Politics A bridge to nowhere 17 Sep 2010 The title of the head of the Roman Catholic Church is “pontiff”, which means, basically “bridge-builder” (in Latin: pontifex; I gather it’s thought by some that the Roman priests would bless new bridges, and the bishop of Rome inherited the term when ROme was Christianised). Evidence that the title is… Read More
Philosophy More Feynman on philosophers 26 Sep 201126 Sep 2011 Take note: he’s writing this in the dark ages of philosophy of science (1965): Another most interesting change in the ideas and philosophy of science brought about by quantum mechanics is this: it is not possible to predict exactly what will happen in any circumstance. For example, it is possible… Read More
The thing to do is write a sensationalist book that gets tons of press and stirs up controversy. Possible titles: “Why I Am (Probably) Not A Christian” “God Is (Almost Certainly) Not Great” “Breaking the Spell (To The Extent It Needs Breaking)” “A Plague On Both Their Houses” “The Greatest Show On Earth (So Far)” “Everything I Need To Know I Learned In (Years and Years of Study and Thinking)”
Knowing that you don’t know doesn’t lend itself to feelings of superiority, even if it is the “beginning of wisdom.”
Riboyzyme – ??? Do mean that in such cases knowing that you don’t know _does_ lend itself to feelings of superiority???
Just makes me feel uncomfortable as I suspect if I lived in the States I would have the same perspective as a New Athiest. I can look at the older generation of my family and ask a comparable though by no means identical question. Most who were around in the 1930’s and 40’s were very active in both the communist party and the I.R.A. Not organisations I have a great deal of time for. Ask what you would do living in the enviroment they were leads to some uncomfortable conclusions.
PZ posted it, too. You are [probably] mentioned in comment #120. You will not be shocked to know that some people wrote unpleasant things about agnostics. You don’t think they are feeling superior, do you? http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/08/best_xkcd_ever.php#comments
What I found interesting in that thread was a few people discussing Fullmetal Alchemist, which doesn’t seem to have much to do with the thread topic, but is full of win regardless.
A- “Personally, I find agnostics to feel superior to everyone else”. B- “Well, at least you’ve found a way to feel superior to agnostics while oversimplifying their position.”
I think it had to do more (in general) with accommodationists, like Mooney, et. al. who wage their war of fact-less insinuation about the defective personalities and strategies of the “gnu atheists.” And not agnostics. Unless, of course, you’re making your own personal beliefs known… 🙂
Well I have argued for accommodationism several times, and criticised the aggressiveness of atheist exclusivism, so sure.
“atheist exclusivism” Now that is a useful term -far more thoughtful than “new atheists,” and “non-exclusivism” is far better than “accomodationism.”
MosesZD, I think if XKCD wanted to take a swipe at accommodationists, it probably wouldn’t do it so obliquely. The comic would hardly even make sense as such a swipe, since accommodationists in general don’t think atheists are smug. BTW, as a geek whose a bit into Linux, the label “gnu atheist” looks more like a description of an atheist who’s almost (?) religiously into Free Software.