Copycat Of Living Cell Underway: Life, But Not As We Know It?

Comment #186236 by LaTomate on May 30, 2008 at 2:19 am

Comment #186209 by Sh!fty on May 29, 2008 at 11:18 pm

Interesting, that made me think of Dawkins' phrase : "Creative intelligences, being evolved, necessarily arrive late in the universe, and therefore cannot be responsible for designing it." What would this life think if it evolves and asks about its creation? I know he doesn't mean that but still.

I think that's what Prof. Dawkins meant when he said that perhaps Earth had been seeded by aliens but that that doesn't explain everything, that we would need an explanation for them too. The Creationists made fun of him for that - "what he refuses God but accepts aliens!?!" As usual they have no clue :/

15. Richard Dawkins lecture at ASU's Tempe Campus

Comment #183843 by LaTomate on May 23, 2008 at 2:23 am

Another great lecture. Thanks Professor !!

16. In God's Name

Comment #182870 by LaTomate on May 21, 2008 at 4:32 am

How nice. Your friendly neighbourhood Christians.

Really kind and helpful, until you're not a crazy bible thumper like them. So much for democracy and individual freedom.

17. Philippe Starck: Why design?

Comment #182516 by LaTomate on May 20, 2008 at 10:06 am

DjSouthPaw:

I think you got it right, that civilization should be our primary goals, and that it's not necessary to be a genius to do so.

I think also that his serious point is that our civilisation isn't all that good, that in this epoch being a designer isn't all that helpful and that the only reason he's doing what he does is to maybe be able to offer the tools so that future generations can start over with a clean slate and build a better world rather than have to inherit our deeply flawed ways.

I think.

18. Geeks and Guinness: the formula for sexy science

Comment #182460 by LaTomate on May 20, 2008 at 7:26 am

This is brilliant, but: Booooo :( In my town it's in Starbucks. How can I have a decent pint there?

True it is hard to find a decent quiet pub big enough, but still. Oh well. I'll show up anyway, this should be interesting.

19. Philippe Starck: Why design?

Comment #182410 by LaTomate on May 20, 2008 at 2:59 am

I think that although not the best TED talk, he explains who he is and why he does what he does with humour and humility. I think it's a nice way to see how evolution can integrate your world view.

And he's French like me, so his horrible accent added a level of humour to it for me - I could tell what he was thinking in French and trying to get it across in English :p

20. A natural selection

Comment #179988 by LaTomate on May 14, 2008 at 4:19 am

Comment #179951 by Barry Pearson

I thought the Vatican still believed that humans are a special case? (Eg. specially created with a soul?)

I recall the book actually had the picture of an ape turning into a man (you know, the famous evolution image).

I think Catholic believers in evolution think that "God made man in his image" means that every human has a soul, which resembles god, and that adam and eve were the first "souled" humans.

I think that's bollocks, of course, but we need to get help against creationism where we can.

As for Muslims, I know there's a conflict. I was a Muslim and raised in a Muslim country and was not taught evolution in biology class but my teacher hinted at it and told us if we were interested to read it up ourselves.

I know a lot of Muslims who are ashamed of the state of science in their countries and Islam's seemingly opposition to science in some cases. They believe (and I did when I was a believer) that science and Islam should not ever be incompatible. I think the state of things there is pretty much as it is in the US... people are very divided.

I think there's also a huge misunderstanding over there (and in every society actually, even "advanced" ones): people confuse science and engineering - or science and technology. They don't really understand what science really is, and how people practice science. They still believe that what scientists do is make nicer mobile phones and computers (I say this but I'm a software engineer myself).

You always hear of third world countries wanting to modernise through technology, but as soon as the science behind it is contrary to their beliefs, they close their eyes and cover their ears. Stoopid.

21. A natural selection

Comment #179936 by LaTomate on May 14, 2008 at 2:40 am

I don't really see what the fuss is about. I guess it's because I don't live in the US...

Comment #179918 by gcdavis:

Unlike the US, in the UK most Anglican and Jewish leaders and quite a few Catholics too, accept Evolution as fact

One of my ex-girlfriends came from a staunchly catholic family, and I remember seeing a book issued by the Vatican explaining how evolution works. I think the Vatican had only recently accepted evolution as a valid scientific theory at that point.

I doubt there is a real conflict between Islam and evolution either, if you twist and squish everything hard enough to fit.

This evolution vs creationism debate is not raging in Europe for the moment, and I hope creationism will never try to impose itself on us like it is in the US :/

22. God seekers go public

Comment #179444 by LaTomate on May 13, 2008 at 8:53 am

Hmmm, interesting initiative. I can't wait to see what they'll come up with.

I love a good laugh.

23. What really goes on at the Large Hadron Collider

Comment #175766 by LaTomate on May 6, 2008 at 2:16 am

I saw this talk before, and loved it. I don;t care much about peoples' hairdos :)

Concerning the fact that it costs a lot of money, well so does a lot of other stuff. The internationally funded and run experimental fusion reactor in France is costing a lot, but you'd say it may be worth it (possibly cheap and abundant fusion energy), wheras for the LHC it is not really so since it does not solve any problems.

I have to disagree... even though practical applications of the research done there won't arrive so soon, it is through theoretical physics and experiments supporting the theory that we make the biggest advances in technology and it seems to me that the LHC won't be an exception to that rule.

Humans have almost always been in crisis of one sort or another. I agree that the latest one, climate change, is a great one, but it's not a reason to reject all scientific research to sort out other science problems.

If people invested their time and money on these sorts of projects rather than wasting time and ressources on their religions we wouldn't be having so much trouble funding proper science.

If the major powers invested half of their military budget on pure scientific research we weouldn't be having a discussion about funding priorities either I'm afraid.

Comment #175689 by Aegisofreason

why does everyone have a cool British accent but me :(

I have a horrible mix of American, Irish and Scottish, with a hint of French. Terrible :(

24. Dumb and Dumber: A discussion between Ben Stein and Glenn Beck

Comment #175610 by LaTomate on May 5, 2008 at 5:27 pm

I just lost one hour of my life. My brain hurts.

Wait... what brain?

25. Research Volunteers Needed

Comment #175310 by LaTomate on May 5, 2008 at 7:24 am

Done. Another atheist :)

26. Museums teach society lacking in science literacy

Comment #172714 by LaTomate on April 30, 2008 at 1:14 am

Brian English said:

Something interesting for those interested in the date of the K extinction.

Lefty scientist propaganda! I mean come on, we all know it was the flood, 4,400 years ago.

And we all know argon dating assumes that the properties of argon have remained the same over time (which is false, since goddidit). And the fact that they're from Berkeley ought to trigger your conspiracy switch...

Oo

27. Science leads to killing people

Comment #170963 by LaTomate on April 28, 2008 at 7:28 am

Um... these are the same people telling us that guns don't kill people, people kill people, right?

And that video games kill people.

And that Marilyn Manson, Eminem, or whoever the current "rebel" fad happens to be, kills people.

They really ought to make up their minds.

"science leads to killing people". Yeah right. If they were in the least bit honest they would refuse vaccines and antibiotics and they would see what kills and what saves.

Actually, if they were in the least bit honest, they would abandon everything science has given them... modern healthcare, TV, cinema, transportation, telecommunications, computers, plumbing, glasses, etc... I actually have a hard time finding anything in our lives which got here without any scientific research or discovery at some point.

Hypocrites, stark raving idiots. They are fighting AGAINST saving our planet too... simply because it's scientists showing where all the evidence leads.

Grrrrr.... I need a cup of tea to calm down...

28. Responses to 'Gods and Earthlings' by Richard Dawkins

Comment #166034 by LaTomate on April 22, 2008 at 5:14 pm

Steve, you're absolutely right.

I'm no scientist (I'm only a pesky engineer) but am very interested in science and read a lot about it.

Despite that, I know I have a particularly weak understanding of most of science. But then, I suspect most scientists also have a weak understanding of most of science.

So, I tend to defer to the experts, some of whom, like Prof. Dawkins, take the time to explain their fields of expertise in ordinary terms to laypeople like myself. Most of the time I do research for myself when the subject intrigues me, or if there is a controversy, like for evolution.

Never would I take the ridiculous position of challenging the experts in their own field. These ignorant, wicked creationists do it all the time, which in my eyes simply weakens them further.

If they just shut up about it and kept their willing ignorance to themselves, maybe we wouldn't be so riled up against them...

Whoah, the post went from a "you're right" to a rant. Sorry for that :)

29. If God Is Dead, Who Gets His House?

Comment #165673 by LaTomate on April 22, 2008 at 2:46 am

But science and reason won't visit you in the hospital.

Wow. This one almost knocked me off my chair. How downright stupid can you possibly get?

30. Ben Stein Vs. Sputtering Atheists

Comment #165044 by LaTomate on April 21, 2008 at 1:29 am

I say we get someone - a well known comedian, say - involved in making a documentary, not about whiny professors who want tenure and little ignorant gits who want to redefine science for their own erectile pleasure, but about evolution and science.

Maybe Marcus Brigstocke?

31. Open Letter to a victim of Ben Stein's lying propaganda

Comment #164799 by LaTomate on April 20, 2008 at 5:39 pm

Thank you Professor Dawkins for taking the time to answer this confused fellow.

I'm quite fed up with people who refuse to realize that science is simply the rational and objective search for truth about our universe. Science is not an excuse for your troubles, nor is Darwin a scapegoat for your losses.

The theory of evolution has survived everything we've thrown at it since it's inception - new discoveries in biology, all the evidence we've amassed - and has permitted us to predict and understand so much. Without the theory of evolution, biology would topple over like a cheap house of cards.

Claiming that a scientific theory is immoral or not is totally ridiculous and irrelevant. Science has nothing to do with morality - it is the study of nature. A scientific theory is a collection of statements of fact about nature which are so extremely probably true that we can consider them to be so. The theory of evolution is as true as the theory of general relativity. Not liking that won't make it any less true. Scientific truth is not democratically decided.

I'm sick of pseudo-scientists who claim science has anything to do with religion or morality. Especially these intellectually dishonest clowns who are trying to destroy the value of science to suit their religious needs and who, as this article shows, warp the minds of others with their wickedness.

I see only one positive point is all of this: these ignoramuses are trying to appropriate science since they now understand that science is the serious benchmark for truth, not religion.

32. Sexpelled: No Intercourse Allowed

Comment #163074 by LaTomate on April 18, 2008 at 12:35 am

You should be ashamed, poking fun at ATT. It's a perfectly valid scientific theory.

I think we should also introduce ATL (Anger Theory of Lightning), FTE (Flood Theory of Everything) and the slightly more controversial EETD (Evil Eye Theory of Death).

Perfect science. I mean, none of these "scientists" has actually has ever "seen" any of these phenomena in action. Tell me, were you there millions of years ago? Of course not! I rest my case...

33. Richard Dawkins' secular army must be stopped. God is behind some of our greatest art

Comment #160486 by LaTomate on April 14, 2008 at 6:42 am

#91:

Some of the best art and poetry is done under the influence of drugs. Therefore absinthe, morphine, LSD and such are a good thing that ought to be encouraged!

I remember this brilliant piece by the French parody show "Les Guignols" (a bit like spitting image in Britain) which had a sketch about the hyppocricy of French politicians against drugs.

Imagining a world without drugs, Victor Hugo (opium and alcohol) ended up writing cheap musicals, Bob Marley (rhum and cannabis) did the macarena and Serge Gainsbourg (pastis and gitannes) wrote boy's band musak.

34. Richard Dawkins' secular army must be stopped. God is behind some of our greatest art

Comment #160414 by LaTomate on April 14, 2008 at 3:56 am

Seems to me the "religion inspires art" argument is far from perfect and doesn't stand to scrutiny.

I would advance that the best art appears at times when religion is least influential, and this in Europe as well as in the Muslim World.

And even if my assumption is false, I really don't see how they can assume that a lack of religion leads to a lack of beautiful art...

I must also insist on how religion destroys art which does not agree with its dogmas.

35. 'Darwin chip' brings evolution into the classroom

Comment #157889 by LaTomate on April 9, 2008 at 5:20 pm

Scientists should emphasize that the process inside is spontaneous and nobody knows the result before it is done. Design means plan - blueprint of the result, if you don't know how the result should look like, you don't design it. These scientist don't know how the resulting DNA will look like, therefore they don't design it.

Computer scientists and engineers have been doing this for a while now - trained artificial neural networks, trained hidden markov models, multi-agent systems, etc...

Although my knowledge of these fields is somewhoat outdated - I majored in AI and biocomputing at uni but that was 5 years ago - the striking thing about all of these methods is that the creators of these systems do not know what they will look like, and once they have attained a result they have no precise idea of how the result was obtained. All they have is a general idea of the workings of the system.

So it's pretty much the same as here: they kick off a process which is almost impossible to follow in detail but which creates a very efficient solution or solver which is often too complex to understand in detail either.

Correct me if you think I'm mistaken though ;)

36. Richard Dawkins on The Big Questions

Comment #156931 by LaTomate on April 8, 2008 at 12:06 pm

At least we know these people exist in this country now.

I wonder how they "selected" the audience. I raise my hat to Richard... I would have blown my top :)

37. Protests no concern for outspoken atheist

Comment #155151 by LaTomate on April 4, 2008 at 7:48 am

Known as 'Darwin's Rottweiler'

Why, is it because he's right? Are ALL scientists and most people the least bit educated in science, therefore Darwin's rottweiler too? Einstein's german sheapherd maybe? Or Newtons' bulldog, Turing's poodle, etc...

How come there is no public debate about Einstein's theories, or Newton's theories, but Darwin needs a rottweiler? How can these people be so ridiculously ignorant, and love it so?

And bizarrely the poor Church can no longer have an "evenhanded debate"... because all of a sudden they have opponents!! Before science came along to challenge them they were the ultimate and only authority on reality. I guess that's what they'd like to get back to. So much for evenhandedness.

38. Anti-gay Okla. lawmaker attracts 1,000 backers

Comment #154549 by LaTomate on April 3, 2008 at 12:27 pm

Let's not forget that being a nice person and being true to yourself without the guiding hand of God leads to Communism, drugs, larson and serial murder. And of course child buggery. You don't know it yet, but once Satan gets a hold of you he never lets go.

Stupid backward bigotted gits :/

39. Christian Founders 3D Adventure Computer Game

Comment #153106 by LaTomate on April 1, 2008 at 3:41 am

I tried this game once, to see what it was like:
http://www.eternalforces.com/

Left Behind: Eternal Forces.

The idea is that the rapture took place and you are left to organize the Christian side in the ensuing war against the Antichrist (the Antichrist's army is called the "Global Community Peacekeepers" by the way).

Prayer keeps you faith up, giving you the right to kill people without too much trouble. You have to convert people and send them forth to build churches and recruit, etc...

Between levels, while the next one is loading, you have pro Christian and anti-evolutionist propaganda with Christian rock in the background (eek).

Needless to say it was a solid piece of crap. Even without the Christian take, it was technically and gameplay-wise a really bad game.

40. Vatican: Islam surpasses Roman Catholicism as world's largest religion

Comment #153093 by LaTomate on April 1, 2008 at 3:02 am

I've lived in both Muslim and Catholic countries, and now live in an officially Anglican country, and I think we should consider these figures with a grain of salt.

In none of these countries did the majority of people live based on religious principles.

Catholic figures use the number of baptisms as a record, wheras in Muslim countries I have no idea how they could judge, unless it were by statistical methods or simply considering everyone to be one.

I'm actually quite convinced that there are a hell of a lot fewer practitioners of either faith, and that Islam has a lot more practitioners than the Catholic Church.

41. Anti-Quran Film Fitna Pulled From Web Due to 'Threats'

Comment #152349 by LaTomate on March 30, 2008 at 7:09 pm

Dextrose, I'm sure you'll find he has not called for the Quran to be banned. The closest he gets is a call to Muslims to clean up their act, and to Europeans to defend their freedom. I think I agree with both.

Probably due to utter selfishness. I am an alcohol drinking, in-sex-indulging, gay and womens' equal rights supporting, pro choicing, racist hating, music loving, movie watching, freedom enjoying, wishywashy left winging, evolution believing atheist ex-Muslim.

That makes me close to the top of the list for those whose heads needs to be sawed off with a blunt kitchen knife to some of these extremist, bigotted scum sucking halfwits.

I grew up in the Middle East and I can assure you that these bile swallowing idiots are quite common over there. And also that thankfully not all Muslims are like that, far from it. In fact, my family is full of kind loving selfless not-at-all racist people who happen to be Quran reading Muslims.

42. Anti-Quran Film Fitna Pulled From Web Due to 'Threats'

Comment #152340 by LaTomate on March 30, 2008 at 6:34 pm

I can speak Arabic and unfortunately I can say that the English subtitles in the movie are all correct.

Although this video is extreme, and I totally oppose the political views of Geert Wilders, I think this film has its place and deserves to be seen.

Of course, I fear it will cause violence. Violence from offended Muslims, but then we've seen it before for a lot less, and also violence from bigoted ignorant people towards Muslims.

Frankly I don't think we should ever surrender to anyone who uses the threat of violence to suppress freadom of expression one way or the other. I don't care who it offends. We should respond appropriately to any rioting or violence in our societies.

I think my greatest fear though is if we let this political surrender to threats of violence continue, extremist right wing fascism will return to our societies as a backlash. I really am scared of this, and I really think it will be inevitable if appeasement continues.

43. Beware the Believers

Comment #151659 by LaTomate on March 29, 2008 at 6:29 am

Oh dear. I unfortunately found this funny. As for who's side it's on, well seems to go both ways. Maybe I'm not subtle enough to understand...

44. Happy Birthday, Richard Dawkins!

Comment #150087 by LaTomate on March 26, 2008 at 12:52 pm

Boldly Brave Sir Dawkins
Rode forth from the UK,
He was not afraid of religion,
Oh brave sir Dawkins,
He was not at all afraid to tell them what he thought,
Brave Brave Brave Brave Sir Dawkins.

He was not in the least bit scared of all their empty threats,
Or to have his ideas misused, and his quotes misquoted,
To be called "spawn of Satan" and other very nasty names,
Brave Brave Brave Brave Sir Dawkins.

His books getting torched, his reputation destroyed, his mail box flamed, his name trampled upon, his science reduced...

"Euh, that's enough now lads..."

Thanks for everything professor, have a great birthday :)

45. Police: Girl Dies After Parents Pray for Healing Instead of Seeking Medical Help

Comment #150056 by LaTomate on March 26, 2008 at 12:23 pm

In France there is a criminal offense called "non assistance to person in danger". This means if you see someone in danger and do not take appropriate action, resulting in that person's suffering or death, you are a criminal.

These parents would be prosecuted in France, religion or no.