Burnee links for Sunday

HOW TO BUILD A NEWSROOM TIME MACHINE « journoterrorist
An exercise in doing journalism the old-fashioned way.

Atheism is an essential part of skepticism | Pharyngula
P. Z. Myers on why it's a bad idea to make a walled garden into which skepticism cannot go.

Abortion: pregnancy counselling centres found wanting | Life and style | The Guardian
This is what happens when organisations with an agenda — in lieu of the state — are allowed to provide public services. Contrary to what we're told, choice is narrowed rather than widened.

New Humanist (Rationalist Association) - Anjem Choudary exploits Norwegian tragedy to publicise his 'Sharia Controlled Zones' for UK cities
Choudary is a notorious media whore, so the seriousness of this proposal is to be questioned. On the face of it he's suggesting that his private police force will be above English law. Clearly that won't be allowed.

Research linking autism to internet use is criticised | Society | The Observer
Susan Greenfield is at it again (has she ever stopped?) — making wild unsubstantiated claims about the evils of the internet while refusing to produce even one single shred of evidence to support any of them.

"I'm not just sitting here staring out of my window and making something up to talk about," she said.

Really? You're not? Then how come it appears to practically everyone else that "making something up" is precisely what you are doing? (Hint: you're a scientist. Evidence.)

Existence of followers isn't proof of that which is followed

Several months ago on a Christian discussion forum I was asked two questions:

1) Who do YOU say Jesus was?

2) Do you deny the resurrection?

I answered both, but the first question is the one relevant to this post, and my answer to that was:

1) It seems likely that Jesus was an itinerant preacher who developed a considerable local following, to the extent that he annoyed the established religion of the time, which got rid of him in an effort to preserve the status quo.

This still seems to me to be a reasonable interpretation of the story we have of Jesus. There are some who deny Jesus existed at all; others suggest that the popular account is a melding of stories of a number of different preachers who were around at the time.

Chapter 27 of Dembski & Licona's Evidence for God, "Did Jesus Really Exist?" by Paul L. Maier, is addressed to those who claim Jesus didn't exist — a claim he characterizes as "this pathetic denial".

Maier's first foray is to say that the New Testament wouldn't make "an ounce of sense if Jesus had never lived." This presupposes that the books of the New Testament do make sense, which to me seems like putting the cart before the horse. He describes this as "internal evidence", which appears suspiciously like "circular evidence". (Or to put it in simple, direct terms, Jesus existed because it says so in the Bible.)

Then we come to "external evidence" — Christian, Jewish and secular. The Christian evidence Maier lists is from Jesus' disciple John, Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, who was John's student, and Irenaeus of Lyons, who was Polycarp's student. Pardon me for my skeptical view of this chain of hearsay, but I see a problem with calling the writings of Polycarp and Iranaeus "evidence", if they both had it ultimately from John. This is evidence from one man, not three. Maier also counts the writings of Justin Martyr as external evidence that Jesus existed, but as with Polycarp and Iranaeus he does not provide references.

When considering Jewish external evidence Maier quotes writings in the Talmud (though once again without a citation). He acknowledges that references to Jesus in the Talmud are garbled, but claims that one of them is "especially accurate" when it reports on Jesus' arrest notice. By what standard, I'm bound to ask, do you assess whether a report is garbled or accurate? (If you already "know" what happened, such assessment is easy.)

As is usual in these arguments it's not long before Josephus is wheeled out to proclaim the existence of Jesus, as if this impartial chronicler is the last word on the subject. But when you read what Josephus writes, you find he's only reporting what others have said.

For his secular external evidence Maier first cites Tacitus, who mentions the Christians in his Annals. Tacitus is referring to followers of Christ, but such reference is no stronger evidence for Jesus than the existence of Raëlians today is evidence for Raël. Next come Suetonius — who mentions Christians and Christ one time each — and Pliny the Younger, who asks for advice in dealing with those superstitious Christians.

In passing Maier also mentions Theudas and Mara bar Serapion as providing evidence for the existence of Jesus, but again gives no references — an omission he excuses on the basis that he's already made his case that "Jesus of Nazareth was no myth, but a totally historical figure who truly lived."

As I mentioned at the top of this post I'm not one of those who deny that someone of the name of Jesus ever existed, but I don't think the evidence for the existence of the man described in the New Testament is as clear cut as Maier suggests. It's likely that a charismatic preacher or three did make waves — enough to get at least one of them executed — but that's a far cry from categorical proof of the existence of the New Testament Jesus. Nor do I deny that the followers of "Christ" existed — but the existence of Christians isn't automatic proof of the existence of Christ.

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4truth.net
http://www.4truth.net/fourtruthpbjesus.aspx?pageid=8589952895

More on BBC2's The Life of Muhammad

A while ago I posted about Rageh Omaar's TV series The Life of Muhammad (and talked briefly about it on the Skepticule Extra podcast). My skepticism about Muhammad's revelations — and about his "Night Journey" as well as other aspects of Islam — provoked a series of comments from a user by the name of Walid, who essentially claimed that it was true because the Prophet said so. I did try to elicit some valid evidence for this claim, but to no avail.

Some days later Stuart Parsons responded to my post with a condemnation of the TV series, and to rescue his comment from the depths of Walid's justification attempts I reproduce it here:

As someone who has made a seious study of the Islamic religion, I can assure you that the BBC2 'Life of Muhammad ' series was a travesty. It was more noteworthy for what it chose to conceal about the life of Muhammad than what is was prepared to reveal.

Islam's own sources, the Quran, Sunnah and sirahs of Ishaq, Tabari and Kathir, reveal a very different life of Muhammad than that disingenuously presented to us by the BBC Head of Religious Broadcasting, Mr Aaqil Ahmed. We certainly were not told that the Quran and many hadiths call for ongoing holy war against ALL non-Muslims, until the religion is for Allah alone throughout the entire world. Instead it was mendaciously explained that Jihad is the struggle of individual Muslims to lead a good life. According to many Quran verses and numerous ahadith a Muslim is leading a good life if he is killing non-Muslims, forcibly converting them to Islam or subjugating them as inferiors under Muslim control. 

This does appear to be a damning indictment of Rageh Omaar's programme, and incidentally of Islam in general. To be fair though, I noticed a good deal of "equivocation by stealth" in the programme, with many hints of "interpretation" of scripture and much use of the phrase "according to Muslim tradition". Often these phrases slip by unnoticed, but they serve the same purpose as judicious use of "allegedly" when saying something that could be judged defamatory in a court of law.

And if we were in a court of law, could we say that the jury's still out?

A heartfelt invitation to believe

Occasionally as an atheist I come across the saying, "It takes more faith to be an atheist than it does to believe in God." This, of course, is usually spoken or written by someone who does in fact believe in God. Sometimes this person claims to have been an atheist in the past, but is no longer, so I might question their sincerity when they now claim to have less faith then they did before.

I would suggest they look into their heart and examine their innermost convictions. Though they outwardly profess a belief in an omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent creator-agent, despite never seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling or otherwise having any compelling evidence — physical, historical, documentary or scientific — for the existence of this agent, I contend that they do not believe in this agent. They know in their heart that this agent does not exist. They are, in effect, in denial about the agent's non-existence, and therefore suffering cognitive dissonance when they proclaim their faith.

To all those in denial about their unacknowledged atheism I offer this simple challenge and invitation. Does the truth matter to you? Does the reality of the external world present itself to you in a way that allows you to represent it to others in the same way — as real? Does what counts for you as "real" depend on whether it can be verified by others, and by yourself, on a repeating basis?

If so, I invite you to accept the reality of the universe into your heart as your only reliable, repeatable measure of truth.

And the truth will set you free.

Burnee links for Thursday

The Atheist Experience™: A Critical Thinking Course You Just Won't Believe
No, you won't. It's incredible. There ought to be some kind of "trade descriptions" claim here.

Science: The incessant drive for 'balance' distorts education | the big issue | From the Observer | The Observer
James Williams leads this correspondence about science education, in the light of Steve Jones' criticism of the BBC's "balance".

Stop the teaching of pseudoscience - Blogs - Pulse
A mild request from Edzard Ernst provokes ridiculous vitriol in the comments -- homeopaths on the rampage!

As atheists know, you can be good without God - USATODAY.com
Good article by Jerry Coyne, but mostly depressing comments.

The Atheist Experience™: Evangelists panic when they're losing ground
Russell Glasser with another perspective on Jerry Coyne's USA Today article.

Jesus and Mo
It's an old one, but still valid.

Click to read the rest of the strip

New, extended, edition of Skepticule Extra

The latest Skepticule Extra, number 10 (double figures! Yay!), features Rosemary Lyndall Wemm who generously shares her insights on the neurological aspects of morality. (This show is our longest to date, making up for the one before, which was truncated.)

Other subjects discussed include near-death experiences, near-terrorist experiences, near-anti-semitic experiences, near-torture experiences, near-prison experiences and near-empathic experiences. Or in other words, a whole bundle of fun.

We also have feedback plus a progress report on a half century of God-arguments. Enjoy:

http://www.skepticule.co.uk/2011/08/skepextra-010-20110724.html

Theology for the masses

It's less than a week since The Rev. Dr. Giles Fraser, Canon Chancellor of St. Paul's Cathedral, informed us on BBC Radio 4's Thought for the Day that America's financial problems were foreshadowed in the Garden of Eden. Now he's berating politicians for using fancy phrases that don't mean anything.

Not that theologians would do anything like that, of course — though Giles does acknowledge dismissals of theology as "unrealistic stargazing" and "the musings of unworldly philosophers with their heads in the clouds". However, says Giles, "...theology, like blue-sky thinking, is the attempt to see things in the widest possible context." Or to put it in a way comprehensible to the ordinary bloke and blokesse (that is, those who are so lacking in the finer subtleties of academe they can't tell exegesis from hermeneutics), theology is like a zoom lens pulling back to its widest setting. That's right, theology lets us see everything. But just in case said bloke and blokesse get a bit cocky by being shown how easy theology really is, Giles tosses in a snippet of Latin to keep them in their place.

Lest we think he's off on a flight of fancy, he warns us, "Of course the practical minded are not wrong to worry that all this abstract reflection can easily slip its anchor with reality." Next, to reinforce his cultural credibility he quotes a verse of poetry. By this time we're approaching the end of his allotted three-and-a-half minutes, and though Giles has dutifully included something theological (remembering to dumb it down for the hoi poloi), thrown in some Latin and even some poetry — he's so far not mentioned God.

But never fear — the flight of fancy may be postponed but it's not forgotten: God is everywhere! And God is in the details!

"One might even say," Giles continues, "that this incarnation of theology of God-become-human is the original localism." One might, but what would it mean if one did?

Whatever the "original localism" might be, Giles won't let those stick-in-the-muds obsessed with practical reality blunt our wild speculations. "Indeed, too often, talk of 'being realistic' is just code for a failure of the imagination."

Wild speculation, apparently, is essential to politics, just as it is to theology. I think the "practical minded" may be right. Giles Fraser slipped his anchor long ago.