Comments on: Templeton tactics

By: Philosopher gets $4mil to figure out free will « Philosophy in Utah

Philosopher gets $4mil to figure out free will « Philosophy in Utah — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 15:44:28 +0000

[...] on usuphilosophy, we once had a discussion about atheists trying to decide whether they ought to accept money from the Templeton foundation. [...]

By: Mike

Mike — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 01:53:09 +0000

I haven't had a chance to read any books by Edwards yet but I appreciated this book review from a while back. Maybe I'll pick up that one.

By: Rob

Rob — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 21:44:47 +0000

Thanks, Jake. I’m especially interested since the second endorsement for the book is by my undergad mentor ( –who, by the way, disagrees with Waugh’s gloss on Wittgenstein’s deathbed remark about having had “a wonderful life”: he thinks Wittgenstein was too fanatical about truth telling to have made it ironically).

By: Jake

Jake — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 21:27:37 +0000

Oh, I guess the link works. I am not that computer savvy. Haha

By: Jake

Jake — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 21:26:29 +0000

Hi everyone, I do not mean to get off track with this thread, but I found a book that I think looks interesting. It is written by a professor at Princeton and it is called “Saving God”. The author calls Hitchens and Dawkins undergraduate atheists, and that religion needs to be saved from their distortions. That jumped out at me. Anyways I thought I would share it, it might be of some interest for future discussion. Here is the link: http://press.princeton.edu/titles/8978.html
Anyways I hope everyone is having a good summer. Seeya
Im sorry that the link will not put you there directly, I guess you will have to type it.

By: Rob

Rob — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 22:56:53 +0000

Dennett’s amusing report of Templeton-sponsored sessions at the Cambridge Darwin Festival:

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/2009/07/09/almost-live-report-daniel-dennett-at-the-cambridge-science-and-faith-bash/

In the second session:

“[David Sloan] Wilson offered very interesting data from a new study by his group on a large cohort of American teenagers, half Pentecostals and half Episcopalians (in other words, maximally conservative and maximally liberal), finding that on many different scales of self-assessment, these young people are so different that they would look to a biologist like ‘different species.’”

By: Clay

Clay — Thu, 09 Jul 2009 03:23:54 +0000

Awesome! Thanks Mike.

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 22:03:19 +0000

and Bokonon

Verses 2-4 (?): In the beginning, God created the earth, and he looked upon it in His cosmic loneliness.

And God said, “Let Us make living creatures out of mud, so the mud can see what We have done.” And God created every living creature that now moveth, and one was man. Mud as man alone could speak. God leaned close as mud as man sat up, looked around, and spoke. Man blinked. “What is the purpose of all this?” he asked politely.

“Everything must have a purpose?” asked God.

“Certainly,” said man.

“Then I leave it to you to think of one for all this,” said God.

And He went away.

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 21:39:45 +0000

I'll try to quote more from Yet Another Testament to balance things out.

Fear not: if thou keepest silent, and stareth into space, it will soon end. Yet Another Testament (author unknown)

By: Clay

Clay — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 19:41:01 +0000

Users on this forum quote Nietzsche in the same way that born-again Christians quote the bible. Nothing against Nietzsche, I own and enjoy a couple of his books. It is just a trend I noticed.