Author: VD

Peter King notes a sporting gesture by an NFL player:

Super Bowl hero David Tyree has a faith-based autobiography, More Than Just a Catch (Strang Book Group), coming out this September. One of the two forewords is by Rodney Harrison, the New England safety who will be inextricably linked forever with Tyree. (Eli Manning wrote the other.) Harrison, of course, played great defense on Tyree and was as close as you can be to separating a receiver from the ball when Tyree made the greatest catch — “the greatest play,” NFL Films poohbah Steve Sabol says — in Super Bowl history.

There are few things I appreciate more than athletic competitors who do their absolute best to beat the hell out of their opponent, and then leave any sense of enmity or opposition on the field. I was fortunate to have encountered a series of great rivals during my sprinting days – Bill of Mahtomedi, Simmy of Brooklyn Park, Johnny and Phil of Minneapolis North – that I’ve never forgotten. Sometimes I beat them, sometimes they beat me, but I know that if I ever ran into any of them again, we’d greet each other with a smile, a handshake, and that half-embrace that you reserve for an opponent who merits your respect.

It’s not necessary to hate those against whom you compete. In six years spent in the dojo, I’ve bloodied my friends’ faces and I’ve been knocked down and knocked out by them in return. But, there is a sporting code that must be maintained, and those who don’t abide by that code deserve all the contempt that will be directed at them by those who do. I don’t think it’s an accident that the uglier sort of bloggers on the Internet tend to people who never played competitive sports. The concept of friendly, or even civil, conflict simply seems to be outside their frame of reference.

The SF maestro speaks on science and fiction:

“I think that if there’s one key insight science can bring to fiction,” he says, “it’s that fiction – the study of the human condition – needs to broaden its definition of the human condition. Because the human condition isn’t immutable and doomed to remain uniform forever. If it was, we’d still be living in caves rather than worrying about global climate change. To the extent that writers of mainstream literary fiction focus on the interior landscape exclusively, they’re wilfully ignoring processes and events that have a major impact on our lives. And I think that’s an unforgivably short-sighted position to take.”

I don’t think he’s wrong… although I think the science fiction world has an awful lot that it needs to learn from mainstream fiction, especially the mainstream fiction of the past. As I wrote a few years ago in my essay that appeared in the Revisiting Narnia anthology, the foolish suppression and mischaracterization of religion in so much fantasy and science fiction has significantly crippled the genre by limiting it to cartoonish caricatures of the human condition. Mary Eberstadt points out that it appears to be a problem that has a deleterious effect on all the arts these days.

As for Stross’s work, while I loved Accelerando and enjoyed Halting State, I like his Bob Howard novels best of all. If you have any appreciation for things squamous or rugose and haven’t read The Atrocity Archives or The Jennifer Morgue, you’re really missing out.

1. I know the Azzurri always start slow in the big tournaments. But that was a bad, bad loss to the Oranje. The defense looked nearly as bad as Poland’s, which is an ominous sign for a team that has historically depended upon a rock-solid defense. But Cannavaro is out with injury, Maldini is retired from international play and the midfield is aging. They’ll still make it to the next round, but they sure don’t look like the World Cup winners of two years ago.

2. I’ve always liked Rob Van Persie and while I don’t like Van Nistleroy, he’s a very dangerous striker. I was surprised that the Dutch midfield controlled the ball so effectively, and having an in-form Van der Sar in the net is always an advantage. The Dutch defense looked a bit shaky to me, but Toni and Del Piero didn’t ever look like they were going to take much advantage of that. Neither will the French or Romanian attackers, but Germany, Spain, and Portugal may.

3. One of the great pleasures of this tournament is listening to the English announcers moan and complain about how awful every game that doesn’t feature the English team is. Which, of course, is all of them. That being said, Alan Hanson was entirely correct to criticize the boring and static French attack; in tournaments like these, if you don’t go after the lesser teams and take the points, you’re likely to find yourself out of the quarterfinals. France can’t play for ties now, they probably require at least one win against Italy and Holland and might need two.

4. I kind of miss Gheorghe Hagi. It’s just not the same seeing Romania in action and not hearing the announcers talk about “the Maradona of the Carpathians”. That’s my nominee for Most Unwieldy Nickname in sports.

5. Nicolas Anelka had two decent season for Arsenal, for which we are grateful. Since then, Le Sulk been reliably ineffective. In international play, two of his five goals in games that count are against the Faroe freaking Islands. I have no idea why he’s on the French squad, let alone the field. Hell, I could score against the Faroe Islands. Seriously.

6. Does anyone else think it would have been funny if a bunch of Italians had stormed the Romanian bench at halftime and set fire to it? Okay, maybe it’s just me.

PZ explains why he hasn’t ever encountered any strong arguments for the existence of gods… it’s hard to listen when your head is buried in the sand:

The fact that the Northern Alliance radio show actually thinks Vox Day is a credible voice for conservative thought tells me right away that there is something wrong with them, and no, I’m not going to trust them at all.

I’ve also read Day’s horrible little book, The Irrational Atheist. Well, to be honest, I read a few chapters of dreck, then flipped through the rest rather quickly. It’s actually the “Vox Day Hates Sam Harris” book, with occasional potshots at other New Atheists, and it’s really not very good. You would think that if he had a strong rational argument with evidence for any gods, then he would have put it in there — nothing would more seriously deflate one of us scientific atheists who claim there is no evidence for god than, say, presenting credible evidence for god. That was what I actually skimmed through the book for, but it wasn’t there.

I don’t know, I wouldn’t have cared if it was Minnesota Atheist Talk. The venue makes no difference to me. Also, it’s worth noting that I’m a libertarian, not a conservative, and the Powerline guys aren’t a whole lot fonder of me than PZ is. (They’re pals with Malkin and they support the Iraqi occupation and I doubt they’re down with legalizing drugs.) But I guess it’s hard to blame him for not wishing to imperil his sobriety and his sanity in an encounter with the dark and mysterious brotherhood known collectively as the Fraters Libertas.

As for TIA, I didn’t take the occasional potshot at Dawkins, Hitchens and Onfray, but devoted an entire chapter to each of them. PZ also skips over the small fact that TIA not only wiped out Dawkins’s self-described central argument of TGD, but also inspired Sam Harris to admit that he didn’t have a case against religious faith, but rather tribalism. And I suspect Dawkins isn’t going to be citing that “striking” Red State argument again anytime soon. I don’t know how I could have made it any more clear that TIA was a book about atheism and atheist arguments, not a theological book about God. I may well write that book someday, in fact, this little episode makes it much more likely that I’ll write it sooner rather than later, but TIA isn’t it and it was never intended to be.

Rachel Lucas figures out why many conservatives and Republicans won’t be voting for John McCain:

The moment of my epiphany was when one parent said something that was almost verbatim what I’ve said about voting for McCain and the fact that you are getting a new president whether you like it or not so you may as well do what you can to get the less shitty one. It was something like, “Well, Billy IS going to smoke pot. There’s nothing I can do about that, he’s GONNA smoke it no matter what I say. So I may as well at least try to keep him as safe as I can, and if that means I have to buy it for him, I will.”

Quickly I ran it through my brain: what if I had kids and was in this situation? Would I get drugs for them just because that was better than them getting drugs from strangers and scumbags? Especially if I knew for a fact that my kids were just dumb enough to get busted and would almost certainly end up in jail if I didn’t choose the lesser evil by getting the drugs for them?

Shit no, I wouldn’t! Because it would violate my principles.

Bingo! Supporting the lesser of two evils is STILL SUPPORTING EVIL! I understand why those who will vote for McCain as a vote against Obama are doing so; what they don’t understand is that this guarantees that the Republican party will continue to move further to the Left if they are successful.

1. Austria was terrible. Rough, foul-prone play, no hint of an attack, no decent passing in the midfield. Giving up a penalty shot in the first five minutes was just horrible and there was no question that it was a penalty either.

2. Croatia was competent but they really didn’t show much after being gifted what turned out to be the winning goal right at the start. They’ve got the talent to beat Poland, but they’ll have to be a bit less lacksadaisical. On the other hand, it seemed like the Austrians were dragging them down to their level, so who knows what they’re actually capable of.

2. There was an awful lot of room being created for Polack jokes in the first 25 minutes of the Poland-Germany game. Speaking as a tactically-oriented coach, it’s really not a good idea to play a high offsides trap with a slow and undisciplined back four. They got badly burned three times and if the German strikers had any idea how to pass to one another, they’d have been down 4-0. I have to seriously question any coach who watches the other side running right through his trap but refuses to change anything until he actually gives up a goal.

3. The Germans won 2-0 and they deserved the victory, but their strikers are not impressive. They’re fast and they’ve got solid midfield support, but they attack rather like midfielders who get squirrelly in front of goal. Germany appears to be one of those teams who need three or four good chances to put one in the net, which is fine against the lesser teams but makes life difficult when playing a powerhouse like Italy or a defensive turtle like Greece. On the other hand, they’re a pretty young team, so they may outlast teams at the tail end of close games.

4. Still haven’t seen anyone I expect to beat Italy.

Dear Dr. Myers,

You recently complained that you’ve never found any intelligent arguments for gods and said the reason you only addressed the weak arguments was because you were unaware of the strong ones. Happily, not only did I hear this intellectual cri de coeur, but so did the good hosts of the Northern Alliance Radio Show in your home state of Minnesota.

So, no doubt you will be delighted to hear that they have invited the two of us to debate the existence of gods on their show this coming Saturday. It is my contention that there is not only substantial evidence for the existence of gods, but that the logic for the existence of gods is superior to the logic for the nonexistence of them as presented by yourself, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Daniel Dennett, to name a few.

I have accepted the invitation to the show and I hope you will soon do likewise. You can let them know if you intend to show up and defend your side or not by emailing The Elder at rightwinger23 at hotmail.com.

With regards,
Vox

Since Dr. Myers does not always make a habit of reading this blog, I posted NARN’s invitation on his blog as well, in addition to emailing him.

Update – PZ reveals himself to be nothing but another atheist coward:

Wait — I complain about the absence of intelligent arguments for God, and Vox Day pops up his little pin head and squeaks about miracles and bleeding statues and liquefying holy relics? Vox, you don’t qualify. You’re a pathetic little twerp with delusions of grandeur.

Typical atheist. He beats his chest and then runs away scared as soon as anyone calls him out. He’s obviously afraid that he’ll get exposed and then won’t be able to play the big bad atheist hero of science anymore. You have to love atheist illogic… just when did I say anything about miracles, statues or relics anyhow? Run away, little professor, run away….

Why isn’t the CPS kidnapping the children of vegetarians around the country? I doubt they ever meant any harm, and yet it appears they’re demonstrably more harmful to children than the infamous Texas polygamists:

A 12-YEAR-OLD girl in Scotland brought up by her parents on a strict vegan diet has been admitted to hospital with a degenerative bone condition said to have left her with the spine of an 80-year-old woman. Doctors are under pressure to report the couple to police and social workers amid concerns that her health and welfare may have been neglected in pursuit of their dietary beliefs. The girl, who has been fed on a strict meat and dairy-free diet from birth, is said to have a severe form of rickets and to have suffered a number of fractured bones.

Give your children bacon cheeseburgers tonight in good conscience. Hold the lettuce.

Ninja Rabbit attempts to rebut:

You seem to have confused what I said about the context of a specific claim. Let’s go back to my example, where I was referring to an incident in which the testomonial evidence of an “extraordinary claim” would need to be corroborated by some evidence that wouldn’t otherwise need to be provided by an ordinary claim. What you said about not knowing whether the plant is actually plastic, or not knowing whether the plants are really his, is true. But I think this was a rather uncharitable interpretation of my example. Let me now explicitly add that you do in fact know that the plants belong to him and that you’ve seen him water them, and you may have felt them before and so you are sure that they aren’t plastic. It’s true that I’m “assuming information,” but this is merely neccesary to prove my point by first trying to establish that the details of such a plant are known by you. The one thing that you do not know is if he specifically watered his plants yesterday. The claim that we are analyzing is the neighbor’s testimony of having watered his plants yesterday. It would probably be reasonable to believe this claim, given what we know. It’s not an extraordinary claim. We could demand some more evidence that he really did water them yesterday if we had some reason to be extremely skeptical but as far as the situation goes, we do not. The evidence required to convince someone an ordinary claim happened is not exhaustive or meticulous, for this would be impractical for accepting everyday claims needed to live efficiently.

Now, of course if we had also seen his neighbor feed his 50 foot three headed alien pet everyday, and he claimed to have fed his pet yesterday, it would similiarly be reasonable to believe him as you rightfully observe! But we’ve never seen such a pet. Indeed, the very existence of 50 foot three headed aliens is highly suspect at best. So now we have a good reason to be skeptical; this is an extraordinary claim. So this means that we can’t accept the testimony right off the bat like we can with the previous one. We’re going to need some further evidence that corroborates this claim.

Now let’s say that we could corroborate a claim about an alien or a ghost and explain its characteristics as we can with other animals. In what sense would they be supernatural as opposed to natural? How can supernatural phenomena interact with natural onesas you say about the poltergeist? Does that mean supernatural things are made of matter? Again, what does “supernatural” mean exactly?

Even if you define an extraordinary claim as something the reciever has no “tangential knowledge” of, it wouldn’t change the fact that we need to investigate that more thoroughly than a claim in which we do have “tangential knowledge.” When you talk about what consitutes ordinary and extraordinary evidence, you have to take into account the type of claim. For a testimonial claim, hearing something we have reason to disbelieve, it’s reasonable to evaluate the claim further before believing it. Scientific claims are more meticulous and exhaustive, so an ordinary scientific investigation would be appropriate for evaluating a supernatural claim, but so far most supernatural claims that I know of have fallen short of being established by such an investigation. And they would still raise all the problems I mentioned in the previous paragraph.

So if a person claims to be able to dribble a basketball, that would be consistent with our body of knowledge about physics so we can believe this ordinary claim without replicating it. But of course, we could ask him to demonstrate if we wanted. If a person claimed to do be able to levitate a basketball, that would not be consistent with what we know about physics, so we’d have to ask him to show us that before we can believe him, since that’s pretty extraordinary as far as we know, and we need some verification that would be more exhaustive than the kind we would use to believe the first guy’s claim about dribbling the basketball. So when people claim to believe in the basketball levitation without it being demonstrated, it can be considered unreasonable.

I’m not quite sure how I can spell this out much more clearly. The analogy is Ninja Rabbit’s, not mine, and the problem he’s posing in it is tautological. The only difference in the ease with which we are accepting the information for which we have no evidence is the fact that he posits different amounts of information provided in the two examples compared. But this is irrelevant, and as he admits, if he were to provide the same amount of information in both cases, there’s no more reason to believe the person’s claims about his actions in the first case despite the extraordinary nature of the second one.

A much better analogy would be to compare the claim of alien pet feeding with running into a total stranger at Home Depot, who claimed to be your neighbor and also claimed to have watered his plants – which you have never seen – the day before. This modified analogy properly separates the ordinary from the extraordinary without providing additional information to weight the comparison. And while we might find it easier to believe the stranger on the basis of his testimonial evidence, for example, asking him the color of his house or the make of the car parked in his driveway, as I pointed out before, we’re only talking about an emotional ease of belief rather than factual evidence. In both cases, it comes down to nothing more than our faith in the testifier’s credibility.

I am far more likely to believe a completely extraordinary claim from an individual I know to be a truthful and sane than a very ordinary claim from a proven liar who I know to be susceptible to self-delusions. But in either case, and contra the late Mr. Sagan, the evidence required to prove a claim is identical. Whether an individual claims to be able to dribble a basketball or levitate a basketball, he can’t prove it without demonstrating it to us, regardless of how reasonable we might feel his claim to be. The ironic thing is that Ninja Rabbit’s attempted rebuttal makes it clear that for some people, the “extraordinary claims” argument is less an insistence on requiring extraordinary evidence to accept supernatural claims as it is for an argument for accepting certain natural claims without any evidence beyond the testimonial. As for the natural vs supernatural aspect, Ninja Rabbit doesn’t seem to be aware that unless he wishes to seriously argue that scientific evidence is extraordinary, he has just conceded the argument in my favor. He also seems to have forgotten that “extraordinary claims” is not concerned with what testimonial evidence is reasonable to accept in everyday life, since the entire context of the argument, as made by Carl Sagan and oft cited by atheists, is the debate surrounding science and the existence of the supernatural.

While we’re on the subject of the supernatural, I should note that one agnostic wouldn’t mind a few appeals being thrown in that direction on behalf of her boyfriend’s father, who was badly hurt in a motorcycle accident yesterday.