It’s that time of the year, my friends! Almost. Anyway, let me try to persuade you to part company with some hard earned cash in support of my projects and books. This is partly a reblog of Caleb Lack’s post some time ago over at the superb Great Plains Skeptic here at SIN (so the first part is written from his point of view):
Category Book / Film Review
The BHA reports this annoyingly insane story. Please tweet them or email a complaint:
The British Humanist Association (BHA) has reacted with alarm at news that a non-religious human rights activist, Maryam Namazie, has been denied the opportunity to speak at a student society event, seemingly because she is an advocate of secularism who is critical of religious extremism.
John Grove, a commenter here on occasion at ATP, and a great supporter of my work, has really kindly placed the first review of my new ebook on classical theism: God’s omni characteristics. It is an amalgam (the book) of my posts, with some original extras, which I think is a super one-stop shop for all things counter-apologetic and arguing against that nonsensical God/god.
Franz Kiekeben studied (University of South Florida) and taught (Ohio State University) philosophy, having written for the SKEPTIC magazine and published academic articles on determinism and time travel. He recently sent me a book he has written called The Truth About God to review.
I haven’t done a post like this for ages. Reading, as I mentioned in a previous post, a book sent to me for review, Franz Kiekeben’s The Truth About God, the author takes a whistle-stop tour through inconsistencies in the Bible (not so much to list them all, as he only mentions a few, but to illustrate the types of defences that Christians typically use). He details the inconsistency which starts the Bible off, namely the six day creation story.
Modern day Christians hold that Jesus and God are one. The Athanasian Creed for instance holds that “…there is one Person of the Father; another of the Son; and another of the Holy Ghost.
Here is another review to my Little Book of Unholy Questions – a 4/5 to add to six 5/5s. Er, buy it! (please… – click on the cover image to access it on amazon)
It’s been known since the 19th century that there are striking parallels between the Ark story contained in the Bible and a narrative episode included in the Mesopotamian story of the Epic of King Gilgamesh. In Gilgamesh, a hero Utnapishti is tasked with saving both human and animal life from a destructive flood (for which somewhat surprisingly, no reason is given) by the god Ea. Like Noah, Utnapishti builds a boat, fills it with animals, and finds himself lodged on the top of a mountain. What’s more, just like Noah, Utnapishti sends out birds on three test flights to establish that the flood waters were receding:
The Christmas Candle, which was produced by the Christian-themed studio that Santorum heads, fails to fly
The Christmas Candle, set in the fictional English village of Gladbury and billed as “a timeless holiday film for the entire family”, attracted widespread critical scorn as well as dismal box-office results, having grossed just over $1.6m (£988,000) after two weeks on release.
Russell Blackford, one of the many superb writers we have here at SIN (over at The Hellfire Club) is going through a prolific writing period, a right purple patch. One of his recent titles just hitting the bookshelves and online retail listings is 50 Great Myths of Atheism.
Here is the book description from the back cover:
I gave a very short amazon review which will hopefully be a precursor to a longer more in depth view of John Loftus’ excellent book, The Outsider Test for Faith:
You would have to be a cultural hermit not to realise that the film production of the famous Victor Hugo book and resulting musical has recently hit our cinema screens to largely rapturous welcome.
Largely. Not exclusively.
So, a review: