901. Are the 'New Atheists' avoiding the 'real arguments'?

Comment #146776 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 11:52 am

Nobody thinks you shouldn't have brought it up. I just think you are wrong to think that it was germane to TGD. Same as the GM questions. Not part of the case against religion. You think it is I think you are wrong.

902. Are the 'New Atheists' avoiding the 'real arguments'?

Comment #146759 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 11:18 am

Sorry I actually think these three laws you bring up are not terribly well put together, and not as cogent as the three robot laws. (So he at least wrote six laws all together.) I am aware that you think 1 applies, and that you think the whole list should have been put in for the sake of the reader to judge. But lookign at the passages in questions that doesn't fit well with the content. Again Dawkins doesn't seem to be saying God (a catch all for all gods) is impossible just highly improbable and lacking corroborative evidence. Nor does he wag his "Darwinianly-evovled physical and philosphophical digits at us," for the simple entertainment of such notions. He does wag his finger for believing in supernatural things for which there is no good evidence. But I think you've said you do too. Again I think you are tilting at windmills.

Nope you are right you can accuse him of cherry-picking. What I meant to say is that I don't think you could do it fairly. But That is fine you can disagree with me. And if you are going to be sarcastic I will say fuck, and shit and piss or whatever else, whenever I fucking want. Fair enough? And there is no need to don kid gloves just be honest in that you like to score cheap points with insults, flawed comparison and sarcasm.

Also you bring this up.

Of course this is not a very good argument FOR god, but it is against 100% atheism.

As Dawkins says. Perhaps you should go look back at his scale of belief and unbelief. The point about the caveats is to remind people that notion of God really does appear to be on a par with FSM, either the reform or orthodox versions, or unicorns or Odin. The question he is trying to raise is why are you so sure it is okay to dismiss Odin, Thor or Zeus but allow greater probablity to be assigned to God or Allah when the evidence for them is about the same as it is for Zeus. So in someways you are pushing an open door there but one you obviously think is closed.

And further you think the free will question is a potent one. I'm not so sure. You still need to define it. Like the word consciousnes a great deal of heavy weather gets made of it but when you dig deeper you find people are often talkign about different things. So I would like to know what you think it means. (Also in my discussion of twins I was refering to twins raised apart, though that was unclear.) You've said above that
That free will is an extra ability we endow ourselves with. This seems like a strange thing to say. Is it really? And extra to what? I'm sorry I think the phrase free will carries with it a tremeondous amount vaguery. That isn't your fault just a fault of the word and the concept it embodies.

903. Full house captivated by atheist Dawkins' take on religion

Comment #146733 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 10:21 am

PostSecularPh.D Said:

There is a certain irony here for me, as well. I grew up in Pentecostal churches where we were often told that some day soon the government would come for us because of our beliefs. My views have changed a lot since then, and I left those fears and that denomination way in my past. But in light of the views of Dawkins and his cult-like following, it appears those Pentecostal warnings may not have been all that crazy. Perhaps the day will soon come when the government takes my children away to protect them from my religious "abuse". This is the logical conclusion to which Dawkins' view points. No doubt most contributors to this conversation think that would be a good thing. Aside from the police state implicit in that belief, I would fear for the loss of culture and art. When I think about Handel's "Messiah" and the ffrf's "The Freethinker Blues", I pity the person who thinks the comparison is anything but an insult. You can count on me to do whatever I can to make sure such a brave new world never comes to fruition.

This is such a common worry among the believers that it almost needs its own special rebuttal FAQ section of this website (Does it even have an FAQ sections, if not then a special topic on our boards). It is strange worry, that the religion police are going to come a knocking, for Christians to have in the US since evangelicals hold such sway and since faith more or less gets lauded in every political speech, and debate. You faithers run the damn show! Do please stop whining about how you are marginalized and how its just a few days away from a Maoist state.

Postsecular Ph.D, Dawkins never suggested that parents lose their children over this. He did, as ThoughtsonCommonToad pointed out, want people to think more fully about the kind of nonsense they spew to their kids. And you would do well to read TOCT's post for a full version of what Dawkins means and thinks about religious abuse of children. I think if more poeple reflected on the religious indoctrination of their children fewer of them would go the whole nine yards. And that change is so much more preferable to the forced changes in behavior anyway, which I again have to say is something I certainly don't want, and probably no one else here wants.

904. Are the 'New Atheists' avoiding the 'real arguments'?

Comment #146719 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 9:59 am

I'm less puzzled. He certainly sees a vast amount of hypocrisy here and every post has a little note of triumph when he "finds" it.

905. Are the 'New Atheists' avoiding the 'real arguments'?

Comment #146710 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 9:48 am

Jac,
No we get the irony you think exists. Sadly your case is just wrong. You are making broad generalization about the notion of free will and its rate of acceptance by this sites users. I think you will need to define free will and then the discussion can proceed. Beyond that I think the discussion is pointless. I am honestly unconcerned either way. I think the real question has been solved. Is behavior random or determined as we might expect if our choices are completely free. Well it doesn't seem to be random. So how we make our decisision is a process currently under research. Maybe you should quite whining about the deep intractablity of the problem and go out and try your hand at some research on the issue. Other people are.

I understand you think we are all hypocrits here and trying to take away somebody's nice little house of comfort, while keeping our own little crutch. It isn't true of course, but that seems to be what you are saying. And it seems clearer with every little gloating "Ah look I've found another INTERESTING, or FUNNY example of hypocracy or error" style post you write.

906. Fleabytes

Comment #146698 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 9:33 am

No, I must confess a bit of love of the western genre. Mostly Elmore Leonard's early Western's. Larry McMurtry isn'tbad either.
I did like the idea that environmental regulators might actually get to kick a little ass though!

907. Fleabytes

Comment #146678 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 9:19 am

I just read this by AnnaBanna:

I work in government as an environmental regulator.

And I was struck by an image of her out on some Arizona landscape, on horse back decked out like Clint Eastwood, two six shooters on her hips, and lever action Remington-rifle poking out of its saddle holster. Steely-eyed, and face cast in shadow by her cowboy hat.

Then I realized she meant something else by regulator.

908. Fleabytes

Comment #146667 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 9:11 am

Al-rawandi said in response to mylearnedfriend:

How do you know that ancient oral traditions are more accurate? This is the argument about semitic languages and the memorization of verse.

I think this is something we might definately want to think about when discussing the verasimilitude of the bible. Oral traditions are pretty inadequate in many ways. Look at the UFO phenemenon or Elvis. People can't agree on certain details, people see him, or did regularly 20 years or more after his (alleged) death. Al-rawandi's point about what was kept and what wasn't is important too.

909. Fleabytes

Comment #146624 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 8:28 am

REverend Dark, (you are the only person I think I would use that title for)
Shortly after highschool i worked in the headstone, burial vault and burying people business. The industry is a fucking joke, and the people in that wing(not the Burial home part) are some of the funniest people you will ever meet. Callous, and for the most part understand what a silly sham the business is.
The flowers, the caskets, the vaults, the whole thing is a grotesque way to bilk sad people out of money.

910. Are the 'New Atheists' avoiding the 'real arguments'?

Comment #146338 by MaxD on March 19, 2008 at 1:15 am

Jac Said:

Faith in RELIGION is greater in the religious camp than faith in SCIENCE is in the atheist camp. But everyone has faith in something unproven, even if their own free will.

I don't have faith in science. I believe in its efficacy based on the evidence of its products. As a biologist I see the work the method produces, I read my papers, I read my books.
I talk to my physicist friends and they tell me what is going on in their fields and I ask them for clarification on this or that. The method produces. I have high confidence in the method. I understand our knowledge isn't complete, and possible never will be and certainly won't be in my life time.

Now some fields, and subjects bring more researcher to them for what ever reason. I'm fine with the ambiguity. You want to equivcate my confidence based on the work of science as faith that is fine these are just words after all. But I think you would at least have to say it was different than blind fucking faith that is practiced by many of my religious friends. I doubt you would do that though because it hurts your point.

What new knowledge has religion produced? Based on the theological enterprise? Hmmmmm...Any new computing breakthroughs? And staggeringly accurate predicitions? Hmmmmm....? How about some God Particle? Theology is literature critique and this of course is interesting as far is it goes but it is and remains purely subjective, unverifiable pap. When it isn't lit-crit it is intuititive and unverifiable, "I sense the God-head is the ground of universal being...."

No I don't have faith in science. Maybe other atheists do. I don't think so. Again one can look around and see that the world owes very little to the ministrations of the clerics as far as technological wonder is concerned. It would be interesting to note how many people come realize they are atheists or are led from fence posts, or converted from believers. I've seen all three things happen and mostly it was a matter of them doing more research and thought. Again people may not be perfectly free as in here is your free lunch, but their actions are variable based on experience, exposure and nature. I am legitamately worried by a study that recently suggested that people have genetic predispostions to religious awe. I think such a discovery, were it the case, would brind discourse to a near standstill. I already worry that often between the two sides the differences in use of language and understanding of evidence pose huge barriers to meaningful dialogue.

I think free will question is a geniunely interesting one, again ultimately a scientific question that we may never satisfy ourselves that we have solved one way or the other. And on it we can remain agnostic.
(My own thoughts on it are evidence based if you must know. But necessarily incomplete as is the data set. Either behavior has determintants or it is random. The studies of identical twins point to a certain amount of genetic predispostion toward certain choice, behaviors etc. People are limited by what they know, and peer groups, talent and aptitude. In any event whatever our choices are, they aren't completely free, they are constrained. The question is really whether hard determinism holds or if it is something softer. It is an open question about which I am agnostic.)

We can remain agnostic about the presense of some super being in the deistic sense, if you are impressed by the apparant perfectness of the universe. That I think would constitute the only-weak-evidence in its favor. The theist though makes entirely unjustified claims about God, the universe (many flat out falsified where every fundamentalist is concerned) and I think we can be fairly comfortable in our outright unbelief on matters of Odin and Thor and Mithras, and Jesus, and Apolonias of Tyanus and so on as not a shred of evidence compells belief in them, and plenty compels us to doubt the veracity of the claims otherwise.

So I am still unconviinced thought that what i think of science is the same as what the faithful believe of their Gods.

PS. I don't think you are being honest about your snidness. Really I don't. You have kind of dogged Dawkins and the left since the beginning of our talk. You were throwing a jab on the break hoping that the judges would award you the point.

And you know what, you did it again.
You said:

I think these are very relevent to the topic at hand, if only because reading these made me realize that Dawkins "cherry picked" rule #3, but ignored the telling #1. #1 is a mixed bag, because the first half is almost a total appeal to authority (saved by saying "very probably"). But the second half hints that things that those in their twilight years say are impossible are probably wrong, which doesn't bode well for the things Dawkins tells us just can't possibly be true. Probably the best argument against this is to say that Dawkins isn't that far gone yet! Otherwise you'd have to disregard or lambast's Clarke's first "law." All I am saying is that it is INTERESTING which of the three Dawkins selected. It didn't just suit his purposes - the EXCULSION of #1 would have potentially been detrimental to his arguments, and yet there he is cherry picking, just like the biblical cherry pickers of the nice versus nasty passages.

Dawkins has not said that God is impossible, just highly improbable. It is interesting that he chose the third law in a discussion about the differences between superbeings of advanced technological sophistication and a supernatural being? One had a rather mundane humdrum and likely evolutionary story where as the other sits on the improbable scale. Dawkins appears to me to have been very careful in his language throughout the book on this probable/improbable distinction. I think the charge of cherry picking is a bit rich as rules 1 and 2 were not germane to what he was talking about in the passage you cite. The discussion was about the extreme improbablity. Dawkins has not said that god is impossible. Just highly improbable. You can disagree with his assessment on the God Hypothesis, but I don't think you could say he cherry picked. And why don't you drone on a bit the rather meaningless 2nd rule. You could say, "Why didn't Dawkins mention the second rule? I guess it would have made no difference to his case or mine. But I tell you he cherry picked, I tell you he cherry picked. Come to think of it why did Dawkins leave out the three robot laws? HUH? Well I guess that would have hurt his case."

911. Immune system differences found

Comment #146215 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 7:21 pm

It would be very bad reasoning indeed!

Goldy says:

Race as a concept is OK but the thinking that it engenders has made me not fully accept it.

Such a stance will always affect discussions of studies as innocuous as the one being cited here, as ThoughtsCommonToad has demonstrated.

912. Immune system differences found

Comment #146193 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 6:18 pm

ThoughtsonCommonToad said:

This is the kind of thing the BNP use to justify their racism

They will have to work hard to make the obvious and statistically significant differences in health outcomes among ethnic/racial groups work to further some racist ends. Many native-americans seemed to have a higher resistance to syphallis, people not descended from pastoral peoples cannot easily deal with lactose, people of african american descent seem to suffer (under american diets at least) much great risk of early onset high blood pressure. Caucasians seem to suffer heart disease more readily. Tay-Sachs is a disease that my kids have almost no chance of getting unless I have sex with a jew.
Human groups have endured long periods of evolution where genetic mixing with neighbors wasn't happening. Groups then diverged in ways that were selected by the ecologies in which they found themselves. Different genetic defects, and different genetic advantages accrued. Sometimes what appears to be a defect now, would not have been in the native environment. Sickle-cell anemia while is an extreme but good example. Cystic fibrosis may have a similar evolutionary story to tell.

Saying they are wrong about human behavioral tendencies may be getting a bit ahead of ourselves in the assurity department. The work is just begining to be done in earnest. For what it is worth, I imagine it will turn up very little. At least as regards intelligence there seems to be more variablity within a group than between groups. But so what if it does? We needn't hold individuals to some average of the groups they belong to or treat the groups differently because some would average lower at task x.

Clearly there are behavioral differences between the sexes (that have very little to do with culture though can be excacerbated or minimized by culture). So other differences are not out of the question though seem unlikely in any large way.

Race is not the discredited idea some would like it to be. Though it may mean less than once was thought. And in any event the research is not even in the slightest unexpected as such findings have been the norm already.

913. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #146119 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 4:19 pm

ThoughtsoncommonToad said,

Your answer: Bombing them is much better.

Not just bombing them, but comprehensively destroying the Taliban and the infrastructure that aided and supported Al-Qaeda. So that it wouldn't happen again and would give other countries pause before aiding and abetting such actions in the future. Sorry there is just no sense in tip toeing around about this. We don't need to play nice. We need to make sure it doesn't happen again, and we need to make sure that other countries with such designs see what happens when such courses of action are entertained.

914. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #146113 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 4:13 pm

Here is what wikipedia had to say about the Taliban and Al-Qaeda.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taliban#Relationship_with_Osama_bin_Laden

[edit] Relationship with Osama bin Laden
In 1996, Osama bin Laden moved to Afghanistan from Sudan. He came without any invitation from the Taliban, and sometimes irritated Mullah Omar with his declaration of war and fatwa to murder citizens of third-party countries, and follow-up interviews,[84] but relations between the two groups became closer over time, and eventually bonded to the point where Mullah Omar rebuffed its patron Saudi Arabia, insulting Saudi minister Prince Turki and refusing to turn over bin Laden to the Saudis as Omar had reportedly promised to earlier.[85]

Bin Laden was able to forge an alliance between the Taliban and his Al-Qaeda organization. It is understood that al-Qaeda-trained fighters known as the 055 Brigade were integrated with the Taliban army between 1997 and 2001. Several hundred Arab Afghan fighters sent by bin Laden assisted the Taliban in the slaughter at Mazar-e-Sharif.[86] Taliban-al-Qaeda connections, were also strengthened by the reported marriage of one of bin Laden's sons to Omar's daughter. During Osama bin Laden's stay in Afghanistan, he may have helped finance the Taliban.[87] [88] Perhaps the biggest favor al-Qaeda did for the Taliban was the assassination by suicide bombing[52] of the Taliban's most effective military opponent mujahideen commander and Northern Alliance leader Ahmad Shah Massoud shortly before September 9th, 2001. This came at a time when Taliban human rights violations and extremism seemed likely to created international support for Massoud's group as the legitimate representatives of Afghanistan.[52] The killing, reportedly handled by Ayman Zawahiri and the Egyptian Islamic Jihad wing of al-Qaeda, left the Northern Alliance leaderless, and removed "the last obstacle to the Taliban's total control of the country ..."[89]

After the 1998 U.S. embassy bombings in Africa, Osama bin Laden and several al Qaeda members were indicted in U.S. criminal court.[90] The Taliban protected Osama bin Laden from extradition requests by the U.S., variously claiming that bin Laden had "gone missing" in Afghanistan,[91] or that Washington "cannot provide any evidence or any proof" that bin Laden is involved in terrorist activities and that "without any evidence, bin Laden is a man without sin... he is a free man."[92][93] Evidence against bin Laden included courtroom testimony and satellite phone records.[94][95] Bin Laden in turn, praised the Taliban as the "only Islamic government" in existence, and lauded Mullah Omar for his destruction of idols like the Buddhas of Bamiyan.[96]

But dismantling the Taliban seems like a bad idea?

915. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #146103 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 3:59 pm

Thoughtsoncommontoad said

The logic of bombing Afghanistan goes like so, a group of people from London, England decide to go and blow up a a building in the US. Should England then be bombed because of this? And actually most of them were French.

Answer No. The reasons for the invasion of Afghanistan are bogus.

Attacks planned by and financed by Al-Queda who were given room to operate and support in Afghanistan by Taliban government officials. And were quite jazzed by Al-Queda and vice versa.
Doesn't seem bogus to me. So if England is helping support, and allowing terrorist operations to occur that will cause our civilians death then yeah they get the hammer too. If the enemy is just operating with out England's knowledge then the hammer needn't fall on them.

Sorry nothing the Taliban does seems terribly reasonable to me.

916. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #146098 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 3:50 pm

WindWeaver Said:

Anyone who believes that Arafat received a great deal at Camp David and that the US and Israel were on the "right" side has been so heavily propagandised that one wonders whether this issue can even be discussed in a rational manner with said person.

If you are refering to me in that quote, I'm not saying shit. I'm reporting what other people were saying at the time. And not just fucking US and Israeli people saying it. I've heard the same report directly from Palistinians, Saudis, and read such opinions from Egypt. Even the former minister of the Palestinian Authority accused Arafat of scuttling the talks (i got that gem from wikipedia). Al-rawandi has suggested a rebuttal to these reports and I plan to read it. You guys maybe right after all and Israel is utterly evil.


However I do think 91% of what you want is a good place to start the debate and begin the dialogue. I think Native American's would love 91% of what they once had in this country for instance. As unfair as it is, it seems unlikely that the Palestinians will get back everything they once had. That is utterly shitty, but that doesn't make it anyless true.

I will reserve judgement on who is impervious to rational discourse.

917. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #146078 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 3:28 pm

Windweaver,
I think if we were being honest we could generate a list of equal vehemence going the other way toward Israel. Often when Israel does engage in cease-fires etc various elements on the other side continue hostilities. I'm not defending Israel here. I'm just saying that there is plenty of blame to go around.

I think Hitchens has stated the problem best. The secularists on both sides have noted the easy tractablity of the problem, but on either side extremists do conspire otherwise against a sensible solution.

I guess I disagree with Al-rawandi on the Camp David talks, being given 91% of what you asked for isn't a bad place to start in a negotiation. It just isn't. Arafat didn't give a counter-offer it seems, he just walked away. Further he would not offer solid assurances that terror networks would be dismantled. (A good palestinian friend of mine maintains that by this point had Arafat capitulated he himself might have been killed as he did not possess the power he once did, and perhaps had no power to make the guarantee of no future violence). That was a point in which Israelis were right to ask for, but that could have begun simultanesously. What seems to have hung Arafat up was the right of return. Of course I am probably buying a load of propaganda about countries I don't really care that much about. I would like to see a stable region bereft of human rights violations because that is pretty good for us. I would like the resolution to be just. But I also see alot of blame for both sides. You don't. Fine.

I'm bothered by Chomsky because his stuff is all fairly one sided anti-war. I remain unconvinced by his arguments on that point for sure. I don't agree with the anti-war movement's knee-jerk opposition to any and every war. I think it is deeply unrealistic. But nor do I think every military action by the US has been justified. I think Vietnam was a pointless conflict for instance. I'm fine with Afghanistan. I find Iraq problematic to an amazing degree and despite Al-rawandi's (I'm not being condescending here, I do enjoy our chats on the subject) best efforts to educate me on the matter have still not made up my mind about whether conflict there was avoidable. I'm with Al-rawandi on the injustice of the sanctions as they were applied. But I also think in many ways it was partly our mess to clean up.

I do agree with Noam that we ought to not meddle in the democratic foreign policy of other countries simply because that might not benefit us economically. I agree with all of you on this point. I think our behavior in South America and Central America has been nothing short of appalling.

Also I find Chomsky's views on the post-modern critique of science to be spot on.

I guess I just think his views on war, capitalism and foreign policy are just not convincing.
Smart guy, brilliant linguist, I'm just not one his complete fans and sometimes yeah it seems like rambling to me.

918. Fleabytes

Comment #146057 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 2:35 pm

Frankus the guy has a youtube page, it is hilarious.
Here is the link.
http://www.youtube.com/user/xGlenreb

He makes that jerks mistake alot. He seems to think God rejects people so it seems strange to hold none believers accountable. He has no problem placing culpablity on the unbeliever despite the fact he seems to have calvinist leanings. At least I think they are calvanist.

919. Fleabytes

Comment #146017 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 1:41 pm

Steve,
Sorry buddy. If I am England way I will buy you and your husband a cup o joe, or tea as you folks prefer.
I lost 7 min of mine too. So I thought I would share.

920. Fleabytes

Comment #146013 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 1:29 pm

Whoops, I guess I was wrong.
Here the is the proof all of us atheists are delusional.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SryZbY14Mfc

921. Fleabytes

Comment #145969 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 12:18 pm

From what I've read, and admittedly it isn't a terrible much, isn't it true that the Gospels themselves come down many years after all the events described take place.

I also note that as a guide to history the bible is imperfect at best. Catastrophically bad at worst. I think Al-rawandi has abley demonstrated some of the problems that arise from trying to take it as a serious guide to history. It seems like a book whose history is contaminated by myth and then cemented by credulity.

As I said, I am no expert so I am clearly open to hear more on these issues.

922. Fleabytes

Comment #145861 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 8:40 am

Michael Shermer once said something about the dishonesty and general disingenuous of religious apologists. He is too polite to call them on what it was.
He was having lunch with Henry Morris or some such character, and he asked the guy if he really believed the case he was making? Surely he knew the evidence wasn't favoring his side.
The guy conceded the point, saying we just have to keep holding out the hope that some day it will, until then they had to make the best case they could until such time as the facts were on their side.
(For a better account of this story you can find it in Why people believe Weird Things.

Anyway I think it is a huge part of the apologists arsenal. Sometimes is it overt, and sometimes is it is sub-conscious but almost always present.

923. Fleabytes

Comment #145838 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 7:56 am

This kind of dishonesty is in someways par for the course in religious circles. In Scientology it is called "fair game". They can be dishonest in effort to slam the critics and further the gospel of L. Ron Hubbard.

Christianity has no such policy that I know of, but it seems as if the sentiment is still there. Judging by the vague and not so vague distortions of many, though not all, of the theists who come here to chat. DR certainly seems to operate under a mild to medium intensity form of "fair game."

924. Fleabytes

Comment #145821 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 7:19 am

Al-rawandi,
That is it! I was with you at Berienstein Bears but you went off the res with Spider-Man comics being on the banned list.
It will be very hard to speak to you for some time for me.
Why not most of the 1990s Image line? I mean aside from the great art the stories were largely CRAP!
And never ever on time!

925. Fleabytes

Comment #145818 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 7:15 am

Pathfinder,
Ah.....
I think I get it.

926. Fleabytes

Comment #145810 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 7:00 am

Epeeist said of the Deity superstars smackdown:

We need to set the rules though, I mean Quetz really is a monotheistic god, Yahweh is a whole fucking tag team.

I'm not sure how you break up the Triple Team of Yahweh, but I think if we can figure out how to get them to agree to fight only one at a time we might go with MMA rules.

IF its MMA rules I put my money on the grapplers. I think the Greek gods take it hands down. The grapplers almost always win these MMA events. Though I wouldn't count Thor and Odin or even Balder out. I don't know about Thai gods, but if they pack the Muy Thai kickboxing they are always a force.

927. Fleabytes

Comment #145807 by MaxD on March 18, 2008 at 6:50 am

Pathfinder,
You are a funny guy.

Could you clarify, though, what offenses might get people publicly humiliated in the ways you suggest? Would public atheism do the trick? Or Writing books?
Just curious.

928. Are the 'New Atheists' avoiding the 'real arguments'?

Comment #145645 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 9:35 pm

Jac,

Alas that idea went nowhere in here from my perspective as people stayed hung up on Dawkins' sermon about how science DOES in fact provide answers for things, abolishing the need for faith (as if they assumed I didn't know this), even though in practical terms many ordinary non-scientists cannot or do not independently corroborrate scientific hypotheses and therefore at some level or some percentage of inflowing information must simply take the claims of scientists and the textbooks they write "on faith" (as well as the promise that OTHERS are independently corroborrating it on their behalf), even though it can IN PRINCIPLE be verified. This, in essence, is what they do with their pastors and priests, and so many do not see the difference except in the content of the held views and the negatively biased "partisan" portrayal of the "other side" against their own self-described "superior/ideal" world view.

Again I think you over play your hand, and its second hand at that. Dennett discussed this very thing at the very first AAI this year.

The faith enterprise isn't the same as the science enterprise no matter how much you try to spin it. There is no way to verify, once, twice or in principle the propositions of faith. Your favorite pet to kick global climate change has brought thousands of scientists to the table to look at the problem. That the problem requires poliitcal action is the hang up. Not the science.

You seem to be whining that people get hung up on the science end, but you keep bringing up how similar the two endeavors are. So you get to stew a bit in a pot of your own making.
People have made the point that the two endeavors differ rather remarkably. But you keep pounding away at the word faith. Tilting at windmills is the phrase I think that springs to mind.

Further I am sorry to see that you see a need to use words like "Dawkins sermon." It shows your hand a bit too clearly.

You also said:

And if Dawkins is the predetermined catalist for predetermined change, then so be it, but from my perspective it seems that in order to do that one must either win the hearts and minds of everybody

Human action isn't hard determinism, I think human choices are extremely limited but variable given certain inputs. As such new inputs can alter actions.

(not just the dyed-in-the-wool atheists and agnostic "fence-sitters"), or else FORCE (by some shudder-inducing as-yet unknown means) everyone to comply with his world view.

Uh paranoia much? None of the authors cited on this site have ever advocated any thing shudder-inducingto limit the influence of religion. Any writer of a polemic probably has several different audience types in mind. Certainly part of his plan was to let atheists know that they were a larger proportion thanthey thought. And let them know they ought to open their mouths a bit. This was a good thing. Dawkins, Harris, Dennett, and Hitchens have simply put forth the idea it might be a good idea to not let the theocratic position be left uncriticised.

And he hasn't exactly, by many accounts, succeeded in winning hearts and minds so far, and has in fact made a point to say that he isn't interested in that.

And by many accounts he has been successful. He has also succeeded in helping to start a debate that long needed to be had in the west. I'm curious about your studies here that show this his total lack of success. Where are you getting your information?

(Funny how "the left," with which I think Dawkins would identify himself as if presssed, usually accuses "the right" in their failings in recent wars for not "winning hearts and minds" amid failing campaigns...)

No it isn't funny at all. It is a snide, unsubstantiated non-point

929. Fleabytes

Comment #145629 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 8:30 pm

Cartomancer what is the pepsi overcoat trick?

930. Fleabytes

Comment #145625 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 8:08 pm

Steve Zara set records straight when he began a post with.

Let's remind ourselves of these points.

I think this is instructive for DR to review.

931. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145619 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 7:54 pm

I'll look up Finklestein's article but I confess to being as worried about him as I generally am by Chomsky's political ramblings.

932. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145614 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 7:36 pm

Clayton Swisher's The Truth about Camp David is the book you are thinking of maybe?
This book claims it would appear that both sides are equally to blame for the failure of the talks.

933. New Atheists Are Not Great

Comment #145593 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 6:47 pm

Tony Snow said:

This is a more difficult task than one might expect: Atheist works tend to combine argument with large doses of bitter biography. Every chapter of Dawkins's book, for instance, describes unpleasant encounters with believing doltsâ€"hate-mail writers, Jehovah's Witnesses, and the like. Hitchens recalls murderous fanatics in Bosnia, Afghanistan, and the Levant, and his blood-chilling encounters with a childhood schoolmarm.

Uh did he even read the books he is describing?

934. Bishop accuses gays of 'conspiracy' against the Catholic Church

Comment #145591 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 6:44 pm

Ha I win.

935. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145588 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 6:39 pm

Al rawandi said:

Every "peace offering" has been shown to be a sham. Israel with America's support has shown that peace is not an avenue that leads to self determination. What do people expect?

Surely you can't mean this. Surely you just can't possibly mean this.
When Clinton and Ehud Barrack (hopefully I am not butchering the spelling) and Arafat were at the table and Ehud was yoinking civilians out of the settled areas by military force there was a palpable sense that things were on the right path. But who walked away from that table? Arafat even after an execellent starting point for negotiations. Most people point to Arafat as the problem in those talks and no one else.

That is just one example where Israel and the US were on the right side. I'm not casting stones here, there is plenty of blame to go around for everybody.

936. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145534 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 5:28 pm

Not to be dense,
al rawandi mentioned a dastardly (he thought) tactic.

Attacking a retreating army

Is that really bad?
Just curious.

937. Fleabytes

Comment #145417 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 2:51 pm

Clearthinker,
What I find interesting about your comment
5636. Comment #144990 by clearthinker on March 17, 2008 at 6:29 am
especially your response to me was the funny way you chose to address the simple points, and only in the way that most favored your own interpretation of the sex ed situation. You neglected the critique of your crazy assertion that we were immoral sex fiends who wanted to export our liberal ideas about sex to the third world when the main point is that we would mostly like to see AIDs/HIV a much lesser tyranny of disease to quote Hitch. Clearly you are under no obligation to respond to every point I make, or the points of any other poster, but your selectiveness constitutes a dishonest form of argument. Futher you didn't address the rather substitative point that about denying funding to those countries that wouldn't alter their abortion policies. This represents a willingness to consign more people to AIDS including children born and unborn. That seems decidedly un-christian, and a catastrophically callous way to make a contestable theological point. There was no Christian stance on abortion prior to the now discredited pre-formatarianism in which every sperm was a person in miniature.

I think comprehensive sex ed is a must, but clearly one of the most important components is teaching about condom use. I am unsure how many people are moved by our talk of abstinence because what we note in the abstinence only talks is that people have the sex anyway. And when it is abstinence only they have it in more reckless, impassioned ways and still outside of wedlock. Virginity promises, and abstenince programs delay intercourse by some thing like six or eight months if memory serves. So which is most important? Condoms or abstinence?

Clearly abstinence is the best way to stop the spred of AIDs/HIV but people won't quite having sex it seems. That is why the educating people about safe sex without necessarily condoning it is one of the best things you can do.

938. Fleabytes

Comment #145325 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 1:34 pm

Clearthinker said the following:

But in the main you and many on this site have not responded at all. Anyone who cares to click on the 'Other comments' will see precisely what I have done.

Bollocks. I think most of the responses to you have addressed your points. Sure there have been ad homs but you are also rather snide and underhanded in your delivery of very same thing so quit complaining about it.
You also like to say that people aren't responding to you in these posts I guess you feel if you say it enough it will be true. You then selectively quote the posts and execute your coup de gras, you whine about it.
I think the phrase you will recognize is come down off the cross, we could use the wood.

939. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145295 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 1:09 pm

I'm telling you, I felt the love in that love fest.

Seriously though, I am sure you are right about Islamic Scholarship. But in the vagueries of ancient religious text a host of evil gets done in name of modern interpretation. The simple fact is that none of these fantasies copes well with modern ethical questions. The bible for instance has not a word about abortion and in fact christians didn't begin to comdemn the practice until preformatarianism came into vouge. The problem is that people who devotely believe are left with the quandry of either admitting their bullshit is mostly irrelevant or in stretching, hammering, and reinvention of interpretive logic to encompass their gut reaction to modern questions.

940. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145278 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 12:56 pm

In fact in what i think was my first post I said,

But again you bring up the theological scholar as if that represents the dominaint strain of Islam. I agree religion isn't the whole story, but it is a huge part of the whole story. (The men who shot, and continue to threaten abortion doctors in this country were and are religiously motivated. To give but one example). I hope you're right the moderate is right, but with something like 40 % of the US thinking that Jebus will return in the next 50 years added large percentage thinking that he will return sometime in the next hundred years one has to wonder at what strains tend to dominate theological discourse

I think sometimes you are defensive on the Islam critiques. I am not trying to make the worl of Islam simplistic, but we must also admit that while the texts may say one thing somefolk continue to recieve revelation and come to different conclusions. There is in fact a large number of muslims that think this sort of thing is right on the money. Suicide bombing I mean.

I would be happy to agree with you on the techniques to fight a larger, more technically advanced power I suppose. But suicide bombing isn't terribly efficient as proper guerilla tactics. Again I think the negative and destructive beliefs about dying in the service of Jihad are to blame for this. That is one thing that makes the tactic appealing I suspect.

But I think you mis-characterize the conflict at least as far as muslims are concerned, in Iraq. Much of the violence isn't directed at US soldiers it is directed at fellow Muslims often of different sects. US casualities are often a by product of the main target. We in fact are often targeted by unmanned IEDs. Non-suicide weapons. I freely admit I don't understand that discrepancy.
Okay that may have been a bit of a ramble.

941. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145267 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 12:41 pm

Nope,
It isn't my intention to say that violence is endemic to islam. And I am sorry if my first post on this topic indicated as such. You and bonzai were having a love-fest about how wrong it was to look at religion as a cause of suicide bombing. I was just challenging that. I think it is hugely instrumental though certainly not the sole cause of the behavior.

942. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145243 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 11:56 am

Did that work with the italics?
I had failed to properly close one.

943. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145240 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 11:50 am

Al-rawandi-
Here is what I think of the Leonidas Squadron.
It flew, it is argued "From 17 April until 20 April 1945" and that its pilots were given "extensive training and political indoctrination." These point seem salient to me. Because it puts the lie to the statement that the pilots were themselves at wildly different psychological places and probably more likely to be operating in same silly German Pagan Nirvana metaphysical happy place. In any event dogma again rears its ugly head and belief proably figured prominently into these brainwashed people's actions.
They were disbanded shortly after their first largely failed use (they achieved marginal success destroying between 1-17 bridges and losing lots of air-craft and material).

944. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145228 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 11:38 am

Al-rawandi,

I am sure you are absolutely correct on the point about there being not one instance of such a passage. Or I am content to fall to your expertise on the subject. But, as it happens, my argument doesn't stand or fall on what I can find in the texts but rather those people claiming Koranic/Islamic justification for the their actions of religioius fratericide. They seem to believe their actions justified by higher powers.

Also I wasn't trying to be selective with my history, just offering up examples. And taking an action that you think has a slim chance of success that you will survive doesn't I think constitute and act of sucide. Sometimes staying in the trenches meant being shot for sure by a commanding officer, the trek across open fields offered at least a marginally higher chance at life in many places in WWI.

945. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145220 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 11:29 am

Al-rawandi said:

Bonzai is right. You are absolutely and totally wrong.


There are two Hadiths in the Sahih al-Bukari. Both have what scholars would consider Isnad sahih (verified chains of narration). Both of these are consistent in saying that the manner of suicide will be the manner of torture in the hellfire.

This is not a "minority of scholars" it is the entirety of scholars.

I think you missed my point, or I was unclear. I think these people represent smaller numbers in Muslim circles. It could be 100% of the scholars but still represent a small portion of Muslim thought. I say this only because I can never get anyone of my muslim friends to admit such intentional attacks against the soft target are immoral. It can also be hard to get such condemnation from high profile muslims on the issue of violence and its uses.

My point is that people obviously cherry pick the texts, and find justification for their action in their tradition.

946. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145213 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 11:20 am

The iraqi sects have been blowing each other up over nationalism?

I thought one of Osama's cronies had said of another sect, it was okay they were killed in these bombings because they were part of an errant sect. I can't remember the details exactly, but I believe he went on to say they would have to be dealt with eventually anyway.

947. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145207 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 11:12 am

Where were the suicide attacks in the Confederacy?
Where were the suicide attacks in the revolutionary war? Where was the relentless targetting of soft targets by the oppressed in both the Confederate uprising, and the Revolutionary wars?

If memory serves the North did a bit of slash and burn warfare in the Civil War.
And the English did some of the same in the Revolutionary war.

Where is the suicide bombing that could occur in this country at the hands of poor African Americans? Why haven't we seen it at times of intense moments of oppression in their history in the US?
I suspect belief is an important factor.

948. Bishop accuses gays of 'conspiracy' against the Catholic Church

Comment #145197 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 11:02 am

To Bonzai's edit. which stated

To you hate speech that incites violence against gays is probably just an abstract idea open for debate. For those who may be on the receiving end it is not abstract at all. There is nothing debatable about my worthiness as a human being.

Yes it is. Sorry. It just is. In a society that is free and open about its ideas it is all open for debate. People can say as G. HW. Bush did, atheists shouldn't even be citizens. I can argue the point. The debate about blacks being fully human, that you are quite happy to see banned,
actually happened and was good for at least this country in that it sped up a wider acceptance of that very personhood. In the war of ideas the homosexual front is, happily, winning. Many sitcoms have homosexuals, there are several hugely popular TV shows centered around gay folk. A gay politician is more likely than an atheist to be elected to public office. These are good things. And a sure sign that argument, reason and empathy work when given a chance.

Do we want to have laws that prevent violence toward people. Sure. But we have them. We needn't add hate speech law to the mix.

949. Bishop accuses gays of 'conspiracy' against the Catholic Church

Comment #145184 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 10:47 am

Bonzai said

"I think the law is pretty clear about offensive and hurtful speech and threatening speech. If someone calls you an asshole you may be offended or hurt but it is not against the law. The police will not take action against the offender. However if someone tells you he is going to beat you up or kill you, then it is a criminal offence. Making threats doesn't go under free speech."

Here is an exchange I had at a fair when some crazy guy started to get loose from one of his crazy-person handlers, and started making lude gestures toward my daughter. He clearly wanted to come after her and accost her in some way.
Here is what I said.
"You had better get a hold of that motherfucker. I am going to fuck him up if he comes over here."
It wasn't idle, and I would have hurt him very very badly.
Should I have been arrested for my threat? I of course don't think so. I did after all threaten a minortiy and somewhat oppressed group-the mentally ill. The crazy person himself noticably calmed down and the woman tasked with handling him apologized and led him away with the rest of their group.

So should threats be considered hate speech or unlawful?

Admittedly this may not be an example you will accept.

950. I don't believe in atheists

Comment #145163 by MaxD on March 17, 2008 at 10:27 am

Bonzai said,

Islam is strongly against suicide, the torture for those who die by their own hands in the after life is quite horrific and most Islamic scholars agree that suicide bombing is not martyrdom. The normal definition of martyrdom is that one has to die by the enemy's hand. Suicide bombing would be the last thing a Muslim would do if he is motivated only by religious fanaticism because mainstream interpretation of the religion is overwhelmingly against it.

I think this would be nice if it were true. My only question to you is this. Who fucking cares about this small body of people you call "muslim scholars?" Clearly they don't represent the majority of muslim thinkers. Or even if they did, some too large number of people are finding some justification for suicide bombing of soft targets in their religious sect. Most of these suicide bombers are as it happens quite well off, and educated. Both the major british bombings and the 9/11 attacks were carried out by educated people, who seemed to be doing well for themselves and had prospects in this life.

But again you bring up the theological scholar as if that represents the dominaint strain of Islam. I agree religion isn't the whole story, but it is a huge part of the whole story. (The men who shot, and continue to threaten abortion doctors in this country were and are religiously motivated. To give but one example). I hope you're right the moderate is right, but with something like 40 % of the US thinking that Jebus will return in the next 50 years added large percentage thinking that he will return sometime in the next hundred years one has to wonder at what strains tend to dominate theological discourse.