1. What is science for?

Comment #182350 by MIND_REBEL on May 19, 2008 at 8:00 pm

No workie.

2. Richard Dawkins Responds to Rabbi Shmuley Boteach

Comment #181316 by MIND_REBEL on May 16, 2008 at 10:35 pm

Dawkins owns another typical ignorant religious nutjob.

3. Richard Dawkins discusses Einstein's new letters

Comment #179967 by MIND_REBEL on May 14, 2008 at 3:32 am

SteveN is correct.

Atheism historically has meant a negative belief in god. It wasn't until recently the definition was reworked(somewhat questionably) to be more appealing to a wider audience. If you place Einsteins statements with the proper context it's clear what he meant.

4. Richard Dawkins discusses Einstein's new letters

Comment #179925 by MIND_REBEL on May 14, 2008 at 1:59 am

"I can't answer with a simple yes or no. I'm not an atheist and I don't think I can call myself a pantheist. We are in the position of a little child entering a huge library filled with books in many different languages. The child knows someone must have written those books. It does not know how. The child dimly suspects a mysterious order in the arrangement of the books but doesn't know what it is."

This one has been contested lately though. Here's the full story. Most of the objections seem pretty weak and the fact Einstein didn't disavow it and partially confirmed it leads me to believe it's most likely accurate. It was also included as part of his biography that was released a couple years back so objections are certainly part of the fringe opinion.

http://einsteinandreligion.com/spinoza.html#spinozasgod

5. Richard Dawkins discusses Einstein's new letters

Comment #179916 by MIND_REBEL on May 14, 2008 at 1:50 am

"I am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views."

I dunno man, how else could you interprete this quote anything but "don't call me an atheist".

It seems like it's a real reach.

6. Richard Dawkins discusses Einstein's new letters

Comment #179910 by MIND_REBEL on May 14, 2008 at 1:38 am

There's absolutely no case for Einstein being an atheist. We actually end up looking really bad trying to make this case.

In order for it to work, we'd have to rewrite history or redefine the word atheist. I say we just stop while we're behind.

7. Richard Dawkins discusses Einstein's new letters

Comment #179908 by MIND_REBEL on May 14, 2008 at 1:31 am

"In view of such harmony in the cosmos which I, with my limited human understanding, am able to recognize, there are yet people who say there is no God. But what really makes me angry is that they quote me for the support of such views."

Towards the Further Shore (Victor Gollancz, London, 1968), p. 156; quoted in Jammer, p. 97

"Then there are the fanatical atheists whose intolerance is of the same kind as the intolerance of the religious fanatics and comes from the same source. They are like slaves who are still feeling the weight of their chains which they have thrown off after hard struggle. They are creatures whoâ€"in their grudge against the traditional "opium of the people"â€"cannot bear the music of the spheres. The Wonder of nature does not become smaller because one cannot measure it by the standards of human moral and human aims."

â€" Einstein to an unidentified adressee, Aug.7, 1941. Einstein Archive, reel 54-927

"There lies the weaknesss of positivists and professional atheists who are elated because they feel that they have not only successfully rid the world of gods but "bared the miracles." (That is, explained the miracles. - ed.) Oddly enough, we must be satisfied to acknowledge the "miracle" without there being any legitimate way for us to approach it . I am forced to add that just to keep you from thinking that --weakened by age--I have fallen prey to the clergy "…

â€" From a letter to Maurice Solovine

8. Richard Dawkins discusses Einstein's new letters

Comment #179885 by MIND_REBEL on May 13, 2008 at 11:45 pm

Einstein wasn't an athiest. He explicitly stated that several times, and actually warned people against stating that he was.

I really wish people would stop trying to rewrite history.

9. Losing Our Spines to Save Our Necks

Comment #178229 by MIND_REBEL on May 11, 2008 at 12:56 am

Awesome, it's ironic it takes an American to finally stand up to the Muslim menace in Europe. While Dawkin and crew are busy focusing on Christians in the states you give your ancestral homelands to foreign invaders who explicitly want to destroy your way of life(secularism included).

You can't value secularism and seek to destroy it at the same time by only allowing immigration from Muslims. In Mexico people are getting really pissed about the discriminatory practices in Europe against Christians and atheist. Last year, England take ZERO immigrants from Mexico.

10. War in Heaven: Hitchens Meets D'Souza on Home Turf

Comment #80998 by MIND_REBEL on October 23, 2007 at 9:42 pm

Morality doesn't really exist. It's a religious concept and atheists shouldn't get dragooned into trying to "one up" religion at their own game.

11. War in Heaven: Hitchens Meets D'Souza on Home Turf

Comment #80997 by MIND_REBEL on October 23, 2007 at 9:40 pm

Hitchens won this easily. I can understand people saying athiests are getting a little silly or whatever but someone trying to argue for god is just retarded.

12. Eddie Tabash at AAI 07

Comment #80992 by MIND_REBEL on October 23, 2007 at 8:53 pm

Amazing speech. I really needed that.

13. Atheists aren't a bad lot

Comment #80990 by MIND_REBEL on October 23, 2007 at 8:42 pm

Canada seems like paradise. I've heard that non-believers can actually be taken seriously as people instead of being treated like second class citizens like they are in the USA.

14. Cheney and Obama: It's Not Genetic

Comment #80988 by MIND_REBEL on October 23, 2007 at 8:40 pm

Obama is still a deluded theist and by any measure of still more religious than Cheney. I wish non-believers had a viable candidate to vote for and support.

15. Catholic condom ban helping AIDS spread in Latam: U.N.

Comment #80987 by MIND_REBEL on October 23, 2007 at 8:38 pm

Logic is to religion as water is to flame.

16. Can the rest of us have our planet back?

Comment #63871 by MIND_REBEL on August 16, 2007 at 1:22 pm

This young upstart reminds me of George Carlin. Great to see the movement gaining strength.

17. In Defense of Witchcraft

Comment #52256 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 3:24 pm

18. In Defense of Witchcraft

Comment #52246 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 3:11 pm

I'm a huge Sam Harris fan, but that was lame.

Leave witches alone, i'm dating a wiccian. She's basically an athiest, but just enjoys the social aspects of the culture. It's more symbolic and traditional than anything.

And let's face it. Not all witch burnings where in the name of religion. Most of them happened after the middle ages-after religion lost its grip on the world. And many witches were just accused of practicing "bad science" along with practicing "bad religion". I hate religion, but witches and the whole goth culture is pretty interesting.

19. Look Forward to Anger

Comment #52245 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 3:04 pm

Who mentioned 9/11? I didn't. Saddam was evil, and need to be removed. Lay off the straw men.

You sound upset upset that freethinkers like Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens have broken with the tradionial liberal dogma and are actually thinking for themselves instead of just parroting everything thier professors told them.

20. Look Forward to Anger

Comment #52214 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 1:36 pm

The excuses were based on the best information at the time. And lets not forget that the democrats supported the war as well as the UK. And the reason why you're safe is because people like GWB have the stones to stand up to bullies that want to destroy your world in the name of religion.

It's one thing to talk tough, it's another thing to stand up and actually do something.

21. The Stupidity of Fox News is Truly Beyond Belief

Comment #52210 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 1:31 pm

For all you bashing FoxNews-Compare the way Dawkins & Sam Harris were treated on the Bill O Riely show vs CNN's horriblely biased piece on atheists.

It's time to wake up and realize the truth.

22. Look Forward to Anger

Comment #52203 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 1:11 pm

Yes, scary people. Most people can't deal with the fact that Muslims want to destroy the West. If they don't like it, leave, say they support terrorism, we'll make you leave.

For being a religious wackjob, GW Bush was willing to face the Muslim threat before most people even knew who Christopher Hitchens even was. History is proving him and the war correct.

23. The Stupidity of Fox News is Truly Beyond Belief

Comment #52198 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 1:02 pm

I like Fox news much better than CNN. Liberalism/Socialism is basically just another religion just without the revelation.

It's great to see some conservative freethinkers like Sam Harris and Christopher Hitchens take the spotlight in the war on unreason, including liberalism.

24. Trio to rock against religion

Comment #52193 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 12:56 pm

No person has ever been harmed by being too rational.

Almost all of Africa's problems could be reversed in 10 to 15 years if they would just embrace rationality, science and logic. Their religious traditions are the only thing holding them back.

25. Egypt mufti says female circumcision forbidden

Comment #52178 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 12:24 pm

It's a shame, but circumcision is the same thing and equally pointless.

26. Trio to rock against religion

Comment #52177 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 12:22 pm

Religion is destroying South Africa. It will be a great day when people can just get along without robbing people or being racist all in the name of some god.

Africa needs atheism and rationality like a plant needs water.

27. The Stupidity of Fox News is Truly Beyond Belief

Comment #52175 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 12:18 pm

I like Fox News, but that was a very stupid clip.

28. Row over religion's role in US jails

Comment #52154 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 11:13 am

If athiests are so immoral explain why we make up 14% of the US population yet only represent 1/10 of one precent of the prison population.

Religion is irrational, and irational thinking promotes irational acts(AKA crime), FACT.

29. Germany imposes ban on Tom Cruise

Comment #52153 by MIND_REBEL on June 26, 2007 at 11:11 am

Good, scientology is an intellectual cancer that shouldn't be tolerated in any form.

If any of you knew how destructive scientology was-you wouldn't question Germany's resolve to fight irrational thinking.

30. His word

Comment #51790 by MIND_REBEL on June 25, 2007 at 12:29 am

Interesting, but i don't like his fence sitting, i really couldn't tell what he was trying to say.

31. Rushdie knighted in honours list

Comment #50305 by MIND_REBEL on June 16, 2007 at 3:30 pm

Rushdie is a great author. I'm planning to read several of his books this year.

32. A battler beyond belief: Review of 'God is Not Great'

Comment #50304 by MIND_REBEL on June 16, 2007 at 3:25 pm

Stalin wasn't an athiest. He opened several churchs during WWII.

33. Interview with Christopher Hitchens

Comment #50303 by MIND_REBEL on June 16, 2007 at 3:22 pm

I'll listen to it later. His book is amazing.

34. In the know

Comment #50189 by MIND_REBEL on June 15, 2007 at 3:25 pm

His futive gestures are as useless as child trying to fix a dam after it sprong a leak, except the leak is rationality and it will soon wash away the bloodtrenched legacy of religion and irrationality.

35. Review of 'Growing Up in the Universe' DVDs

Comment #50188 by MIND_REBEL on June 15, 2007 at 3:21 pm

This should be required viewing for everyone wanting to understand the world. Had i had more science education growing up i'm postive i'd be a happier, more successful person.

36. Vatican cardinal calls on Catholics to stop funding Amnesty

Comment #50032 by MIND_REBEL on June 14, 2007 at 3:54 pm

LOL at this crap. This is almost worse than the Vatican outlawing condoms in Africa, which caused the AIDS crisis.

The Vatican is the most powerful organization in the world, and its shameful the way they're able to bully around entire countries.

37. Baptists Warned About Islam, Atheism

Comment #49671 by MIND_REBEL on June 12, 2007 at 8:58 pm

Religion is evil, because it embraces irrationality, which is the common thread of ALL evil deeds. Remove religion, and people will act according to thier natural moral code, which is based on our evolutionary programing to not harm each other.

38. We stand awed at the heights our people have achieved

Comment #49670 by MIND_REBEL on June 12, 2007 at 8:54 pm

Powerful, sharp prose. If PZ had dedicated his life to literture he could have been an important literary figure. It's great to see top scientists well versed in the humanities.

39. Religion - our maelstrom of ignorance

Comment #49403 by MIND_REBEL on June 11, 2007 at 8:10 pm

Although, Al Gore is a creationist and Hillary thinks god cares about her husband. One side isn't any better than the other. They're both theistic morons.

40. The Benny Hinn Report

Comment #49348 by MIND_REBEL on June 11, 2007 at 3:06 pm

He should be arrested for fraud. No question. If a person makes claims for profit that he can't support with empiracal evidence, then that is the legal defintion of fraud.

41. Tome truths

Comment #49345 by MIND_REBEL on June 11, 2007 at 3:03 pm

The religionists are scared because they can no longer hold back rationality or reason, and science has exposed their beliefs as memes and the world will no longer accept thier excuses for ruining the world and making the bulk of it inhabitants miserable, so religion will seem attractive and make sense.

Misery and religion go together like water and rain.

42. We of little faith

Comment #48872 by MIND_REBEL on June 9, 2007 at 9:30 am

I think you guys are falling for the Western Religion=Bad, Eastern Religion=Good. They're both bad. Buddhists have a tendency to just sit around, and justify the most horrible governments in the history of the world. The government could slaughter 100K people, and some monk would respond with some meaningless bromide like "two grapefruits with yellow skin are one orange in training".

And Buddhism is irrational. Many forms of Buddhism have a concept of hell, believe in the afterlife through reincarnation. And it was that same believe in reincarnation which drove the kamikaze planers and submariners during WWII. And what Buddhism allowed the Kamikazee pilots to carry out during WWII isn't that much different in principle than other events where religious lunatics used planes to suicide themselves. It just that instead of 72 virgins they get reincarnationed as super models lap dog or a hawaian tropic tan boy.

And you can call me stupid all you want, but the facts are facts and i'm more concerned with the truth than looking cool or hip in some nonsense mystical faith. No disrespect, but Buddhism is pretty stupid, and for a religion that aims to dissolve the ego, they tend attract some real egomaniacs.

43. Christopher Hitchens: Religion Poisons Everything

Comment #48727 by MIND_REBEL on June 8, 2007 at 8:43 pm

Sancus is correct. Buddhism is the whore of facism.

44. We of little faith

Comment #48726 by MIND_REBEL on June 8, 2007 at 8:36 pm

I find it interesting that Mrs. Blackmore calls herself an athiest, yet is a follower of Zen Buddism, which is the same irrational faith that drove the kamikaze bombers and the Japanese rape of China.

45. Republican candidates range from ignorant to dishonest, part 2

Comment #48478 by MIND_REBEL on June 8, 2007 at 6:03 am

Ron Paul?

46. Republican candidates range from ignorant to dishonest, part 2

Comment #48389 by MIND_REBEL on June 7, 2007 at 5:00 pm

I'm going to vote. It's important. I do think religion is a delusion, but it's still possible to be a good leader and religious. I'd rather vote for a fellow freethinker, but understand things are getting better slowly over time. Baby steps.

47. What use is Religion? Part 2

Comment #48388 by MIND_REBEL on June 7, 2007 at 4:57 pm

Religion started as a way to explain the world. Why does it rain? Because god says so. Now that science can explain the weather and the natural world religion no longer serves any function except as a mind virus that destroys it's host intellectually.

48. Protesting the Creation Museum

Comment #48365 by MIND_REBEL on June 7, 2007 at 3:20 pm

The creation(denial) museum is as offensive to rational thinkers as a WWII museum would be to holocaust surviviors.

49. Wanted: Moral Education for Secular Children

Comment #48363 by MIND_REBEL on June 7, 2007 at 3:18 pm

Great read.

50. A Quote Against Theocracy

Comment #48362 by MIND_REBEL on June 7, 2007 at 3:17 pm

CS Lewis is massively overated. Much of it is poorly written.