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# Ive seen enough of him and his brother on Question Time
and I could only watch about 1 minute of his interview at the Hay festival before i had to turn the TV of before i felt the impulse to destroy it..

Hes a very bitter twisted man..

He is an athiest.. where as Dawkins holds a certain amount of condesending sympathy for those who are relgigious.. Hitchens holds nothing but contempt.l. he sees all those with religious views as the enemy..

He is as part of this ridiculous modern cult of religious war and as such i cant stand him..

I have known Muslims and Christians and Hindus, who were all perfectly accepting of every one elses views on this crazy world we live in.. Just because a few mentalists exist that fuck up other peoples lives because of their religion, doesnt mean he has rthe right to declair war on ALL people who have any incling of belief in the supernatural...

There are ancient barbarian tribes that had more cultural and relgious compasion and acceptance than this bloke.

(I helped save b3ta! Jorvic, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:06, archived)
# I bet you havent read any of his books.
He does not want a war on all people who believe in the supernatural? WTF.
It sounds as though you had religious parents, thats my opinion.
(I helped save b3ta! PointlessCamel Last one on drugs is a queer., Tue 27 May 2008, 3:10, archived)
# No i havnt read any of his books.. maybe i should..
And no my parents arnt relgious.. i was raised in the typical Enlgish fashion of.. Yeah turn up to church a bit.. mwah.. cant be arsed.. dont really believe in that bollox anyway.. kind of thing..

My family range froma agnostic, to converting to catholicism, to athiest.. to believing in god in the JethroTull theology..

Every time ive seen Hitchens since he released that book though, hes said increadably inflamatory things, which lead me to believe that hes a very angry man, who hates all religion as much as any religious zelot hates the infadel...

I dislike his attitude..

I Like dawkins despite some of his attitudes.. but he has a cojent philispophical attitude to it all, and isnt as confrontational as some would expect.. it apears quite grating, but he simply sees things in his way, and obviously is frustrated by other people who dont see it the same.. Hitchens litraly talks of the DESTRUCTION OF CULTURE AND CIVILISATION!!!

MY fuckign god!! I mean there is a big gap there.. and Hitchins for me. is on the fundementalists bank..
(I helped save b3ta! Jorvic, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:19, archived)
# OK
That still does not make him a cunt. Calling him that sounds like fundamentalist talk to me?

Hitchens meets fundamentalism with strong reasoned arguements that stem from his extensive knowledge on the subject. His attitude is justified in this case, he is angry with suicide bombers and terrorists, who isn't?
(I helped save b3ta! PointlessCamel Last one on drugs is a queer., Tue 27 May 2008, 3:29, archived)
# Im angry at suicide bomebers etc
He litraly calls all religion an attack on modern civilisation..

And the reason hes a cunt is, because on a More4 sting he said "Why shoukld I give a shit about wha George Clonny has to say on polotics etc"

Then spends his time airing his fucking opinions on every fuckng thing, just like his brother..

Their both increadbly anoying to me, jsimply put because of their attitude to other peoples opinions, their ignorance to alot of issues.. and just generaly having anoying voices..

Thats why they are cunts for me..

Im a fundementalist cunt hater.. but im not whipping it up int he media like he is am i!
(I helped save b3ta! Jorvic, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:36, archived)
# I'm sorry but
I strongly disagree with you and we should leave it there i think.
(I helped save b3ta! PointlessCamel Last one on drugs is a queer., Tue 27 May 2008, 3:39, archived)
# Ha i think w3eve reached the end of it is suppse
Well good having a disagreament with you.. Cured my bordom for a bit...


Godd night sir..
(I helped save b3ta! Jorvic, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:42, archived)
# night
(I helped save b3ta! PointlessCamel Last one on drugs is a queer., Tue 27 May 2008, 3:46, archived)
# I'm not sure you understand how debate works.
You don't really have the right to champion the opinions of others when they are nothing more than a personal view.
I have little or no knowledge of the guy in question because his preaching has not affected me yet. I do happen to know Dawkins well and think the guy is very much on the button with many of his thoughts. His problem is again that he's not got the common sense and people skills needed to endear himself to people when trying to spread his ideas. But that comes down to preaching and as much as i think the guy is correct I also think he's an idiot who should shut the fuck up. Advice many could benefit from.

As for 'terrorists' that's a label that is poorly used and too wildly banded about. It suits the user and rarely tells the truth. Suicide bombers? I fear them, I have good reason to given my past. I'm not angry with them. I'm sad that they have fallen into that life and eventual death. No point being angry with a person who is just trying to have others notice that he believes different to them. You can't hate the Palestinian for feeling he has no other recourse to bring to the attention that his homeland is under occupation than to kill people.
I liberated Kuwait fella, I might have been one of many but I did my job and I did it without prejudice.
(I helped save b3ta! Pasanonic 's been known to cause insanity in laboratory mice, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:42, archived)
# Im a youngen...
My early childhood memories have a slight tinge of the the gulf war.. My mum still tells me how affraid I was of the news when all that was going on..

All I can say is I have ultimate respect for the armed forces, and especialy for those of my school friends who are in the army now. One of which I smoked cigars from Iraw qith this last new years eve..

I live in rural Yorkshire, I have no fear of suicide bombers, I dont like the idea of them, but I feel sorry fro anyone in London etc that possibly feears that kind of thing..

All I feel is, that whether it be Christian slating Muslim, or Muslim slating Jew or Athiest slating all religion.. It doesnt help tjhe situation.. we all need to accept that we a re all human beings, who have our own ways of coping with life.. and if we start to hate each other for that fact, its just going to cause mroe bloodshed..

Put it this way.. We all look back on 9-10 years ago at the GFA.. and think god, how hard was it for that to happen? why would it take souch negotiation to stop that bloodshed? Why should we activly create arguments for our own bloddshed? Northern Irelands problems are arnt much different to the problems we have now.. Only we have the oppertunity to nip them in the bud.. and Hitchens isnt helping none..



(I helped save b3ta! Jorvic, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:52, archived)
# I think I do actually.
I have every right to challenge others in thier opinions. Hitler's 'personal views' turned out to be rather harmul wouldn't you say?

If you think that 'people skills' are needed to convince others into agreement then you should really think about going back to school.

WHY do you think that bombers have fallen into that life and mindset in the first place!? Religion poisons everything it touches.

I can hate anyone who decides to kill innocent others to make a point! I am asahmed that you helped to 'liberate' Kuwait.

You lack reason and intelligence.

(I helped save b3ta! PointlessCamel Last one on drugs is a queer., Tue 27 May 2008, 3:59, archived)
# the method can have more weight than the message
telling people they are dumbfucks for being wrong won't work too well irrespective of if you are right and they are wrong.
(I helped save b3ta! discomeats This canoe, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:04, archived)
# who said
dumbfucks?
(I helped save b3ta! PointlessCamel Last one on drugs is a queer., Tue 27 May 2008, 4:07, archived)
# it was not a literal response to you, it was a statement in regard to method
Having said this, lacking reason and intelligence has as much value as calling someone a dumbfuck, though pasanonic is more than capable of defending himself in an argument and I feel this discussion has reached it's end if it must contain such statements.

Some moments not looking at the screen would be beneficial.

(I helped save b3ta! discomeats This canoe, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:17, archived)
# shit the bed..
I disagree with you on so many levels there..
im off to bed though.
(I helped save b3ta! Jorvic, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:07, archived)
# fucking arguing with fools is not something I take glee in, but if I must.
I have every right to challenge others in thier sic opinions.

I agree that you have a right to challenge the opinions of others, I'd just like to point out that this is not relevant to my comments. I said you had no right to champion the personal opinions of others as you started to do earlier

Hitler's 'personal views' turned out to be rather harmul sic wouldn't you say?

no, I would not say, given that you are rather vague and don't explicitly speak of the 'opinions' you refer to. Hitler was in fact one of the most outstanding politicians of our time. He came from nowhere to rouse a nation to fight for what they believed to be a place in Europe that they had previously occupied and should occupy again. I don't doubt that there are many Nazi policies that we could discuss the merits or demerits of but you offer no examples and even then you offer no citation to show that these were the personal opinion of Hitler so I'll leave that with you

If you think that 'people skills' are needed to convince others into agreement then you should really think about going back to school.

that would be your opinion and I don't think there is any valid point in discussing what are the best skills needed to preach ones own personal opinion to others. I will say that going back to school will give me little. I've already been merited with all the accolades I could expect to gain whilst proffering myself for examination

WHY do you think that bombers have fallen into that life and mindset in the first place!? Religion poisons everything it touches.

I'm not of the opinion that it matters what my thoughts are on this issue but seeing as you ask I will say that I agree that it is religious indoctrination that causes many people to behave in a manner that is both confusing and distasteful outside of their own peronal cult. I'd like to make it clear that I make no distinction between muslim, jew or catholic here. They are all archaic cults built on superstition and have no place in a future society based on humanity first

I can hate anyone who decides to kill innocent others to make a point! I am asahmed sic that you helped to 'liberate' Kuwait.

hate is stupid. Hate brings you to a point of opposition and hate will ultimately make you just the same as the thing you oppose.
You can be ashamed of me all you like but I think that as a member of the armed forces who did his job in Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Iraq that most people will understand that I have been a benefit to this society even if I have not always agreed with the motives of my masters.


You lack reason and intelligence.

personal insults. I refer you to my earlier statement where I point out you have no understanding of what debate is about

(I helped save b3ta! Pasanonic 's been known to cause insanity in laboratory mice, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:24, archived)
#
Sort of like the feminist who hates or looks down on men, the gay person who has it in for heterosexuals, the black person who hates whites etc.

Bigotry works both ways, people need to wise up and realize that.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:13, archived)
# Why is it good to be sympathetic and compassionate towards
people believing and hoping to spread myths?
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:14, archived)
# well we get the obvious first:
- You can't prove they're myths.
- Perception is a delicate issue and even when you're sure you're right you can never guarantee that what you see is either accurate or what anyone else sees.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:16, archived)
# perception is the point
one man's truth etc

ultimately whatever is said, things are what they are in reality, irrespective of what is chosen to be true or false

so, in summary: bollocks
(I helped save b3ta! discomeats This canoe, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:18, archived)
# Yes.
However, we can identify bullshit. When faced with sincerely presented ideas such as a celestial teapot (or "the moon landings were faked" or "breaking a mirror is unlucky"), we can call bullshit, and scathingly. Why should religious belief be treated any more gently, given that it is on the same level of implausibility by common standards?
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:21, archived)
# We can?
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:24, archived)
# Unreliably, yes.
Do you think there's something wrong with calling an idea ridiculous when it appears to you to be ridiculous?
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:27, archived)
# I think it makes you a tool if you do mostly
there are ideas I don't believe and I'll discuss them and all surrounding reason and issues but I don't think calling someone a liar or a bullshitter for believing something you don't, (say, god, faked moon landings, the illuminati, any of the counter-theories etc. etc.) is big or clever.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:30, archived)
# OK.
How about just saying "that doesn't make any sense"?
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:34, archived)
# As an expressed opinion with a view to continuing discussion
it's perfectly valid
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:35, archived)
# I believe that's known as heresy
often punishable to varying extremes :)
(I helped save b3ta! discomeats This canoe, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:36, archived)
# there is when someone points a gun to your head to remind you the idea isn't ridiculous and it's the only correct idea
as sometimes thinking for oneself is not an available option
(I helped save b3ta! discomeats This canoe, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:30, archived)
# Eek.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:35, archived)
# yes
I think that's the part I don't like

a new king turns up and has his own religion "my subjects are now [x]" of course all the right minded followers of [y] will be "I can't do that! I will offend my deity[ies] if I do not follow the one true way"

"you will if you want to stay alive"

I suspect more have suffered with forcing one religion over another belief, than have suffered from forcing athiesm

oh my, an opinion without researched factual basis!*


*and unlikely to be proven wrong
(I helped save b3ta! discomeats This canoe, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:43, archived)
# who is
spreading myths?
(I helped save b3ta! PointlessCamel Last one on drugs is a queer., Tue 27 May 2008, 3:17, archived)
# What do you mean?
Members of religions hope to spread myths, with the possible exception of buddhists (and they probably manage it anyway inadvertently).
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:26, archived)
# So what you are saying right here, and right now, is that all religions are wrong?
That's a pretty big claim, I hope you've got the evidence to back it up.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:28, archived)
# I'm saying that all claims of a deity who intervenes in any supernatural way
are as implausible as the celestial teapot.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:32, archived)
# Implausable is not impossible
and not all religious people believe that their god or gods intervene in any way.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:34, archived)
# Implausibility is a reason not to believe in a thing,
given that we can invent endless implausible things, and for the sake of consistency must either believe all of them or none of them.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:40, archived)
# That would imply that you required either a scale of plausability which you don't have
or that you have to believe anything that's more than 50% likely which, on the grand scale of things, will tell you fully sod all.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:43, archived)
# Scale?
I'm not talking about probabilities. I'm talking about explanations. I assert that interventionist deities are over-complicated explanations of anything. We can launch into an argument about why such a deity is a better explanation for observations than a world without the deity. I make the further assertion that to believe in a thing like a deity in the first place is weirdly simple-minded and inconsistent with the kind of ideas I expect people around me to hold, and that it ought to be trivially dismissed, and the fact that otherwise sensible people can cling to ideas about God for ages supports the notion of anti-rational memes that protect themselves from criticism.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 3:59, archived)
# The simplest explaination is not always the right one
in fact there's nothing simple about anything in life. Do you seriously expect me to believe that what you believe is more simple just because it's what you've been able to understand? That's very arrogant of you. Also, criticism is one thing, calling someone simple-minded entirely another.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:03, archived)
# Out of any group of explanations which explain the observed facts
we should always go with the simplest. If at some future point it fails to explain the facts then we require a more complicated explanation, but not before then. There are almost infinitely many explanations to choose from, if we include every excessively complicated one we can possibly make up.

Of course, if you can show me that there's a hole in my simple explanation and that it needs to be more complicated, then fair enough. And of course I might be (and I'm sure I always am, in some way) wrong. The fact that this might happen is no reason for me or you to give respect to any of the panoply of silly ideas that a person could pull out of his ass, prior to that person showing that there's something wrong with the more sensible alternative.

I didn't call anybody simple-minded; I said that there's something funny going on - that in fact I don't think the average, say, Christian is simple-minded, and therefore belief in God, which is akin to unicorns, is jarring when you consider that it's so commonly found in otherwise sensible people.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:16, archived)
# Do we have to go with any?
All avenues should be open to exploration and an assessment of either simplicity or likelihood is always going to be flawed until you know the full truth, if such a thing is even possible. You could always found a belief based on paradox instead of reason as any reason you have is unlikely to be precise at best.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:21, archived)
# Oh, sure.
By "go with an idea" I don't mean "banish all alternatives from your mind and never contemplate them again".
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:34, archived)
# To me that does sound like what you're doing
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:35, archived)
# All ideas we encounter have a place somewhere in our minds
and I fully accept that ideas about deities are ideas. I keep them near my ideas about unicorns and gnomes.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:45, archived)
# Well that clenches shut that avenue of discussion...
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 4:53, archived)
# Hey,
we can also discuss whether tinkerbell exists. I say no and it's a silly idea.
The discussion is still possible, though. Evidence that she exists in reality
can be presented to me, and I will listen. It would be a bad thing if I gave
the impression I thought the idea was sensible, though. It would be a bit like
lying about my ideas about reality in general, because of the implications on
related ideas. This is what we do when we respect religious viewpoints.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 5:06, archived)
# You're just too stubborn to admit the difference between being a git
and disagreeing. I see no reason to continue this discussion.
(Guineapiggy Fuzzeh!, Tue 27 May 2008, 5:34, archived)
# Religion
is able to demand respect in discussions which it doesn't deserve.
Its success in obtaining undeserved respect distorts the conclusion
of discussions, usually in the direction of "maybe God exists, who
indeed can say, ahhhh."

Meta-comment about arguments being ludicrous - that is, founded in
a collection of other ideas commonly agreed to be false, or self
contradictory in trivially obvious ways, or otherwise weak - can be 
part of truth-seeking, and not an attempt to shut down discussion,
but rather an attempt to avoid being tricked into an inconclusive
admission that anything is possible, which implies the ideas are
sort-of-true even though there's no reason at all to think that.
(_Felix 's school of dance and occult sciences, Tue 27 May 2008, 14:19, archived)