Slashdot Mirror
Theologian Attempts Censorship After Losing Public Debate
RockDoctor writes "Theologian John Haught publicly debated prominent evolutionary scientist and atheist Jerry Coyne at the University of Kentucky back in October. Before the debate, both parties agreed to the debate being video-taped. Coyne is of the opinion that he convincingly won the debate over Haught. But we'll never know, because Haught, with the assistance of staff at the University of Kentucky, who sponsored the debate, is banning publication of the video of the event. They are even refusing to release the half of the debate containing Coyne's comments and questions."
A "literal interpretation of Genesis" tells the reader that God lied to Adam and Eve; punished them for disobedience; and then chose to throw them out because their disobedience had made them more like God, so they had to be prevented from living forever and becoming even more like God.
(Chapters 2 and 3, if you want to cross-check that for yourself.)
You really sure you want Genesis to be literally interpretable? Because it makes your God out to be evil, selfish and kinda insecure.
Ah, but you're all just ACs. Just trolling, I guess, rather than interested in learning any new truths. For everyone else reading this, I thought I'd include a standard rejoinder about the nature of scientific 'proof', just in case.
When one does not have proof, one need not avoid any conclusions; evidence is sufficient. Most of the evidence suggests that there is no imaginary friend; all of the evidence otherwise is provided by anecdote, fallacy, fraud, or fiction. There is evidence that his friend is imaginary, in one sense of the word. There are indicators in the brain that are associated with religious activity; literally faith is all in your head.
I'll believe in god when there is more evidence in favor of its existence than there is against it. I won't do it because some random clown on the the street with a bullhorn (or on the Internet) yells about it. That isn't evidence. You believe; too bad for you. If I knew more about you, I might even be able to explain why you believe (probably because you were raised with the notion of god as a child, but perhaps not). But your belief is not evidence.
See? An open mind that evaluates evidence and comes to a conclusion using the best data available. That's how you have to deal with the scientific worldview.
It's not simpler because now you have to explain:
Who is god?
Why did he make the world?
Why 7 days?
What made god?
That last one is important, because whatever your answer just was, could probably be applied to the original question.
Life is too short to proofread.
If he'd just let this public debate be viewed by the public, we wouldn't have to assume anything. We could make our own conclusions. If he's going to great lengths to hide it, we're going to assume the worst. It's a pretty big leap of logic to assume that everything was all unicorns and flowerbeds when he's flipping out about it like he is.
As I noted on the web site, this is likely actionable by Coyne.
He expended time and effort to prepare for and engage in the debate with a justified expectation of having the video posted. An agreement, with consideration given. Sounds actionable to me. Haught should be made to deliver on the agreement, or give compensation.
What made god?
The typical response is that God is eternal, but if you are willing to believe that then why not simply believe that the universe itself is eternal?
You only have to look at the world to see how ridiculous the Christian notion of God is. Imagine you were a student living on campus. Your room is cold and damp, the heating is broken, the mattress has springs poking out, mud comes out the taps, there are large cracks in the windows. You ask faculty staff if the landlord can do something about it, and they tell you "Yes, he is well aware of the situation and could fix everything with the wave of a hand. And most of all he loves you, he wants you to have a good life. Thing is he doesn't get involved directly, you have to fix everything yourself. If you keep texting him he might offer some words of encouragement, but you still have to do all the work."
You sigh and spend months cleaning, fixing and tidying the place, making it liveable and saving yourself from hypothermia. Just as you are re-painting the last damp stained corner the faculty staff member turns up again and says "Wow, you must be thankful that the landlord provided all this stuff and helped you with all this work by sending ambiguously worded emails to us. You didn't get cc'ed in? Well, take our word for it, none of this would have been possible without his support. Don't forget to thank him if you don't want to spend your post-student life flipping burgers for eternity."
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC