I ran into a former student who once took my Weird Science course. She’s pretty religious and a creationist, and she told me that she recently watched a movie featuring Lee Strobel that she liked. It made her think of my course. I’ve read a couple of Strobel books, and I regularly lend out his … How insular are we?

I recently posted a rant concerning honor killings, using an Iraqi Muslim example. Well, I just ran into a Hindu example that is just as horrifying to modern liberal moral sensibilities. Again, note the connection to religion. There should be no surprise here: traditional communities depend on their religion for their sense of moral order. … A Hindu honor killing

As I argued in my previous post (“Dawkins’ Definition of ‘God’ “, 5/8/08), Dawkins’ use of the word “God” in The God Delusion is idiosyncratic and muddled. I’m trying to work through the muddles in order to determine to what extent, if any, Dawkins’ reasoning and conclusions are relevant to the age-old question, “Does God … Dawkins’ Definition of “God” – Part 2

Steven Pinker has a very good essay on The New Republic online, “The Stupidity of Dignity.” It examines the uselessness of the concept of dignity in bioethics, particularly the Catholic-inflected “theocon” version of bioethics that has become very influential in the US government.

I can think of at least four different skeptical approaches to miracle claims. Each approach has advantages and disadvantages. There is no need to settle on just one approach. The best option is, no doubt, to make use of all of these approaches. The Big Guns – AtheismThe first approach is to argue that there … Skeptical Approaches to Miracle Claims

Here is a gut-wrenching story from The Guardian about a young Iraqi woman brutally killed by her father and brothers because of an infatuation with a British soldier. The police did not detain the father, and even supported him. By and large, the local community considers such honor killings right and proper. Honor killings, indeed, … Honor killings

In confronting miracle claims skeptics and naturalists look for flaws and weakness in the evidence put forward for specific miracles, and ask critical questions like, “Do we have eyewitness testimony for the event?”, “Are the eyewitnesses credible and reliable?”, “Are the accounts of the eyewitnesses consistent with each other?”, and “Is there physical evidence that … Richard Purtill “Defining Miracles”

Adnan Oktar, the public face of the very successful Harun Yahya Muslim creationist phenomenon based in Turkey, has just been sentenced to three years in prison, on a racketeering charge. If carried out, I doubt it will put a dent in the popularity of Islamic creationism. It may even give Oktar, who has always had … Harun Yahya sentenced

Here’s another book I want to recommend: Philosophers Without Gods: Meditations on Atheism and the Secular Life, edited by Louise M. Antony (Oxford University Press, 2007). Half the book is taken up by informal descriptions by philosophers of why they don’t believe. Many are very interesting, and the more informal reflections are, I think, a … Philosophers Without Gods

The Conclusion of Chapter 4In the final paragraph of Chapter 4 of The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins draws one of his main conclusions: If the argument of this chapter is accepted, the factual premise of religion – the God Hypothesis – is untenable. God almost certainly does not exist. This is the main conclusion of … Dawkins’ Definition of “God”