51. Oxford's Christian colleges 'are not suitable for school-leavers'

Comment #71667 by Ultraviolet G on September 19, 2007 at 12:37 pm

Steven Mading>

It means people just out of high-school (ie. they have "left" their secondary education).

52. Do you have to read up on leprechology before disbelieving in them?

Comment #70999 by Ultraviolet G on September 17, 2007 at 12:46 pm

Flagellant (plus everyone else, actually):

When I said maybe we should refer to "gods" rather than "God"; I wasn't thinking about that particular "statistical" argument about Zeus and so on, so much as how very simple choices of language can get in the way of making oneself understood to a believer, particularly in a montheistic religion.

Revcort is providing an excellent example of that emotional reaction: he or she is making the assumption that the "God" she believes in is specifically the one that I don't believe in.

Revcort: Allah is the one true God and Mohammed is his prophet. There are millions of testaments from deep personal experience that this is true. Please take up this discussion with them and maybe they can help you see the error of your ways.

53. Do you have to read up on leprechology before disbelieving in them?

Comment #70926 by Ultraviolet G on September 17, 2007 at 9:01 am

Here is an idea, possibly useful for Prof. Dawkins when he gives interviews. I am sure someone can improve on it.

When referring to what Atheists (don't) believe, it might help monotheists bypass their emotional reflex, and understand your point better, by saying that Atheists don't believe in gods. Saying "God" triggers an automatic response. Saying "gods" is both more accurate and less emotional.

54. Do you have to read up on leprechology before disbelieving in them?

Comment #70922 by Ultraviolet G on September 17, 2007 at 8:54 am

To Fides et Ratio:

Yes, those are 2 different gods deserving 2 different criticisms.

The first ("small god") is the fundamentalist "this book is actually true, and bats are actually birds, and rabbits chew the cud." kind of god.

The second ("metaphorical god") is the liberal definition "god is love" or "god is the force of nature"; which is less obviously wrong, but is literally meaningless beyond being poetry. An atheist could say exactly the same kind of thing, and indeed Einstein did so. If "god" is a nice word for "the universe" then everyone here believes in that god, but this is just playing word-games.

To Revcort: Wow, you are the x000th person to make that exact same mistake/ fall for that lie.

Let us all sing it together now: Atheism means not having a belief in any of the many gods people have had during history. It is similar to not having a belief in unicorns. Maybe unicorns could exist, but I don't believe in them and I expect you don't either.

55. Youtube hater, I respect your right to free speech.

Comment #70659 by Ultraviolet G on September 16, 2007 at 1:34 pm

Some very good points again all round about whether the important fight against superstition requires a "movement" or simply individual courage (methinks both although the "movement" is certainly not Atheism itself- rather it is a "pro-atheism lobby" or "anti-superstitionism").

However, Yorker and Spinoza, stop trading insults (especially Yorker), sheesh. You guys, and this whole extended debate, remind me of that Bill Hicks sketch.

"You should see how badly the abortion issue divides my friends:

On the one hand, some of my friends think these so-called pro-lifers are annoying idiots.

On the other hand, some of my friends think pro-lifers...are evil fucks."

56. Creationism raised as Ont. election issue

Comment #68487 by Ultraviolet G on September 7, 2007 at 9:16 am

Good points from Crazymalc & Spinoza (and Dennett).

One small but useful bit of vocabulary:

TENANTS = people who rent a building.

TENETS = principles, beliefs and dogma.

Especially when some of the people you are debating / talking with may not know what "tenets" are, it's good to have the right word in case they want to look it up in order to understand your arguments better.

(Yeah right... I think John Cornwell has shown us how likely that actually is).

57. Cartoons from Evolution: a journal of nature 1927-1938

Comment #67958 by Ultraviolet G on September 5, 2007 at 11:30 am

Something all fundamentalists seem to have in common is an astounding lack of a sense of humour (or at least one that isn't horrifically sadistic and life-hating).

Laugh-a-minute stuff, this. Good to see the subtle references to that hilarious tsunami:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/aftereden/view.aspx?id=202

I believe the original title of this one was "next time do what the men say, bitch!"
http://www.answersingenesis.org/aftereden/view.aspx?id=203

Then there's these guys. Trying real hard, but they keep coming back to really unfunny and ambivalent "jokes" about osama bin laden, suicide bombs and kidnapping...take your own hints, guys.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bVuco280-zg

Sorry for inflicting those on you- don't bother searching AIG for more of those terrible catoons, it will destroy your sin-filled, corrupt, selfish soul.

Oh, and pewkatchoo, please make a distinction between nominal "christians", and the hardliners who are perverse, sadistic, sexist bastards who do indeed need punching.

58. Like any half-decent atheist, I'm fond of a bit of religion

Comment #67928 by Ultraviolet G on September 5, 2007 at 7:30 am

Methinks the Professor takes a little too much satisfaction in the eloquence of his own metaphors and too little account of the richness of the alternatives.

59. A Daddy Longlegs Tells the Story of the Continents' Big Shifts

Comment #66240 by Ultraviolet G on August 29, 2007 at 12:20 pm

>>Big John
How does an invertebrate biologist support himself?

..I expect he gets a grant from Harvard.

za-ZING!

60. Sleights of Mind

Comment #64893 by Ultraviolet G on August 22, 2007 at 8:06 am

As an aside- on the subject of Magic. A friend of mine is an expert close-up magician. Particularly card tricks. He does one trick involving the audience member taking a card, then replacing it in the pack, then "magically" making your card flip over face up. I simply couldn't work out how it was done. So, after his show, he explained it to me. He alters the pack layout a little, but the important "magic" is this:
He just flips the pack upside-down (with a little hand movement).

He showed me slowly, again and again, so that I could see the very smooth and well-practiced technique involved. I asked him to do the trick again at usual speed, thinking I would certainly "catch" him doing it.

I chose a card, put it back, then kept staring at the cards for ages until he said "er...I already did it, see?" I actually felt an increase in stress - part of my brain was reacting as though he was "lying" about it, because my visual perception still didn't match what I consciously knew about the technique. This sort of thing happens all the time. What we think we "know" about our reality is not always very reliable or even consistent.

61. Sleights of Mind

Comment #64888 by Ultraviolet G on August 22, 2007 at 7:45 am

Mr Empirical (and others)>

Spinoza's sentence is counter-intuitive but worth parsing again. She already knows EVERYTHING about red. Including, yes, what it is like to experience seeing it. She simply hasn't physically had those parts of her optic nerve stimulated by a Red object before.

To paraphrase Dan Dennett: is consciousness real? - or is it just a collection of robots?? .. Well, it IS real - And it's made from a collection of robots!

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

Comment #53971 by Ultraviolet G on July 4, 2007 at 1:48 pm

I'd like to make it clear that at no point have I called Xenocratic any names, and that (s)he is factually correct about many aspects of U.S. and European abuses of power through history.

My problem is that the overall tone of the post seemed to be veering towards Noam Chompsky style moral equivalence, or, worse, the post-modern Left's obsession with guilt and blame.

The Persians, Romans, Celts, Brits, Aztecs, Mongolians, Japanese, Chinese and so on ad nauseam also did terrible things throughout history. But there is no "atrocity bank" where suffering is cached, added and balanced. We don't reach equilibrium by subtracting the evils of one culture from another.

Furthermore, we are learning to behave better. With luck the British will not repeat massacres of Indians and Africans, and the Spanish won't be killing any Peruvians. And as Sam Harris points out, even the Chimp President would, given the choice and some kind of competence transplant, avoid civilian casualties whenever possible.

Right now Islam actively encourages civilian casualties and shows no sign of even wanting to become more tolerant: this is a threat to the future of civilization. Blaming some dead old racists because they were also bad isn't going to help us much.

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

Comment #53895 by Ultraviolet G on July 4, 2007 at 3:01 am

>Xenocratic

Hitchens would actually agree with you about the Zionist occupation of Palestine (which is exacerbated by American Christians), US war crimes (especially in Cambodia which was even more egregious than Vietnam: see his work on Kissinger) and the House of Saud (he often pointedly refuses to call Arabia "Saudi"). Where did you form your opinion of him? It seems completely opposite to the truth. You seem to fall into the old "liberal vs. conservative" or "America vs. everyone else" trap. (Hitch isn't a conservative by the way).