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Christopher Hitchens Dies At 62
An anonymous reader sends this quote from the NY Times:
"Christopher Hitchens, a slashing polemicist in the tradition of Thomas Paine and George Orwell who trained his sights on targets as various as Henry Kissinger, the British monarchy and Mother Teresa, wrote a best-seller attacking religious belief, and dismayed his former comrades on the left by enthusiastically supporting the American-led war in Iraq, died Thursday at the M. D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. He was 62. He took pains to emphasize that he had not revised his position on atheism, articulated in his best-selling 2007 book, God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, although he did express amused appreciation at the hope, among some concerned Christians, that he might undergo a late-life conversion. Mr. Hitchens's latest collection of writings, Arguably: Essays, published this year, has been a best-seller and ranked among the top 10 books of 2011 by The New York Times Book Review."
Among Greeks, probably best known for one of his less-blockbuster books, 1997's The Parthenon Marbles: The Case for Reunification .
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Well he had kids, so not exactly...
Any religion that promotes supernaturalism or offers mythology as a substitute for reality is bad.
That takes almost every religion out of the equation. About the only thing left is a few schools of Zen Buddhism, and most people call that a philosophy, not a religion.
If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
I remember a reviewer observing that Christopher Hitchens writes books faster than most people read. I suspect that was true.
Oh, yeah, it's not easy to pad these out to 120 characters.
I come to slashdot hoping to read some great comments about Hitchens and the first post i see moded up is someone being an religious apologist? Hitchens was much more than his atheism. Much much more. What a disgrace mods.. seriously.
Nonsense. All religions are bad. Even Buddhism has its extremists (Google for examples.)
The problem is that any philosophy that claims to have a God-given truth inevitably turns evil because you can't question God-given truth. When you can't question beliefs, you can't hold believers accountable and corruption sets in.
Hitchens himself criticized Buddhism in "God is not Great". You should read that book.
Surely he only finds out if he was wrong.
I think you've confused "atheism" with "puritanism". Easy mistake to make, I'm sure.
To quote Farscape, specifically Noranti answering the question "Do religions hate each other where you come from?":
"Oh, good heavens no. Religions are grand lofty ideals. Religious followers, now that's another story."
Religion is like just about anything else. It can be used for good (e.g. helping the poor) or for evil (e.g. killing "heathens" who won't convert). In both cases, the credit or blame should go to the person doing the actions, not the religion itself.
My sci-fi novel, Ghost Thief, is now available from Amazon.com.
You are so right...atheism was such a small part of what he wrote and spoke about. It certainly was the topic that sold tickets and books, but he commented and wrote about nearly every topic related to culture and civilization. Love him or hate him, he was always interesting and thought-provoking.
"We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers." Carl Sagan
I don't really understand your comment. Not believing in an afterlife, one should try to enjoy real life. His attitude (whether well-founded or not) was that he did that. I think you've been misguided on the way atheists think.
Not to mention the implication that those who believe in the afterlife would think, "I can shorten my life as much as I want".
--
Person 1: There are bad aspects to X.
Person 2: No! Here is a good aspect to X!
--
The whole "be nice to people" is a small part of Christianity. Furthermore, it is not in any way necessary to have Christianity (or any religion at all) to want to "be nice to people". While Christianity might implore you to be nice, it also carries with it severe baggage; homophobia, misogyny, intolerance, and fear. Seriously; if you told your child that you were going to throw her in the furnace for being bad, it would be child abuse; tell your child that God will throw her in a furnace for all eternity and all of a sudden it's OK. Christianity is a festering sore on our moral development, the sooner we can be rid of it, the better. I will close by passing on Hitch's legacy in the form of a question that he was fond of asking believers: Name one good, moral action that could not have been conceived of by a person of no faith. Tough question, right? Ok, here's an easier one: Name me one wicked action that was committed in the name of religion. Chew on that one for a little bit, and the cognitive dissonance might wake you up from your intellectual coma.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Idiocy fell on his watch.
We all know that Hitch
was nobody's bitch,
so let's thank him by raising a scotch.
Skeptical Limericks
Even at that, Zen Buddhism has been used to justify a great deal of nastiness; off the top of my head I can tell you that, despite being nominally Shinto, the army of the Empire of Japan was heavily influenced by Zen Buddhism. The whole kamikaze thing, while nowhere near as widespread as some would have you believe, was nevertheless directly influenced by the teachings of Zen Buddhism.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Christopher Hitchens, you were a gentleman and a scholar. You will be missed dearly.
You were a rare man. Thank you.
Years later, a doctor will tell me that I have an I.Q. of 48, and am what some people call "mentally retarded".
I'm not sure if you're serious or trolling, but I'll assume serious. Are you implying that a theist who believes in an afterlife would be more cavalier with their physical health since they consider life on Earth as merely a speed bump on the trip to eternal salvation? I know that holds true for many evangelicals with regard to our natural resources and the health of the planet (("F**k the earth, god gave it to us to rape and pillage so don't complain to me about my Hummer!"), but most religious people I know are generally not smokers and drinkers.
Why would an atheist avoid physical (guilty) pleasures like drinking or smoking? Would a longer, more boring life be preferable to a shorter, exciting, experience-filled existence? I would say the more surprising thing about the fact that he drank and smoked is that he is knowledgeable about the scientific body of evidence related to the detrimental health effects. He made an informed decision to spend what he knew was a finite existence doing things that gave him pleasure rather than squandering that time twiddling his thumbs.
"We make our world significant by the courage of our questions and by the depth of our answers." Carl Sagan
Slashdot has always taken at least a partial interest in the wider world, with many articles on the technological or social angles of events. Hitchens often spoke about such events, and you might regard the linking as abstract or tenuous, but others will not. Technology is often cited as being part of a wider movement that unleashes forces for good, and unbinds people from tryannical and oppressed lives. Hitchens nominally shared *and* very publicly worked for the same thing.
Its only right such a man is noted. The fact it made slashdot is all the better.
We`re all equal
Basically all the Republicans except for Ron Paul last night in the debate were frothing at the mouth and chomping at the bit to bomb some Muslims.
Because over 1 billion people are our enemy and we are going to go to Holy War with them because the Dominionsts like Bachmann, Perry, et alia, believe it's necessary.
Or some such nonsense.
Goddamn, these people are fucking dangerous.
--
BMO "I believe in peace, bitch" - Tori Amos
Whether or not you agree with his stance on the Iraq War, it is a grotesque oversimplification to say that he was a shameless shill. His views on the war were extremely well reasoned and definitely worth listening to; differentiating him from the brainless talking heads on Fox News. While I never happened to agree with his stance on the war, I always found his thoughts on it to be extremely informative, thought-provoking, and challenging. This man was there, he saw what was really happening. He went out of his way to seek out and confront totalitarianism throughout his career. For you to sit back from the comfort of your parent's basement and say that he can rot in Hell for expressing an opinion that is different from yours is disgusting and shameful. Fuck you, and fuck the people who modded you up.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Hitchen's criticisms of all religions primarily boils down to their impacts as a whole to large portions of society, and how the larger defined body of Buddhism in the world is just as bad as Christianity. There are so called Buddhist sects are just as intolerant and violent as Christian ones, and ask their followers to cast off thought and reason and simply listen to their teachings. It's this abandoning of reason that's the problem with religion, and while one might define that for an individual person religion was good... for example, Jesus was a good guy who did good things and was better for his beliefs... but for society as a whole, religion has had negative impacts and is used for evil and hypocritical purposes. The Abrahamic religions do this far more efficiently than Hinduism and Buddhism but the latter are not, as a whole, innocent religions.
And that's not to mention the supernatural. Emphasizing the supernatural over reason is immediately a problem because it leads to be people not questioning the supernatural and simply accepting it.
I could find you a sect of Christianity that is equivalent to Theravada Buddhism, but there is a fine line between philosophy and religion. There's also a fine line between humanism and a well thought out philosophy that emphasizes reason. Where you want to draw the line is another debate entirely, but using Theravada Buddhism as a way to counter Hitchen's argument about religion is equivalent to using an anecdote to counteract statistical evidence. Invariable, as religions grow and spread they are twisted and used for evil and force people to abandon reason. Some smaller religions and philosophies emphasize reason, but the moment you put reason below anything else, you open up people to the principle that at some point, they are allowed to stop thinking for themselves.
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
Yes but it is the wrong question. This question is asking if religious persons are morally superior to non-religious persons. I have often heard that claim but I don't believe it is true, nor it is relevant to me. The relevant question in my view is, "Name one good, moral action you took that was motivated by religious belief, that you would not otherwise have done." In other words, ask not whether religion makes "people" more ethical, ask whether religion makes me more ethical. And BTW that is very easy to answer.
And name one wicked action committed in opposition to religion. Also easy.
I hope there is more to Hitchens' book than that. Very likely. Frankly as a religious person myself I am interested in reading it. I believe it was Aristotle who said the unexamined life is not worth living. Answering questions like these is in my opinion good for anyone's moral development, whether they prefer a religious or humanist approach.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
I'm not condemning Hitchens for having an opinion that's different than mine. I'm condemning Hitchens for promoting a war that's left at least a hundred thousand civilians dead.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
I know you are a troll, but I see this idiotic point made often enough, and I feel that there are enough non-trolls on /. who hold similar views that I would like to address it. While I am sure there exist atheists who want to attack religious freedom, 99.999% of what religious nut-jobs call attacks on religious freedoms are really just a defense of secularism, which is the source of ALL religious freedom.
It is NOT infringing on your religious freedom to abolish a National Day of Prayer, it is simply re-establishing a secular government, which is the only type of government that can truly defend religious freedom. The same goes for getting organized prayer out of school or trying to get "Under God" out of the pledge.
The point it, nobody has the "freedom" to subject others to their point of view. You would not like it if we did it to you, and thankfully, we are not. We are not trying to get the schools to teach that there is no God. We aren't trying to get "Under God" replaced with "Under No God". We simply want the establishment to stop infringing on OUR religious freedom, or more specifically, our freedom to choose not to have a religion.
Is that really so much to ask? I mean, sure, I know that there will be a whole lot more atheists if we take religion out of the public sphere a bit, but what does that say about your cause? People stop believing it if it's not shoved down their throats 24/7? This is a tired, destructive meme that needs to be taken out back, shot, burned, and turned into fertilizer.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Evil? What do you mean by that?
Evil implies harming, oppressing, and killing others. Some evil creatures simply have no compassion for others and kill without qualms if doing so is convenient or if it can be set up. Others actively pursue evil, killing for sport or out of duty to some malevolent deity or master.
I think someone needs to re-read Leviticus. Yahweh most certainly hates homosexuals.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
Are you fucking kidding me? You don't think that we have any innate sense of right and wrong? You don't think that we have any sense of solidarity with one another? Are you really willing to debase yourself that thoroughly? The fact that we don't have perfect, clean cut, black and white answers to every moral question is no proof against this; that is simply NOT how reality works! You have provided a perfect example of the destructive effect that religion has on our collective consciousness; this sort of binary, black and white, good and evil thinking is what causes the religious to make such bad decisions that are antithetical to reality. In real life, the vast majority of moral decisions are gray and murky, mired in context and implications. I think we can, however, all agree that when religion is given the only say, that the results are uniformly horrifying.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
I think it is nice that you brought up Dominionism*. Is is a movement that Christians as a whole are either willfully ignorant of or manipulated to the point that they are forced to agree, with the stakes being their own souls. Not looking this movement in the eye is modern American Christendom's single greatest failure; they allowed fascists to sneak in and pervert their highest ideals.
*For those not familiar with it, Dominionism, it is derived from a passage in Genesis: "and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."
There is even a Dominion Church that actively advocates, very literally, world domination. Yes, the Evil Genius world domination. Many of these churches require that you walk through their book store before entering and exiting the sanctuary (at least in the two I have been in), making it the "Cracker Barrel Restaurant and Old Country Store" of Christendom. They even ask business owners to join their Dominion Business Network. In a couple US cities you'll find yourself driving past a Dominion Carwash, Dominion Title Loan and Dominion Fried Chicken, all business network members who are obligated to send non-taxable donations for inclusion in the Business Network Directory (I'd love to know if it also covers any licensing fees for use of the Dominion name).
What do you mean, "you can't question God-given truth", specifically?
I mean this, specifically: Extremists who believe they have God-given truth will take all kinds of nasty actions up to and including genocide to silence those who question them or disagree with them. I also mean this: Any religion which claims to have some sort of God-given truth will inevitably spawn extemists. That's simply a fact of human nature.
So although you might argue that religion itself is not the problem (extremists are), I disagree. Religion itself is like a loaded handgun left lying around. It's a danger in and of itself because it will inevitably be used for evil.
Right.... except that it isn't hard at all to find that different people have interpreted it differently. A quick google search will bring up some interesting articles on the topic. Interesting if you find biblical interpretation debate interesting. I usually attribute my interest to the sort of bemused fascination that comes from having been an atheist who went to catholic schools...
The main quote on the topic is:
Some bibles have reinterpreted this to "Homosexuality is a sin", which would include lesbian acts, etc. Clearly thats a debatable stretch, but, before even debating that part, arguments about the context of the statement lead to different conclusions:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/hom_bibh4.htm
Under that interpretation, its kind of hard to use that as a condemnation of all gay sex.
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
He specifically said he would have no last minute conversion, so no he did not wager ... ..the religious nuts will claim he did anyway ...
Puteulanus fenestra mortis
It's not your metaphysics, it's that you're an asshole. The difference should be clear.
The distinction between the sinner (who God loves) and the sin (that is unacceptable to God) is made quite clear in the New Testament. The Bible does not say that God hates homosexuals. The Bible states that homosexual behavior is sin, along with sex before marriage, failure to respect your parents, and witchcraft, among other things. God hates sin because it separates him from his creation, which he loves.
It should be pointed out that CHRISTian means a follower of Christ, not an adherent to the old Jewish law.
I'm agnostic, but I grew up Evangelical Christian and I went through two years of bible college classes while in high school.
I'm pretty familiar with the Bible and its teachings, and I can categorically say that anyone who claims that God hates any particular category of sinner is not following the teachings of Christ, and therefore is not a Christian.
That said, bastardized christianity HAS been the rationalization for a horrifying litany of evil.
I would argue that this is more because of its ready availability as an excuse that everyone would accept than its inherent aptitude.
Any system of belief can and will be perverted by those seeking personal power.
RUGBYRUGBYRUGBY
This question is asking if religious persons are morally superior to non-religious persons. I have often heard that claim but I don't believe it is true
There is a strong argument to the opposite -- a person that performs moral acts out of fear of personal punishment (hell) or expecting a personal reward (heaven) is morally inferior.
Until he got cancer. Sorry anyone gets cancer, but I wonder if he "found god" before he passed away. For his sake, I hope he made peace with god.
Why would he "make peace" with something he didn't believe in? On top of that, which god do you mean?
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
Name me one wicked action that was committed in the name of religion.
I can't name one wicked action but I can name several.
How about The Crusades (1095-1291) which were primarily against the Muslims but also triggered increased persecution of Jews.
How about:
the Medieval Inquisition (1231-16th century)
the Spanish Inquisition (1478-1834)
the Portuguese Inquisition (1536-1821)
the Roman Inquisition (1542-c. 1860)
How about the numerous witch trials from the 15th to the 18th centuries.
Yeah, nothing wicked there.
Some of what I say is fact, some is conjecture, the rest I'm just blowing out my ass...you guess.
Yes. This is human nature. This is why when religion can have its go we are all subject to the innate moral sense of the clerics. This is why in Afghanistan girls have acid thrown in their faces for trying to get an education, and why witches were burned in the Middle Ages. This is why we all need to try to work together and try to balance all of our moral senses against one another, and find the best possible middle ground. It adds nothing to the situation to make a man-made work of fiction the ultimate moral arbiter for all of these matters. Nothing will change the fact that we are primates; we are not capable of perfectly logical or rational thought. We can, however, move forward by recognizing this and moving forward, rather than imposing a silly, barbaric code of conduct that was written by bronze-age goatherders.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
Pascals wager has a fallacy so huge I'm surprised you haven't tripped and fallen into it.
He misses the obvious -
What if the real god is Allah, Shiva, Zeus or Odin?
What if the real god is judging us on how rationally we behave in a godless, toy universe he created?
What if the real god hates worship and wants to be left alone?
What if...?
What if...?
Pascal presents the options that Christianity is right, or atheism is right. He misses an infinity of other possibilities, all as likely as christianity (i.e. unevidenced).
On top of which he also discards any idea that living under delusion in a godless universe may have downsides.
Pascal's wager is, to use the modern vernacular, a crock of shit.
This leads to the confusion between what the nutters are saying and what Christianity is really about.
So tell me, is the following represent what the "nutters" say or is it what Christianity is really about?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Why don't they just ask God to clarify?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Why would they be included? There's no dogma in atheism.
Dogma is the main problem: If religion holds that something is the absolute truth, any attempt of questioning it inevitably clashes with religious authority, and does so in a way that rational discourse is impossible. This both greatly retards moral progress, and gives people a way to justify evil actions by clinging to scripture.
The only way that moral progress happens in religious societies is by slowly and painfully inventing ways to work around scripture while still keeping it, by for instance coming up with some convoluted explanation of why a passage formerly thought to be completely serious is actually not for real, because it's an obsolete rule made for an old brutal society, or means something entirely different if you squint just right at it. But those things never disappear entirely, and always remain in existence for people to cling to when it validates their position on some issue.
And Hitler was a Catholic -- so what? Stalin and Mao are another thing entirely. While both were explicitly atheistic, they were both completely hostile to all notions of free-thought. While they both banned any other form of religion, it could be said that they in turn made themselves into gods. Free-thought is the key. While ridding ourselves of the shackles of religion is not sufficient to establishing a free thinking world, it is a necessary step.
To the haters: You can't win. If you mod me down, I shall become more powerful than you could possibly imagine
There's even a book, Zen at War by Brian Daizen Victoria specifically focused on how Zen influenced Japanese ideology for WWII.
I am officially gone from
Except that's not really how it works, because there is not a choice of religion on the one hand and not-religion on the other hand. Instead, there is a choice of either no religion or one from a large number of other religions. Or, as another wise man once said: there are no religious people, just two kinds of atheist. Some disbelieve all religions, some disbelieve all except one.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
So although you might argue that religion itself is not the problem (extremists are), I disagree. Religion itself is like a loaded handgun left lying around. It's a danger in and of itself because it will inevitably be used for evil.
i) You're foolish to disagree.
ii) Nutjobs can use anything to further their aims.
iii) A loaded handgun left lying around is just a loaded handgun left lying around. It's no more deadly than a book until its trigger is pulled, and that takes a someone to pull it.
I'm an atheist, but I don't ascribe inherent malevolence to inanimate objects (including religion), regardless of how little I appreciate them. "An idea is not responsible for those who hold it."
"Tongue tied and twisted, just an Earth bound misfit
He did, they call it Islam.
Then apparently he clarified even more, and they call that Mormonism.
It's a pity that God's definition of "clarity" seems to be the exact opposite of ours.
Not only that, if you follow Pascal's wager through to its logical conclusion, it leads to horrific actions.
Consider: it is of infinite benefit to die and go to heaven. Children who die with faith are guaranteed to go to heaven. Children who do not die have a non-zero chance of growing up and becoming godless atheists, which means that they will not go to heaven - which is, relatively, of zero benefit.
This means that allowing a faithful child to grow to maturity and, potentially, lose their faith is one of the worst things you could do; it is far better to kill them right now, in order to ensure their entry into heaven.
Therefore, if you accept Pascal's wager, you ought to kill your children right now; otherwise they might grow up and become atheists. Not only that, you ought to kill all the faithful children you can find, for exactly the same reason.
Of course, you won't be going to heaven yourself if you do this; but that's a small price to pay, if you save all those children at the same time.
You'd think the almighty creator of the heavens and the earth and everything that resides therein would be able to, y'know, get his book of rules right first time round. Wouldn't you?
C-x C-s C-x k
So what you are saying is that God needed to add Automatic Updates into religion?
Actually, I would prefer a changelog.
I call it 'The Aristocrats'
This is what I love about religious debates: No one can prove their position, so it all boils down to faith. Yes, even atheists profess a faith that there is no Supreme Being.
no, that's not true. we have to explain this to you again.
there is no notion or need of 'faith' to NOT engage in a practice. right now, I'm NOT swimming (for example). am I of a group called non-swimmers? I also don't believe in unicorns. I'm of the non-unicornists (local 707, in fact). uhuh.
to not believe in jesus, to not believe in odin, to not believe in zoroaster, why do you still want to group together people who do NOT engage in practices such as these?
its not 'faith' to not_believe. its an absense of a thing.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
This biblical passage is a stub. You can help Christianity by expanding it.
You might want to actually read his papers.
There is saying the the US should remove Saddam, and then there is the method to go about it.
He was not a fan of Bush's method.
And he didn't misrepresent any intelligence.
And his opinion can't really be called propagandist.
And I disagreed with his arguments, but lets not act like he is the guy who made the decisions.
Your argument needs to be balance against what the regime was doing at the time... not that you actual think about your argument.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
this reminds me of a debate I had with a Jehovah's Witness (normally I wouldn't, but she was cute, and I needed some eye candy at that time in my life). She was definitely set in her ways and me mine...
me: so how do you justify Dinosaurs? :I don't see how the age of the earth and belief in God have anything to do with one another, but ok...
her: the Devil put them there to deceive us on how old the world is
me: why would Satan do that? Seems like a total waste of time
her: to sway your belief
me
her: see? It has already swayed your belief
me: no it hasn't - I don't believe the world was made in 7 days either, but to me that is figurative
her: no, it's real
me: (shaking my head and looking up a verse in her Bible) hey - there's missing verse here, and this is strangely interpreted
her: there is nothing missing or incorrect in our Bible
me: so you're saying your mistranslation of a translation of a translation of a Bible doesn't have any mistakes?
her: it's not a mistranslation, God made sure our translation was perfect
me: so what is my Bible then?
her: a mistake.
The reason you won't come around and hurt us or kill us is because the Enlightenment thinkers, and in particular John Locke showed how to pull your fangs. We can only hope that it eventually catches on in many Muslim countries, too, because there are a good many Mullahs who need political/social castrating, just like the West did to all its fire-and-brimstone preachers.
The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.