Month: February 2012

Matt’s 2008 article on Philosophos – just capturing the link so I don’t lose it.

It’s customary to reckon Godfather III as the weakest of the trilogy; it happens to be my favourite, so I notice the fact. I also noticed this Simpson’s gag that reinforces the meme. Thanks to Jorn for the link.

“Moe Baby Blues,” Season 14 – Moe becomes Maggie’s caretaker, rescuing her from a standoff between Fat Tony’s crew and rival gangsters, moving them to tears with a paean to Maggie’s goodness.

“I ain’t cried like this since I paid to see Godfather III,”
Tony sobs.

Or does it ?

Tickled by this “high energy” physics story.

Apparently the potential of a particle hurtling round CERN’s LHC at its full power of several TeV’s (Tera 1,000,000,000,000. electron volts)

… is equivalent to the energy of …

… one whole mosquito in flight.

[Post Note : See ex-page-footer for the significance of the “fly on a windshield”.]

Ooh another fight. This one runs and runs – like any catchy black vs white meme. Of course militant secularism is a threat to religious faith – that’s its point by definition.

Sadly popular secularism has become a one-trick militant pony – whose sole purpose is to attack religion and/or faith in public. The professor for the public understanding of science would do well to focus on his job rather than shooting fish in a barrel – it sets such a poor example of what makes for quality science. It wouldn’t be an issue if science weren’t such a public shambles itself in these days of mass media, public funding and crass sound bites.

Roll on Alain deBotton. Or Zizek; taking sides in a battle to the death is never the best course.

[Post Note : From Zizek’s “Empty Wheelbarrow” –

“… clearly perceived by GK Chesterton who – in the very last pages of his Orthodoxy, the ultimate Catholic propaganda piece – exposed the deadlock of the pseudo-revolutionary critics of religion: they start by denouncing religion as the force of oppression that threatens human freedom; but in fighting religion, they are compelled to forsake freedom itself, thus sacrificing precisely what they wanted to defend: the atheist radical universe, deprived of religious reference, is the grey universe of egalitarian terror. Today the same holds for advocates of religion themselves: how many fanatical defenders of religion started by ferociously attacking secular culture and ended up forsaking religion itself, losing any meaningful religious experience?”

And the “militant” BHA gets one thing right at last;
Andrew Copson quoted in response to Baroness Warsi;

“In an increasingly non-religious and, at the same time, diverse society, we need policies that will emphasise what we have in common as citizens rather than what divides us.” 

Let’s focus on the humanity, rather than picking fights. I’m a fully paid up atheist member of the BHA, I support what it’s for – but not for being what it is against.]

Richard Price in TechCrunch (via David Gurteen).

The democratization of the web is good for the freedom, but not for the quality, of information. Of course if peer-review is too narrowly subject-matter focussed, the opposite “censoring” effect can distort and slow-down or even destroy the knowledge-evolution processes, but some level of editorial quality control (see Bruce Charlton) is needed to counter memetic spread of fashionable but dumb “reactionary” science.

Interesting.

Strangers, over
Friends, over
Brands.

I’m listening to the infamous William Lane Craig vs Christopher Hitchens “Does God Exist” debate, and I was reminded of Carl Sagan’s clear and simple (opening) statements of how pointless the cosmological / cosmogenetic first-cause “something from nothing” argument is as a basis for a “creator”. Craig leads off on this – before going off on a misunderstood summary of “fine-tuning” arguments against coincidence and improbability.

The theist is concerned primarily with “objectivity” and “evidence” of “great facts” – Jeez – yet says we mustn’t focus on “external arguments” for our individual beliefs and inner voices – Jeez. And shameless strawmen like “atheists say there is nothing wrong with rape” etc. Why am I listening to this ? (Just interested in why so many evangelical theists see Hitchens as having been slaughtered in this debate … 2 hours of it … but all the standard rehearsed arguments and tricks from the theist side so far.)

And lo and behold, Hitch leads off on the irony of the theist using “scientistic” arguments, physics and cosmology that could never have been available to the original prophets. Retrospective evidentialism – infinitely updatable hindsight – not worth arguing against. If that’s your argument, you win the undisprovable pointless point. And eventually we get to first cause  … see above.

Interesting that the riposte is basically agnosticism vs atheism. The “meta-why” argument. Why would you want “proof” – what would “proof” look like anyway ? It’s why I say non-theist. (Oooh, Craig also suggests non-theism.) Too important to be agnostic (evasive), too sceptical to expect proof – just balance of rational argument needed to “explain”. The wrong argument(s) – a non-debate.

The ubiquitous golden rule. Human solidarity.