If I live to see humans on Mars... Holy Fuck! that will be so goddamn epic. We will belong to the first generation of earth animals to visit a foreign fucking PLANET. It might have been more useful, space exploration wise, to establish a proper base on the moon, but hell, It will be awesome if we can see people on Mars. Especially considering the technology involved at that time. Just 20 years!! I'm gonna have goosebumps starting now!!

I would go further than this as well, and push to have the vatican officially declared a terrorist state. This corrupt, bizarre little pretend-city fits all the relevant criteria of such a description, It has sleeper cells all over the world almost solely engaged in the attempt of gaining peoples trust, and when some of its servants abuse that trust and terrorize communities by raping peoples children, the church's first instinct is to protect the rapists and the church itself.

Lets just hope Al-qaeda never gets this devious and sophisticated in their attempts to spread fear, guilt and terror, and to protect themselves in the process.

Again criticism of TGD by someone who cannot possibly have read it or understood any of its points. Where the hell does Dawkins say or imply that "men were stupid until science rescued them?" The sentence doesnt even make any sense.

I'd like to hear people like Robert Wright explain how the war in Iraq is partially responsible for attacks like this. (see his recent bloggingheads.tv with hitchens: http://bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/24732)

Like Hitchens points out, as as incidents like this shows, it is bullshit. Islamists couldnt give two shits about their own people being slaughtered, their minds are so warped that the only thing worth protecting to them is Islam itself, and islam, as we all know, despite being invented by God himself, is so frail that a single page in a small Danish newspaper can do some serious damage apparantly, and if thats true, then noone can reasonably expect to share planet earth with these lunatics.

Whatever God might be, God is not visible: God's invisible. Whatever God might be, God cannot be defined: God's ineffable. Nothing positive is said. But nonetheless something is said of God

Help! I'm stuck in drivel, somebody pull me out!

Quite frankly, I'm tired of all this "sphere" talk as well. allright, allright some of you think the world is sphere-shaped and some of us believe its flat, there's no point in harping on about it, right? Live and let live, I say. And by the way , whats all this fuzz about sex anyway. I firmly believe, like my parents told me, that I was brought home by a stork, why does all these sex-obsessed people keep saying I'm crazy? Seriously, the discussion is getting boring, I'd much rather take a poetic approach to the affair, you write about satellites and sex, and I'll ponder the wonders of the stork flying in from literally the four corners of the world.

I am sorry to hear about your dog , Richard. I dont think you can truly understand or appriciate dogs before you've kept one, they are amazing creatures. I also loved the dog chapter in TGSOE.

One thing I always wonder when hearing things like this is that those microbes in the sandstone have, like all life, evolved for billions of years. presumably, its ancestors lived in much more life-friendly habitats, where it probably is much more likely that life will form, and after eons spread to the wierdest places. In other words, had the entire planet been nothing but antartic sandstone, there probably wouldnt have been any microbes either. just a thought

Perhaps if Dawkins understood some of the new philosophy taking place in biology involving cooperation(...)

Dawkins wrote that book some 30 years ago, its called The Selfish Gene, unfortunately ignorants like you only read the title, so you would have no idea of its, or of "Greatest Show"'s content, would you?

Nor do you understand squat about epigenetics or lateral gene transfer, go go read some books before opening your silly, creationist mouth

I ordered from amazon.co.uk back in March, and it shipped today, sept. 3rd. Can't wait to have a crack at it next week.

No, you are not crazy, just human. And as ALL humans, including all non-religious scientists, you are susceptible to self-deception, delusion, biases, fallacies, over-confidence and other ways of blurring ones own thinking. As "trained scientists", however, you should now be aware of these very human faults, and realize that this is the very reason we use science in the first place: We simply cant trust ourselves. This is why you, in your respective fields will require good evidence and reasoning -and nothing less- before accepting a given idea, hypothesis or theory. Circular reasoning, arguments from authority and other fallacies simply won't do.

The fact that you seem to completely ignore such requirements from the ideas of first-century middle-eastern goatherds is to me a stunning testament to the above mentioned susceptibilities of the human mind.

While I obviously disagree with the cowardly and corrupt decision this bus company made, it so happens that their buses are probably private property, and they have the right to reject, or put up, anything they want on their buses, and secondly, these takedowns create MORE publicity rather than less, plus they should refuse to pay on the grounds of breach of contract. so all in all its a win-win situation for the atheists.

So the lesson is clear, these campaigns are working, whether they are actually working as intended or not.

Props for getting Jessica Alba in there :)

That would be your theory, mine is that that is Scarlett Johansen

EDIT:Doh, I accidentally flagged my own comment as offensive. Its not.

Francis Collins was born in Staunton, Virginia, and maybe he is a big Staunton Bulldogs fan, he may be their biggest ever fan, for all I know, and I dont care, just like I dont really care what strain of evangelical racket he's fallen for. But if he, under the authority of being a scientist, starts presenting powerpoint-slides explaining how the laws of physics were put into motion so that the Staunton Bulldogs could win the Superbowl every year, I WOULD have a problem with his football fandom, because it would self-evidently be a major handicap in his ability to think critically

Comment #393013 by robotaholic: bicyclerepairman, almost all those ppl in that video were cute lol

Well, I only could perhaps fancy some of the female ones, but I realize my chances would be pretty slim anyways :). I support their message tho.

http://www.videosift.com/video/Fuck-you-very-very-much-from-France

George Carlin on the Ten Commandments
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pkRYaMiP4K8

You gotta hand it to catholics. putting their trust in old male virgins with an unhealthy taste in young boys and ridiculously moronic superstitions. Thats faith right there.

Seriously, what is this fear that believers or "believers in belief" have of having someones faith "shaken"

To me, it seems pretty obvious that having one's faith shaken is among the noblest and most blissful experiences one can have. What better way to sharpen one's knowledge, morality and understanding?. We all need to have our faiths and beliefs shaken from time to time.

Imagine, for a second that the 9/11 hijackers experienced a serious shaking of their faith in their last moments, isnt it unshakeable faith that is the real problem?

What about our sometimes shameful history of beliefs about human "races" and their believed superiority over eachother, how about the people like Rosa Parks who shook that "faith"?

Shaking someones faith, even when they are RIGHT, has to be a good thing, thats the only way we can refine our arguments and "sharpen our knives" to cut down on the very people shaking our faith. In some ways, I've kind of learned from creationists, when they come at me with their silly ideas, it makes me want to understand proper biology better so that I know how to counter their claims

Do a good deed today: Go out and shake someones faith.

My best wishes to the Hawk'

Although (as some pointed out here) he is not an Einstein "replacement", Stephen Hawking is a great inspiration within not just mathematics and physics, but all of science, he is perhaps one of the biggest populizers of modern science, matched only by the likes of Attenborough. In addition he is a discoverer and a formidable thinker, who has contributed to our understanding of black holes. Lets hear it for Hawking Radiation!

I'm kind of surprised Jerry Coyne would make such comments before, with his comprehensive knowledge about how evolution has shaped all life into its current form, and will continue to do so as long as there is life. It seems to me to be transparently obvious that this understanding would improve medicine in many, many ways. What about the field of psychology?, hasnt it been known for some time that many mental health problems are a direct result of our "caveman in a modern city" syndrome? There is no rational reason, for example, for someone who spends most of their life in big cities, to be scared shitless of tigers, as they likely would never stand eye-to-eye with a tiger, yet our fear has been shaped by the selection of our ancestors who were likely to be eaten by tigers.

I did the parodies of myself and the 'out of context cutting', wearing -- or not -- Josh's dark glasses, and changing my clothes, to satirize quote mining and dishonest editing, as was done in Expelled.

Haha, that's awesome! I didn't know that. in that case, excellent work, the trailer is funny as hell, and spot on. Except Ben Stein monotone nasal droning which is so awful, un-engaging and boring that any imitation, no matter how good, lights up the room in comparison. :)

Thank you for the response, I meant no offense :)

I found it a bit strange that Dawkins didn't introduce the "Sexpelled" trailer with a bit of background. As it happens, I know about Expelled, and that this is a user-made parody found on the internet, but I imagine that some people in the audience might be confused and think that Dawkins was behind the video himself, which again would be bizarre because clips of him are being "abused" to make him say absurd things.

I found the presentation a bit awkward in that respect.

I think this article misses the point. A "good" dam doesnt directly serve the beaver, it serves the genes that helped construct it, it is an expression of genes, just as much as the beavers flattened tail is, the dam could also potentially be affected by non-beaver genes. this is what the gene-centric view that Dawkins proposes advocates, right?

The problem is that if people have trouble accepting the far reach of the gene, they mistake it as individual vs individual or species vs species or group vs group. even "gene vs gene" is the wrong way to see it, as genes are "selfish" in the sense that they adapt to whatever the environment is. If other genes shape the genes "behaviour" ie: survival, it simply adapts ie: dies out or changes.

On the surface, this LOOKS like selection of individuals, groups or "genes for specific purposes" but it is EP.

Feel free to correct me.

Although science can state a great deal about what followed after the big bang, it cannot in fact explain how "something" (the energy of the universe compressed into a volume the size of a golf ball) arose from nothing beforehand.

This yawning logical gap leaves open the possibility that something else may be going on.

Actually, the "cannot explain" part has more to do with us evolved primates having an insufficient grasp of physics to understand it. For the most part, the math works, scientists DO understand it at some basic mathematical level, the problem is trying to express this in common understandable terms. At the time of the big bang, the universe was strange, and concepts like time and space is really the same thing, (it still is) so thinking of it as an expanding golf-ball doesnt really make sense, there was nothing to expand in, it was everything, and the time it took was the beginning of time itself.

To explain this to someone willing to listen is hard enough I would imagine, but how a creotards thick bible-reinforced forehead can be penetrated is probably a harder to imagine than the concept itself.

*The above explanation is based on my very limited understanding of the matter, but I think I'm atleast closer than Crowley

I, for one, wholeheartedly disagree with Dawkins on the "unfit parents" issue.

I do ofcourse not want children to be brought up by bad parents, but this is a matter of choice for mothers as well, its not just that there would be cases in the "gray area" , but here EVERY SINGLE CASE is a gray area, it is NOT the same as taking children from provingly unfit parents, precicely because the baby hasnt been born yet. The mother might stop drinking/taking drugs when she gets pregnant, she might stop, then start up again mid-term, she might become a caring parent, she might not, the is NO WAY TO TELL, when people have children, most of them change, one way or another, it might stop an addiction, it might start one.

And what about control?

What if some drug-abusing girl gets pregnant and she KNOWS the state will force an abortion, What if she decides, for this reason, to keep it a secret until its too late? is that better for the child? Will she drug herself even more in despair?


Children who are taken from their parents because they've been abused or mistreated for years is a completely different thing, because the crime has already been committed. We dont go around arresting people who might become murderers or rapists, before they've done anything. If we did, there might be less murder and rape, but it wouldnt be fair.

"That one was made up in photoshop, and has caught me out (as well as the BBC)"

I was actually aware that the islam-poster was fake, the real one said "Behead those who insult islam" Which really comes down to the same thing, since the "insult" people "should be beheaded" for, usually is calling Islam a violent religion.

As for the slogan I made up by replacing Islam with atheism, I merely did that to illustrate my point; That there's a difference between disagreeing, and fighting your opponents right to disagree. If people wanna go around saying all atheists are worthless scumbags, that they have no morality or that they are the spawn of Satan, then that is actually their right, the way I see it, I will of course argue against it, I'll call them wrong, ignorant and silly, but I wont expect the right to be exempt from these insults or opinions, however wrong or misguided they might be.

I dont like the sound of this word. I know there are cases of atheists being treated very unfair, simply for their lack of faith, which is sad, but this word, as mentioned above strikes me as too close to "Islamophobia" which shouldnt really be a word at all. People have a right to disagree with us and a right -no- a duty to express those disagreements.

Our job is to answer such criticism and perhaps even more importantly, simply being the antithesis of their pre-concieved ideas. The opposition to false beliefs is always a worthy cause, but to fight the very expression of them is the complete opposite, sometimes its a gray area, but I believe we must remain firmly on the side of freedom of speech, I dont want to end up seeing "behead those who say atheism is violent" written on posters.

I'll throw in a suggestion: Something from The Ancestor's tale, More specifically the part where , i think its in the first chapter where you see evolution from the elephants perspective, where every previous ancestor (and every other animal) had "unfinished" or "insufficient" trunks. I love that bit. Its both funny, and it makes an excellent and important point.

I first though it might be this guy, but his name turned out to be named Clive wearing, suffering from something similar:

Extreme Amnesia - Less than 30 seconds memory