by Carl Howard | Sep 6, 2009 | Blog Topics
Repent, heathens! Despite overwhelming evidence of the LORD, you continue to think you might confound Him. But no more! Behold, as the InspiredTM, InerrantTM Bible condemns* the lot of you!!1! [1] But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of...
by Carl Howard | Sep 3, 2009 | Atheism and Religion, Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, Science and Skepticism
One of the most long-standing arguments used by religious debaters (eg. Dinesh D’Souza) is to claim that atheism is responsible for more killings than all the religions put together because of Stalin, Hitler, Mao etc. I have typically seen several types of responses...
by Carl Howard | Aug 15, 2009 | Atheism and Religion, Atrocities and Oppression, Blog Topics, Blogging Jewish Law
I want to look at stoning in Judaism as a quick case study of how concepts evolve in religions as their practitioners mature morally. Early Hebrew Bible: You can get stoned for anything (there’s about 22 capital crimes, although stoning itself only applies to some)....
by Carl Howard | Aug 15, 2009 | Atheism and Religion, Blog Topics, Philosophy
A quickie today. In the Atheist Experience, Russell and Jeff dissect the Argument from Game Design, as proposed on a forum of Christian gamers. It does something like this: If you design a computer game, the only objective purpose/meaning to the game is the one that...
by Carl Howard | Aug 14, 2009 | Blog Topics, Evolution and Biology, Philosophy, Science and Skepticism
Tue night, I went to Paul Griffiths’ inaugural lecture at Sydney Uni called Reconstructing Human Nature (thanks John Wilkins for letting me know!). The talk was on conceptions of human nature and what it means for something to be “innate”. I won’t summarise it — but I...
by Carl Howard | Jul 16, 2009 | Atrocities and Oppression, Biases and Fallacies, Blog Topics, History, Science and Skepticism
I usually try to keep posts concise. But I thought once a month I can splurge on my word count and try talk about something in a bit more detail. Here goeth my first attempt. A few days ago Takis Konstantopoulos wrote a reaction to my 2008 post about the Holodomor...
