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Comments by BaronOchs


251. The Paradoxical Hatred of Christopher Hitchens

Comment #42956 by BaronOchs on May 20, 2007 at 6:30 am

Oh well then you should know that the Catholic Church is the best source of hope and truth in the world.


Ryan I could happily discuss that with you. I was one of the Catholic Church's more fanatical devotees once. Sure, i can still see why people are atracted to it. Though I can see its flaws a bit better now as well.

252. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42948 by BaronOchs on May 20, 2007 at 6:09 am

Ryan Vilbig I kind of get what you mean. It would be interesting to see those ideas expanded and clarified.

The traditional understanding of the atonement was formed at a time when genesis was read as fact and I wonder how the church might need to re-interpret the atonement to fit it with the ideas you suggest.

253. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42936 by BaronOchs on May 20, 2007 at 5:58 am

There is no contradiction between Catholicism and evolution.


Does the church still take the fall to be a historical event? It is a bit of a stretch to lump the old theological narrative onto evolution. I think evolution at least demands some kind of rethink over fall/atonement theology. I was a catholic actually, though I don't really recall much on this subject.

254. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42928 by BaronOchs on May 20, 2007 at 5:49 am

Thankyou for correcting my missed apostrophe devolved, consider it your good deed for the day.

Things are getting pretty axiomatic here. I mean if it isn't obvious to someone that those three beliefs I used as examples are totally ridiculous, I hardly see any point in trying to demonstrate that they are.

Even if your objections to evolution held up they wouldn't get us within a few light-years of your account being true.

Your tactic seems to be to muddy the waters around evolution with a few sophisticated criticisms then declare that the bible was right all along. That's no way to go about reaching the truth and so long as you do so, what ground is there for a proper discussion with you about evolution?

255. The Cyclic Universe: A Talk With Neil Turok

Comment #42897 by BaronOchs on May 20, 2007 at 4:41 am

Ryan.Vilbig if you were unfairly dismissed from your job you could have taken legal action. If you were discriminated against it was only by one individual, not Jews as a whole. And all kinds of people have discriminated against all kinds of other people, get some perspective on it.

Sorry I don't know much about m-theory, except that it is not worth getting so worked up about.

256. The Cyclic Universe: A Talk With Neil Turok

Comment #42889 by BaronOchs on May 20, 2007 at 4:18 am

"They [The Jews] killed Jesus"


Have any good historical evidence for that?

It is meaningless anyway, even if a few jewish people did happen to kill someone called Jesus.

But considering that so many have been killed because of that belief for so many centuries I suggest you don't state it unsupported here or I'll just mark you as a troll.

257. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42863 by BaronOchs on May 20, 2007 at 3:11 am

devolved may i ask you precisely what your creationism consists of? Obviously you don't believe the genesis account, which has night and day preceeding the existence of the sun (what the earth orbitted in those first few days I know not). 99.9999... percent of the universe created as an afterthought (he made the stars also) and the first woman created out of one of the first mans ribs.

But I assume you believe in a young earth? If so this is problematic before we even begin to consider life. So many regular geographical features can be explained, by simply allowing the processes we observe today to have been operating for a long enough time span. Visit a v-shaped valley and watch the river/stream carrying silts eroded from the underlying rock down with it, it is only necessary for it to have done that continuously for a long enough period, and that assumption is probably smaller than those you'll need for any other theory. The theory of tectonic plates can explain the correlation in rock types and fossils along the coasts of Africa and South America, so long as you allow it enough time, in this case millions of years. Everywhere you look the signs are that the earth is old not young. And that creates problems for young earth creationism before we have even begun considering biology.

258. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42800 by BaronOchs on May 19, 2007 at 5:13 pm

"…but to say order implies intelligence is a fallacy, pure and simple." WHY?


You are saying wherever you find order there must be an intelligence behind it. In your favour you have one set of examples, the items human beings have designed. But why assume it is also the case for anything else? There is no basis for such an extrapolation. Neither does it aid explanation. A divine creator, if there is one, is beyond scientific observation, so postulating one cannot aid any scientific theory.

Of course laws may sometimes be the result of an intelligent lawmaker, but if you want to claim they are always so, and are so in the case of the universe, it is you who must back that up.

259. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42773 by BaronOchs on May 19, 2007 at 1:20 pm

devolved you're probably right, the belief in an ordered universe was an important foundation for the natural sciences. But that doesn't mean the success of science is a validation of medieval philosophy. Rather it exposes a contradiction, because working from a christian assumption the world was shown to be devoid of divine action. Why one thing rather than another might happen is simply a matter of probability, not the will of god. And this fact is admitted by everyone who has an insurance policy.

Evolution has shown how the level of order present in living things came to be without any intelligent designer. Perhaps you might ask "what makes sure the gravitational force stays the same from moment to moment" or like questions. I'm not entirely sure myself how meaningful those questions are, whether there already are answers, or whether there will be, but to say order implies intelligence is a fallacy, pure and simple.

260. The Cyclic Universe: A Talk With Neil Turok

Comment #42766 by BaronOchs on May 19, 2007 at 12:43 pm

77. Comment #42764 by Dr Benway on May 19, 2007 at 12:29 pm

There are 10 kinds of people in the world: those who understand binary, and those who don't.

________________

Ha! very good lol

261. Why Christopher Hitchens is not Great

Comment #42741 by BaronOchs on May 19, 2007 at 9:55 am

SciFi there are some articles about the scientology documentary here:

http://richarddawkins.net/article,1070,BBC-man-says-I-was-wrong-to-lose-it-But-these-scientologists-are-truly-scary,John-Sweeney-The-Daily-Mail

http://richarddawkins.net/article,1068,Row-over-Scientology-video,John-Sweeney-BBC-News

http://richarddawkins.net/article,1069,Travolta-spearheads-Scientologists-attack-on-BBC,Tahira-Yaqoob-The-Daily-Mail

262. Pedal power takes Islamic shape in Iran

Comment #42659 by BaronOchs on May 19, 2007 at 1:50 am

Newton30 cheers! you've taken apart pretty much everything they said. So how much did the CIA pay you lol!?

263. Pedal power takes Islamic shape in Iran

Comment #42614 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 5:00 pm

V I watched that 9/11 video and oh dear! They have a surprisingly good case. I guess it's a good lesson because I can all too easily accept the world picture created by the media as being reality, but it's a construction, and you never know if what you're getting is true. Sorry to go all post-modern there!

If everything they said in that film is perfectly accurate it's a good case, but of course it's not possible for me to check whether or not it is.

264. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42599 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 2:35 pm

Bizarro said:

One of the apostles even suffered from a debilitating physical condition (I forget which one it was and I'm too lazy to look it up), and he prayed many times that God would heal him and He never did.


Did you mean 2 Corinthians 12:7-9

Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness."


If so I always thought the nature of his thorn in the side was a peculiar mystery, but by no means obviously a disability. But if you refer to something else I certainly don't remember it (and I did read it all once!).

Anyway I must hand it to you Bizarro, you have the audacity to criticise people here for showing scorn towards your hitleresque pastor and won't even bother to explain your obnoxious belief that everyone with a different worldview to yourself will suffer eternal torment. How noble of you for sure.

265. The Fastest-Growing Religion

Comment #42593 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 2:00 pm

errm... oh dear, do you know anywhere I can find a story about that? When I was a catholic I came across a movement called Youth 2000, and I know they hold events at glastonbury. They were a scary bunch, the kind of people you find in fundamentalist churches and cults who seem devoid of personality, behind their empty smiles.

266. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42518 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 10:22 am

BillySands I recall the catholic church says it is self-evident (without the need of revelation) that to separate the sexual act and procreation by attempting to have either without the other is demeaning to the essential dignity of both. Therefore IVF, contraception, and homosexuality are all "gravely disordered". Or else they say homosexuality and such is contrary to "natural law" things aren't like that for that purpose and that is just common sense.

Well make of it what you will.

267. Pedal power takes Islamic shape in Iran

Comment #42436 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 7:41 am

Corylus and Russell Blackford I love the poems!

268. The Fastest-Growing Religion

Comment #42420 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 7:16 am

BillySands said:

There is something more satisfying about climbing when you realise there is no god there to reach out to in trouble. You get satisfaction from knowing that you got out of trouble yourself.


Although not actually relevant this reminded me of Petrarch's The Ascent of Mount Ventoux.
I'm not sure but I think it one of the earliest records of someone climbing a mountain just to see the view (rather than to pray or receive some stone tablets) and so should be something of an important step towards a secular vision of the world:

I was unable to discern the summits of the Pyrenees, which form the barrier between France and Spain; not because of any intervening obstacle that I know of but owing simply to the insufficiency of our mortal vision. But I could see with the utmost clearness, off to the right, the mountains of the region about Lyons, and to the left the bay of Marseilles and the waters that lash the shores of Aigues Mortes, altho' all these places were so distant that it would require a journey of several days to reach them. Under our very eyes flowed the Rhone.



Except that Petrarch reaches the top to decide he should have stayed at home praying, the great moose(!):

My brother, waiting to hear something of St. Augustine's from my lips, stood attentively by. I call him, and God too, to witness that where I first fixed my eyes it was written: "And men go about to wonder at the heights of the mountains, and the mighty waves of the sea, and the wide sweep of rivers, and the circuit of the ocean, and the revolution of the stars, but themselves they consider not." I was abashed, and, asking my brother (who was anxious to hear more), not to annoy me, I closed the book, angry with myself that I should still be admiring earthly things who might long ago have learned from even the pagan philosophers that nothing is wonderful but the soul, which, when great itself, finds nothing great outside itself

269. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42317 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 4:04 am

V how's it going!? I hope you can see now that Jerry Falwell was really a nice guy, just a bit tactless that's all!!! lol!!!!

270. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42312 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 4:01 am

So Bizarro I recall to go to heaven you need to "love God and love your neighbour"

I've known plenty of people who are loving and compassionate, some of whom believe in god and some of whom don't. If two people who have been equally loving in their lives die, and one had been a believer, the other a non-believer, do you think only the believer would go to heaven?

Or perhaps you'd say the non-believer loved his/her neighbour but didn't love god. If so I don't accept that. Assuming your beliefs are correct for a moment, then all the goodness in the world has its source in its divine creator, so just by finding joy at anything in life you would be affirming that God is good without knowing it.

So if the christian faith were true perhaps then it might be good fortune to be a person of faith. But why should it be necessary for salvation? I don't see any reason at all.

271. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42231 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 12:42 am

Wonderful Bizarro, my point is why then do we have to choose to be not separate from "him" in the first place? So god is omnipresent and therefore an unavoidable part of reality.

Yet still if you're not an evangelical christian you'll go to hell, really you've made perfect sense of it for me.

272. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42226 by BaronOchs on May 18, 2007 at 12:27 am

If god is the source of all being how could you choose to be separate from it and still remain in existence?

I was just trying to understand, not trip you up.

273. Jerry Falwell's Hit Parade

Comment #42202 by BaronOchs on May 17, 2007 at 10:42 pm

First, none of you know me or my background. Second, I struggle with my faith daily with hard questions I am hard-pressed to answer. There is never a moment I don't question, and I don't think that there should ever be a moment that I don't question.


Are you saying you weren't brought up in your current beliefs, but found them the best answer to the questions you were asking? I'm interested you know. But also you didn't answer Dower's question, do you believe non-believers necessarily go to hell?

274. Bible drawn into Hong Kong sex publication row

Comment #41864 by BaronOchs on May 17, 2007 at 8:09 am

As much as I like to think of the cognitive dissonance this could cause for the Mary Whitehouses of the world this just gets up my nose. I'm glad I don't live in Hong Kong if that's how patronising it is to its citizens.

275. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41666 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 2:02 pm

Manfred that is a good article. You should send the link to

design@richarddawkins.net

276. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41649 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 1:33 pm

SpaggieMo, I'm not sure how you got from here:

life is a force that is constantly consuming; using what it needs and excreting what it doesn't need.


to here:

So it should follow that mankind is really just a bunch of shit…….. right?

277. The stone is cast

Comment #41634 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 12:31 pm

So Jerry Falwell dies and RDnet descends into tussling, is that his last laugh?

278. Pope Warns of Globalization, Marxism

Comment #41606 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 11:45 am

slummingangel John Paul II once vociferously ruled out the chance of women ever being priests on the same afternoon as he condemned "discrimination on the basis of race, culture, sex, or religion."

I think it's a papal thing.

279. Thought vs. feeling in religion

Comment #41600 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 11:34 am

The Vatican has recently condemned a man called Jon Sobrino for writing books of liberation theology. As a result of his "errors" they have attempted to drive him out of the University of Central America and prevent him from getting other teaching posts.

The Vatican will still treat anyone it dislikes in a disgraceful way. Liberation theology was an honest response to the problems in South America, and I have some respect for the many catholics who think for themselves rather than swallowing everything from the smug vermin in Rome.

280. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41574 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 10:29 am

Summer and Dower
I said to a christian friend that there have been a fair few interesting atheism books out recently and he responded something like "yes well a bit of persecution might do us good".

I mean where do you go from there? Other people I know have told me they don't really accept evolution, "so how old do you think the earth is?" I say, "not sure about that" is the reply. What can you do?

281. The stone is cast

Comment #41497 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 7:39 am

2 pages a month good lord! well I was more suggesting they both grew fat off exploitation. I'm not wanting to pick an argument over the wonders of the porn industry though, so in Larry Flynt's favour at least he never expected people to call him Revd.

282. The stone is cast

Comment #41490 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 7:23 am

Dower I'm sure they found plenty in common.

283. Hitchens' flat world

Comment #41444 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 6:07 am

I would ask him to read a book like Roger Penrose's "The Road to Reality" and say whether he still thinks "Scientific Materialism" is banal.

Hitchens places a lot of importance on Literature -and the Arts in general- no discussion of that at all here.

Hence, I declare it a straw-man attack.

284. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41374 by BaronOchs on May 16, 2007 at 3:12 am

Thankyou for that link Drad Frantle.

I think Chris Hitchens there conveys well why there has been so much anger expressed on this thread. This is an evil man who has died.

There are two things worth saying about the "jump on his grave" remarks:

The world will not become a better place just as a result of a few televangelists dying, as some perhaps hope it would. Until the battle is won against the repugnant and fallacious ideas they devoted themselves to there will always be new people to replace them.

It's the very fact this man gained credence that should be our real concern and we shouldn't let his death distract us from that. Also dance on his grave and we give a just rebuke to people like Bizarro Dawkins who go on to claim this was really a good man who just said a few silly things from time to time.

285. Nothing sacred: Journalist and provocateur Christopher Hitchens picks a fight with God

Comment #41244 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 5:09 pm

Robert O'Brien how about actually making a few critical points instead of just telling us you don't like Dawkins/Hitchens?

286. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41187 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 3:32 pm

Sen. John McCain, the school commencement speaker last year, said Tuesday that his prayers were with Falwell's family.

"Dr. Falwell was a man of distinguished accomplishment who devoted his life to serving his faith and country," McCain said.


like you say smithnya lets watch all the creepy politicos get their hankies out.

287. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41173 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 3:13 pm

72. Comment #41171 by Logicel on May 15, 2007 at 3:11 pm

I truly cannot imagine men with men, women with women, doing what they were not physically created to do, without abnormal stress and misbehavior.


Well if he just said we'd have sent some videos along as a help.

288. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41149 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 2:51 pm

Fred Phelps does not give the religious right a bad name, because nobody claims kin to that guy.

Jerry Falwell


So maybe they will . . .

I did hear Billy Graham got a lot of stick from some fundamentalists for being willing to work with Catholics. Perhaps it was to do with that?

289. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41139 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 2:37 pm

I always feel a bit moved when I read the obits and think about the various achievements of the deceased. Incidentally I've just heard the architect who built the British Library has died and I think there's someone who with only one shot a life made a good effort and left the world a little bit of a better place.

I'm also moved by the news of Jerry Falwells death, what a waste of a life, I'm sure with his talents he could have done some good for humanity. But instead he was a promoter of lies and a menace to society. And I do find that sad.

290. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41098 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 1:40 pm

Homosexuality is Satan's diabolical attack upon the family that will not only have a corrupting influence upon our next generation, but it will also bring down the wrath of God upon America.

~Jerry Falwell

291. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41094 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 1:35 pm

(PS: How do I do the quotey thing, where the text appears in a little inset box, as in #6?)

put "blockquote" inside these arrows < > then write the text, the put /blockquote in the same arrows.

those tricks are explained in the comment posting guidelines.

292. Television evangelist Falwell dies at 73

Comment #41086 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 1:29 pm

What could this mean for the prestigious Liberty University?


Is it true that place is actually accredited? If so that is a stain on american academic life.

Anyhow I hope and pray (or don't rather) it will sink beneath the waves.

293. Statement of Concern about Impact of AIG's Creation 'Museum'

Comment #40964 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 9:02 am

Rtambree I look forward to the day we all drive volvos and watch porn, but you are relying on the hope that security and welfare will necessarily improve. Which isn't given at any rate, what if society deteriorates? Will people start reaching the gods out of the back of the closet?

294. BBC man says 'I was wrong to lose it. But these scientologists are truly scary'

Comment #40782 by BaronOchs on May 15, 2007 at 1:04 am

Cheers GodlessHeathen, just watched it. What a bunch of creeps. Also did John Travolta say Marilyn Monroe would still be alive if she'd been a scientologist?! perhaps she's not the only one?

295. How dare you call me a fundamentalist

Comment #40696 by BaronOchs on May 14, 2007 at 5:41 pm

When a true genius appears in the world you may know him by this sign: that all the dunces are in confederacy against him.
Jonathan Swift


Of course and Ignatius! the world needs you!

296. Facing Off on Evolution

Comment #40664 by BaronOchs on May 14, 2007 at 4:39 pm

Wello I guess some things in life are just more interesting than the supposed existence of a supreme being:-)

297. Facing Off on Evolution

Comment #40612 by BaronOchs on May 14, 2007 at 3:28 pm

But Aaron SF he didn't specify who precisely was causing him the temptation:-)

298. Let us pray for the soul of Richard Dawkins

Comment #40555 by BaronOchs on May 14, 2007 at 1:13 pm

RD, you're the best. You keep the hard-core info coming through the system, We'll keep the hits coming in your general direction.


Damn right, this is my current favourite place on the web.

Here's a toast!

299. Travolta spearheads Scientologists' attack on BBC

Comment #40348 by BaronOchs on May 14, 2007 at 6:46 am

Allright BBC what a good chance to show you're worth your god-damn license fee (and all those irritating licence fee letters)! If they compromise over this one they're finished in my eyes and the whole institution can be cast to the hounds.

300. Row over Scientology video

Comment #40344 by BaronOchs on May 14, 2007 at 6:39 am

Alas if he'd just been a little bit stronger and not lost it that one time. But well done to him anyway, the effort to expose movements like scientology must be total and ceaseless. And I think this already gives an idea of how evil it is, to its very core.

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