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Richard Dawkins to Appear on Doctor Who
Ravalox writes "In an interview with The Independent, current curator of the Doctor Who legacy Russell T. Davis announced that distinguished evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins would be making an appearance in the new season of Doctor Who. To quote Davies: 'People were falling at his feet ... We've had Kylie Minogue on that set, but it was Dawkins people were worshipping.' Dawkins is the author of many best-selling non-fiction books, from The Selfish Gene and The Blind Watchmaker to The God Delusion, and a renowned advocate of both Darwin's evolutionary theory and the merits of atheism."
Mod me down if you think this is too far off topic, but does anyone else wonder how much Dawkins' popularity (as related by Davies) applies specifically to the Who audience and others like it?
I can't imagine the average person would get excited over the guy if he appeared on an episode of Friends or Deal or No Deal.
Luckily Mr. Dawkins seems to know his audience, and the Who fans' natural tendency towards the geekier, more analytical side of the human personality spectrum makes his appearance on the show a stroke of publicity genius.
That someone can be famous in the 21st century for being an "advocate of Darwin's evolutionary theory".
sic transit gloria mundi
Most atheists are aware that you can't prove the absence of God, anymore than you can prove his presence.
So most atheists could be called agnostics, but we are as agnostic about the Christian Yahweh, as we are about Thor or Shiva.
So yes we are technically agnostics, but that may confuse us with those who actually give some credibility to these superstitions.
Almost all atheists, are saying "There is no (credible reason to believe there is a) God"
Remember, Atheism is "Free of Theism", not "God does not exist"
This is NOT a signature.
They mock theists for their faith, but there's certainly no way to prove that there's not a god, so aren't they also believing in something independent of scientific proof?
What a novel and exciting argument, no one's thought of that before!
Theism and agnosticism are orthogonal (as the kids say) concepts. Most atheists are agnostic, most theists are gnostic (not to be confused with Gnostic). There are some gnostic atheists out there, but not many - like you say, it's a hard position to end up in.
sic transit gloria mundi
It's because of Occam's razor. Theism posits that a God or Gods exist(s). However, observable evidence doesn't necessitate that one exist; that is, a God is an 'extra', if you will, there's no phenomena that cannot be explained without the existence of a God. As such, the principle of Occam's razor - do not make theories more complicated than necessary - eliminates the existence of a God, because the world is simpler without one. This leaves atheism as the remaining scientific theory. Another way of thinking about this is that all parts of scientific thought have doubt inherently as a part of them, not just ones surrounding God. So, atheism and agnosticism are essentially equivalent - few atheists would argue that they can prove that there is no God.
There is also no way to disprove that the universe was created by a tea pot orbiting Venus. There is no readily available tool to scientifically disprove that.
We atheists simply think that it is plain silly to believe in the tea pot because some ancient scrolls written by some guru says so. Now, if someone were to find the tea pot, or any trace of it, it would be interesting.
Victims of 9/11: <3000. Traffic in the US: >30,000/y
Part of the idea is such that, most of the mono-theists think God is really all about them. God is so they can justify what they want. It justifies the suppression of the rights of minorities, It justifies the abuse of women, and children.
Its a little bit selfish to think that you matter so much to the creator of the universe, if there is such a thing, that he cares about small pointless things, that Humanity and its Earth somehow hold some special place in the cosmos. If there is a "First one." does it not stand to reason that we really wouldn't matter?
For example. Christians argue against abortion. but that has nothing to do with God really. It has everything to do with Muslims not outnumbering Christians because of population control.
Its even more self centered to think that a creator of the Universe would want to entertain or torment us until the end of time. Thats completely and utterly pointless.
You see where I'm going with this? its a Huge huge universe. Human beings are small, insignificant. The creator of the universe if he exists wouldn't blink twice at what Humans care about.
Theists are not more socially adapted to survival. Quite the opposite. The rational survive in an emergency. The religious panic and pray, and as a result die. As a result of religion, we have county school boards embroiled over "intelligent design." We have propoganda that claims that Evolution is completely random. We have politicians telling students that condoms don't work (They can break/tear but thats different.)and as a result STDs are rampant. Religion is a mad house that delights in psychotic behavior of all kinds. Its a cauldron and opiate.
i\hbar\dot{\psi}=\hat{H}\psi
That's disingenuous: He was rejected because he stated that he would be compelled to force his religiously based views on others -- it had nothing to do with him being Catholic.
This is a fallacy. You positively do not have to be understand very much about Norse mythology to realize that's it's a silly belief system. The same applies to other gods.
HAND.
"But he's only famous/infamous for his atheism"
Yeah right, and Hawkings is only famous for his wheelchair.
"Theists do better in society"
Which society? - India for instance has at least twice as many polytheists as the entire population of the US.
And did you exchange a walk on part in the war for a lead role in a cage? - Pink Floyd.
There is no distinction at all between any fictional beings, except perhaps that deities happen to be less likely to exist than unicorns. With the unicorn, the FSM, or the yet unseen sub-atomic particle you only need to admit (as a skeptic) that you cannot prove or say much about it, since no evidence for the positivity of it's existence has been shown.*
.22 that religion cannot win.
With gods and such, particularly the monotheist version,you just have to sit back and ponder on the entire scheme of the religion at hand to see how bizarre the underlying philosophy is. People think it's the tenets of faith/the law that makes religion un-likable, but that's not really it. I would be willing to accept any of that, but it is the "god" bit itself that is disgusting. Thousands of religions, each thinking they are "right", the others are wrong, their god is the Truth, all of them required of "believe" that. All of them expected to live and die by those respective "beliefs", those "leaps of faith" that become a microcosm of existence for each, sending them to the limits of insane behavior. And all of them not recognizing that it is their respective god that is responsible for this sick scenario, assuming we forget everything we know about physics and the dynamics of the world. Islam, the most philosophically advanced theology of the monotheist faiths(abstract god, non-deification of humans including prophets..etc), had its second Caliph arrest and kill anyone who talked about destiny/determinism debate. He had good reason to do so. The only gods that are not six-year-old in mentality happen to be the ones that do not "want" you to do things.... they sidestep the philosophical debate entirely. And by doing so, they warrant no attention from us as well - i.e the only sensible gods do not matter. It's a catch
Religion is a simplistic, silly idea that has no place in the free world of today. We have strong instincts for it, sadly, but I hope one day we no longer need them to emotionally survive. The world is beautiful without deities. Let's grow up and forget about them.
* This is in contrast to mathematical logic, where you can indeed make statements about provability, both negative (there does not exist...) and positive(there exists...).
I never really understood atheism anyway. They mock theists for their faith, but there's certainly no way to prove that there's not a god
July, 1998
A juror in Judge Esmond Faulks' court in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, eagerly asked the judge for the defendant's date of birth so he could draw up a star chart to help him decide the case. He was removed.
There ya go. Presuming that you agree it was *appropriate* to forcibly eject that juror, presuming you consider that juror mockable and perhaps even a dangerous loony-toon, now you completely understand atheism.
To elaborate, probably half the other people on the jury read their horoscopes during lunch. Silly, irrational, but Mostly Harmless entertainment value so long as they don't take it seriously and start fucking over other people based upon their faith in magical messages from the sky.
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- - You can't take something off the Internet! That's like trying to take pee out of a swimming pool.
It's not an important distinction because the set of all possible Gods is infinite, but Theists rarely believe that any kind of a God exists, they believe in their specific flavour. Jehovah, Allah, Zeus, Osiris, Freya, Thor, Ahulane ... there's no specific evidence to support the existence of any of them.
Likewise when you look in detail at the behaviour of the universe and physics, there's no need for a God of any kind to keep it all running. Whether there was a need for a God to start it all 13.7 billion years ago is irrelevant today.
For all his putative omnipresence, God is as elusive as the Unicorn. There's no more reason to believe in any God than there is to believe in Unicorns.
IMO, that's the *only* viable option. On one extreme, no one can prove that no gods exist. On the other, if you lower your standards of evidence to accept one religious claim, you have to accept them all (or else be hypocritical about it). So the only options are ordinary atheism (as in "I don't believe anyones religious myths") and self-delusion.
FWIW, 'agnostic' seems to have come into use due to a shift in the popular meaning of 'atheist'. Acording to Wictionary, the term didn't even exist before 1870. If people would try to quit reading more into a-theism than the word actually suggests, we wouldn't need a term for the neutral category.
But in excessively religious societies like ours, people tend to interpret atheism as yet another competing claim, rather than merely a rejection of other people's claims. For me, atheism isn't a religious belief; it's a *lack* of religious beliefs. I suppose you could call it "a belief", but only in the same sense that my lack of any particular reason to believe in Bigfoot is "a belief" about Bigfoot.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Some people (like Dawkins) don't accept that and call themselves agnostic, but it's just intellectual and they're really atheists.. their world would be shattered completely if they learned that they were wrong. Agnosticism isn't just some technicality, it's a completely different way of thinking.
;-)
How's that? I'm pretty much in the same field myself, thinking the whole thing is a lot of hogwash.
However, if one of the gods decided to actually show up and do some, you know, godly stuff, and I'm not talking the ambiguous kind but serious, honest-to-whatever god stuff, heck, I'd be cool with that. Assuming he/she/it doesn't mind being poked by scientists for a bit anyway
Obviously that would take out the whole "belief" part though...
People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.
Atheists come out? Hardly! Reading all the replies to this article, I think the ratio was about 100:1 atheist to theist. On Slash, atheists rule the roost. So, actually, I'm going to come out as a theist.
Hi! I'm not scary, I swear! I don't think you're going to hell, as long as you're nice (i.e. I believe in the idea of the anonymous christian). I believe very strongly in evolution, and I think gays are perfect just the way God made them. However, I am very much a Christian. I have a calling in life, God has given me a task, and I need to follow it. Jesus died for my sins, and- I believe- yours too. He loves us, and when we sin it pisses him off. I don't feel smug, and I think of atheists as my brothers and sisters; we're all in this together. So please, please, please, you guys, don't talk about my religion like it's evil. Sure, when religion gets mixed up with politics it's a terrible mess (viz. Bush/Khameni) and it's caused a lot of problems in the past. Sure, there are a tonne of idiots in my church, and in others, who believe that you're all evil, and so are all the gays, and the Jews, and the Muslim. Sorry some of my people have tried to convert you. Sorry they don't look at science and realize the immense beauty of the way in which God has chosen to bring us into being. Sorry they've killed some of you for your beliefs.
What more can I apologize for? What can I possibly say to make you accept that I know we've done wrong? All I can say is this: when you deride religion, when you say it's "the opiate of the masses" or "the cyanide" as someone else put it, when you mock me for my beliefs, and when you brand me as some fundamentalist nutjob, it really, really hurts. It's not fair to me. It stereotypes, and it shows the same kind of logic that fundamentalists use. If you said "all blacks are criminals, they should go back to Africa", or "homosexuals are girly, they should all just be straight like me" you'd have everyone on your back, berating you for your insensitivity. It's the same thing with theists. Respect us, please, we have the right to practice our faith in peace. And if the fundy brigade comes with their wacko wagon and starts telling you that you're going to hell, and trying to shove a bible down your throat, I'll be right next to you, fighting those assholes off.
The King said to the Priest: "You keep 'em stupid! I'll keep 'em poor!"
We (you Americans, rather) don't have Kings anymore, but "Business" will do just as well.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
"If one of the gods decided to actually show up and do some, you know, godly stuff". I refer you to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Granted, you may not wish to believe the event or the accounts, but it is a central claim of Christianity that God has involved himself directly and personally in the world.
I don't really care who he invites as guest stars, as long as he keeps his hands off the Dr Who legacy. When Torchwood was first announced, I had high hopes. An adult version of Dr Who? Bring it on! As it turned out, Torchwood was Dr Who without the humor, and plus an agenda. The end result was, IMO, rubbish.
So, is Dawkins a decent actor? References to evolution had better be along these lines. Dr Who is not the place for a lecture.
Which is ironic since the only argument anyone can put forward for a specific sort of god consists entirely of quoting other people and no, it's not very convicing at all.
I used to but I don't any more.
His early books were great, they were all about science and how you didn't really need god or fairies or any of that nonsense - and you would say 'Oh yeah' I see where you are going with that, that's really cool.
His latest book (the god delusion) seems to be just an invective against people who believe in god and I didn't like it.
I find he is becoming more a self-appointed spokesman for atheists (a priest, if you will) - and is presenting just the one point of view (dogma), in exactly the same way the various churches do.
In fact, as scientist, I find atheism in general to be more and more repulsive to scientific thinking - in that it rejects without proof any possibility of gods, fairies etc rather than just rejecting the theories as unproven - I suppose that makes me an agnostic now. Oh well.
Genesis 1:32 And God typed
We are all atheists, unless you hapeen to believe in all the 1000s of gods out there. You may just be a theist in one god, and atheist about the rest.
If this seems like a reasonable way to be, then you are delusional.
...On the other hand there are many people who claim to have experienced God, in many different times and cultures, some have written about their experiences, some are happy to talk about what they experienced. etc. Many of these people are reliable witnesses (e.g. you would probably quite happily accept their evidence in court), who are sceptical about evidence in many areas, and who have put a great deal of thought into whether their experiences were genuine of delusional. For the word God in the above paragraph you can so easily substitute the words 'Alien Abduction' or 'Ghosts' or 'The Devil' or many other subjects that are liable to appear in the pages of the Fortean Times....oh, and yo momma's so fat, her Schwarzchild radius is visible to the naked eye.
All the same, it's not accurate to say that Social Darwinism is an abuse of the theory.
It absolutely definitely is.
It is well known that many species of evolved to form communities of co-operatively behaving individuals. That made their whole communities, or entire species more likely to survive while they competed with other communities and species (remember, in evolution it doesn't matter which individuals, or all of them, survive and produce offspring -- what matters is which genes do they mostly pass to the next generation), and both humans and insects are examples of this very mechanism.
With insects' colonies it's obvious because colonies are composed mostly of clones -- worker bee can never produce an offspring by herself, but a queen (who has the same genes as workers) can if worker bees are successful in supporting the hive, so successful worker bee promotes passing her genes by supporting the survival of queen and offspring, competing with other hives or other species of insects.
With humans the collective nature of all activities involved in survival (hunting, agriculture, building of shelters, development of technology, medicine), and combination of long lifetime and a tradition of having stable families, places a hostile, aggressive individual that is ready to rip throats from everyone he meets including other humans, at a huge disadvantage compared to the rest of society, so humans ended up much less naturally aggressive than most of animals -- even less than animals that perform some activities collectively (hunting, migration) but remain highly competitive against each other within the same species.
Therefore a society that emphasizes co-operation between humans is actually a result of evolution, and "Social Darwinism" goes against the mechanism that humans developed over their evolution -- it promotes development of society that is hurting its own survival by wasting resources and shutting out individuals depriving others from use of their abilities in collective activities.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Then you are not a Christian. See Matthew 25:41.
I think gays are perfect just the way God made themThen you are not a Christian. See 1 Corinthians 6:9
You may think you are a Christian, but you are clearly a heretic who preaches that some of your Bible's most clearly laid out laws can be ignored.
**TODO** Steal someone elses sig.