A new Dan Cardamon. Each new one is more brilliant than the last. This one is very brilliant.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owgqleO7JXA

 … Read the rest

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Well now that I’ve been told about the three Christs of Ypsilanti, I have to take a look at them.

The Three Christs of Ypsilanti (1964) is a book-length psychiatriccase study by Milton Rokeach, concerning his experiment on a group of three paranoid schizophrenic patients at Ypsilanti State Hospital^[1] in Ypsilanti, Michigan. The book details the interactions of the three patients, Clyde Benson, Joseph Cassel, and Leon Gabor, who each believed himself to be Jesus Christ.

Ah the eyes widen, the spine straightens, the attention zooms in. The possibilities are obvious, and abundant.

To study the basis for delusional belief systems, Rokeach brought together three men who each claimed to be Jesus Christ and

… Read the rest

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Since when do judges tell people what they can name their babies?

The issue, at least as Child Support Magistrate Lu Ann Ballew saw it, was that the child’s name was “Messiah,” a moniker Ballew believes should be reserved only for Jesus Christ. Here’s local NBC affiliate station WBIR-TV with more of the judge’s logic:

       “The word Messiah is a title and it’s a title that has only been earned by one person and that one person is Jesus Christ,” Judge Ballew said.

Nonsense. It’s the name of a very nice piece of music, and a lovely name for a baby. Besides, they can call the kid Messy for short. Think of all the fun they’ll have!

 … Read the rest

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Bad Obama administration. Don’t do that. Bad, bad, bad.

The Obama administration has taken sides in a significant new test case on the separation between church and state, urging the Supreme Court to allow prayers at the beginning of government meetings. The administration lays out its arguments in a newly filed amicus brief in Town of Greece v. Galloway, a case that questions whether the prayer practices at town council meetings of a small town in upstate New York violate the First Amendment. The case could drastically expand the types of legislative prayer practices considered constitutional.

Bad. Bad, bad, bad.

The administration argued in its brief:

Where, as here, legislative prayers neither proselytize nor denigrate any faith, the

… Read the rest

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Taslima has a beautiful (indignant and compassionate) post about the poverty of Bangladesh’s transportation system and the consequent dangers of travel on major holidays…like Eid. She illustrates with many poignant pictures.

Allah sent Muhammad buraq, the winged horse,  so that Muhammad, the prophet  could travel to heaven. He went to heaven on buraq and met Moses, Jesus, a few more bearded guys  and finally Allah the almighty.

Now look at  the condition of Bangladesh today.  They don’t have enough vehicles to travel. Millions of people are travelling to  home to celebrate Eid, the biggest Muslim religious festival with their family and friends tomorrow. They are desperate to get some space on the public transports. Train roofs and doors are

… Read the rest

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Tom Foss takes a look at Tim Farley’s long-delayed response to objections to his very long post about the Block Bot. Wait. That’s so meta it’s confusing.

Tim Farley did a long post about the block bot.

People had criticisms of it. I was one of those people. Tom was another. Tim Farley made many objections to the criticisms, none of which addressed the actual criticisms that were made. It was frustrating and irritating, especially since Farley’s objections included rebukes for addressing a small part of the post instead of the whole of it. Now he has addressed the criticisms, and Tom has addressed his response. It’s part of a video hangout, which is a very odd … Read the rest

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Robin Ince took part in an Intelligence Square debate yesterday, on the motion ““The world needs religion, just leave God out of it.” He and Peter Atkins were against, Selina O’Grady and Douglas Murray were for. He posted his opening statement and summing up.

Enough statistics, I want to speak of my personal experience, of the people who do good, care about their community, and want to build something better, but do it without religion.

(here I had a long list including…)

I think of the work of the human rights lawyer who spends his life campaigning for people across the world who he feels have been wrongly punished, including incredible work in Guantanamo Bay. He is a

… Read the rest

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Jerry Coyne posted about Dawkins and the Tweets this morning. I had a column to write for the Freethinker yesterday and I decided to write about Dawkins and the Tweets. I sent it yesterday, proofed it this morning.

The subject isn’t as trivial as it might sound to a visitor from Mars. (Ok not Mars. We can’t use Mars that way any more, not now that we’re rummaging around up out there ourselves, making ourselves at home, taking snapshots. Ok Neptune. A visitor from Neptune.) There’s something interesting about the way Twitter can act as a kind of Id for some people, and about Dawkins’s failure or refusal to see that it’s not a good idea to use it that … Read the rest

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Random person on Twitter:

BTW, not believing in any god is a form of religion.

Hm. So everything is a form of religion – believing in any god, and not believing in any god.

So the phrase “a form of religion” doesn’t name anything. It’s just another word for “all the possible options.”

Seems superfluous.… Read the rest

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A message from humanists in Nigeria:

Dear friends, The 2013 Humanist Association for Peace and Social Tolerance Advancement International Conference comes up on 16-17 August, 2013 at Roseboom Hotel Akwa-Ibom.

Even though you could not attend, it is our belief that it wont be out of place for you to extend your goodwill message to participants.

Send such to hapstang@gmail.com and/or yemi.johnson@younghumanistasnetwork.net

Thanks.

Yemi HAPSTA 2013 International Conference

Theme: SUPERSTITION, HUMAN RIGHTS AND DEVELOPMENT IN AFRICA

Issues to be discussed include: *Culture, Cultural Practices and Superstitions *Religion and Promotion of Superstitious Beliefs

*WitchKilling and Witchkilling in Africa *Culture and Religion in the age of Science * Science, Scientific mindset and Science Education * Science, Humanism and Development * Superstition, Modernity … Read the rest

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Guest post by Kevin Kirkpatrick, originally a comment on Hiss point hiss hiss. When I read Emily D’s defense of Shermer’s “NAUGHTY-NAUGHTY” comment, I see a direct parallel in how parents might choose to deal with sibling in-fighting, teasing, and bullying.  I have direct experience with three methodologies: that which my mother applied to my siblings and me; that which my father applied, and that which my wife and I apply for our own children. My mother’s approach to dealing with teasing was “rule based”.  She simply had a set of rules which determined what behavior was teasing and what behavior was not.  Rules included but weren’t limited to: no unwanted touching, no name-calling, no finger-pointing, no ‘copying’, and… Read the rest

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Emily D just dropped in to leave a comment promoting a blog post of hers. She left it on Items, a post from two days ago that ended with a link to a Twitter conversation I had with her.

On Twitter we’re being told that “we are sexual beings” and that flirtation out of nowhere is fine.

Her comment included some extra material.

Hey folks, it’s your friendly neighborhood misogynist here! Ophelia has highlighted my chill-girl attitudes in a way so few can. Maybe you’d like to see the rest for yourself: http://emilyhasbooks.com/naughty-chicken-ruffled-feathers/

Compare the two. Note that I did not call her a misogynist or a chill girl, and that I didn’t even name her*. Her… Read the rest

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Al Stefanelli has posted (or “rage blogged,” as the saying goes) a characteristically vulgar and belligerent response to PZ’s post.

On 08 August 2013, Paul Zachary Myers posted about being handed a ‘grenade‘ with the pin pulled out. Basically, he wrote that a woman told him she was raped by Michael Shermer at a conference a while ago.

That Myers chose to ‘reprint‘ this shows not only a complete lack of common sense, but is also indicative of the incredibly spurious depths to which he will sink to garner a few blog hits.

That’s the first two paragraphs, and there’s not much need to read more, is there. What a fucking stupid thing to say. For … Read the rest

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Oh dear. Richard Dawkins has been getting pushback about some tweets, so he’s written a piece for RDF to explain things. Maybe that should be a sign to him that tweets aren’t the right medium for complicated thoughts.

Twitter’s 140 character limit always presents a tough challenge, but I tried to rise to it.

Ah, no, it wasn’t a sign to him then.

No; don’t try to rise to the challenge. That’s not what it’s good for. It’s not a game of “try to say something useful about what’s wrong with Islam in 140 characters without being simplistic or banal and without setting off a noisy brawl.” People use it that way, yes, but it’s silly.

He summarizes several … Read the rest

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Fortunately, though, it’s always easy and safe for women to report rape.

Wait.

Anti-sexual abuse campaigners, among them the author who successfully put Jane Austen on the £10 note – before having to fend off the resulting torrent of online rape threats – have reacted angrily after it emerged that a man who admitted having sex with a 13-year-old girl walked free from court; while his victim was described by the judge and prosecution as sexually “predatory”.

Neil Wilson, 41, faces having his eight-month suspended jail sentence reviewed after the Attorney General Dominic Grieve agreed to look into the case yesterday. And the Crown Prosecution Service was forced to admit that its own prosecutor acted “inappropriately” when he placed a

… Read the rest

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And now there’s another grenade: PZ’s post about being told something by a woman who doesn’t want to go public with it.

She’s torn up about it. It’s been a few years, so no law agency is going to do anything about it now; she reported it to an organization at the time, and it was dismissed. Swept under the rug. Ignored. I can imagine her sense of futility. She’s also afraid that the person who assaulted her before could try to hurt her again.

But at the same time, she doesn’t want this to happen to anyone else, so she’d like to get the word out there. So she hands the information to me. Oh, thanks.

It seems unfair, … Read the rest

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