Category: Uncategorized

I’ve been very disappointed in most of my critics, for the most part. Re-read the column more closely, especially if you find yourself getting upset. A few points:

1) The piece has nothing to do with Christianity per se. The same points hold true with regards to Hinduism or Zen Buddhism. The fact that I stated my argument is one with that of the pre-Christian Socrates, not to mention the self-professed antichrist Nietzsche, should have been your first clue. Yes, I’m a Christian. No, the argument does not depend on that. Hell in this case refers to both the Christian concept as well as the hell on earth regularly created by atheist-run societies.

2) I made no statements about the rationality of Christians or any other group of faithful. In any case, there is no irony with regards to them, as they do not hold themselves up as devotees of Reason. Quite the opposite, in many cases.

3) I do not hold myself up as a moral examplar at any point. Nor would I. Trying to bring Rush Limbaugh into it only shows that you’re not equipped to even begin understanding the piece.

4) Get your facts straight. I will not waste any time responding to anyone who is so ignorant as to equate the Spanish Inquisition (6,000 deaths in 356 years) with the National Socialist’s Holocaust (12 million in 11 years). This does not make me a coward, it makes you an ignoramus unworthy of debate. Most wars are not caused by religion. Did the significance of the Seneca quote escape you? Read the Chronicles of the Assyrian Kings or Chinese history if you think war and religion are synonymous. War is about power, plain and simple. Religion, most of the time, is only the excuse. If it does not suffice, another excuse is always found.

5) If you seriously want to argue that the Soviet Communists were not atheists, please go talk to a Russian emigre. The State as God is a metaphor. Metaphors are not to be confused with reality.

6) There is an important distinction between the acceptance of established and proven scientific method and the unquestioning acceptance of untest, untestable scientific theory. Riding on an airplane is not an act of faith. Arguing that the Earth is X years old – 6,000 or 6 billion, is. Remember, scientists used to say that the Hittites and Assyrians didn’t exist either. Scientific theory is a moving target, and faith in it as a constant is not only blind faith, but blind faith sure to be shattered soon.

7) Remember, you’re not only arguing with me, but with Socrates, Voltaire, Plato and Nietszche. Do you like your odds? I don’t.

I’m Agnostic, and for a good reason: I can’t visualize a space with more than three dimensions. What the hell has it to do with the concept of God, would you say. Well, for me it matters, and matters a lot. Our brain, where our mind is created, is a result of evolution which is tied to the development of our senses, so, something really concrete, objective, down to earth and more, unable to perform spatially abstract thingking, I mean, a thinking independent, free, from our environment, from our frame of reference. That is why physics, as a science, is reaching a dead end. Our mind can’t “see” more than three spatial dimensions, time is another one but not spatial. The Universe is so overwhelmingly vast, infinitelly mighty, inbelievably complex that an entity able to create it would be out of our experience. We, could, by no means, grasp it, reach it. The only way has been to create a God with anthropomorfic features, some sort of super man, but we are short of stuff, we used to create a God with our characteristics, only that at a higher scale. I don’t buy such a God anymore.

Some reasonable points – except the faith-based acceptance of the untested, never-replicated evolution theory – but I disagree with the conclusion. The God of the Bible tells us flat out that we cannot understand Him or His wisdom, and the reasons listed above are only part of why. There are also numerous hints about God’s existence outside of space and time. You don’t buy such a God, but I do. That’s fine – we can certainly agree to disagree on this.

Opponents of conceal and carry, such as Rep. Mark Pocan, D-Madison, are just as passionate — and just as mindful of Minnesota’s precedent. [in passing a pro-gun law that has caused zero problems in the last year] “Usually I think of Wisconsin and Minnesota as very responsible states,” Pocan said. “We’re hoping not to duplicate [Minnesota’s] mistake. From looking at Minnesota and other states, we believe this will put 36,000 new guns on the streets of Wisconsin. There will be that many people walking around with guns in their coats and purses, after applying for this permit. If people are packing guns like cell phones, those guns will go off at the most inopportune times, like cell phones.”

Sure they would – if other people could trigger them remotely at will, like cell phones.

TW writes: As an atheist, I found your column to be simplistic and illogical, rendering your title just a tad ironic. I’d label it, and therefore you, hypocritical as well, but for the fact that one cannot be hypocritical if he has no understanding of what he’s done. Your comments are wholly unbecoming of one who employs Mensa status as a credential. If you need a one-liner description on the column, it’s: My God, that was profoundly ignorant.

Of course, TW doesn’t provide a single example of how the column is simplistic, illogical, hypocritical or ignorant. Mostly because he can’t. Nevertheless, we’re just expected to take his word for it, never mind that my argument is in synchronicity with the intellectual positions of two of history’s leading atheists. I thought this bit was particularly amusing: “As an atheist…. My God….” So TW, by just what god do you swear? And why? This is genuine irony, in contrast to TW’s understanding of the concept, which rivals that of Miss Alanis Morrissette.

I’ve pointed this out before to my would-be critics, apparently to little avail: Don’t bring it unless you can back it up. TW sounds exactly like many a clueless feminist – substitute woman for atheist and sexist for hypocritical and it would be identical to emails I’ve received in the past. And profoundly ignorant? Yes, because the op/ed bar has been set so high that people are bored with Maureen Dowd’s constant expositions on Plato, the Encyclopedists and quantum mechanics. This is nothing but defensive name-calling without substance. Color me underwhelmed.

I don’t often agree with the leftist writers at WND, though I have enjoyed an occasional exchange of email with both Bill Press and Marilyn Lois Polak. But Ellen Ratner has the Bush administration dead to rights in this column, in which she points out only a few of the administration’ inconsistencies. I mean, she doesn’t even point out that last week, the president predictably began backing away from his previous commitment to allowing democracy in Iraq – something that only surprises those who don’t remember the last democratic vote in Algeria, which was cancelled by the military at the last minute.

You see, radical Islamic populations have this disturbing, but predictable tendency to elect radical Islamic politicians. This is likely what will happen in Iraq the moment that a popular vote is permitted, which is why it makes no difference what the administration says, they simply can’t allow a vote without first putting into place a convoluted system designed to prevent the will of the people from prevailing. This is, of course, only one of the reasons our Founding Fathers weren’t dumb enough to design this nation as a democracy, and why our sanctification of the idea is so astoundingly stupid.

Ellen also doesn’t point out that we’re not even at war, from a legal point of view. Which renders all the administration’s arguments about “enemy combatants” completely moot. I thought ignorance of the law is no excuse, Mr. Attorney General.

Do you ever get the impression that a young baby is more aware of what is going on than you think it should be? One of the pastors I respect most theorizes that the spirit is mature at birth, and is capable of being influenced by things that can’t possibly be grasped by its developing mind. That makes this report of a baby toy that says “I hate you” even more chilling. There’s no way of knowing, of course, but I suspect that the evil logic behind whoever hid this message behind the soothing melodies is more spiritual than political.

My column today notwithstanding, there is much evil that is done by those who are not atheists. The worst evildoers are those who have a glimmering of understanding of how the spiritual world operates, and attempt to use that knowledge against others. To use it against defenseless infants is truly despicable.

To understand infinity, one need only contemplate the limits of human perversity.

From the noise emanating from the sportsjabbersphere, McNabb really was injured earlier in the season, as I had speculated. But the Eagles’ recent success notwithstanding, it’s not as if he’s been lighting it up for the last three weeks, though they have been an order of magnitude better than before. A 61 percent completion rate can’t be considered exceptional when it results in only 217 yards and 1 TD per game. Not when your three opponents have been Green Bay, Atlanta and the Jets, with a total of 9 wins between them.

Meanwhile, unheralded black quarterback Daunte Culpepper has lost the last three games, while exceeding McNabb’s performance by 4 percent completions, 54 yards and 1.66 TD’s per game. Guess which quarterback is paired with a defense that served up 42 points on a platter last week, and which one only had to rack up more than 14?

Which pretty much gets us back to Rush Limbaugh’s original point, if you think about it.

WEEK 11 POSTSCRIPT – McNabb looked pretty good today, though. Got to give credit where credit is due. And, I fear, the Vikings collapse is complete. I knew they were doing it with smoke and mirrors, but I thought Michael Bennet’s return would make it easier to keep up the act, not harder. No one deserves to win the NFC North at this point.

Charles Stross lists a few of the president’s requests to Her Majesty’s Government for his upcoming trip.

1. The entire London underground railway system to be shut down for the duration of the visit (apparently in response to fears that suicide bombers might hijack a tube train and blow it up under the President’s feet)

2. That US military aircraft, including helicopters and ground attack aircraft, be allowed to patrol London’s airspace

3. That 250 Secret Service agents, including snipers, who will be travelling with the President be granted diplomatic immunity from prosecution in the event they shoot and kill civilians (whether deliberately or by accident)

4. That the Presidential security detachment should include units armed with miniguns (read: high cyclic rate machine guns)

5. Closure of a large chunk of central London (to the point where Cabinet staff are being advised to “work from home” for the duration of the visit, if possible)

I wouldn’t blame the Brits if they took one look at this list and decided, you know, maybe we can get this done by phone.

In Cryptonomicon, Neal Stephenson submits that a knowledgeable government eavesdropper – hi guys! (wave to the camera) – noting the use of a 4096-bit key, will conclude one of the following:

1) The encryptor doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

2) The encryptor is clinically paranoid.

3) The encryptor is extremely

a) …optimistic about the future development of computer technology

b) …pessimistic about the political climate

c) …both

4) The encryptor has a planning horizon that extends over a period of at least a century.

File me as 3c, gentlemen.

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I’d like to make fun of Britney Spears. She can’t sing, and while she’s cute, she’s nowhere nearly as pretty as the media seem to think her. But some people are so gifted with self-parody that there’s nothing you can do but quote them. From NRO’s Corner, an excerpt from the Diane Sawyer interview. She’s apparently talking about what she considers to be the sacrosanct nature of self-gratification.

Diane: “Sacred?”

Britney: “No, the song, ‘Touch of My Hand’ talking about indulging in yourself.”

Diane: “And that’s sacred?”

Britney: “It is sacred to me, but in a way, explaining, um, okay, I’m confusing myself right now.”

My guess is that using an esoteric word such as “indulging” must have put her brain into synaptic overload. If nothing is required for pop stars but looks these days, can’t somebody hook Adriana Lima up with a producer and some forgettable electro-pop?