1851. True faith is greater than the ranters

Comment #40315 by steve99 on May 14, 2007 at 5:38 am

"He makes an assertion, that is contrary to common experience, that the vast majority of religious believers are closer to the beliefs of American evangelists or of bloodthirsty Islamic terrorists than to quiet and rational religion. That is a sociological judgment."

No, it is a matter of statistics.

"I believe it to be false. It is certainly false in England, where Professor Dawkins presumably meets most of his theist acquaintances. It is not true of Anglicans; it is not true of Roman Catholics."

This is an outrageous statement. It shows Rees-Mogg is out of touch with reality here. Very recently his supposedly moderate Anglican and Catholic churches were campaigning vigorously, including all their unfortunate political muscle, against the gay rights in the UK. The Catholic Church has labelled gay relationships as "weak and deviant". And what some of the African Anglican Bishops state on this subject has to be read to be believed. When Dawkins states about the vast majority of believers is factually correct.

It is fine for some well-off establishment journalist with a cosy life to claim that all is well, but he is blind to the hatred and oppression caused by his so-called moderate Churches.

1852. The Case Against Intelligent Design: The Faith That Dare Not Speak Its Name

Comment #40250 by steve99 on May 14, 2007 at 3:07 am

devolved:

I have read that link presented a critique on this page. In case you missed it: (1) The knee is not irreducible in design because it can be used even when damaged; (2) You don't need transitional forms between the knee joint and other types of joint because it did not evolve from them. To ask for transitional forms in this case is like asking for transitional forms between the eye and the ear. (3) You can follow the evolution of the knee all the way back to fish.

As for that supposed refutation of tiklaalik, it is a joke. Just to take one example; it claims that transitional forms can't be transitional if they are larger than things that came afterwards.

Are you honestly expecting us to take that kind of crazy reasoning seriously? Do you believe that short people that are smaller than their supposed parents must be either illegitimate, adopted, or spontaneously created by God?

If you are going to agree with that link about the knee, you are going to have to argue against those points I raised above. You are going to have to show:

(1) That when we see people walking with damaged knees, it is an illusion, because knees are irreducible.

(2) Specific reasons why the human knee could not have evolved from simpler forms even though those simpler forms can be seen even in current animal skeletons - you don't even need fossils.

(3) Why the knee must have evolved from some other kind of joint (such as ball-and-socket).

Science is not about what you want to believe. It is about what is testable. Your need to belief that we did not evolve through a combination of chance and selextion does not make that belief right. No-one is trying to stop you having that belief. The problem is trying to justify that belief with science. It just doesn't work.

1853. The Case Against Intelligent Design: The Faith That Dare Not Speak Its Name

Comment #40184 by steve99 on May 13, 2007 at 4:02 pm

devolved:

All you have to do is go an look at the knee joints of a range of animals, all the way 'down' to amphibians and fossil fishes to see how the knee joint arose and developed.

There is not the slightest foundation to Burgess' claimes - anyone can go to their nearest Natural History museum and dispose of his arguments in minutes.

What you see is precisely what you would expect to see if the joint had evolved through the slow forces of Natural Selection. Evolution is a predictive and falsifiable science. A particular transitional form between fishes and amphibians (including limb evolution) was predicted, and such a form was recently found: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiktaalik_roseae

You are, of course, free to claim that this evidence is purely imagination. But if you do that it hard to conceive of anything that you would consider evidence.

1854. The Case Against Intelligent Design: The Faith That Dare Not Speak Its Name

Comment #40126 by steve99 on May 13, 2007 at 8:23 am

One thing I find amazing about so much ID 'theory' is that even the supposedly scientific parts seem to be unfalsifiable. Behe is still arguing that the bacterial flagellum is irreducible, long after this was refuted from the point of view of any reasonable biologist. The existence of similar but simpler structures to the flagellum, which showed that, in principle, the flagellum was not irreducibly complex, led to a response that this didn't count, as the flagellum appeared first! This is, of course, irrelevant to the irreducibility argument.

This is such intellectual dishonesty.

1855. The Case Against Intelligent Design: The Faith That Dare Not Speak Its Name

Comment #40123 by steve99 on May 13, 2007 at 8:00 am

CJ: I am far more optimistic. For one thing, it is hard to think of how a system of apparently irreducible complexity could be proven to be irreducible - it is almost always possible to conceive of some route by which a feature has evolved. The other point is that even if we find true irreducible complexity, that is no justification for suggesting an even more complex designer.

1856. The Case Against Intelligent Design: The Faith That Dare Not Speak Its Name

Comment #40099 by steve99 on May 13, 2007 at 5:28 am

CJ: If you will excuse the double-negative; we don't have an inability to see previous forms in the fossil record. See the link I supplied.

1857. The Case Against Intelligent Design: The Faith That Dare Not Speak Its Name

Comment #40097 by steve99 on May 13, 2007 at 5:10 am

devolved:

I find it depressing that someone can write such a detailed and lucid article and yet it can have no effect on some people.

Any claim that the Human knee is irreducable (as in that link) is ludicrous, and clearly demonstrated by the fact that people with certain types of major knee injury can still walk!

Just look at some more of the nonsense in that "paper":

"The knee joint presents a major challenge to the evolutionist because it is unique, and because there are no intermediate forms of joint between a condylar joint and the other two limb joints found in animals and humans - the ball and socket joint and the pivot joint."

There are no intermediate forms because the knee joint did not evolve from those other joint types!

Here is a link showing limb evolution:
http://homepage.mac.com/wis/Personal/lectures/limb-evolution/LimbEvolution.html

So there is yet another silly Intelligent Design argument in the wastebin...

1858. Defenders of Marriage

Comment #39976 by steve99 on May 12, 2007 at 1:12 pm

Well put Logicel. I am a huge admirer of Tom Lehrer, and Roy looks like a possible successor.

1859. Ted Haggard Is Completely Heterosexual

Comment #39930 by steve99 on May 12, 2007 at 10:25 am

This guy is really talented. He is a true heir of Tom Lehrer.

1860. Unintelligent Design

Comment #39899 by steve99 on May 12, 2007 at 8:16 am

"In the competition for moral allegiance, secular ideologies are at a disadvantage."

I believe this is easily shown to be false. One of the most inspiring experience of my teenage years was watching Carl Sagan's Cosmos series. Although much of the science is now very outdated, what it did so well was to give the experience of science and the wonders it can reveal, and experience I, and I am sure many others, found far more inspiring than small and parochial concerns of religion I had experienced.

And as anyone who watched that series will remember, it had a very moral message.

I would challenge anyone to watch that series again; to read Sagan's writings, and then attempt to back Atran's assertion.

1861. Does God Exist? The Nightline Face-Off

Comment #39807 by steve99 on May 12, 2007 at 2:06 am

I admire their courage for participating, but I don't think Brian and Kelly did that well; they seemed to win by default only because their opponents were so bad. If you are going to appear in public to discuss science, you need to be very sure of the science you are going to discuss. Brian should not have used poor physics arguments to debate the creationists. The problem with doing that is if you make mistakes in your arguments like that it will be picked up eagerly by your opponents. There was also a distraction into discussing the contents of the bible which the RRS should not have been lured into.

I think this strongly supports Dawkins' point of view that debating with creationists is a waste of time.

1862. Is Christianity Good for the World?

Comment #39311 by steve99 on May 10, 2007 at 9:51 am

bluehillside: Good points. However, I think there is another argument believers commonly use...

"I have had a personal experience or revelation that proved to me that God exists".

I think this arises because most people have a very poor understanding of psychology and conciousness. We are very easily fooled (even by our own minds). We see things that aren't there, and we hear voices that aren't there. (I have seen some demonstrations from Daniel Dennett and Michael Shermer of how the mind can be fooled that have amazed me).

1863. Is Christianity Good for the World?

Comment #39180 by steve99 on May 10, 2007 at 6:15 am

I think there is an interesting point that is rarely raised in such discussions. The religious views are always intensely anthropocentric. They seem to neglect the fact that we can see good evidence of 'morality' in other species. Where are the holy books and messiahs that encourage good behaviour in chimps, elephants, dolphins etc? The evidence that a sense of morality is innate is clear.

1864. An ecumenical contempt for religion

Comment #38696 by steve99 on May 9, 2007 at 1:49 am

"It the end of the day, it was either a good idea or a bad idea to invade Iraq. The Coalition had to choose either to invade or not to invade. The Coalition didn't have the option to 'partially invade' Iraq."

This again is the kind of statement that troubles me. Everything put in black-and-white terms and with such certainty. Whether or not it was a good idea depends on who you were and where you were. Go to Iraq and ask a Kurd, and you would almost certainly hear that it was an very good idea indeed.

"I think it is reasonable to be fairly certain that the Iraq War was a mistake. Especially given the fact that democracy and freedom have not been successfully established in the country."

You see, this makes my point quite well. If different actions had been taken and democracy well-established, perhaps then you might now be saying that the war was not a mistake. So what was the actual mistake? Invading? Or any of a hundred decisions taken afterwards?

The coalition had many, many options about what do to after the initial invasion. The problem was that mistakes were made. Perhaps the worst of those was to disband the existing Iraqi military structures.

In my view it is far, far too simplistic to put forward statemens like 'to invade was wrong' or 'the war was wrong', as there were so many factors and possibilities and consequences.

What I really don't like is that much 'anti-war' sentiment seems to arise from well-meaning but unthinking left-wing herd mentality. It is one of the things you almost have to declare if you wish to be known as a correct-thinking person in some circles. I am not saying this is the case here, but it seems to be often used against Hitchens - he must be wrong about everything because he is pro-war. He is an independent thinker and many seem to find that hard to deal with.

I am, on balance, against the Iraq war, but at least I admit things are complex and far from obvious.

1865. An ecumenical contempt for religion

Comment #38503 by steve99 on May 8, 2007 at 11:46 am

AtheistAttorney....

The fact is that many intelligent, worldly wise people have (at least for a while) supported the Iraq war. Argument from incomprehensibility has never been useful.

"I would not like to be seen to be supporting a tyrant but one point of view is that Iraq for all Sadam's sabre rattling was a rather advanced country with many beautiful cities and for all the alleged oppression people may have suffered, at least their children went to school, they had shelter, food, water and could go to the ice cream shop on Sunday for a treat."

It depended who you were and what your views were. If you were a Kurd or a Shi'a or a Marsh Arab life was not so wonderful.

"I'd take Sadam."

It seems to me to be a patronising attitude to declare that others should be happy under a dictator.

All I am trying to point out here is that intelligent, knowledgeable people can come to hold different opinions. I am personally mostly against the war, but I can see how others have diferent views, and I can respect them.

1866. An ecumenical contempt for religion

Comment #38428 by steve99 on May 8, 2007 at 4:43 am

"I have no trouble understanding complex issues. I have examined the evidence, and I have presented a brief summary of the evidence. The evidence indicates that the war was and is wrong."

In this life things are rarely simply 'right' or 'wrong'. For very many Iraqis the war was and is right. For many Iraqis the war was and is wrong.

"That is not arrogance. It is evidence-based reasoning."

I am sorry if this sounds harsh, but I feel it is arrogant to claim such certainty from any evidence.

"I have argued - using evidence and reasoning - that his viewpoint is wrong."

But others using the same evidence have argued that his viewpoint is right.

I am not disagreeing with your conclusions. I am disagreeing with your certainty.

1867. An ecumenical contempt for religion

Comment #38397 by steve99 on May 8, 2007 at 1:46 am

MrEmpirical:

"It irritates me that Hitchens can be so right about some things and yet so wrong about others."

Surely what you mean to say is that it irritates you that while Hitchens shares your view about some things, he has different views on other things. These are complex issues, and to claim knowledge of the rightness and wrongness of them seems a bit arrogant.

"Saddam was an evil man, but perhaps an iron fist is needed to control a country that contains so many opposing 'tribes' (i.e. Sunnis, Shiite, Kurds, etc.)."

I find this a very troubling point of view. It is a patronising "democracy is good enough for us but not for them" view.

"If Hitchens is opposed to religion, and the problems associated with religion, why is he in favour of the Iraq War?"

Because he is opposed to murderous genocidal tyrants. This is nothing to do with religion.

"I simply can't understand how Hitchens can be so blind to the fact that the Iraq War is and always was a big mistake."

But surely part of the atheist attitude we are trying to encourage here is an ability to admit what we don't know. Just because you don't understand Hitchens' viewpoint does not mean that he was necessarily wrong.

I happen to have major doubts about the Iraq war, but I am happy to admit to being confused about the whole complex, messy business. I also realise that Hitchens, for all his faults, is a lot brighter than me and has undoubtedly researched things a lot more than I have. I happen to think he is wrong, but that is just my view. I would not be prepared to claim it with any certainty.

1868. The New Atheists loathe religion far too much to plausibly challenge it

Comment #38221 by steve99 on May 7, 2007 at 8:59 am

Ms. Bunting has been a long-time contributor to the Guardian, and her piece here is typical of her middle-brow ideas.

I believe the reason why the Guardian is such a good source of such muddled thinking is because it has only a token reporting and understanding of science issues. Apart from the occasional piece by the wonderful Ben Goldacre, the paper has a tendency to drift into sloppy cultural relativism. I stopped buying it daily when its sister paper the Observer started publishing horoscopes...

1869. Martin Amis reviews The Islamist: Why I Joined Radical Islam in Britain, What I Saw Inside and Why I Left by Ed Hussain

Comment #37602 by steve99 on May 5, 2007 at 10:24 am

Weefree - I have not heard of a single atheist who claims that only religious people are motivated to 'do really bad things'. The problem is not theism as such. It is faith. Supporters of Mao and Stalin had unquestioning faith in their leaders. The problem with religion is that it is such a strong source of faith. That does not mean it is the only one.

The really important struggle is not really between theists and atheists. (I am beginning to think that this is something of a distraction). it is between those who have faith, and those who are prepared to doubt. This applies just as much in other areas (scientific, political) as it does in religion.

1870. How multiculturalism is betraying women

Comment #36880 by steve99 on May 2, 2007 at 4:05 pm

The recent history of inappropriate respect for oppressive right-wing views (justfied as 'religious') of minorities is discussed in detail in a recent book "What's Left" by Nick Cohen - an interesting read.

1871. Religion & Culture Panel

Comment #36500 by steve99 on May 1, 2007 at 10:45 am

I am glad that Hitchens is getting such a wide audience as a result of his new book. I have admired him for a long time. (Although not all of his views - but we so badly need gadflies like him). He has a formidable and independent intellect, as so amusingly demonstrated in this discussion. What was disappointing was how the other panelists seemed to simply ignore the questions he was asking.

On another matter, Kirch's statement about vandalism was simply outrageous. Questioning the religious belief of a culture through reasoned argument is equivalent to vandalism? He should be ashamed for making such a statement.

1872. Just 120 Trillion Miles From Home

Comment #36147 by steve99 on April 30, 2007 at 9:42 am

Squinky - people were saying exactly the same thing about high-speed train travel, about flying, and so on. Serious scientists last century even suggested that getting to the Moon was impossible, and gave apparently sound physical arguments why.

I suggest you take a look at Clarke's Three Laws:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clarke's_three_laws

However, even with current technologies we can imagine at least the possibility of how to get human colonists (or their descendants) to nearby stars. As has been mentioned, a very high-power laser system could launch a 'solar sail' arrangement at a significant proportion of the speed of light, and with a sufficiently focussed beam could even be used for deceleration at the destination. There are many ways to provide shielding from cosmic rays - rock from an asteroid around a craft, or magnetic fields.


There is very good reason to colonise, and talk of preserving our planet is simplistic. Part of the normal cycle of events on our planet is mass extinction. There has been talk of diverting possible extinction-causing asteroids, but no technology we can even imagine could do anything about supervolcanoes or massive lava floods.

Thinking about colonisation of other planets both within and beyond our solar system is a rather good idea for the long-term survival of humankind.

1873. Here Comes the Fourth Musketeer.

Comment #33763 by steve99 on April 21, 2007 at 4:26 pm

I have seen many posts about Christopher Hitchens that in my opinion are extremely unfair. He is neither purely right wing or an opportunist. He is that very rare thing these days - an independent thinker. Just because he does not follow the standard and complete off-the-shelf set of left-wing ideas does not make him a typical right-winger. Hitchens has always been a source of original and challenging ideas and because of this is someone to be valued and listened to.

1874. Prophets of the new atheism

Comment #30468 by steve99 on April 8, 2007 at 6:13 am

"Can disbelief in God be considered "religious"? Sure. Just ask Zen Buddhists, who worship no deity. By religion, I mean any faith-based set of values that makes exclusive claims for its truth and explains the mysteries of the universe. Yes, atheism begins with a faith, namely that only material and physical (not spiritual) causes make the world run."

And at this point I gave up. Even in this short section there is inconsistency, factual errors and very confused thinking.

Firstly, to equate Zen Buddhism with a religious disbelief in God is absurd. Zen Buddhists don't actively go around "disbelieving" in God, any more than they actively go round disbelieving in the Flying Spaghetti Moster. Zen Buddists simply are religious without the need for a God.

Secondly, I have yet to hear of any atheist who claims that their values explain the mysteries of the universe. That level of arrogance seems associated with some religions.

Thirdly, the claim that atheists necessarily abandon spirituality is shown to be nonsense with the example he gives - Zen Buddhism.

Not a very impressive bit of writing.

1875. In the Beginning

Comment #29010 by steve99 on April 1, 2007 at 6:59 am

Yorker. I shan't go on much more, as I don't want to bore people... but I hope you won't mind one more comment.

As for 'purpose', well who are we to judge what that means, or to say it is or isn't likely? My impression of what Davies is moving towards is some sort of 'feedback loop', in which concious life picks certain universes out of the possibilities simply by existing in the future. This is probably hopelessly over-simplified, but indicates that by 'purpose' he is in no way suggesting 'divine purpose'.

I have to admit I am not a huge fan of Davies myself. (He seems to have an excessive fascination with singularies as if they were a place where 'magic' can happen, rather than simply indicating our theories are incomplete).

However, as I said, a recent award from the Royal Society suggests that far from doing science a disservice, his continuing contribution (although admittedly controversial in some ways) is highy valued.

Thanks for the discussion.

1876. In the Beginning

Comment #28771 by steve99 on March 30, 2007 at 6:10 pm

Yorker, I agree we aren't going to agree, but what disappointed me was your strong language. We aren't doing the atheist 'cause' any favours if we are so quick to dismiss those who aren't the follwers of the purest of atheist stances. This seems immoderate.

And as for Stenger's thoughts, well, again I think you are vastly overstating the case. They are interesting thoughts, but, as I said, most cosmologists think have little doubt that there really is a fine-tuning issue with parameters of the universe. Stenger is, anyway, attacking what is virtually a straw man, which is the point of view that only our form of life is possible. The fine tuning argument is far deeper than that, and is not only about 'carbon-based life forms'. According to most cosmologists, we are talking about having to fine tune even to get universes where any form of complexity at all that lasts any length of time is possible (especially regarding the cosmological constant, for example). I can understand the attraction of Stenger's ideas, but I don't think we need to move away from mainstream consensus physics to defend atheism. I worry that this makes us look like we are cherry-picking in the same way as we accuse our religious opponents of doing.

1877. In the Beginning

Comment #28746 by steve99 on March 30, 2007 at 3:16 pm

Yorker - I am just uncomfortable about rejecting the opinions of someone who is definitely still a respected physicist, and with very interesting ideas. I think you are overstating the case. He received the Michael Faraday Prize from the Royal Society in 2002 - not an indication of someone widely rejected by the scientific establishment. I dislike the Templeton Prize too, but to reject Davies' work because of that seems excessive, especially the phrase "it looks like he decided Templeton's money was more important than anything else to him". I don't think that is at all fair.

And, arrogant though it must sound, I disagree with that statement of Venger. There are vast ranges of the physical parameters of the universe for which there would not even be atoms, let alone any possibility of life. I am in good company in my skepticism of this view (Sir Martin Rees, for example). Venger's models are very controversion and many think that they contain too few parameters.

1878. In the Beginning

Comment #28715 by steve99 on March 30, 2007 at 1:20 pm

Yorker - I consider your statement about Paul Davies to be perhaps a bit harsh. I have been reading his books since the 70s, and I don't think his views have changed that much. He gave a very good talk at last year's Beyond Belief conference, and I'd like to quote from a recent book of his: "The Goldilocks Enigma":

"Our minds are the products of genes and memes. Now we are free of Darwinian evolution and able to create our own real and virtual worlds, and our information processing technology can take us to intellectual arenas that no human mind has ever before visited, those age-old questions of existence may evaporate away, exposed as nothing more than the befuddled musings of biological beings trapped in a mental straightjacket inherited from evolutionary happenstance. The whole paraphernalia of gods and laws, of space, time and matter, of purpose and design, rationality and absurdity, meaning and mystery, may yet be swept away and replaced by revelations as yet undreamt of."

In the same book, he also rejects many explanations for the origin of the Universe as "ridiculous or hopelessly inadequate", including "pre-existing God who is somehow self-explanatory".

You may disagree with his emphasis in his writings, but I think mention of a "Judas-like defection" is way over the top.

1879. Richard Dawkins: Author of the Year!

Comment #28304 by steve99 on March 28, 2007 at 5:10 pm

I hope this doesn't sound too fawning, but I have to agree to some extent with Shaker. There seems to have been a recent renaissance in science publishing for the general public, but Dawkins has been consistently working at making science accessible and exciting for decades.

I admit that there would be delicious irony seeing an honour for one of the most well-known and active atheists bestowed by the head of the Church of England. On the other hand, I am sure that many fellow scientists (like me) see the FRS after Dawkins name as an honour that far exceeds anything that could come from goverment.

1880. Richard Dawkins: Author of the Year!

Comment #28261 by steve99 on March 28, 2007 at 2:45 pm

Richly deserved (although, to be honest, it is hard to see how they could have decided otherwise - what other author has been so influential?)

1881. Stephen Hawking Says Universe Created from Nothing

Comment #28230 by steve99 on March 28, 2007 at 12:45 pm

The problem with discussing matters like the origin of the universe is that our language does not really cope well with this kind of thing, and common sense is not that good either. (Certainly, the language that Hawking seems to have used is not that clear). What I find interesting is that in this area modern physics seems to be on the way to making so many philosophical and theological debates redundant. There are many ideas about why the universe exists that don't require any idea of a definite beginning but neither do they ask us to believe the universe has always existed. Some work in String theory suggests that both time and space might be the secondary result of other interactions (although language fails us, as what does 'interaction' mean if there is no time?). One of Hawking's ideas was 'imaginary time' - there was no beginning, and time appeared smoothly from a space dimension. Other physicists (Andre Linde) have suggested that our apparently linear time split off from what was originally a time loop.

This all makes discussion of 'first cause' look rather like a debate about the geometry of a flat Earth - irrelevant and outdated.

1882. Stephen Hawking Says Universe Created from Nothing

Comment #28133 by steve99 on March 28, 2007 at 5:41 am

Yorker - I agree. Although he is undoubtedly a brilliant mathematical physicist, I don't think he ranks near the brilliance of, say, Ed Witten or Roger Penrose.

1883. US TV Commercial for The God Delusion during Countdown with Keith Olbermann

Comment #26538 by steve99 on March 20, 2007 at 7:02 am

"let's stop calling Queen Elizabeth the Defender of the Faith."

Well, the heir to the throne has said that he wishes to be knows as 'Defender of Faiths'. Yes - whatever you blindly believe, he will defend it.

1884. UK Christians 'suffer for faith'

Comment #26387 by steve99 on March 19, 2007 at 4:28 am

This is a rather silly claim. In the UK, religion is part of the establishment, bishops get to vote in the House of Lords, the Head of State is also head of the Church of England, there are faith schools, funded by government and only a short time ago religions were campaigning against a new equality law for same-sex couples. Considering all that, it takes a lot of nerve to claim they are discriminated against!

1885. Is Your Baby Gay? What If You Could Know? What If You Could Do Something About It?

Comment #26179 by steve99 on March 17, 2007 at 1:50 pm

Roll: the theory that BaronOchs mentions is probably not that useful, as it would require that gay members of a species had at least some degree of bisexuality, and would make an effort to mate with females. Personally, I favour the idea that gay individuals help to support siblings and offspring of siblings. Being gay myself, and having many nephews and nieces, I can definitely see how this could work.

1886. When They Came for the Homosexuals...

Comment #25749 by steve99 on March 15, 2007 at 2:14 am

The ironic thing is that the phrase "Christ was a man with muscles" does sound rather homoerotic. To consider the masculinity, dominance and physical build of a man part of the reason to worship him sounds like repressed same-sex attraction to me.

1887. Religion and Politics

Comment #24301 by steve99 on March 5, 2007 at 6:49 pm

kkant: I think the big difference between Buddhism and Christianity is that it really doesn't matter if the person of the Buddha actually existed (at least for some schools of Buddhism). It is about the ideas, and whether or not they work to help people live happier lives. Mystical stories of the Buddha (such as idea of virgin birth) are certainly not part of some of the more rational schools of Buddhism. Buddhism has always been a pragmatic and adaptive philosophy, and has 'evolved' to include such stories to help it spread in some cultures.

And, as for the "whoa" moment in Matrix 1 - well, that worked because it brought back fond memories for us Bill and Ted fans.

1888. Religion and Politics

Comment #24292 by steve99 on March 5, 2007 at 5:41 pm

Economicus: That is not just how Buddhism is practised mostly in the West. The more philosophical (rather than religious) approach to Buddhism is an ancient Eastern tradition too. And kkant: Hey! I have to admit I liked Constantine. (And so, surprisingly did some of my Hellblazer-reading friends)

1889. Religion and Politics

Comment #24278 by steve99 on March 5, 2007 at 4:37 pm

Robert - Firstly, I am a bit disappointed that someone would post such an unenlightened(!) view of the way Buddhists live (they don't spend all day meditating), and there are some highly successful and motivated Buddhists - Michael Stipe, Keanu Reeves, George Lucas, so it is not like you can't be a Buddhist and also competitive.

But anyway you are missing my point, I think. The author of this article was stating that belief without evidence is a liability, a position I fully support. But; many schools of Buddhism also reject belief without evidence, and encourage critical thinking. So, including Buddhism in that list did not reflect well on the author's understanding of 'religions'.

1890. Religion and Politics

Comment #24265 by steve99 on March 5, 2007 at 3:34 pm

Generally a good comment, but I think it is simplistic to lump all those 'religions' together, and imply they are all equally flawed. For example, I would to take issue with the inclusion of Buddhism in that list. For many Buddhists it is certainly not a faith, and does not imply supernatural phenomena. Theravadin Buddhism is strictly materialist, and encourages constant critical re-evaluation of what one thinks of the Buddha's teachings. I can't see much in that for any rationalist (or even atheist) to object to. Not being a general expert in religion I can't comment on some of the other supposed 'faiths', but for all I know they may be just as different from the faith- and deity-based religions that the writer so dislikes.

1891. The Dawkins Confusion: Naturalism ad absurdum

Comment #23568 by steve99 on March 1, 2007 at 2:43 pm

My goodness. That was positively painful to read. I recently read "How Mumbo-Jumbo Conquered the World" by Francis Wheen, which contains a hilarious discussion of deconstructionism. I was reminded of this when I read above:

"According to classical theism, God is a necessary being; it is not so much as possible that there should be no such person as God; he exists in all possible worlds. But if God is a necessary being, if he exists in all possible worlds, then the probability that he exists, of course, is 1, and the probability that he does not exist is 0. Far from its being improbable that he exists, his existence is maximally probable."

This is nothing more than word-play, which the author, I am sure, thinks is clever. I can, of course, simply define God as an unecessary being, and with a simple flip of 1's and 0's, prove he does not exist (perhaps I should label this 'classical atheism' to make it seem more authoratative).

And, I am astonished that someone who is supposed to be a philosopher does not understand the principle of parsimony. If evolution can be understood assuming it is blind, then it is excessive to say the least to assume a designer when one is not needed.

The fine-tuning argument was not one of his best either. After all, the universe isn't quite as good as it might have been. If it were me, I would have made stars live longer (I mean, ours is middle aged already!) and cut back on those pesky asteroids that cause so much trouble every now and then.

Strangest of all, I felt, was attempts to argue that God need not be complex. A strange term for an entity that would understand how to guide the evolution of millions of species.