Fans de Waal is a crucial figure in the research into morality, fairness, reciprocal altruism and suchlike within the realm…
For those of you who do not know what a Google Hangout is, it is effectively a Skype call with multiple people which is broadcast to the public so that they can watch (though not join in). It can be recorded and posted to You Tube. It’s a great feature with good functionality.
By analysing MRI images of the brain with an elegant mathematical model, it is possible to reconstruct thoughts more accurately than ever before. In this way, researchers from Radboud University Nijmegen have succeeded in determining which letter a test subject was looking at.
The journal Neuroimage has accepted the article, which will be published soon.
Leading Indian Rationalist Assassinated By Gunmen
It is with deep shock and sadness that we report the assassination this morning (Tuesday, 20 August) of one of India’s most renowned rationalist and Humanist leaders, Dr. Narendra Dabholkar.
He was reportedly shot four times by two men on a motorbike this morning on Omkarweshwar bridge in Pune, Maharashtra state. He wasreportedly taking his daily morning walk when he was assassinated, a route that may have been known to his attackers.
Manipulation is often thought of as morally repugnant, but it might be responsible for the evolutionary origins of some helpful or altruistic behavior, according to a new study.
After having looked at Randal Rauser’s reasons for being a Christian, and having had my reasons and his defences intensely debated on his blog, I have in a previous posts (linked below) offered Dr Vincent Torley’s account. Some readers may know Vincent from the Uncommon Descent website which attempts to refute evolution. I have argued with him at length when I used to write for John Loftus more often at Debunking Christianity. Here is his bio:
As most of you probably already know, my first book was Free Will? An into whether we have free will or whether I was always going to write this book. This has received overwhelmingly good reviews (the only negative one on Amazon.com is from a mental Catholic priest who hadn’t read it and who has been banned from here, as well as negatively reviewing all of my books.
Anywho, I just thought I’d share the last couple of reviews for Free Will?
I, as you may well know, contribute to the Skepticule podcast by recording a counter-apologetics segment for them, Pearced Off.…
Good on Williams here. I have talked about this before, that persecution as defined and supposedly exemplified by the victimised modern Christian is nothing but a ridiculous concept, and an insult to people around the world who are genuinely being persecuted, including real Christians in some hardline Islamic contexts. Here is the Guardian:
Jeez. And what gets me down is that there is a really professional looking TV station to peddle this utter…
[EDIT] Sorry about this post, because I starting writing it (well, copying it from Aaron’s blog) with a view to…
I have recently listened to a really interesting debate between Justin Schieber of the rather excellent Reasonable Doubts podcast and Max Andrews. Andrews writes at Senentias.org and I believe may be some sort of ‘backroom staff’ for William Lane Craig. His bio is:
To those of you who use Reddit and who run blogs, you know people don;t like other posting their own…
A chap called Lothar’s Son from Germany has contacted me to offer an argument against naturalism which he has posted on his blog. His blog, lotharlorraine, hosts the piece which can be found here. Please feel free to comment there as well as here. Thanks for LS for contacting me! Here is his argument, with kind permission:
Having just had a small discussion on an Amazon book review concerning evolution, and with the science denier proposing as one of his 3 main arguments against evolution being ‘junk DNA’, I thought this article would be interesting; a recent paper described by Science Daily:
Aug. 2, 2013 — Researchers from the Gene and Stem Cell Therapy Program at Sydney’s Centenary Institute have confirmed that, far from being “junk,” the 97 per cent of human DNA that does not encode instructions for making proteins can play a significant role in controlling cell development.
Whilst on holiday I finished reading John Loftus’ The Outsider Test for Faith which I greatly enjoyed and will be reviewing in a short while. There is much to talk about within the pages, not least some of the excellent quotes he has gathered from other writers which he uses to defend his own positions on various topics.
For the purposes of this post, I want to just think a little about the jurisdiction, even the residence, of God.
And so it is. Goddidit and supernaturalism sidle into the corner of explanatory power as the march of science proceeds. Today, Near Death Experiences and their afterlifey dualism take a hit….
The BBC:
Some time ago I posted a piece called God Loves Abortion, to which Andy Schueler added a nice piece on conception and the creation of the soul and personhood from a biological perspective. The other day on my Free Will, Heaven and the Problem of Evil video, Honest_John_Law linked this summary by Scott Rhoades of an interesting piece by Gregory Paul.
As reported here, the House of Lords recently had what can only be described as a fascinating debate. Whilst some non-UK visitors to this blog may not be able to access the video, thanks to Chris Street at HASSNERS (where you can find the transcript with really useful notes and comments), here is the full transcript from Hansard:
So we (my partner, twin toddler boys and myself) had a wonderful stay-cation in Cornwall. Beautiful accomodation, weather, countryside and beaches. An all-round winner. The boys loved it. The only moment of furrowed brows (well, mine) was at a lovely seaside town called Perranporth, where we stopped at the beach. Walking back, I saw a bunch of purple-shirted youngsters dancing and generally having fun surrounded by a small horde of beach-going holiday-making children.
Not sure if I have posted this one before, but needing to do quick and edifying (hopefully) posts, I am…