I have reasons for my vegetarianism, but they or my thinking behind them may be wrong = I don't attack others because they eat meat.

... although it is perfectly within your rights to attack (verbally!) anyone you like for any reason. What wouldn't be right would be for you to be treated differently by the law simply because you hold certain beliefs.

The argument is good: individualism and freedom of information benefit reason and diminish religion. Shame about the text, the graphics and the voice though.

@mmurray

So is this standard practice in the Foreign Office? The team handling a state visit are chosen especially to know nothing about the state in question?

They're not Catholics, yet I expect they know quite a lot about the Vatican. I hesitate to generalise, but Catholics tend to be a bit selective of the facts.

We've moved on from Sir Humphrey, it's Malcolm Tucker who calls the shots now.

(I mean in political sitcoms, not the Civil Service)

What a contemptible reaction.

No-one has lost their job over the memo, which was sent to Downing Street and at least three Whitehall departments, and the civil servant who authorised it has simply been moved to other duties

No-one has lost their job over the child rape, and the priest who committed it has simply been moved to other duties

Hitchens used a helpful analogy in a recent article: strip the Vatican of its fancy dress and it becomes just another multinational corporation.

Compare the Catholic church to something like GlaxoSmithKline and then imagine its senior executives defending practices of institutional perversion [of the course of justice]. Somehow I feel public opinion would be more strongly against GSK than it is now against the RCC.

It's easy for the old(er) world to forget that Americans see something established in 1952 as "heritage".

@Alvega

Agree. But then what?

Where has anyone made or even implied a case for discriminating against heaven-believers?

Saying a belief is irrational or harmful etc. is NOT the same as saying that it should be banned, or that its believers are inferior, or that they should be treated differently. Not even close. Nor is it "denying" anyone that belief. Nor is it necessarily a criticism of the believers.

The eagerness with which some people like to identify skeptics with fascists is worrying.

Bonzai

Humans are irrational most of the time, so as long as the irrationality doesn't translate into something harmful to others why insist on "curing" it?

Who insists? Is it wrong merely to point out irrationality?

Surely people should be allowed to believe what they want to believe about Heaven without someone trying to tell us what Heaven is or isn't or whether we should or shouldn't believe

The first part, yes: people should be allowed to believe what they want to believe about heaven. But why shouldn't other people be allowed to simply say those beliefs are irrational? Talking is not oppression.

In short, Nader believes that the very act of remembering can change our memories

Reminds me of floppy disks.

The media always have to write about a scientific discovery as if it was entirely the work of some hero prevailing against the consensus... I suspect the reality is that lots of scientists are testing new ideas all the time, and the heroes are merely the ones who get lucky.

It seems to me that if we can locate an origin in TIME, we should be able to locate it in SPACE.

In that sense, the location of origin is "everywhere", in the 3D geometry we're familiar with, which isn't a very helpful thing to know.

You seem to have the idea that matter expanded from a point in space, rather than the space itself expanding.

Wikipedia: "What is the universe expanding into?"

why is it "lgbt"? what's wrong with "gbt"? and if "l" has to be part of it, why need it come first? when it comes to sexuality, two of the categories are hetero and homo. i don't see the heteros making any gender distinction. seems a bit divisive to me; and political.

To many, hetero and homo alike, "gay" refers only to homosexual men, not women, although perhaps there are regional differences. Thus the L in LGBT is intended to be inclusive, not divisive. It doesn't always come first, but one of the letters must. The spelling of "center" is no more reasonable...

I enjoy reading about science and, like everyone, do care about knowing some things about some things, but this is the difference between lots of millions of years, and 50% more lots of millions of years. And the suggestion that fossil and molecular dating do not produce identical results. Hardly controversial!

Species that were previously thought to be 140-190m years old are now thought to be 215m years old. To most people the figures translate as "very old" and "very old". Given reports like this, I'm not surprised that some think science is boring...

What isn't reported in the news is that Richard spoke about the six constants of the universe being imagined as knobs that could be turned to tune the universe...

He's missed out on trends in physics during the last half century or so, if he says there are just six constants: from what I've read many string "theories" require hundreds.

Well if his brain IS oversized that's yet another design flaw on the part of God.

In comments above some people have pointed out that homosexuality is only in small part to do with coital preferences, and there is therefore no reason to criticise public figures for making their homosexuality public. But even if it were entirely about (the act of) sex, what would be wrong with talking about it in public? Sex is what is required to happen, and what did happen, in order for nearly every person to exist. I don't think it is right that it is considered impolite or immoral to talk about sex openly. Surely at least us non-theists aren't so puritan.

That's a great idea from Todd & Diana Stiefel. It's just a shame that the school board's decision seems to be regarded as acceptable.

BTW it's obviously not a problem that the school board hold "outdated religious mores"; what is a problem is that the mores they hold happen to be bigoted and stupid.

@SaintStephen

In a second go of Evolution, whatever adapted to the trees as their niche would develop along similar lines.

:o like the Na'vi!

"While this analysis is not unfailing, it works slightly more often than not. "

I have to wonder if this isn't simply because their sample hasn't been large enough, or if the people doing the study don't take their own biases along with them for the analysis

Or maybe it's because EVERY statistical conclusion about the real world is "not unfailing but works slightly more often than not".

@ Lucas

on "conflating nature with nurture": so are you under the impression that personality traits can only be a product of nurture, not nature?

Or do you accept that SOME personality traits might IN PART be INFLUENCED by prenatal development or genetic inheritance? That some personality traits could be more/less common among a particular sex or genetic group?

I wonder how many people here would deny that 'hormones affect personality' and that 'hormones affect growth'. If you accept both of those facts it's obviously a very small step to 'face shape indicates personality'.

Just because it's not pleasant/moral/egalitarian doesn't mean it's not real.

as one cannot be without something that doesn't exist. How astute an observation

??? Trite and meaningless more like.

Such as the Utah woman who allegedly paid a man $150 to beat her and cause miscarriage

The just legislative response to such an incident would be to decriminalise abortions. The obsessive promotion of foetus' over women's welfare is very disturbing.

@andrew.trapp

The Heisenberg uncertainty principle shows us that real, genuine randomness exists, thus making a strictly deterministic future impossible. And yet, our past seemingly IS determined.

What aspect of the uncertainty principle depends on time? I thought that, like most of what we know about physics apart from entropy, the uncertainty principle did not refer to time.

It might be an expensive experiment - after all you have to pay these expert homeopaths enough. I'm sure it's very strenuous shaking bottles of water medicine all day.

@stephenray

And you must be aware that religion, rightly or wrongly, holds an important place in English law; this being so a judge would be setting out an extremely controversial precedent if he or she announced from the bench that religious character is completely irrelevant on the question of previous good character?

Is that true? Is it established in English law that religiosity indicates good character?

I agree this is a statement Blair won't have thought about much, but it does reveal a worrying level of prejudice

the Roman Stoic conception of good character knocks Mrs. Blair’s (and Mr Rifkind’s) into a cocked hat, where they belong

Wonderful.

#455063 by Ivan The Not So Bad

There is nothing stopping RDF, the Royal Society or any other scientific or non-religious body from applying to set-up and run [state-funded] schools.

Wrong
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2007/sep/23/schools.faithschools

Let's confront the absolutists: those who absolutely believe and those who absolutely don't

That doesn't make sense to me and I'm inclined to think it's obfuscation. Those who do not have any belief whatsoever related to X are not associated with anything absolute. And naturally those who have a belief in the (im)probability of X are not absolute either. The absolutists are those who do believe with absolute certainty in X, or in "not X". It's rare to find someone who absolutely believes in the non-existence of gods...

I think the effects of the RDFRS campaign have been:

1. More donations to Haïti
2. More fuel for the religious to attack atheists

So how exactly has it "furthered the atheist cause"?