Penn Jillette on how reading the great religious texts will make you into an atheist, the future of magic, and how he and Teller work together.
hat tip boingboing
Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data, ability to repeat discredited memes, and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Also, be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor even implied. Any irrelevancies you can mention will also be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.
"Overall household indebtedness is up from $7 trillion to almost $10 trillion since 2000. On this sum, we estimate, the American consumer has an annual interest bill of more than $500 billion; a sum, by the way, that vastly exceeds his current income growth." —Kurt Richebacher
Knowing that the vote over the weekend in Greece was really a referendum on Euro membership, a majority of the Greek Parliament said yes to staying. European Finance Ministers meet again on Wednesday to solidify the 2nd bailout package for Greece at the same time hopefully a deal is consummated between Greece and its creditors this week. The Greek 14.5b euro bond that matures on March 20th is up by 2 pts. The optimism that all will be completed and contained AGAIN to Greece has yields lower in Portugal, Spain and Italy. The iTraxx Financial Index is also narrower by...
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July 9th, 2010 at 12:15 pm
Interesting…first you have to differentiate between religions and spiritual disciplines-Religions are socio/political structures, spirituality is not.
Then, you kinda’ have to ask yourself if all of these “mathematical” relationships we’ve “discovered” in Nature can possibly be the product of no intelligence?
July 9th, 2010 at 1:55 pm
hear, hear.
Penn is a great skeptic and atheist spokesman.
July 9th, 2010 at 2:02 pm
@nanka: Don’t understand this argument – if they were a product of some kind of intelligence (which could be so, of course) this intelligence must be the product of either another intelligence (and this one too and so on… infinite ascent) or of no intelligence at some point. So the problems get bigger and bigger every time – Doubtful if you ask me…
July 9th, 2010 at 2:17 pm
“Then, you kinda’ have to ask yourself if all of these “mathematical” relationships we’ve “discovered” in Nature can possibly be the product of no intelligence?”
To paraphrase God talking to Moses through the burning bush: “Those mathematical relationships in Nature — they are what they are.”
No further explanation is necessary. If you need to explain those relationships by some “intelligence”, then you need to explain that “intelligence.” And then explain that explanation, ad infinitum. It’s elephants all the way down.
God said to Moses, “I am what I am.” No further explanation. But no further explanation is necessary beyond Nature itself.
July 9th, 2010 at 2:54 pm
Heh. Came across this the other day:
===========
The Egg
By: Andy Weir
You were on your way home when you died.
It was a car accident. Nothing particularly remarkable, but fatal nonetheless. You left behind a wife and two children. It was a painless death. The EMTs tried their best to save you, but to no avail. Your body was so utterly shattered you were better off, trust me.
And that’s when you met me.
“What… what happened?” You asked. “Where am I?”
“You died,” I said, matter-of-factly. No point in mincing words.
“There was a… a truck and it was skidding…”
“Yup,” I said.
“I… I died?”
“Yup. But don’t feel bad about it. Everyone dies,” I said.
You looked around. There was nothingness. Just you and me. “What is this place?” You asked. “Is this the afterlife?”
“More or less,” I said.
“Are you god?” You asked.
“Yup,” I replied. “I’m God.”
“My kids… my wife,” you said.
“What about them?”
“Will they be all right?”
“That’s what I like to see,” I said. “You just died and your main concern is for your family. That’s good stuff right there.”
You looked at me with fascination. To you, I didn’t look like God. I just looked like some man. Or possibly a woman. Some vague authority figure, maybe. More of a grammar school teacher than the almighty.
…
http://www.galactanet.com/oneoff/theegg_mod.html
July 10th, 2010 at 9:57 am
Penn Jillette: angry
July 10th, 2010 at 2:18 pm
God’s ways are higher than man’s ways and His thoughts are higher than man’s thoughts. Just as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are God’s thoughts higher than man’s and his ways higher. (Book of Isaiah)