The Hazards of Belief

PopePalpatine · 15-01-2015 09:58PM

You'd have to wonder whose article came up first, the Independent's or the Waily Mail's.

recedite · 15-01-2015 11:35PM

RikuoAmero wrote: »

What I thought was going to happen was that books were going to be published and sold in the UK that wouldn't contain any references to pork, so as to not "offend" muslims.

They probably will be. But if the UK home market has a similar % of muslim readership to the global market, that also makes economic sense, so it shouldn't bother you unduly.

Peregrinus · 16-01-2015 02:35AM

robindch wrote: »

Nope, I read it to the end and didn't bother quoting for the reason above - it's just pointless raving.

But the earlier bit which I did quote does raise useful questions about where the line on this kind of stuff should be drawn.

Gotta disagree with you on both scores. The earlier stuff is pretty clearly on the right side of the line. You are writing school textbooks for the Middle Eastern market? You don't gratuitously include stuff which will be jarring in that market.

Whereas they guy who is "just pointlessly raving" is an MP on whose vote the government depends. And his just pointless raving tells you a lot about his attitudes and his values and his instincts. If this newspaper report discloses any "hazard" at all, I think it's him.

Peregrinus · 16-01-2015 02:44AM

RikuoAmero wrote: »

. . . I admit that I started thinking in the slippery slope fallacy (which isn't always a fallacy, but most often is).

The problem with slippery slope arguments is that, if you accept one, you must accept them all.

obplayer · 16-01-2015 02:50AM

Peregrinus wrote: »

The problem with slippery slope arguments is that, if you accept one, you must accept them all.

Why? Not arguing about this thread but about your very sweeping statement. Fascinated to hear answer.

Turtwig · 16-01-2015 02:50AM

Peregrinus wrote: »

The problem with slippery slope arguments is that, if you accept one, you must accept them all.

Nice!

Peregrinus · 16-01-2015 02:58AM

obplayer wrote: »

Why? Not arguing about this thread but about your very sweeping statement. Fascinated to hear answer.

It's a joke, obplayer. My "very sweeping statement" is itself a slippery slope argument.

obplayer · 16-01-2015 03:04AM

Peregrinus wrote: »

It's a joke, obplayer. My "very sweeping statement" is itself a slippery slope argument.

Ah! Sense of humour meter needs re-calibrating.

Nodin · 16-01-2015 04:11AM

Cackle, ye mockers and scoffers......

"Tyndale House, a major Christian publisher, has announced that it will stop selling “The Boy Who Came Back From Heaven,” by Alex Malarkey and his father, Kevin Malarkey.

The best-selling book, first published in 2010, describes what Alex experienced while he lay in a coma after a car accident when he was 6 years old. The coma lasted two months, and his injuries left him paralyzed, but the subsequent spiritual memoir — with its assuring description of “Miracles, Angels, and Life beyond This World” — became part of a popular genre of “heavenly tourism,” which has been controversial among orthodox Christians.

Earlier this week, Alex recanted his testimony about the afterlife. In an open letter to Christian bookstores posted on the Pulpit and Pen Web site, Alex states flatly: “I did not die. I did not go to Heaven.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/style-blog/wp/2015/01/15/boy-who-came-back-from-heaven-going-back-to-publisher/?tid=sm_fb

Absolam · 16-01-2015 04:34AM

Soooo.... it was all malarkey? :eek:

Brian Shanahan · 16-01-2015 10:10AM

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

Disappointing to see the UK Independent (not our trash mag) go down the Daily Wail/Daily Excess inflammatory headline route.

The UK Independent has been a trash mag for yonks. You have to remember Tony O'Brien owned it for years (from 1994 at least) and gutted the staff and investigative reporting. And now you've got Two Beards Lebedev whose only interest in the paper seems to be to use it as a means of positioning himself as the new Bono.

Stealthfins · 17-01-2015 02:18PM

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/isis-terror/isis-executes-pigeon-bird-breeders-diyala-iraq-n287421

oscarBravo · 19-01-2015 09:57AM

A UK court forces a father and his children to go to mass as part of a divorce settlement, even though it wasn't requested by the mother:

http://www.skepticink.com/tippling/2015/01/18/my-colleague-is-forced-to-go-to-mass-by-the-uk-courts/

robindch · 19-01-2015 02:10PM

Florida shows one tiny, tiny part of the RCC one possible route forward.

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/wife-grandma-catholic-priest-rebel-women-defy-church-ban-n286766

RikuoAmero · 19-01-2015 04:56PM

robindch wrote: »

Florida shows one tiny, tiny part of the RCC one possible route forward.

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/wife-grandma-catholic-priest-rebel-women-defy-church-ban-n286766

Good for them. One question I do have is - do they have any right to call themselves Roman Catholic? I thought being RCC meant loyalty to the Pope (among other things), which is not what these people are.

robindch · 19-01-2015 05:05PM

RikuoAmero wrote: »

Good for them. One question I do have is - do they have any right to call themselves Roman Catholic? I thought being RCC meant loyalty to the Pope (among other things), which is not what these people are.

One would have thought so, but these good ladies think otherwise.

You might want to ask katydid that question as his/her area of interest, if not clarity, is the nature of christianity and its evidently perplexing membership rules.

Shrap · 19-01-2015 07:16PM

robindch wrote: »

One would have thought so, but these good ladies think otherwise.

You might want to ask katydid that question as his/her area of interest, if not clarity, is the nature of christianity and its evidently perplexing membership rules.

They seem to get excommunicated as fast as they're ordained. Perhaps this it the break-away Catholic church of our dreams? Maybe we'll run out of priests so badly well here that the congregations will be forced to consider it! To be fair to Katy, if Christianity is what you make of it, and there are congregations now breaking off from Rome to the extent that they'll choose a woman priest themselves, religion could become a whole new thing rather quickly.

I'd love to hear katydid's take on that alright.

B9K9 · 19-01-2015 07:40PM

sure won't they be sued for copyright?

recedite · 19-01-2015 08:14PM

Effectively they are protestants; the bona fides of their ordinations are that

.. a clergyman in good standing — referred to only as Bishop X — ordained the first female bishop..

which gives them an unbroken line of holy anointedness all the way back to Big J.
But as they have this heretical stance, protesting against the ban on women ordinations, their own peculiar brand of holiness is of the protestant kind.
They can still be catholics though (with a small c)

RikuoAmero · 19-01-2015 08:24PM

recedite wrote: »

Effectively they are protestants; the bona fides of their ordinations are that
which gives them an unbroken line of holy anointedness all the way back to Big J.
But as they have this heretical stance, protesting against the ban on women ordinations, their own peculiar brand of holiness is of the protestant kind.
They can still be catholics though (with a small c)

Exactly that. What I see potentially happening is this group of women eventually saying that they have the right interpretation of scripture and that the pope has it wrong (at least when it comes to the question of ordination of women). They will eventually have to say that because the pope has it wrong, he thus loses claim to the title of Vicar of Christ. He cannot be God's representative on earth, if he's ignoring God's apparent teaching to ordain women. He will have to be called an anti-pope or something along those lines. The women will have to say that the popes have, for almost two thousand years, had it wrong, they will say women should have been ordained from the very beginning.

Hotblack Desiato · 20-01-2015 12:37AM

oscarBravo wrote: »

A UK court forces a father and his children to go to mass as part of a divorce settlement, even though it wasn't requested by the mother:

http://www.skepticink.com/tippling/2015/01/18/my-colleague-is-forced-to-go-to-mass-by-the-uk-courts/

This sort of craziness is where power without accountability inevitably leads. It sure isn't justice.

MrPudding · 20-01-2015 09:26AM

Hotblack Desiato wrote: »

This sort of craziness is where power without accountability inevitably leads. It sure isn't justice.

I can't find any reference to the case... Until I do, I am treating this with a degree of scepticism. It should be noted, I only spent about 30 minutes looking, but I did check all the 'name v name' cases in the Court of Appeal for December. Not saying it couldn't happen, but I would like to read the judgement before believing an unreferenced rant on a blog.

MrP

Delirium · 20-01-2015 09:44AM

MrPudding wrote: »

I can't find any reference to the case... Until I do, I am treating this with a degree of scepticism. It should be noted, I only spent about 30 minutes looking, but I did check all the 'name v name' cases in the Court of Appeal for December. Not saying it couldn't happen, but I would like to read the judgement before believing an unreferenced rant on a blog.

MrP

Found the story being reported on Telegraph site also

oscarBravo · 20-01-2015 09:50AM

Reporting restrictions will make it hard to verify the story, but the Telegraph does claim to have seen the court transcripts.

robindch · 20-01-2015 10:15AM

oscarBravo wrote: »

[...] hard to verify the story [...]

FWIW, the Telegraph claims that the judgement is restrictive and applies to one day per year (and the judge suggested the mother have the child for christmas, and the father had the child for new year):

Alleged judgement wrote:

If the children are with their father at Christmas he will undertake that they will attend the Christmas mass.

While the original skepticink article was unbounded:

Skepticink wrote:

he Roman Catholic judge introduced the requirement for Steve to attend Roman Catholic mass if Steve has the children when there is a mass, including at Christmas

I'm not saying that the Telegraph's slant is true, or skepticink's isn't, but the two stories are not consistent and -- shock!! -- I'd be surprised if the Telegraph simply invented the text of a court judgement.

robindch · 20-01-2015 10:17AM

And on the topic of slanted headlines, here's Maria Konnikova of the New Yorker on some interesting research on how headlines can influence the way in which news and opinion pieces are interpreted and recalled:

http://www.newyorker.com/science/maria-konnikova/headlines-change-way-think

oscarBravo · 20-01-2015 10:17AM

Requiring someone to attend a religious service once a year is once a year too often.

robindch · 20-01-2015 10:51AM

oscarBravo wrote: »

Requiring someone to attend a religious service once a year is once a year too often.

I'm not agreeing with it, just suggesting that if the Telegraph's court transcript quote is accurate, then the original article appears to be inaccurate, IMHO, to the point of dishonesty.

recedite · 20-01-2015 03:15PM

oscarBravo wrote: »

Requiring someone to attend a religious service once a year is once a year too often.

Its only on the off-chance that he happens to have the kids on Christmas day, which is probably unlikely anyway as they seem to spend most of the time with the mother. The kids have been "declared" to be RC (presumably either by themselves or by the parents) and I don't think this is a particularly onerous task for Steve.
IMO the statement attributed to Steve by the Guardian is an unfounded and mischievous statement, and shows him up as a twat;

..Because my contact arrangements now give me the children on some weekends, I am concerned that I will now also be required to take them to mass on Sundays when they are with me, even though that is not part of the original order..

RikuoAmero · 20-01-2015 09:44PM

recedite wrote: »

Its only on the off-chance that he happens to have the kids on Christmas day, which is probably unlikely anyway as they seem to spend most of the time with the mother. The kids have been "declared" to be RC (presumably either by themselves or by the parents) and I don't think this is a particularly onerous task for Steve.
IMO the statement attributed to Steve by the Guardian is an unfounded and mischievous statement, and shows him up as a twat;

If the article is true, then it doesn't matter how onerous or non-onerous a task it is. Steve has declared himself a non-RC, the kids apparently don't want to go, and the mother apparently never asked for or required it. It seems that this is all on the judge, who has unilaterally declared that these children must go to the church he specifies, the religious affiliation of the father or kids be damned. What if the father and/or the kids join a non-RC religion? Will the judge still demand they go to an RC church?

The Hazards of Belief

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