Rachel Maddow rocks

Go watch her talk about Rick Warren over at Ed Brayton’s place. I had seen the old video Maddow dug up on YouTube, but it was a lower quality version, where it wasn’t clear what exactly Warren was agreeing to when he said “I do.” Now we know for sure: Rick Warren thinks gay relationships [...]

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Sociology and Economics as Physics?

That’s what suggested by a recent post at the philosophy of mind blog Brains. I don’t buy it. The modeling techniques described did not, as far as I know, originate in physics, and a very important part of physics involves getting results fundamentally more precise than can be gotten from any model of human behaviour.* [...]

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Faith and trust

Here’s a little side-issue that came out of reviewing D’Souza yesterday: faith and trust. A lot of religious rhetoric uses these words in one of two ways: (1) Even atheists have these things or (2) Religion allows you to have these things, atheism doesn’t. These appeals seem to target something fairly deep, because they tie [...]

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Dinesh D’Souza’s What’s So Great about Christianity

One of the most notable features of Dinesh D’Souza’s What’s So Great about Christianity? is how well it states the arguments of major atheist authors, and how casually it ignores them. Take the issue of whether religion is responsible for violence. D’Souza freely admits that the Torah condones the killing of those who follow other [...]

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Feministe on Rick Warren

Holly of Feministe has a nice post on Rick Warren:
You were just hustled by a member of one of America’s oldest fraternities of snake-oil salesmen: the slick-talking preacher. I’m sorry to have to tell you this, because it’s clear that you both want to sincerely move forward into a new era of change with a [...]

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