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“The Passion of the Rational” [Dan Collins]

Four miles into last Sunday’s Seattle Marathon, runners came on a sight so singular that some stopped to be photographed with it.

It was a banner, 3 feet by 6 feet, that read: “SEATTLE ATHEISTS — WE BELIEVE IN YOU.”

Behind it, handing out water to the runners and cheering, were 30 volunteers with one thing in common: They say there is no God.

Why in heaven’s name were atheists sponsoring a road-race water station?

“Because we like that people are running on a Sunday instead of going to church?” said Wendy Britton, 43, a financial consultant from Bellevue and lifelong God-denier.

Joking aside, the atheist presence at the marathon isn’t the half of it. Suddenly atheists are hot.

And everywhere. Wearing Santa hats while wrapping gifts for charity. Giving blood in groups of 15. Manning pledge-drive phones at Seattle public radio station KUOW.

Membership in the five-year-old Seattle Atheists has soared — to 122 dues-paying members plus 600 more on the event list.

It has a budget surplus. It’s planning ads in Metro buses. It has its own line of “atheist activewear” — T-shirts to mark the wearer as out and proud in their disbelief.

They even have a local hero, Ron Reagan, son of the former president. He has cut radio ads that end with: “Ron Reagan, lifelong atheist. Not afraid of burning in hell.”

Mel Gibson was so 2004. Now it’s the passion of the rational.

“We do feel like a dark cloud has lifted,” says Jerry Schiffelbein, 46, a Bothell database consultant. He was a baptized Catholic until he realized he didn’t buy the biblical creation story.

Hey, they want to organize and do good works? Good for them. I’m glad at least that I won’t be held responsible for their misery.

But there’s nothing rational about rejecting Catholicism because of the Creation Story. As far as I’m aware, I don’t know a single Catholic who takes it literally, and I can tell you I spent a lot more time on Lyell, Mendel and Darwin in Catholic school than I did on Genesis. So, good on ya, Seattle atheists, for donating blood and all, but please don’t give material to idiots like this Danny Westneat to go off on a moronic jag.

Can we all get along? No. No, we cannot. Not when it comes to religious symbols.

Which is why the atheists are winning. If you allow an overtly religious symbol such as a Nativity scene in the Capitol, then all can follow. So come on down, atheists, Muslims, Hindus and Jews. Satanists, Wiccans, Animists and you. And Ken Hutcherson, too.

Now that’s a diorama that would light up the Capitol! Not to mention holiday hearts. But I bet it gets decided that it’s better for both government and religion to put all this where the atheists said it should go all along: out.

Didn’t you just say that they held up a sign in a public place? People like you, Danny, make a religion of the expression of government power and influence, just as long as it’s power and influence of which you approve. And you may not understand this, but that’s because you’re an accidental totalitarian. I’m sure your bumper stickers are offensively stupid to me. I say, let them all manifest, except for the damn Mithraists. I hate those bastards.

Or, if you prefer, here is a link to some Zombie Haiku by famous poets.

124 Replies to ““The Passion of the Rational” [Dan Collins]”

  1. happyfeet says:

    No link? This smells like journalism not a report of genuine news value about stuff what is going on in society that is meaningful and impactful.

  2. B Moe says:

    Giving blood in groups of 15.

    What is that all about?

  3. happyfeet says:

    oh.

    It’s not that there are more atheists. It’s that the political setback for conservative evangelicalism has atheists practically breaking out in song.

    Atheists hate Christians is the newshook here I guess.

    oh wait.

    Well, let’s not get carried away. Atheists still are among the most despised minority groups.

    oh. These people are an oppressed minority group is the deal he says. Bless their hearts.

  4. Sdferr says:

    Seems like a good thread in which to re-post a link to Harvey Mansfield’s address to the AEI on “Religion and Rational Control through reflections on Tocqueville”. Really, the audio version is better, as being more complete as well as more entertaining. Audio. Printed, gist only. And a hat tip is due to Russ Roberts at Cafe Hayek for putting it out there.

  5. happyfeet says:

    Hopefully we’ll move to events what mock hysterical marxist climate change pansies being as normal and as unworthy of comment as others.

  6. Barney Frank says:

    Hopefully we’ll move to atheist events being as normal and as unworthy of comment as others.

    Like Christians?

  7. B Moe says:

    Dammit.

  8. SSG Ratso says:

    People like you, Danny, make a religion of the expression of government power and influence

    Yes. Whetehr they practice a religion or not, whether thay beleive in God, or the supernatural or not, all people are religious. Those who claim not to be, simply do not know, or have not acknowledged what it is that they are worshipping.

  9. Rob Crawford says:

    Suddenly atheists are hot.

    Why? Because it’s Christmas time and reporters are the laziest fucking people in the universe.

  10. parsnip says:

    Why,

    Beccause America is now on the same road to godlessness that Europe is on.

    They just got a head start.

  11. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    Keep telling yourself that, snippy.

  12. Ajax says:

    Being an atheist myself, and a capitalist (a devotee of Ayn Rand, in fact), it’s hard for me to understand this conceptual package deal of “if youre an atheist, youre a socialist; if you believe in god, youre a capitalist”. It really makes no sense when you parse it out logically. But I have no doubt that these demonstrating atheists are all leftists, just as I am usually pretty sure when someone tells me they voted McCain that they are at least somewhat religious. It’s a cultural thing, I guess. Obviously, I am all in favor of these concepts being divorced from one another, but I don’t see that happening any time soon.

  13. happyfeet says:

    at least somewhat religious a lot encompasses anyone that voted for either of the climate change pansies what were running. I guess time will tell if the angry sun gods were appeased but they are wrathful and we have been very very sinful.

  14. happyfeet says:

    I think it’s nice that the atheists are comfortable being open about their alliance with NPR though.

  15. B Moe says:

    if youre an atheist, youre a socialist

    Its not that, exactly. I think a distinction needs made between atheists and agnostics and Capital “A” Atheists who are evangelical in their non-belief and hold meetings and marches and rallies and give speeches and only have to get them some paper mache heads before they can protest at WTC meetings. Those Atheists who feel attacking, ridiculing and harassing Believers is part of the package. Those guys, like most of the hard core green crowd, are lefties at heart.

  16. Rob Crawford says:

    Being an atheist myself, and a capitalist (a devotee of Ayn Rand, in fact), it’s hard for me to understand this conceptual package deal of “if youre an atheist, youre a socialist; if you believe in god, youre a capitalist”. But I have no doubt that these demonstrating atheists are all leftists, just as I am usually pretty sure when someone tells me they voted McCain that they are at least somewhat religious.

    The association has little to do with the non-belief they’re expressing so much as their comfort in publicly expressing their attitudes towards others.

    Lefties, while patting themselves on their backs for their “tolerance”, are the group most comfortable publicly expressing their intolerance. When you see a group literally parading their intolerance for others, the odds are good they’re lefties.

    When you see positive press concerning their expressions of intolerance, the odds they’re lefties approaches certainty.

  17. meya says:

    ““A” Atheists who are evangelical in their non-belief and hold meetings and marches and rallies and give speeches ”

    Its the evangelicals and their meetings and marches and rallies and televangelism that are the worst.

  18. Sdferr says:

    Fervent public expression of atheism is, historically speaking, a rather new thing. It does seem to be catching on, in the faddish sense of the bandwagon effect, with posturing to be included and all that entails for human beings, etc.

    I have long wondered at the wisdom of this approach (the public aspect of the thing), at least in a risk/reward sense, as I’m not at all sure there is a worthwhile payoff to be had and the downside, as historical examples will show, can be pretty ugly, if not terminal.

    Only time will tell but in the meantime, I just don’t see much general good to be had from it. Personal, relatively tiny, private goods, such as book contracts and so on, well sure, there’s that. But widespread public goods? I don’t see them, yet.

  19. Jeff Y. aka The Continental says:

    So many atheists incorrectly assume that Christianity is necessarily or predominantly a fundamentalist religion. It isn’t.

  20. Darleen says:

    Ajax

    Rand, indeed, was an atheist, but she still held Man in a Romantic vision — Man as heroic, Man as superior to His surroundings.

    Really, her view of Man was rooted in her Jewish background. A universe that was created by random chance holds no moral value and thus, Man has no more moral worth than a rock, since Man is as random as granite.

    I can fully understand why Rand and many others reject overt religiousity, especially the unexamined kind of strict fundamentalism. When someone gets “because God sez so” to any question of “why” after a while it sounds suspiciously self-serving.

    But a lot of serious thinking has come from religious roots, much more than just “god sez so”. The Talmud, for example, is a collected series of what can be considered religious debates akin to reading arguments before the SCOTUS.

    I’m making a huge generalization, but for the vast majority of Believers, God is the ultimate justice — that something of us exists outside our fleshy shells, survives death and is judged on our actions during life.

  21. ushie says:

    I look forward to the time when everyone, like me, just won’t give a rat’s ass about trendy atheists.

  22. Fred Stone says:

    Dan fails to make the distinction between individuals “holding up a sign in a public place” and a local government placing religious symbols in a government-sanctioned display of religious sentiment.

  23. happyfeet says:

    wow, Fred. That really opens up the discussion.

  24. Sdferr says:

    It is an odd thing though, having to go all theological in order to discuss a-theology, don’t you think Darleen?

    Oh, and that random stuff just isn’t so, is it now. There doesn’t seem to be anything particularly random about human tetrapodality, for instance. Contingent, maybe, or dependent on particular chance events, but contingent with a very distinct history to it. Life is very particular that way. Had to have happened just the way it did to end up where it is, so to speak, rather than in some airy-fairy cloud-cuckooland possible other way, no?

  25. parsnip says:

    So many atheists incorrectly assume that Christianity is necessarily or predominantly a fundamentalist religion. It isn’t.

    Then what’s the difference between Christianity and your average feel good new agey therapy?

    God may as well be a Care Bear.

  26. Dan Collins says:

    Parsnip, I’d say Christianity is a good deal more challenging.

  27. Log Cabin says:

    When one is an atheist, how does one determine what is right and what is wrong?

    Is it all subjective? Does one just know? Why wouldn’t one just do whatever he/she can get away with? Is there a reason not to?

  28. parsnip says:

    So, Dan,

    Atheists are just Christians who don’t buy the god bit?

  29. Atheists still are among the most despised minority groups.

    Note to today’s fragile-nerved hothouse-orchid activists: not having your every thought and action slavishly admired and exclaimed over is not the same as “being despised.”

  30. Dan Collins says:

    I would look to someone like Dante for that, Parsnip. Meanwhile, go worship your Care Bear.

  31. dorkafork says:

    Comment by Ajax on 12/7 @ 12:19 pm #

    Being an atheist myself, and a capitalist (a devotee of Ayn Rand, in fact), it’s hard for me to understand this conceptual package deal of “if youre an atheist, youre a socialist; if you believe in god, youre a capitalist”

    Ditto. I’d say it has more to do with the cultural issues dividing the left and right today, rather than it being a difference of opinion over economic policy. There are some hot button issues (like stem cell research, or teaching creationism) where it would be hard to imagine an atheist supporting the common right-wing position.

  32. Darleen says:

    Hmmmm, is Fred part of the cranky set? I see meya is.

  33. Dan Collins says:

    dorkafork and Ajax, wall of the Achaians, I hope I didn’t say that atheists are all socialists. I meant that the author of the piece appears to be.

  34. donald says:

    Log Cabin and Meya, those are two incredibly stupid things. Something is either right or wrong. That is determined by about 4 thousand years of theory that you have the right to your beliefs and feelings. As long as you don’t use those beliefs to harm others, that’s right. If you use your beliefs to harm others, that’s wrong. If you use your person to deprive someone of life, liberty, or happiness that’s wrong. Fuck, what a bunch of twits. What a bunch of small minded jack asses. It is very important for atheists to exhibit these characteristics, otherwise I really don’t want you on my side dig? It is also very important to be tolerant of others. Fuck.

  35. happyfeet says:

    If you use your person to deprive someone of life, liberty, or happiness that’s wrong except when it’s not I think. You seem awfully dogmatic for an atheist.

  36. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    As far as I’m aware, I don’t know a single Catholic who takes it literally

    The “reporter” and Mr. Schiffelbein might want to Google up Gregor Mendel and Georges Lemaître, among others.

  37. happyfeet says:

    I will share my happy song with donald I think.

  38. JD says:

    Fred and meya and parsnip are the kinds of people that get offended at the sight of a Christmas tree.

  39. parsnip says:

    I don’t mind seing a Christmas tree, JD.

    I even have one in my living room.

    I just pity anyone who sees it as anything more than a decorated stick.

  40. Dan Collins says:

    Parsnip, we invest things in meaning.

    I doubt you’d be here if that were not so.

  41. JD says:

    sniffles/alphie – crawl back under your rock.

  42. Salt Lick says:

    I don’t mind seing a Christmas tree, JD.

    I just pity anyone who sees it as anything more than a decorated stick.

    See, that right there is how I feel about Obama voters.

  43. Salt Lick says:

    I’m getting used to that Kim’s Little Titties song, hf, but this is still my happy song.

  44. happyfeet says:

    I love that one! I forgot about it. Bookmarked.

  45. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    I don’t have a happy song on tap, but this is my ass-kicking song.

    Very outlaw, I think.

  46. JD says:

    Fred and meya and parsnip should be taxed, heavily, for the volume of oxygen that they suck out of a room.

  47. SSG Ratso says:

    Perhaps meya or parship could articulate a rational objection. That is, without reference to how anyone feels about it.

  48. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    This one is a little happier.

  49. Darleen says:

    I just pity anyone who sees it as anything more than a decorated stick.

    root veggie reminds me of those cynical boys of the 60’s who would tell a girl “baby, marriage is just a piece of paper of no value to true lovers … now let’s fuck”

  50. happyfeet says:

    I am Who-resistant cause they’re so babyboomery. I know it’s rank bigotry but I’m afraid I’ll like it mostly is why.

  51. parsnip says:

    Objection to what SSG?

    Atheists handing out water?

  52. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    I used to feel the same way about Frank Sinatra, ‘feets.

    I got better.

  53. happyfeet says:

    atheists just want to be loved is that so wrong?

  54. happyfeet says:

    Frank Sinatra I am very down with. I’m kind of working backwards with the rest of it trying to get a handle on the seventies and then maybe we can creep up on that boomery stuff.

  55. JD says:

    The next actual point that parsnip/sniffles/alphtard makes will be its first.

  56. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    Francis and Eugene.

  57. Log Cabin says:

    Wow Donald, I can see that it IS incredibly important for you to be tolerant of others. Your post just oozes with tolerance. Have you ever tried to express yourself without insults or the use of F-bombs?

    You must work in public relations.

  58. Sdferr says:

    LC, I laughed at donald’s post so long and hard I had to end up figuring it was an intentional — if only a little inept — funny maker.

  59. SSG Ratso says:

    Do try to keep up, parsnip. Objection to public religious displays, which is the subject of the post and discussion.

  60. donald says:

    Nah, just a really shitty bit of writing. To clean it up a bit, here’s the deal, think what you want, just don’t harm the other guy. Know what I mean? I’m not gonna stop anybody from being a piece of shit, just don’t deprive me (Or others) of their life, liberty, or happiness. I can be tolerant, and yet disgustings of anybody’s thoughts. I’m a small business owner, built it all up from the ground on my happy go lucky personality. So, yeah, I guess you could say I’m in public relations. 98% of the people in this world have their own thoughts and feelings however different or weird. They choose not to try to ram them down other people’s throats. You other 2%, you suck. Better?

  61. donald says:

    Oh, and I was in the Navy, so I cuss like a sailor.

  62. parsnip says:

    As long as all religions and atheists can display their trinkets and beads in a given public space, I have no objections SSG.

    Provided, of course, that the govenment isn’t paying for any of them.

  63. donald says:

    OH, and the Falcons just lost, so fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, damn, shit, fuck, fuck, fuck.

  64. commander0 says:

    “Comment by Log Cabin on 12/7 @ 1:28 pm #

    When one is an atheist, how does one determine what is right and what is wrong?

    Is it all subjective? Does one just know? Why wouldn’t one just do whatever he/she can get away with? Is there a reason not to?”

    Through a reasoned application of the Golden Rule. It sometimes requires some intellectual effort. We do not, however, generally torture ourselves over whether it is the right day to eat a pulled pork sandwich. Nor whether any day is right for that. Anybody who wants to argue that angel is free to do so. We have more important things to consider. Like our navels.

  65. Sdferr says:

    Oops, my bad LC. And donald’s recursive irony detector is set to off today, I guess.

  66. JD says:

    RTO – You know better than to expect parsnip/sniffles/alphtard to actually make a point, or at least one related to the actual topic at hand.

  67. donald says:

    What’s irony?

  68. Sdferr says:

    Expecting the Falcons to win, maybe?

  69. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    Through a reasoned application of the Golden Rule.

    So you want your neighbors to file lawsuits against you?

    Odd, if true.

  70. donald says:

    Bastard.

  71. JD says:

    Colts win their 6th in a row. Texans win at Lambeau. Go Steelers!

  72. SSG Ratso says:

    If it’s in the public square an argument can be made that the government is paying for it, or at least subsidizing it.

    So rather than parsing a way out, why not answer the question?

  73. SSG Ratso says:

    Hope springs eternal, JD–ref your comment regarding Pittsburg.

  74. Mossberg500 says:

    assnip=non sequitur

  75. Sdferr says:

    I see Romo coughed up an int. already (bad throw or putzed-up un-catch, anybody?), so JD’s got that going for him.

  76. JD says:

    Oops, sorry ’bout that, maggie and RTO. I just do not care for the Cowgirls. I like their cheerleaders well enough.

    You two should come visit me in Austin next week.

  77. parsnip says:

    What’s the matter, SSG?

    Do you object to none-Christian religions displaying their stuff or what?

  78. Rob Crawford says:

    What’s irony?

    It’s like coppery and goldy, except it tends to rust.

  79. Mossberg500 says:

    none-Christians must celebrate festivus! arsenip is just doing its “airing of grievances.”

  80. Ajax says:

    Dan: Let’s not forget that Ajax was the only Achaean who didn’t require a god watching out for him every second on the battlefield ;-) And I didn’t take any offense to your post, it just makes me sad to know that these demonstrators, fellow atheists, also believe that government should control my life.

    As to the question of how an atheist determines right and wrong: that’s something I struggled with since I became an atheist at 16 or so. Sadly, I thought Nietszche was the answer when I was younger and that morality is something to be transcended – beyond good and evil, you know (I was a socialist at the time, go figure). Luckily, I finally read Atlas Shrugged. Rand grounded her morality in the requirements of rationality. I won’t try to explain it, but if you want to know how an atheist can be moral, she’s the best one to read (Virtue of Selfishness, perhaps)

    And Darleen, you’re right that Rand’s Jewish culture shaped her into what she became. She was also quite tolerant of religion (in moderation) and her atheism was one thing she never shoved in peoples faces. She knew, I think, that on a fundamental level it was the religious conservatives who were her allies, no matter how bitter her battles with conservative leadership at the time.

  81. commander0 says:

    “Comment by Spies, Brigands, and Pirates on 12/7 @ 3:12 pm #

    Through a reasoned application of the Golden Rule.

    So you want your neighbors to file lawsuits against you?

    Odd, if true.”
    I haven’t filed any lawsuits against my neighbors. Have a bacon sandwich on Friday, nutjob.

  82. happyfeet says:

    I don’t think that comment about the bacon sandwich is a good example of effective commenting. I’m just not getting anything out of it to where I feel engaged. My new thing is all my bread what I get lately has flax in the name. This means it’s very fibery. It would probably make for a tasty bacon sammich but so far I’ve only tried tuna and also my cheese and jalapeno one.

  83. commander0 says:

    Well then, maybe a bone in your nose to show your piety is more in line with your particular form of devotion. Whatever, have at it. I don’t much give a shit.

  84. happyfeet says:

    oh. You sort of attenuate the engageyness with the I don’t give a shit part but I think that was better. Kind of racist though.

  85. commander0 says:

    Disc lip? Oh no, that’s racist too. How about, bomb vest? Shit more racism. Vine bungee? Nope. Hmmmm. What lunatic devotion couldn’t possibly be construed as racist by the thought police? Snake handling? Nope, only white do it. Speaking in tongues, there you go. Whites and blacks got that one going on.

  86. happyfeet says:

    There’s always squiggly bulbs. They control the weather you know. You just have to have faith.

  87. commander0 says:

    Somehow I don’t think my level of faith is going to impact the weather much, squiggly bulbs or no. Then again, we’ll never know, will we? Oh noes, I’m not turning agnostic, am I? Because that would just be so pointless. I think I’m having a crisis of no faith. You bastard.

  88. I always get a big laugh out of atheists who constantly complain about “Christian” Christmas symbols. I always tell them that, as a non-Christian, I have no problem with the displays, and they always ask why. Then I gently tell them that, actually Jesus was more than likely born in September or October, and that nearly ALL the symbols used in the Christmas season are “Borrowed” from European pagan religions, including my own, and that, by using these symbols, Christians are actually helping keep parts of my faith in the public eye, and propagating those memes. So I actually thank them for doing so.

    Totally blows atheists minds…

  89. commander0 says:

    I’m blown away.

  90. Mossberg500 says:

    feets, I don’t think commandero is getting the whole greenieness of the bulbitude. Quite a faithless non-religiously sort of rager. He might like a little Michael Jackson “jesus juice” to give to the kiddies during the solstice.

  91. commander0 says:

    I’m not much for jesus juice. Catholic priests, on the other hand…..

  92. SSG Ratso says:

    I object to the masquerade; the general athiest assertion that their position is purely rational. It also leads to the spurious conclusion that they are also intellectually superior. Go look to the mental midgets at Secular Right blog for an example that this is not particularly a left/right issue
    The whole notion of “offense” is emotional and therefore not rational.

    So quit squirming now and answer the question. Better yet, where did your fellow traveller, meya, go? She should be giving this a shot as well.

    Incidentally, why do you refer to me as “SSG”? I’m thinking you likely don’t even know what it means.

  93. commander0 says:

    Who are you talking to? And why are you so defensive about reason? It isn’t that scary a concept.

  94. SSG Ratso says:

    Commandero, it’s gerneally considered good form to have lurked for a while before jumping into a new forum.

    If you read the other comments in the thread, you’ll see who I’m talking to. You might even realize that you’ve drawn some wildly erroneous conclusions about my position. Defensive of reason, perhaps.

  95. SSG Ratso says:

    JD, considering how this game is going, Maggie says she may drive to Austin and punch you.

    Woof.

  96. commander0 says:

    It is “good form”, old chap, to address a reply after several hours and posts have passed since you last joined the conversation.

    I’ve “lurked” for quite few years. I’ve also made a few comments over those years. I do not for one second accept your obnoxious notion that I should watch and learn before I dare to opine.
    Your masquerade remark was bogus. You may object to the form of the rationale of any one atheist but a blanket assertion that an attempt to adhere to reason is some kind of masquerade is ludicrous. Voltaire had those who disagreed with him. Fine thinkers, many of them. You are no Voltaire.

  97. Spies, Brigands, and Pirates says:

    How about, bomb vest?

    How about TrollHammer?

    Buh-bye.

  98. parsnip says:

    You still haven’t answered my question yet, SSG.

    Do you object to public spaces being open to displays by all religions?

  99. commander0 says:

    “Comment by Spies, Brigands, and Pirates on 12/7 @ 6:48 pm #

    How about, bomb vest?

    How about TrollHammer?

    Buh-bye.”

    Too racist for ya?

  100. Sdferr says:

    Ratso (I plaint), that durn T. Romo is like:

    There was a little girl who had a little curl
    Right in the middle of her forehead;
    When she was good, she was very, very good,
    And when she was bad she was horrid.

    Feh.
    And scene.

  101. SSG Ratso says:

    Commandero, I said it was a generalization. You’ve also failed to comprehend my argument on the most basic level.

    Taking offense at a religious display is an emotional response, which by it’s nature, cannot be rational. Yet we are treated to justifications predicated on the inherent superiority of the atheist over the “religious” (a silly distinction as athiests are just as religious as any adherant of an organized religion, simply by virtue of being human) because their positions are based on rationality.

    It’s rank hypocrisy. It is a masquerade.

    Voltaire also wasn’t given to propping up strawmen, and I’d think wouldn’t appreciate being used, by you, as such. Then again, you’re an athiest? He’s dead so doesn’t care.

  102. SSG Ratso says:

    parsnip,

    To answer your question, which you posed after I posed mine; no. I do not object. I fail to see how my opinion in that regard is germaine to the conversation.

  103. parsnip says:

    Well SSG, we are in a agreement.

    I don’t care what the Christians want to put in the public square as long as I can put my Flying Spaghetti Monster next to it.

  104. JHoward says:

    So many atheists incorrectly assume that Christianity is necessarily or predominantly a fundamentalist religion. It isn’t.

    Cartooning is the friend of the weak-minded. Look at the nearest Democrat, generally speaking: An entire worldview based mostly on fervent hope, blind faith, ignorance of history, ignorance of human nature, and first-level reactionary myth.

    With giant floppy red shoes and hairy monkey ears. The bastards. Who hate their grandmothers. So before you go there, preemptively I condemneth myself.

  105. JHoward says:

    I don’t care what the Christians want to put in the public square as long as I can put my Flying Spaghetti Monster next to it.

    You miss a lot. Probably you miss that the FSM has no being, meaning, resemblance, point, or ethic. God does, even if only by, wait for it, human definition. Dood!

    The difference is trajectory of meaning, ‘snip. The FSM has none except to miss making a point. “God” has so much meaning even you can’t define It. Kinda like Christ himself only hinted at such Definition. Whoa.

    Rich irony, that.

  106. Swen Swenson says:

    I don’t know about happy songs, but this song makes me happy..

  107. Sdferr says:

    One thing we haven’t explored, at least here in this thread, is the possibility that decoupling reason and passion may be in fact impossible. Or, in other words, holding out the possibility that they can be decoupled meaningfully may be a figment we (in the west) have made up long ago and cling to despite any proof of concept. Or it may be that the two (presumed) faculties can, as a matter of fact, be decoupled, but only at the cost of a very particular sort of brain injury which in its turn may be judged to have effectively ended the ordinary life of the possessor of that brain.

    I only mean by this to suggest that these relationships may turn out to be rather murkier territory than we commonly think.

  108. SSG Ratso says:

    So you still won’t answer my question. Figured.

  109. Dan Collins says:

    As a matter of fact, Sdferr, it is impossible to decouple passion from reason, nor is it desirable.

    http://www.metanexus.net/magazine/ArticleDetail/tabid/68/id/3050/Default.aspx

  110. parsnip says:

    Jho,

    Can I assume you haven’t been touched by his noodly appendage yet?

  111. Sdferr says:

    Yeah Dan, I had something like Damasio’s ideas floating around in there somewhere, though his particular notions I can only have gotten gisty like, maybe form hearing him talk on radio or hearing someone else talk about his ideas, since I haven’t read his book.

  112. Sdferr says:

    from, dammit.

  113. Sdferr says:

    Speaking of passion and reason and their relations, can anyone explain why the BCS algorithms are (and have been) so fucked up? Ranking OU 1 and Florida 2 just doesn’t make any sense to me on the face of it.

  114. JHoward says:

    Not yet, ‘snip. I figure his Appendage must be a predestinationist and my red sauce ain’t preordained.

  115. happyfeet says:

    oh. I was like that’s gotta be that other guy’s kid and yup it sure was. Ben Taylor I mean. That whole identity thing was kind of distracting but it was a nice song. It’s just his dad reminds me of Harry Chapin. I am a lot ambivalent about Harry Chapin.

  116. happyfeet says:

    I would probably never have been so ambivalent about Harry Chapin if I hadn’t never seen his picture. It’s just I did though and it doesn’t match his songs at all at all and I don’t know for sure I really get him. Also have you ever had Cat’s in the Cradle come on while you’re in a car with just you and your dad? That’s just effed up.

  117. Ranking OU 1 and Florida 2 just doesn’t make any sense to me on the face of it.

    um, overall points, maybe? OU’s last, uh, five games have they have scored over 60 points.

  118. B Moe says:

    And OU’s last three bowl games they got whupped. This is basically the same team that my Mountaineers man-handled last year, and the Gators are way meaner than we were. This is going to be a slaughter.

  119. This is going to be a slaughter.

    if my fambly scores tickets again, then probably, B Moe, probably. but, OTOH, I don’t remember OU making quite the trouncings last season. I don’t really follow it closely though.

  120. Carin says:

    Well SSG, we are in a agreement.

    I don’t care what the Christians want to put in the public square as long as I can put my Flying Spaghetti Monster next to it.

    Erm, no. Because your FSM isn’t a symbol of faith, but (instead) a FU to those with faith. Otherwise you wouldn’t be interested in putting next to a Christian display. The lack of sincerity of militant atheists is obvious every time they attack faith.

    I don’t need to attack Mormons or Muslims in order to practice my religion. Atheists, likewise, should be able to do the same. The atheists I know personally are like that.

  121. Slartibartfast says:

    This is going to be a slaughter.

    OU looks tough, and Bob Stoops is a great coach. I don’t think it’s going to be a cakewalk for the Gators.

    OTOH they’ll have a lot of injured players back, and they are deep enough to use those players in rotation with other experiences players that are pretty much good enough to start for anyone else.

    Florida is the 9th-ranked defense in the country; Oklahoma does not appear on the rankings, possibly because of their 99th position on pass defense. Total defense ranking, they’re 65th, nationally. Florida just beat the #3 defense in the country without its major weapon, Percy Harvin, so I think that they can easily take Oklahoma.

    Whether they will or not is why they play the game. Offensively, they’re the best in the country. Florida, on the other hand, is 9th in total defense and 3rd in scoring defense. If Florida truly is 3rd in scoring defense, Oklahoma won’t be able to score at will as they’ve done against their other opponents. Turnover margin, we have the top two ranked teams in the nation in that category playing for the national championship.

    Oklahoma’s opponents have been rather unstellar, defensively. There isn’t a team in the Big 12 that’s in the top 50 in the nation, defensively. That’s part of Oklahoma’s offensive ranking, right there. Florida, on the other hand, beat the #3 defense and absolutely destroyed the #13 defense (Florida State).

    I pick the Gators by 18.

  122. Sdferr says:

    Thanks for that round up, which more than fleshes out my simplistic “on the face of it”, Slart.

    I’m just idly puzzled at the poor agreement between the BCS rankings and the various other polls over the season — AP, Harris, etc. So idly that I’m ashamed to admit I haven’t done the research to understand how the BCS actually works but have noticed that many people pretty constantly grumble about BCS outcomes.

  123. Slartibartfast says:

    Dunno why I said 18. I meant 17. A couple of safeties isn’t out of the question, but it’s not something I’d bet on.

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