Tag Archives: fundamentalism

Why Adam and Eve Never Existed (Illustrated By An Analogy To Birds On An Island)

Imagine an island off the coast of a continent. Two birds from the continent–a male and female–get swept up by a storm and find themselves stranded on this island. They go on to mate and a new species of bird … Continue reading

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Thomas Aquinas on Exterminating Heretics

In the Summa, Thomas Aquinas says that you can reason with someone who holds a different doctrine from yours so long as that person is open and searching. On the other hand, if the person persists in his view, and does … Continue reading

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The Center Does Not Hold: Bastard Christianities

If his lecture outlining his argument is any indication, Catholic intellectual Joseph Bottum’s new book, An Anxious Age: The Post-Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of America (Image 2014), is going to be talked about “far and wee”: The major event … Continue reading

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Creationists Win Another Pyrrhic Victory Over Evolution

When I learned that, in South Carolina, two Republican young earth creationists recently blocked the adoption of the woolly mammoth as the state’s official fossil (all but seven states have one) because they don’t want people reminded of evolution, I thought … Continue reading

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Could the Debt Default Crisis Turn into Our Reichstag Fire?

Something Chris Hedges wrote back in August of 2010 about our American anti-Enlightenment right (a.k.a the Tea Party) is haunting me a bit this week: The next catastrophic attack, or the next economic meltdown, could be our Reichstag fire. It could … Continue reading

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What Apologetics Really Is

In psychology, you can change your attitude or you can change your behavior, and it’s always easier to change an attitude than it is to change a behavior. That’s apologetics; what it is really. Apologetics gives the doubting believer heavily … Continue reading

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The Muslim Brotherhood and Religious Fascism

This is being reported by the AP today: Mustafa Hegazy, a political adviser to interim President Adly Mansour, told a press conference Saturday that […] Egyptians took to the streets on June 30 – the day that led to Morsi’s ouster … Continue reading

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A Nice Example of Ad Hominem

Ad hominem, adding or attacking the man as opposed to the argument, is on display for over nine minutes in this hilarious Fox News interview with Reza Aslan. Professor Aslan, you see, is a Muslim who wrote a book about … Continue reading

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Does the Bible Advocate Book Burning?

It appears so. After Paul preached the gospel in Ephesus, and won numerous converts, the Book of Acts says, with approval, that there was a book burning (19:19-20 KJV): Many of them also which used curious arts brought their books … Continue reading

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The GOP: Unhinged, Yet Still (Kind of) Popular?

Andrew Sullivan recently made the following observation: [T]he GOP Obama faces is arguably the most partisan, factional and deranged that it has been since I started observing it in the mid-1980s. Yes, and the GOP is nevertheless on track to gain … Continue reading

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Social Butterfly Becomes a Submissive and Hijab Draped Caterpillar

The Protean nature of the self (that is, the water-shifting nature of the self, from the ancient Greek sea god Proteus) is on disturbing display in Katherine Russell, the widow of Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev. Here’s The New York … Continue reading

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Egypt without Jews, Christians, and Pyramids?

Jews have been a part of Egypt and its history for over three thousand years, but Islamic fundamentalism’s steady rise in the country has absurdly driven their numbers literally into the dozens. A new documentary, made by an Egyptian and … Continue reading

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A List Of Republican Dog Whistles That No Longer Seem To Work

These don’t get Republicans to 50 percent + 1 in elections as readily as they used to: The pro-torture dog whistle, the drug war dog whistle, the anti-immigration dog whistle, the anti-gay dog whistle, the fear-of-terrorism dog whistle, the anti-Muslim … Continue reading

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X Marks the Flop: The Real Problem for Cultural Conservatives Going Forward

Whether you’re an anti-gay evangelical activist or a Muslim dreaming of a new caliphate, here’s the really big picture: liberal attitudes are well adapted to urban life and culturally conservative ones are less so. And the world’s demographics are moving … Continue reading

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No More Jesus Bashing: John Loftus Throws in the Towel

John Loftus, the ex-Christian author, has had enough. He’s recently decided to stop blogging and writing books debunking Christianity. Here’s part of what he wrote at his blog earlier this month: I have no more desire to engage Christians. They … Continue reading

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Humanism vs. Nihilism: Has the Occupy Movement Gotten Away from Chris Hedges’ Nonviolent Vision for It?

From its inception, Chris Hedges has been a key intellectual supporting the Occupy movement, and he sees its lineage in the nonviolent tradition of Tolstoy, Thoreau, Gandhi, and King: absorb blows without returning them. This (presumably) arouses the conscience of … Continue reading

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Definition: What is a Fundamentalist?

The word “fundamentalist” is bandied about—most typically as an insult—across a broad range of contexts. There are: Muslim fundamentalists market fundamentalists Hindu fundamentalists Marxist fundamentalists Christian fundamentalists Of course, there are other “fundamentalists”—but you’ve probably never heard someone called a … Continue reading

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When the Western Atlas Shrugs: The Economic Consequences of the Islamic Brotherhood Ruling Egypt

The majority of Egyptians are on the verge of getting their wish—a theocratic state—but they may rue the day that they did. The following quote comes from Middle East analyst Theodore May, and appeared as part of an opinion piece … Continue reading

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Thomas Jefferson, Johann Gottfried Herder, and the Revived American Cult of Muscular Christian Nationalism

A bit of (good) advice for politicized Christian fundamentalists from Rob Boston: Jefferson and Madison worked together to end the government-established church in Virginia and guarantee religious liberty for all. Jefferson coined the metaphor of a “wall of separation between … Continue reading

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Islamic Herderianism is Coming to Egypt

As a result of recent Egyptian elections, the (so-called moderate) Islamic Brotherhood and (all agree fanatic) Salafists will represent two-thirds of the seats in the new parliament. Erik Trager of the New Republic interviewed seven of these election winners, all … Continue reading

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