If there were any doubts about writer and general provocateur Christopher Hitchens ability to pull a crowd, they were entirely dispelled by the sold-out opening night of the first ever Festival of Dangerous Ideas. Presented by the Sydney Opera House and the St James Ethics Centre, the Festival brought together some of the more controversial thinkers from Australia and around the world. Hitchens’s keynote address, followed by a discussion with our own Tony Jones, was an expansion on his bestselling, “God is Not Great: Religion Poisons Everything”. Hitchens was at his polemical best, delivering a beautifully constructed speech supporting his argument that religion is not only completely implausible, but often actively destructive. Christopher Hitchens’s other books include “Letters to a Young Contrarian”, “Why Orwell Matters” and “The Missionary Position: Mother Theresa in Theory and Practice.” He also writes a regular column in “Vanity Fair”.
On March 11, 2010, In Uncategorized, by admin
If there were any doubts about writer and general provocateur Christopher Hitchens ability to pull a crowd, they were entirely dispelled by the sold-out opening night of the first ever Festival of Dangerous Ideas. Presented by the Sydney Opera House and the St James Ethics Centre, the Festival brought together some of the more controversial [...]
If you enjoyed this article, please consider sharing it!
Thanks and same to you. A lot Creationists say that all atheists do is make fun of them yet they feel free to tell atheists that theyre gonna burn in hell for their blasphemy. Wasn’t it Jesus who said that God is the one to judge, not people? Hypocracy is abundant on both sides of the argument.
If only those who proclaim atheism shared your viewpoint. I believe that is the more intellectually honest viewpoint if you’re not a believer. Some folks just don’t see the point of faith, which is the primary component of Christianity…faith in Christ. I have reconciled my beliefs with science, and truly put weight in that which is Scientific Law, not theoretical…too many unknowns and margins of error to be convincing. Have a pleasant evening.
Right now i’m studying neurology and endocrinology. I love physics as well and spent a long time studying physics. Your welcome to your own opinion. Im not an atheist I simply believe i don’t have enough evidence to lean either way and am content with saying i don’t know. In the end being good is what matters.
BTW, your previous responses did not show up in my “comments” box. That is why I didn’t respond. I apologize. Are you a student of all scientific disciplines, or do you focus on a specific one? I prefer physics, and am not much of chemistry buff.
That’s incorrect. The aforementioned geneologies skip generations, first of all. However, The approximation is close enough. Where does it say God created the Earth on the first day? All it says is He created day and night. God the “heavens and the earth”(v. 1) “Now the earth was formless…”(v. 2) “And God said…”(v.3) You are referencing what is called “New Earth” creation. I am an “Old Earth” creationist. In either case, the message of the Bible is Jesus, not biology, physics, or chemistry.
You can’t infer that there are a few hundred million years in margin that would be necessary to agree with my cosmological standpoint. God made everything in 6 days and (adam n eve on the 6th) according to the bible.
theologians use called apostalic succession to prove the descendancy of apostles from jesus and the twelve apostles. they use the geneology of jesus to prove jesuses’ descendancy from adam. Knowing the ages of each person you can come to an estimation of when adam and eve were made, which was shorty after the world was made. It’s in Matthew 1:117[1] and Luke 3:2328
The Bible doesn’t say how old the Earth is. There is no time mentioned from, “In the beginning…”, to the time of the first “day”. All it says is that the earth was void, and had no order.
Your spelling was ok, your punctuation was a little off. The word, “peoples” needed an apostrophe, but, other than that, all is well.
Wait what? you’re not going to point out the obvious mistake in spelling of my last comment?
@MrProgressivelib1
Thanks for dodging my earlier replys. You are welcome to move on with your superiority complex pointing out peoples lack of grammar instead of arguing anything intelligent.
lol…what does it say that a retard was 100 times the person and president than the current knucklehead will ever be! BTW, I think you meant to type, “And”…you’re so stupid, you can’t even spell.
An BTW, Reagan was a complete retarded dumbass. The fact you are his fan says it all!
Maybe Zeus is very upset right now that you are not preaching his gospel, better watch out. Maybe, just to be sure, beleive in him too. And then get upset with other people who did not fell in to the trap of there own imagination.
I dont need to disprove god. Why would I need to disprove something which I say does not exist. You make the claim there is a god, therefore the burden of proof is on you. I am very openminded, if there even was a miniscule proof of god, I would not dismit it. But that is not the case. You are the one making the leap of faith into fantasyland.
Which percieved superiority, the fact that God does not exist makes me superiour?
Simply look at the facts. Is it really so hard to think that your God is a human fantasy. For example. Have you ever seen a miracle?
You claim god can’t be disproven and that is why science is not a religion. In introductory physics you might learn that the light we see projected from other galaxies actually predates the estimated creation of the earth in the bible. unless the universe is an illusion made by god there is no other way to explain this.
Religion is a thing of faith and worship. If science were a religion we would still be worshipping einstein’s theories. we wouldn’t believe in accelerated inflation or weakly interactive massive particles.
Obviously from the context of your comments you don’t understand what a singularity is. THE singularity infers that you think there is only one. Black holes are singularities and are part of what keeps our galaxy from being a chaotic mess. Without black holes we could not exist. Neutron stars collapse due to carbon shell cooling breaking the schwartzchild radius and colapsing space time. This also pertains to the multiverse theory that the other end of the black whole is a white hole (universe)
You can look up the multiverse theory if you would like. I’m sure you will say oh that’s just a theory but so is god. At least physicists are trying to prove the theory and will drop it if they find it’s not the most likely answer. Again your blind faith will only tell you that something unlikely should always be the most likely answer. Again you’re at the short end of the stick. Do you call medicine a religion when you take it when you’re sick?
Yes, they have theories of of the origin of the singularity. You obviously want me to pull it out of my pocket and show it to you because your religion causes you to assume you have an innate reason to know how it happened. There obviously is a stick and your at the short end of it. You call something based on theories that for the most part can be proven in labs and by satelites a religion. Your introductory education in physics obviously didn’t go to deep into relativity now did it?
They cannot account for the origin of the singularitry, or the first 3 minutes(a manmade unit by the way). I took several physics classes, and understand plenty. I will admit that I have not pursued much interest in the last three years, so if there has been a new discovery, I’d be happy to look into it. There is no stick. And atheism is a religion.
All I see on here are idle threats of perceived superiority, and NO proof of that superiority. You cannot disprove God anymore than I can prove Him. Just be honest enough to admit you are as closed-minded as you claim believers are, and next time, please punctuate correctly. Otherwise, you have no intellectual credibility with me.
Well, you’ve proven that you have at least a 2nd grade education. I have one, and I, at least, know how to how to use it.
Useless religious crackpot prick. Get a brain.
First of all, let us reach an agreement on what is considered a religion? Otherwise, its way to easy for beleivers to confuse due to semantics. However, the fact they have to to this proves they themselves actually do not beleive in what they wants others to beleive. All religion has been made up by humans and is practiced by humans. Nothing divine about it.