Ed Brayton is a journalist, commentator and speaker. He is the co-founder and president of 
I had to laugh while reading Vox Day's most recent bit of absurdity at the Worldnutdaily. It is, like nearly everything he writes, little more than a string of ad hominems and arrogant pronouncements rather than any actual arguments. He really does seem to think that a haughty sneer and an insult regarding some entirely irrelevant trait of one of his enemies magically defeats their arguments. To wit:
Now that its moment in the media sun has passed, the New Atheism is fading fast. Richard Dawkins has repeatedly demonstrated why he needs to be put out to intellectual pasture. He published an entire book dedicated to passing off an inference as a fact before belatedly discovering what everyone else knew already: His biggest fans are an unpleasant collection of socially maladjusted losers. Christopher Hitchens was repeatedly beaten up in debates by various Christians before being physically beaten by Syrians he had provoked. Then he took Dawkins's OUT campaign a little more literally than anyone had expected and outed himself as an occasional homosexual. Sam Harris' two accomplishments have been to create the amusingly misnamed Reason Project, which was founded for much the same reasons and is expected to have about the same success as Air America, and to publish a wildly irrational attack on one of America's most celebrated and accomplished scientists in the New York Times that was completely disregarded by the Obama administration as well as everyone else.No one has any idea what Daniel Dennett has been doing, but that's understandable because no one, including the atheists who claim to be his fans, actually reads his books.
Notice what's missing from all of that? Anything even remotely resembling a substantive argument. Is that really the best he can do? All this could have been stated in much more simple form:
"Richard Dawkins is a big poopyhead and Christopher Hitchens is gay!"
Wow, how convincing. Each of these men, of course, can be fairly criticized for a number of things. I've done a good bit of that criticism myself. But this is not criticism, this is nothing more than a bit of juvenile namecalling covered in a thin veneer of pseudo-intellectual pretension. Which is pretty much what we've come to expect from Vox Day. What else does he have?
Politics
Comments
Well, for what it's worth his last point is (obviously, I know) rubbish. Dan Dennet is one of my favourite non-fiction authors.
Posted by: David Durant | March 17, 2010 9:50 AM
Oh, I love a good Vox Day bitchslapping. It’s really quite intriguing (and amusing) how someone of such purported raw brainpower (if IQ means anything at all) can consistently say such hilariously and transparently stupid things on such a regular basis. The man is obviously intelligent, well-read on a variety of topics and has a decent mastery of the written word – yet seems to have been born without any shred of common sense or reason. An odd specimen, indeed.
Posted by: Joé McKen | March 17, 2010 9:51 AM
That is because you are a big stupidhead and are too cognitively inferior to understand the intellectual powerhouse that is
Theodore BealeVox Day.QED
Posted by: carlsonjok | March 17, 2010 9:59 AM
Oh, but you missed his powerpoint slides! Full of refutations you (yes you!) can use the next time a new atheist tries to pick on you for being religious.
Such as: amphibians have greater genome size than mammals, therefore Dawkins is "incorrect to imply that Darwinian natural selection entails increasing complexity."
Good stuff.
Posted by: JRQ | March 17, 2010 10:01 AM
Does he really think that we'll be offended by "lol your gay" insults? I guess it's very hard for him to move past junior high and realize that some people don't think being gay is shameful.
Posted by: catgirl | March 17, 2010 10:04 AM
Better a book based upon inference than one based upon unfounded assertion.
Posted by: rpsms | March 17, 2010 10:08 AM
JRQ-
Ai yi yi, I missed that one. The proper response would be "OR.....the mere size of a genome is not the proper measure of complexity."
Posted by: Ed Brayton | March 17, 2010 10:11 AM
So, to be clear, Vox Day publicly endorses violent street gangs engaging in acts of assault and terrorism. He cannot bring himself to see anything wrong with the attack on Hitchens, in fact he celebrates it. If he weren't such a coward, he'd be out there beating people up in the streets too. He knows he hasn't got anything remotely similar to a legitimate argument, so all he can do is hope for the people who disagree with him to be assaulted, intimidated, or murdered, since he's too lazy and cowardly to go out and murder them himself.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | March 17, 2010 10:21 AM
I think there's little doubt regarding who ultimately won the fight in the streets between Mr. Hitchens and some Syrians.
Posted by: Michael Heath | March 17, 2010 10:26 AM
Not to mention the fact that modern amphibians are equally evolved (and therefore complex) as modern mammals.
Posted by: Granis | March 17, 2010 10:29 AM
He really brings up the C-value enigma, a "problem" solved before he was even born, as an argument against evolution? (Hint: non-coding sequences) As I think about it I don't know why I'm surprised. It's par for the course with this misleading dolt. In fact, the more I think about it the bigger surprise is that he went with amphibians. Some amoebas have 200 times more DNA than humans. Though apparently those amoebas really are more complex than some humans as well.
Posted by: Abby Normal | March 17, 2010 10:30 AM
Atheism, new or old, is not going to "fade" away as long as atheists keep asking the central question: does God exist?
The majority of people want religion; but, does God exist? People can find ways to reconcile belief in God with science; but, does God exist? Religion allows people to justify their values and politics; but, does God exist? Atheists are mean poopyheads; but, does God exist?
It's not beside the point; it is the point.
Posted by: Sastra | March 17, 2010 10:42 AM
The hilarious thing about Vox's little screeds is constant, oblivious projection. He purports to call people on their "logical fallacies", but can't coherently expose any of these fallacies without committing five his own for every one he tries to address. He pontificates about atheists having a poor grasp of what evidence means, but he shows virtually zero comprehension of the concept every time he mentions it. Here he goes on about how he exposed all the fallacies of the New Atheists in his book, but the arguments just won't die! Meanwhile, his book was systematically demolished over a long series of posts at Evangelical Realism and he never bothered dealing with any of it beyond simply waving his hands and declaring Deacon a "deeply clueless reviewer".
Vox is simply one of most absurdly irrational and self-aggrandizing characters it has ever been my pleasure to to laugh at.
Posted by: JRQ | March 17, 2010 10:52 AM
Where to start.
-The relationship between descent with modification and changes in complexity is a complex technical issue.
-Ditto for the relationship between organism complexity and raw genome size.
-Amphibians need genes for two distinct free living forms the larva and the adult so we might expect them to have more than mammals with a simpler life cycle. Has anyone looked at this hypothesis by the way? I'd be interested to see what is actually known.
Posted by: Matty | March 17, 2010 11:00 AM
Apparently he missed the big conference in Australia....
Posted by: FastLane | March 17, 2010 11:04 AM
Ah, there is always something comely about Theodore Beale's references to others as "socially maladjusted losers." It evokes imagery of an ouroboros nearly bursting after being filled with its own ass. However, he has, in an attempt to prevent his writing from becoming passé, taken a shot at someone else for toiling in obscurity. As a fan of a heterodox school of economics perpetuated mostly through web pamphlets, he seems to have sprouted a second ass with which he may fill his own face. Maybe next time he writes a blog comment to be distributed by WND he can tease Daniel Dennett for wearing glasses. I am sure there's room for it in his guide to refuting atheists, which I am sure will obtain hundreds of downloads.
Posted by: mb | March 17, 2010 11:13 AM
Everyone knows Amphibians are not affected by Darwinian natural selection. They were blinked into existence 6000 years ago.
Posted by: MarkusR | March 17, 2010 11:16 AM
"What else does he have?"
He has a Mohawk and super-duper-quadruper intelligence. Did you not check out his bar graph of super-intelligence in his amazing power point (If Jesus had power point, this is the presentation He would have made. [Answering the question IJHPPWPWHHM?].) Atheist are only a mere 3 points above average, unlike the super smart MENSA, including Vox Day just in case you forgot, which are an amazing 32 points above the average. I know what you are saying: the bar graph does not actually compare atheist to any religious group, nor does it plot IQ verse Religiosity. And when you stop to think about it, the graph does show that the average atheist is smarter that the average person. But that could all be explained away with standard deviations, which the graph also does not show, because why would you expect something as 'standard' as deviations to be on anything as 'extraordinary' as this graph.
Posted by: holytape | March 17, 2010 11:32 AM
Ahem, I read Dan Dennett's books-- it would've been hard to write a review of one of them without doing so. If Vox Day hasn't, he's missing out.
Posted by: Gretchen | March 17, 2010 12:04 PM
Dawkins needs to be put out to intellectual pasture? His book The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution is the #1-#2 book on Evolution at Amazon and #3 for biology as a whole and is currently 28th on the New York Times best seller list for Hardcover Nonfiction. The guy still knows how to make evolution sexy to the public at large.
I also love how often certain Christians celebrate the death of the "new atheism". It's clear that they are trying to convince themselves that the threat has ended, but they know in their hearts that atheists still have a lot of momentum.
Posted by: penn | March 17, 2010 12:05 PM
Ed @ 7, JRQ @ 4:
Also, has anyone ever seriously argued that natural selection entails increasing complexity? That sounds like something you'd only hear from a creationist.
Posted by: Escuerd | March 17, 2010 12:10 PM
Seems that Beale is just as expert on amphibians as he is on mice.
Posted by: Christophe Thill | March 17, 2010 12:11 PM
Vox Day: another data point for the assertion that anyone who advertises their Mensa membership is a fool with nothing intelligent to say, and that bragging about your IQ is just the intellectual equivalent of bragging about your penis size.
Posted by: Eamon Knight | March 17, 2010 12:18 PM
I noticed that his slide on who commits more crimes: Christians vs. No Religion is based on data from the UK. Anyone wanna guess why he didn't use the numbers from the US?
Posted by: Iason Ouabache | March 17, 2010 12:21 PM
an unpleasant collection of socially maladjusted losers.
Funny, because that seems to describe most of the Libertarian Party members I have met.
Posted by: Tommykey | March 17, 2010 12:28 PM
Companion thread -
http://voxday.blogspot.com/2010/03/monday-column.html
"Victorian Dad" has soem fun with him
Posted by: Rich | March 17, 2010 12:35 PM
A high IQ is meaningless if you squander it as Vox Day seems to do.
Posted by: Alareth | March 17, 2010 12:52 PM
Good point. The number of atheists in the US has been growing continuously for 50 years, and will continue to grow for some time as the older, more religious generations die off. As many as 25% of young people are non-religious these days, and there is no sign that this trend is reversing itself.
Vox Day would do well to note that practicing Christians in countries like Britain and Sweden have shrunk to minority status without any help from the New Atheists or from non-believer activism of any kind.
Apathy and disillusion are far more powerful anti-Christian forces, and very likely unstoppable in the long run.
Posted by: tacitus | March 17, 2010 1:00 PM
To which arrogant twerps such as Vox Day respond "I have this book and..."
Which is why atheists not only continue to exist, but are increasing by an ever increasing rate.
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 17, 2010 1:07 PM
Obviously my redundancy filter on my editing matrix is ... ummm redundant? ;o)
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 17, 2010 1:09 PM
Anyone seen Vox and David Berlinski in the same room? (Kidding, of course, except about the glaring empty-headed diatribes).
Glen Davidson
http://tinyurl.com/mxaa3p
Posted by: Glen Davidson | March 17, 2010 1:19 PM
It's not necessarily redundant, because the derivative of an increasing function isn't necessarily strictly increasing. The population could be increasing at a constant rate, an increasing rate, a decreasing rate, or in any number of more interesting ways. I don't know if that's what you meant to express, but without data I wouldn't even want to make claims about it.
Posted by: mb | March 17, 2010 1:29 PM
While that is basically what I was expressing, I was really making fun of myself for the way I said it which was more than a bit sloppy.
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 17, 2010 1:37 PM
Re Glen Davidson @ #31
Has anyone ever seen Theodore Beale, David Berlinski, and Robert O'Brien in the same room? Incidentally, Mr. O'Brien made a jackass of himself after showing up to one of PZ Myers' talks in California last month.
Posted by: SLC | March 17, 2010 1:44 PM
The argument being made from the non-dumb side isn't that natural selection inexorably increases complexity/information in the genome, but that it can. Creationists are fond of making a misguided argument, often invoking the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics, that since the grist for natural selection is random, it cannot possibly generate information or increased complexity.
There are several ways of dealing with this canard. If they invoke the Second Law, you can simply remind them that Earth is not a closed system (DERP!). If they try to use pseudo-mathematical definitions of information, as Dembski has done, you can tear them apart on the bad math (see Mark Chu-Caroll's blog).
My personal way of dealing with it is to reframe it. While natural selection introduces "information" into the genome, much of the meaningful part of that "information" is not summoned sui generis out of the air... it was already present in the organisms' environment. Natural selection transforms information present in the environment (e.g. trees are tall) into information in the genome that reflects a response to that environment (giraffes have long necks).
Of course, we are now finding that natural selection is not the only contributor -- and maybe not even the biggest contributor! -- to evolution. Genetic drift and other factors play a much bigger role than anyone previously imagined. So the mental model I describe above is a vast over-simplification. But it helps me, at least, to visualize how a natural process with random inputs can generate meaningful information.
Posted by: James Sweet | March 17, 2010 1:49 PM
New atheism! Same great godlessness, bold new flavor!
Posted by: debaser | March 17, 2010 1:55 PM
Rich, you should be more careful where you point your links. I read a comment in which Theodore estimates another poster's IQ through their blog correspondence. Afterward, I had to run through the alphabet to ensure I hadn't lost any letters.
Scott Adams is another Mensan that enjoys trolling his blog readers and talking about how clever he is, but Theodore Beale really puts him to shame.
Posted by: mb | March 17, 2010 1:58 PM
Generally those who brag the most about their intelligence have the least reason to do so.
Posted by: dogmeatib | March 17, 2010 2:06 PM
Dogmeatib@38: A consequence of the Dunning–Kruger effect, no doubt?
Posted by: Don't Panic | March 17, 2010 2:16 PM
Posted by: Modusoperandi | March 17, 2010 4:03 PM
I've still got my original copy of Mind's I on bookshelf. I still read it every now and again. Well worth the time. Dennet's a very good philosopher.
Posted by: Mylasticus | March 17, 2010 4:45 PM
Vox Day still exists?
Posted by: Siamang | March 17, 2010 4:52 PM
Really? That's it? I thought he must have been in the 180's the way he's bragged about his "big brain..."
BTW, most people in Mensa don't act like Vox Day. They're actually, for the most part, smart people, well read and can carry on an intelligent conversation without comparing the size of their IQ...
More important, lots of them play Dungeons and Dragons... And lots of Star Trek nerds, too...
But hardly any complete ass-hats like Vox Day...
Posted by: Moses | March 17, 2010 5:51 PM
"His biggest fans are an unpleasant collection of socially maladjusted losers."
Vox could easily be talking about himself in the third person here.
Posted by: Tyler DiPietro | March 17, 2010 5:56 PM
I don't put much stock in IQ tests. For the most part they test your ability to quickly solve dumb logic puzzles, they don't test conceptual level or curiosity or other things that we associate with real intellectual acumen. Vox Day doesn't display those traits to any extraordinary degree.
In the interests of full disclosure, my I.Q. in high school tested at 129. Respectable, but not "genius" level.
Posted by: Tyler DiPietro | March 17, 2010 6:04 PM
With results that poor, Tyler, you could only reach to the heights of the likes of Richard Feynman. You wouldn't even understand Theodore's explanation for why you can't understand him, should he condescend to explain it to you.
Posted by: mb | March 17, 2010 6:29 PM
The passage you cite is from the introduction only. There is a lot more of his argument to be made if you care to refute it. Somehow, I don't see that coming...
Posted by: TheManFromRoom5 | March 17, 2010 6:32 PM
Vox Day/Theodore Beale, a loser scam artist:
http://www.applelinks.com/index.php/more/openofficeorg_clarifies_status_of_the_openoffice_mouse/
He created some 18 button mouse, named it the OpenOfficeMouse and acted like they were working with him, then they said knock it off, we want nothing to do with you, and he had to change the name to WarMouse.
Needless to say, the reviews so far are not positive.
Posted by: nimb | March 17, 2010 7:35 PM
Hey Ed,
Why didn't you include Vox's powerpoint associated with the article? You are criticizing the introduction while ignoring the body of evidence?
Posted by: Travis | March 17, 2010 7:57 PM
Other peeps have picked up on Vox's abuse of genome-size comparison, but there's also the fact that Dawkins has never proposed anything akin to the windmill Vox is tilting at.
Dawkins has never argued that complexity monotonically increases throughout natural history, only that evolution builds complexity from simplicity (the "climbing Mount Improbable" metaphor). Dawkins stronger claim in TGD, that evolution is the only way to obtain increased complexity is convoluted and, IMO, probably wrong. But there is nothing wrong with Dawkins claims about evolution progressively building complexity, or at least Vox hasn't pinpointed any such thing (especially since the content of most genomes is highly redundant, see T. Ryan Gregory's "Onion Test").
Posted by: Tyler DiPietro | March 17, 2010 8:34 PM
Teddy has evidence? Since when?
Posted by: Badger3k | March 17, 2010 8:46 PM
Judging by the combination of Vox's vituperative response to this post and the comments thereafter, I conclude that Vox is unable to fully grasp A.) the definition of Kolmogorov complexity/algorithmic information and B.) that the distinction between deductive and inductive inferences has nothing to do with whether you're inferring facts. Doesn't reflect too well on someone who fancies himself a genius.
Posted by: Tyler DiPietro | March 17, 2010 9:44 PM
"Notice what's missing from all of that? Anything even remotely resembling a substantive argument."
You mustn't have read through the slide show that was linked to in the article which presents extremely convincing evidence that the following claims of the new atheists......
Religion causes war
Religion inspires violence
Religion inhibits science
Sam Harris' extinction equation
Sam Harris' Red State argument
Atheists commit less crime
Richard Dawkins' improbability of divine complexity
....are nonsensical. Obviously, Hitchens, Dawkins, Dennett, and Harris, don't seem to think that their claims need to be based in any kind of reality at all.
From the facts presented in the slideshow, and in Vox's book, it's apparent that much of the "wisdom" and "expertise" of the new atheists should be dismissed as irrational rantings.
Posted by: Byob | March 18, 2010 3:20 AM
"He created some 18 button mouse, named it the OpenOfficeMouse and acted like they were working with him, then they said knock it off, we want nothing to do with you, and he had to change the name to WarMouse. Needless to say, the reviews so far are not positive.
Ed, no doubt we will continue have egregious differences of opinion, but you should know that this is totally untrue. And while we don't think highly of each other, I don't imagine that you would want any part in this sort of stupid and outright slander.
As both Sun and the Marketing Project of the OpenOffice Community will confirm, we requested and received permission to use the OpenOffice.org logo and name for mice and mousepads. We worked with the OpenOffice.org marketing group for months and announced the mouse at their global conference last November as part of the conference program. The first press release generated so much press attention that it alarmed Sun Microsystems, who owns the OpenOffice.org trademark, because many people thought they were making the mouse and not simply branding it ala Guild Wars (Razer) and World of Warcraft (SteelSeries). Due to this confusion, everyone involved agreed it would be a good idea to change the name; in fact, the cited press release was one that I wrote and released in cooperation with Sun.
There has never been any question of any sort of "scam", we remain on good terms with both Sun and the OOo Community, and the only actual hands-on preview of the product to date just took place last week and was rather positive. "You should not forget that WarMouse has given the concept of the mouse a whole new meaning here."
I apologize for the tangent as I merely wished to set the record straight. Please feel free to return to abusing my column, my intelligence, my readership, and my character.
Posted by: VD | March 18, 2010 4:55 AM
"I apologize for the tangent as I merely wished to set the record straight. Please feel free to return to abusing my column, my intelligence, my readership, and my character."
Ok, you're a duplicitous bottom-feeding pseudo-intellectual. Your grasp on science -and indeed, reality- is shakier than a full-blown alcoholic going cold turkey, and the extent of your arrogance is deeply amusing. Oh, and your posting name is 'VD'. The jokes just write themselves.
Posted by: Coryat | March 18, 2010 9:42 AM
Vox, your character doesn't need to be abused. It's significantly deformed already.
You may not remember me, but during one of your exchanges with Luke from Common Sense Atheism, I complained on your site about your vicious and shameful use of accusations of Asperger's Syndrome as an insult.
In return, you expressed utter indifference and continued insulting people for no apparent reason who had done nothing to you. How would you feel if I insulted your mother for having cancer, or your grandfather for being crippled? It's not right to insult and slander people for health conditions they can't control.
You're a pathetic and twisted individual. But even you can get help, if you're willing to admit that you might be wrong. Of course, who am I kidding? Is there any evidence that you're even capable of such a thing? You have no humility. You have no decency. You have no respect.
You exemplify faith at its very worst: a combination of ignorance and hope, a gnawing lack of self-awareness combined with a pathological need to reinforce your own ego. Your faith is not in any supposed God: your faith is entirely in yourself. You are one of the worst hypocrites I have ever witnessed.
I hope you read this. If you could at least admit some possibility for error, perhaps my own faith in humanity could be restored. I can only laugh at you, or I might have to despair.
Posted by: Teleprompter | March 18, 2010 6:13 PM
Yeah, of course Sun/OO was "alarmed" about "all the press": it was negative:
http://www.lowpra.com/tecnologeek/2009/11/openoffice-distances-itself-from-openofficemouse-joins-everyone-else/
And yes no one doubt they worked with Beale to produce that last press release because it noted they wanted nothing to do with him:
The "OpenOffice Mouse" demonstrated at the Community's Conference
on 4th November will be produced by WarMouse, an independent company with no business relationship with either the OpenOffice.org Community, or with Sun Microsystems, the owner of the OpenOffice.org trademark.
Posted by: nimby | March 18, 2010 6:48 PM
VD: "Please feel free to return to abusing my column, my intelligence, my readership, and my character."
Boo-fucking-hoo.
Coming from a self-proclaimed "award winning cruelty artist" who regularly maligns and defames half the human population (women) with his asinine pontifications on the idiocy of the human female (among his many other critiques of various non-white, non-male, non-christian groups), you just have to fucking laugh at his Poor Me routine when he's confronted with his own vitriol blown right back into his face.
This man, through his own anger, hatred, and ignorance, has created and is living in his own hell on earth that his christian faith has clearly not saved him from. And, he perpetuates that hell for the angry men who adore and worship him on his blog.
I actually have pity for them.
Posted by: Just A Dumb Bitch | March 19, 2010 4:24 PM
Isn't it funny, his self-pitying? "Please feel free to return to abusing my column, my intelligence, my readership, and my character."
This from a guy who trolls the internet for blog posts with which he disagrees (and which have nothing to do with him) so he can not just disagree in a civil manner, but insult the blog owner in the nastiest terms imaginable. And then he comes here and whines pathetically about people abusing him.
What a loser.
Posted by: ihjk | March 19, 2010 4:39 PM
For anybody who has too much time on their hands, it's quite interesting to compare VD's slightly grandiose take on events with the more modest discussions of the OpenOffice team themselves, which you can find on the OpenOffice mailing lists.
The last word goes to Louis Suarez-Potts, who seems genuinely puzzled by the whole chain of events: "I'm not blaming Theo for this confusion. I blame myself for not being more patient or clear in explaining to him what these terms mean and what they don't... this is the first such mistake we've seen, and I think it will probably be the last."
Posted by: merkur | April 27, 2010 9:15 AM