There are a few nationally known Republicans I like. Jon Huntsman is one of them.
Filed under: Misc | Tagged: Jon Huntsman, Thought of the day | Leave a comment »
Jesse Bering update
Posted on September 16, 2012 by Michael
As I said I would, I am posting an update to my post about Jesse Bering, psychologist. Bering wrote about circumcision a few weeks ago and linked back to me:
One can either listen to outspoken atheist bloggers who can’t seem to understand that this is no longer a religious or cultural issue, the overwrought intactivists attempting to intimidate new parents through strong rhetoric and graphic images of botched circumcisions, the endless stream of nosy polemical parents who are happy to share their judgmental attitudes, or one can take the advice of those who, you know, actually know what the hell they’re talking about.
There was some confusion over this for at least two reasons. First, Bering did not do his research to find out that “outspoken atheist blogger” is exactly what I am. His reference was intended for the subject of my post, PZ Myers, but that was far from clear given his writing style and lack of fact gathering. It would be as if he wrote about another psychologist and I linked to his post saying, “Well, you can listen to this dumb psychologist or you can…” No one would have any idea which psychologist I meant. He did the equivalent of introducing a pronoun without first telling us what the noun was.
Second, my post did not even come remotely close to supporting Bering’s contention about PZ. We both think PZ is wrong to deny the science behind the efficacy of circumcision, but Bering also believes that PZ can’t get beyond the issue being one of religion and culture. At no point did my post say anything about PZ’s views on those two things. I solely talked about his denial of the science. If Bering wishes to make his independent conclusion, he needs to find another source. (Linking straight to something PZ has written might be one crazy place to start.)
At any rate, on multiple occasions I have asked Bering to either change the wording of his link to reflect who he was actually referencing or to simply not link to me. I would prefer the second option since my post doesn’t even support his contention – he really is not a careful reader. Unfortunately, he appears to be a rather stubborn man, so I have taken the only action I can and added this to the beginning of the post to which he links:
Update: This post has received a pingback from Jesse Bering. It does not support the contention he makes, nor does he make it clear which “outspoken atheist blogger” he means (me or PZ). I have asked him to correct his obvious error, but he refuses.
You know, I would have given some thought to reading what Bering has to say on circumcision in the books he has written, but he has made it abundantly clear that honest, clear writing isn’t his concern.
Filed under: Blogging | Tagged: Jesse Bering | Leave a comment »
Fun fact of the day
Posted on September 16, 2012 by Michael
About 50 million years ago, the area that is now known as Egypt was covered with an ancient sea. At the bottom of this sea were nummulites, a genus of small seashells made of calcium and carbon. Over millions of years, these creatures would die and stack up on the ocean floor, eventually creating limestone. Fast forward to human civilization and we see this:
This image comes from a limestone quarry near Cairo – the same sort of quarry that the ancient Egyptians used to build the pyramids and other structures of that great civilization. In other words, there is a homogenous mix of fossils that can be found all throughout one of the 7 Great Wonders of the World; the Egyptians owe much of their incredible accomplishments to deposits laid down by dying marine creatures over 50 million years ago.
Filed under: Misc, Science | Tagged: Egypt, Fun fact of the day, Nummulites, Nummullites gizehensis | Leave a comment »
Doctor arrested for child pornography; no extensive organization comes to his defense
Posted on September 13, 2012 by Michael
A doctor in Boston has been arrested for receiving child pornography:
A search of Richard Keller’s home turned up more than 500 photographs and as many as 100 DVDs full of pornography, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Boston said in a statement. An associated complaint described the content of some of the DVDs, which mostly featured young boys in a variety of situations.
The complaint noted that on multiple occasions, orders for pornographic DVDs were delivered directly to the Isham Health Center on Phillips’ grounds.
Keller, 56, was medical director of Phillips for 19 years, ending in 2011. A prestigious boarding school that dates to the 1780s, it counts both former presidents Bush among its graduates.
Interestingly, and in contrast to the Catholic priests, no extensive or prominent organization has come to the defense of Keller. No one is getting up and standing in front of this man, defiant to the charges against him. The only people who will be defending Keller are those he hires and, perhaps, close family and friends.
Weird how things work in the normal world, huh?
Filed under: Religions | Tagged: Catholic Church, Richard Keller | 1 Comment »
In which I agree with Nate
Posted on September 12, 2012 by Michael
Every once in awhile Nate and I will agree on something. Most often that something is beer, but sometimes that something is more political/social in nature:
I saw this on Facebook recently:
Aside from being completely devoid anything even like cleverness, I have a few issues…
First, I’m not interested in what any woman wants to do with her vagina. I may feel that abortion is wrong, I may feel that birth control is wrong, I might feel that abortion should be mandatory, or I may feel that birth control should be, but really I feel like the state should keep it’s nose out of it and you can do whatever you want. Lets be clear on one thing though, I have just as much of a right to have an opinion and express it as you, whether or not either of us have a vagina or not. If you think otherwise you are either an asshole or an idiot.
If you truly think that the chart has it right, lets apply this to a few other things and see what we get:
Do you own a gun? No? Shut up about guns.
Do you own a car? No? Shut up about cars (texting, etc).
Do you have a kid in school? No? Shut up about education.
Do you live in (whatever state is restricting abortion this week)? No? Shut your mouth about their abortion laws.
Nate then makes his point more about when the government is involved with spending money on abortion and other services rather than about what a women should and should not be allowed to do under the law. I’m less concerned about that and more concerned about the idiocy of telling half the population that any opinions any of its members may hold are invalid on reproductive rights because they have a member. Let’s work this out.
Presumably the picture isn’t trying to imply that women’s opinions are inherently more valuable than the opinions of men. That would be horribly sexist and wrong. So what is it saying? (This is the point where I accurately describe what it is necessarily saying, only to have some random person on the Internet incorrectly nitpick.) It is saying that the reproductive rights of women are only the concern of women because we’re talking about their bodies; it is taking the libertarian position that one’s body is sovereign and should not be subject to the whims of others. That raises the interesting issue of whether or not a woman is allowed, under the rules of the picture, to have an opinion about other women’s reproductive rights, but I’ll skip that here because the point that interests me is, Are women who cannot reproduce entitled to have an opinion on women’s reproductive rights?
Let’s review real quick: Presumably, the picture is not implying that women’s opinions are inherently more valuable than the opinions of men. And why is that important? It’s important because it means having a vagina isn’t the real crux of ‘How to Have an Opinion on Women’s Reproductive Rights’. The real crux is that, following along with the position I described earlier, what matters is a woman’s ability to reproduce. It is her body, a sovereign place. Not only should no one else be able to tell her what to do with it, but she’s the only one who knows best. And why? Because, aside from it being her own body, she’s the one who will be doing the reproduction. It isn’t, per se, that she is a woman. It’s that she’ll be reproducing.
So where are we now in this argument? Simple: Women who cannot reproduce should “shut up”. It isn’t about being a woman – if it was, that would mean that the opinions of men are inherently less valuable, a surely sexist and idiotic position. No, it’s about the ability to reproduce. If you can’t do it, you aren’t allowed an opinion on that matter. Got it?
I wish I could say this was simple reductio ad absurdum, but I’ve barely gone anywhere with what the picture has presented us. All I’ve done is summarize what it said and taken a single step to what it concludes: The ability to reproduce entitles one to an opinion on women’s reproductive rights, so women past menopause or who are otherwise infertile do not enjoy such an entitlement.
Now, back to where people think things through before writing them down, the reality is that anyone who gathers their facts together, thinks about said facts, and then forms a reasoned opinion is doing it right. The person’s sex isn’t relevant in the least. And if you think it is, well, I’ll let Nate say it:
Don’t have a blog? Shut up about what I put on mine.
That goes double for those of you who don’t have my blog.
Filed under: Politics and Social | Tagged: Abortion, Nate, Women's Reproductive Rights | 1 Comment »
Atheist lobbying in Maine
Posted on September 10, 2012 by Michael
I recently wrote about the Secular Coalition for America’s push to establish chapters in all 50 states. I mentioned that I had been interviewed for a piece in the local Maine newspapers concerning that push. Here is that piece:
Rarely does a news release headline jump off the screen like this one that landed last week in my inbox: “Maine atheists to organize state lobbying group this month.”
Good heavens. As if Maine doesn’t have enough to argue about these days.
Later this week, the Secular Coalition for America will open its phone lines to anyone and everyone in Maine who a) doesn’t believe in God, b) can’t be sure there is a God or c) believes, regardless of his or her spiritual underpinnings, that government at any level should not be doing anything in the name of the man (or woman) upstairs…
“Lobbying is the tip of the iceberg,” [Sean] Faircloth agreed. Like the gay rights movement has done over the last three or four decades, he said, “the key is building a grassroots organization that has credibility.”
Which is where Mainers like Michael Hawkins come in.
Hawkins, 27, grew up attending the Roman Catholic St. Mary’s School in Augusta.
His road to atheism began when he was in his teens and heard a group of God-fearing adults asserting, with utmost certainty, that the Earth is a mere 7,000 years old.
“I knew that wasn’t true — but I didn’t know why it wasn’t true or by how much they were wrong,” recalled Hawkins, who’s now one course away from a bachelor’s degree in biology and helped found a loosely knit group on Facebook called Atheists of Maine.
Hawkins, upon hearing about the Secular Coalition for America’s conference call at 1 p.m. Thursday, said he’ll definitely be on the line. (To join in, call 530-881-1400 and punch in the access code 978895.)
But where it all goes from there, Hawkins said, is still up in the air.
He’s well aware that “there’s a lot of stigma around the word” atheist.
And he harbors no illusions that in Maine’s current political climate, wary politicians on either side of the aisle might embrace what undoubtedly would be branded the “atheist agenda.”
“With the Republicans in control of everything, it’s not going to be well received,” Hawkins predicted. “It’ll take a little while.”
If not an eternity.
The comment sections on this article are interesting. (The article appears on several websites because many of Maine’s major newspapers are owned by the same company.) Some people are going off with the usual garbage about atheists calling the religious stupid. I’ve never heard or read any major atheist do this. Other people are attacking Faircloth for this or that. One person even said he doesn’t have a real job, even though he’s one of only 4 people listed at the head of the Richard Dawkins Foundation. A few are trying to tackle the writer, Bill Nemitz, for one imagined thing or another. Hey, maybe my mention of the fact that Republicans control everything in Maine right now really is Nemitz’s political agenda. That totally makes sense. Fortunately, a good number of people are simply excited about this. We’ve even seen a slight uptick in membership on the Facebook page Atheists of Maine.
My only disappointment is that my old school got a mention. It isn’t something I’ve ever tried to hide, but I’m sure the people at St. Michael School (previously known as St. Mary’s) weren’t overly excited about it. As much as I disagree with the Catholic religion, I’m constantly grateful that I went to that school over the less than stellar public choices in the area.
At any rate, I hope the SCA makes a big splash in Maine. I’ll keep things updated.
Filed under: Atheism/Humanism, News | Tagged: atheism, Bill Nemitz, Maine chapter, SCA, Sean Faircloth, Secular Coalition for America | 1 Comment »
Thought of the day
Posted on September 8, 2012 by Michael
It astounds me that anyone takes Pascal’s Wager seriously.
Filed under: Misc | Tagged: Pascal's Wager, Thought of the day | 1 Comment »
For the Sake of Science 