151. Vatican cardinal calls on Catholics to stop funding Amnesty

Comment #50022 by CJ22 on June 14, 2007 at 3:14 pm

"This has nothing to do with legitimising abortion as part of a campaign for human rights, it is to do with combating violence against women,"

No dilemma there for the Vatican. They don't give a shit about women or women's rights, and they never have.

152. The Future Forum Presents: Christopher Hitchens and Marvin Olasky

Comment #49907 by CJ22 on June 14, 2007 at 4:10 am

Maybe he's finally cottoned on that while HE thinks it's great to have become a citizen, some of his British audience might feel a slight sense of implied criticism if he makes too big a deal out of it. But Hitchens knows the primary rule of being a foreigner in the US - you don't make any enemies telling Americans how great America is.

153. The Great Mutator

Comment #49739 by CJ22 on June 13, 2007 at 7:43 am

Yay, my old home town :)

One has to wonder why, if his colleagues within his own department feel this way about his views (and I imagine feelings have to be running strong to air them so publicly), does the university continue to employ him, especially since from an academic point-of-view, he's bringing his department into disrepute (clearly, or why make a statement at all?).

154. The Great Mutator

Comment #49698 by CJ22 on June 13, 2007 at 2:48 am

Bravo. An excellent reference to point IDers to in an argument.

When I started reading this article, I had a thought about a brilliant and original (so I thought) analgoy to explain the 'process' of natural selection to the uninitiated, using coins first thrown at random to attempt to generate a run of heads, then thrown in sequence, selecting for heads. Then to my chagrin, Coyne uses the exact same analogy using dice. Curses! Still a useful analogy though, to the differently-rational.

155. A Compass That Can Clash With Modern Life

Comment #49602 by CJ22 on June 12, 2007 at 2:20 pm

Hmm I dunno, we have a law here that it's okay to shoot a Welshman with a cross-bow after six o'clock on a Thursday, or something like that. Some secular laws are pretty silly. Having said that, it's not a recent introduction.

Anyway, they're all mad. "Is it okay to shake the hand of a non-muslim?" Only if you don't intend to detonate while he's in range. It would be impolite otherwise.

156. Majority of Republicans Doubt Theory of Evolution

Comment #49527 by CJ22 on June 12, 2007 at 9:20 am

It seems to me that highly republican, highly religious people are essentially 'Un-American', in a non-pejorative sense, given the fact that the nation was founded on 'liberal democratic' principles. Republicans aren't liberals, and right-wing christians aren't democratic. You'd best keep an eye on them buggers.

157. Religion - our maelstrom of ignorance

Comment #49491 by CJ22 on June 12, 2007 at 5:08 am

"If This Goes On..."
~Robert A. Heinlein

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

1940!

"Secrecy is the keystone of all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy ... [sic] censorship. When any government, or any church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, 'This you may not read, this you must not see, this you are forbidden to know,' the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man whose mind has been hoodwinked; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, a man whose mind is free. No, not the rack, not fission bombs, not anything —you can't conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him."

158. The New Atheists

Comment #49488 by CJ22 on June 12, 2007 at 4:58 am

The main problem I have with some kind of detente with moderate theists is the very point Mr. Aronson pointed out - moderates refuse to condemn the basic premises of the fundies because they share them. The only difference between them is one of interpretation. When the worst your allie can say to your enemy is "Yeah I hear what you're saying, and I agree with you on some level, but...", well having a wet CofE vicar on your side isn't going to convince a rabid fundy that you might just have a point.

159. The Benny Hinn Report

Comment #49316 by CJ22 on June 11, 2007 at 1:16 pm

7 hours! I've seen Derren Brown convince people that red was blue in 30 seconds. You could probably get the flock to remortgage their house in 7 hours!

160. Tome truths

Comment #49311 by CJ22 on June 11, 2007 at 1:05 pm

pwnd!

161. Evolution: God as Genetic Engineer

Comment #49242 by CJ22 on June 11, 2007 at 6:09 am

I think the problem is he's no idiot. And while he is being made to look like one, it's a price he's prepared to pay for Jesus. He knows full well that his consituency aren't interested in what's true, they just want to be convinced.

It's all very well debunking him in Science magazine, but how many fundies read that? They've all run off yelling "See!" long before that. Behe isn't trying to convince evolutionary biologists, he's trying to deflect evolutionary biologists arguments with the faithful by obfuscating them with reasonable sounding counter-arguments that sound convincing to the flock.

162. Manliness is next to godliness

Comment #49239 by CJ22 on June 11, 2007 at 5:53 am

I'm just wondering how they're going to top this on the bonkers-christian scale.

I'm the boss in my house. I live alone :(

I have to wonder where this strange notion of 'swearing' came from. I can understand how 'blasphemous' utterings became taboo, but what about those words with non-religious connotations? Why when I was a kid would I get my arse kicked for saying 'piss' but was thought to be cute when I said 'pee'. What's the friggin difference?? Puzzling.

Anyway, the above article represents at least an obvious stick to beat the religious with, so I'm all in favour of it.

163. Ryan Tubridy interviews Richard Dawkins

Comment #49130 by CJ22 on June 10, 2007 at 2:21 pm

Here's the link:

http://www.todayfm.com/Article.asp?id=275805

You have to donwload some sort of widget that points to the correct address for the stream.

164. Americans believe in both evolution, creationism: poll

Comment #49070 by CJ22 on June 10, 2007 at 7:36 am

To be clear, this isn't "20% of Americans believe in an old Earth that was instantiated by God", this is "20% of Americans believe in both a Young Earth AND an OLD Earth".

There are occasions when my mind just gives up and wanders off to think about something else.

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

Comment #48930 by CJ22 on June 9, 2007 at 4:14 pm

"Most atheists become so, because they are disillusioned by their own religion."

Hmm, do you have data to support this assertion?

166. Dobson and John MacArthur fantasize about the downfall of America

Comment #48837 by CJ22 on June 9, 2007 at 7:01 am

Fundementalist Christianity is becoming every bit as much of a death-cult as Islam.

167. Protesting the Creation Museum

Comment #48344 by CJ22 on June 7, 2007 at 2:00 pm

That guy had a slot in the Beyond Belief sessions, as something of a religious apologist. Nice to see him taking a stand.

168. Atheism is pretentious and cowardly

Comment #48252 by CJ22 on June 7, 2007 at 7:42 am

I never really understand why people find the Prof and Hitch personally objectionable. I find the characterisation of RD that the christians object to (that he's rude, agressive, fundementalist) to be a product of their fevered imaginations, and more a product of their resentment than of anything real and rational (hmmmm). Likewise, I would cheerfully have Hitch as a neighbour. I find him puckish. I don't agree with everything he says, certainly not on Iraq, but so what? He's one of the good guys, in my mind.

I can only assume that RD is correct - christians have gone so long being immune from criticism, that even polite, reasoned analysis seems like fundementalist ranting to them. Yet put, say, RD up against, say, Falwell, and who's the most rabid? It would be like putting Daffy Duck up against the evil queen from Snow White (hmm, don't ask me where that analogy came from - RD = Daffy? Clever but faintly irritated? Anyway...)

I think they loathe the message and can't resist the impulse to shoot the messenger, and it's really not very christian of them to impune two such fine fellows.

169. Atheism is pretentious and cowardly

Comment #48092 by CJ22 on June 6, 2007 at 2:53 pm

His theory is that because some atheists are quite rude about his religion, we' all must be really nasty people and therefore in a just universe can't possibly have anything to say worth saying.

This pinhead has the nerve to infer that Dawkins, Hitchens and Grayling are intellectually lacking! Compared to him! His smug assumption of righteousness oozes out of his every word, despite offering nothing but rhetoric and thin ad hominem attacks.

Wanker. He deserves the verbal kicking he's in the process of receiving.

170. Atheism is pretentious and cowardly

Comment #48058 by CJ22 on June 6, 2007 at 12:25 pm

Oh my, I can hardly bear to look! It's not pretty in there. The poor fool - who pushed him into the arena armed only with a haddock??

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

Comment #47990 by CJ22 on June 6, 2007 at 8:05 am

"Of the lot, I think he could champion secularism most convincingly."

Yes he probably could, but I think he already has enough 'handicaps' on his plate to attempt secularity as well. So does Clinton. They'd both be historic 'firsts' if they go all the way as it is. They certainly don't want to add to that challenge by adding burdens they can easily skip with the judicious use of a little hypocracy. Hypocracy is, after all, part of a politician's toolkit, and they'll use it without the revulsion us lesser mortals feel.

America is NOT going to vote for a secularist. Not this time round. Not yet. They'd vote for a kiddy-fiddler first.

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

Comment #47924 by CJ22 on June 6, 2007 at 4:02 am

I too feel Clinton is the least worst candidate, largely because she is clearly lying through her teeth to curry favour. I'd prefer a hypocritical secularist to a sincere faith-head anyday. Clinton might pay lip-service to 'faith' but she's unlikely to kick-off any armageddons because God told her to.

173. 6 Billion Bits of Data About Me, Me, Me!

Comment #47656 by CJ22 on June 5, 2007 at 7:19 am

Yeah, all granted. I meant 'in principle' of course. There are those that think even if we could do it safely, reliably and in full knowledge of the consequences, it's still a bad idea. Those coming at it from one side feel it's against God's plan, those coming from the other side think it's 'messing around with nature' (a nonesense phrase if ever there was one) or something equally vague and budhist.

I imagine a heavily-improved humanity living in the year 3000 (with their 300-year lifespans, wet-wired network connectivity, long-term views of life and eyes on a horizon that makes today's petty Gods look like hicks) shaking their heads in wonder at how ready we are to attach policies to our baseless superstitions.

174. 6 Billion Bits of Data About Me, Me, Me!

Comment #47622 by CJ22 on June 5, 2007 at 4:58 am

No doubt the wingnuts will be frothing: "What's next, designer babies??!!!???!?" (yes, with that many exclamation marks).

Personally I've never been quite sure what is wrong with the concept of doing the best one can to elliminate abnormalities and propensities for disease. Clearly there are issues with gender balance, but nothing beyond the wit of man to solve.

175. Hamas Kindergarten Graduation Ceremony

Comment #47604 by CJ22 on June 5, 2007 at 3:59 am

All Americans are murdering racists. See this photo for proof:

http://www.sprawlmagazine.com/Images/8-17-05kkk.gif

Gimme a break.

Palestinian society is a victim of the grossest abuse. And in the same way we expect a victim of child sexual abuse to in turn become an abuser, or at the least to be screwed up, why should we think Palestinian society would be any different, especially when such abuse not only continues unabated, but is unlikely to come to any satisfactory resolution any time soon because the world doesn't care enough to do anything about it?

When you're getting screwed up the ass and nobody cares, exactly how reasonable can you be expected to act?

176. God Exists. A Formula Proves it.

Comment #47329 by CJ22 on June 4, 2007 at 5:22 am

Oh my! Why isn't this on the news everywhere?? They PROVED God?? This is...momentous, it's staggering - they should be debating it in congress and parliament and the UN and the Vatican? And they claimed science and religion were seperate magisteria! But to think I was alive on the Earth on the day that the existence of God was finally proven! We'll always remember where we were on that glorious day! I'm going straight home to watch the coverage on the BBC.

Oh, wait, it's bullshit...

177. Should Science Speak to Faith? A dialog between Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins

Comment #47323 by CJ22 on June 4, 2007 at 4:59 am

I found the statistics in the sidebar fascinating:

■ 88% rejected the idea
that God favors any
particular political party

So 12% either think God DOES favour a political party, or aren't sure? How much mental gymnastics does THAT take to rationalise??

■ 69% rejected the idea
that God favors the U.S.
in worldly affairs

So 31% DO think God is specifically on the USs team, or aren't sure? Do they imagine Allah is on the USs team? Or Vishnu? Strange strange people.

178. My Road to Atheism, What Took Me So Long and The Aftermath

Comment #47300 by CJ22 on June 4, 2007 at 3:07 am

You made it to the new world buddy. Well done. Those of us who were born here don't know how lucky we are.

179. Should Science Speak to Faith? A dialog between Lawrence Krauss and Richard Dawkins

Comment #47297 by CJ22 on June 4, 2007 at 2:36 am

Religion gives ground. It always has and it always will. Christianity remains the God of the Gaps. As science fills those gaps, religion will become ever more vague and ever less prescriptive and one unsupportable premise after another gets demolished. It may never go away entirely, but it will probably linger as the vague sort of Spinozan faith that absolutely avoids any contacts with reality and the mundane.

I also think that if science can significantly increase human lifespan, that will have a massive effect on religion (after we deal with the wingnuts who try to stop it happening because it's 'against God's plan' and/or 'the natural order', depending on whether your a monotheist wingnut or a healing-crystals-type). Once fear of death recedes, or maybe we all feel like we're getting a squarer deal with the whole life-span thing, then what happens after will seem less important.

180. Atheism shall make you free

Comment #47008 by CJ22 on June 2, 2007 at 5:07 pm

"but if we have free will, we can choose to do evil things, and a loving God wouldn't squash our choice"

What about the victims of our evil? By giving me the choice to do evil, God has squashed THEIR choice. What 'choice' did the victims of the Virginia shootings have? Should they thank God that he gave the shooter the choice as to whether to do evil? The idea that God "allows" us choice is nonesense, since it amounts to robbing Peter to pay Paul.

181. U.S. a theocratic state, says former Canadian ambassador

Comment #46939 by CJ22 on June 2, 2007 at 10:13 am

"According to recent polls less than a third [of Americans] approve of the way he's [Bush is] doing his job. "

So, that's a 100,000,000 Americans that are so hard-core they'll support President Gump despite the obvious immensity of his screw-up. Sounds like an army-in-waiting to me. And when the army of God rise up, what percentage of the other 2/3rds will pick God's team just to be on the safe side.

The fact is that moderates will always side with the extremists when it comes to the crunch - they don't want to be going against God, they don't like people who don't want to engage in the mental contortionism of belief-without-evidence, and they side with somebody who believed in the healing power of crystals over an atheist any day.

182. Photos of The God Delusion Event in Second Life

Comment #46787 by CJ22 on June 1, 2007 at 4:00 pm

*Shudder

This would have been time better spent down the pub.

183. What I Think About Evolution

Comment #46662 by CJ22 on June 1, 2007 at 3:31 am

You know what's happened here? he's thought "I need to get out of this whole denying evolution thing or I'm screwed, so I need to get the straight facts. I know, I'll ask one of those ID guys, they'll give me the skinny". D'oh!

Asking any rational qualified biologist would have shown him that speciation can and does occur beyond reasonable doubt, and his whole house of cards with regard to 'macro-evolution comes collapsing to the ground like the red herring it is (apoligies for the tortured metaphor). It's not just stupid, it's intellectually lazy. He's said enough just to fool the people who will read the article then think no more of the subject, which I suppose was entirely it's purpose. Politics is sooo cynical, and akin to religion in many ways.

184. What I Think About Evolution

Comment #46659 by CJ22 on June 1, 2007 at 3:20 am

"What a load of rubbish. The NYTimes should be ashamed to allow this to be published."

On the contrary, it's called "giving them enough rope..."

185. What I Think About Evolution

Comment #46509 by CJ22 on May 31, 2007 at 2:15 pm

Doesn't want to alienate his core voters, doesn't want to look like a dimwit.

186. I Believe In Evolution, Except For The Whole Triassic Period

Comment #46354 by CJ22 on May 31, 2007 at 2:53 am

Good point HunterZolomon, you couldn't make it up.

I don't find the Onion that funny, but at least it's batting for the right team. And I honestly believe that ridicule is a powerful tool for deprogramming the flock.

187. Why Do Some People Resist Science?

Comment #46252 by CJ22 on May 30, 2007 at 4:54 pm

Maybe it persists because ingorant people tend to have more kids, who they raise to be ignorant? We're being out-bred by chavs.

188. Christopher Hitchens at Politics and Prose

Comment #46019 by CJ22 on May 30, 2007 at 3:01 am

To get at the download links on foratv (it's not that obvious):

1/. Click on the link on this page to bring up the foratv page
2/. Click on the image on the foratv page to bring up the video player pop-up
3/. On that page, click on the 'downloads' link in the top-right corner, and that brings up your links. V handy for we ipod users.

189. Scientists divided over alliance with religion

Comment #45885 by CJ22 on May 29, 2007 at 1:35 pm

Martin Rees: "I have here a piece of paper..."

190. Group Threatens to Sue Pentagon Over Military Role in Evangelical Festival

Comment #45740 by CJ22 on May 29, 2007 at 5:25 am

Robert Heinlein must be spinning in his grave.

191. Secular Thought for the Day

Comment #45738 by CJ22 on May 29, 2007 at 5:23 am

This was on BBC radio 4 Lee, who's audience is a strange blend of the traditional and the liberal. It still has quite a lot of religious programming, as well as the hitherto religious 'Thought For The Day' (usually by a trendy rabi or anglican vicar who gives a sermon vaguely reminiscent of that Not The Nine O'clock News sketch). In other words, a perfectly targetted message.

192. Atheists: Get off of our country!

Comment #44899 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 2:18 pm

Blogging's a filthy habit anyway Phaeonix. It can make you go blind.

193. Another Christian Science Fair embarrasses itself

Comment #44731 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 8:30 am

Even if he had managed to come up with some proof that stalagtites grew faster than the scientific consensus, how does that 'disprove some parts of evolution'? What have stalagtites got to do with evolution?

194. The Art of Handling Thetans

Comment #44712 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 7:55 am

Best read I've had all week. Nice one Ray.

195. Comic in US 'hate speech' row

Comment #44701 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 7:38 am

Aye, except I don't believe that religion or lack of it is a 'choice', more an imposition.

196. Importing a slave class

Comment #44698 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 7:34 am

"We fought a civil war to force Democrats to give up on slavery 150 years ago."

wtf??

197. Atheists: Get off of our country!

Comment #44680 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 7:13 am

It turned out to be a hoax:

http://templewhore.blogspot.com/2007/05/not-all-news-is-bad.html

"In two days, we receive more than 30 letters. Some were angry with her. Some were angry with us. They said we should be ashamed of ourselves for printing it, and that we would never have done that if it were about blacks or Jews. They're right, we wouldn't have. However, to be an atheist, you make a conscious choice."

Conscious choice? How do they figure?

198. Fighting the Fundamentalists

Comment #44607 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 5:30 am

"When Hitler attacked Russia, England and America gave aid to Stalin. It was not that they particularly liked Stalin or his system, but they worked on the principle that the enemy of my enemy is my friend."

Yes, and then spent the next 50 years locked in a cold-war with the same system they'd supported! So, come the day when secular and moderate allies finally defeat the evils of fundementalism, we can look forward to spending years wishing we hadn't listened to the idea that the enemy of my enemy is my friend? Foolish example.

Moderate god-botherers are worse than fundementalists. At least a fundy is firm in his convictions, and you can deal with him on that basis. Your moderate's world-view twists and turns with the wind - you can't 'educate-away' what you can't even define or grasp.

199. Heliocentrism is an Atheist Doctrine

Comment #44593 by CJ22 on May 25, 2007 at 5:14 am

Of course it's a satire.

200. Here Comes the Fourth Musketeer.

Comment #44043 by CJ22 on May 23, 2007 at 8:14 am

Splitters!