Just read George Will’s review of “Moral Minority: Our Skeptical Founding Fathers” in the New York Times. I don’t know why I take so much comfort from Conservatives Who Make Sense (Brooks, Sullivan and Will foremost among them). Perhaps it … Continue reading →

I am listening to Penn (of Penn and Teller) interviewing Richard Dawkins as I type. Dawkins just used the phrase, quoting Dennet, “belief in belief” to describe the tone of many of the reviewers of his new book The God … Continue reading →

Bob suggests that my belief in the possibility of flying by concentrating very, very hard, is not reasonable because there is strong evidence against the claim of flying but while I admit that there is no evidence either for or … Continue reading →

Bob quotes John Stuart Mill any one who feels it conducive either to his satisfaction or to his usefulness to hope for a future state as a possibility, there is no hindrance to his indulging that hope” (Mill 1874: 210). … Continue reading →

The BBC reports that the Vatican is thinking about doing away with limbo – the doctrine that unbaptised babies don’t quite make it to heaven but they don’t get sent straight into the inferno. It’s great that the Pope is … Continue reading →

John Wilkins wonders when atheism began. Over a number of beers, the discussion turned to the question when it became possible to be an atheist. De Sade lived at a time when public atheism was just beginning its run. Prior … Continue reading →

When the pope says, “Only this can free us from being afraid of God — which is ultimately at the root of modern atheism,” he said. “Only this God saves us from being afraid of the world and from anxiety … Continue reading →

One thing struck me as unusual in the latest Blogging the Bible post. Our blogger mentions the red heifer story and says it is vaguely familiar. Also, an unusual ritual is described: An unblemished red heifer is sacrificed, burned to … Continue reading →

I have been following the Blogging the Bible series at Slate, reading a few chapters each week, and today I reached the book of Numbers. In my past attempts to read the bible, I always enjoyed the Abraham-Isaac-Jacob-Joseph stories (when … Continue reading →

In my research for the entry on global warming, I found a number of sites that were protesting the Landover Baptist site. To my horror, I found that I had no way of knowing which of those sites were, themselves, … Continue reading →