Author: VD

One of the few coherent commenters at Bad Astronomy shows genuine insight:

“American Religious Right == another Taliban” is the most apt and precise way of describing the situation. They sound sooooooooooooo similar. How I wish some of the fence-sitters listened to that line of reason.

No, it’s an utterly retarded way to put it, and does much harm to the cause of reason and skepticism. Not to mention it demonstrates a near complete ignorance of what the Taliban was really about. Will you people ever [bleeping] learn that the name calling and hyperbolic comparisons do nothing more than cause the other side (and many of the fence sitters) to circle the wagons? Will you EVER learn this? It happens every time.

You claim to be scientific, but you keep making the same error over and over.

He sounds exactly like an Alliance battleground leader cursing at the idiots who keep trying to burn Tower Point before Iceblood turns. This is a very good example of an influence that was a factor in causing my thinking to adjust significantly over the years. When I was young, I was a dinosaur-enthusiast, I was totally convinced that science was the only means of establishing truth, I was certain that scientists were objective seekers after the truth, and I was ruthlessly committed to the use of reason uber alles. While I was skeptical about evolution, this was more the result of my fifth-grade teachers inability to provide reasonable answers to some of the obvious questions that arose from our textbook than any religious influences. My Dad had a few Young Earth Creationist books that I recall but I didn’t subscribe to it as a kid and I don’t subscribe to it now. To this day, I remain utterly agnostic on the precise mechanisms and timing utilized by the Creator God in constructing this particular creation.

College changed everything for me, although not in the usual manner. The great benefit of studying economics was the dawning realization that not even the world’s greatest experts knew what the hell they were talking about. The beauty and the challenge of economics is that it is both incredibly complex and astoundingly fast-moving. Economists don’t have the luxury of building a crude theoretical model, then sitting around admiring it for fifty years while arrogantly demanding to know if you’ve got anything better because events will usually destroy their latest and greatest within weeks no matter how painstakingly it has been designed, tested and backtested. It’s a fascinating field, and one either has to be a committed ideologue (Karl Marx, Paul Krugman, Larry Kudlow) or have a puckish sense of humor (Josef Schumpeter, John Maynard Keynes, Milton Friedman, the Freakonomics guy), to make any useful sense of it. Indeed, had I stuck with economics, I would have pursued a career in econometrics, as in economics and game design alike, the primary factor is probability.

I am not anti-science, I am pro-science reform. But the haughty language and baseless arrogance of the would-be secular priesthood has caused me to conclude that not only is there a massive difference between scientody and scientistry, but that science would be very well served by a significant culling of a scientific community that has gotten well above itself. The absurd figure of the secular scientist evangelist pontificating on matters having little or nothing to do with science proper, and making no use of either reason or scientody to do so, should be as egregiously offensive to scientists truly devoted to the scientific method as the behavior of the Borgia Pope is to devout Catholic Christians today.

So, if I am considered an enemy of science today, it is only because scientists and science fetishists have chosen to view me that way. But when you elect to create an enemy ex nihilo, you should not be terribly surprised when that newly fabricated enemy responds by behaving in a manner very similar to that of a self-declared enemy.

The OC writes the only episode of Star Trek I would ever watch:

Okay Gene, here’s the outline. Returning from a mission dirtside, the Away Team discovers that a freak malfunction of the transporter contrast control has turned them all black. Piccard retires to the executive conference room (I understand we’re contractually obligated to use the conference room set for at least five minutes in each show, right?), opens the executive safe, and reads the Enterprise warranty, only to discover that the transporter is covered by a carry-in service contract and the nearest XEROX service center is 200 light-years away.

Troi gets a “bad feeling” about this.

I liked the original Star Trek when I was a kid. I didn’t like it as an adult, however, and I loathed ST:TNG and all the subsequent Treks. (I really liked Galaxy Quest, though, and not because it poked fun at Trekkies. Go figure.) I only saw part of a few episodes, but ST:TNG was one of the most derivative shows I’ve ever seen. By way of example, I once freaked out a Trekkie by telling him the plot of a show he was watching after seeing the first few minutes.

I didn’t stick around to watch it unfold, so around an hour later, the guy came out and demanded to know how I could have possibly known what was going to happen. It was simple, the whole story was ripped off from Ann Rice’s Lasher.

No scientist should even open his mouth about other scientific disciplines, nine times out of ten, he merely discredits the entire profession:

evolutionary biology does in fact explain our concepts of justice, equality, and freedom. Just because you say it doesn’t doesn’t mean it doesn’t. We evolved these concepts as prehistoric humans and the species we evolved from developed into tribal cultures. Those concepts helped ensure our survival, so we adapted to include them in our daily lives.

I’m definitely going to nail an evolutionary biologist to the wall with this one during the next discussion of evolution. I so love how scientists in one discipline make outrageous, nonsensical claims for other disciplines, which are then completely disavowed by the scientists in that discipline. Scott Hatfield, I should very much like to know your opinion on the matter….

Now, do provide the scientific evidence for this evolution of justice, equality and freedom, BA. What was the mechanism of this “evolution”? How fast did these concepts evolve, and from what? At what museum may we view the memetic fossil evidence? And given the clear empirical evidence that a belief in God is hugely beneficial for the rate of human propagation, aren’t you really offering a proof of God here?

This is the best part:

It’s clear to me that you don’t really understand anything at all about science, the scientific method, and how successful it is in understanding the world and universe around us.

This is pretty amusing coming from someone who genuinely believes there is scientific evidence for the evolution of abstract concepts. This is especially ironic when that same someone claims conclusive proof of what he also declares cannot be seen, tasted, heard, touched or sensed in any way. This is a particularly interesting statement in light of the way in which scientists reliably insist that science is not in the “proof” business at all.

The idea that science is successful in understanding the world around us is also amusing. Whether one looks at an individual, a family or a society, the one thing you can absolutely count on to rapidly destroy it is following the advice of the scientists interested in the matter. Assuming, of course, that the entire planet isn’t destroyed first by a few of the more deadly gifts that scientists have so kindly given humanity. Thanks, science!

You may now make your historically ignorant statement attempting to give science credit for that which either predates science, was created by non-scientists, or should more rightly be credited to entrepeneurial activity.

And FYI, libertarian!=ultraconservative.

The Bad Astronomer doesn’t realize that science is undermining the basis for materialism:

The energy budget of the Universe is the total amount of energy and matter in the whole cosmos added up. Together with some other observations, WMAP has been able to determine just how much of that budget is occupied by dark energy, dark matter, and normal matter. What they got was: the Universe is 72.1% dark energy, 23.3% dark matter, and 4.62% normal matter. You read that right: everything you can see, taste, hear, touch, just sense in any way… is less than 5% of the whole Universe.

In other words, even by its own lights, science and rational materialist philosophy is only relevant to five percent of what we currently consider to be all known Creation. Combined with its complete inapplicability to abstract concepts such as justice, equality and freedom, this shows that even attempting to build a social order on a secular basis is not only doomed to failure, but is quite arguably insane.

Considering some of the lawyers I’ve known, I find it difficult to believe that most literate children would have a tough time passing U.S. law school exams:

Brazil’s lawyers have been shocked to find that a boy aged eight has managed to pass the entrance exam to law school. The Bar Association said the achievement of Joao Victor Portellinha should be taken as a warning about the low standards of some of Brazil’s law schools…. My dream is to be a federal judge,” the boy said, according to Globo TV’s Web site. “So I decided to take the test to see how I would do … it was easy. I studied a week before the test.”

I don’t know why they don’t simply let little kids who can pass the tests practice law or rule from the bench, the results couldn’t be significantly worse. Imagine how effective a little girl crying in front of an all-female jury would be.

I’m sorry about the absence of bloggertainment for the last two days, but I actually had to do a bit of what passes for labor these days. This took me to Germany, and the most remarkable thing I noticed was that during my entire trip, I saw a grand total of three children. Now, granted I wasn’t often in an environment where one would expect to see a lot of children, but even at the train station or when a friend and I walked to lunch through the middle of town, I saw virtually no one younger than 15 or so.

When I mentioned this yesterday to a media relations woman – a pretty, married German lady in her late twenties and childless – she commented that German women are taught to believe that if you take the time to pursue a college education, you have wasted those years should you subsequently fail to “use” that education by having children instead of a career. But when I asked her if she felt she was making effective use of her education by keeping the press informed about her company’s latest innovations in a minor field of electronics, she laughed and admitted that she was already beginning to wonder what was so damned important about her career. This was remarkable, since questioning the intellectual status quo isn’t exactly what you’d call a strong point for Germans of either sex.

In the Terry Pratchett novel Interesting Times, the British humorist notes that a breeding bias for treacherous killers eventually creates a situation where it is dangerous to lean over a cradle. In light of this observation, it seems remarkable that even the most staunch proponents of evolution fail to recognize the obvious problem intrinsic in teaching the more intelligent 50 percent of the female population that they have a moral imperative to unquestioningly render themselves worker drones. It’s also remarkable that so many people believe themseselves to be “using” their education by virtue of their employment in a job that has nothing whatsoever to do with their university studies.

GoTT feels that I didn’t give Sam Harris a fair shake in TIA:

First off, an apology. I have been unfair to Vox Day. I sent him an email yesteray after readin his book. I suggested that he made up that quote form Harris that rape is better than relgion. It was a shocking quote, but I should never have accused Vox of lying, and that’s essentially what I did. I turned out that Harris DID make this quote. I sent an email afterward saying I was disappointed in Harris’s comment. But I did not get through. I also said that the Blue State argument was one I did NOT think was erronous, although others were.

Apology accepted. To be honest, I wasn’t offended by the accusation of lying – the damning Harris quote that begins the chapter was a Sep. 2006 interview entitled “The Temple of Reason” – but rather the idea that I’d be dumb enough to lie about something in a book that thousands of people would be scrutinizing closely. And to GoTT’s credit, at least he attempts to list what arguments he feels are erroneous, rather than hiding behind a nebulous general statement.

I told him in the email that I thought his attacks on Harris were unfair becasue they seemed to misconstrue the intention of Harris’s arguments. Here are some examples I posted on Samharris.org:

For example, Vox says that Sam’s definition of morality (about happiness vs. suffering) is incorrect, because this is not the system of morals Christians subscribe to. this is exactly Sams’ point, that religious concersn of morality often lie outside happiness vs. suffering, and thus often even contribute to suffering. Harris proposes this definition of morality becasue he beleives it is superior to the Christian definiton, of “whatever God says.” Vox ignores this, saying that “morality should never be confused with a hedonic metric of happiness or suffering.”

GoTT doesn’t understand the point. I’m not saying that Harris is incorrect because his imagined definition of morality is different than the Christian one – although he is incorrect when he states that Christians use human standards of good to define God’s goodness – but because he is simply inventing a morality ex nihilo. Since the morality he discusses in Letter to a Christian Nation are Christian morals, it is incorrect to criticize them from the perspective of a non-existent standard. I’m not ignoring the fact that he’s proposing a new standard, I’m pointing out that it’s a stupid one.

He also faults Harris’s blame for AIDS transmission in Africa, on the reluctance of teaching condom use, saying that STDs are caused “by the very prudery that Christians condemn.” Right, but it’s the sex taboos that actually contribute to that very promiscuity whicb is Sams’ whole point.

Sex taboos don’t tend to contribute to promiscuity. They tend to inhibit it, which is why would-be libertines like Christopher Hitchens hate them and complain about sexual repression.

He also says that Harris is wrong in declaring that faith presents a nuclear threat becasue,” it is Science, not Faith that is the factor in the equation represents a deadly danger to mankind.” This is where he goes terribly wrong. THis is technophobia and full-flower. Not too different from what we see in Hollywood from Terminator to Godsend. Now, he has a point in declaring that “all risks are inherently NOT worth taking. He gives the example of “weapons designed to kill anyone with a genetic marker” as a possible abuse of future technology. But he ignores what Sam has already pointed out–that atoricites that are generally held up as the abuses of science–like those of the Nazi doctors or Hiroshima–are really not attributable to science but to tribalism. LIke giving chimps advanced weapons to carry on their petty warfare. To be fair, it’s not really faith that’s the root problem either–Vox is right here. The underlying problem is still tribalism, not belief in God. Vox admits he doesn’t want to do back to the stone age, and has no desire to eradicate science. But his contention that science is the worst offender is entirely false.

I don’t ever say anything about science being the worst offender, except to point out that IF Harris’s extinction equation is correct and that Man is under dire threat of extinction, logic dictates that it is science that must be eliminated to end this threat, not faith. This is an unavoidable conclusion, since eliminating faith will not end, or even seriously reduce, the threat.

If I was unfair to Sam Harris, it was the cruelty of taking his arguments seriously enough to address them in a straightforward manner.

It’s more appealing to female readers than sexy were-seals:

Kelly’s exposé could be the start of a widespread backlash against misery literature, a genre kick-started by Angela’s Ashes in 1996, and which took off globally four years later with A Child Called It, Dave Pelzer’s account of growing up with an alcoholic mother who beat, starved, stabbed, burnt and force-fed ammonia to him. “Inspirational memoirs”, the polite term for this type of book, now account for nine per cent of the British book market, shifting 1.9 million copies a year and generating £24 million of revenue for the publishing industry.

I’m embarrassed that I failed to see this coming. For years I’ve hated television because it’s little more than emotional porn for women. But this misery lit offers precisely the same rush of tears and Elendfreude that keeps ER on the air.

Lisa Schiffren provides an excellent example as well as conclusively claiming the title of Worst New Addition to The Corner:

Last night was the very first time I’ve thought Cindy McCain looked really good this season. All through the campaign she has favored very sharp-shouldered jackets, (an 80’s, Dynasty look), usually in hard and bright colors like tomato red. Her naturally thin frame doesn’t need, or benefit from either the hard shoulder or the wasp-waist it is constructed to suggest….Not that I’ve given this much thought…. (The sad things is, I haven’t. This stuff just glares at me while I am trying to pay attention to the substance….)

It’s only been a few days and already Buckley is rolling over in his grave. I note that despite the fact that WFB stated that the struggle between Christianity and Atheism was the supreme issue of the age, even more important than the one between Communism and the West, NRO is demonstrably less interested in that intellectual debate than in what the presidential candidate’s wives are wearing.

Justin Raimondo remarks on the irony of the American and European medias complaining about the Russian media and what passes for Russian democracy:

We are bombarded on an almost daily basis with anti-Russian, anti-Putin propaganda in the mainstream media, falsely claiming that the “independent” media is being curtailed by the Kremlin. Yet there is no government censorship in Russia; no newspapers or television stations have been closed down by the authorities. Putin’s critics are exercised over the alleged lack of “freedom of the press” because the Russian owners of privately owned media outlets exercise the same editorial control that private owners exercise in the West.

For the American media to complain that their Russian counterparts are too subservient to the government is a classic case of pot-kettle-black. It wasn’t the Russian media that wore flag lapel buttons while reporting the start of a major military assault and shamelessly transmitted government propaganda disguised as “news reporting” to a frightened and shamelessly manipulated public. It wasn’t the Russian media that put Judy Miller’s tall tales of Iraq’s “weapons of mass destruction” on the front page of the New York Times as the rest of our “free” and “independent” journalists followed dutifully along. If Russia’s reporters are government lackeys, then their Western brothers and sisters are cut from pretty much the same cloth….

If the Council of Europe is so concerned about the state of democracy in the world, then let them look into the practices of the European Union, which seem to involve repeating an election until one gets the “right” result.

Raimondo is the most underrated columnist in America today. If you’re not reading him on a regular basis, you are seriously missing out.