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Legal blogger Eugene Volokh writes the following about the attempt to rid a teenage boy of a “homosexual demon” “Come on You Homosexual Demon”: That’s a line from an apparent “gay exorcism,” according to ABC News. The article saus that “Robin McHaelen, executive director of the Manchester-Conn., True Colors,” “a nonprofit group for gay and [...]
Posts Tagged ‘Religion’
Daily Hilarity: “Possession”
June 30th, 2009 
Daniel Fincke 
Posted in Homosexuality, Law, News Discussion, Religion 
Tags: Child Abuse, Demons, Eugene Volokh, Possession, Religion 
No Comments »Genesis As A Scientific Account
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Our Caveman Brains
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke No one is immune—the question is whether we cultivate or counteract our natural cognitive fallacies. A professor at the University of Guelph, Prof. Davis has spent the past 20 years paying attention to the use of such seemingly benign phrases: “It was a sign,” “Thank God” and even “Good luck.” To him, such phrases reflect [...]
Posted in Epistemology, Philosophy, Psychology, Religion Tags: Epistemology, Philosophy, Religion No Comments »Graphs Suggest Secular Countries Less Corrupt, More Peaceful
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke An interesting graph: Here’s Tom Rees’s interpetation of the data: the graph (as shown on the right) shows a dramatic and strong relationship between religiosity and corruption. This does not mean that religion causes corruption. A more likely explanation is that a common, third factor explains both. And the obvious explanation is wealth. Rich countries [...]
Posted in Abortion, Atheism, Religion, Sociology Tags: Corruption, Global Peace Index, Peace, Poverty, Religion, Secularization, War 2 Comments »Rainfall Caused By Frogs Marrying
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke If they want rain so much, they should just move to New York! Thanks to Atheist Nexus for the link to this video and this summation of the story: “More than 250 people in northern Bangladesh have attended a wedding ceremony between two frogs as part of a ritual to bring rain to the parched [...]
Posted in Epistemology, Religion Tags: Epistemology, Frogs, India, Religion, Superstition No Comments »Voyage That Shook The World?
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke PZ Myers with news of a creationist film coming: They’re doing it again. There’s a new movie being released, The Voyage That Shook the World, that you can tell from the tagline — “One man, one voyage, one book ignited a controversy that still rages today” — is creationist trash (hint: there is no scientific [...]
How Best to Support the Iranians? Larison vs. Hitchens
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Daniel Larison excellently states the case for personal support for Iranian freedom but non-involvement by the US government: Something that I don’t quite understand is why anyone would conclude that silence or minimal comment condemning the Iranian government’s violence by government officials requires that private individuals refrain from expressing their moral support. There has been [...]
Posted in Christopher Hitchens, News Discussion, Religion, World Affairs Tags: Daniel Larison, Iran, Politics, Religion No Comments »Beginning of the End of Radical Islam?
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke The Washington Post reports: Election and polling results show a diminishing influence of radical Islam acroos the Middle East and other Muslim countries. Radical political parties are losing clout, support for suicide bombing and terrorist tactics is dropping, and the deteriorating situation in Iran mark the beginning of the end of radical Islam. Regardless of [...]
Teenagers’ Limbs Cut Off For Stealing
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke as a crowd of 300 men, women, and children watched: Somalia’s capital Mogadishu was witness, Thursday, to the public amputation of the left leg and right hand from each of four thieves. They were all teenagers, about seventeen years old. The thieves, were convicted of stealing some mobile phones and two guns by a Whahbist [...]
Posted in Islam, News, Religion, Theocracy Tags: Islamism, Religion, Sha'ria Law, Somalia No Comments »To Ban Or Not To Ban
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke A youtube point-counterpoint on this topic (on which I am still interested in your thoughts). Click here for Njustus’s stab at the topic and my attempt to play devil’s advocate against him. Pro-ban: Anti-ban: Your Thoughts?
Posted in Atheism, Feminism, Pat Condell, Religion, Religious Rights, Women's Rights Tags: Burqua, Islamists, Islamophobia, Politics, Religion, Sarkozy No Comments »How Faith Is Not Like Other (Revisable) Reflexive Assumptions
June 29th, 2009 Daniel Fincke (It should not be necessary for understanding this post, but for the full backstory to this debate see my series on Objections to Religious Moderates and Intellectuals, parts 1, 2, 3, & 4 and my post “On Teleology and Intellectual Virtues and Vices”) Shane writes in reply to my post “On Teleology and Intellectual Virtues [...]
Posted in Atheism, Authoritarianism, Epistemology, Ethics, Faith, Historical Ethics, Metaethics, Metaphysics, Miracles, Naturalism, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Psychology, Religion, Teleology Tags: A Priori Moral Knowledge, Aesthetic Knowledge, Assumptions, Cultural Relativism, Emotivism, Epistemology, Hermeneutics, Humean Skepticism, Mathematical Knowledge, Metaethics, Mythology, Nietzsche on Objective Values, Perceptual Knowledge, Philosophy, Prejudices, Religion, Supernaturalism 3 Comments »Brigham Young Ends Three Year Youtube Ban
June 28th, 2009 Daniel Fincke The story. Sigh, banning things doesn’t make people morally good, it takes away even the opportunity for exercise of moral judgment. And, quite often it chokes off more good than it prevents evil.
Posted in Religion Tags: Brigham Young, Censorship, Good Motives, Moral Infantalization, Religion, Youtube No Comments »Children’s Bill of Religious Rights
June 28th, 2009 Daniel Fincke I have almost always found children’s choirs incredibly loathesome because almost always they are used to have children in unison preach bland platitudes which are simply empty words to kids. Only recently I heard a great use of a children’s choir as part of the Decemberists’ new Hazards of Love album, which effectively just uses [...]
Christian Belief as a Natural Phenomenon
June 28th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Since May, Valerie Tarico has been writing a six part series of articles called “Christina Belief as a Natural Phenomenon.” Part 5 was just released last night. I highly suggest reading through all the articles and would love your feedback in our comments section. Your ideas from there might lead to future blog posts. So [...]
Taking The Unity of Truth Notion Seriously
June 28th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Cosmologist Lawrence M. Krauss on the incompatibility of God and science. The whole piece is worth your time. This succinct statement summing up the article, however, hits the nail on the head: My practice as a scientist is atheistic. That is to say, when I set up an experiment I assume that no god, angel [...]
Posted in Atheism, Christianity, Epistemology, Faith, Naturalism, News Discussion, Philosophy, Religion, Theocracy Tags: Democracy, Epistemology, Iran, Philosophy, Politics, Reason, Religion, Roman Catholics, Scientists, Virgin Birth No Comments »France Considers Banning Burqas in Public and I Consider Haidt on Pluralism
June 28th, 2009 Daniel Fincke France, which has already banned headscarves in schools, purportedly as an effort to separate church and state, is now considering banning the burqa in public since it represents servitude and indignity for women (according to Sarkozy). Click here for the full story and links to perspectives on the option. Would the effects of this be [...]
Posted in Applied Ethics, Contemporary Ethics, Ethics, Feminism, Islam, Metaethics, Moral Psychology, News, News Discussion, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Psychology, Religion, Religious Rights, Separation of Church and State, Women's Rights Tags: Burqua Ban, France, Haidt, Islamophobia, Metaethics, Multiculturalism, Philosophy, Politics, Religion, Sarkozy, Secularism No Comments »Last Week in Gays
June 28th, 2009 Daniel Fincke A round up of only some of the numerous interesting stories about the progress of gay civil rights covered this week by Box Turtle Bulletin: Ireland now has civil partnerships “with many (but not all) of the rights, priveleges, and responsibilities to same-sex couples.” In Texas, 57% now support some sort of recognition of gay [...]
Greg Laden’s Qualms With Missionaries
June 28th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Just learned about this from PZ Myers. Sounds most interesting, their last episode in their current format (before they switch to a podcast) starts at 8 am this morning. But more than just the concept of an atheist talk show is this really intriguing and morally urgent topic for today’s show: Missionaries tell us that [...]
Posted in Atheism, Religion Tags: Africa, Atheist Talk Radio, Minnesota, Missionaries, Poverty, Religion No Comments »New Interview With Richard Dawkins
June 27th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Via Richarddawkins.net
Posted in Atheism, Evolution, Religion Tags: Religion, Richard Dawkins, Science, The God Delusion No Comments »PZ Myers on the Incompatibility of Christian Faith and Science
June 27th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Related to the issues in my recent posts objecting to religious moderates and intellectuals, here are a few remarks from an excellent piece worth reading in its whole about why science and religion are not compatible from PZ Myers. I encourage you to click the link and read the whole thing, but here are a [...]
On Teleology and Intellectual Virtues and Vices
June 27th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Below I quote Shane’s reply to part 4 of my series, “Objections to Religious Moderates and Intellectuals” (for further background to this debate, check out parts 1, 2 & 3) and reply to him. The topic has evolved into questions of teleology and the “point” of life, so little background in previous installments should be [...]
Posted in Atheism, Epistemology, Ethics, Evolution, God, Intellectual Vices, Intellectual Virtues, Metaethics, Philosophical Ethics, Philosophy, Prejudice, Religion, Teleology, Uncategorized, Virtues Tags: Epistemology, Metaethics, Philosophy, Purpose, Religion, Religious Justification, Uncategorized No Comments »This Week in American Theocrats
June 27th, 2009 Daniel Fincke This week’s American theocrat is Oklahoma state legislator, Sally Kern has offered this resolution (and click for video): WHEREAS, the people of Oklahoma have a strong tradition of reliance upon the Creator of the Universe; and WHEREAS, we believe our economic woes are consequences of our greater national moral crisis; and WHEREAS, this nation has [...]
Actions
June 26th, 2009 Daniel Fincke Box Turtle Bulletin highlights these stories: The Southern Baptist Convention has ousted Broadway Baptist Church of Fort Worth, Texas over the church’s acceptance of gays. Even though that church had sent their own gay-tolerant pastor packing over a controversy surrounding photos of same-sex couples in the church directory, it appears that what remained still wasn’t anti-gay enough [...]
No More Theology Departments?
June 26th, 2009 Daniel Fincke I still have to get to replying to a few outstanding comments but in the meantime, I figured I’d quickly address this question from Evangelos: would you contend that theology departments should not exist at the academic level, even if they were challenging traditional beliefs (I’m thinking of this fellow who appeared on Colbert a [...]
Why Worship Someone With Mysterious Motives?
June 26th, 2009 Daniel Fincke The Conversational Atheist raises a good point: When you ask a person to explain God’s apparently contradictory actions, you will inevitably get a shoulder shrug, and perhaps a “How am I supposed to know the mind of God?” Atheists need to figure out the kinds of questions that get a bit deeper. Don’t ask a [...]
Posted in Atheism, God, Problem of Evil, Religion Tags: Conversational Atheist, Hiddenness of God, Religion, Romans 9, South Park, Theodicy No Comments »
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