1. Anyone who wants to keep up with the latest news on the war in Pakistan should find the Fourth Rail of interest.
2. Ted Rall has written a cartoon insulting our troops and comparing them to suicide bombers. Cassandra says Axis Sally did prison time for less an offense. I guess General Washington would have hanged Rall, but we live in a different time. Is Rall a traitor or is his cartoon covered by our freedom of speech?
3. Deal keeps Internet radio from being muted. Radio Dismuke streams on.
4. Diana Hsieh gave a lecture in 1999 called "Why Be An Atheist?" It is a PDF document (don't want to piss off Billy Beck). It starts with a refutation of the classic arguments for theism and agnosticism. My only criticism is that instead of using Occam's Razor as the first argument for atheism, I would use the Objectivist idea of the arbitrary. If there is no evidence for God, then the concept is arbitrary and can be dismissed without further argumentation. I've seen Occam's Razor used to prove some strange things, so I'm wary of it.
In my 50 years on earth I have yet to see any evidence for the existence of God. The typical theist reply to that statement is, "Just look around, God is everywhere," as if the evidence of the senses somehow proved the existence of a supernatural being. When we just look around we see existence, which does exist. Anything else is the product of man's imagination.
5. So James Hetfield of Metallica "didn't quite agree with what was going on there" (at Live Earth, in which he performed). If I were a recording artist who didn't agree with the politics of an event, I would not lend my name to the venture, even if it promised to boost record sales 800%, as Live Earth did for Metallica.
6. Joe Kane is taking pictures in Australia before he ships to Iraq.
5 comments:
Nice blog, and thanks for the plug!
Regarding the existence of God, it is NOT just a matter of "looking around". It is looking around AND understanding. The universe does have a logic to it. IF you believe the universe is logical, then the assumption/belief it was created by a superior being(s) is also logical, since there is no being we have physically encountered which is capable of such a task.
As for Ted Rall, even idiots are entitled to freedom of speech. ;)
I'm not religious but neither am I an atheist. I don't mind using the word "religion" as short-hand for the awe that I feel about the cosmos and its as yet unknown origin. Religion cannot be debated on the playing field of science. Religion is poetry, dance and music not science. (I hate to use the word "awe" because it's as debased as "lerv" but my inner caveman enjoys it.)
That sounds a lot like the "sense of wonder" that science fiction fans talk about.
Ed, I have to agree with you about Rall.
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