Peter Wall states the obvious (that's not a criticism - it needs to be stated): "But there's no chance in hell that a rich white male, once accused of a crime, will succeed at asking his detractors to behave reasonably and suspend their belief in his guilt until it has actually been proven in a court of law. God forbid. Because we all know that the legal system does nothing but prop up the interests of rich white males, therefore no one can be trusted in this case, except for the black woman in the middle and all of her supporters amongst women and other minorities." This brings me back to that strange conference I went to on critical legal theory, where, basically, if it feels good, it ought to be law. 

Web 2.0 is going evil! 

Jeremy Lott has a review of Peter Schweizer's Do as I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy. 

You wanna know how sleazy atheists are? Here's one who wants sex with Po from the Teletubbies. And I quote: "I'm talking torture and dominatrix shit." 

Public Transport Ain't Sunshine And Light 

Dave likes the BART system (SF) and says how much he likes it: "mass transit makes travel a bit more human".

Sorry, but I'm going to have bring out my misanthropic tendencies to compensate for Dave's optimism, especially as I'm travelling on the train as I write this (to go to Geek Dinner with Marc Canter).

Train travel is overcrowded, noisy and my fellow passengers aren't the enlightened San Fran folks. The announcements penetrate the field of silence I like to build up around myself. People use their mobile phones and portable games with the sound turned up. I shudder with embarrasment when I have to, say, reset my laptop because the noise of the boot-up may disturb my fellow passengers.

They bring this rickety carriage up and down the train with overpriced refreshments. I don't mind the price, although I've been rather put off since I bought a can of soda with rust on the bottom.

It's especially bad travelling on bank holidays or during school holidays - screaming and crying children, despondent and decadent parents all crammed in to a depressing little box.

The windows and the mobile connectivity save the train.

Without drowning my ears in music, it's almost impossible to do any work on the train. It's meditative to what the sheep and clouds whizzz by, but it's not helped by my fellow passengers.

Our trains used to have smaller apartments which would fit a maximum of about six people, rather than forty (or more when crowded). These were much nicer, even though I do like the fact that the modern trains have air conditioning.

The other part of it is that Brits are far less chatty in public than Americans. If you happen to be in a carriage with an American, they are more likely to make passing conversation with you throughout your trip, while my fellow Brits remain as quiet as a mouse (until their phone goes off, they pull out their PSP or they take their kids with them).

When you travel on these beasts every day, they become far less enjoyable to ride.

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Religion as Ethics 

In response to my angry post yesterday, Mike McDuggan has responded in the comments. I will respond below rather than in the comments, since posts are more permanent than comments and less inclined to spam and being drowned out. Traditional fisk style, ladies and gents, because it's early in the morning.

Indeed, but as I pointed out yesterday, if the religious folks had to put up with the crap which the anti-religious people do from everybody, then they'd be a lot more vocal and their voices wouldn't just be angry, they'd be angry, mad and delusional. Since they get pretty much whatever they ask for from the government, they don't have to be angry or mad, just delusional.

Well, most atheists I know don't rebel against love, forgiveness or charity - they just don't associate them with religion. Over 92% of the British population do not attend any weekly religious service, but we don't have any surfeit of charity or love.

Compared to what? Compared to our current mostly secular ethic of the golden rule plus a bit of naive prohibitionism (I certainly don't agree with the latter!)?

The Ten Commandments, as has been pointed out by many authors, is incompatible with both religious liberty and the Constitution. Those people in the United States who claim that the 10C are the fundamental basis of the liberty and Constitutional government of the country are totally deluded. The 10C and the Constitution are incompatible.

Not only is there nothing in the 10C about the setting up of a government, there is no protection for religious freedom, something which the First Amendment codifies in the strongest and most rigourous form that anyone has ever seen.

Judged solely on moral grounds, the 10C are often commended because of their absolutist values - but is that such a good thing? Who cares about coveting when there's a war on? Who cares about people not keeping the Sabbath holy? I don't care what you do on your Sabbath.

The statements of Jesus aren't a great deal better. His thought is unsystematic, dogmatic and offering an 'end times ethic'. As Austin Cline says: "Anyone who did not renounce all that they had could not become a disciple, and anyone who rejected his teaching would receive severe punishment. Does any of this logically follow from the principle of love? What kind of God requires a love which leads to neglect of family? killing family?... Unsurprisingly, little of this is actually followed by Christians today. How many Christians are genuinely unconcerned about their future? Indeed, any rational and moral person who considers a free and just society important would have to invest a great deal of concern in the future. Many of the most serious problems which face us today, especially environmental, are often the result of not planning enough or properly." (source)

Part of what makes ethics useful is the ability to question, and almost no religious ethics that have arrived take the ability to question even our most sacredly-held moral principles with philosophical rigour. The naivety of faith excludes critical thinking about ethics from many, tying them down to ancient, unquestioned principles rather than letting them engage in the ethical debate properly.

We are back to this prolem of definition again. You define God and religion as being about unconditional love and forgiveness, but that is not an exclusively religious phenomenon, and is open to the charge of being reductionist (not something I usually throw around, but a charge worth contemplating nonetheless).

If one pulls the church, the clergy and the self-appointed representatives of God out of the picture, we may have a prettier picture, but hardly a more realistic one.

We have to be careful in why we remove those things - is it because we wish to analyse other facets of religion or is it because they embarass the whole enterprise?

I think that most atheist writers are very clear in their statements. The writings of Bertrand Russell on the subject of religion are very clear, as are the (surprisingly few) published statements of Professor Richard Dawkins or the book by Julian Baggini on the subject. Sam Harris writes clearly on his subject, as do many other authors in places like the Secular Web Library. Having read many books on religion, from a wide variety of authors in both philosophy and theology, I find that the work produced by atheists to be of a certain clarity that the writings of religious believers rarely ever meets - especially as many of them are now tied up in the postmodern enterprise of justifying faith through incoherence.

Many, if not most, atheists realise the need for constraint but realise it on a secular basis. I believe that the best way is the non-initiation of force rule which most libertarians subscribe to. You shouldn't start anything. It gets around the problems with most moral rules - their inflexibility to new circumstances - and gives us a good guide to life. If someone hits you, you have every right to defend yourself. But you shouldn't hit another. You shouldn't steal other people's property or demand they do things they have not chosen to do.

I am constrained by this rule. I cannot beat people up or force them to have sex with me - the former is assault and the latter is rape. Both are immoral and illegal.

As for Jesus' example? His short-term ethic will be of use when we finally arrive at the point where the end times are upon us, but since they've been promised for over three millenia now (and predicted so often and with such failure), I'm not inclined to believe they are coming any time soon. The whole history of failed predictions prove simply that God, while able to create the universe, is unable to master the calendar.

Jesus' ethic gets both support and condemnation from atheists, but it doesn't seem clear to me that it is particularly wonderful compared with other moral systems - it has good and bad, and has the major stumbling block of faith.

Thanks for taking the time to respond.

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