Wow, that was a shock. I was at the county library today – at a branch of the county library system, that is – and on my way out I passed a catalogue terminal and had a wild and crazy impulse to look up Why Truth Matters. I didn’t think they’d have it of course, just thought I’d make sure. But what a shock I got – they’ve ordered three copies. That’s a lot of copies.

One is for Redmond. Maybe that’s Bill Gates’s copy.

Speaking of libraries – last Saturday I went to a talk-book signing thing at a local branch (of the city library this time) with Marjane Satrapi, who wrote and drew Persepolis and Persepolis 2. … Read the rest

Update: outeast pointed out in comments that the article linked is, shall we say, long on rhetoric and short on evidence; or perhaps a joke; anyway that it seems to misrepresent what the game is actually like. Somebody play it for me and find out, okay? I certainly don’t want to play it.

Did you look at the Christian dominionist video game items? Exciting, aren’t they? Thrilling to know there are people with views like that out there, planning, planning, planning…

Imagine: you are a foot soldier in a paramilitary group whose purpose is to remake America as a Christian theocracy, and establish its worldly vision of the dominion of Christ over all aspects of life. You are issued

Someone told me the other day that argument isn’t, shall we say, my strong suit – by which I think was meant I’m terrible at it. Oh, I thought, and picked up the classifieds to look for another job. This time I might even try to find one that pays money, however little. That’s what I get for leaving school in the seventh grade. Not that I regret it – those years on the streets were the making of my character.

But so I was amused to see this entry on a philosophy-type blog (a transgendered one at that) that’s full of recommendations of good skeptical, philosophical, scientific and similar sites, and says in a paragraph on logic-oriented sites –… Read the rest

Next up. Bush’s bizarro non sequitur.

Mr Bush said: “Ages of experience have taught us that the commitment of a husband and a wife to love and to serve one another promotes the welfare of children and the stability of society.”

Okay – and? So what? What’s your point? What follows from that? How, exactly, do you get from that to a need to forbid gay marriage? What’s the deal? Are you thinking that the existence of gay marriages will exert some kind of sucking effect on straight marriages, causing them gradually but surely to – um – become something other than straight marriages? To turn into poker dens, or iron smelters, or Manolo Blahnik shoes? But how? How … Read the rest

People do keep trampling on the rights of religious believers, don’t they. Have you noticed that? Exhibiting paintings that some Hindus don’t like, putting on plays that some Sikhs don’t like, drawing cartoons that some Muslims don’t like, refusing to give arbitrary unequal treatment to people that some Christians would prefer to see getting arbitrary unequal treatment – there’s just no end to it. So naturally the religious believers are speaking up. Wouldn’t you?

Consider for instance these UK proposals to ‘protect gays and lesbians from being denied “goods, facilities and services” because of their sexual orientation.’

Lord Mackay of Clashfern and the Bishop of Rochester, the Rt Rev Michael Nazir-Ali, said in a statement issued by the Lawyers’

Oh dear, another ‘community’ has been attacked and defamed and had its human rights abused. Will this kind of thing never end? This time it was an art exhibition that attacked and defamed the Hindu community and abused its human rights. But the Hindu community didn’t take this attacking and abusing lying down – or at least, the group ‘Hindu Human Rights’ didn’t. Bless their hearts.

So we are fully aware of, respect and uphold British laws and traditions, which protect the rights of the Hindu community to protest when attacked and defamed.

That’s a sly one. Yes, of course, British laws and traditions protect the rights of anyone to protest when attacked and defamed, or any other time; British … Read the rest