Because of new relevance, my review of The Moral Landscape for Issue 53 of TPM. Posted at ur-B&W April 16, 2011.

Sam Harris asks an interesting question in the introduction, after laying out his central (and not really controversial) claim that questions about values are questions about the well-being of conscious creatures. “Is it possible,” he asks, “that certain people are incapable of wanting what they should want?” Of course, he answers; there are always people who get things wrong. But that question doesn’t exhaust the difficulties that arise in moral discussion, yet Harris separates it out as if it did. The really hard question, which he generally gives short shrift, asks “is it possible that there are many people … Read the rest

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I reread this post by Skeptic Lawyer from two years ago, Miss Manners and playing the victim, and I feel like giving some elegant extracts.

There are various manifestations of these atrocious manners, but they seem (to me, at least) to boil down to an inability, on the part of certain men, to take ‘no’ for an answer. I think this is tied to participation in various ‘geek’ subcultures (both on-line and off-line, so while it may be convenient to blame the internet, blaming the internet is unfair). Participation in these varied subcultures is seen to give people something of a pass for rudeness. The justification proffered is that participation in the subculture resulted in bullying when the man

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Comic interlude – the best troll question I’ve seen in some time.

Kindly tell me how “The hell with you, it’s my freedom, I’ll say what I want” is whining and “Please don’t do that” isn’t.

Do admit.

Also – a profound observation on the nature of comedy.

In my opinion, the best humor is pointed at someone else and in some cases those people lower than ourselves.

You know, I’ve noticed the same thing about punching. The best punching is pointed at someone else.… Read the rest

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Oh, man, bad idea. Really bad idea.

Sam Harris has issued a challenge. Shades of the Randi challenge, right? Only Harris’s is rather different.

It has been nearly three years since The Moral Landscape was first published in English, and in that time it has been attacked by readers and nonreaders alike. Many seem to have judged from the resulting cacophony that the book’s central thesis was easily refuted. However, I have yet to encounter a substantial criticism that I feel was not adequately answered in the book itself (and in subsequent talks).

So I would like to issue a public challenge. Anyone who believes that my case for a scientific understanding of morality is mistaken is invited

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It’s definitely asshole Saturday.

Thunderfoot has a new video about how feminism is roooning atheism, part 5. Yes seriously, it’s part 5.

I watched almost 5 minutes of it. He gets his facts wrong. He starts by saying American Atheists “just” invited PZ to speak at the next convention, after he went and did that terrible thing by posting the email a woman sent him about Michael Shermer. Wrong. They asked him long before the post. It’s laughably easy to confirm that, because they also announced it before the post.

Mason never pauses, in the part I watched, to ask himself what if it’s true. He never pauses to consider the grapevine reports that have been circulating for years. … Read the rest

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A comment by Leslie Brown at Pharyngula on a post about geekbro culture.

First time commenter, this issue really chaps my hide. I was really keen to work in computers when I was in my 20s, way back in 1979. I applied for a place on a government run programming course, and sat an aptitude test along with about 250 others. I found the test quite straightforward, completed it in about half the allotted 2 hours, and was eventually called for an interview. I was told that even though I’d scored exceptionally highly on the aptitude test, they couldn’t offer me one of the 12 places available, as I might have children! Despite explaining that I’d recently split from my

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So I see this post of PZ’s, We’re all bad together here…and proud of it.

Zinnia Jones is rightly resentful when a blogger who goes by the name “the atheist asshole” calls her “one of the good ones”. They’re missing the truth: while she’s all straightforward and civil and all that, she’s also one of our top bad-asses on Freethoughtblogs.

Oh, I know who that is – “the atheist asshole” – that’s Anton A Hill, the one who did a forty nineteen* minute video about me because I told him to fuck off on Twitter, and then went on and on and on and on sniping at me about it, for weeks. So I read Zinnia’s post that … Read the rest

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I should just title every post that way, right?

An asshole posted on the Atheist Alliance of America National Convention Facebook page:

Remember gentlemen, if a woman looks at you while you are at this convention, and you think she may be interested in you, she isn’t. She’s most likely reminiscing about the chocolate volcano she enjoyed last night at dessert. Do not approach her, or speak to her for any reason other than to inform her that she is on fire if you happen to see flames flickering from her hair or clothing. Keep your hands to yourselves. Politely decline all handshakes or hugs. Do not under any circumstances attempt to discuss any topic at all, or otherwise

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Which includes Ken Buddha and his inflatable knees. A smile, two bangs, and a religion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KcoOkXy2Pk

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Well that’s…disturbing.

A Montana judge has apologized for comments he made about a 14-year-old female rape victim that seemed to take the “blame the victim” approach to a new level. “I don’t know what I was thinking or trying to say,” Judge G. Todd Baugh tells the Billings Gazette. “It was just stupid and wrong.” In ordering a former high school teacher to spend just 30 days in jail for raping a student, Baugh explained on Monday that she was “older than her chronological age” and was “as much in control” as teacher Stacey Rambold. The girl committed suicide with the criminal case pending.

She was as much in control…and yet she committed suicide. That doesn’t sound … Read the rest

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Colin McGinn is still writing blog posts.

Here’s one from a couple of weeks ago.

“I could list a great number of these one-sided diminutive romances. Some of them ended in a rich flavor of hell. It happened for instance that from my balcony I would notice a lighted window across the street and what looked like a nymphet in the act of undressing before a cooperative mirror. Thus isolated, thus removed, the vision acquired an especially keen charm that made me race with all speed toward my lone gratification. But abruptly, fiendishly, the tender pattern of nudity I had adored would be transformed into the disgusting lamp-lit bare arm of a man in his underclothes reading his paper by

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It’s rape culture day in the neighborhood.

There’s Alex’s Shouting arson in a crowded theatre: rape, reputations and reasonable suspicion.

The statements we have don’t warrant certainty. They may or may not meet legal standards of proof. But they do meet what standards we need to ask ourselves, ‘Should this person attend our conference?’ or ‘Should we invite them to our group?’ – and to answer these questions reasonably, if provisionally. This does not amount to pitchfork-laden mob rule; it does not amount to vigilantism; and the evidence we have, while many no doubt would welcome legal procedures, should not in my opinion be deemed wholly meaningless in the absence of court action.

The ‘Take it to court, or

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One good thing. Wait, though, no, it’s not really a good thing – it’s just the avoidance of a bad thing. I keep noticing how often a bit of good news I’m pointing out is actually just a bit of bad news reversed or prevented or stepped around. More actual good news that isn’t just the negation of previous bad news would be nice.

One bad thing avoided.

An appeals court has sided with a hospital that wants to force a 10-year-old Amish girl to resume chemotherapy after her parents decided to stop the treatments.

Yeh that’s a pretty minimal, routine thing to greet as good news. Girl with leukemia continues chemotherapy; wow.

The hospital believes Sarah’s leukemia is

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Here we go again -

Mariama N, a lesbian from the Gambia, faces a new threat of deportation after she has twice stopped attempts to send her back to anti-gay persecution.

On 24 July Mariama stood her ground, refused to get on the Royal Air Maroc plane at Heathrow, resisted all the threats of the guards, challenged them on the policy and injustice they were implementing, and rejected their warnings of what would happen to her ‘next time’. Another flight on 13 August was cancelled. Now Mariama has been given ‘removal directions’ for Tuesday 3 September, 9.15am on Monarch Airlines flight ZB5394 from Gatwick.

…

Please take action to call on Monarch Airlines to refuse the flight - Tell them

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I was in Ballard yesterday afternoon, and I was walking down Ballard Avenue, which is a protected historical district with beautiful 19th century brick buildings – old hotels and shops and newspaper offices – and passed a gallery with some amazing sculptures in the windows, so I went in to look at all of them.

They’re like this:

The woman in the gallery said to me, “You know what they’re made of?” I said, “I assume paper.”

They are made of lottery tickets!

How cool is that?

The sculptor is Alex Lockwood.… Read the rest

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Guest post by Josh, Official Spokesgay. He wrote to Vermont Public Radio to cancel his donation because of NPR’s coverage of Chelsea Manning, and then -

So I waited for five days to hear back from Vermont Public Radio, and all I got was a polite, non-committal “Thank you for your support. . bye bye” form letter confirming my cancellation. This next won’t surprise you—I sent the board and executive staff an irritated letter for their shitty donor/listener engagement. I run a nonprofit myself and my board would have my head if I blew off a longtime donor who took the time to write such detail.

That got some attention. The development director emailed me today to apologize for … Read the rest

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We hear a lot about “tearing apart” this or that – skepticism, the atheist movement, the world of skeptoatheo science-loving nerdery. Sometimes the idea is that the tearing apart is mutual, and sometimes it’s that it’s only the pesky feminists (or the mythical Atheismplussers, who are always people who aren’t in fact Atheismplussers, like PZ and Rebecca and me).

Anyway – this idea of tearing apart is interesting. It seems like an odd thing for people who see themselves as involved in a movement to object to, because being involved in a movement also tears things apart. That’s the point of being in a movement. A movement about Keeping Everything Exactly the Same needn’t bother to be a movement. It … Read the rest

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So – Dave Silverman got his godless license plate after all. The New Jersey DMV backed down.

From the press release:

Cranford, NJ—As public backlash was growing, the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission reversed its decision on Wednesday, approving American Atheists President David Silverman’s application for custom license plates reading “ATHE1ST.”  American Atheists, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year, is a national non-profit dedicated to fighting discrimination against atheists.

On Monday, Silverman received a rejection email from the Commission concerning his application. It stated, “Reason for denial: Objectionable or Need Clarification.” When Silverman called to offer this clarification, he was told by a Commission official that his proposed plates were “offensive.”

“There was absolutely no reason that this plate

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From comments by quixote on First world phobias.

I’m a plant evolutionary biologist. The problem with the GMO debate is, as others have said, the conflation of many issues.
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1) The modification in approx. 75% of GM foods is RoundUp resistance. Both seed and RoundUp have to be bought from Monsanto, which strikes everybody who isn’t Monsanto as a conflict of interest. Result: besides chaining farmers to Monsanto, a whole mess of environmental issues, bad farming practices, etc., etc., etc. Triple-plus Ungood.
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2) The evidence is unclear on the transferability of the viral vectors used to introduce foreign genes to the target plants. The initial dogma was that lateral transfer was about as likely as being hit … Read the rest

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