Moderate Islam
August 31, 2010
Filed under Sam Harris, people, religion, social and literary criticism
Sam Harris’ The End of Faith was the first and, to my mind, most important of the “New Atheist” books. Important, because after the September 11th attacks, the crazy in the liberal half of American thinking about religion came out and it seemed like everyone was saying that the attacks had nothing to do with [...]
Continue Reading »Attacking individuals vs. nebulous criticism
Here’s an idea that sounds, at first, very nice: when you need to criticize a bad idea, or a common sort of bad behavior, don’t say whose idea it is, or give examples of people engaging in the bad behavior. From a purely pragmatic angle, you don’t want to provoke angry reactions from the people [...]
Continue Reading »Victor Reppert comments on my book
Just over a week ago, Victor Reppert promised an “attack” on me, specifically with reference to my book UFOs, Ghosts, and a Rising God. Shortly afterwards I saw this:
Chris Hallquist’s book, UFOs, Ghosts, and a Rising God, is a nice compendium of skeptical responses to Christian historical apologetics.
Oh! Thanks, Vic, that was much nicer than [...]
An Open Letter to Religious Believers on God and Evil
August 4, 2010
Filed under ethics, philosophy, religion
I’ve written a new essay on the problem of evil, and here’s the teaser:
Since this letter is a bit long, I’m going to repeat myself just so there’s no confusion about what the point is. The only point I have to make in this letter is that I’ve never been able to think the following [...]
Consistency
July 29, 2010
Filed under religion
From Andrew Sullivan. Money quote: “at least this protester is being consistent with literalism fundamentalism.” Though oddly, he insists on titling the post “Christianism watch,” when it should just be “consistent fundamentalism watch.”
And to think that a few days ago, I was feeling all warm and fuzzy about how few religious people in the U.S. [...]