Many of us who have advocated scientific examination of religions have experienced forceful push-back by those who are religious. We scientific types don't always understand that reaction; our attitude is often "We study everything. That's what we do. It's better to know than not to know." Folks who are religious…
Alternet has interviewed Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker on the credibility of science. Pinker's answer bears on many of the discussions we've had at this site. In the following excerpt, Pinker distinguishes the scientific method from the "method" of politics, though his logic applies to most things that are not science…
In this video, Bill Maher discusses Religulous with Mike Huckabee. It's all quite civil, though both sides work hard to make their points. Watching this video makes me relived that at least some people on the national stage can discuss these serious issues without undue heat (that tone is what…
Topic: Proposed change to comment policy concerning ill-informed comments regarding A) the scientific method and B) evolution by natural selection. At DI, we’ve had a wide-open comment policy. Until recently, I have rarely rejected comments. The ones I have rejected consisted mostly of preaching (see the current comment policy). I’ve…
In this 2006 lecture at TED, philosopher Daniel Dennett (Breaking the Spell) takes on the "brilliant" contemporary redesign of religion by Rick Warren, author of The Purpose Driven Life. After acknowledging that Warren's book is, indeed, "brilliant" (it has sold 30 million copies and motivated comparable numbers of people), Dennett…