The more I think about it, and read what other people have to say about it, the more I think “supernatural” is a meaningless word. That’s just another way of saying I’m a naturalist, I guess. I think the same thing about the word “god” or “gods” – I think that word brings a lot of excess baggage, and warps thinking about it from the outset. I kept stumbling on that in a discussion on a post of Jerry’s yesterday. Sigmund said

I suspect we will be unable to determine whether such evidence indicates a ‘God’ or a ‘God-like alien’.

And I thought, and said, what is the difference anyway?

Really – what is the difference? The … Read the rest

Jen McCreight said what’s wrong with Ms magazine’s blog post asking whether gnu atheism will make room for women. Jen did it, so I don’t need to. But I’ll go over some of the ground anyway, because I feel like it.

If you’ve been following the rise of so-called “New Atheism” movement, you may have noticed that it sure looks a lot like old religion. The individuals most commonly associated with contemporary atheism—Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett and Victor Stenger—are all male, white and, well, kinda old (69, 61, 68 and 75).

I have been following the rise of gnu atheism; I’ve even been participating in it, in my own small (but noisy) way; … Read the rest

The Freedom House report on blasphemy laws underlines the distinction between blasphemy and incitement.

There is an important distinction in international law between blasphemy—meaning critical, insulting, or offensive expression against religious doctrines, figures, and deities—and incitement—meaning expression that explicitly encourages and calls for hostility and violence. Of the two, only the latter appears to fit the limited circumstances in which restrictions on freedom of expression are considered acceptable.

Why is it the Telegraph that mentions such things? Where are the papers to the left of the Telegraph?

Nick Cohen is on the case.

Jon Stewart’s Rally for Sanity yesterday featured Yusuf Islam aka Cat Stevens singing “Peace Train”. Islam/Stevens previously showed his commitment to peace and sanity by saying that death was the appropriate punishment for Salman Rushdie’s “blasphemy”.

I’m hoping that Rushdie will drop a word to Stewart and Colbert and that they will say something – like perhaps that they didn’t realize that about Islam/Stevens and have no desire whatsoever to endorse fatwas on heretics or blasphemers or apostates.… Read the rest