You should give back your present just on principle.

1. He’s making an atheist joke on my alias, i.e. it’s high time the world rid itself of Allah.

That’s my vote.

I mean it is Hitchens, and the only time he and the Right agree is when it comes to radical Islam (so it might not even be a joke). I wouldn’t be surprised if he knows who you are even if he doesn’t read Hot Air.

And people with common sense know you’re a brilliant writer, so it could never be number 2.

Sigh…we Christians are an easy target 365! We won’t cut your head off or blow ourselves or you up along with your families. All we do is express our frustrations on a silly blog and then we go about our daily business trusting our Lord that all is actually ok with the world. And He reminds us that it is…

sabbott

Silly, don’t you know that to liberals and atheists, that amounts to hate speech and emotional terrorism?! And to them that is worse than getting your head chopped off.(especially since maybe if they rage against the Christians, the “religion of peace’ers” might leave them alone.Heh, heh, good luck with that);)

AP, you should know better than to care about this unrepentent, pseudo-couth drunk.

Then, Mr. Hitchens would have written 08-XII-23 – with no relationship to logic, or necessity, of course :)

Entelechy on December 28, 2008 at 5:59 PM

Or he may have been inspired by the French Republican Calendar, which got rid of the dastardly Gregorian Calendar (damn those Christians!), and used Roman Numerals to designate years.

It’s a gift.

Don’t psychoanalyze yourself and everyone else so much. God, you sound like my mother. “Does this gift make my ass look fat?”

Subsunk

Seneca has no relevance to any serious debate concerning religion. He was probably the greatest hypocrite in human history, certainly in recorded history.

aengus on December 28, 2008 at 2:36 AM

To be sure, no claim made to the contrary.

On the way he wrote the date – I noticed it yesterday and forgot to comment – I like it, just in format, and that it is truly him.

Aside – on a more serious note, only the Asian way of writing dates is logical, especially in a computer age – it’s yymmdd. The American and European versions need to be converted to subtact one date from another. Sometimes it w/b good if all the world would adopt something meaningful, no matter the source.

Then, Mr. Hitchens would have written 08-XII-23 – with no relationship to logic, or necessity, of course :)

“May you do your job so well that it will seem ludicrious that punditry on the subject of Allah is necessary.”

So I don’t really see it as a joke, but as a serious well-wish. That reading gives no definitive answer as to whether Mr. Hitchens has read you, but it hints that he has not, since, as I’m reading it, it’s purely a response to the name.

Frankly this utilitarian argument for religion (the Medved argument) seems similar to arguments in favor of the Gulf of Tonkin lies, since they were successful they should be given some credibility, not because of their factual merits.

Well, that is the most negative possible way of construing the issue. Here’s a more positive way: in the schema of humanity’s priorities, exploring ultimate and unanswerable questions, being a bit of a luxury, takes a distant back seat to the important of forming functioning communities. Shared stories and mythology is an extraordinarily powerful tool, perhaps even essential, for creating communities and propagating their shared values.

The modern belief seems to be that hypocrisy and mendacity are the worst of all possible sins, and the follow-on belief that this trumps any possible value that a shared story may have for community formation. I call shenanigans. I just don’t think that this modern set of priorities is right; in fact, I think it’s insidiously destructive. Columbus and the Pilgrims didn’t regard indigenous people with the same respect that we now do? Then let’s trash the heroic stories that have helped form America’s culture! Think God doesn’t exist? Then let’s just call Christians bigots because they have no ultimate reason to disapprove of homosexual behavior! Did Jefferson own slaves? Then down with those shared cultural myths that would lead one to admire him!

Hogwash. The shared mythology of a community is its binding and its strength, and we would do well to send our valuable analytical talents in some other direction than picking our mythology apart.

Now, if you want to look at the effect of a shared story on the values and behavior of a community, and judge both the story and the community thereby, I’d agree.

That said, all due respect, can you stop saying “good lord” now? :)

Just sayin’…

Good lord. It’s like getting a Bible autographed by the Pope.

No, it’s more like getting an autographed copy of the satanists bible signed by anton la vey.

Well, Miss_Anthrope, in the current war, religion is certainly the enemy. Passive religions and practitioners of same aren’t an issue. It’s the in-your-face-save-you-from-satan ones that are the problem.

I’m anti-fundamentalist. Muslim, Hindu, Jew and Christian fundamentalist are all dangerous in their own way (as are some of the new pseudo scientific religions). I’m unquestionably anti ignorance which goes hand in hand with being anti religious fundamentalist.

Good lord. It’s like getting a Bible autographed by the Pope.

So I guess we know what Michelle got Ed for Christmas. But what did MM get in return? My guess is that Ed sent frozen samples of climate change, and Allah sent some of his lithium prescription.

I don’t understand the claim that you can’t be atheist/agnostic and be conservative. I am!

You can be atheist/agnostic and conservative at the same time, no problem. But you cannot be an anti-theist and a conservative simultaneously. Western civilisation was not created by Voltaire or his legions of clever intellectual imitators.

aengus on December 28, 2008 at 2:31 AM

aengus is absolutely right on this. Those who are anti-theist or anti-religion cannot be conservative at the same time. That’s because, in my view, they view religion as their enemy.

Let me explain, as someone is who is a Conservative non-theist:

Those who are trying to gather people together for other issues: environmentalism, worker’s rights, etc., tend to utilize many of the same concepts to keep their flock together, but use the state not God to worship. Religion interferes with their issues, so anti-theists will aggressively pursue efforts to diminish or eliminate Religion altogether.

That’s why Conservatives will tend to be quiet non-theists, while Liberals will tend to be loud, aggressive, militant anti-theists.

Then again, he probably never reads the comments.

Almost as cool a gift as Lego Indiana Jones, almost.

And so what if he was implying you sucked? So What?

Why do you care what he thinks…is it just because he’s the premiere atheist that you give a sh!t about his opinion, but if he was just some schlump then who gives a flyin’ flip?

Dude, you really are fulfilling your beta status…I suggest you go find your spine.