I just saw this about the Smithsonian's new Human Origins hall and thought .... "I wonder how many people on T|A would like to see that?"



So, anyone feel like setting up a field trip to visit the Smithsonian in March? Kind of like the trip the SSA recently took to Ken Ham's Creation 'Museum', only with actual science and knowledge.



Edit: Perhaps I should say, if such… Continue

This was posted on the blog Dispatches From The Culture Wars, which is written by Ed Brayton.



It's a truly disheartening and depressing comment on the state of our military, and the attempts (mostly successful it seems) to turn it into God's Personal Army Against The Infidel.



An Officer's Experience in Our… Continue

Forty years since the first human being set foot upon another world.

Forty years since we took that first step, became for the first time a species that had truly left its home and set forth into the universe at large.

Forty years since the world hung by a thread, breathlessly watching TV or listening to the radio, the attention of the planet focused on that tiny craft a quarter of a million miles away.



Forty years. And in honor of that momentous day, I jotted this down, to… Continue

Sounds good to me, anyone got a trumpet?

There is an excellent article on RichardDakwins.net written by Marshall Evans, about his travels from a deep fundamentalist family to atheism. I most heartily recommend that you read it.

I don't know how many people here follow a lot of blogs (I know Nelson does, and Syn, and some others), but for those who may not, I thought I'd point out a blogging event known as the Carnival of the Godless.



The Carnival moves from blog to blog, being hosted at a different one each time. It consists of a collection of links to various blog posts, submitted by bloggers to the host. It servers a couple worthwhile… Continue

Those were just about the first words out of the mouths of the two men standing at my door. That immediately clued me into what they wanted, and amused me somewhat. The JW have gotten a pretty bad reputation if even other door-to-doors are disavowing them.



It was partially what I expected. They weren't so much proselytizing as inviting. Specifically, they were looking for people to invite to their church's bible study and discussion group (Held every other Thursday).



While… Continue

(( A re-post of a blog entry I posted elsewhere a while back ))



Yesterday, a couple of co-workers were talking about current events, and one of them said ‘Well, there are two sides to every story, and I’ll listen to them both.’



This got me thinking of the assumptions inherent in such a statement, and the fallacies that can and often do appear in such discussions.



The first and most obvious potential fallacy is right in the statement itself. Two sides. Either-or.… Continue