Arguments for morality are not arguments for religion

(This article is also available on Edge, along with some other rebuttals to and affirmations of Haidt’s piece.)

Jonathan Haidt has a complicated article on moral psychology and the misunderstanding of religion on Edge. I’m going to give it a mixed review here. The first part, on moral psychology, is fascinating and a good read that I think clarifies a few ideas about morality. The second part, though, where he tries to apply his insights about morality to the New Atheists*, fails badly. I can see where he has thought deeply about morality, but unfortunately, he hasn’t thought clearly about the New Atheism (and perhaps that isn’t entirely his fault. We’re “New”, after all, and I don’t think the structure and goals of these New Atheists have quite gelled yet.)

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Credit where credit is due

A football player, Kevin Everett, suffered serious spinal cord trauma in a game the other day. That’s tragic, but the impressive part of the story is that he may recover to some degree thanks to advances in treatment, and most surprising, this comment from a consulting neurosurgeon:

“I don’t know if I would call it a miracle. I would call it a spectacular example of what people can do,” Green said. “To me, it’s like putting the first man on the moon or splitting the atom. We’ve shown that if the right treatment is given to people who have a catastrophic injury that they could walk away from it.”

No miracles, just hard work and fast action and science. Sounds like the right answer to me.

Where can I get a creationist degree?

On eBay, obviously!

The source is the PL Institute of Space Technologies. It’s an amazing place that offers undergraduate and graduate degrees in “Creationist in Sciences” (a Cr.S. degree is not equivalent to a bachelor’s degree, they say), and also carries out research in these fields:

  • Creational Healing: We develop a new kind
    of healing method.
  • Electrical Engineering: We develop and use
    a new kind of semiconductor technology mainly based on silicon, copper and
    oxygen, and we search for new energy systems, etc.
  • Minor-System-Technology: This
    environmentally sustainable technology uses a minimum of resources to solve
    problems perfectly.
  • Polycultural Engineering: We develop a new
    kind of agriculture based on balanced ecological systems.
  • Spacecraft Engineering: We develop minor
    probes and new kinds of drives using principles of alternative physics. The far
    distant goal is to develop and to realize a generation spaceship for a
    God-fearing community.
  • Theological Cosmology: Research of the
    deeper knowledge in astronomy and exobiology.
  • Mathematics: Research of the deeper
    knowledge in holistic mathematics.
  • Theology: Practicing and teaching of
    down-to-earth Christianity based on the Holy Bible.

“They” are using the plural pronoun, but I’m afraid I get the impression that it’s actually a singular fellow talking to himself in his garage. His biography page says that he’s not certain that he’s not a fruitcake and that he has a B.S. in electrical engineering. Shhhh, don’t make a big deal of it, the engineers are always embarrassed when another creationist engineer staggers out of the utility closet.

Fla*ed protocol *eakens brain study

There’s an obvious design fla* in this experiment reported in the LA Times. The researchers ran a simple experiment *here the subjects *ere sho*n a series of letters, and they *ere supposed to tap a key *hen they sa* one, but not the another. The subjects *ere classified by their political vie*s, from left-*ing to right-*ing, and a correlation *as discovered: students *ith liberal vie*s had more brain activity and made fe*er mistakes than conservatives. This fits *ell *ith my biases, but I *ouldn’t *ant to s*ear to the trust*orthiness of the *ork. There *as a very poor choice in the design.

The letter that you *ere supposed to tap *as “M”. The one that you *ere supposed to avoid *as an upside do*n “M”, the letter also kno*n as “*”.

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Kathy Griffin is my new hero

We won’t get to hear Kathy Griffin’s Emmy award speech — it’s being censored. Here’s what she said:

In her speech, Griffin said that “a lot of people come up here and thank Jesus for this award. I want you to know that no one had less to do with this award than Jesus.”

She went on to hold up her Emmy, make an off-color remark about Christ and proclaim, “This award is my god now!”

The off-color remark was to say, “Suck it, Jesus.”

I thought it was funny. If I ever win an Emmy (do you have to be on TV to win that, or something?), I hope to remember to say something similar. It is, of course, ridiculous to censor someone for denying the influence of an invisible phantasm, but I guess the usual suspects got huffy. You know who I mean: the Indignant Sour Prune of the Airwaves, Bill Donohue.

The comedian’s remarks were condemned Monday by Catholic League President Bill Donohue, who called them a “vulgar, in-your-face brand of hate speech.”

Hate speech? Who did she hate? She laughed at an old superstition, mocking the habit of celebrities giving credit to an omnipotent ghost for nudging a shiny statuette their way. If Donohue were serious about his religion, he ought to be more upset at the trivialization of the Lord of the Cosmos into the guy who hands out trinkets.

Another creationist serial litigator goes down in flames

Larry Caldwell has a history of suing in California courts for creationist causes. Mike Dunford has some material on the latest attempt to claim that leaving out Christian myths was “viewpoint discrimination”, and in particular on their interesting choice of a star witness.

The Christian schools hired Dr. Behe (for $20,000) as an expert in “biology and physics.” (That second part should make Chad and Rob’s heads explode, given that Behe has absolutely no physics experience of any kind.) To earn his fee, Dr. Behe prepared a report that said, basically, that the Christian textbooks are excellent works for high school students. He also defended that view in a deposition that was taken back at the end of May.

Wooeee, that Behe fella has a real racket going. No wonder he’s so committed to his absurd version of creationism — there’s profit in it.

Anyway, Chad and Rob can break out the superglue and reassemble their crania now, and use a pastry gun to reinject their splattered brains. The case has been dismissed.

I’m sure Mr Caldwell will be back next month, filing another frivolous lawsuit. I’m also sure the Discovery Institute will be very, very quiet about this new failure in their history of legal shenanigans.

Oops. Behe was testifying in a different case in California. How many suits are the creationists involved in, anyway? Wesley has the rundown on the correct legal case.

On the utility of mice

I’m soon to run off to a class in which we’re going to discuss 16th-17th century science (Vesalius, Bacon, Harvey, Hooke, etc.), and there’s an amusing passage in J.A. Moore’s book that I have to share. It’s a description of a bestiary by Edward Topsell that explains the importance and usefulness of various animals, including mice. Mice seemed to do everything.

A mouse can be skinned, cut in two, and placed over an arrow wound to help the healing process; if a mouse is beaten into pieces and mixed with old wine, the concoction will cause hair to grow on the eyelids; if skinned, steeped in oil, and rubbed with salt, the mouse will cure pains in the lungs; sodden mice can prevent children from urinating too much; mice that are burned and converted to powder are fine for cleaning the teeth; mouse dung, prepared in various manners, is useful for treating sciatica, headache, migraine, the tetters, scabs, red bunches on the head, gout, wounds, spitting of blood, colick, constipation, stones, producing abortions, putting on weight, and increasing lactation in women.

One does wonder if there was a plague of people running around with hairy eyelids in 1607, and I’m almost tempted to try the pulped mouse in wine for the effect. The toothpaste recipe…eh, only if I never wanted to be kissed again.