…and this is a 
Jerry Coyne is being berated once again for daring to speak out against the folly of religion. This time, it's a complaint by Michael Zimmerman, instigator of the clergy letter project, claiming that all those positive atheists are driving away the religious people who would support the teaching of evolution.
Like religious fundamentalists, Coyne is arguing that people must choose between religion and science, that they can't accept both. There are, I believe, two problems with this position. First, pragmatically, studies have clearly suggested that in the United States, when people are given this choice, they will more often than not opt for religion. Now, I'm not suggesting that Coyne, or any of us who care deeply about science, should pervert our understanding of the discipline simply to make converts. No, I'm arguing that there is a way to promote the principles of scientific inquiry fully while not alienating many who are likely to be supporters by belittling their sincerely held beliefs
Coyne addresses it well, better than I would, because I'd hit that first phrase comparing us to religious fundamentalists and have to whip out the cyberpistol and switch on the agonizer. I'll refrain from repeating the familiar arguments that you can find on Jerry's post and cut to the chase.
The clergy letter project isn't helping. This refusal to tell people they're wrong when they are isn't helping. This craven surrender to nonsense out of fear isn't helping.
How do I know? I've read the goddamned sermons. They're uniformly awful. The entire enterprise isn't about encouraging people to think thoughtfully about the science, it's about allowing priests to babble on about creationism and intelligent design and make their pious lies with the pretense of promoting science.
I haven't read them all, because I can't get through more than 2 or 3 at a sitting before I have to puke, so maybe there are a few gems in there where they actually promote, you know, reason, critical thinking, and science, but I haven't found them yet and am disinclined to dig further.
So Susan Andrews preaches on evolution Sunday, and what does she promote? Intelligent Design.
I have come to believe, in my own journey of faith, that God lives in the questions. I believe that seeking understanding with my mind is the preparation I need to trust with my heart. I believe that faith is the frontier beyond the limits of knowledge. I have started looking for portents - in the sky, in the newspaper, in the textbook, in the science lab, in the hospital room, in the darkness as well as the light. Yes, I have started looking for those signs of a God who is trying to do a new thing. And I have discovered that it is in the process, and in the journey, and in the questions that new knowledge and new understanding is usually found. Specifically in this peculiar American controversy about intelligent design, I have come to believe that evolution is intelligent design. And that the Intelligent Designer is the One whom I call God.
Rabbi Friedland preaches on the Sabbath, and what does he promote? Biblical creationism.
After billions of years chemicals were combined to create the first stirrings of life. This developed into human life. What impetus brought those first living cells together? The Torah teaches us it was the Divine Force or Will of God. The sustaining force we call God is what brought it all about.
Life continues as a pattern. The Torah's version is first earth and sky and water and planets and eventually life forms. Less to more, simple forms to more complex forms. plants to animals to humans. Humans most complex created b'tzelem Elokim.
Hub Nelson preaches on evolution Sunday, and what does he promote? Well, first he praises Rick Warren and The Purpose Driven Life, then he bashes Richard Dawkins and The God Delusion, and he wraps it all up by telling us his god provides meaning and beauty.
Unsurprisingly, everything in those sermons pushes a pro-religious agenda and wraps the science of evolution in a gushy, goofy package used to endorse religion, not science. I'd be more impressed with Michael Zimmerman's claim that Coyne was undermining efforts to educate the faithful in good science if Zimmerman's project was actually doing that. But it's not. The Clergy Letter project is actually encouraging more fuzzy, sloppy thinking and reinforcing religious authority. And if Coyne is making his job harder, more power to Jerry.
Comments
Posted by: https://me.yahoo.com/a/2Jn.tLEkscmcY8VjT.PPeUU9Ngc.Ri6_sYwYPw--#8e984
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October 26, 2010 1:59 PM
It just never gets any easier. Gah.
Posted by: Tobinius
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October 26, 2010 1:59 PM
Could you find two concepts further apart than these? Xians can twist anything to become part of their belief system - facts be damned!Posted by: Manny Calavera
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October 26, 2010 2:05 PM
"God lives in the questions."
I believe the correct term is 'the gaps'. Either way I think God should at least dip his toe into the answers now and then. Y'know, if he's torturing people for not coming to the conclusion that he exists you'd think he'd arrange it so that every answered question didn't chase him out of a place of lodging.
Posted by: Kevin Anthoney
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October 26, 2010 2:11 PM
There's nothing wrong with being fundamentalist if you happen to be right.
Posted by: SC OM
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October 26, 2010 2:14 PM
Coyne is right, of course. But what kind of morons are these people that they'd be put off from supporting science by an argument? If they really believe they and others can fully accept science while maintaining their religious beliefs without doing violence to either, why don't they just do it? If this is the case, what should they care if someone argues that the two are incompatible? All they're doing with these projects and desperate attempts at reconciliation is illustrating the incompatibility.
Posted by: Ian
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October 26, 2010 2:18 PM
God lives in the questions. Science lives in the answers.
Posted by: Dan L.
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October 26, 2010 2:19 PM
She means "in the gaps", of course.
Posted by: Dhorvath, OM
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October 26, 2010 2:23 PM
No one should be surprised when immature thinkers have immature thoughts. Religion only makes sense to children so is it any wonder that they keep using the same incomplete arguments in favour of faith.
Only when the religious stop treating their stories like science can we stop talking about choosing between science and faith.
Posted by: Janine, The Little Top Of Venom, OM
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October 26, 2010 2:25 PM
I apologize for going off topic so quickly, but PZ, you just pissed me off. In the American Thug thread, I stood on my soap box about the use of the word "bash". I hate how the word is used interchangeably for critical words and a physical attack.
I ask that the word "bash" be used in the original meaning, a crushing blow. Use of the word as you have used it continues to muddy the distinction between words and an attack.
Posted by: Glen Davidson
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October 26, 2010 2:25 PM
I really can't be sure whether or not Andrews was preaching ID, or if she was co-opting ID for evolution. Obviously, that's part of the problem.
Regardless, most people don't know the science and don't especially care, so it's not clear that science has much of a chance if religion and science are truly pitted against each other. Hence I don't mind the accommodationists, so long as they're not shooting at the people who are pushing science in a way that the preachers surely are not.
It does seem to me that the accommodationists ought at least to be pushing the preachers for a more pro-science message than I've seen, regardless of the religion that surrounds such a message.
Glen Davidson
Posted by: nigelTheBold, Minister of Spankings
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October 26, 2010 2:31 PM
Of course they can't accept both. That's just silly talk.
Let's say they did accept both, as they stand right now in the most subtle and sophisticated argument for God, and the best scientific understanding of universe. The very first time science kicked over a rock and discovered something that slightly challenged their model of God, they'd turn against science.
This happens every fucking time. The next big thing will be the final and complete destruction of dualism, I think. Once science proves there is no need for a "soul," that the mind/body problem is a problem with our perception and not a real problem at all, we'll see another round of religious addicts scurrying about bemoaning how scientism is destroying truth.
I find it hard to respect anyone who stops believing something just because someone presents rational arguments in support of it.
Posted by: Red Weasel
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October 26, 2010 2:31 PM
#9
Can we also use it for running scripts?
#bash ./Richard_Dawkins
Posted by: M.
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October 26, 2010 2:37 PM
Perhaps we need to pick a few concrete examples, and keep repeating them until they stick.
For instance: the Catholic crusade against birth control is causing infinitely more pain, suffering, death and evil in the world than all creationists put together. Therefore, in the hierarchy of problems this world has, eliminating or reducing the influence of the Catholic Church is far more important than eliminating creationism.
Or: We would actually have more respect for Hub Nelson if he was a YEC, instead of being a promoter and a supporter of that hateful little evil man who goes by the name of Rick Warren. We do have priorities.
Similar things can be found for every religion, and then we can go from there. The accomodationists keep pretending that evolution and global warming are the only issues, when from wider perspective they aren't even the major ones.
Posted by: Sajanas
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October 26, 2010 2:46 PM
There is only one science, and though there are many opinions on various topics of contention, it all describes the same reality and world. Religion, however, is a buffet of realities unconnected to our own, with resurrecting demi-gods, hundred headed monsters, one-eyed crow fanciers, and shapeshifting philanderers. Even more importantly, they are unconnected to each other, except in that they are all practiced by humans. The defenders of religion in the US think they're coming from some sort of unified front, but I've been to church a lot in my younger years. Behind closed doors, Lutherans talk about how Catholics are deluded and how Scientology is a cult. Religion as a whole offers no real option, because once you look around, you realize that its unlikely that one would be right, and the others so very, very wrong. It is more likely that they are all wrong in the same basic way.
Posted by: H.H.
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October 26, 2010 2:48 PM
Yup. In the gap between her ears.Posted by: a.human.ape
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October 26, 2010 2:54 PM
The clergy letter project is anti-science because the Jeebus idiots who signed it pollute biology with theistic bullshit. If Christians are too retarded to accept a basic scientific fact without invoking supernatural magic to explain it, they should just stay away from science completely.
All ministers are fucking idiots, whether or not they endorse evolution.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 3:03 PM
Technically she's not promoting ID, which is exactly creationism; she's intentionally subverting the term "intelligent design" to mean something else, namely "theistic evolution." The latter could mean anything from "god steering evolution" to "god" observing evolution. Wherever she falls on that continuum, she's obviously still a theist, and her woo-woo about "portents" is an acute embarrassment, but she's not "promoting ID."
Posted by: Jeffrey A. Myers
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October 26, 2010 3:04 PM
These people will NEVER support the teaching of evolution because once you accept the possibility that science and human understanding can pinpoint and describe and modeland even reproduce the mechanisms by which the cosmos can evolve and life can evolve, God becomes wholly unnecessary. They cannot allow that which is why Religionists have retreated beyond the Planck epoch because it is the only veil they can hide behind.
Posted by: CJO
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October 26, 2010 3:06 PM
I hate how the word is used interchangeably for critical words and a physical attack.
What about the word "attack" itself? Words often have more than one meaning. The way PZ used "bash" is standard English usage.
Posted by: LarianLeQuella
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October 26, 2010 3:07 PM
What the fuck does that even really mean? I know that to us it means the "gaps", but what the fuck does this guy think he's talking about?
Posted by: Jerry Coyne
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October 26, 2010 3:09 PM
The sad part is that the National Center for Science Education endorses this project, which means endorsing all manner of theistic evolution. They apparently don't care that they're signing on to many views of evolution that explicitly violate the scientific one.
Posted by: nigelTheBold, Minister of Spankings
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October 26, 2010 3:13 PM
Well, it's a beautiful, poetic way of saying that God is only viable when truth is not known. Once we gain knowledge, and the answer to the question, God dies just a little bit.
So stop answering the fucking questions.
At least, that's what it seems like to me.
Posted by: sendittodevnull
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October 26, 2010 3:13 PM
Isn't is great the way the whole "I'm thy humble servant lord...blah blah blah" lot are so incredibly egocentric. Look at that piece of text: 8 sentences. 4 of them begin with "I" the rest with an opening clause and "I"Noticed that the first time I saw a megachurch thing -- it's all MEEEEEEEEEEEEE Jebus loves MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE IIIIIIIIIIIIIII IIIIIIII MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
Posted by: Evomonkey
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October 26, 2010 3:17 PM
Gack!!! Zimmerman and the pastors of The Clergy Letter Project promote this same overly saccharine idea that science and religion just have to be compatible. The alternative is unbearable to them. This is same message of Krista Tippet on her NPR show "On Being" and the underlying theme of her book "Einstein's God".
I was at a book club discussion of this book recently and everyone (~15 others) but me bought into this idea. I think they know and fear science is cornering religion in an ever smaller box. So they come up with deepities like "I have come to believe that evolution is intelligent design" in a last ditch effort to integrate their hollow shrinking faith with the modern state of scientific knowledge. It's truly sad that so many see this type of pablum as profound thinking.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo
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October 26, 2010 3:18 PM
Prescriptivist!
Language evolves! Deal with it!
Posted by: Freodin
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October 26, 2010 3:29 PM
No, Coyne is not right with that. You don´t have to decide between science and religion. You can have both.
BUT....!
... you have to accept the clear distinction: science is what our senses tell us and our mind processes. Religion is all the additional stuff you like to believe.
God [i]may[/i] lives in the questions. But science [i]does[/i] in the answers.
Posted by: Dan L.
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October 26, 2010 3:30 PM
I think it means the same to her as it does to us. What else could it be but a frank admission of god-of-the-gaps thinking?
What's appalling is that she apparently finds this dopey idea inspiring in some way.
With friends like these...
Posted by: Manny Calavera
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October 26, 2010 3:31 PM
I'm sorry but that's just an unproven theory. Sure words can change within kinds but we've never seen a vowel turn into a consonant. (Sorry, I had to)
Posted by: Janine, The Little Top Of Venom, OM
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October 26, 2010 3:34 PM
CJO, sometimes, the standard usage is an example of duckspeak.
Sven, I am aware that language evolves. Sometimes in detriment to the clarity of the language. Deal with it.
Posted by: Tulse
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October 26, 2010 3:39 PM
The Torah's version is also that plants were created before the sun.
Posted by: TGH
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October 26, 2010 3:41 PM
I thought this one was fantastic...
http://blue.butler.edu/~mzimmerm/pdf/dewolf.doc
...no bible babble, just the facts. Should have been called "From Galileo to Dover".
Posted by: abb3w
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October 26, 2010 3:42 PM
PZ: The clergy letter project isn't helping.
There appear to be five major clusters of belief in the US: Young Earth Creationism, Old Earth Creationism, Intelligent Design, Theistic Evolution, and Atheistic Evolution. The split looks to be about 30-15-25-15-15.
The clergy letter project will have little to no direct impact for an end-goal of moving people to AE; however, I expect it has some impact in moving people from YEC and OEC to ID and TE positions. This is not a complete solution, but seems likely to help with society making an (heh) evolutionary transition. We probably won't get the YEC to AE; however, it may help shift the children of YECs and OECs to IDs or to TEs, meaning that it will be easier to shift their children's children from their IE/TE upbringing to AE.
On the other hand, I also expect the Clergy Letter phenomemon is more symptom of the attitude transition than cause - lagging, rather than leading.
I'd adjust my position if there were polling data to examine the impact on people's acceptance of evolution. ("Which of the following five statements best characterizes your belief?" "Have you heard of the Clergy letter project?" "Does knowing about these letters tend to make your acceptance of evolution and uniform common descent strongly increase, slightly increas, have no effect on, slightly decrease, or strongly decrease?") However, I wasn't able to turn up any.
MORE DATA, DAMMIT!
Posted by: Epikt
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October 26, 2010 3:44 PM
Red Weasel
Depends. Are you Bourne again?
Posted by: Jeffrey A. Myers
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October 26, 2010 3:45 PM
@ Nigel,
You just don't understand Christian Math. If you have rational and reasoned understanding of any given subject then ipso facto no faith is required and as we all now, Not-Faith is inherently human and bad and sinful and means you don't go to heaven to dwell with the invisible sky wizard.
Posted by: CJO
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October 26, 2010 3:48 PM
Sometimes in detriment to the clarity of the language. Deal with it.
There simply is no standard by which to judge "the clarity of the language" independently of a community of speakers. There is nothing inherently unclear about a word having two different but related meanings. One could as easily say that it would be in detriment to the clarity of the language to have a situation in which "attack" is commonly used in both the literal, physical sense and in a metaphorical sense, while its near synonym, "bash," was never used metaphorically.
Posted by: Walton, Marquis of Carabas
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October 26, 2010 3:48 PM
FWIW, I agree with Janine.
Criticising someone (deservedly or not) is not "bashing" them. I realise I've been guilty of this myself in the past, but I think we need to avoid using the imagery of violence so readily as a metaphor for verbal criticism, as though the two things were genuinely equivalent. They are not.
Posted by: Dhorvath, OM
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October 26, 2010 3:49 PM
Dan L.
Not to endorse the thought, but it could also mean that seeking brings one closer to the divine. It wasn't stated as: 'God lives because there are questions.' which is much closer to a god of the gaps argument. Instead it explicitly relates the divine to questions, which suggests to me that they are divine not because they are unanswerable, but because they are unanswered. Worship becomes research.
Posted by: Sal Bro
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October 26, 2010 3:49 PM
Ugh, the kiss-ass tone of the Zimmerman article is incredibly annoying and disingenuous. "I have the utmost respect for Coyne, blah blah blah, but I wish he'd stop talking now and just respect us." BTW, check out Coyne's response in the comments to Zimmerman's hand-wringing.
Posted by: Deepsix
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October 26, 2010 3:49 PM
I believe in Unicorns.
I believe Unicorns cause the sun to rise.
Every morning when the sun rises, it proves the existence of Unicorns.
However, others tell me it is the rotation of the Earth that causes the sun to "rise" and that Unicorns have nothing to do with it.
Can't I believe in both? In reality, Unicorns cause the earth to rotate, which in turn causes the sun to rise. See, science and faith are perfectly compatible.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp
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October 26, 2010 3:52 PM
ugh
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 3:54 PM
But by using the term intelligent design to describe theistic evolution, she is promoting ID. More specifically, she's lending legitimacy to ID by using the term to describe something more vague. People who already believe in ID think she's on their side and people who believe in theistic evolution will now think that ID promoters are harmless proponents of theistic evolution.
Posted by: nigelTheBold, Minister of Spankings
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October 26, 2010 3:58 PM
Ah! So it's faith that's important. I see.
I can imagine future questions in Texas BOE-approved math textbooks:
"A scientist is traveling on a north-bound train, which is moving at 30 miles per hour. A priest, a rabbi, and an evangelical Christian are traveling south on a train moving at 48 miles per hour.
"Question: How long does it take the scientist to go to hell?"
Posted by: First Approximation, L'esprit de l'escalier
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October 26, 2010 4:01 PM
Where 3=1.
Posted by: CJO
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October 26, 2010 4:03 PM
I think we need to avoid using the imagery of violence so readily as a metaphor for verbal criticism, as though the two things were genuinely equivalent. They are not.
In the example to hand, someone was described as bashing a book.
And using a word in a standard metaphorical sense is not to make two things "genuinely equivalent." It's using a metaphor, a comparison, explicitly acknowledging that the two are not exactly the same; if they were, what would be the point of using a metaphor?
Posted by: Rorschach
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October 26, 2010 4:10 PM
Indeed.Sad and hard to believe.
Posted by: Geds
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October 26, 2010 4:11 PM
I ask that the word "bash" be used in the original meaning, a crushing blow. Use of the word as you have used it continues to muddy the distinction between words and an attack.
And I ask that "computer" be used in the original meaning, a person whose task is to calculate the lord of the manor's money or the merchant's take in the market...
But, seriously, definition 2 of "bash" from Merriam-Webster:
: to attack physically or verbally [media bashing] [celebrity bashing]
Sorry if the dictionary insists on muddying up the clarity of the language...
Posted by: Don Quijote
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October 26, 2010 4:12 PM
Problem solved: God lives in the London underground. "Mind the gap".
BTW Bash, to fiercely criticize or oppose OED.
Posted by: Deepsix
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October 26, 2010 4:14 PM
Never trust the heart, it is a lying bastard.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 4:16 PM
Wow, *really?* A bunch of moderate-liberal Christians accepting evolution, and preaching about that to their congregations, really is worth howls of outrage and disgust to you guys? Based on the tone here, you'd think these folks were stoning adulterers or supporting the teaching of Noah's Flood in the public schools.
What this person said. Just because you hate religion doesn't mean you get to mis-portray what some religious person is actually saying.
This is crap. The people in the Clergy Letter Project support the teaching of evolution. It might make your brain explode, but it's true. I tend to think science and reason need all the support they can get in public opinion and politics this days, and I suspect almost anyone who has actually been involved in political battles about science education in various states is grateful for the support of Christians. But apparently you guys think the thing to do is just piss on them every chance you get.
For folks who allegedly promote reason, (a) you've been giving unreasonable and unfair portrayals of the clergy letter project people, (b) emotion and hatred of religion are dominating your reaction, rather than calm consideration that exhibits a sense of proportion, and (c) as a general strategy for promoting science in public opinion and in the schools, the "let's be mean jerks to everyone who's not a hardcore atheist like us" has got to be one of the most irrational strategies ever devised.
Get a sense of proportion, please, and save the bile and outrage for people who actually deserve it, like actual religious fundamentalists.
Posted by: SteveM
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October 26, 2010 4:16 PM
It has already been established that "creationism", "intelligent design" and "theistic evolution" are all synonyms. She is not misappropriating the term, there is no difference between them.
"Bash", in the verbal sense, I understand to mean an unreasonable or irrational verbal attack, not just a criticism. The verbal equivalent of violence. But that's just me, I suppose.
Posted by: Franklin Percival
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October 26, 2010 4:16 PM
Feynmaniac, Chimerical Toad Superhero. #43
christian maths.:
3=i exepresses more accurately, no?
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmqD_mcUIrSfOTlK3iGVsnEDcZmI43srbI
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October 26, 2010 4:18 PM
I'm with you, CJO.
Words can be used metaphorically.
Bash is one of them. Nobody reading PZ's sentence would ever think that a literal blow to the skull was involved.
/Kevin the googlemess
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 4:19 PM
In a sense that's true; she's doing nothing to counter the underlying bad premises. But she's "promoting" it in the "embrace and subvert" sense that Microsoft adopts an open standard and quicker than the eye turns it into a proprietary standard; the folks who advocated the original find themselves, to their consternation, advocating its opposite without quite knowing when they reversed themselves. It's also a popular political ploy in which a lofty ideal is co-opted into its opposite, as Orwell parodied by openly proclaiming "Freedom is Slavery," etc.
If her cronies adopt the notion that "evolution is intelligent design," they'll end up saying, "Evolution! Brilliant idea, Lord!" to the great irritation of PZ and others. To that extent they'd be accepting more of reality than they did before and moving away from young-earthism and six-day-creationism.
That might lead, like other commenters suggest, to nothing more than moved battle-lines in which evolution joins heliocentrism on the "good" list, and something else draws their ire. Or it might lead them (some of them at least) out of religion entirely, or into something like the educated man's hinduism--performing pujas for social reasons, but not really believing the elephant-headed god is smelling their incense.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 4:20 PM
That's silly. Theistic evolutionists are among the leading opponents of creationism/ID. And they have been since at least the 1920s.
Posted by: mothra
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October 26, 2010 4:22 PM
'Gods die' when questions are asked.
Science was born when testable questions were asked.
Science flourishes when the answers to testable questions yield yet more testable questions.
'Gods now live' only in areas of rigorously defended ignorance.
@9
I fly and a flea in a flu,
Were imprisoned so what could they do?
Said the fly, 'let us flee!'
Said the flea, 'let us fly!'
So they flew through a flaw in the flu.
So sorry about your language thingy. English is a rich and nuanced language, usurping and inheriting words from other languages. To object to some hyperbole in the written word would be just 'silly.' (Although your point is well taken that verbal assault does not equal and should not be equated with physical assault and that language can be to blame. The solution here is education [double plus good] not censorship [minus bad]).
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 4:28 PM
I'm not exactly a fan of these kinds of dishonest word games. In addition to a general ethical revulsion, I think they are counterproductive.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 4:32 PM
Hey, I'm not endorsing it! Just pointing it out. One of the reasons I have no faith in humanity is how terribly susceptible everyone is to this tactic. A little adroit equivocation, and almost anyone can be brought around to almost anything, and conversely almost anyone can be turned against almost anything. It's downright depressing.
Posted by: SteveM
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October 26, 2010 4:32 PM
Re 54
Regardless, their opposition is only over the label, the concept is the same. "intelligent design" is theistic evolution relabeled to get around the establishment clause of the 1st amendment.
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 26, 2010 4:39 PM
Remember that there are YEC proponents who go under the ID label too.Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 4:42 PM
You mean these two concepts are the same? "My favorite deity made everything from nothing by magic during a certain week in April, 6014 years ago," and, "All living things descended from a universal common ancestor over the course of about four billion years, mainly by natural selection, and my favorite deity watched the whole thing from his favorite armchair in the sky."
They do look pretty different to me, I must confess. The only thing they have in common is that "my favorite deity" is mentioned in both. Are you approaching this on the level that "they're identical, because they're both stupid"? If so, then Christians believe the earth rests on a stack of turtles--it's the same thing as Genesis, after all, because they're both stupid...
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 4:48 PM
I had no idea criticizing other people's public pronouncements was "shitting on" them.
If people promote sloppy thinking, we're going to criticize them for it. If they don't like it, then I suggest they stop promoting sloppy thinking.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 4:52 PM
That's not intelligent design, that's Young Earth Creationism.
That's theistic evolution but it also intelligent design as described by some ID advocates. Other ID advocates (specifically the authors of "Of Pandas and People") posit that their favorite deity created classes of creatures fully formed.
It's all a continuum of stupid.
Posted by: Dhorvath, OM
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October 26, 2010 4:57 PM
Niblick,
You seem to have a problem with the difference between young Earth creation and theistic evolution. Theistic evolution and intelligent design are the same thing. YEC and ID are not.
Posted by: PhD In Heresy
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October 26, 2010 5:16 PM
Anthropologist Peter A. Primavera explains why the aggressive atheists and the accommodationists will all be ineffectual in his first article written as Chair of the Department of Heretical Anthropology at Logidea University.
http://www.doctorofdisbelief.com/blog/homo-sapiens-evolving-an-anthropological-perspective.html
Sincerely,
Richard McCargar
Dean of the College of Heresy
Logidea University
Posted by: James F
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October 26, 2010 5:17 PM
Bill Dembski and Ken Ham must be grinning ear-to-ear at this infighting - no one hates theistic evolutionism more than they do. The Christian and Jewish clergy of the Clergy Letter Project aren't of the theocratic variety, so they share the same goals of keeping sound evolution education in public school science classrooms and, more generally, keeping church and state separate. The Clergy Letter Project has scientific consultants if people have questions about the details of evolution from the experts; the goal of the clergy is to address the idea that their faith does not translate to rejection of evolution. That involves a lot of discussions of metaphors and parables that are, ipso facto, meaningless to the non-religious.
At the same time, it works both ways: the creationist canard of equating atheists with religious fundamentalists has got to go, and it's unfortunate to see Michael making that mistake. More discussion is clearly needed between the two camps.
Posted by: Janine, The Little Top Of Venom, OM
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October 26, 2010 5:19 PM
I do want to derail this thread more than I have already done, my reply is in the undead thread.
Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 5:22 PM
@nickmatzke.ncse #49
Indeed, science and reason needs all the support it can get.
Pimping out facts and whoring truths to placate people who carry delusional ideas of how reality works is far more shortsighted than the oh-so bloodthirsty howls full of words and indignation found here.
Science does not need nor rely on the supernatural to work. Endorsing the preaching of those that say it does, which is what the Clergy Letter do, undermines the very basic foundations of science.
It's that fundamental dishonesty of trying to reconcile science and religion that pisses people off.
Posted by: Timberwoof
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October 26, 2010 5:26 PM
One phrase I hear a lot from theists in these discussions is "sincerely held beliefs" as in "belittling their…". Apparently sincerely held beliefs are exempt from examination and reasonable discourse. Because they are sincere, people can cling to their beliefs.
Well, I sincerely believe that the Constitution does not allow the Federal Government to tax me, so I won't pay my income taxes. I also sincerely believe that that guy who cut me off in traffic is a sinner, so I can pass him, cut him off, and stomp on the brakes to make him it me. No, I sincerely believe that. Why can't you respect that? (Well, not really. It illustrates the point.)
I shall take a new tack in discussions. When Goddites tell me (as they always do) that they "disagree" with my lifestyle, I'll tell them that I sincerely believe that being gay is blessed by God bla bla bla, and dare them to contradict me. Which they will. Then I shall offer Band-Aids for their feet and show them what hypocrites they are for demanding my respect for their sincere beliefs while not respecting mine … which I know won't make a damned bit of difference, for they are sincere in their beliefs.
Posted by: Lost in Utah
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October 26, 2010 5:37 PM
What say someone here gets real? Theistic evolution can NEVER be compatible with the science of evolution. Can you imagine a believer accepting that man (i.e., home sapiens) is not the inevitable consequence of evolution? But for a certain asteroid whacking dinosaurs about 60 million years ago the dominant species might well have been a raptor and we humans would be lunch. What then for the "imagine and likeness of god"? One thing the believers seem incapable of comprehending is that humans are neither inevitable or exceptional.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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October 26, 2010 5:37 PM
First, perhaps you should explore why a white font on a charcoal-and-slate background will be ineffectual in enticing primate readers to suspend their tl;dnr reflex.
Beyond that, the article was poorly argued and offers no substantive alternative. So, Primavera doesn't like Gnu Atheists or accommodationists, and his answer is to argue with believers using emotionless reason? In what fucking alternative universe did you all grow up in where nerds coldy orated on chess and Dungeons and Dragons while the sportos, the motorheads, sluts, bloods, waistoids, dweebies, and dickheads all sat and listened in rapt attention?
Blogwhoring is annoying. Stupid blogwhoring borders on criminal.
Posted by: SteveM
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October 26, 2010 5:38 PM
re 60:
You left out "...his favorite armchair in the sky except when he intervened to ensure that I resulted at the end of this long chain of evolution". Whether God designed us all at once 6000 years ago or designed the universe in such a way to produce us after 4 billion years is still an act of "intelligent design". That is how the two concepts are essentially the same. Theistic evolution does not allow for God to just throw a bunch of stuff in a pot to "see what happens" and gets "surprised" when man pops out of the kettle.
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 5:40 PM
I am a pastor and a member of the clergy letter project. I am not going to defend the quoted piece from Susan Anderson as I think she is making something of a sloppy argument about ID. And for the record here I am not a proponent of any form of ID.
I will speak to the use of her language "god lives in the questions" which quite frankly is a fairly common liberal Christian phrase. It is definitely not a god of the gaps argument. It is rather an argument against the idea that God has spoken in some definitive way in the Bible or anywhere else and the there are no more questions. It is rather to locate God as the moving force for the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom. Every time we learn something new the horizon opens up a little more and we are confronted with more questions. God is the source of that drive to learn. We are not arguing with atheists or evolutionists. We are arguing with fundamentalists.
Of course on this blog God is a toxic term. The word has magical powers here to elicit all kinds of amusing responses.
I pastor a small congregation in the twin cities made up of 'families' of all kinds, religious and otherwise. Among my members are those who hold a variety of beliefs or non-beliefs about God. I talk about God as a metaphor for love, peace, wisdom, etc. There is not a single person who questions evolution and among the members are high school science teachers who teach evolution, hate ID, and who belong because we are comfortable with science and committed to social justice.
This description would be true of the vast majority of congregations who participate in the Clergy Letter Project. We mostly are bemused at some of the atheist ire directed at liberal Christians, many of whom are not theists and all of whom are comfortable living within the skeptical worldview of modern science. Our real battle is with the conservative and fundamentalist Christians who sully the life and memory of the rebel Jesus with their intolerance and ignorance. That context gets lost on blogs like this.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 5:41 PM
TE and ID are not the same: ID claims that natural selection is insufficient to explain existing features, but that miracles are also required. That's the entire point of their pet "irreducible complexity" argument. Behe accepts common descent, but argues that "someone" needed to step in and put together the bacterial flagellum by hand.
Among the various versions of ID are some that overlap with TE, others that are a subset of YEC or OEC. All three, ID, TE and creationism cover a range of ideas, but none is identical with either of the other two.
There's no telling what Susan Andrews means exactly when she says, "evolution is intelligent design," but from the context it's clear that she's redefining ID to refer to evolution, rather than the converse. I.e., that "ID" means "my god decided in his brilliance to let things evolve," rather than that "evolution" means "miraculously whomping things up."
She might or might not be, but one certainly could, use precisely her language in order to sell christians on evolution. That's a different agenda than advocating ID, which is intended to counter evolution by arguing that certain features must have been specially created.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 5:43 PM
Yawn, the "god of questions" is just another bit of inane theological sophistry, designed to ignore the lack of evidence for your imaginary deity. Just another gap to shove your shrinking deity into.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 5:47 PM
By lying to them about what evolution is (and about what intelligent design is).
Posted by: Coleslaw
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October 26, 2010 5:47 PM
Actually, they do. The sound of the consonant "w" is the "oo" sound blending with the following vowel, and the sound of the consonant "y" is the "ee" sound blended with the following vowel.
Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 5:47 PM
@jhsteele58 #72
Please elaborate on how one can be a Christian but not a theist?
Also, how can one live within the skeptical worldview of modern science, which completely removes the need for a God as mover for anything, yet still be a believer?
Posted by: SteveM
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October 26, 2010 5:53 PM
re 77:
I believe it's called "compartmentalisation".
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 5:54 PM
jhsteele58, in other words, you're atheists who find the word "God" useful as a metaphor for things that, historically, it was not used to mean. You'll forgive our confusion, given you don't exactly go out of your way to publicize what you mean by "God" nor to engage fundamentalists to discuss what you see as their theological errors.
Given that you are already an atheist and that "Christians" like you make up a minuscule percentage of American Christians, I hope you understand that our attacks on religion aren't directed at you, since you're neither religious nor influential among the religious.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 5:56 PM
Maybe: I imagine advocates of TE will tend to assume that god threw that asteroid at the dinosaurs to open up a niche for mammals. If so, their fairy-tale is orthogonal to the science, which doesn't know or particularly care what set that particular asteroid on a collision course for Earth. If someone wants to attribute it to Xenu, it's pretty weird, but it doesn't alter the known facts.
Conversely, though, an advocate of TE need not believe that his deity flings asteroids in the first place. The standard definition of omnipotence and omniscience are self-contradictory anyway, so believers have lots of practice accepting that they don't really know what "omniscience" means exactly, or what their deity's limits are, or how to reconcile preforeordestination with "free will." It would be in character for them to believe we evolved from a common ancestor, because the evidence says so, and their deity exists, because their holy books say so, without taking any position on what their deity was up to for the 3+ billion years before literacy and holy books came along.
If you argue that they "must" believe their deity did this or that, you're just begging to get dragged down a rabbit hole from which there's no escape. That's the lesson of the FSM: whatever you claim he "must" have done, he already did the opposite just to spite you.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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October 26, 2010 6:02 PM
So, you're like Robot Judaists? "We believe he was built, and that he was a very well-programmed robot, but he wasn't our Messiah."
That's pretty cool.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 6:02 PM
Please elaborate on how one can be a Christian but not a theist?
http://christianatheist.com/
there's a book.
summed up:
Think about all the people who follow fictional characters from movies and TV as if they actually were real, and quote the things they said as if they were fountains of wisdom.
you know, like Twilight fans.
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 6:03 PM
Truthspeaker, that's right we are not religious or influential among the religious. Don't forget, though, that one of our non-religious non-influential 'members' currently lives in the oval office. There are far more of us than you imagine. We just don't make the evening news by making all kinds of outrageous claims. We aren't nearly as entertaining for the media or for you.
Oihorse, I am not a believer; I am a follower, or better yet one who tries to live my life in the manner of Jesus.
Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 6:04 PM
@truthspeaker & SteveM #79 & #78
I guess the easy question would be if they recite and believe the Nicene Creed then they are blatantly not living within the skeptical realm of science.
If they don't believe in the Nicene Creed they aren't Christians.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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October 26, 2010 6:06 PM
Dear me; whatever for?
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 6:07 PM
Oihorse, I am not a believer; I am a follower, or better yet one who tries to live my life in the manner of
JesusBuffy the Vampire Slayer.there's a book for that, too!
http://www.amazon.com/Quotable-Slayer-Buffy-Vampire/dp/0743410173
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 6:07 PM
It's not just orthogonal to the science, it's contrary to rational thought. There is no evidence suggesting that any entity directed that asteroid to earth. To believe that one did is irrational, because there is no evidence to support that belief.
Posted by: Rutee, Shrieking Harpy of Dooooom
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October 26, 2010 6:07 PM
Are you talking about the obama who cast aspersions on non-believers, and trying to claim he's a non-theistic Christian now? Why? The depiction he's given by his followers starts out half nice, half asshole, and becomes progressively more of an asshole. I do'nt mean his current followers; I mean the ones that came a generation after him (The closest to contemporaries he would have had if he existed). I generally try not to idolize assholes, personally.Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 6:08 PM
Bearing in mind that she probably doesn't understand evolution, so she herself probably is lying, what you say here is not necessarily true. Supposing a christian who understands evolution properly, the above statement can be made without lying about what either is: by assumption he understands evolution correctly; and "intelligent design" is already such a broad term as to be essentially meaningless beyond the obvious implication that one believes in some sort of ueber-being. If one believes that his ueber-being opted to leave things alone and let natural selection take his course, then he believes in an intelligent designer who evolved us.
That strains the notion of "design," but engineers are already doing that by, e.g., using evolution to design an antenna that's omni-directional, circularly polarized, with a wide passband and a wide impedance bandwidth. The analogy is obviously not perfect, but it's a coherent and consistent use of both terms to say of the X-band antenna that "evolution is intelligent design."
Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 6:10 PM
@jhsteele58 #83
Pardon me while I chortle at the thought. If Obama is non-religious he makes a poor showing of it, to the point of being non-influential - or about the same impact that God, if it exists, has on science.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 6:15 PM
Then what in blue blazes is your problem with us? You're angry at us for treating and reacting to the ordinary, accepted, uncontroversial meaning of the word "God" by sniffing indignantly that we're sneering at you, who claims not to be a believer in a deity? Do you see what's wrong with that?
Your anger is so misplaced, and it baffles me. You simply cannot redefine the term "God" to mean all sorts of fluffy, nice things, when the common parlance means something else entirely, and then get angry at us. We have perfectly good words for "love" and "questions." Those words are "love" and "questions." And you know what? You know this.
If you want to see a world filled with compassion, intellectual pursuit, and humane interaction, I'm with you, and so are most of the people here. But cut the crap and stop calling it "God". It doesn't make you more noble, or more gentle, it makes you a misleading provocateur directing your anger inappropriately at people who can't be expected to know your idiosyncratic, unnecessary definition of "God" and "Religious."
You don't get to call black white, or call Chryslers recumbent bicycles, and then get angry at the "irrationality" of people who don't.
I suspect what you're really doing is the typical self-regarding ploy where you simper about deploying the words "God" and "religious" so you get the societal benefit of an unearned I'm A Good Person halo and get the nodding approval of the majority of Christians without having to do the hard work of speaking clearly and honestly. It's so much easier to do that and then vent your splean at the atheist minority-you know, the ones actually taking your terminology at reasonable face value.
You need to examine this. It really is a problem.
Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 6:16 PM
@jhsteele58
Which Jesus are you following? The one who preached do unto others as you would have done to yourself?
Or the one that exclaimed he did not come to overturn the laws but fulfill them?
It's laudable to treat others with kindness and respect - a goal humanity should strive for - but it doesn't need superstitions or cherry-picked bible verses to get there. Given that, why bother with the hocus pocus?
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 6:17 PM
no it isn't, since the principle of parsimony is ALSO part of science.look, no one is saying that it's impossible for people to believe in both scientifically accurate and mythical ideas. The argument is specifically that the thought-process required for the former, and the thought-process required for the latter are incompatible: holding beliefs because they make you feel good, or because an authority told you to believe them, or because you made it up to make your incompatible world-views look compatible is in direct conflict with a scientific way of coming to "believe" things.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 6:18 PM
If he truly is as you claim, he got there by pretending to be a believer.
If there are so many of you, why is your congregation so small? Why are churches like yours vastly outnumbered by churches full of believers?
You live your life by telling people they have to worship you as a god or be cast into a lake of fire? Because that's what Jesus did.
jhsteel58, you are a Christian in the same sense that a socialist is a communist - that is, you aren't one. You just cling to the label because of a tenuous historical connection, despite jettisoning virtually all of the beliefs that characterize Christianity.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 6:19 PM
No argument here. That has nothing to do with the fact that one can believe all sorts of fairy tales--religious, economic, or political--while accurately grasping other aspects of reality, such as biology. Such a person is less than fully rational, true, but sadly I've yet to meet a fully rational human, including myself.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 6:19 PM
Jh knows exactly why. She/he is doing it to reap the benefits of societal sanction without having to be honest about it. Worse, she/he uses it to club atheists over the head. Jh, you're not just misguided, you're actively unethical. You're not a kind, nice, gentle person. You walk in protective coloring so as to be approved by the majority, then you help that majority shit all over non-believers.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 6:22 PM
Josh, your comment in #91 is beautiful. It's everything I wanted to say but far more articulate than what I could come up with. Kudos to you, sir.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp
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October 26, 2010 6:23 PM
So you don't believe he lived his life in this mythical way you are choosing to follow?Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 6:27 PM
True! Yet all humans engage in both types of thought process. The most rational atheist, doing good work in the sciences, strangely believes that every detractor of Obama is a racist, or alternately that Obama and all his supporters "hate America," etc. Just as Olympic athletes sometimes lounge around eating Doritos and watching TV, so otherwise rational, intelligent people sometimes accept anti-empirical notions as fact.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 6:27 PM
truthspeaker, #97 - thanks, but I'm chuckling, since it was clumsier than I wanted (and it has a misspelling). That's what happens when I encounter the "nice" "liberal" Unitarial-Spirituo-New-Age-Milquetoast types. Their rank dishonesty, and the fact that they portray themselves as Gentle Souls™ while effectively (and sometimes actively) propping up the social dominance of religion drives me to inchoate rage.
I used to think they were merely silly, irrelevant, or irritating at worst. I now see them as collaborators; dangerous and in need of facing up to it whether they mean to be or not.
Posted by: Rey Fox, Bird Caller Guy
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October 26, 2010 6:29 PM
"I talk about God as a metaphor for love, peace, wisdom, etc."
To paraphrase Hank Hill, you're not making God better, you're making love, peace, wisdom, etc. worse.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 6:31 PM
What? That's crazy, too. There were theistic evolutionists in the AAAS back in the 1920s, they weren't trying to get ID or creationism into the schools, they were trying to keep evolution from being banned by the creationists.
The "ID" label only arose in serious way after the "creation science" label failed to pass constitutional muster in the 1987 Edwards v. Aguillard SCOTUS case. Learn a little history, please...
Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 6:31 PM
@josh
Almost like they are accommodating something...
If only I could put my finger on it.
Posted by: Dhorvath, OM
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October 26, 2010 6:35 PM
Niblick,
And yet, your initial comparison:
was clearly between YEC and TE and was in reference to a statement regarding ID and TE. I will admit that intelligent design is a nebulous concept, but your comparison stretched that character to shreds.
YEC doesn't say that evolution is insufficient to describe complex life, it says that it never happened. Intelligent design is incredulous about how effective evolution alone would be at generating complex life in the absence of guidance. They are not the same, but your comparison directly equates them.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 6:36 PM
Oh good, I won't hold back with you then.
I can't speak for every one of thousands of sermons, but as a general rule, those people don't think science should rely on the supernatural. You don't even have the basics of the case right.
It's your getting so pissed off, when you don't even bother to understand the basic pro-science positions of the people you are ignorantly, arrogantly bashing, that pisses me off. Cheers!
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 6:38 PM
Cheers to you, too, Matzke, and sod off. You've made a career out of whining about how phillistine clear speakers and thinkers are, at least since you left NCSE. Super. Boring.
Which reminds me, why do you still sign in with that nickname? Wasn't it you who got all sniffy-huffy recently because someone didn't know you'd left NCSE?
Derp-a-derr.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 6:43 PM
if they believe this, they are not rational, atheist scientists or not.That's the whole point though. Religion makes it acceptable, even a virtue, to hold irrational beliefs. it shouldn't be. it's a flaw, and should be treated as such. It also trains people in this acceptance of non-skeptical, non-rational ideas, and it comes to permeate their thinking and spills into non-religious areas, creating a whole culture in which people think they ARE entitled to their own facts as well as their own opinions.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 6:45 PM
Agreed, Jadehawk. We're not denying that it's human nature to think irrationally. We're just saying it's something we should try to be aware of and avoid, not embrace as a virtue. It's a bug, not a feature.
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 6:48 PM
Nickmatzke@49:
But the thing is they don't accept evolution. The whole Darwinian insight is that the process is natural: there is no design, no god directing the process, no plan, no direction. Moderate-liberal Christians accept none of this.
At best, they accept the earth is old, that all life on earth has a common ancestor. They cannot fully understand or accept evolution if they still believe in a designer. They will not understand the value of diversity. They will not appreciate the randomness of evolution. They still think that humans are somehow divinely special in some unspecified way. They will not see the fragility of the ecosystem, or the precariousness of existence, because some how it is all "meant to be this way", and some deity is "looking after us" and "has a plan for the earth".
Rule 1 of science: Do not add deities to scientific hypotheses. The minute you do, it is no longer science. If these people were pro-evolution, they would stop talking about a deity's role in it. All they have accepted is an old earth.
I agree the Gnu atheists are uncompromising: we refuse to compromise reality by introducing fantasy elements to appease those who prefer fantasy to reality.
And there is no reason why we should not mock the notion that fantasy is real, even if there are more damaging fantasies around.
Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 6:48 PM
@nickmatzke.ncse
Nick, if you think for one moment that Christians don't fundamentally believe that God is the root behind all science (if they can get that far in their thinking), then you are being willfully ignorant of the fundamental core of Christianity and its precepts.
They MUST invoke the supernatural as the final mover or they find themselves going against the very tenants of their religion.
Please, try to argue that away. I'm eager to see your rationalizations against it.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 6:53 PM
oihorse, you are absolutely correct, but the word is "tenets".
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 6:54 PM
And fuckwit, if you are trying to make room for that imaginary deity, you have to show conclusive physical scientific evidence for said deity, or shut the fuck up about said deity. That is how science operates. Whether you like it or not, is irrelevant, because your opinions matter not to working scientists...Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 6:55 PM
[meta]
Janine:
There is no muddying — bash has always referred to either a physical strike or (figuratively) harsh criticism.
--
On a side note, I would ask that 'gay' be used in its (actual) original meaning, but I know it's a lost cause.
So I don't.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 6:57 PM
'Tis just my gmail address which is the easiest way to sign in to scienceblogs. If someone has their email as @ncse.com then they are NCSE employees. But gmail is just gmail. Shrug.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 6:57 PM
No, it isn't. If you think a goodly number of us queers are going to stop shouting every time we hear some dumb kid using "gay" to mean "stupid", think again.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 6:57 PM
Nick, if you think for one moment that Christians don't fundamentally believe that God is the root behind all science
*thinks immediately of Ken Miller's 'quantum field' nonsense*
They pretty much HAVE to.
If you conclude your god has no impact at all on the natural world, ever, then the next logical step is to of course ask yourself why even bother to believe?
Nick continually gets the argument confused.
He keeps thinking in terms of this debate being about the tactics of preserving science in the face of zealots, while instead the real debate is about the root of zealotry to begin with, and how we end up ridding ourselves of it.
He's entirely blind to that aspect of the discussion. Scarily so, in fact.
so, don't headdesk yourselves over him.
just ignore him and move on.
Posted by: Dhorvath, OM
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October 26, 2010 6:57 PM
echidna,
YES!
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:00 PM
John Morales:
It just sunk in. Please tell me that you just momentarily forgot that the more pertinent issue over the meaning of the word "gay" is how it's been turned into a universal insult. Please tell me that just slipped your mind, and that you didn't mean what you wrote to make light of that.
Posted by: Wowbagger, Man-Hating Man of Pharyngula
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October 26, 2010 7:04 PM
Josh, I think John wants to see 'gay' return to its original orginal meaning (i.e. cheerful) and not be insulting to anyone; I don't think he's in any way attempting to justify its use as an insult.
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 7:06 PM
Nickmatzke with .ncse misleadingly attached:
BS. Utter BS. They think everything should rely on the supernatural. That is the point.
Susan Andrews:
From Wikipedia:
Fantasy is not reality. Deities have no place in scientific understanding. If you talk about science in terms of deities then you are doing it wrong.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:08 PM
So that means no more unfounded sniffy-huffy at people who (for obvious reasons) see it and assume you're still working for them, right muffin? No more like the recent tantrum, because now you understand reasonable people would make that connection, right? Puppy-dog face.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:08 PM
"The whole Darwinian insight is that the process is natural: there is no design, no god directing the process, no plan, no direction. Moderate-liberal Christians accept none of this."
Darwinian? Not even Darwin thought that. Let's have a look at the quotes at the front of the Origin, shall we?
1st edition:
6th edition:
A quote from Darwin from the 6th edition:
Looks like Darwin was one of those lame, idiotic, good-for-nothing accomodationists, himself.
Saying that evolution is a natural process is not any more antithetical to religion than saying that chemistry, or the weather, or whatever is a natural process. Moderate religion gets along with this just fine. Even fundamentalists get along with most of this just fine. It is true that some religious people, some of the time, try to jam supernatural intervention into science, but many of them don't, and it is wrong, irrational, emotional and hyperbolic, and unfair to pretend that the latter can be bashed as if they were no different than the former.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:13 PM
Please tell me that you just momentarily forgot that the more pertinent issue over the meaning of the word "gay" is how it's been turned into a universal insult.
I think that was his point: he'd prefer it to go back to the original meaning of “merry, lively” and “bright or showy,”.
of course it was also used early on to describe licentious, dissipated, or wanton.
not sure how it eventually got applied to sexual orientation, but that usage goes back at least 100 years.
even less sure how in the hell it got twisted to replace the word "lame" in the US slang lexicon, or even how "lame" got to be used in that sense.
I assume "lame" and "gay" essentially replaced "ridiculous" or "inane" as being more "lowbrow" and thus acceptable.
still, I too find the use of "gay" as universal insult to all thing unacceptable to be way more than irritating, and I'm one of those people that used "lame" in the same sense as a teen.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:13 PM
Shorter Matzke:
"Ima pretend I'm unaware of the socio-religious pressures on Darwin that would have made such literary concessions necessary and then Ima pretend you're 2 stoopid to know what I'm doing. Ur all stoopid and unsofiztickated. And you dunno any hiztory neither."
Posted by: Timberwoof
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October 26, 2010 7:14 PM
jhsteele58, there is something I've been wondering about Christianity.
As groundwork for the question I'll describe the core beliefs of Buddhism: The Three Pillars and the Eightfold Path. Basically there is suffering and death, suffering comes from frustrated desires, and that can be relieved by proper management of expectations. The Eightfold Path is the basics of that management. There's woo associated with Buddhism, but it isn't strictly necessary to following the philosophy and achieve a happy life which is the point. The woo can be interpreted in a number of palatable semantic contexts or jettisoned entirely without giving up the central tenets.
Christians justify Christians by talking about the social and ethical benefits of following the teachings of Jesus, but they never really say what those are in any solid ways. The true test of a Real Christian is whether he follows the Nicean Creed, which is full of woo and offers little in the way of day-to-day philosophy-of-life advice. And the day-to-day kind of advice varies tremendously between Christians. Some tell me I can't be gay and be a Chrstian; others tell me that God Love expresses itself in many ways.
The big objection to Christianity is all the woo. There's crazy stuff all throughout the Bible that simply doesn't stand up to rational analysis. That crazy stuff makes Christians murder people. Is it really necessary? Can you get rid of the woo and still be Chrsitian? A woo-free Christianity might be acceptable to the New Atheists. It would contain truth and insights about human behavior and offer a way to be happy in the life we can verify exists. It would abandon the mythological creation stories and the divinity of Jesus
But it seems to me there is no way to create a woo-free Christianity in the True Christian meaning. The closest I've seen are the Unitarian-Universalists and the Society of Friends. I'm no expert … so I ask you. Is Christianity without Woo possible?
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:15 PM
Eh. This passage is obviously by someone, either creationist or atheist, who wishes to portray catholics as anti-evolution, I think based on an outdated non-binding statement from a Pope like 60 years ago. I bet you couldn't find a moderate Catholic who is a scientist who would defend special creation of humans.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 7:16 PM
Matzke, either show conclusive physical evidence for that imaginary deities, or shut the fuck up about idjit losers who believe in them...
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:19 PM
More silliness. There were plenty of scientists in Darwin's day who launched strong attacks on religion -- e.g. Huxley and Tyndale. They wanted Darwin to join them. He consistently refused. You can disagree with his decision, but don't pretend it didn't happen that way.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:19 PM
Darwinian? Not even Darwin thought that.
uh, Nick, the quote from Origins you posted SUPPORTS what that person said.
read again:
The whole Darwinian insight is that the process is natural:
which is exactly what Darwin said in the quote you posted.
so, um, what's your argument, exactly?
Looks like Darwin was one of those lame, idiotic, good-for-nothing accomodationists, himself.
you yourself know that Darwin made many concessions to religious pressure in later editions of Origins, and one of the reasons he delayed initial publication was out of fear of the impact it would have on religious ideologues.
man, you can be a truly intellectually dishonest hack.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:22 PM
You really do think we're stupid. No one "pretended it didn't happen that way." Where did you get that?
It did happen that way. Darwin did refuse to join them. He did put religion-conciliatory prose in his works. But what I said above doesn't contradict that. I referred to the socio-religious pressures that might plausibly account for why Darwin bent over backward the way he did. You, on the other hand, are refusing to acknowledge this.
Simple question, not amenable to misunderstanding: do you or do you not accept that social pressures in favor of religion might have influenced Darwin to soft-pedal the issue?
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 7:23 PM
how precisely is what Darwin personally thought relevant to what the science of the neo-darwinian synthesis shows to be the case?Arguments from authority are another form of mindrot propagated by religion.
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 26, 2010 7:23 PM
I wonder what 'murder' Darwin was confessing to...
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:23 PM
Saying that evolution is a natural process is not any more antithetical to religion than saying that chemistry, or the weather, or whatever is a natural process.
bullshit.
If i believed in the Norse gods, or in the Greek pantheon, your words would be heresy of the highest order.
can you NOT see there is no difference?
religion is nothing more than a poor attempt to explain the natural world.
it failed, and it's time to move on to something that is proven to work.
people can compartmentalize failed ideas, because they grew fond of them as children, or because they simply like the imagery invoked.
this hardly means that in any real sense, their religious ideas are any more relevant than those of the ancient Greeks.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:24 PM
Interesting. I though Gnu Atheists took great offense when people with dissenting views were commanded to shut up.
Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 7:25 PM
[meta + OT]
Thanks, Wowbagger, Ichthyic.
--
Josh, no matter what term was used for gays, so long as cultural homophobia exists, that term would find pejorative usage (cf. Euphemism treadmill).
Unlike 'bash' (1600s), 'gay' has indeed recently acquired a new principal sense (1900s).
(It no doubt makes for sniggering when reading older works, or watching older movies.)
Posted by: areyoulistening
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October 26, 2010 7:26 PM
abb3w #32:
Five? I only see four.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:27 PM
Nick Matzke, it's not enough to call you a hack (though Ichthyic is right). You are a liar. You are a flat-out, dictionary-pure liar. Your conscious intellectual dishonesty, coupled with your transparently slippery political maneuvering, makes the skin crawl.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 7:27 PM
You're right, I unfairly equated the two; I had in mind the likes of Paul Nelson, Dean Kenyon, etc., who are young-earth creationists relabeled as ID proponents. You're right that Behe, who accepts common descent, is more emblematic of ID, as is Dembski, who rejects common descent but accepts an old earth.
The critical difference between ID and YEC, on one hand, and TE on the other, is that they deny that evolution is even possible. ID includes under its umbrella the possibility that evolution-with-miraculous-assistance is possible, but fundamentally denies evolution as we understand it.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:27 PM
I'll answer your question if you answer mine: was Darwin an accomodationist?
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:29 PM
Not playing your game. Doesn't matter what the (obvious) answer is to that question; it's irrelevant to what I asked you.
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 7:30 PM
I dispute this:
Darwin changed his views significantly when he visited Australia. He saw former convicts in Sydney being pillars of society, when it was believed that your place in society was ordained by God. He saw animals that led him to write that that it looked as if there must have been two creations. He realised that the whole concept that God ordains everything down to the minutest detail was wrong - and that the natural environment is the driving force for change.
We don't change our views overnight. Darwin moved his, and everyone-elses thinking significantly from "God ordains the minutest detail" to "But with regard to the material world, we can at least go so far as this—we can perceive that events are brought about not by insulated interpositions of Divine power, exerted in each particular case, but by the establishment of general laws."
The facts of evolution were not established in Darwin's time to anything like the degree they are now. Darwin could only speak from where he stood 150 years ago, closer to Laplace than to us. We stand in a different place, on his shoulders, with much more established fact behind us.
We, much later, can hear in Darwin the echos of Laplace:
"Je n'avais pas besoin de cette hypothèse-là."
Now, we can confidently say: if it involves the supernatural, it is not science.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:32 PM
Evidence please. There are countervailing factors, such as the idea that humans should take care of their God-given (via natural processes) creation. In my experience liberal Christians have been ahead of the general public in being environmentalist & conservationist.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:32 PM
John Morales: I get it about the euphemism treadmill. Sorry for the derail, belongs more in Teh Endless Thread.
This thread is about watching
A HagfishNick Matzke contort.Posted by: Wowbagger, Man-Hating Man of Pharyngula
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October 26, 2010 7:32 PM
nickmatzke wrote:
Yes, just like marriage gets along just fine with adultery and government gets along with corruption. I mean, there's nothing really wrong with hypocrisy, is there?
Posted by: areyoulistening
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October 26, 2010 7:32 PM
Italics and bold contradict one another. ID cannot deny that evolution is even possible while accepting that evolution-with-miraculous-assistance is possible - if ID denies evolution entirely, by definition this denies evolution-with-miraculous-assistance.If anything, "theistic evolution" is intelligent design, and the "intelligent design" proponents who outright deny evolution are simply creationists disguised as clowns.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:33 PM
people like Matzke, think we attack religion because we hate the religious, but what they fail to grasp is that all we are attacking is faulty reasoning, and the reason we are so vehement about it is that that faulty reasoning, as has been pointed out by the OP, is alarmingly prevalent!
most of us here aren't atheists because we chose to be atheists, we're atheists because that is where logic and reason lead us.
the accomodationists would have us put aside reason and logic in favor of tactics.
sorry, but that just ain't gonna happen.
I will never give a false impression of how science works, or what I know about any aspect of it, in favor of placating someone's delusions.
Nick, you can play that game all you like, but you damn well know it's a losing proposition in the end.
If Darwin was an accommodationist, he was so only in the same sense Galileo was.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:35 PM
"Now, we can confidently say: if it involves the supernatural, it is not science."
Hey, I agree with that. But these liberal Christians don't think the supernatural is science, either.
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 26, 2010 7:37 PM
What I don't get is why so much effort is put into saying there's no contradiction, when quite clearly there is. Are creationists all truly misinformed about evolution? If not, are those who are informed lying to those who don't know better? It seems that we would be deluding ourselves to think that teleology isn't an innate part of our thinking, and hence evolution and big bang theory are going to necessarily come into conflict with the conception of God for some because they do away with the role God plays for them.
This isn't to say that all conceptions of God fall into this contradiction, but that some do and we have science-advocacy groups engaging in a struggle over theology because the science on its own is corrosive to some and hence rejected. That there necessarily has to be theological interpretation coupled with the scientific concept is evidence that there is a conflict - at least for some!
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 7:39 PM
Nick:
Re the Catholic church's stance on evolution, which is indeed regressing:
Benedict, 2007:
Posted by: areyoulistening
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October 26, 2010 7:41 PM
Matzke #134:
We also take great offense when people start waving red herrings around in response to a request to put up or shut up.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 26, 2010 7:41 PM
ID fundamentally denies that evolution is possible without miraculous intervention. Therefore, evolution as we understand it is fundamentally incompatible with ID. You should have italicized and bolded thusly:
"Evolution" in which a god steps in to miraculously create flagella and other "irreducibly complex" features is not evolution. Behe accepts common descent, which is only one aspect of evolution among six identified by Coyne, but denies the role of natural selection and gradualism by postulating that only miraculous intervention can account for the diversity we see today.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:41 PM
There are countervailing factors, such as the idea that humans should take care of their God-given (via natural processes) creation.
funny, but I haven't seen that as a common attitude amongst at least half of the xians I have known.
any that take the dogma seriously tend to also think God will take care of it.
one way or another.
that said, it's entirely irrelevant to whether or not any person acts on a rational basis or not.
I can indeed criticize someone for the REASONS they conclude something, even if their conclusion, in the end, is equivalent to my own.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:43 PM
"If Darwin was an accommodationist, he was so only in the same sense Galileo was."
In other words, pretty damn accomodationist! And Galileo was so before there was any threat of the tribunals that later went after him. Read his Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina.
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 7:43 PM
I'll say it again for the literacy impaired:
You cannot truthfully say that people who claim that a deity has a role in evolution accept the scientific concept of evolution.
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 26, 2010 7:44 PM
Was Darwin anaccomodationist? It depends, did he tell Huxley to 'shut up' because his attacks on religion were harming the cause of science-advocacy? If not, no.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:44 PM
So what?
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:45 PM
Yes, just like marriage gets along just fine with adultery and government gets along with corruption. I mean, there's nothing really wrong with hypocrisy, is there?
I wonder if there has been significant selective pressure for humans to be able to compartmentalize disparate concepts.
hard to wrap my head around how easy it is for us to do.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:47 PM
Zing!
Posted by: Wowbagger, Man-Hating Man of Pharyngula
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October 26, 2010 7:49 PM
nickmatzke wrote:
Okay, I'll take 'special pleading' for a hundred, Alex.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:51 PM
And Galileo was so before there was any threat of the tribunals that later went after him. Read his Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina.
yes, because he was, of course, entirely oblivious to what happens to people with ideas the religious establishment disagreed with.
I'm sure he never even heard of Giordano Bruno, either.
*rolleyes*
forced accommodationism is merely kowtowing to terrorism.
is that what you would have us do, Nick?
sorry, not buying.
Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 7:52 PM
Nick, you're suggesting that such as The Kolbe Center is an aberration.
Perhaps.
Seems to me Catholic rationalisations depend on sophist obfuscation, as this article (under "science") in Catholic Education Resource Center demonstrates.
As does this one.
They're trying to have their cake and eat it, too.
Alas, it's transparent.
--
No. But he was was prudently circumspect, and even so was demonised.
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 7:53 PM
Newton was an alchemist. His brilliant work in physics in no way endorses alchemy. Although his alchemy is now worthless, it was a critical stepping stone in his thinking towards the other work he did.
Criticising the social/mental frameworks that Darwin, Newton or Galileo constructed which supported their achievements is stupid.
We stand on the shoulders of giants. You, Nick, would criticise their shoe laces.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 7:53 PM
Posted by: H.H.
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October 26, 2010 7:54 PM
The accommodationists at the NCSE strike me as very much like to those police departments who care more about cleaning up their crime statistics than cleaning up crime. Their only goal seems to be to get more more Americans to say they "accept" evolution when polled. It doesn't seem to matter how evolution is marketed to the public, or if the public truly understands its core concepts. It doesn't matter if they have to insert needless teleology to "sell" them on the idea. It doesn't even matter if the public's understanding of evolution matches what scientists mean by the word. The only thing that matters is getting the public to say they accept evolution and all our problems with scientific illiteracy in this country will be solved.
Total nonsense.
Posted by: nickmatzke.ncse
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October 26, 2010 7:54 PM
"You cannot truthfully say that people who claim that a deity has a role in evolution accept the scientific concept of evolution."
It all depends on what is meant by "role in evolution". They don't think there was supernatural intervention. They think God's role in evolution was the same as his role in chemistry, in the weather, etc. -- God uses natural processes.
If you don't buy this theological viewpoint, that's fine -- I don't either. But it's not an anti-science viewpoint, and it's not creationist, and it's not fair to pretend it's just as bad and stupid as the creationists who deny transitional fossils, common descent, the efficacy of natural selection, radiometric dating, the existence of stars millions of light years away, and much of the rest of science.
A sense of proportionality is all I argue for. Disproportionate reaction and invective to moderate viewpoints is extremist, emotional, and irrational.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:55 PM
Nick thinks of TE as the "get the ball rolling" type.
what he forgets, is that as scientists, at best this is superfluous.
trite, but does Occam ring a bell, Nick?
why should we, as scientists, EVER be in the business of saying it's fine and dandy to add superfluous mechanisms to a good explanation?
again, for the LAST time.
this is NOT a debate over tactics.
this is a debate about what, at the core, science should represent itself as.
and promoting, or even equivocating to superfluous nonsense, is not now, nor should it ever be, the responsibility of scientists.
you shouldn't be a scientist, Nick.
you should be a politician.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmVT1LBhwmO9ej9LNg7a5e9d-AVJ8ezfmE
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October 26, 2010 7:56 PM
jhsteele58 writes:
It is rather an argument against the idea that God has spoken in some definitive way in the Bible or anywhere else and the there are no more questions.
Considering that the bible or "anywhere else" is where the notion of 'god' comes from you've just sawed off the epistemological branch you're sitting on. There are no more questions because you no longer have any basis for claims of knowledge. Call it "atheism" and you're done. Or call it "theistic atheism" if you're intellectually dishonest.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 7:59 PM
It all depends on what is meant by "role in evolution".
no, it really doesn't.
NO role.
that is all we have evidence to support, thus it is the only conclusion a scientist should EVER say.
you want to speak as an individual with "ideas"?
fine.
don't claim it has fuckall to do with representing science.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 7:59 PM
nickmatzke.(ex)ncse #126
Unfortunately for your argument, just a couple of days ago we had a discussion about how the Catholic Church made ID official dogma. Msgr Charles Pope of the Archdiocese of Washington wrote:
This wasn't published 60 years ago, it was published last week.
Posted by: AJ Milne OM
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October 26, 2010 8:01 PM
Well, there are these ninety letters he wrote to the royal society under forty different pseudonyms in which he insists loudly that 'Huxley is not helping'... Many of the letters writing in support of previous ones he'd written...
... oh, also he reports in one a them how once, at a garden party fundraiser for this fossil expedition he's not exactly gonna specify real completely, a buncha young toughs who idolized Huxley heckled a minister who otherwise was gonna be onside and give the expedition all this money... It was rilly, rilly bad... They called him just awful names...
... oh. Right. And then they punched that minister right in the face.
'Kay. So none of that was true. But my understanding is: this makes me the victim, here, for reporting it.
(/And I hope you all feel rilly, rilly bad about that, too.)
Posted by: windy
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October 26, 2010 8:02 PM
What is God's role in chemistry and the weather according to these liberal Christians? How does he "use" natural processes, exactly?
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 8:02 PM
If they didn't, they would shut the fuck up talking about god in the same sentence or paragraph as their imaginary deity. Loser.Darwin's time was much more religious and stupidsticious than the present. That you don't see it says a lot about your lack of intelligence and observation.Actually it is. Either you are a realist or an believer in imaginary things. Can't be both.Yes, the proportion that says either you are a scientist, or a religious person. One cannot be both. IDJIT.Posted by: H.H.
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October 26, 2010 8:03 PM
Nick Matzke said: "A sense of proportionality is all I argue for. Disproportionate reaction and invective to moderate viewpoints is extremist, emotional, and irrational."
LOL. Like when you said the general "tone" in this thread rose to the level one would expect directed at murderers? That kind of disproportionate reaction?
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 8:07 PM
I bet you couldn't find a moderate Catholic who is a scientist who would defend special creation of humans.
well, since we're playing fast and loose with even what "Christian" means, let alone Catholic, Francis Collins, self proclaimed accomodationist AND evangelical Christian, head of the human genome project, and current director of NIH sure seems to believe in special creation of humans.
or did you forget his entire "Moral Law" argument in his book?
strangely, none of us have ever criticized his work in genetics based on his religious inanity, and his ignorance of behavior and evolution.
his genetics work has problems of it's own that have nothing to do with his moral law arguments.
go figure.
some of us actually can manage to separate the issues.
in fact, all of us speaking to you currently can.
you seem to have a problem with that, but that's YOUR problem, not ours.
Posted by: dreadpiratemick
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October 26, 2010 8:07 PM
jhsteele58 said...
"Don't forget, though, that one of our non-religious non-influential 'members' currently lives in the oval office."
Oh dear, I thought atheists had gotten over the silliness of claiming Obama as one of us. Sadly it appears not to be the case. The guy is, according to all the available evidence, a sincere god-believing liberal Christian. Deal with it.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 8:08 PM
AJ
MooneyMilne OM #170You owe me one keyboard.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 8:10 PM
Um, that IS supernatural intervention.
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 8:12 PM
Nick
What, are you referring to this?
I defy you to find any quote of mine that you can characterise as disproportionate, or label as invective.
Yes, the YEC deny established facts. This is bad. But we can demonstrate that they are wrong, without accomodationists telling us to respect their beliefs.
You argue that accepting evolution as part of God's plan is good enough. I say it is not.
But it is. Stephen Hawking quotes the Pope as personally telling him what science he may or may not do, lest he get to close to God's creative act. This is anti-science.Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 8:14 PM
That's foolish. It's just relabeling physical processes as Big Daddy.
Yes, it is. It is the very definition of an anti-science viewpoint, if they hold it any more sincerely than merely playing with words (see above).
No, it isn't. You argue for far more. You inaccurately label legitimate criticism as disproportionate, you spend more time scolding rationalists than you do superstitionists, and you flagrantly dodge perfectly reasonable questions.
Here's the problem many of us have with you and your cohorts at the NCSE. We're in a fundamentally asymmetrical relationship. You all spend an inordinate amount of time shushing us, and claiming (at ever higher and more alarmed levels of volume) that we're "hurting science" and "driving people away." We ask for evidence, and you have none. You have, apparently, also not the slightest twinge of guilt at repeating the evidence-free charge.
Many of us, by contrast, recognize the valuable work NCSE and the like have done. I genuinely believe that without NCSE, many of the most crucial evolution/creation court cases would not have turned out in our favor. In a very real sense, NCSE has held the line and prevented some disastrous backsliding.
But NCSE can't do everything, it can't solve every problem, and it can't be every answer. For decades, the number of Americans who believe in evolution hasn't budged. It hasn't gone up. This indicates we need to try something new - isn't that obvious? It doesn't mean NCSE should stop or go away; in fact, I think that would be a calamity. But it does mean we need to try new things. Also, for many of us, the goals are much broader than protecting or advancing evolution. We really do have a problem with religious thinking, and you're not going to talk us out of that until it becomes an irrelevant force in public policy and human rights (so stop tilting at windmills before you get knocked over by a blade).
One of those new things we're trying is the full-throated, unapologetic atheism that makes you cringe. It's about changing the social norms so that the stifling, peculiarly American social enforcement of religion (or paying it lip-service) isn't seen as the steady state of the universe (and you all really do treat it like an immutable constant).
We don't expect NCSE to do that, and indeed, none of us are asking you to. We know it's not your job.
So why, then, do you all keep telling us to do exactly as you do, to politic, to soothe, to hold the line, and yes, to dissemble? Why can't you stop telling us to shut up? We don't ask you to approve of us in public (we do get politics, believe it or not), but why do you target us? Why are we so "bad for science?" Has it ever occurred to you that we might just carve out a great big new territory with our so-awful ways that would give you space to make even more progress?
Really - what's with this? I think it's because you've been doing what you do so long (and very well), that many of you are complete insiders. You're insular, and you've developed into an industry--- every industry is interested in perpetuating itself. You feel immense pressure from the religious cretins, so you bunker down and reaffirm your own culture and your own values. Some of those are good.
But they're not cure-alls, and you need to wake up to that.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmVT1LBhwmO9ej9LNg7a5e9d-AVJ8ezfmE
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October 26, 2010 8:14 PM
echidna writes:
You cannot truthfully say that people who claim that a deity has a role in evolution accept the scientific concept of evolution.
Molly-worthy.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 8:16 PM
How does he "use" natural processes, exactly?
I think you need to ask Deepak Chopra.
:)
or maybe just ask Ken Miller, since in essence they say similar bunk:
from Jerry Coyne's dissection of "Finding God":
http://www.tnr.com/article/books/seeing-and-believing
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 8:16 PM
Josh, this is the beginning of your reply to me:
I invite you to reread my post and then yours and ask you is angry and irrational? There was no anger in my reply; the word I used was bemused.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 8:19 PM
AJ Milne and HH above - full of win.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 8:20 PM
The Clergy Letter Project offers methadone to treat the addiction. We suggest quitting cold turkey. What technique works best is different for every individual.
Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 8:21 PM
Nick:
1. It can only mean that this purported deity has a role; i.e. does something.
2. Yes, they do — deities are (by definition)
supernatural, and if they have a role, then they [the supernatural] are intervening.3. See #2.
4. You don't buy it, but you do defend it, if poorly and unconvincingly.
5. To postulate an explanatory cause that is (at best) otiose. To abandon the principle of parsimony is indeed anti-scientific.
6. If this deity purportedly caused the universe, it's creationist. Thus the terms 'creation' and 'creatures'.
7. Strawman. This is an epistemic failure, but not directly denialist. The distinction is not lost on us, and there is no pretending the two are equivalently bad and stupid, only that they're both in that category.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 8:22 PM
Don't parse words with me. I wrote you a substantive post with very specific critiques. Did it have some anger in it? You bet. Are you angry? If you say you're not, then I accept that.
Now, are you ready to engage substance?
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 8:22 PM
bemused.
applied to you?
I wanna replace that with slack-jawed and glassy eyed.
but that would make me look angry, right?
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 8:22 PM
But to follow my above analogy, the Clergy Letter Project doesn't offer methadone as a tool to eventually end the addiction, but as a life-long treatment.
Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 8:22 PM
*squeal* That's a first!Posted by: oihorse
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October 26, 2010 8:25 PM
@truthspeaker #111
. Wow that was a stupid mistake on my part. Fucking hate auto-correct on mobile devices.
Thanks for the catch!
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 8:28 PM
No problem, oihourse, and thanks for taking it in the spirit it was intended.
Posted by: Matt G
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October 26, 2010 8:29 PM
Well, PZ, you can't say they're "uniformly awful" and "pro-religious" because two of them I know for a fact were written by an atheist (I know, in part, because he is my father). I regularly attend a UU church, I've been a staunch atheist since I was 8 (came to that conclusion by myself - wasn't steered towards it), and I'm a strong defender of science against any form of creationism (or other pseudoscientific nonsense).
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 8:30 PM
It's rather telling that accommodationists want us to shut up but we don't tell them to shut up.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 8:30 PM
nice listed takedown, John.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 8:34 PM
It's rather telling that accommodationists want us to shut up but we don't tell them to shut up.
actually, I'm rather tired of NOT telling them to shut the hell up, that all they end up doing is causing needless energy to be spent clarifying their inevitable misrepresentation of what science actually is, all in favor of claiming NOMA as a valid tactical strategy.
so, just for Nick, so he can claim the victimhood he so ardently desires.
shut.
up.
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 8:35 PM
Timberwoof, you say:
My short answer to your post is MLK Jr. All of his work in the civil rights movement came out of his reading of the bible and growing up in the church. He learned his tactics from Ghandi but he didn't talk about the Nicene Creed when he talked about Christianity; he talked about justice. And then he talked about peace when he shifted his focus to his opposition to the war in Vietnam.
I grew up with a Christianity that emphasized social justice, peace, and simple living. It all came from the words of Jesus. Yes, I also grew up with the woo, as you say, although it was more about mystery than magic. I gave up the woo long ago but still appreciate the community that gathers to work for change in the world, following in the way of Jesus.
Is this the only way to do it? No, it isn't. I make no claims that my way or the Christian way is the only way. It works for me and for the people in my community and for other liberal Christians.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 8:38 PM
You know what would be an impressive clergy letter? Something like this:
"Dear Parishioners,
Within the Christian community, there is some debate over the meaning of the book of Genesis, and how it relates to what science tells us about the natural world. Here is my perspective. The book of Genesis was compiled around 500 BC by Jewish priests in exile in Babylon, as part of their attempt to create a unified Jewish religion for purposes of rebuilding the society that had been conquered by Babylon. It is a story with no relation to reality, just like the rest of the Bible. Much of it is interesting from a historical perspective, some of it is enjoyable as literature, but none of it is any more special than any other book.
There is no such thing as god. Matter and nature are all there is. There is no evidence that a deity created us, and there is certainly no evidence that any transcendent entity cares about us or is looking out for us. These Sunday mornings have pretty much been a waste of time, although I enjoyed some of the music. I encourage you to keep getting together to sing for fun. I might join you when I don't have a Sunday morning tee time.
Why should you believe me? You shouldn't. I'm just a person. I have no more wisdom than you and no authority over you. This whole "Christianity" thing is a scam that I'm ashamed I ever took part in. Tomorrow morning, I'm going to start looking for a real job.
Now go home and do something fun.
Sincerely,
Pastor whoever"
Now that's a clergy letter that might actually do some good.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 8:45 PM
Evidence?
Here's the thing. The teachings of Jesus that you follow aren't unique to him and weren't all that revolutionary when he proposed them. The teachings of Jesus that are unique to him are that you have to worship him as a god or be cast into a lake of fire. If you're going to follow some of his teachings but ignore the ones that A) differentiate him from other philosophers and B) have historically formed the backbone of Christianity, why call yourself a Christian? Doesn't calling yourself a Christian lend credibility to the supernatural teachings?
Again, you're like a socialist who calls himself a communist even though you disagree with most of the tenets of communism.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 26, 2010 8:49 PM
And another thing:
Then you're not following the teachings of Jesus. He was pretty clear that the Christian way is the only way.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 8:50 PM
My short answer to your post is MLK Jr. All of his work in the civil rights movement came out of his reading of the bible and growing up in the church
I wonder if the same exact thing could be said of Scott Roeder
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 8:54 PM
Matt G:
It would be helpful if you gave a citation and a link.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 8:57 PM
So you're not a Christian. Perhaps you're like Gandhi*: "I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."
*BTW, your misspelling is common but incorrect.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmVT1LBhwmO9ej9LNg7a5e9d-AVJ8ezfmE
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October 26, 2010 9:02 PM
Consider that "theistic evolution" implies "theistic cosmology" as well. The real argument, if there is one, at the base of "theistic evolution" is that god made the universe and defined its operating principles and then sort of stood around either watching or nudging a bit here and there.
Modern cosmology has made a lot of progress (cue Lawrence Krauss) and we understand physics pretty well; well enough to understand how the universe followed from physical law and its initial state. Krauss makes good arguments that we're likely to find that the universe is, in fact, nothing - just slightly unevenly arranged nothingness. So where's god in the "theistic cosmology"? Is god the quantum fluctuation that got everything started? Or is god the nothingness? Because once we pass the initial conditions of the universe there's no sign of the hand of god. After the fluctuation everything followed as a matter of course - big, complicated, beyond our ability to understand, but controlled by physical law. Theistic evolutionists, deists ("theistic cosmologists") are left worshipping the consequences of a random quantum fluctuation but what they don't understand is that there was no need of god from the fluctuation onward, or to cause the fluctuation. I suppose they can believe some higher power invented quantum fluctuations. Le wow.
As soon as someone says that there's a supreme whatever guiding the process - let's say nudging evolution along here and there - or intending some particular outcome - then we can credit that power with nudging evolution towards spina bifida, HIV, and Adolph Hitler.
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 9:04 PM
Josh, on the substance you say:
I am not trying to convert you or convince you. The religious community I am a part of, like many liberal Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, communities is made up of people who grew up within those traditions and still find the celebrations and community meaningful, even if they no longer buy the 'woo' as another poster put it.
You can dismiss thousands of years of tradition in these various communities. It doesn't bother me in the least. But there are some of us who grew up in these communities and learned some important and useful lessons and skills about peace and justice and community building, among others. We have no interest in defending what is indefensible about our histories. We have an interest in taking from them what works and what remains meaningful in our world today.
Do you want to attack me for this or accept the fact that we have some goals in common? I'll work in my world to make them happen and you work in yours.
Posted by: H.H.
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October 26, 2010 9:05 PM
Would it matter? Even if one of the clergy letters was penned by an atheist, that wouldn't necessarily exclude from being either awful or pro-religious. Plenty of atheists write awfully while giving lip service to religion.Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 9:08 PM
Further to the "I follow Jesus" arguments - why is it necessary to have a hero figure to justify one's behavior? As truthspeaker pointed out, Jesus (or his character in the Bible) didn't say anything ethically revolutionary. It's not as if no one knew about charity or compassion for the weak before the alleged Jesus came along. And it's not as if none of these principles (and a whole lot of others) wouldn't have occurred to us as humans without Jesus having (putatively) said them.
There are any number of historical figures whose compassion, far-sightedness, intellect, political acumen, or humanitarianism I find inspiring or worth contemplation. But I don't appeal to them when I go about my daily business. Like most other people, I attempt to live my life ethically (though surely failing sometimes), based on ethical principles that are both self-evident, enculturated in me, and likely the product of my evolutionary heritage.
That's enough. They don't need justification by appeal to Gandhi, MLK, Jesus, or Jane Addams. They are what they are on their own, and they stand and fall on their own.
So why do you (especially you, "I don't believe in the supernatural but I believe in the wisdom of Jesus' teachings") folks feel the need to put the Jesus brand name on these common human concerns? Do you think it elevates your conduct? It doesn't. Do you think it makes your conduct any more ethical? It doesn't. Do you think you wouldn't have known it was better to offer an old lady a hand across the street than to smack her down in front of a car if you hadn't found Jesus?
You would have, and if you think otherwise, you sell yourselves short.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 9:15 PM
hey, what about these guys:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Army_of_God_%28USA%29
the Army of God surely was motivated by their reading of the bible and growing up in the church, just like MLKJ.
or maybe, just maybe, jhsteele is a moron who hasn't yet figured out that religion as a motivator is nothing more than what the person who uses it thinks it is.
IOW, nothing unique, nothing special, no source of absolute morality or goodness.
it's all, just, bullshit.
and it's bad for ya.
Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 9:22 PM
jhsteele58:
You can't have it both ways.
If they don't buy into the woo, then it's not a religious, but rather a cultural community.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmVT1LBhwmO9ej9LNg7a5e9d-AVJ8ezfmE
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October 26, 2010 9:24 PM
jhsteele58 writes:
The religious community I am a part of, like many liberal Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, communities is made up of people who grew up within those traditions and still find the celebrations and community meaningful, even if they no longer buy the 'woo' as another poster put it.
So, do you lie about 'god' directly or by omission? If you're no longer a believer and are pretending otherwise then you're lying. Or are you lying to us by pretending you're not a woo-woo but saying something different to your sheep?
Posted by: Kirk
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October 26, 2010 9:25 PM
I love that sentence.
Yahweh, grand fuckup of all time, has reconsidered his position and is trying to do a new thing.
If he existed, he'd fuck up the new thing too.
Posted by: David Marjanović
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October 26, 2010 9:25 PM
Repeated for truth.
If it merely watched, without even starting the process, then that's not theistic evolution. It's at most deism. Theistic evolution means God is a directed mutagen.
Cdesign proponentsists have a very wide range of views. Dembski jumps between OEC and YEC depending on who happens to be his employer at the moment, while Behe is a theistic evolutionist who believes God the Mutagen changed two amino acids at once in some protein of Plasmodium falciparum to give it resistance against chloro-whatever. The term "ID" is a smokescreen that allows a wide variety of people to hide from Ockham's Razor.
Evidence?
My own curiosity is the moving force for my pursuit of knowledge and wisdom. I just find it fun. :-) My innate curiosity is the source of my drive to learn.
Where does that curiosity come from? Apparently it's heritable to some degree, and apparently it's been selected for – curiosity may kill cats, but a lack of curiosity kills people faster than they have children.
It looks that way if all you know is English or French or Spanish or German, but there are plenty languages where words can end in "y", and even some where they can end in "w".
You're right, but your examples are wrong.
Opinions by a mere archbishop aren't official dogma.
In fact, even opinions by a pope aren't official dogma unless they're made ex cathedra.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 9:34 PM
Words like "easy", "ally", "spew" and "cow"?
Posted by: David Marjanović
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October 26, 2010 9:36 PM
Should have said "proclaimed" or "uttered" instead of "made".
jhsteele58, what sense does it make to call you a Christian? Why not an "Atheist For Jesus Except Everything He Said About the Lake of Fire"? There are photos of Richard Dawkins wearing an "Atheists For Jesus" T-shirt, you know.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 9:36 PM
Jhsteele:
I did not dismiss tradition or community celebration, and you know I didn't. Take down the mental brick wall for a second because it's causing you to think I'm saying things I manifestly did not say.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 9:39 PM
Ugh. Blockquote fail in #214. Mea culpa.
Posted by: David Marjanović
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October 26, 2010 9:40 PM
Please. I'm talking about the sounds, not the letters.
Posted by: Cuttlefish, OM, CR
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October 26, 2010 9:41 PM
The scientist told me
He said it so well:
The secret to life, son,
It’s all in the cell—
The key to our essence
It’s there in our genes
Except when it isn’t… cos god intervenes.
Within every cell, son,
The scientists proved,
Sub-cellular structures
And things that they moved
Molecular transport
Like little machines
Except when it isn’t… cos god intervenes.
We know, even Darwin
Said it all looks designed
But natural selection
Is all that we find
With blind evolution
Directing the scenes
Except when it doesn’t… cos god intervenes
He’d worked on The Project
From when it began
The one that’s decoding
The genome of Man
And Collins knows science,
And he really knows genes
Except when he doesn’t… cos god intervenes
In the journals of science
The write-ups will change
There’ll be an addition
A little bit strange
Cos in the conclusions
The asterisk means
“Except when it doesn’t… cos god intervenes.”
A cure for depression
Might seem to work well
In a medical journal
The researchers tell
“It stops oxidation
Of monoamines*
*Except when it doesn’t… cos god intervenes”
The worst of disasters
We call “acts of god”
The faithful believers
Must think that it’s odd
With whole coastal regions
In smashed smithereens
Is that what it look likes ... when god intervenes?
We study the genome
We study the prayer;
About intervention,
We find nothing there.
We find antibiotics
And look for vaccines
Cos no one can count on… when god intervenes
The methods of science
Have practical worth
We don’t look to heaven
But merely to earth
There’s one or the other
There’s no in betweens
It cannot be science… when god intervenes.
http://digitalcuttlefish.blogspot.com/2009/08/for-francis-collins-when-god-intervenes.html
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 9:41 PM
I just re-read that article that's been linked a lot of late:
http://www.alternet.org/story/148588/fascist_america:_is_this_election_the_next_turn/
and started thinking about the "new accommodationists" again, and realizing what they really are:
new appeasers.
Posted by: Timberwoof
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October 26, 2010 9:43 PM
Jhsteele58 has pretty much said that he wants to be Christian without the woo, and it is the woo that New Atheists object to. So you you guys are harping on him for not being a True Christian. In defining Christianity for him and then saying that he's not it, you are making a straw-man fallacy or a No True Scotsman fallacy.
This would, IMHO, be a good time to let go of him. Since there is no woo, what harm is there? (Be sure to base your response in his arguments, not your version of what you think his arguments ought to be.)
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 9:44 PM
Josh, you say:
We apparently have nothing further to talk about. I specifically said I did not hold myself up in any way as "more" ethical than others, only that I grew up within a community of justice and peace that I found meaningful.
What I find on many of these comments is the worst kind of stereotyping, akin to 'you are black so you are somehow inferior...'; "you are gay so there is something wrong with you..."
'You are Christian so you necessarily believe these stupid things...'
For a community that supposedly believes in following the evidence where it leads, where ever it leads, apparently that evidence cannot include the fact that there are many liberal Christians who are not troubled by the findings of science and whose reason to be together is community and justice.
Posted by: David Marjanović
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October 26, 2010 9:45 PM
I'll try again... I should have gone to bed long ago.
Please. I'm talking about the sounds [j] and [w], not the letters y and w.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 9:48 PM
Then why are you using the misleading term Xian? You can just say "church of what's happening now" without any reference to an imaginary deity and his fictitious son. Why can't you do that???Posted by: echidna
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October 26, 2010 9:48 PM
QFT
Gob-smacked.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 9:49 PM
Timberwoof:
Bullshit. Don't play that game of "we can all define words to mean whatever they mean." "Christian" is widely recognized to mean "follower of the alleged son of God who adheres to scripture and believes Jesus was the resurrected son of a deity." That's not unreasonable, it's not a strawman, it's called "how language works."
If he doesn't mean to claim these things, the onus is on him to find other, more accurate words to describe his position. He doesn't get to throw a tantrum at us for not telepathically divining that he doesn't mean "supernatural" when he says "God," and he doesn't mean, "son of man, risen," when he says "Jesus."
What's so hard to understand about this? I don't care what he believes. I do care about knowing what that is, however. He chooses to obfuscate terms in order to identify with the religious while making unreasonable demands on other people who can't possibly know his linguistic idiosyncrasies.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmVT1LBhwmO9ej9LNg7a5e9d-AVJ8ezfmE
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October 26, 2010 9:51 PM
Josh, OSG, OM ponders:
So here it is - do you care more about our common humanitarian goals, or do you care more about defending your identification..
Might just be job security. The skills of a pastor map to careers as: used car salesman, homeopath, acupuncturist, lobbyist, marketing director, and WAL-MART greeter.
...Maybe not WAL-MART greeters because they're not expected to lie to the customers. "Napkins? Aisle 5. But I don't really believe we have napkins I just think you came to WAL-MART for the cultural experience."
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 26, 2010 9:56 PM
That's another thing I find perplexing. If those liberal believers don't believe in anything like the conception that's being attacked, yet they take it so personally.There's evidentially a problem with those who have more serious beliefs in God and accepting evolution. Bring this up and people who don't have such beliefs howl about how unrepresentative it is.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 9:56 PM
jhsteele:
Get off your Lofty Steed of Persecution. I'm quiveringly delighted to meet people who embrace science, reason, and human compassion. I'm only objecting to you getting butt-hurt because people question (for obvious reasons) why you think "Christian" automatically conveys that stance, and why you're more upset about the label you adhere to than you are concerned with our common goals.
Shorter: you don't seem to give a shit whether your winter coat protects you from frostbite as long as everyone on the street thinks it's got a Prada label inside.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 10:00 PM
For a community that supposedly believes in following the evidence where it leads, where ever it leads, apparently that evidence cannot include the fact that there are many liberal Christians who are not troubled by the findings of science and whose reason to be together is community and justice.
yes, because we wouldn't want to discourage people from being irrational hypocrites, even if they agree with us on any specific issue.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 10:01 PM
Silly me, not realizing when you were talking about "y" and "w" you actually meant "j" and "w".
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 10:02 PM
But I don't really believe we have napkins I just think you came to WAL-MART for the cultural experience."
heh.
but I DID go to Walmart for the cultural experience...
http://www.peopleofwalmart.com/
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 10:02 PM
And by the way, Timberwoof, is this portion of your site meant to be read straight, or as satire? Genuine question.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 10:07 PM
Get off your Lofty Steed of Persecution.
that SO needs a picture.
not this?
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/upload/2009/08/see_what_you_missed/pz_dino.jpeg
Posted by: Timberwoof
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October 26, 2010 10:08 PM
I don't know, Josh. The link is busted.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 10:10 PM
You know exactly which portion of your website I'm referring to. If it's mean to be social commentary, try a more straight-forward style.
Posted by: Aquaria
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October 26, 2010 10:14 PM
Do you want to attack me for this or accept the fact that we have some goals in common?Do you want to attack me for this or accept the fact that we have some goals in common?
Fuck off. If you had the same goals we did, you'd be going to other church groups and spreading your smug, self-righteous smarm on them.
We're not the ones teaching people lies and that believing lies because some guy behind a pulpit says they're true is a good thing.
Your buddies are.
Go bug them.The reason you are getting such a vehement response here is because you came in and took a big steaming dump on the floor. You don't come in here and berate us for how we're having to clean up the utter disastrous messes your simpering Kumbaya accommodationist tactics have made in the world. We have have people still trying to teach creationism in American schools. We have people who are going fucking insane because a black man is President. We have people who believe any fool thing some cretin tells them from the idiot box, as long as it reinforces their prejudices and makes them feel good about themselves.
As for your Dr. King, here is a quote of his that you need to read:
You should be ashamed of yourself for invoking MLK. You are as divorced from what he stood for as you are from reality.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 10:18 PM
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 10:19 PM
I am seeing comments here about me taking this argument personally or feeling persecuted in some way. Get real. I have no skin in this game at all; as I said in an earlier post my energy for fighting battles goes towards conservatives and fundamentalists within the Christian community. My enjoyment here is just in finding the same kind of close-mindnedness and stereotyping that I find among conservative Christians.
There are so many people here who put Christian in this narrow and easily pounded straw-man that they can effortlessly burn down. It requires no thinking at all. But it must feel good.
Posted by: Timberwoof
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October 26, 2010 10:19 PM
Woof, Josh! Who pissed in your Cheerios? Ease off a bit; I prefer to disambiguate instead of assuming.
The Elf site is satire. Farce. It even says so in the deconstruction page.
It is amazing how much hate-mail I get from people who accuse me of having latched on to the elf thing after the LOTR movies were released. It is also interesting how much mail I get from kids who tell me they are elves and feel estranged from their peers for a variety of reasons.
Posted by: Aquaria
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October 26, 2010 10:20 PM
Good grief, a whole paragraph disappeared in there just before the blockquote, and I don't remember the wording of it. Just that it said something along the lines that irrational thinking is the cause of the stupidity that is becoming rampant in America, and people like our kumbaya-warbler is bashing us for it, and not the root cause of it: Millions of stupidity peddlers in the form of religion. They are the cause of the problem, not the rational. Why we have to be attacked because they are fucking things up is beyond me.
Posted by: Aquaria
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October 26, 2010 10:24 PM
No, jerk, you are the close-minded one. You are being the white moderate Dr. King was disgusted with. You are paternalistically dictating what you think we should be doing to soothe your delicate feelings, rather than doing what will work, even if it upsets people.
Omelettes, eggs, moron.
Now fuck off.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 10:26 PM
Jhsteele, imagine:
Do you see why this is confusing?
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 10:27 PM
Only a professional liar and bullshitter would say that. One that doesn't recognize reality. That is you. Because only liars and bullshitters say that. We are open-minded, but not so open that our brains fall out and we start believing in imaginary things. So, you need a clue. Try the third door on the left under "i am a fool" and "god doesn't exist".Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 10:28 PM
jhsteele58, please define to what you refer when you employ the term 'Christian'.
Or, if you don't care to, perhaps state what you think is wrong with the Wikipedia definition:
Because I think you're consciously equivocating.
Posted by: https://www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawmVT1LBhwmO9ej9LNg7a5e9d-AVJ8ezfmE
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October 26, 2010 10:32 PM
jhsteele58 writes:
There are so many people here who put Christian in this narrow and easily pounded straw-man that they can effortlessly burn down.
Well, it is pretty effortless, that's true.
You're cagy about not answering the crucial questions, yourself. If you're keeping your position obscure to protect it, you shouldn't grouse that others don't understand your position - that's not intellectually honest.
Pastor, let me ask you:
- Do you believe in god?
- Do you believe jesus christ was a real person/god?
- Do you believe jesus christ was a messiah/son of god/divinely inspired person?
If the answer to any of the above is "No" then:
- Do you preach or teach?
- Do you preach or teach that there is a god?
- Do you preach or teach that jesus christ was a real person/god?
- Do you preach or teach that jesus christ was a messiah/son of god/divinely inspired person?
Some simple ground-setting will help; that way we won't have to argue with any straw men. Or, you can ignore these questions, which is answer enough.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 10:38 PM
My enjoyment here is just in finding the same kind of close-mindnedness and stereotyping that I find among conservative Christians.
shorter:
"I enjoy ignoring your actual arguments in favor of this here strawman i just erected."
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 10:39 PM
jhsteele58 #237
So what are you doing to fight "conservatives and fundamentalists within the Christian community." Do you go to the local school board to ensure evolution is taught instead of creationism? Do you do anything besides wring your hands when attempts to legalize gay marriage are shot down by state legislatures?
You come to an atheist blog, proudly announce your religiousness, and have the gall to expect us to say "that's nice, and how 'bout them Giants?" We're not impressed with how Jebus has influenced your life. We really aren't. We're especially not impressed by your stance that you're a Christian but not really a Christian but sorta-kinda like a Christian, maybe an atheist Christian but possibly more like a deist Christian and Jebus is a big factor in your life but you don't really believe in Jebus even though he's a big factor in your life even though you don't really believe in Jebus but did you mention how he's a big factor in your life?
Sure, we're closed-minded because we think your religion is wishy-washy and flabby. Whatever faults Ken Ham and Benny Ratzi have, at least they're candid about their Christianity. They're not like someone who wants to call us "fundamentalist atheists" but isn't forthright enough to say it.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 10:39 PM
he isn't talking about "j" and "w" (because those are letters, i.e. the little symbols you use for writing), he's talking about [j] and [w], which are the sounds you use to form words when speaking aloud. and the letter "y" often makes the sound [j]Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 10:43 PM
Timberwoof:
You did, with your inanity and bad-faith reading of the situation. You want to disambiguate? Try treading for context.
Then it's bad satire. You don't have a gift for it. You may be talented in many things, but this isn't one of them. And that's not "hate mail," it's an honest "meh." If the reader has to ask, you need to rethink. Especially when you've got those silly, teen-aged Tolkien motifs all over your site.
I mean, really.
Posted by: Wowbagger, Man-Hating Man of Pharyngula
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October 26, 2010 10:43 PM
jhsteele58 wrote:
Why aren't you hassling mathematicians, then? With their closed-mindedness regarding 1+1=2 (in base 10), and their stereotyping of everyone who doesn't agree as irredeemably stupid, they should be far more exciting to stir up.
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 10:48 PM
John, honestly if the only acceptable definition of 2000+ of Christianity is what can be found on a no-brainer web-site then what is there to talk about? Is this where you go to do all your research?
This is a perfect example of the stereotyping I am talking about.
Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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October 26, 2010 10:50 PM
Man, I can feel for jhsteele58... I get the same sort of bullshit, assumptions and bashing whenever I tell people I'm a rapist. And by rapist I mean harmonica player.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 10:50 PM
The [w] sound is found as a final sound in English. The word "cow" both ends with the letter w and the sound [w].
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 10:50 PM
jhsteele58:
Then what the fuck do you want? Do you want every word in the language to mean 16 different things? Do you want every person to speak their own idiosyncratic language, so that no one understands what in creation anyone else is saying?
Stop it. The problem is with you, not other people. If you want to define your religiosity in a way that no ordinary person with understanding of current English idioms would understand, you may. But the consequence is universal misunderstanding.
Seriously. What the hell about that don't you get?
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 26, 2010 10:53 PM
There's nothing more condescending than how often I'm compared with fundamentalists for merely saying something. Are people so afraid to actually proportion their beliefs based on evidence that the mere affirmation of a position is met with slurs of religious persecution? Got proportion?
Posted by: Randy (not Randy)
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October 26, 2010 10:54 PM
I think hjsteele58 probably pastors at a church with a similar naming convention to what the Christian Scientists use.
So all that remains is to find out where exactly one goes to find the "Third Church of Christ, Athiest."
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 10:55 PM
Man, I can feel for jhsteele58... I get the same sort of bullshit, assumptions and bashing whenever I tell people I'm a rapist. And by rapist I mean harmonica player.
ROFLMAO
perfect.
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 10:55 PM
Exactly, and in fewer words than I used. Jhsteele -this has been made crystal clear for you. You still don't "get" it.
Which leads me to conclude your agenda isn't really "peace and goodwill," just as most of us suspected. Your real agenda is to identify with the vast religious majority in America for all its benefits, and damn the consequences to honest discourse. People here have tried to engage you in plain terms, but you equivocate.
So, in the best Pharyngula tradition, may I offer you a porcupine-with-quills-athwart on which to position yourself until you find your sufficiency?
Posted by: Wowbagger, Man-Hating Man of Pharyngula
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October 26, 2010 10:56 PM
jhsteele58 wrote:
Because words have meanings, and to move beyond a reasonable interpretation of those meanings is to make communication virtually useless.
You don't believe in - or, at least, claim not to believe in - the divinity of Christ; ergo, your use of the term 'Christian' is misleading, because the term has an established meaning different from how you use it.
Is a vegetarian who eats meat still a vegetarian? Is a pacifist who starts fights on the weekend still a pacifist? Is a heterosexual who only has one-night-stands with members of the same sex still a heterosexual? If you call a dog's tail a leg how many legs does it have?
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 10:57 PM
Yawn, bullshitter can't stop bullshitting. News at eleven. Except that isn't news.
I always find it amazing how much energy is expended by folks who really have nothing to say, but keep saying it ad nauseum, instead of letting a comfortable silence occur. Almost like quiet is like a vacuum, abhored by nature. Except nature is mostly almost vacuum, they are the one with the problem.
Posted by: Randy (not Randy)
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October 26, 2010 10:58 PM
Wowbagger, a heterosexual who only has one-night-stands with members of the same sex is called a Republican.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 26, 2010 10:58 PM
I always find it amazing how much energy is expended by folks who really have nothing to say, but keep saying it ad nauseum
a recent juggalo comes to mind...
or am I being racist?
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 11:00 PM
I'm shocked! And astounded. Flabbergasted even. John's using the common, accepted definition of Christian when an honest-to-Huitzilopochtli pastor has his own, idiosyncratic definition of Christian which he hasn't explained to us yet but expects us to use in place of the definition the vast majority of English speakers use. I thought John was smarter than that. :=þ
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 11:03 PM
This exchange with jh and Timberwoof ranks high in my personal Halls of Pathetic Internet Shame. Talk about insipid. It's like watching Ned Flanders fap 'til dawn, just to thank Jesus that he couldn't get it up.
Posted by: Cuttlefish, OM, CR
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October 26, 2010 11:06 PM
I'm Christian, and I'm born again,
By which I mean, I'm not.
My faith is not the simple faith
A True Believer's got,
But something more ephemeral
Which cannot be defined;
I'd tell you all about it, but
I'm rather disinclined.
But yes, I am a Christian--though
I mostly don't believe;
To treat me as a strawman, why,
It's really quite naive.
I've simply re-defined the words
As what they mean to me;
I've decked my church in camouflage,
It's your fault you can't see!
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
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October 26, 2010 11:08 PM
Cuttlefish for the win!
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 11:08 PM
'Tis Himself, OM
Ok, so the sign in signatures can be a little challenging. I hope I got it right...
You ask the question about the local school board and evolution. The local school board (from two different school districts) is represented in my congregation and totally supports the teaching of evolution. Yes, I have been to the school board meetings, many times. Yes, members of the state legislature participate in the life of my congregation and support gay marriage. I am personal friends with several of them in MN, including working as the treasurer for one them in their campaigns. I am actively involved in progressive politics in the state, as are many people in my congregation.
Can you say the same?
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 11:08 PM
oh yeah. it's exactly the same, since we're trying to ban Christians from marrying, bully them into suicide, casually declare them subhuman (as the pope has done with atheists, in case you were wondering), and generally spend most of our free time fantasizing how awesome it'll be once Richard Dawkins rules the world and begins torturing Christians forever for not believing in himtotally like fundamentalist christians, yep.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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October 26, 2010 11:11 PM
Why do you still claim to be a Xian, instead of the "church of what's happening now"? All else is bullshit. Especially since you cannot/will not define your beliefs. Keep flapping your jaws loser. You will keep saying nothing cogent until you quit flapping them, and decide that communication requires intelligence, and thoughtfulness, and defining what you believe to other people. So far, you are a failure.
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 26, 2010 11:13 PM
It would be nice if instead of just being labelled a fundamentalist or close-minded that arguments would actually be engaged. They are being made after all...
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 11:15 PM
Many of us here can say the same. So, how about you spend less time twisting your damned undies up over people not "recognizing" you as a "Christian," and more time working with people who care about your progressive politics and agree with them?
Hmm?
Or, is it more fun to poke fun at the "fundamentalist atheists?" Be honest.
Shit or get off the pot. More importantly, please shut the fuck up about people who don't buy your totally-personal definition of Christianity and make common cause with them on things that matter.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 11:18 PM
I'm not arguing that he's right, only that he isn't referring to the letters. and in any case, no words to my knowledge end in [j], so he'd still be half right ;-)Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 11:20 PM
Further to 270 -
Before you go off on some wounded, self-righteous diatribe, really do consider shutting up. The lot of us have heard your schtick before for years, and we don't need to hear it again. If you want to play the persecution card, go to a lower-rent district. Seriously - don't keep carping on the same crap.
You want to effect change? Good. So do we. Don't blubber, don't ask for "affirmation" for your oddly unique religious views. Talk about action.
Posted by: Rey Fox, Bird Caller Guy
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October 26, 2010 11:22 PM
2000+ years, people! That's a long time!
Except that all that came out of those 2,000 years was various tortured logic for believing in the unbelievable, various deified-but-not-really-deified saints, and some humanistic philosophy that was born out of humanism but co-opted by religious leaders as soon as it became lucrative.
And some pretty architecture, I guess.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 11:25 PM
actually, let me correct that one: cow ends in [aʊ], not in [w], just like day ends in [ei] not in [j]Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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October 26, 2010 11:26 PM
"Can you say the same?"
Yes.
*crickets*
Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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October 26, 2010 11:30 PM
@226
Actually I amend my statement. No, I can't say the same because *I* am not making the problem worse by promoting the idea that church and congregations should be the driving force in politics. The fact that you have followers who you lead towards progressive goals is much less useful than some actual independent people who are able to think and value said goals without needing a big authoritarian god figure (or metaphor) to tell them to.
I see the problem as "religion is having far too much sway enforcing their values over other religions and nonbelievers" you seem to say "The WRONG religion has sway...mine is much superior because it's liberal!"
Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 11:32 PM
[meta]
Cuttlefish is awesome.
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 11:33 PM
Josh, "many of us here can say the same?" How about you? Tell me the school board meetings you have been at and the state (or national) legislators you have met to advocate for progressive causes. No obfuscation. Just names and places. No generic 'we all do that' but evidence that your convictions lead to concrete contacts and actions.
Then if there is evidence that suggests your convictions match that of the liberal Christians I know as school board members and legislators and members of my congregation who are actively involved in progressive politics we can agree to stop arguing about theology and make common cause.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 26, 2010 11:35 PM
sooo... let me get this straight: jhsteele58 is an atheist who prefers to hide under the umbrella of the majority instead of fessing up to the fact that he's an atheist (here's a hint for ya: admitting to one's atheism doesn't ban you from celebrating Christmas; or liking the good half of the stuff Jesus said; or getting together once a week with others who feel that way; hell, you're not even banned from joining the UU's as an atheist), but then whines that WE are the messed up ones because we don't like his hyper-idiosyncratic definition of Christianity, which the majority of Christians wouldn't recognize as such, either?
He and Spong need to grow a spine and stop cluthcing to the lies they don't even believe anymore. no one is going to take their "traditions" away from them if they do.
Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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October 26, 2010 11:37 PM
@278
By you're definition we might in fact qualify as liberal Christians.
Btw, you need to zip up that fly and stop waving your self righteous dick around demanding size comparisons. Didn't that dead guy you follow, but in no way think was divine or worship, say something about doing good deeds and charity for the sake of looking good in public?
Quick, no one tell him anything! If we stay silent we're better christians than he is!
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 11:38 PM
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 26, 2010 11:42 PM
Jadehawk, #279 - yep, that's about it.
And it makes jhsteele a cowardly douchebag.
Posted by: Ing: PhD Trollologist
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October 26, 2010 11:43 PM
Also.,..you know you provided as much evidence of you're super sugary awesome goodness as us replying "yes we do" do. Why hold us to higher standards? Is it because we don't have morals form the god you don't believe in?
Posted by: John Morales
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October 26, 2010 11:47 PM
jhsteele58:
You haven't stated what this common cause might be, and you're addressing gnu atheists, here.
Besides, didn't you already imply that theology is woo? We have no argument with that.
Posted by: jhsteele58
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October 26, 2010 11:55 PM
Josh,
Your answer speaks for itself. Not one simple name or action.
I am on an atheist blog and I am beating up atheists? Evidence please. I am just stating my position and being amused at the unthinking-vitriolic response.
I am not excited about my liberal Christian identity. It is just the worldview I grew up with and continue to find meaningful. I think I have stated that plainly enough.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 27, 2010 12:00 AM
you're saying we're the same as those who want to see us dead and tortured, but WE are the ones with the "unthinking-vitriolic response"?go clutch your pearls somewhere else
Posted by: Josh, "Raquel Dommage," Porte-parole Gay Official
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October 27, 2010 12:00 AM
Jhsteel -
I've devoted more typing to engaging you than I have for almost anyone else here. Yet, you just blather.
So, fuck off.
Posted by: abb3w
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October 27, 2010 12:03 AM
Incoming....
@109, echidna: Rule 1 of science: Do not add deities to scientific hypotheses. The minute you do, it is no longer science.
...not really. Only if you add a deity that is more than (in the mathematical sense) ordinally complex. Or if you're simply speaking about the Western anthropological practice, rather than the abstract philosophical discipline.
When you use a cardinally (continuum or higher) complex deity, then it's no longer (in the formal mathematical sense) giving a description, and thus stops being a hypothesis. But an ordinally complex "deity" - say like the Douglas Adams character rain god Rob McKenna - is subject to investigation by science. You can form hypotheses, describe evidence, and test them. True, you're left with an unexplained primary ("it's going to rain around him"), but that's ultimately no different from the lack of explanation for inertia, much as Feynman and his father discussed. (YouTube turns the clip up readily.)
Of course, we haven't found any rain gods like that. But they're not philosophically precluded from the scope of science; they just don't seem to exist.
@136, areyoulistening: Five? I only see four.
Phrasing of the 2002 Cleveland Plain Dealer Mason-Dixon poll in Ohio (tinyurl.com/2dwdd3p), put into what I consider "standard" order:
The categories appear to be anthropologically distinguishable, regardless of whether any pairwise coherent philosophical distinctions can be made. I'll also note that the segments of the population as a whole appear genuine (if perhaps unthinking), even while banner-carriers for the positions may be flying false flags.
@138, Niblick: The critical difference between ID and YEC, on one hand, and TE on the other, is that they deny that evolution is even possible.
More exactly, that ID believe that some structures are "too improbable" to be achieved by evolution. In evolutionary terms (although they do not THINK in these terms), there are transitions that cannot be achieved by selective adaptation and neutral drift among adjacent environment variations. They think there are steps that planned intervention was necessary, and indicates a deliberate choice of end (IE: humans/intelligence). In more dubious terms, while they may accept "microevolution", they don't think uniform common descent can work without intervention.
TE, by contrast, can be thought of as setting up a sufficiently complex rigged demo; God is clever enough that he could simply pick the exact right laws of physics at time t=+10-43s so that at time t=+4.26*1017s humans would inexorably result. While the option remains for further intervention, it's not a requirement to finish setting up the board.
@151, Niblick: Therefore, evolution as we understand it is fundamentally incompatible with ID.
However, insofar as the masses of ID adherents in the US population do not seem to insist on a young earth, nor special creation for each species (merely a nudge over the biggest gaps), it's also distinct from YEC and OEC. And, since it thinks there had to be such interventionist nudges, it also is distinct from TE or AE positions.
A bit of nuance to understanding might help with divide and conquer. Surely the folks around here can handle a little complexity in their anthropological model?
@164, H.H.: The accommodationists at the NCSE strike me as very much like to those police departments who care more about cleaning up their crime statistics than cleaning up crime. Their only goal seems to be to get more more Americans to say they "accept" evolution when polled.
Frankly, getting even that much out of the YEC brigade seems like progress.
@164, H.H.: The only thing that matters is getting the public to say they accept evolution and all our problems with scientific illiteracy in this country will be solved.
No; they only seem to aspire to an evolutionary advancement, not an apotheosis. =)
@165, nickmatzke.ncse: A sense of proportionality is all I argue for. Disproportionate reaction and invective to moderate viewpoints is extremist, emotional, and irrational.
"Moderate" is a relative thing. It's more moderate to merely kill every child under the age of two than to order the massacre of the city; that doesn't mean it's reasonable.
I think the most you can hope is that the invective will be proportionate to the degree of unreason perceived; so, TE will get a few mild insults, while ID may involve profanity elaborated in iambic pentameter, OEC full sonnets, and YEC a full epic cycle with bonus acrostics.
Also bear in mind, the degree of invective will vary between individuals. "Well, that's inane" may measure as a mild reproof to an ally from one person, and an ultimate dismissal from another.
@166, Ichthyic: Nick thinks of TE as the "get the ball rolling" type.
what he forgets, is that as scientists, at best this is superfluous.
trite, but does Occam ring a bell, Nick?
That it is non-parsimonious and philosophically unsupported by evidence is irrelevant to it being an anthropologically distinct belief grouping from either Intelligent Design or Atheistic Evolution.
Besides, the proof of Occam's razor is decidedly non-trivial. I admit I'd aspire to reforming high school mathematics so that the proof can at least be outlined, but schools have enough problems with the current curriculum without introducing axiomatic probability theory, formal languages and automata theory, and information theory.
@169, 'Tis Himself, OM: Unfortunately for your argument, just a couple of days ago we had a discussion about how the Catholic Church made ID official dogma. Msgr Charles Pope of the Archdiocese of Washington wrote:
Archbishops don't get to define dogma. That's reserved to pronouncements Ex Cathedra and from full Ecumenical Councils. At best, this can be called Theologica certa, and more likely just Sententia communis. As IAmNotACanonLawyer understand, that Latin translates to English as "he's talking out of his (too-small funny) hat".
@184, truthspeaker: The Clergy Letter Project offers methadone to treat the addiction. We suggest quitting cold turkey. What technique works best is different for every individual.
An excellent analogy.
Now... is anyone willing to actually try and find data as to which is more effective?
@188, truthspeaker: But to follow my above analogy, the Clergy Letter Project doesn't offer methadone as a tool to eventually end the addiction, but as a life-long treatment.
Ah, but once they are down to a methadone-only addiction, you're much more likely to keep them from going back, and someone else can have much better chances of getting them (or the next generation) to quit completely. Have the methadone clinic be one step, the chocolate factory another, and then you can put them on a diet.
@237, jhsteele58: My enjoyment here is just in finding the same kind of close-mindnedness and stereotyping that I find among conservative Christians.
You might care to examine Karen Stenner's "The Authoritarian Dynamic". While individuals vary in what norms of behavior they expect from others, and how sensitive their standard of deviation from the norms are, and while person A may have a wider standard of deviation than person B on one area but a narrower standard on another... pushed far enough, humans will react similarly.
That said, characterizing as close-mindedness a refusal to take "the sky is green!" seriously - when the idea has been repeatedly examined from first principles - is a form of Source Derrogation, a basic denial tactic. You might care less for "Strategies for Resisting Persuasion", Jacks and Cameron, Basic and Applied Social Psychology, Vol 25, #2 June 2003, pp 145-161 (doi:10.1207/S15324834BASP2502_5), but would probably benefit more.
@249, WowbaggerOM Why aren't you hassling mathematicians, then?
Because mathematicians can go deeper into la-la land than theologians can follow... and more, can find their way back.
And set theory is futzy hard.
Posted by: Randy (not Randy)
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October 27, 2010 12:03 AM
You know what you haven't stated, plainly or otherwise? Answers to simple straight forward questions.
I'll type slowly so you understand.
What. Do. You. Mean. When. You. Say. That. You. Are. A. Christian. And. Why. Do. You. Expect. Us. To. Understand. And. Accept. That. Your. Definition. Is. Right. Even. Though. It. Goes. Against. Every. Other. Definition. Of. Christian. Used. Throughout. Time?
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 27, 2010 12:04 AM
By their fruits you shall know them
*looks at JhSteele's posts*
I think I know this one as "troll".
I am just stating my position
you've said nothing of any significance, or sense.
when you get done flapping your gums, give us a ring.
Posted by: Mandrellian
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October 27, 2010 12:10 AM
Come on lads & lasses, let the non-Christian Christian have his meaningless meaning, faithless faith and non-religious religion; let him call it Christianity if he wants, even if it doesn't fit any definition of the word; let him call his gathering of (presumably) like-minded non-worshippers a church; let him not-worship the saviour who didn't save him - his not-god named Jesus.
I mean, who are we to judge someone with a vague belief system which, when it does approach coherency, does not resemble in any recognisable way the description he gives it? I'm sure we all do this to some extent! Why, despite my ignorance of the Torah, my lack of impressive hats and my utter rejection of Yahweh I consider myself a devout Hasidic Jew because I love doing nothing on Saturday and once enjoyed a Mel Brooks film. There's nothing anyone can say to dispute that and if they do I'm going to scream anti-Semitism.
Posted by: Randy (not Randy)
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October 27, 2010 12:15 AM
Aw, come on Mandrellian. You've got to at least include the hats!
Posted by: Mandrellian
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October 27, 2010 12:17 AM
Hmmm. I agree, Randy (#292).
I shall henceforth purchase a selection of awesome hats so that I may be better-equipped to defend my theology.
Posted by: Myron
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October 27, 2010 12:21 AM
In my view, the entire conflict between (theistic) religion and science boils down to the following question:
Is the belief in (divine or nondivine) spiritual beings, i.e. in (immanent or transcendent) supernatural agents with mental properties (consciousness, even self-consciousness) but without any (intrinsic) physical properties, consistent with the body of contemporary scientific knowledge?
Posted by: mikeyB
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October 27, 2010 12:27 AM
One thing I've always wondered about "intelligent design" maybe someone can answer. Doesn't the movement implicitly betray a bias that design is more important or valuable than construction. Aren't they equally valuable in the real world. Isn't this kind of an elitist bias? I mean you can have an intelligently designed building that is terribly constructed or vice versa, an terribly designed building which is redeemed through intelligent construction.
And another thing - doesn't an intelligent design imply the need or an intelligent constructor. If so aren't there at least two gods now? Or perhaps god is an intelligent designer but a crappy constructor.
Posted by: Mandrellian
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October 27, 2010 12:30 AM
Myron (#294), that seems to be the question.
The answer to that question seems to be a flat "no". A lot of people seem to have a problem with that. To them I say: stiff shit. Deal with it.
Truth hurts, yes - but only because it all-too-often has to put on its big boots and stomp through several layers of very sturdy, very old bullshit to get through to people.
Posted by: Wowbagger, Man-Hating Man of Pharyngula
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October 27, 2010 12:38 AM
jhsteele58, you didn't answer my questions back up at 258; here they are again:
Is a vegetarian who eats meat still a vegetarian? Is a pacifist who starts fights on the weekend still a pacifist? Is a heterosexual who only has one-night-stands with members of the same sex still a heterosexual? If you call a dog's tail a leg how many legs does it have?
Posted by: mikeyB
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October 27, 2010 12:39 AM
My more accurate restatement of the sermon:
I have come to believe, in my own journey of faith, that [my personal ignorance] lives in the questions. I believe that seeking understanding with my mind is the preparation I need to trust with my heart. I believe that [blind] faith is the frontier beyond the limits of knowledge. I have started looking for portents - in the sky, in the newspaper, in the textbook, in the science lab, in the hospital room, in the darkness as well as the light. Yes, I have started looking for those signs of [my ignorance of the true causes of things] who is trying to do a new thing. And I have discovered that it is in the process, and in the journey, and in the questions that new knowledge and new understanding is usually found. Specifically in this peculiar American controversy about [creationism wrapped in scientific sounding language], I have come to believe that evolution is [creationism]. And that the [creator] is the One whom I call [my personal ignorance about the true causes of things].
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 27, 2010 12:43 AM
Come on lads & lasses, let the non-Christian Christian have his meaningless meaning, faithless faith and non-religious religion; let him call it Christianity if he wants, even if it doesn't fit any definition of the word;
I do have to admit to being slightly curious if this is the "religion equivalent to knitting" that PZ dreamt of a while back.
If so, it can only be progress.
Posted by: Mandrellian
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October 27, 2010 1:04 AM
When it comes to religion, Ichthyic, I think the only way to truly make any progress is to leave it behind you.
Posted by: Jadehawk, cascadeuse féministe
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October 27, 2010 1:07 AM
may well be. but even secular Jews have no problem admitting they're atheists and don't get huffy when people rail against religious judaisms idiocies. our fake christian here will need to take that last step before he can be taken seriously againPosted by: Philip Legge
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October 27, 2010 1:18 AM
Jadehawk, I think you nailed it back at #279. I think our jhsteele is more or less a social atheist post-Christian like someone such as John Shelby Spong, who lacks the courage to make the break from identifying with Christianity. Thus the attempts to reconcile his or her form of Christianity with the Wikipedia definition are doomed to failure, since the non-woo, non-crazy pontification and non-divine Jesus is more in line with Dawkins’ “Atheists for Jesus” essay than with the “you are Christian, therefore you believe every word of the Nicene Creed” argument advanced upthread. About the best I can think to say about this is that as far as Asimov’s “Relativity of Wrong” goes, jhsteele is wrong, but by a small margin compared to the run-of-the-mill god-botherer in the pews who has to suffer through the tedious sermonising of the clergy letter project. Why can’t (or won’t) jhsteele break the habit and jump ship?
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 27, 2010 1:23 AM
our fake christian here will need to take that last step before he can be taken seriously again
frankly, unless I missed something, there were many posts by this person, but none of them actually said anything other than whinging about being stereotyped.
there was no attempt at at to engage on anything.
again, my conclusion is this isn't even a real person.
just someone trolling for fun.
Posted by: Caine, ghetto féministe
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October 27, 2010 1:32 AM
Ichthyic:
I agree. There was the same handwaving as we've seen with some other religious types lately and it was combined with that pathetic need to feel superior.
There was never an actual argument set forth.
We've had other 'liberal christians' here before, who have custom defined christianity for themselves; several of them carried on discussions with me via email. Unlike the current troll, they at least made an effort to understand a point of view different than their own and freely admitted that they clung to their 'belief' because it gave them comfort and motivated them to do good.
Posted by: Mandrellian
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October 27, 2010 1:34 AM
From Ichthyic at 303:
"there was no attempt at at to engage on anything."
Hey ... maybe he IS a real Christian!
Posted by: echidna
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October 27, 2010 1:59 AM
I'm getting cynical in my old age. I can't help feeling that there might have been a sock-puppet somewhere in this thread, trying to demonstrate how mean and nasty the gnu-atheists are to harmless Christians who don't have an anti-science bone in their bodies. But it didn't pan out, because the all mean and nasty gnu-atheists did was press for clarity and consistency. No invective, no nastiness aimed at the believer for some unspecified belief.
Posted by: Philip Legge
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October 27, 2010 2:02 AM
I thought “custom defined christianity” was pretty much a given fact of life, what with fifty thousand different splinters of the one basic religion? In those circumstances, finding a non-woo, non-divine, non-supernatural, non-religious form of Jesus admiration society doesn’t appear so outlandish – except for their strange, puzzling desire to want to be associated with all of the rest of the Christians…
Posted by: Caine, ghetto féministe
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October 27, 2010 2:03 AM
echidna:
Oh, Echidna, you know that's right up there on the evil scale with "I'm an atheist." We just don't understand all the handwaving in favour of some esoteric, custom defined form of christianity. We don't pay respect, man! We're just so fucking evil.
Posted by: Caine, ghetto féministe
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October 27, 2010 2:08 AM
Pope Maledict:
In a nutshell. We had one of those religious types show up in the latest Sunday Sacrilege thread and I pointed out that liberal christians are fine, in and among theselves, but the huge gorilla of a problem is that they will not openly denounce the various factions of their religion who are doing active harm and evil in the world.
They want that happy "yeah, I'm a normal, god believin' person" identity, but they won't fight the wrong in their own house.
Posted by: Ichthyic
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October 27, 2010 2:32 AM
We had one of those religious types show up in the latest Sunday Sacrilege thread and I pointed out that liberal christians are fine, in and among theselves, but the huge gorilla of a problem is that they will not openly denounce the various factions of their religion who are doing active harm and evil in the world.
They want that happy "yeah, I'm a normal, god believin' person" identity, but they won't fight the wrong in their own house.
again, from the link being posted so often of late...
http://www.alternet.org/story/148588/fascist_america:_is_this_election_the_next_turn/?page=4
Posted by: Philip Legge
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October 27, 2010 2:46 AM
Agreed. They seem to naturally think their liberal, moderate (or maybe, not-so-moderate, depending on the flakiness of their liberality) flavour of Christianity is the entirely reasonable variety; that most other mainstream varieties are not too far from sharing their own enlightened views; and that the crazy views sometimes described as a “theological freak show” are very much a loud, but numerically-disproportionate minority. Unfortunately the statistics on the general acceptance of evolution (especially in the US) show that is not the case. jhsteele seems to want to be congratulated because his views are so much more reasonable compared to the spectrum of evolution-denying possibilities. The question is, would j.h.s. make a real effort to stand and argue against the stupidities of his co-religionists? Somehow I doubt it.
Posted by: Caine, ghetto féministe
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October 27, 2010 2:58 AM
Ichthyic:
This is the bit you can almost never get through to so-called liberal christians. If they aren't fighting the hateful idiots who are part and parcel of their belief system, they are enablers who are most seriously part of the problem.
For those so-called liberal christians to call out their own, it requires the ability to think critically and it requires acknowledging that a great many people who take refuge in christianity do so in order to justify and shore up their personal hatreds and bigotry.
Posted by: Caine, ghetto féministe
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October 27, 2010 3:11 AM
Pope Maledict:
I doubt it too, as there was no definition or argument set forth. Just a "oh, accept my custom definition of christianity (even though I won't explain it) and give me a medal for accepting evolution!"
Posted by: John Morales
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October 27, 2010 3:22 AM
Caine,
They're in a hard place. They must pay lip-service to their religious tenets; in particular, that faith is the most important thing, that prayer is useful, that souls exist and that this world is but a qualification exam for the next.
How then can they (ahem) bash their more passionate fellows for excessive faith, dedication to prayer over action, or an overly mystic outlook? To be thus is, in their mythos, to be saintly and thus laudable.
Posted by: Caine, ghetto féministe
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October 27, 2010 3:34 AM
John:
Yes, I know. That's why I said it's one of the most difficult humps to get a so-called liberal christian over. In many cases, it's damn near impossible.
Used to be, I would say "it's impossible", but looking at how many people here at Pharyngula woke up from deep fundamental christianity, I hold out hope.
However, I've begun thinking that it's easier to get through to 'raised, drowned, drank the koolaid' fundamental christians than it is the so-called liberals. The so-called liberals are so convinced that their brand of christianity is a force for good, they refuse to listen, much like our little troll in this thread.
They want to (and do) scream and shout that they don't have any problems with science, but they do. They tend to deal more in outright lies than fundamentalists, who don't bother lying, they say straight out they don't believe in much of anything science says.
Those like our little troll simply want to be congratulated, they do not want to be questioned and will do most anything to avoid answering questions. They want to impress that they are on the same side as atheists (when it comes to science), but run and take refuge in the "mysteries" of christianity when pressed and go for the whole "oh god, you people are mean and you're stupid, for not knowing what my custom definition of christianity is too!"
Posted by: lykex
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October 27, 2010 5:10 AM
@jhsteele58
You mean the strawman of accepting 'christian' to mean someone who actually believes what Jesus supposedly said? Accepting the definition that has held true historically for nearly two thousand years? That strawman?
With no reservations or modifications? I'm asking since the topic of this post is ID and theistic evolution.
But, of course, you're not trying to "hold [yourself] up in any way as "more" ethical than others". No, not at all.You didn't provide any either, so I guess your post speaks for itself as well.
But, we're already done with that, aren't we? You're an atheist. So are most of the other people here. Subject closed.
Posted by: percyprune
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October 27, 2010 5:46 AM
@ jhsteele58. Calling us closed-minded is not really very helpful. Particularly when we perceive you have been very evasive about your philosophy.
While recognizing that Christianity is a--ha ha!--broad church, non-theistic Christians really are out on the fringes of the faith. (Or is that non-faith in your case?)
It's really not clear what kind of species of Christian you are. You are certainly not the common-or-garden godly such as those that we have to deal with daily. Nor is it clear whether mainstream Catholics, Baptists, etc. would even recognise you as one of their own.
So far as I can make out from the fragments you have given us, you have no faith; you just like the ceremony and the sense of community the church gives. Well, that's just dandy, but as sects go, yours appears to be a way off on the fringe. Unless, of course, you can present evidence to the contrary, in which case I'm keen to hear more.
So, you are charged with using words that do not mean what most of us accept them to mean. Can you not see that calling yourself a Christian when you don't actually resemble a Christian might cause a lot of cognitive dissonance for us?
Posted by: percyprune
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October 27, 2010 5:49 AM
@ jhsteele58. Calling us closed-minded is not really very helpful. Particularly when we perceive you have been very evasive about your philosophy.
While recognizing that Christianity is a--ha ha!--broad church, non-theistic Christians really are out on the fringes of the faith. (Or is that non-faith in your case?)
It's really not clear what kind of species of Christian you are. You are certainly not the common-or-garden godly such as those that we have to deal with daily. Nor is it clear whether mainstream Catholics, Baptists, etc. would even recognise you as one of their own.
So far as I can make out from the fragments you have given us, you have no faith; you just like the ceremony and the sense of community the church gives. Well, that's just dandy, but as sects go, yours appears to be a way off on the fringe. Unless, of course, you can present evidence to the contrary, in which case I'm keen to hear more.
So, you are charged with using words that do not mean what most of us accept them to mean. Can you not see that calling yourself a Christian when you don't actually resemble a Christian might cause a lot of cognitive dissonance for us?
Posted by: Kel, The Privileged View From Nowhere
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October 27, 2010 6:02 AM
Perhaps, though I'm inclined to think otherwise. Because being an atheist I've found no matter what I say about Christianity I'm wrong. I talk about the stuff I learnt in scripture at school, I'm wrong. I take on what those people say and I'm still wrong. I read articles, listen to theists talk, I'm wrong. It's funny that not a single theist I've ever met has ever thought that I knew even the most basic fact about what they believe.This made me consider two possible explanations for this lack of me grasping the concept of God. The most obvious explanation to me was that belief was subjective, that each individual had their own conception so it was like I was having a different conversation every time. This would certainly explain why from person to person I was told I was wrong even if they all professed to believe in the same God. But the second possibility was something I didn't really consider initially because I didn't know much about human psychology, and that is that the reason I'm always wrong is because I'm the out-group and the one to protect their beliefs from. This would be able to explain why when I followed their beliefs and their line of reasoning to logical ends that I was still told I was wrong.
So perhaps its a little column A, a little column B, combined with my personal ignorance among other things. But the only thing I've learnt in the many years I've been discussing the concept of God with theists is that no matter what I conceive of God to be I'm going to be wrong! Forever arguing the straw-man is the curse of being an atheist as far as I can see...
Posted by: percyprune
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October 27, 2010 7:03 AM
Apologies for the double-post.
Kel speaks the truth, by the way...
Posted by: Leslie in Canada
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October 27, 2010 7:05 AM
Just when I thought that I was beginning to understand this Christianity thing, along comes this article about how people in Quebec are excited about Brother Andre's canonization at the same time that they don't believe in Catholicism. What was that about holding two contradictory ideas at the same time?
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/quebec/brother-andr-a-simple-twist-of-faith/article1770042/
Posted by: Cosmic Snark
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October 27, 2010 8:15 AM
From Tis Himself, OM:
I bet the 501(c)(3) tax exempt status of the "church" jhsteele58 is a pastor at contains no ambiguities at all.
jhsteele, from what I've read here, you are, in a way, where I was at in my final days as a Christian. I too rejected the supernatural aspects of the religion and focused solely on telling people I was a Christian solely because I liked some of his purported teachings. However, I came to realize that Jesus was not the originator of the ethic of reciprocity, nor of the ethic of humility, nor of the ethic of anything for that matter. All these nice things existed previously, either in older religions or in secular society, long before Jesus supposedly walked the earth.
You say "I pastor a small congregation in the twin cities made up of 'families' of all kinds, religious and otherwise. Among my members are those who hold a variety of beliefs or non-beliefs about God. I talk about God as a metaphor for love, peace, wisdom, etc.". So you not only deny the divinity of the son, but the actual existence of the father. And yet you consider yourself a Christian because you attach the Jesus sticker to universal decent human attributes. You may as well be calling you and your "congregation" "Amish for supercomputers". It just doesn't work that way.
You are not a "liberal Christian" as you claim. You are not a Christian at all. You in fact are a feel-good "whatever gets you there" feel-good new-age bundle of cognitive dissonance. That is not "No True Scotsman", that's just simple fact, based on your own words here. Christianity is a monotheistic religion whose adherents believe that Jesus of Nazareth is the son of God and their savior. Period.
This is partly why you are getting so much flak from the people here - because you are wishy-washy and have un-courageously diluted your Christianity down into unrecognizable touchy-feely new age bullshit but still claim membership. Whether that is because you are a near-apostate afraid to leave the religion entirely, or because you leave the word "Christian" in it in order to keep your church's tax exempt status, or because you are truly a confused babbling wreck, I don't know, although I suspect it is a combination of things. In any case, I know one thing - you are a religious remora, sucking on the side of the shark of Christianity, getting what you want out of said shark without having to go through all the bother of actually having to be the shark. In other words, you are a parasite.
I detest fundamentalists, but after reading your spineless, wimpy dreck here I have to say I respect them a heckuva lot more than dissemblers like you... because at least they are unequivocal about who they are and what they stand for. You, sir, are a coward.
Posted by: Cosmic Snark
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October 27, 2010 8:33 AM
Kel
If you had presented yourself to these theists as an earnest seeker, or as presently a Christian, these same people would undoubtedly be thumping you on the back, telling you how right you are about most things. Theists simply will not cut a known atheist any slack. They will tell you you may know the words of the bible, but you have no ability to discern the true meaning of what you are reading. Bullshit, of course, spread in the name of bigotry and desperate perpetuation of self-delusion.
Christianity is Linus Van Pelt's sad, tattered little security blanket, fiercely clung to in the hope that it makes them among god's "in" crowd". Of course no blanket-carrier is going to tell you, as a known anti-blanketist, that you understand the blanket.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 27, 2010 8:40 AM
QFT.
Listen, I enjoy community, ritual, and symbolism too. And I get to indulge them whenever members of the Dead decide to tour. But if I went around calling myself a Deadhead, despite the fact that I actually hated the Dead and followed Widespread Panic around, wouldn't you think I was being a little dishonest?
Posted by: davej
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October 27, 2010 8:59 AM
I think it is true that a huge number of people in the US are so dependent on their religious "mental-emotional crutch" that we could see public funding cut off for any aspect of science that they are convinced conflicts irreconcilably with their religious beliefs. If you want to sell the idea that religion is in total conflict with science then you might say goodbye to stem-cell research or the teaching of evolution in publicly-funded schools and universities. These people are irrational.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 27, 2010 9:16 AM
I certainly can't speak for @JHSteele58, but there's a substantial minority that roughly fit his profile. Most notably the Unitarian Universalists, who will generally tolerate any range of belief from orthodoxy through atheism; the only belief they insist in is tolerance of all other beliefs. They're at least nominally christian, because they do like to quote the bible at their services and don't like to quote the quran, the suttas or the bhagavad gita. But they're not especially concerned about "doctrine," nor about whether the bible's stories are factual or not. They're concerned with things like "love" and "social justice" and "tolerance" and the like. They're a common choice for homosexual believers for those reasons.
There are other denominations and individual churches that work similarly. Once I attended a girlfriend's relative's wedding at such a church, where the guy performing the wedding kept prefacing everything with, "In our faith tradition we like to imagine god as a father-figure," or, "In our faith tradition we like to express our positive thoughts as 'prayers'," etc. It was a bit nauseating, really: either believe your fairy-tale and lay it on with some style, so we can enjoy the show, or go do something else; don't keep digging in your elbow to wink and nudge.
In any case, I'm sure christians argue whether such christians are christians. Then again, christianity being more than 1500 years old the copyrights have expired, so it's not clear who gets to say who is and isn't one.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 27, 2010 9:19 AM
In my experience, Unitarian Universalists rarely identify themselves as Christians.
Posted by: Topsailsman
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October 27, 2010 10:18 AM
Who has seen the documentary "Flight from Death: The Quest for Immortality" produced in 2003?
The film reports on research that shows that most people can't deal with their own mortality, and when confronted with it, they become irrational in their effort to prop up their belief system. This seems to help explain the irrational fear and over-reaction to science we are seeing.
Very disturbing to see how the human brain operates in this respect, if the documentary is sound.
Posted by: Michael Dowd
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October 27, 2010 10:34 AM
Evidence from neurobiology, evolutionary psychology, behavioral economics, and other disciplines reveals that human beings are much more likely to be led by their feelings than by rationality. Given this, I'm willing to bet that widespread embrace of science and reason in America will not occur until it becomes much more widely known that a naturalist view of reality provides better (more dependable, more consistent) access than myths to feeling-states humans have always needed to thrive, individually and collectively, such as trust, gratitude, inspiration, etc.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 27, 2010 10:41 AM
Their official stance is that they're a "liberal religion with Jewish-Christian roots." Their traditions, vocabulary, organization, etc., are all based on christianity, with "reverends" and "ministers" and "sunday school," etc. Plenty of UU's self-identify as christians. It's not mandatory, though, and plenty of others don't.
Lots of them joined the UUA because of bad experiences in other christian churches and prefer to dissociate themselves by avoiding the label "christian." Most UU's I've known personally are people who've left some other christian church, for example after coming out of the closet, but still self-identify as christian. They would make the "no true scotsman" argument that they are christian, and the churches they left are not. The churches they've left will generally make the same argument in reverse.
Posted by: Matt G
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October 27, 2010 10:47 AM
RE: Unitarian Universalists.
Quite right, truthspeaker. A large proportion of us (maybe 40-50%) identify as atheist, humanist, or agnostic. Only about 10% identify themselves as Christian. Yes, we do have a lot of new age-y types (with certain pseudoscientific leanings, sadly), but I think (hope) this is largely used as metaphor. Most of us strongly support science and reason, and strongly oppose religious fundamentalism and other ideologies. Our origins are Christian, and we live in a Christianity-dominated culture, so you will hear more readings from those sources. Darwin attended a Unitarian church, BTW, but had to identify himself as Anglican to be able to attend university (as I understand it).
Posted by: KG
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October 27, 2010 11:04 AM
jhsteele58 is a Christian because he says he's a Christian. So there! Ner-ner-ne-ner-nerrr!
Incidentally, I don't go for this "I follow Jesus because he was just so wonderful!" shit. If we actually look at Jesus as he appears in the gospels (leaving aside the whole issue of whether there was such as person and if there was, whether we can actually know anything about him), he was a bullying cult-leader who broke up families, threatened those who refused to accept his (on the face of it) absurd claims to divine status with eternal torture, and was very hurtful to his own mother. In short, the L. Ron Hubbard of first-century Palestine.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 27, 2010 11:07 AM
The UUCNC estimates it at 20%. The number isn't germane to the point that plenty of people self-identify as "christian" without necessarily believing anything one associates with christians. To get sucked into an argument whether they are "really" christian or not is to get trapped in the tar-pit of identifying the true scotsmen.
Posted by: Mattir-ritated
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October 27, 2010 11:08 AM
My dissertation advisor (the final one, not the one who asked inappropriate questions during poster presentations) attended a UU congregation. He described its non-Christian status with this analogy: sometimes a church gets so far out on a branch that it simply falls off the tree.
I read several of the UU sermons on the website and all of them were fine, as were the secular humanist Judaism ones. Some were a bit woo-ish in vocabulary, but none of them had the ID stuff from the ones cited in the OP.
Posted by: ereador
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October 27, 2010 11:11 AM
So, you 're admitting you don't know shit?Posted by: Niblick
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October 27, 2010 11:15 AM
Right--the UUs only came into it when I speculated about where jhsteele58 might be coming from. Not that he is one; only that they provide one example of a group where you'll find self-identified christians who don't treat the bible as literally true, or even necessarily believe in any gods. It's not at all hard to imagine whole congregations that like christmas and organ music and group sessions on sundays without fitting any of the standard christian tropes.
Posted by: truthspeaker
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October 27, 2010 11:16 AM
Yes - with Christian roots is not synonymous with "Christian".
Posted by: KG
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October 27, 2010 11:21 AM
Michael Dowd@319,
The work of Gregory Paul, and experience in post-WW2 western Europe, indicate that the socio-economic security provided by a reasonably generous welfare state are an effective solvent for religiosity. Whether Christianity will recover some or all of its lost ground if, as seems likely, the elites destroy those welfare states, remains to be seen.
Posted by: Niblick
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October 27, 2010 11:31 AM
Truthspeaker, it's not clear what you're after here: an estimated 20% of UUs, or about 58,000 people world-wide, self-identify as christian. That's more than enough to make my point, which had nothing to do with what percentage do so. You seem intent on hammering home a point--that a majority do not--that I've already conceded and that is irrelevant to the point I'm making in the first place. Why?
Posted by: Matt G
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October 27, 2010 11:37 AM
Mattir (#334)-
As my minister puts it: UUism is what you get when you take a left turn at every schism.
Posted by: Timberwoof
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October 27, 2010 11:52 AM
I never got a real answer to my questions about woo-free Christianity from the most likely proponent of such a thing.
So nope. Christianity cannot be divorced from its woo and still be Christianity. All you get is a confused jumble of rules that still don't make sense in the modern world. Protestantism was an attempt to get rid of some of the woo: they said that there is no transubstantiation and caused a schism in which members of both sides accuse the other of not being Christian.
I'm not going to get all up in arms if someone calls himself a woo-free Christian; that's a job for the True Christians. Someone else's personal beliefs aren't my concern; their actions and words are. Would such a belief make them a liar to be shunned or excommunicated? Maybe … but that's not practical.
Posted by: lykex
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October 27, 2010 11:56 AM
Actually, I'm ok with that. If he wants to call himself a christian, fine with me.
What I'm not ok with is him being annoyed (or "bemused", take your pick) when people misunderstand him.
He's using the term in direct contradiction with both its historic roots and it's common present-day use. Yet when we criticize christians, he, for some reason, still thinks that we're talking about him.
From his first post:
The reason for this is that most people don't mean "love, peace, wisdom" etc when they use that word. I don't understand his problem with using words
Posted by: lykex
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October 27, 2010 11:59 AM
... in accordance with their normal definitions.
If you mean 'love', then say 'love'. If you say 'god', don't be surprised that people think that that's what you mean.
Sorry about the accidental quick-post.
Posted by: Owlmirror
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October 27, 2010 1:56 PM
Alas, Christians themselves have been confused about what "God" means since the first century or so. See 1 John 4.
Posted by: diakosoune
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October 27, 2010 2:05 PM
I think the appropriate place to deal with your rage against religion is the psychiatrist's couch, not the pages of a scientist's blog.
Posted by: meprimate
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October 27, 2010 2:10 PM
When we antagonize about cherished beliefs they stop thinking (if they ever started) and emotional defenses kick in. Antagonizing believers is like throwing snowballs at igloos - the walls only get stronger. They dig in their heels & vilify their antagonists, i.e. us. Thus cranky factual hardball increases polarization. This is frightening primarily because they, not we, have the big numbers. Not to mention creeping fascism.
Hardball was probably the only way for Harris, Dawkins, Dennett, Stenger, Hitchens and *select* blogs to fire up the debates once again, so I’m good with their books. Still, it’s a fact of life that reason and evidence don’t blast through self-sealing walls. Factual hardball does more to polarize than win converts to reason. It always has. Good science must be kept out front, the facts discussed, science education strengthened and the church/state boundary maintained. Education and reason have brought us this far one generation at a time. With the debates under way again, we can work on figuring out how to pull back from playing perpetual hardball without falling back into craven accommodation.
Posted by: AJ Milne OM
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October 27, 2010 2:12 PM
... adding to this, really, it seems terribly inconsistent to me that these apparently ever-so-liberal Christians who're all so loosey-goosey about what words actually mean get their knickers in a twist over what the Gnu Atheists have to say on anything whatsoever, really...
I mean, it's just hypocritical. Insofar as this lot are, after all, the champions of the freedom to assign whatever meaning you happen to wish to assign to such words as 'god', 'deity', 'creator', 'is', etc...
So sure, they claim to mean 'love' or possibly 'creativity' or 'warm chocolate chip cookies'... Fiiiine...
... but by the same token, it seems to me we should be equally free to mean 'your crutch' and 'your excuse for saying stupid shit (or just one of 'em)' or 'your pathetic addiction' or 'your invisible friend' or 'your weirdly/conveniently mutable morpheme'...
... or even 'the metaphorical callous left on your metaphorical hand by endless (metaphorical) mental masturbation'...
... oh, and note how nice 'n metaphor-y that last one is! I mean, how could the liberal Christians possibly object?
(/Total double standard, I tells ya.)
Posted by: Mattir-ritated
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October 27, 2010 2:14 PM
Haven't been paying attention to the Professor and his blog, now have we?
Get a freaking clue already. The scientist has plenty of rage, as do many of his loyal readers. While PZ did not have to suffer through years of religiously-derived self-hatred or suicidality, many of us loyal readers did, dealt with it via therapy or some other route, and arrived here to entertain ourselves with trolls such as yourself. In fact, I would not be surprised if psychiatrists treating cult victims were to prescribe participation in Pharyngula as an adjunct to their therapy.
What is your point, exactly?
Posted by: Janine, The Little Top Of Venom, OM
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October 27, 2010 2:55 PM
You are mistaken there. I do not have a rage against religion nor am I angry at god. I dislike other people insisting that not only does their religious beliefs but that I should life my life according to their baseless beliefs.
I like how you are implying that all of the regulars here needs to see a psychiatrist instead of spending time on this blog. So, what is the disorder you think we are suffering from?
Posted by: Owlmirror
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October 27, 2010 2:58 PM
A while back, heddle was arguing for a narrow definition of "Christian" ("A Christian is someone who believes that eternal life comes through faith in Jesus Christ"), and I (and Wowbagger, and others) were arguing for a wider one.
(Lots of back-and-forth before the definitional argument gets going, but say around comment #201 or so)
Anyway, something that I found to support my argument were some Pew studies based on recent polls:
Many Americans Not Dogmatic About Religion
Christians: No One Path to Salvation
And Wowbagger offered some definitions from Dictionary.com:
To point out that the word has more than one definition, and it does appear to be used in the wider sense by many people.
FWIW
Posted by: Tulse
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October 27, 2010 3:24 PM
Owlmirror, while there may be various definitions for the letter-string "Christian", it is undeniable that, in common parlance, it is understood to mean "believer in the divinity of Jesus". More to the point, religion is almost always construed to involve some sort of belief in divinity or the supernatural. If our good pastor doesn't believe in either the divinity of Jesus, or the supernatural in general, he/she is clearly using the term "Christian" in a non-standard way, one not in keeping with general understanding.
Posted by: Franklin Percival
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October 27, 2010 3:29 PM
meprimate #246
Cod, I've read some pusillanimous shit on this site, you whingeing, small-minded accomodationist. Those who pretend to suffer from some sort of congenital brain damage deserve no quarter. If you will look at the 'Good old American thugs' thread on this site you will see where your approach will get us, argued by those far better qualified than I.
If xtian, hindu, muslim or any other wooists are allowed to believe that their irrationality should:-
a. be allowed into the public sphere, rather than being entirely banished from it;
b. or are given let that their arguments in any way trump evidence,
we will finish up seeing unnecessary violence.
Physical addiction is one thing, which may well take a generation or so to resolve once we adopt a sensible policy toward drug treatment; voluntary dedication of one's life to non-hallucinatory fantasy is quite another. The only things that these two social problems have in common is that they both involve control and make enormous sums of money for those at the top of the tree which sums,for all the good they do to society as a whole, might just as well be gathered as paper and burned.
Think about it.
Posted by: Franklin Percival
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October 27, 2010 3:43 PM
My 352 should have referred to meprimate #346 not #246. My apologies for poor proofing.
Posted by: Katherine Lorraine, Chaton de la Mort
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October 27, 2010 3:48 PM
JHSteele (although he appears to have cowgulled himself off this blog post) sounds a heck of a lot like I used to before shedding the Christian label and embracing atheism.
JH... do it! You'll feel a lot better about yourself. Stop lying!
Posted by: David Marjanović
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October 27, 2010 3:58 PM
Sometimes I seem to forget that the basics of linguistics aren't common knowledge.
Voiced palatal approximant; IPA symbol: [j]
Voiced labiovelar approximant; IPA symbol: [w]
The letter J and its history.
Hallelujah.
Thread won.
See comment 274. I find the difference pretty easy to hear.
Thirded.
Dude (...?), you're in a league up there with Cuttlefish.
Why don't you comment here more often?
You don't mean gratitude, you mean happiness. I can't tell what you mean by "inspiration", however.
Posted by: John Phillips, FCD
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October 29, 2010 8:39 PM
Josh, OSG said
That is so full of win that I am unashamedly stealing it for future use.