551. A hole lot of nothing found by astronomers

Comment #65532 by mmurray on August 24, 2007 at 3:48 pm

What do Astrophysicists mean when they say "Nothing"?

Not sure what qualifies as empty. Certainly there could be a small amount of matter and we would be unable to see it or its effects. Small here would be by solar standards. I can't see why you couldn't put the earth in that void and not notice it from where we are. And of course light, gravity and other fields travel through it.

Yes, void of "matter"... but there's a big freaking space... surely there's "something" filling the space... otherwise there wouldn't be any space there.

Space doesn't need matter in it to make it exist.

Michael

552. Scientists Induce Out-of-Body Sensation

Comment #65377 by mmurray on August 24, 2007 at 1:11 am

After reading about the experiment, it seemed to me that at best, the results demonstrate that it is possible to simulate the sensations and perceptions associated with an OBE. How does it even begin to directly demonstrate that OBEs are 'just in the head' and not associated with a 'soul'. I can see the headlines twisting things to make it seem like more of a breakthrough than this really is. Thoughts?

It demonstrates that it is possible for the brain to create the feeling of an OBE with a pretty simple device. I guess that device could be making the person's astral body leave their real body but I find that implausible. Having this simple technique should also make it easier to postulate a model for how the brain is behaving when we feel like we are having an OBE. Of course you can never rule out the possibility that some people have `real' OBE's but the case against this I think is strengthened by a plausible `in brain' mechanism.

Michael

553. Send In the Clergy!

Comment #65339 by mmurray on August 23, 2007 at 5:15 pm

In one video game (Age of Empires I think) you can use priests to convert the opposition troops to your side. So my kids and their friends started to use a a new verb `to priest'

Michael

554. Scientists Induce Out-of-Body Sensation

Comment #65322 by mmurray on August 23, 2007 at 3:20 pm

Thanks for the other links. I thought that this had been done before using magnetic fields to scramble parts of the brain.

This isn't about God existing or not existing but about whether OBE's show there is a `soul' or something that can separate from the body.

Michael

555. Scientists should unite against threat from religion

Comment #65109 by mmurray on August 22, 2007 at 11:22 pm

I am simply arguing that abstinence is much more effective at curbing the spread of STD's than condoms are. Is that true or isn't it?

Are you talking individuals or populations? I assume from the use of `spread' you mean population. Let's go back to HIV in Africa which was the original issue not STD's in college. There are at least two things you have to take into account. Compliance rate and failure rate. Celibacy has zero failure rate and condoms a small but non-zero failure rate. On the other hand celibacy applied to most groups of people has only a very small compliance rate and condoms have a much higher compliance rate. (Most men I suspect aren't that keen on condoms but they would rather sex with condoms that no sex at all.) In most real life populations the small compliance rate for celibacy makes the failure rate of condoms insignicant. For example assume you have 100 people and you tell them to be celibate. Let's say 30 manage it (a lot higher than I would expect) so that is 70 unprotected sexual acts. Now assume you try condoms and say 80 use them and 10% of condoms fail during sex so you get 100 - (80 - 8) = 72 acts of protected sex. So with celibacy you get 70 unprotected sexual acts and with condoms 28 - celibacy loses big time in preventing HIV spread. Of course in different populations culture bites in different ways to change the numbers but we are talking about Africa now and people are dying and babies are getting infected at birth. The Catholic church's response is an obscenity they are smart enough to know that comparing failure rates is not the issue -- they just don't give a damn if people suffer and die.

Of course for an individual who is committed to 100% compliance then all you need to worry about is the failure rate so celibacy is the way to go.

Michael

556. Artificial Life Likely in 3 to 10 Years

Comment #64404 by mmurray on August 20, 2007 at 1:52 am

"When these things are created, they're going to be so weak, it'll be a huge achievement if you can keep them alive for an hour in the lab," he said. "But them getting out and taking over, never in our imagination could this happen."

Let's hope this doesn't turn out to be one of the great all time failures of the imagination.

Michael

557. Interview with Richard Dawkins about 'The Enemies of Reason'

Comment #63909 by mmurray on August 16, 2007 at 5:16 pm

At the risk of bringing us back on topic the actual Enemies of Reason show is available as

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=8669488783707640763&hl=en-GB

It is also downloadable as a torrent if you search a bit.

Michael

558. Good luck, Dawkins!

Comment #63809 by mmurray on August 16, 2007 at 1:18 am

My memory might be going, but didnt Sue rip Richard a new one for criticising the falsehoods and irrationality of religion?

Doesn't ring a bell to me. Can anybody find this ?

Michael

559. Atheists and believers have got religion wrong

Comment #63605 by mmurray on August 15, 2007 at 4:04 am

For those who haven't heard of Mark Steel,he is a comedian and his articles are meant to make you laugh whilst making serious points.

Didn't work for me.

Michael

560. Interview with Richard Dawkins about 'The Enemies of Reason'

Comment #63413 by mmurray on August 14, 2007 at 5:07 am

Don't you think your avatar, 'the eye of Sauron' looks like a sort of cosmic vagina? Maybe it could be the basis of a new religious cult. Anyone?

Well it's not far from the Crack of Doom.

Michael

561. The vanishing jihad exposés

Comment #63276 by mmurray on August 13, 2007 at 7:28 pm

Regarding the topic (sort off), I don't understand why western countries are allowing (big) mosques being built in their countries with Saudi money and accept that Saudi Arabia closes their border not only to churches, temples etc. but even to non-islamic religious literature (not only sale, but also possession). One-way multiculturalism indeed.

On what grounds would you say no? Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindu's etc are allowed to build religious buildings -- why not Muslims ? If you say it is because Saudi Arabia is a theocracy the local western Muslims can just say `so what'

Michael

562. Interview with Richard Dawkins about 'The Enemies of Reason'

Comment #63257 by mmurray on August 13, 2007 at 5:12 pm

Thanks for the link to channel 4 online but it doesn't seem to work outside UK/Eire. It also doesn't work on the officially approved Dawkins brand of computer :-) I will have to get teenager to show me how to tune into Channel BitTorrent.

Am I confused or was this a Channel 4 programme (Richard and Judy) advertising a Channel 4 programme (Enemies of Reason) ? Just wondering if maybe RD wasn't Judy's first choice of interviewee but it was a higher up decision.

Michael

563. The vanishing jihad exposés

Comment #63010 by mmurray on August 12, 2007 at 10:00 pm

If you have a WindowsPC, Palm, PocketPC or some Smart Phones grab a copy here

http://www.mobipocket.com/en/ebooks/bookdetails.asp?BookID=56971

Michael

564. 'Delusion' Revisits Faith Vs. Reason Debate

Comment #63008 by mmurray on August 12, 2007 at 9:19 pm

Surely if Dawkins is being criticized for not being up to date with the latest thinking on theology the same must apply to James who died in 1910.

Michael

565. Why Richard Dawkins is right on alternative medicine - but not when it comes to religion

Comment #62655 by mmurray on August 10, 2007 at 3:56 pm

I guess someone forgot to tell the Bishop of Carlisle

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/01/nflood201.xml

that the CofE has gone all warm and fuzzy. He seems to think the floods in the UK are a punishment from God for their immoral lifestyles.

Michael

566. Curriculum for Baptist School

Comment #62410 by mmurray on August 9, 2007 at 4:29 pm

Everybody should have a look at the links as the extracts given above are a bit short. For example the all important test:

BIOLOGY

Students will study the physical life of God's creation. They will continue to develop skills in the use of the scientific method. The students will learn methods and techniques of scientific study, general attributes of the cell and its processes, characteristics of the wide spectrum of living organisms, the classification, similarities and differences of the five kingdoms, evolutionary models and the creation model, the mechanics of inheritance, disease and disorders, and the workings of the human body. Students will gain experience in manipulating the conditions of a laboratory investigation and in evaluating the applications of biological principles in everyday life.

Actually reading the maths and science parts it looks like a pretty poor attempt to `christianize' a document someone already had by sticking in a few key phrases and sentences everywhere. I am reminded of things I write for my work where you are told to mention the strategic plan. So you write what you would have written anyway and then stick a few references to the strategic plan in here and there afterwards. It would be interesting to know what actually happens in the class room. This could just be principally marketing for the parents.

Michael

567. Curriculum for Baptist School

Comment #62409 by mmurray on August 9, 2007 at 4:27 pm

SCHOOL VERSE:
"But those who hope in the Lord, will renew their strength. They will soar on wings of eagles,
they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint."
Isaiah 40:31 NIV

I'll bet this lot win the inter schools cross country each year.

Michael

568. New age therapies cause 'retreat from reason'

Comment #62100 by mmurray on August 8, 2007 at 6:51 am

because I have never seen a Harry Potter movie,

Don't watch the movies, read the books they are so much better :-)

Michael

PS: While we are in confession mode I will confess to reading all the Tuesday Lobsang Rampa books as a teenager. (wikipedia will tell you who he was) I really liked the idea of astral travel and out of the body experiences but never managed them.

569. Arrogance, dogma and why science - not faith - is the new enemy of reason

Comment #61829 by mmurray on August 7, 2007 at 3:43 am

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melanie_Phillips

570. Philip Kitcher - Living with Darwin

Comment #60154 by mmurray on August 1, 2007 at 6:49 am

And in general wouldn't be nice if people used the General Forum for starting new trains of thought, rather than de-railing existing ones with irrelevancies (or, since I seem to be in carping mood, with those private exchanges between pairs of individuals that really belong in private e-mails)?

Hi

Have you thought about running the site so that all comment goes to the forums ? At least that way people would know the forums are there and *might* use the forum PM option for private conversations. An example is here

http://www.brighthand.com/

(Different use of `bright' here :-) )

Michael

571. Richard Dawkins on Hardtalk

Comment #59071 by mmurray on July 27, 2007 at 7:40 am

The problem we face is that almost all private schools in Australia are faith based

My wife and I had the same concerns. For want of anything better being available in Adelaide we ended up with something `non-denominational' which thinks it is christian in some vague sense. There is a chaplain but also some counsellors. It is also co-ed which is something we wanted particularly as we have two boys.

There is a temptation to use the catholic system because it is cheaper. But as someone raised catholic I would do anything other than send my kids to a catholic school

I think the kids learn the messages at home more than at school. My son came home sometime during the first week and said `who is this gwod person ?' (*not* a spelling mistake he didn't hear the word properly!). After that I knew he would be OK.

Michael

572. Richard Dawkins on Hardtalk

Comment #58530 by mmurray on July 25, 2007 at 6:11 am

the_assayer that link doesn't work. I assume you mean

http://theassayer.org/

?? Michael

573. Richard Dawkins on Hardtalk

Comment #58523 by mmurray on July 25, 2007 at 5:09 am

I haven't called my son a Christian on here (yet), I've refered to him as a child of faith. The evidence for this is that he chooses to pray (and says he enjoys it) and prayer is something only people of faith or people who want faith seem to do.

I don't actually recall Richard Dawkins being opposed to calling a child a child of faith. So I am not sure what your worried about here? Of course calling him a child who prays would be more accurate from your description.

Does meditation count as prayer? I meditate but I don't have any faith.

I used to pray as a child but all it did was feed a genetic tendency to anxiety. "OK if this doesn't happen I promise to say 50 Our Fathers .... not enough ? OK 100 .... ." Bit like touching all the door knobs twice before going to bed and arranging your things just so. It would have been better if someone had taught me some more useful anxiety reducing skills rather than having to learn them a lot later in life :-(

Amazing how fast you can say the Lord's Prayer when you get up to speed :-) If only Catholics had adopted the Tibetan idea of prayer flags and prayer wheels I could have prayed in my sleep.

OK I'm rambling. Spent too much time over at the Chamber of Secrets Forum arguing with people who think Harry Potter is a Christian allegory.

Michael

PS: fides_et_ratio you might be interested in the new subforum on parenting

http://richarddawkins.net/forum/viewforum.php?f=52

574. Religion beat became a test of faith

Comment #57898 by mmurray on July 22, 2007 at 4:05 am

To read this is to feel a strong sense of empathy for a decent human being struggling to reconcile the irreconcilable, yet also to wonder why anyone would ever let their beliefs be determined by such vacuous crap. He drifts into religious belief with no evidence, and drifts out again with no coherence.

It would be interesting to know if he had a religious upbringing before going with his friend to find god. It is notable that he regarded going to church and the bible as a way of solving his relationship problems instead of counsellor, psychologist etc.

An excellent and moving article. It must be hard to go down this road when your partner in life is religious. Luckily I don't have this problem.

Michael

575. Face to faith

Comment #57777 by mmurray on July 21, 2007 at 1:48 am

I wish one of these complainers would write the book they think Dawkins, Dennett et al should have written. I would be genuinely interested in reading it.

Michael

576. Using the 'Beauties of Physics' to Conquer Science Illiteracy

Comment #56977 by mmurray on July 18, 2007 at 2:49 am

I refuse to memorize anything by rote.

So seven time eight equals .... ????

More seriously I would like to know how he gets the students to read the text before the class. Wish we could do that in our first year calculus classes


Michael

577. Interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #56903 by mmurray on July 17, 2007 at 7:15 pm

For example, it's a left-wing position to criticise America's diplomatic and military support of the repressive theocratic House of Saud with all their abuses of women, dissidents, etc.

Sure but it is the left that has problems with the tension between the right of people to freedom and the right of people to pursue their own cultural practises. The kind of multiculturalism that equates criticising Muslim men for beating their wives with some of kind of western cultural imperialism is pretty much a phenomena of the left of politics. Don't forget that wonderful though we are on the left we have occasionally got our judgements wrong *cough* stalin *cough*. Only in the past of course.

Michael

578. A force for good?

Comment #55174 by mmurray on July 10, 2007 at 7:38 am

but the Department of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford - a secular body -

Actually if you look at

http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/peace/about/

it says

Following an initiative by the Society of Friends the Department of Peace Studies was established in 1973

The Quakers are pretty close to christian deists I guess but still -- not as secular as it appears.

I can't find the actual Audit -- it was prepared for the BBC -- as I would like to check if they were really silly enough to not adjust for technological capability.

Michael

579. Ten Politically Incorrect Truths About Human Nature

Comment #55055 by mmurray on July 9, 2007 at 10:38 pm

What a load of rubbish.

Michael K. Murray Ph.D.

580. Genetic Engineers Who Don't Just Tinker

Comment #54707 by mmurray on July 8, 2007 at 3:50 pm

... or to have said hardwiring drastically reduced or eliminated biologically and thus lack the need for conscious rejection?

Why stop there? Why not modify poor people so they don't mind being poor and hungry ? Modify people who have to work in mines and factories so they enjoy it ? Modify people so they don't mind doing what the government asks them to do ...

Michael

581. Won't anyone stand up for God?

Comment #54547 by mmurray on July 7, 2007 at 5:52 pm

What modern theologians defend is a philosopher's God who nobody would bother to worship.

Very nicely put. And that is one reason why they are not clamouring to attack people like Dawkins -- they don't actually disagree with them on very much.

Michael

582. For Muslim Extremists, Religion Matters

Comment #54390 by mmurray on July 6, 2007 at 6:44 pm

"Kill the unbelievers wherever you find them."

how would a reformer 're-interpret' this i wonder?

Well I don't know any Islamic theology and how it works but I had a Catholic upbringing and they were masters at this. Off the top of my head I would say either:

(a) It is a slight mistranslation from the original arabic and means kill their unbelief not the actual unbelievers.

(b) It is metaphor referencing a more violent time and, again, the idea is to kill unbelief.

(c) Or you could ponder the meaning of kill and decide that in this context it doesn't blow up or bodily dismember or remove the life from.

In my experience human ingenuity in these matters knows no bounds. For a jesuit arguing that black is white is easy stuff.

Michael

583. Don't Mince Words: The London Car-Bomb Plot Was Designed to Kill Women

Comment #53885 by mmurray on July 4, 2007 at 12:51 am

A state, I might add, that may luxuriate in its secular nature but has murdered untold millions throughout the world since World War II

Millions? Can you give some examples to back that up or are you just using `millions' as a euphemism for `lots'.

Michael

584. Don't Mince Words: The London Car-Bomb Plot Was Designed to Kill Women

Comment #53854 by mmurray on July 3, 2007 at 3:37 pm

These bombers may be far less technically savvy than, say, the IRA, but they are also far more ruthless and dangerous. What is more, they are hear to stay for the foreseeable future.

And they don't have a political aim like the IRA - they just want to kill us. It reminds me of the movie Independence Day (OK I like B grade science fiction) where they ask the alien something like what can we do to live in peace and it says `die'.

Michael

PS: There is a certain irony of course in the fact that 9/11 was the beginning of the end of the IRA because the US funding and support dried up.

585. When is a bishop like a suicide bomber?

Comment #53778 by mmurray on July 3, 2007 at 5:30 am

Strange how when it comes to virgin births and raising the dead god is not constrained but can change physical law at will. However when it comes to designing a world where there can be free will without massive pain and suffering god is at a loss to know what to do.

It's all just barmy of course.

Michael

586. Christopher Hitchens and Al Sharpton

Comment #53490 by mmurray on July 1, 2007 at 5:21 pm

"Where does gravy come from?"

Usually I put a tablespoon of gravy powder in a saucepan and heat with a cup of water. You have to stir a lot to avoid lumps.

Michael

587. Darwin Still Rules, but Some Biologists Dream of a Paradigm Shift

Comment #52761 by mmurray on June 28, 2007 at 2:58 am

Surely plate techtonics was a paradigm shift. The geologists went from bagging anybody who advocated continental drift to it becoming the orthodoxy fairly quickly.

Michael

588. Rival to evolution may enter schools

Comment #52758 by mmurray on June 28, 2007 at 2:51 am

There are some good comments on the Sunday Herald site.

Michael

589. Science of the Soul? 'I Think, Therefore I Am' Is Losing Force

Comment #52631 by mmurray on June 27, 2007 at 2:55 pm

"However, if you regard the soul as something else, as you might, say, the spiritual reflection of your individuality as a human being, then the theology of the soul it seems to me is on firm ground."

I wonder what his idea of quicksand is ?

Michael

590. Trio to rock against religion

Comment #52437 by mmurray on June 27, 2007 at 3:14 am

If they get Dr Dawkins out there, people won't be encouraged to read religious texts from other religions!

Why not ? My memory of The God Delusion is he was keen on people studying comparative religion.

Michael

591. An Inquisition in science's name

Comment #51099 by mmurray on June 21, 2007 at 1:03 pm

This is so stupid for so many reasons. Not least of these is that the Inquisition's problem wasn't that it felt it had the only truth but that it felt it had to torture and kill those who disagreed with it. Had they just written books, posted on web sites and appeared on TV an unimaginable toll of human suffering would have been avoided.

I find something deeply offensive about using the Inquisition in this flippant manner. It's an insult to the memories of all the people who suffered and died. Just because it was hundreds of years ago doesn't meant they felt the pain any less at the time. If Bellarmine was alive today he would be in the International Court of Justice in the Hague charged with crimes against humanity not writing letters to Dawkins.

Michael

592. Call for 'post-9/11' RE teaching

Comment #50765 by mmurray on June 19, 2007 at 10:43 pm

I wonder if when they talk about totalitarian marxist and fascist regimes in the 20th century they emphasis the role they played in `community cohesion'.

Michael

593. Rushdie knighted in honours list

Comment #50483 by mmurray on June 18, 2007 at 11:51 am

Has a fatwah ever been announced against JK Rowling? Her novels should be much more troubling to god-botherers.

I don't see why her novels would particularly annoy Muslims and she wasn't born or converted to Islam so she is just an infidel not an apostate. There are comments in the Bible attacking magic as the work of the devil as a result of which some people have tried to get her books banned -- mostly in the US. I did watch a shop assistant in a local shop here in Australia try and convince the person in front of me not to buy one of the books for this reason.


Michael

594. In the know

Comment #50190 by mmurray on June 15, 2007 at 3:28 pm

This gets a good panning over on the Guardian site.

Michael

595. Can we really learn to love people who aren't like us?

Comment #48957 by mmurray on June 9, 2007 at 6:03 pm

The real battle, and it applies to secular and religious alike, is: can we love, not hate, the people not like us? We are tribal animals.

Yes we are tribal animals. This is one of the major problems with the abrahamic religions. They are particularly intolerant of non-believers because the non-existent god they worship is one of the more jealous and intolerant ones. Personally I don't care if all the believers love me it would be enough if they respected my right to not worship their gods and were willing to put up with the social and political consequences that flow from that respect. I could live with them believing that I and my family are all going to suffer unbearable torture for all eternity if only they would leave me alone in this life.

Michael

596. God is not responsible for war and suffering

Comment #48163 by mmurray on June 6, 2007 at 11:02 pm

It took a bit of googling but here he is

http://johnheard.blogspot.com/2007/06/dreadpublishing-john-heard-in.html

For those not familiar with life in Melbourne I think `Newmaniac' refers to Newman College at Melbourne University a residential college run by the Jesuits.

Michael

597. The Myth of Secular Moral Chaos

Comment #47917 by mmurray on June 6, 2007 at 3:19 am

Because you can *never* know that the to be tortured actually has the knowledge you seek, torture is never justified.

What if you have overheard a terrorist group who have planted a bomb with a timer and a code to stop the countdown. They have said they all know the code. You have one of the group in custody and located the bomb. All you need is for that person to give you the code.

While I don't trust a lot of hypothetical situations this one seems possible.

Michael

598. The Myth of Secular Moral Chaos

Comment #47915 by mmurray on June 6, 2007 at 3:16 am

599. Sen. Clinton: Faith got me through marital strife

Comment #47910 by mmurray on June 6, 2007 at 2:50 am

A pity they couldn't find the courage to say that their faith was their own business. By pandering like this they further erode the already flimsy division between religion and state.


Michael

600. Pell plans fidelity oath for principals

Comment #47909 by mmurray on June 6, 2007 at 2:45 am

Looks like they forgot about the enlightenment down under.

Pell makes it look bad but a lot of people are going to ignore him. More recently he has been telling Catholic politicians in NSW that if they don't vote against stem cell research they might be refused communion. He has been told to stuff off by everybody including the Premier

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200706/s1944347.htm

Michael