|
Post by merkavah12 on Dec 10, 2009 3:44:34 GMT
I wonder what ever became of that Dr. Thompson fellow (the one who Rook convinced that Tim and Frank W. were the same guy)?
|
|
|
Post by humphreyclarke on Dec 11, 2009 7:46:14 GMT
Looks like P Z Myers is embracing 'Jesus Mythicism' here, at first he seems to be taking on the resurrection, but then gets a bit carried away. scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/12/the_dead_are_dead.php#commentsThe resurrection of Jesus is not a reasonable historical event. There are no primary, contemporary accounts of his existence. The books of the Bible that describe him were written decades after the purported event, and most of the biblical accounts are second-, third-, or distant-hand hearsay written by people with a vested interest in promoting a religion. The accounts we do have are inconsistent or contradictory, or inconsistent and contradictory. By the standards of historical verification, Jesus and his miraculous resurrection are myths. Nothing more. Maybe something less.
|
|
|
Post by irukandji on Dec 11, 2009 7:59:14 GMT
Humphrey,
I know nothing of PZ Myers except for the blog you linked to but judging by it he knows absolutely squat about religious history (of any kind, let alone Christianity) yet feels qualified to comment on it. Is he by any chance a crony of Dawkins? The comments section alone compels me to believe they appeal to the same level of mediocrity.
|
|
|
Post by humphreyclarke on Dec 11, 2009 10:49:40 GMT
Humphrey, I know nothing of PZ Myers except for the blog you linked to but judging by it he knows absolutely squat about religious history (of any kind, let alone Christianity) yet feels qualified to comment on it. Is he by any chance a crony of Dawkins? The comments section alone compels me to believe they appeal to the same level of mediocrity. Yeah, P Z is something of a crony of Dawkins. His blog became big combating creationists and it's readership is now massive. The scientific stuff is quite good (the posts tagged with 'blogging peer reviewed research) but the posts people really want to read are the nu atheist rants which he serves up. Hence he tackles a range of topics with varying degrees of competence. I'l say this, he does know a lot about evo-devo and the mating habits of squids. I don't think he knows anything about religion beyond the biblical literalism of people like Ray Comfort.
|
|
|
Post by noons on Dec 11, 2009 13:53:57 GMT
Well, he still attacks all sorts of theists, often theists who believe in evolution. Not because he thinks Genesis should be taken literally (I haven't heard him specifically comment on this) but because to him it doesn't matter what you think about science - as long as you're a theist, you're still a nutcase.
I'd say Dawkins is a moderate compared to him. His rants are fun to read at first, but get old very fast because he basically writes the same rant over and over again.
|
|
|
Post by eastshore4 on Dec 21, 2009 3:43:11 GMT
Myers is just creepy... his little "stunt" a couple months ago was just weird considering it was done by a (supposedly) normal middle-age man. I don't think I was offended as much as I just had to laugh at the thought of a creepy old man huddled over his desk giggling to himself like a child as he stabs a communion wafer.
I don't really keep tabs on these various blogger types(except for quodlibeta of course!), but I am curious... how do these science vs. religion types like Myers or Coyne argue their case? Are there actual rebutals to people like Polkinghorne who have no problems believing in science and religion or do they just shoot off rapidfire rhetoric like"oh he's just lying to himself etc etc" If that's all it is, I'd be rather dissapointed but probably not surprised... the more I come to understand that atheism isn't so much a "truth" as just another outlook on life the less I'm finding myself swayed to it's charms.
|
|
|
Post by noons on Dec 21, 2009 4:47:55 GMT
It's mostly just rapidfire rhetoric, talking about how science and faith are two incompatible outlooks, i.e. science as a process precludes faith. Its frustrating, because they're primarily attacking scientific institutions for saying that evolution and mainstream denominations are compatible - but they avoid actually making an argument. For example, they won't go out on a limb and argue for a literal interpretation of Genesis, because they know that is outside of their knowledge.
According to their statements, they want scientific institutions to be "neutral" on whether religious belief and evolution are compatible. The way I see it, the scientific institutions like the NCSE are simply stating the official positions of the Catholic and mainline protestant denominations on the matter, and that scientists have no reason to argue otherwise.
|
|
|
Post by humphreyclarke on Dec 21, 2009 15:23:33 GMT
Here is today's entertainment: www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/audio/2009/dec/17/simon-le-bon-atheists-guideThe lead singer of Duran Duran on how he lost his faith, then the comments.... Some chap called 'Fun with whips' says: as with the rest of the book, this is an excellent chapter from Simon.
There is no god, there is no proof of god and even if there was a god, s/he is such a crap designer, the human body being a mish mash of "it'll do" that a GCSE biology student could do a better job.
Scientists are overwhelmingly atheist and it is inspite of threats of excommunication and burnings from the church, that has driven our scientific knowledge forwards. Lets not forget the Catholic church is personally responsible for holding back humanity for 800 years!And then later: The Dark Ages - the times when the Church had the most power, when the greatest thinkers of the time had to spend their hours debating how many angels you can get on a pin head or what the wingspan of an angel is lasted 800 years. When any scientific thought was met with a pitchfork and a flaming torch. the most quoted example is that if it wasnt for the Church's continuous attacks on science, the internet would have been invented in 1600.
Ignorance was celebrated by religious leaders, indoctrinating children etc.
And lets not forget that if God was omnipotent and omniscient (mutuall exclusive anyway) would he have chosen child abusers and murderers to represent him here on earth
All that Muslim "science" did was save the earlier work of the Greeks that was being destroyed by the Catholic church at the time, rewrite and translate it and eventually import it back into Europe. Most scientists who said they were christian, were most likely Deists at most if not athiests but at the time said they were christian for fear of being shunned by family and/or burnt by the church.
|
|