March 31, 2010 on CNN
The attorney for a man expected to soon be put to death for "sorcery" speaks to CNN.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Man Awaits Death Sentence for "Sorcery"
March 31, 2010 on CNN
Philip Pullman on Censorship and Free Speech
From Boing Boing:
Philip Pullman, addressing an audience at the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford, was asked about whether his latest book, The Good Man Jesus and the Scoundrel Christ, was offensive. Here's his reply:
"It was a shocking thing to say and I knew it was a shocking thing to say. But no one has the right to live without being shocked. No one has the right to spend their life without being offended. Nobody has to read this book. Nobody has to pick it up. Nobody has to open it. And if you open it and read it, you don't have to like it. And if you read it and you dislike it, you don't have to remain silent about it. You can write to me, you can complain about it, you can write to the publisher, you can write to the papers, you can write your own book. You can do all those things, but there your rights stop. No one has the right to stop me writing this book. No one has the right to stop it being published, or bought, or sold or read. That's all I have to say on that subject."
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
The Simpsons - The Greatest Story Ever D'ohed
Watch on TV Shack (Requires DivX Player)
Season 21, Episode 16
Aired March 28, 2010 on FOX
Download link
AC Grayling Interviewed by Greg Clarke
Play all videos (2)
Anthony Grayling (Atheist/Naturalist/Philosopher) is interviewed by Greg Clarke (from the Center for Public Christianity) in Melbourne before the Rise of Atheism convention(via RichardDawkins.net)
Christopher Hitchens Slams Vatican, Pope Over Sex Abuse Scandal
March 30, 2010 on MSNBC's Morning Joe
From Huffington Post:
Christopher Hitchens, whose antagonism towards religion is well-established, had harsh words for the Catholic Church, and the Pope in particular, during an appearance on "Morning Joe" today.(Thanks 'Guest')
Read more
ABC Nightline: God's Warriors
March 29, 2010 on ABC Nightline
Soldiers are accused of plotting to kill law enforcement agents in the name of Jesus
Monday, March 29, 2010
Monika Havelka: Why Sex? The Evolution of a Paradox
Posted March 28, 2010 on TVO
Monika Havelka from the Biology Department at the University of Toronto Mississauga presents her competition lecture entitled Why Sex? The Evolution of a Paradox(Thanks Elkin)
9 Christian Militia Members Charged in Police-Killing Plot
March 29, 2010 on AP
Nine suspects tied to a Midwest Christian militia that was preparing for the Antichrist were charged with conspiring to kill police officers, then attack a funeral using homemade bombs in the hopes of killing more law enforcement personnel, federal prosecutors said Monday.
Read more
Sunday, March 28, 2010
Jim Crace on Grass and the Death of an Atheist
March 29, 2010 on ABC Fora TV
How does an atheist commemorate death? When British author Jim Crace's staunchly atheist father died, he demanded that none of his family be present for the funeral or collect the ashes. In this talk at Adelaide Writers' Week, Jim Crace discusses why he regrets honouring his father's wishes. It was this dilemma that inspired him to write "Being Dead" a novel that seeks to find narratives of comfort in death that aren't bound to religion.
British author Jim Crace's first novel "Continent" was published in 1986, and won both the Guardian Fiction Prize and the Whitbread First Novel Award. Since then he had written eight more books, including "Quarantine" which was the winner of the 1998 Whitbread Novel of the Year award and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. "Being Dead" won the National Book Critics Circle award for fiction in 2000. His latest novel "All That Follows" was published in 2010.
Jane Sullivan is an Australian literary journalist and a regular contributor to The Age.
Pope Defiant Amid Calls for Resignation
March 28, 2010 on ITN News
Pope Benedict XVI says he won't be intimidated despite growing calls for his resignation over the Vatican child abuse scandal
Richard Dawkins at the Sydney Opera House
Watch The Full Lecture
March 7, 2010 at the Sydney Opera House in Association with Sydney Writers Festival
A Matter of Mind-Sets? Religion and Science | ABC Radio (With PZ, Singer, Dawkins)
March 27, 2010 on ABC Radio
Download MP3
Do science and religion represent fundamentally different mind-sets? Physicist Richard Feynman said, 'Science is what we do to keep us from lying to ourselves'. From the Global Atheist Convention held in Australia this month, philosopher Peter Singer, biologist and popular science blogger PZ Myers, and evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins weigh in on matters of minds and faith. Next week, renowned philosopher A.C Grayling.(via RichardDawkins.net)
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Friday, March 26, 2010
Sam Harris: Why We Should Ditch Religion | CNN
BBC Newsnight: Pope Led Cover-Up of Priest Who Molested 200 Deaf Boys
March 25, 2010 on BBC Newsnight
How will the Pope deal with the latest child abuse allegations to hit the Vatican? Tonight he appears to be under more pressure than ever before.
In the 1990s did he fail to respond to letters from an American archbishop about a priest who may have molested as many as 200 deaf boys?
Internal correspondence from bishops in Wisconsin directly to Cardinal Ratzinger, warning him and other top Vatican officials that failure to act could embarrass the church, have been unearthed as part of a lawsuit, according to The New York Times.
Riz Khan - War and peace in Quran and Bible
March 26, 2010 on Al-Jazeera English
We examine what role the Bible and the Quran played in inciting violence through the ages.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Geneticist Wins Top Religion Prize
March 25, 2010 on AP
A one-time Spanish-born priest who later became an evolutionary geneticist and molecular biologist and helped scientifically refute creationism with his research has been honored with one of the world's top religion prizes.
Vatican: No Trial of Priest Accused of Molesting 200 Deaf Boys
March 25, 2010 on AP
The Vatican on Thursday strongly defended its decision not to defrock an American priest accused of molesting some 200 deaf boys in Wisconsin and denounced what it called a campaign to smear Pope Benedict XVI and his aides.
BBC | Wonders of the Solar System | Episode 3: The Thin Blue Line
Play all videos (6)
Aired March 21, 2010 on BBC Two
Professor Brian Cox visits some of the most stunning locations on earth to describe how the laws of nature have carved natural wonders across the solar system.Episode 1: Empire of the Sun
Brian reveals how something as flimsy as an envelope of gas - an atmosphere - can create some of the most wondrous sights in the solar system. He takes a ride in an English Electric Lightning and flies 18 km up to the top of earth's atmosphere, where he sees the darkness of space above and the thin blue line of our atmosphere below. In the Namib desert in south-west Africa, he tells the story of Mercury. This tiny planet was stripped naked of its early atmosphere and is fully exposed to the ferocity of space.
Against the stunning backdrop of the glaciers of Alaska, Brian reveals his fourth wonder: Saturn's moon Titan, shrouded by a murky, thick atmosphere. He reveals that below the clouds lies a magical world. Titan is the only place beyond earth where we've found liquid pooling on the surface in vast lakes, as big as the Caspian Sea, but the lakes of Titan are filled with a mysterious liquid, and are quite unlike anything on earth.
Episode 2: Order out of Chaos
(Thanks to AnonH5N1)
John Galt on Original Sin
John Galt is a fictional character in Ayn Rand's novel Atlas Shrugged
Excerpt: (starts around 3:30)
"Damnation is the start of your morality, destruction is its purpose, means and end. Your code begins by damning man as evil, then demands that he practice a good which it defines as impossible for him to practice. It demands, as his first proof of virtue, that he accepts his own depravity without proof. It demands that he start, not with a standard of value, but with a standard of evil, which is himself, by means of which he is then to define the good: the good is that which he is not.(Thanks Andrew)
It does not matter who then becomes the profiteer on his renounced glory and tormented soul, a mystic God with some incomprehensible design or any passer-by whose rotting sores are held as some explicable claim upon him - it does not matter, the good is not for him to understand, his duty is to crawl through years of penance, atoning for the guilt of his existence to any stray collector of unintelligible debts, his only concept of a value is a zero: the good is that which is non-man.
The name of this monstrous absurdity is Original Sin. A sin without volition is a slap at morality and an insolent contradiction in terms: that which is outside the possibility of choice is outside the province of morality. If man is evil by birth, he has no will, no power to change it; if he has no will, he can be neither good nor evil; a robot is amoral. To hold, as man's sin, a fact not open to his choice is a mockery of morality. To hold man's nature as his sin is a mockery of nature. To punish him for a crime he committed before he was born is a mockery of justice. To hold him guilty in a matter where no innocence exists is a mockery of reason. To destroy morality, nature, justice and reason by means of a single concept is a feat of evil hardly to be matched. Yet that is the root of your code.
Do not hide behind the cowardly evasion that man is born with free will, but with a 'tendency' to evil. A free will saddled with a tendency is like a game with loaded dice. It forces man to struggle through the effort of playing, to bear responsibility and pay for the game, but the decision is weighted in favor of a tendency that he had no power to escape. If the tendency is of his choice, he cannot possess it at birth; if it is not of his choice, his will is not free.
What is the nature of the guilt that your teachers call his Original Sin? What are the evils man acquired when he fell from a state they consider perfection? Their myth declares that he ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge - he acquired a mind and became a rational being. It was the knowledge of good and evil - he became a moral being. He was sentenced to earn his bread by his labor - he became a productive being. He was sentenced to experience desire - he acquired the capacity of sexual enjoyment. The evils for which they damn him are reason, morality, creativeness, joy - all the cardinal values of his existence. It is not his vices that their myth of man's fall is designed to explain and condemn, it is not his errors that they hold as his guilt, but the essence of his nature as man. Whatever he was - that robot in the Garden of Eden, who existed without mind, without values, without labor, without love - he was not man.
Man's fall, according to your teachers, was that he gained the virtues required to live. These virtues, by their standard, are his Sin. His evil, they charge, is that he's man. His guilt, they charge, is that he lives. They call it a morality of mercy and a doctrine of love for man."
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Mr. Deity And The Equation
by Mr Deity
Mr. Deity frantically throws together his own version of science in an attempt to save his job.
Hip Hop Anthem for Skeptics
Off That (Rationalist Anthem) by Baba Brinkman
Geek Pop Festival exclusive produced by Mr Simmonds, lyrics by Baba Brinkman, animation by Tommy Nagle(via Pharyngula)
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
The Nightline Face-Off: Does God Have a Future?
Play all videos (12)
March 10, 2010 at the California Institute of Technology
Sam Harris and Michael Shermer vs. Deepak Chopra and Jean Houston
Original link - Scheduled to air tonight March 23, 2010 at 11:35 Eastern
Tony Hendra: Pope's Brother May Have Abused Children
March 22, 2010 on FOX Business Channel with Don Imus
Monday, March 22, 2010
Muslim Cleric on Wife Beating in the Early Days of Islam
Aired January 7, 2010 on Al-Nas TV (Satellite) - Transcript
Sam Harris: Science Can Answer Moral Questions | TED 2010
Filmed Feb 2010; Posted Mar 2010 on TED
Questions of good and evil, right and wrong are commonly thought unanswerable by science. But Sam Harris argues that science can -- and should -- be an authority on moral issues, shaping human values and setting out what constitutes a good life.
Sunday, March 21, 2010
The Big Questions: Does The Devil Exist?
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Aired March 21, 2010 on BBC One
From Times Online:
Sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic Church are proof that that "the Devil is at work inside the Vatican", according to the Holy See's chief exorcist.(Thanks to TreVelocita)
Father Gabriele Amorth, 85, who has been the Vatican's chief exorcist for 25 years and says he has dealt with 70,000 cases of demonic possession, said that the consequences of satanic infiltration included power struggles at the Vatican as well as "cardinals who do not believe in Jesus, and bishops who are linked to the Demon".
He added: "When one speaks of 'the smoke of Satan' [a phrase coined by Pope Paul VI in 1972] in the holy rooms, it is all true – including these latest stories of violence and paedophilia."
Read more
Irish React to Pope's Letter
March 21, 2010 on CNN
The pope's letter of apology is leading Irish newspapers. CNN's Nic Robertson reports on how it's being perceived.
Colbert Report - Glenn Beck Attacks Social Justice
| The Colbert Report | Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c | |||
| Glenn Beck Attacks Social Justice - James Martin | ||||
| ||||
Viewers in Canada can watch it here
Viewers in other countries can use Hotspot Shield or Modify Headers
Saturday, March 20, 2010
Jon Stewart's Epic Glenn Beck Parody
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Conservative Libertarian | ||||
| ||||
Viewers in Canada can watch it here
Viewers in other countries can use Hotspot Shield or Modify Headers
(via Political Humor)
Richard Dawkins on Catholic 'Saints' and Pope Pius XII
From Pharyngula:
The comment that has stirred up the most condemnation from the press is Richard Dawkins' mention of "Pope…Nazi," which everyone assumes was about the current Pope. Wrong. Everyone knows the current Pope is most properly addressed as "Pope Palpatine". No, Pope Palpatine is not currently up for canonization (at least, I hope not), but there is another pope who is, and this thorough discussion explains who Dawkins was actually talking about.(Thanks Joel)
Pope's Apology 'Not Enough'
March 20, 2010 on Al Jazeera English
Pope Benedict XVI, the Roman Catholic leader, has written to Irish Catholics to apologise for failing to deal with cases of child sex abuse within the church.
But victims of abuse say the apology does not go far enough.
They want the pope to break his silence on the church role's in shielding paedophile clergy from prosecution.
Friday, March 19, 2010
Rep. Steve King and Glenn Beck: Voting for health reform on Sunday is 'an affront to God'
March 18, 2010 on the Glenn Beck Radio Show
Partial transcript:
KING: They intend to vote on the Sabbath, during Lent, to take away the liberty that we have right from God. [...]Read more via Think Progress
BECK: You couldn’t have said it better. Here is a group of people that have so perverted our faith and our hope and our charity, that is a — this is an affront to God. And I honestly, I don’t think anybody is like, “yes, and now what we’ll do is we’ll vote on the Sabbath.” But I think it’s absolutely appropriate that these people are trying to put the nail in the coffin on our country on a Sunday — something our founders would have never, ever, ever done. Out of respect for God.
BBC | Wonders of the Solar System | Episode 2: Order out of Chaos
Play all videos (6)
Aired March 14, 2010 on BBC Two
Professor Brian Cox visits some of the most stunning locations on earth to describe how the laws of nature have carved natural wonders across the solar system.Episode 1: Empire of the Sun
Brian reveals how beauty and order in earth's cosmic backyard was formed from nothing more than a chaotic cloud of gas. Chasing tornados in Oklahoma, he explains how the same physics that creates these spinning storms shaped the young solar system. Out of this celestial maelstrom emerged the jewel in the crown, Brian's second wonder - the magnficent rings of Saturn.
On an ice-choked lagoon in Iceland, he sees the nearest thing on Earth to Saturn's rings. Using the latest scientific imagery and breathtaking graphics, he explains how the intricate patterns round Saturn are shaped by the cluster of more than 60 moons surrounding the planet.
One of those moons makes a spectacular contribution to the rings and is the third wonder of the solar system. Brian describes the astonishing discovery of giant fountains of ice erupting from the surface of Enceladus, which soar thousands of kilometres into space.
(Thanks to Sydenham Infidel)
Thursday, March 18, 2010
German Archbishop to Abuse Victims: 'Speak Out'
March 18, 2010 on AP
A prominent archbishop called Thursday for justice for sexual abuse victims in Germany's Roman Catholic Church, saying they need to feel they can finally speak openly about their suffering.
Pope to Address Letter to Irish Catholics Over Paedophilia Crisis
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
BBC Newsnight: How Paedophile Priest Was Allowed to Evade Justice
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Aired March 9, 2010 on BBC Newsnight:
Former priest Bill Carney was named as one of the worst cases in Dublin's Catholic diocese in the Murphy report into clerical abuse there. However, for the last 10 years he has been free to live quietly in Britain.
Newsnight's Olenka Frenkiel has investigated his case and tracked him down in the Canary Islands.
Read more
Monday, March 15, 2010
The 'Life of Brian' Debate (1979)
From Wikipedia:
Shortly after the film was released, Cleese and Palin engaged in a what would become an infamous debate on the BBC2 discussion programme Friday Night, Saturday Morning, in which Malcolm Muggeridge and Mervyn Stockwood, the Bishop of Southwark, put the case against the film.*Repost
Muggeridge and the Bishop had arrived 15 minutes late to see a screening of the picture prior to the debate, missing the establishing scenes which demonstrated that Brian and Jesus were two different characters, and hence contended that it was a send-up of Christ himself.
Both Pythons later felt that there had been a strange role reversal in the manner of the debate, with two young upstart comedians attempting to make serious, well-researched points, while the establishment figures engaged in cheap jibes and point scoring
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Valedictorian Sues School Over Graduation Prayer
March 14, 2010 on FOX News with Fr. Jonathan Morris
Growing Fears Over Muslim Prison Gangs
March 12, 2010 on BBC News:
The Muslim prison population in England and Wales has sharply increased in recent years. The BBC's Ushma Mistry hears from former inmates and prison officers who claim gangs of Muslim prisoners are an increasingly powerful force.
"Muslims run it. Muslims run the prisons and there's nothing the screws can do about it. For a Muslim you'd say it's good but for a non-Muslim, it's very, very bad," a former inmate called Jay says.
'Jay' has spent many years inside various prisons in the South of England
It is a claim which is backed by former prison officers and other inmates.
Jay, 24, is a Muslim and has been in and out of prison for most of his life. He openly admits to helping to convert non-Muslim inmates to Islam and has meted out violence against anyone who dares to "disrespect" his religion.
Read more
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Friday, March 12, 2010
Don McLeroy: The Creationist in Charge of Education in Texas
March 11, 2010 on ABC Nightline:
Fundamentalist Christian dentist promotes drastic curriculum change.(via LGF)
Catholic School Expels Two Kids For Having Lesbian Parents
March 10, 2010 on FOX News with Bill O'Reilly and Fr. Jonathan Morris
God's Favorite TV Shows
by InfoMania
With reality shows, rap videos, and workout programs, Christian TV tries to keep up with these sinful times.
Catholic Church Rocked by More Sex Abuse Scandals
March 11, 2010 on France 24
In recent months the Catholic Church has been rocked by scandal. After widespread accusations of child abuse by priests in Ireland, similar claims have begun emerging from other European nations including Austria and the Netherlands. Now criticism in Germany is intensifying especially after the revelations that the current Popes' brother Georg Ratzinger knew about mistreatment of children in his Choir, although he claims no knowledge of sexual abuses.Extended Report (12min)
Richard Dawkins in conversation with Robyn Williams
Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3
From Slow TV:
At the Melbourne Town Hall, presented by the Melbourne Writers Festival, outspoken and influential author and scientist Richard Dawkins speaks to Robyn Williams (ABC RN) about the ideas underpinning his new book, The Greatest Show on Earth. They discuss the intricacies, the fascinating patterns and the anomalies produced by the process of evolution on earth. Dawkins then takes further questions from the audience about the theory of evolution, genetic determinism, the climate change denial movement and the place of religion in the world of science.(via RichardDawkins.net)
Thursday, March 11, 2010
Richard Dawkins on Why Evolution Trumps Creationism | Adelaide Festival 2010
Also available on YouTube
From ABC Big Ideas:
He's the King of All the Atheists, and now Richard Dawkins is hammering home what he sees as his key argument against the existence of God. In his book, "The Greatest Show on Earth", Dawkins aims to put the theory of evolution in a factually unassailable position. Here, at Adelaide Writers' Week in 2010, he goes through his book chapter by chapter, and in doing so attempts to convince his audience of the absolute veracity of Darwin's theories.
Richard Dawkins is the author of several books on science and on atheism, including "The God Delusion", "The Selfish Gene" and "The Extended Phenotype". He is the founder of the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science. In 2008, he was part of a group of humanists and secularists responsible for the controversial London bus-borne advertisements that advised people "There's Probably No God. Now Stop Worrying and Enjoy your Life".
Professor Gavin Brown is a mathematician and the Inaugural Director of The Royal Institution of Australia. Prior to this he served for twelve years as the Vice Chancellor and Principal of the University of Sydney.
Dinosaurs: The Greatest Story Ever Sold
First broadcast June 1994 on ABC
Download the full episode from Atheist Movies
Episode description:
The Council of Elders is convened to determine answers to the Great Question Of Life, and the answer is found to be Potatoism. Soon it's stake-and-potatoes for Robbie and Earl, when Robbie rejects the elders' wisdom and the duo is sentenced to be burned as infidels. But a gust of wind extinguishes the fire, and with it dies the people's belief in the message of The Great Potato.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Tuesday, March 9, 2010
BBC | Wonders of the Solar System | Episode 1: Empire of the Sun
Play all videos (6)
Updated with new link thanks to Sydenham Infidel
Aired March 7, 2010 on BBC Two
Professor Brian Cox visits some of the most stunning locations on earth to describe how the laws of nature have carved natural wonders across the solar system.Episode 2: Order out of Chaos
In this first episode Brian explores the powerhouse of them all, the sun. In India he witnesses a total solar eclipse - when the link to the light and heat that sustains us is cut off for a few precious minutes.
But heat and light are not the only power of the sun over the solar system. In Norway, Brian watches the battle between the sun's wind and earth, as the night sky glows with the northern lights.
Beyond earth, the solar wind continues, creating dazzling aurora on other planets. Brian makes contact with Voyager, a probe that has been travelling since its launch 30 years ago. Now 14 billion kilometres away, Voyager has just detected the solar wind is beginning to peter out. But even here we haven't reached the end of the sun's rule.
Brian explains how its greatest power, gravity, reaches out for hundreds of billions of kilometres, where the lightest gravitational touch encircles our solar system in a mysterious cloud of comets.
Episode 3: The Thin Blue Line
Episode 4: Dead or Alive
Episode 5: Aliens
(Thanks to Aheist Planet)
FFRF's Dan Barker on The Daily Show
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
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Viewers in Canada can watch it on The Comedy Network
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Q&A: Adventures in Democracy (With Richard Dawkins)
Play all videos (6)
Aired March 8, 2010 on ABC (Australia) - Full video with transcript
(via RDnet and Atheist Planet)
Monday, March 8, 2010
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Saturday, March 6, 2010
The Intelligence² Debate: Europe is failing its Muslims?
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Aired March 6, 2010 on BBC World
From IntelligenceSquared.com:
Has Europe fallen into an "us vs them" mindset? Have Europeans nurtured the perception that Islam is alien to the continent? Do they know what to make of people who don't conform to their Enlightenment values?
Or do Europeans have good reason to associate Muslims with violence? Perhaps it's opposition to fundamentalist Islam which is really anti-fascist. Perhaps Islamophobia is just a constructed model designed to protect Islam from criticism, rather than individuals from discrimination.
The debate "Europe is failing its Muslims" took place on February 23rd at Cadogan Hall in London, in association with BBC World News and the British Council. Arguing in favour of the motion were Tariq Ramadan and Petra Stienen; against the motion were Douglas Murray and Flemming Rose.
Vatican Hit By Gay Sex Scandal
March 6, 2010 on CNN
From Huffington Post:
The Vatican has been thrown into chaos by reports that one of the Pope's ceremonial ushers, as well as a member of the elite Vatican choir, were involved in a homosexual prostitution ring.
The allegations came to light after Italian newspapers published transcripts of phone calls recorded by police, who had been conducting an unrelated corruption investigation.
The tapes appear to record Angelo Balducci, a Gentleman of His Holiness, negotiating with Thomas Chinedu Ehiem, a 29-year-old Nigerian Vatican chorister, about men he wanted brought to him for sexual purposes. Balducci was allegedly paying 2,000 euros ($2,714) for each man he met, according to the Irish Times.
Read more
Friday, March 5, 2010
Christopher Hitchens delivers the Daniel Pearl Memorial Lecture at UCLA
Also watch: Q&A After Lecture
On March 3, 2010, author and journalist Christopher Hitchens delivered the 2010 Daniel Pearl Memorial Lecture at UCLA. The lecture was presented by the UCLA Burkle Center for International Relations, the Daniel Pearl Foundation and the Yitzhak Rabin Hillel Center for Jewish Life at UCLA.
A well-known commentator on contemporary thought, politics and culture, Hitchens has written more than a dozen books and corresponded from more than 60 countries. He has contributed regularly to the Atlantic, Slate, Vanity Fair, the New York Review of Books, the London Review of Books, Washington Post Book World, the Nation, the National Review and the New Left Review, among other media outlets. Honored frequently for his reporting and the literary quality of his prose, Hitchens received a National Magazine Award in 2007 and was a finalist for a 2007 National Book Award. He appears frequently on radio and television broadcasts.
Thursday, March 4, 2010
Christopher Hitchens in Conversation: The Only Subject is Love
February 26, 2010 at Emory University
Writer Christopher Hitchens and Dr. Laurie Patton, Emory Professor of early Indian religions, discuss freedom of expression and Hitchen's friendship with Salman Rushdie. Themes of love and hate weave through stories of Rushdie's time under the fatwa, self-censorship, blasphemy, and writing by committee.UPDATE:
Christopher Hitchens participated in 'The Only Subject is Love' Symposium in honor of the opening of his friend Salman Rushdie's archive at Emory University.
Slaman Rushdie and Friends in Conversation: The Only Subject is Love
Richard Dawkins in conversation with Richard Fidler
March 4, 2010 on ABC Radio Brisbane:
Download MP3
Scientist, Darwinian and atheist Richard Dawkins has written many books. They very quickly hit the bestseller list, thanks to his ability to translate complex scientific ideas into language the general reader can understand, without doing any violence to the science itself.(Thanks Keith)
His latest book The Greatest Show on Earth is his presentation of the evidence of evolution, from palaentology and embryology to genetics and geography.
Christopher Hitchens: The New Commandments
From Vanity Fair:
The Ten Commandments were set in stone, but it may be time for a re-chisel. With all due humility, the author takes on the job, pruning the ethically dubious, challenging the impossible, and rectifying some serious omissions.
Read more
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
Dispatches: Britain's Islamic Republic
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Aired March 1, 2010 on Channel 4
Journalist Andrew Gilligan investigates how a fundamentalist Muslim group - the Islamic Forum of Europe - has infiltrated the British political system. Based at the East London Mosque in Whitechapel, the IFE has received millions of pounds of public money and has been visited by government ministers and royalty. Despite claiming to support tolerance and community spirit, Gilligan reveals it also hosts extremist speakers and stocks radical books.*Videos are blocked in Guernsey, Ireland, Isle of Man, Jersey, United Kingdom (Watch on 4oD)
FOX News: Atheist Group Gives Students Porn in Exchange for Bibles
March 2, 2010 on FOX News
See also:
- Tucker Carlson on last year's "Smut for Smut" campaign
- AtheistAgendaUTSA.blogspot.com
- Twitter.com/AtheistAgenda
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
The Big Questions: Does Religion Have a Place in Sex Education?
Play all videos (2)
Aired February 28, 2010 on BBC One
Ministers are being accused of caving into pressure from faith schools over sex and relationships education.(Thanks to TreVelocita)
The government is due to make sex and relationship lessons compulsory in England's schools from 2011 through a bill in Parliament next week.
But pressure groups and the Liberal Democrats say a late amendment means faith schools will be able to teach it in line with their religious character.
The government denied faith schools were being given an opt out.
In a statement on its website, the Catholic Education Service says the amendment was secured after a period of "extensive lobbying".
It said the change would allow schools to teach the subject in accordance with their ethos.
Read more
Monday, March 1, 2010
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