Ben C. O. Grimm - One Weblog Too Many

Whereas Richard Dawkins focusses on the stupidity and intellectual poverty and dishonesty of holding religious beliefs, Sam Harris (see also Wikipedia) has a much more alarming take on things.

He considers religion, especially apocalyptic religion (everything will go wrong on earth, triggering Jesus' return and the rapture, which is the belief of a certain Mr. Bush and a majority in the American Congress), to be an immediate threat to world safety.

Very interesting and intelligent lecture about the book he wrote in 2004, "The End of Faith: Religion, Terror, and the Future of Reason", although you might want to step out for a cup of coffee when Sam rambles on about the positive side-effects of Buddhist meditation in part 3 of the lecture, unless you're a devout fan of Richard Gere.

Also watch out for his latest work, "Letter to A Christian Nation".

Lecture:

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4

I normally do not use words like 'heroes' to describe my, ehm .., heroes, but if there's anyone who comes close to that moniker, it's Richard Dawkins, probably the most outspoken and intelligent atheist on the face of the earth today.

I hope I will be able to make some time very soon to read his book "The God Delusion".

In the meantime, I thoroughly enjoyed his lecture (featuring excerpts from that book) at the Randolph-Macon Woman's College in Lynchburg, Virginia, USA. No better place than America to put forth your harsh criticisms of (any) religion than there.

The first part of this lecture is, like I said, an introduction to the book plus some surrounding information, the second part is a Q&A featuring a swarm of "students" from Liberty "University", a (self-described) "fundamentalist Baptist university", also located in Lynchburg, Virginia. They were probably sent there by their university to "stone that atheist to death".

Look at how Mr. Dawkins fleeces them one by one by the combined power of thorough logic reasoning and a bone-dry sense of humour, finishing it off with the advice "to join a proper university".

If you can't sit through this roughly two hours of brilliance, at least enjoy this terriffic one-liner.

If you need something more vivid than a straight lecture, you can watch the documentary "Root of all evil?" featuring Richard Dawkins on a trip around religious hotspots (like Lourdes), in five parts of roughly ten minutes each:

• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4
• Part 5

Almost two years ago, I wrote a little article about (my limited understanding of) String Theory and the possibility of an eleventh dimension.

For most of us, thinking in four dimensions (three-dimensional space plus time), or even five (the different paths events might have taken in that time), is hard enough, let alone scaling up to ten dimensions or more. Luckily, there's this cool Flash animation to help us up the ladder to the next dimension: Imagining the Tenth Dimension.

This animation illustrates the concepts presented in chapter one of the book "Imagining the Tenth Dimension" by Rob Bryanton.



[ via Retecool ]

Sire probeert met de campagne "Ik zie ik zie wat jij niet ziet" de aandacht te vestigen op kinderleed in Nederland. Zo worden er jaarlijks 80.000 kinderen mishandeld, zijn er 100.000 kinderen slachtoffer van seksueel misbruik, overlijden er jaarlijks 50 kinderen aan de gevolgen van mishandeling en wonen er meer dan 5000 kinderen op straat.

Reden genoeg dus om daar een campagne voor te starten en Sire doet dat met deze intens mooi gebouwde en geproduceerde site.

(vergeet niet op schermelementen te klikken ..)

[via Retecool]