Sunday School

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

A new office to protect religious privilege is announced. Onward Christian soldiers and commence Project Blitz.

The demographics of religion are shifting dramatically.

Can you be a Muslim if you are an atheist?

In Egypt the Thought Police continue to arrest atheists. In Saudi Arabia some members of the religion of peace want to live stream the beheading of an atheist for insulting the prophet of their imaginary god.

Cardinal Pell will stand trial for the sexual abuse of young children. Jehovah Witness insular culture is a recipe for child abuse.

This weeks’ Woo:  Dr. Oz

Climate Change: Carbon Dioxide concentrations once again exceed records. Captain, it’s the Engines here. I don’t think Scotty can handle any more.

Happy New Year to the Yazidis of Iraq.

All you need to know about Flat Earth ideology. It will have you all on edge!

Jordan Peterson is not the new Messiah.

A timeline of the entire history of the Universe……and how it ends.

Biology can teach us much about crime and justice.

InSight is on its way to Mars.

How theology reinforces the delusion that gods exist. You will not be able to read the full article.

Atheism as grounds for asylum.

The snipers decided to train their sights on the trees knowing the starving women would soon be coming out to gather the leaves for their children’s dinner.

There is no philosophy of life without a theory of human nature.

Could ripples in space-time move us closer to a Grand Unifying Theory?

Some photographs taken last week.

We pause to remember Rosalind Franklin.

This week I am reading some of these books: 5 free online atheist books.

While you are waiting for the kettle to boil…..

GMO Coffee Break Video:  Jordan Peterson, the Deepak Chopra of Christianity. Do you really know why you do what you do?

• This topic was modified 7 years, 11 months ago by Reg the Fronkey Farmer.

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

Have a great week everyone!!

[Strega]

Thanks, Reg!

[JadeBlackOlive]

I never did buy into that phony Dr. Oz.

[Simon Paynton]

I’ve got no problem with Jordan Peterson at all, I think he’s a refreshing breath of fresh air.  Somebody has to engage with the “lost boys” of the alt-Right and the congenitally blind sad-sack Mens Rights Activist types, and he’s doing the right thing by telling them to sort themselves out.  It would be good if Isis were to perform the same service for the equivalent young males in the Islamic world, instead of using them as human bombs.

If he had a dream about being a messiah – that’s just appropriate.  He really is one for many people.  As for me – he provokes a lot of food for thought with his work-in-progress style of thinking.

I’ve been impressed by the way it hasn’t gone to his head.  Even though he’s “bigger than Jesus”, he doesn’t act like it and still asks people for advice and listens to good ideas.

He also functions as a hub between all sides, which is a good thing and I would think that some useful actual communication and progress has been facilitated.

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

I am actually going to see Jordan Peterson in a debate with Sam Harris in mid July. To be honest, it was only after the Channel 4 News interview with Cathy Newman that I paid him any serious attention. There are merits to much of what he says but he can then ruin his credibility (in my eyes) with some of his other utterances. I will decide after the “evening with”. Have you watched the coffee break video? Here is a fair minded (imo) article about him.

[.]

Who is Jordan Petersen? Omg what have I missed lol

[.]

OMG he’s hot lol

[Davis]

The American constitution is a document many Americans don’t respect. A long term religious figure of only one religion leading prayer inside a legislature?  It’s selective enforcement of principles. Defend the right to bear arms relentlessly, staunchly as though the constitution is an unbreakable set of commandments…but the whole separation of Church and state…that’s a matter of interpretation and exceptions are reasonable. LOL

Strenghtening the right for religious people to discriminate and treat others cruelly…is only the cherry on top of a religiously tanted Sundae.

[.]

Actually so far I love him! I’ve been listening to him on YouTube. He’s brilliant!!!!

[_Robert_]

I think that sometimes I do take the right to free speech for granted. Peterson had some good points when he was on Maher. I do not agree with him about rationality…he seems to think humans will never really be rational….ah shit. maybe he’s right about that too…after all we are just apes, LOL. He also talks about gender identity….can I also race identify? where does it end? those were his points…and also that respect must be earned….respecting everyone makes no sense…I see his point there too.

Incidentally I ran into a YT video where a white dude is claiming he identifies as a female Filipino. Well the pendulum swings….

[.]

I just found out who he was today. But from listening to him, he’s spot on from a clinical psychologist’s perspective. There’s nothing I have seen him say so far that I can disagree with as a psychologist in training myself… he’s spot on.

• This reply was modified 7 years, 11 months ago by ..

[Simon Paynton]

For me, the point is you don’t have to agree with him, but he provokes the right kind of thinking.

He’s not right wing, he’s a liberal, but the Left don’t like him because he slaps their silly faces.

I think he’s been very skillful in giving the right-wing losers something to play with, and a way to stop being losers.  People are allowed to be right wing, but as he points out, resentful losers are dangerous.

@robert – “I do not agree with him about rationality…”

– there you go, he’s made you think.  Who else talks about rationality, publicly?  I believe in 5 years’ time he might be saying different things, and I don’t know anyone else who changes their minds.

@belen – thanks for the video, that’s the first time I’ve ever actually sat down and watched him, and I’m impressed, he’s measured like a scientist.

[Simon Paynton]

“How theology reinforces the delusion that gods exist.”

– to be fair, I think it’s reasonable in a way that they’re reasoning “as if” God exists – to start with those premises, and the premises that their holy book is true.  But also, to scientific types like us, it’s weird to take these basic assumptions on faith alone.  I don’t believe we do that at all, but if we do, I can’t think of an example.

[Simon Paynton]

“Could ripples in space-time move us closer to a Grand Unifying Theory?”

– “‘I want to encourage people to keep an open mind and not to dismiss ideas because they don’t match their preconceived notions.’”

– sounds good.

There’s an interesting BBC radio interview with physicist Carlo Rovelli on “why time is not what it seems” – basically, in his theories of quantum gravity, he says that time and space don’t exist in the way we think, and everything solid that we think exists is actually a set of processes, from which arise time and space.  Or something.  The dimension of time is not a single line as we see on a graph’s axis: more of a competition of processes.

[Author]

Posts