A reader writes

Over on Huffington Post, that “ritually-impure” site of left-leaning bias (yes, I check it along with Drudgereport every day), Sam Harris has decided that one can, in fact, derive an “ought” from an “is” using science. The article is so long, I couldn’t read it all, but it seems to hinge on this easy-breezy thing called “well-being”. That is to say that one (probably Sam Harris himself, no doubt) can scientifically determine those actions that most contribute to an organisms’ “well-being”, and then one can decide what to do. It’s kinda like natural law, I think?… only, not really. Of course, he gets in a few zingers against Church teachings and the sexual abuse crisis. He can’t help himself.
As a Catholic, I find him offensive. As a scientist, I find his hypothesis to be absurd. In particular, take a look at his example of his “scientific” case against women wearing a burka.
I would love it if you could take a look at his article and provide an opinion. I so enjoy your posts on the “professional atheists”.

There are certain activities one needs to budget time for. Among them is not, for me, taking time to take seriously anybody who thinks they can provide a “scientific” case against the burka. It’s like arguing with some guy with tape on his glasses about the “scientific” case for explaining love in terms of pheromone interactions. There’s something *wrong* with these people, like a personality disorder. Normal people, if they are going to argue against a burka, do so on normal human grounds like “It assumes there is something disgusting about the female body” or some such argument. Of course, such argumentation presumes things like “human dignity” and other facts rooted in our status as creature made in the image and likeness of God (facts which remain fact even if the person relying on them does not clearly see them). But absurd attempts to provide some “scientific” basis (doubtless owing to Darwinian concerns about maximizing breeding potential) simply show that, once again, evangelical atheists like Harris are about as far from Bright as you can get.

There seems to be an inverse corrolary between those who worship the intellect and those who use it. Harris, like so many atheists, is a devout worshipper of the intellect.