Don’t Take Me Literally! (Hellfire edition)

Last updated on: September 29, 2012 at 12:12 am By Leah Libresco

I’ll be responding to the very interesting discussions developing on yesterday’s thread on baffling inconsistencies displayed by people on both sides on the religious divide after I turn in my senior thesis powerpoint for review before my presentation tomorrow. I need to finish not only the powerpoint and talk, but also a glossary of tech terms (4chan, DDoS, etc) and add a content advisory note, since some of my primary sources include obscene and anatomically impossible epithets. (Yale folks, let me know... Read more

Don’t Take Me Literally!

Last updated on: September 29, 2012 at 12:09 am By Leah Libresco

Patrick made a good observation about the disparity between some apologists’ stated beliefs and their actual behavior and the problems this hypocrisy creates in debates. He summarized some of William Lane Craig’s more terrifying beliefs (particularly with regard to Old Testament slaughters) and asked Do you treat Craig (and by extension his faith and his holy text) as monstrous, since that’s what his interpretation makes them? Do you treat him as an idiot, because you know he’s not a monster... Read more

Don’t Hand Weapons to Your Enemies

Last updated on: September 29, 2012 at 12:08 am By Leah Libresco

It didn’t take very long into the comment thread of my post critiquing nasty atheists for someone to lob the ‘accommodationist’ charge at me. So let’s get a few things straight: I don’t think religion and atheism are compatible (with the exeptions of some extremely boring religions).. And, on either side, the stakes of being wrong are high enough that there’s little use in papering over the differences or agreeing to disagree. If you want to sort out the truth, I think... Read more

Tech Apocalypse

Last updated on: September 29, 2012 at 12:07 am By Leah Libresco

No, not that bad. My laptop charger has ceased to charge, so my ability to post/pull comments out of the spam filter just got sharply curtailed. Add to that the fact that I’m presenting my senior thesis on Tuesday, and I can guarantee that the computer time I manage to get will not be spent here as much. Happily, Lenovo’s tech support has been nothing but helpful, and they should have a new charger to me by Wednesday. So,... Read more

7 Quick Takes (3/25/11)

Last updated on: September 26, 2012 at 1:26 am By Leah Libresco

–1– Last week, I really enjoyed the conversations sparked by my post on seven common atheist misconceptions about Catholicism (inspired by Jen’s post that covered the vice versa problem). This week, I want to highlight some of the resources and clarifications that people contributed to the post. I should have a guest post or two going up soon in response to atheist questions about how Catholics read the bible, but I’d welcome more contributors. Check out this call for exegetical guest posts... Read more

How Should I Call Out Nasty Atheists?

Last updated on: September 26, 2012 at 1:18 am By Leah Libresco

In a post earlier today, I disagreed with the conclusions of Jen Fulwiler’s critique of Atheist Awareness Week, but there’s an element of truth in her article I want to acknowledge. There’s something exhausting and unpleasant about spending a lot of your writing/thinking time trying to argue with people you don’t respect. When you think of your job as smacking down morons, it hard to imagine you approach it with a spirit of charity, and it’s more than likely the contempt and... Read more

Proud to be Atheist?

Last updated on: September 26, 2012 at 1:17 am By Leah Libresco

It’s A Week! Uh, perhaps I should clarify. It’s essentially Atheist Pride/Awareness week (the Supreme Council of Atheists didn’t contact me for naming advice). The organizing group recommends you set the image above as your facebook profile picture for the week to remind your friends that atheists are all around and are “good without God.” It’s basically analogous to the British campaign to remind atheists to check “No Religion” (as opposed to Jedi) on the Census. The instructions are straightforward enough, but the... Read more

The Trap of Numbness and Self-Satisfaction

Last updated on: September 26, 2012 at 12:41 am By Leah Libresco

1 Comment

I’ve still been thinking about some of the questions we’ve been picking over in the discussion of David Brook’s new book and attempts to alter personality/moral character through pharmacology. I’m sure some of my friends are delighted to find that there are transhumanist ideas I’m uncomfortable with, and I’ve been trying to nail down why. To refresh your memory, Tristyn asked: What if there was a drug that made you kinder, more charitable, more forgiving? Let’s say even that it... Read more

Do you have challenging questions for Christians?

Last updated on: September 26, 2012 at 12:40 am By Leah Libresco

A Christian pastor wrote in at Friendly Atheist to ask for difficult questions his congregation could try to tackle in discussion groups. He wants his flock to avoid isolating themselves from challenges (and I bet he’d like them to be better prepared for evangelizing). I’ve had problems with the questions atheists pose to Christians (some of which seem rooted in the common misunderstandings I ran through on Friday. I’ve summarized and linked to my Why I Do Not Believe series, which was inspired by conversations... Read more

Trying to Will Your Beliefs (A Case Study)

Last updated on: September 25, 2012 at 11:54 pm By Leah Libresco

There’s been a fair amount of discussion on this blog lately about whether people can choose their beliefs or whether beliefs are compelled by evidence (and then some more about what this all means for free will). Good news for me, because that was all the excuse I needed to post the following excerpt from Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, a fanfiction story written by AI research Eliezer Yudkowsky. In Yudkowsky’s story, Harry was raised by a science... Read more