Homo economicus’ Weblog

I caught a later train than I had intended (household routine disrupted by mortal illness of insanely loved dog — whoever says you can’t love a dog as much as a person doesn’t know what love is) so I unfortunately missed the welcoming session at the conference. I walked in on the first plenary discussion group. Chaired by Caspar Melville, Editor of New Humanist, the members were Ehsan Jami (Dutch politician of Iranian origin), Hanne Stinson (British Humanist Association), A C Grayling (needs no introduction), Fariborz Pooya (one of the organizers, impressive) and Mina Ahadi (Iranian Ex-Muslim leader from Germany, who spoke in German with an interpreter). The topic was Apostasy laws. and the Freedom to Renounce and Criticise Religion. There was little disagreement among the panel. In the Q & A, the chairman established a pattern for the day, which worked rather well. He took questions in bunches of about five, then allowed the panel to answer any one question, with no obligation to answer more than one. As you might expect, A C Grayling was especially impressive, but none of the panellists could be described as lightweight,

At the end of the session, I was assigned a bodyguard, but it didn’t seem necessary while I went out to lunch with Andrew Copson of the British Humanist Association. We had an interesting discussion, and he updated me on our plans for the BHA to distribute, at RDF’s expense, DVDs of Growing Up in the Universe to British schools. Things are looking good on that front.

After lunch we began with a lovely stand-up comedy routine from the comedian Nick Doody, telling good jokes at the expense of religion. One that I remember: Religion is like a very big dog, comforting to the owner but terrifying to everybody else. Then another panel discussion, this time on Sharia Law. The chairman, Andrew Copson, adopted the same policy as before, and again it worked well. Again, one member of the panel, Mahin Alipour [Edit: I wrongly said this was Houzan Mahmoud before, sorry], spoke through an interpreter, which held things up a bit. Other members of the panel were Roy Brown (rightly respected elder statesman of the British Humanist movement, now living in Switzerland), Maryam Namazie (Iranian born leader of the British Ex-Muslim movement), Johann Hari (brilliant Independent journalist), and Ibn Warraq (author of Why I am Not a Muslim and one of the great heroes of today’s secularist movement). This panel showed flashes of real oratory, especially from Johann Hari (for example, on the question of respect: “I respect you as a person too much to respect your ludicrous beliefs”) and from Maryam Namazie, who urged us to put together a lawsuit, in the civil courts, against the Sharia courts who presume to set themselves up in Muslim communities. Theoretically these Sharia courts are supposed to be voluntary: everybody has the option of going to proper British courts, but Sharia courts are available as a voluntary alternative. Speaker after speaker pointed out that this apparent voluntariness is a wicked sham. Women are ordered by their husbands or fathers to go to Sharia courts, not British courts. Many of them don’t even realise there is an alternative. Those who do are accused of being “unislamic” if they opt for real British courts.

The session on Sharia Law provoked some constructive suggestions from the floor, and ended with Maryam in a rousing reiteration of her call for a lawsuit, in the British courts, against the Sharia courts. It sounds as though this might really happen. I want to look into the possibility that RDFRS might make a contribution to the legal costs, although that might be ruled out by our own statutes with the Charity Commissioners.

The next item was a remake of the film Fitna — remade by Reza Moradi, who was also acting as the projectionist and technical expert for the conference. I wasn’t too clear which bits of the film we saw were the original, and which bits the remake, but it was impressive anyway.

After the tea break was my own talk, about the infamous Harun Yahya. It was pretty much based on my article on this website, called something like Slippery Eels, Venomous Snakes and Harun Yahya, with Keynote slides of the pictures of fossils and modern animals that they are — mistakenly — alleged to resemble. I am going to supply Reza with the Keynote slides, so he can drop them into the film he is making of the conference. I spoke for only 15 minutes, in order to leave time for 15 minutes of questions. The question session went well, I think.

The final event of the day was another panel discussion, this time on educational issues, chaired by Keith Porteous Wood, of the National Secular Society, that extremely useful and resourceful body. I was part of this panel, and was joined by Terry Sanderson (Keith’s partner at the NSS, and its current President), Joan Smith (wonderfully trenchant Independent columnist) and two eloquent leaders of the Iranian resistance against the Islamists in that country, Hamid Taqvaee and Bahram Soroush. One of these, I think Bahram, defended Islamophobia. The word is used to stifle opposition to islamism, to which it is a legitimate and understandable response. Everybody in the room, it seems, was deeply disturbed by faith schools, and especially the move to institute new Islamic schools.

This last session typified the whole conference in its conspicuous lack of ‘herding cats syndrome’. It was as though the menace of Islam is so sinister that the normal differences that divide atheists were put aside. A pair of formal resolutions was put to the vote, and carried nem con:

“The conference calls for the immediate release of all those imprisoned for ‘apostasy’, abolition of the death penalty, and cancellation of laws that punish the right and freedom to renounce or criticise Islam.”

“The conference calls on the British government to bring an end to the use of Sharia law in Britain, which is discriminatory towards women and children in particular, and guarantee unconditional equal citizenship rights for all.”

In addition to these two formal resolutions, Keith Porteous Wood called for a vote opposing faith schools. This too was carried nem con

The meeting ended in goodwill, and with a general feeling of solidarity with those Ex-Muslims brave enough to stand up and announce their apostasy.

At the drinks afterwards, I was approached by a young woman, probably about 20, whom I shall not name. She told me she is on the run from her Muslim family who, she believes, want to ‘honour’ kill her because of her apostasy. She is living in an institution that caters to such women, and is feeling rather lost and lonely because she no longer has the support structure of family and friends. She has had to give up her university place because the university is the first place her father would come looking for her, and she is hoping to find a place in another university.

I suggested that, if she feels threatened, she should go to the police. I should have known better. She had tried that. The law does not allow the police to take any action until the would-be victim has actually been physically molested — by which time it is likely to be too late. At a loss to know how to help her, I introduced her to a woman who, I felt, might be well placed to help her (again, I shall not name her, in case it helps the girl’s father to track her down). I left them together, the girl close to tears (the kindness of strangers often moves me to tears too). Before saying goodbye, I gave her my email address, and encouraged her to write in to this website, assuring her that she would find many friendly people of goodwill here, so I hope she does. If she does, please treat her extra specially well. She is vulnerable, and extremely courageous to have defied her odious father over the matter of religion. She told me how he had the habit of beating his children if they failed to memorise the Koran accurately.

I think Reza plans to release his film of the whole conference, and I’ll talk to Josh about getting a link to it on our site. Meanwhile, if you know any Ex-Muslims, or Muslims on the brink of the brave step of apostasy, please offer them support and friendship and encouragement to renounce and denounce that vile and despicable religion.

Richard

Reposted from here and here from the richarddawkins.net Forum

OTHER BLOGS:

Council of Ex Muslims of Britain video of Conference

Dawkins was talking at the Council of Ex Muslims of Britain’s first International Conference, October 10 2008. Harun Yahya as well as writing the book Atlas of Creation is behind the richarddawkins.net being baned in Turkey – a move which the National Secular Society is trying to have included in the EU report on Turkey’s suitability to join.

OTHER BLOGS:

Richard Dawkins on the Counicl of Ex Muslims of Britain

Richard Dawkins Website access barred in Turkey

International Conference Council of Ex Muslims of Britain (CEMB)

Next week Richard gives the tenth and final Simonyi Lecture, as he has retired from the Oxford University Chair for the Public Understanding of Science.

Max Hammerton’s article below mentions a skepticism about the success of public understanding on science – largely because it is hard and difficult. Studies reveal that more formal years of education and those that took voluntary course in mathematics and science were more likely to express an interest in science.

In terms of understanding, a survey in the United States [source]:

The percentage of correct responses to most of the NSF survey questions pertaining to basic science facts, concepts, and vocabulary has remained nearly constant.(See appendix table 7-9.) For example, more than 70 percent of those surveyed knew that:

• Plants produce oxygen.
• The continents have been moving for millions of years and will continue to move.
• Light travels faster than sound.
• Earth goes around the Sun (and not vice versa).
• Not all radioactivity is manmade.

In contrast, about half the respondents knew that:

• The earliest humans did not live at the same time as dinosaurs.
• It takes Earth one year to go around the Sun.
• Electrons are smaller than atoms.
• Antibiotics do not kill viruses.
• Lasers do not work by focusing sound waves.

A study conducted for the People for the American Way Foundation took a closer look at the question of teaching evolution and found an overwhelming majority of Americans (83 percent) agreeing that it should be taught in the classroom. However, there is also strong support for teaching creationism. A detailed breakdown of the survey findings shows a wide range of opinion on the issue:

• 20 percent favor teaching only evolution and nothing else in public schools;
• 17 percent want only evolution taught in science classes but say that religious explanations can be discussed in other classes;
• 29 percent do not have a problem with creationism being discussed in science classes but believe it should be discussed as a “belief,” not a scientific theory;
• 13 percent believe that both evolution and creationism should be taught as scientific theories in science class;
• 16 percent want no mention of evolution at all;
• 4 percent are in favor of teaching both evolution and creationism but are unsure about how to do it; and
• 1 percent have no opinion (People for American Way Foundation 2000).

While Dawkins is based in the UK, answering those questions right is for him a concern. I thought it was disconcerting that 14% of men in the poll thought the earth did not go round the sun – when reading that 34% of women thought the sun went round the earth I was dumbstruck. If this is a realistic sample of the American public the upcoming election will be won with less of a majority than those that do not know the orbit of the earth. Thankfully the world keeps on going around no matter what people think.

Perhaps there is always going to be a minority that will not concern themselves with basic science. It seems that parents do care that their children get a good science education, and when it is an issue that directly effects them, or gets a lot of media coverage they take a keen interest. The answer to me is that science has to become more connected to the everyday – to excite and encourage inquiry in early years so that science in secondary school builds on that interest.

Why does this matter? Well:

Without a grasp of scientific ways of thinking, the average person cannot tell the difference between science based on real data and something that resembles science—at least in their eyes—but is based on uncontrolled experiments, anecdotal evidence, and passionate assertions…[W]hat makes science special is that evidence has to meet certain standards (Rensberger 2000, p. 61). [ibid]

The key thing is being accessible and available. On that score, Richard Dawkins has achieved and those that wanted to understand had somewhere to go, where science could be explained in its beauty to those interested. Everyone else could fuck off.* That attitude to the role is why Dawkins succeeded with a job title beyond ability to deliver.

The above article re posted from here.

*To paraphrase what a New Science editor said; often wrongly thought to originate with Dawkins.

OTHER BLOGS:

Great Ideas of Biology – 9th Simonyi Anniversary Lecture

Me and Douglas Adams [Richard Dawkins helping me to understand Evolution]

There has been a change in the guidelines on the forum – which is to safeguard the charitable position of the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science – with regards to content. There has always been discussions about moderating the forum between staff members, and I will not allude to the positions we took in those discussions – they were ongoing and with a view to making the site the best we could. Richard has made the position clear, and with the best of reasons for doing so:

THIS site is focused around reason and science, coupled with strong opposition to unreason, including religion.

I acknowledge that it is also a place where people make friends. It is a community, and that is a valuable part of it. Many of our forum threads have an atmosphere of friends going out for a drink and chatting. I think that is valuable, and I don’t think we should insist on sticking to serious topics. That would be a good way to stifle the sense of community, and that would be a real shame (although I can think of better things to be “almost in tears about”).

On the other hand, the parent organization of this site is two charities, one in Britain and one in USA. We fought long and hard (much longer and harder than most charities have to) for our charitable status. You wouldn’t believe how innocent were the things we had on our website that the lawyers made us remove for fear of offending the Charity Commissioners. You wouldn’t believe the innocent things we had on our website that the Charity Commissioners queried, and advised us to remove before we could proceed to charitable status. You wouldn’t believe the money we spent (I spent) on all that legal advice.

Now, the issue of “censorship”. Don’t be so silly. Censorship is PREVENTING people from speaking or writing freely. Censorship is seizing books and impounding them. It is NOT censorship when a publisher refuses to publish a book, for whatever reason. The publisher is simply saying, “Thank you, I don’t want to publish your book. Perhaps another publisher will.” That’s not censorship. Same thing with newspapers. When you send an article in to a newspaper, or a letter to the editor, the chances are they won’t publish it. But they are not CENSORING you, they are just exercising editorial discrimination.

We on RD.net are in the position of publishers and editors. Publishing costs money, believe it or not. We are specialist publishers, specialising in reason, science, and opposition to unreason and religion. As an extra service, we subsidize conversations on topics of general interest among friends who come here in the first place because they are interested in the primary focus of the site. But we are under no obligation to publish EVERYTHING that comes our way. Would you expect a site devoted to ornithology, or model railways, to publish, at their own expense, conversations on fist-fucking? Especially if they are vulnerable, on a year by year basis, to losing their charitable status?

As for the abrupt timing, I feel I should apologise for that. I received such forceful complaints from veteran members of the forum, mostly about a sadomasochistic thread, that I thought I’d better have a look at the thread for myself (I had no idea of its existence before). I read it through the eyes of a charity commission lawyer, which explains the haste with which I picked up the phone to Josh (who also was completely unaware of its existence).

I’d now like to start a constructive discussion on how to preserve the sense of fellowship and community on our forum, without departing so far from our stated aims of reason and science that we jeopardize our charitable status.

Richard [source]

I know that some members have moaned about freedom of expression on the forum, some making their position very clear in signatures. However, the charitable consideration of RDFRS are of greater concern than the lewd behaviour that some people wanted to talk about. Soon no doubt it will be water under the bridge, and I hope people realise that the aims of the Foundation are more important.

It has meant that OBC is no longer the site administrator of the forum. His comment on that is the measure of a man that not only takes responsibility but is a fine guy that has devoted a lot of hours and time on behalf of the website and RDFRS as a volunteer, and for that I am thankful and want to pay tribute to Wayne publicly for that:

I feel that I should make this announcement about the recent controversy and the miss placed attacks. As the Site Admin this is my fault. The subjects, while I did not really partake in them, I did argue on behalf of them. I thought I was acting in the best interest of the community. There were others that expressed there concerns of this. I should have listen to them, if I had none of this would have probably happened. The owners were put in a tough potion, that I unintentionally put them in. They had no choice to act the way they did, which I fully support. By me not tacking action to curb the tone of the threads, we now find ourselves in this situation.

Please try to understand, if I had acted and removed the outlandish threads there would be some unhappy, but we would not find ourselves where we are now. The owners are acting responsibly regarding the content of the forum. Please stop directing your anger at them, it is me that you should place the blame on. I was the one responsibly, the buck stop here. They if anything are cleaning the mess I put us in. We need to move on, and heal as a community, this to shall pass. [source]

Quentin Letts is right wing, Daily Mail posh gossip tit bit journalist often found trying to be as amusing as Mark Mardell on This Week and failing spectacularly. So it should be no surprise that he has written a book on Fifty People Who Buggered Up Britain. He rails against the removal of corporal punishment from schools, that Britain is broken and the European super state is coming, when what we need is some more church going.

So it should be no surprise that Richard Dawkins comes in at number 30:

30 Richard Dawkins

Anti-religionist Dawkins, the best-known English dissenter since Darwin, is the merciless demander of provable fact.

He is the Charles Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science and tours the world lecturing the elites of the West that they are stupid to believe in any god.

He proselytises against the proselytisers, most of his targets wishing they had a fraction of his apparent certainty.

He is the anti-preacher whose sermons are designed to erode churchgoing and, with that, weaken our happiness.

A man less obsessed with himself and with the narrow calculations of men in white coats might realise that religion, although never offering proof of God’s existence, can sugar catastrophe and brighten chasms.

In times of turbulence, the human being is little different from the vole or the dormouse. It will take shelter where it can.

No amount of superior lecturing from an anti-Christ, not even one with so important a title as his, will alter that. [Daily Mail]

Mind you, if not altering anything was the measure of what a person should not do then Quentin Letts would be unemployed moaning about the traitor Edward Heath, waiting for last orders at the Saville Club. He misses the point that The God Delusion is aimed at those that do not know that there is a credible alternative to non belief in a supernatural entity. There is a choice beyond thinking there is something out there.

If church going is what the happiness of the nation rests then we are a sorry nation. Because happiness is not faking reality or what we do not know but accepting it and being able to move on with our lives.

It is not only Hollywood celebrities that are accused of hurting people’s sensibilities when it comes to religion (Natalie Portman). Pat Condell, a comedian who has been featured on Richard Dawkins Website, had his video on Sharia Law flagged by users and complained about by Muslim Groups when posted on 30 September. YouTube have reinstated the video stating:

“YouTube is a platform for expression of all kinds. Our Community Guidelines prohibit speech that promotes or encourages hatred or violence towards certain groups or individuals, and the video was flagged by our community on that basis. Upon further review of the context of Pat Condell’s comments, we’ve reinstated it.”

Richard Dawkins welcomed the decision:

I congratulate YouTube on an excellent decision. Pat Condell is hard-hitting, but always quietly reasonable in tone. That some people say they are ‘offended’ by something is never a good reason for censoring it. Incitement to violence is. Pat Condell never incites violence against anybody. He always signs off with “Peace” and he means it.

Freedom of speech can not be limited based solely on people saying they are offended. There is a huge difference between not respecting ideas and inciting hatred and violence towards people. That distinction needs to be kept in mind and free citizens need to be vigilant against that distinction being eroded at the cost of all  our civil liberties.

Here is the video:

Sign the Petition: Stop Islamic Sharia Law being used in Great Britain

10 Downing Street Petition Stop Sharia Law

[N.B. Only British Citizens can sign these petitions - the first one runs out today; the second one 1 January 2009 - thanks to Stephen Gash for comment]

OTHER BLOGS:

Archbishop up holds Sharia Law in England – a critique of what he said

The circular argument – the con artist (features Pat Condell video on atheism at bottom)

I have to give credit for the group for trying to parody the Church of England apology to Charles Darwin. Though naturally they are more funny when they get the wrong end of the stick in their observations on nature (such as Peacocks feathers – which Dawkins had a conversation about with Clive James). Their insults are at odds with the manner by which Dawkins goes for arguments, and the manner in which he does describe opponents. No doubt they would benefit from a day out at the zoo with a zoologist, rather than picketing outside one on Gay Sunday.

14 September 2008, Zoo then party animals at G-A-Y Late

Evolution does not underpin my reasons for being an atheist. That it explains the development of life on earth without having to resort to supernatural explanations, and has evidence for it rather than circular reasoning that says all other opinions are from the devil. As a scientific theory new discoveries and ideas play a part in building up what we know about the process of evolution, once they are verified. They will be obtained by pursuing science, and not fearing where the truth will take us.

Those reasons would be Bertrand Russell’s Why I am Not A Christian and becoming aware that philosophy allowed serious discussion of life on earth without needing the assumption of god to work. That you really do have a credible choice in not believing in a higher power that needs worship or else.

Anyway here is the press release:

Dated 15th September 2008 21.00 hrs

Professor Richard Dawkins is to receive an apology from the prayer and lobby group Christian Voice, despite being spiritually dead for over sixty years. The move follows a posthumous apology to Charles Darwin which the Church of England issued today.

The apology will read:

‘Professor Dawkins, 67 years (give or take a month or two) from your birth, Christian Voice owes you an apology for misunderstanding you and, by getting our first reaction wrong, encouraging others to misunderstand you still. (We are not sure that is good English, but please forgive us for that as well.)

‘In the past Christian Voice has ridiculed you for your irrational belief in evolution and for failing to blaspheme the Holy Spirit.

‘We said, in a press release dated 10th October 2007, that you were ‘daffy’ in encouraging children on your website to blaspheme the Holy Spirit. We said your failure to understand what blaspheming the Holy Spirit actually was stemmed from ignorance and implied that you were barking mad to get people to try to blaspheme a God in whom you did not even believe.

‘We described you as an “evangelical atheist” who looked “malicious, loony, ill-informed and stupid in equal measure”. We pondered your “peculiar combination of wickedness and madness” and asked, “Has the evolutionary biologist lost the plot?”

‘Yesterday, outside London Zoo, while witnessing against the Zoo’s ridiculous “Gay Sunday”, we gave out leaflets mocking the theory of evolution, for which you are such a prominent advocate.

‘We imagined in the leaflet a conversation between two prototype swallows, desperately trying to work out how to stick mud together and watching all their eggs smash on the ground. We had the male swallow saying “I’m sorry about the eggs, darling, it takes time to evolve this nest-building lark.”

‘We ridiculed the idea that the tail of the peacock and the tuft on the head of the tufted duck are there to attract a mate, observing that starlings and sparrows manage to reproduce without over-the-top tails and redundant tufts.

‘In so doing, we characterised you as irrational, illogical and a total loser. We implied you were ill-educated if not a complete plank to think that the incredible interdependence and design in creation could just “happen” over time and did not need a divine designer.

‘People, and institutions, make mistakes and Christian people and Churches are no exception. When a big new idea, like Jesus Christ being King of kings and Lord of lords, emerges that changes the way people look at the world, it’s easy for Roman Empire pagans and modern secularists, both Christian and Atheist, to feel that every old idea, every certainty, is under attack and then to do battle against the new insights.

‘So we recognise now that your dependence on evolution is not science, or even bad science, but an irrational excuse to deny Almighty God. We see that your attempts to poor scorn on Christianity and Jesus Christ are the result of a sort of ‘virus of the mind’, put there by the father of lies.

‘We acknowledge that your hatred of intelligent design – and the Intelligent Designer – is merely a faith-based position, as is the use of your gifts to obscure and even deny the truth of the Gospel.

‘Above all, we now realise, that contrary to your being a complete waste of space and a descendant of apes, you are actually made in the image of God. We realise that although you are still stupid, that is simply because the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and that your eyes are blinded and your ears will not hear any contrary view. In short, we now see you are a sinner in need of the saving, life-transforming grace of God in Jesus Christ.

‘It is a start for you, that you realise there is a deep incompatibility between the pseudo-scientific theories you have adopted and developed from Darwin and Christian teaching. But that is not quite enough.

‘So we apologise if we have failed to say, that rather than continue as a militant, proselytising sinner, you need to recognise your failings right now and seek the forgiveness of the incarnate, crucified, risen, ascended, glorified Lord Jesus Christ.

‘The struggle for your spirit is not over yet, and we pray that you will cast away the dead faith of Darwinism for a living faith in the living Saviour.’

OTHER BLOGS:

Being born a Lesbian

Bill Meets the Mayor of Loughborough, Cllr Stephen Campbell

Bill Newton Dunn, member of the European Parliament for the East Midlands, visited my home town today. In one of those small world coincidences he was in the same class as Richard Dawkins at Chafyn Grove school, in Salisbury, where he remembers Richard often starring out of the window. I also have him to thank for many a British Government essay, as he was the first person to use the term “democratic deficit”  when discussing political European institutions.

One person that we met in the town market (Mary) wanted to have a go at politicians for saying one thing and then doing another. Bill’s wife Anna made the point how one person did not want to hear how policy was created at the European level. I sometimes wonder whether people actually knowing how the system operates is a separate issue from people wanting to hold their elected representatives to account. In many ways both these issues are answered by transparency – a key part of the democratic deficit.

That however does depend on people like Mary, who on her crutches charged at Bill to bend his ear while shoppers dived for cover. That spirit is vital; if people could only knew just how active people are on their behalf then perhaps it would take the edge off the cynicism that allows people to feel they have a valid excuse for not getting involved. Or ignore someone like me handing out flyers.

Today was “In My Town Without My Car” day, and Bill and the rest of us met up with the Mayor of Loughborough who bused into  town. I do find these things a bit gimmicky, hoping that my bicycle was secure outside the Cinema. To help with that John Catt was about, who is involved with Action For Charnwood keen cyclist and trustee of the British Humanist Society (I could go on but if you need a definition of pluralism in action it is John) gave me a security tab for my bike and a cycle map.

After talking to Bill about Richard, the junior years, and finding out he advocates the disestablishment of the Church of England from the State (the only time I have ever discussed such things in a McDonalds) we moved on to a garden party generously hosted by Councillor David Walker and his wife Claire.

Among things discussed with people were Michael Reiss and The God Delusion, with a late Summer’s day beating down on us, with puffs and wine providing sustenance as we discussed meta physical frameworks of reality, and politics. It made me appreciate just how many things are going on behind the scenes whether at the local or international level.

David and Claire Walker, at their home

For American readers there is a tale for you. Bill’s son spent 6 months working for a Congressman in Washington DC, and just before leaving he tried to arrange interviews with people on the Hill to have something to bring back to the UK. No one seemed interested talking to a nobody Brit. The last day before he was due to finish he got his one and only call back, from a Senator that had a spare hour to discuss anything he liked while on a long drive.

That person was John McCain. In many ways it is that kind of character that makes me wish that his politics were not moving so far right in the Presidential Campaign. We discussed that if he can separate himself from the Bush administration he has every chance of hanging on to his lead in the opinion polls.

All the best to Bill for the forthcoming European elections in June of next year, and thanks to David and Claire for hosting the garden party.

From my earlier blog it is now official that Adna Oktar has been responsible for the courts action blocking internet access to richarddawkins.net

“Istanbul’s Sisli 2nd Criminal Court of Peace has banned the site in Turkey on the grounds that Adnan Oktar’s personality was violated by this site. The court reached the decision to ban the site on September 3. A lawsuit is filed for the damages of mental anguish against Richard Dawkins in the amount of 8000 YTL (about 4000 Euro)”.

Irony is that Adnan Oktar is pro EU membership for Turkey. Freedom of speech restrictions and other concerns over human rights are a barrier to that goal. While most EU law emphasises libel, in Turkey the law has a focus on offense. The press officer for Adnan quoted above explained:

“We are not against freedom of speech or expression but you cannot insult people. We found the comments hurtful. It was not a scientific discussion. There was a line and the limit has been passed. We have used all the legal means to stop this site. We asked them to remove the comments but they did not.”

Because if on the site we removed every post that someone else found offensive, then we would not have much of a site for people to discuss science, religion and secularism. I remember being accused of being a communist (which given that I am an Adam Smith fan I found rather amusing). It did not occur to me that laughing it off was not the appropriate option.

Because the mental anguish motive could have been much more profitable. Perhaps enough for a kebab.

In any case, I wonder if the website will be adding countries to the banner of shame? In the meantime thank goodness for proxies!

Quote from New Humanist.

The letter to the New Scientist was sent before Reiss resigned. It is refreshing that Dawkins has a cooler head then the Nobel Laureates that were after blood:

Before Michael Reiss stepped down as director of education for the Royal Society, Dawkins sent New Scientist his thoughts on the creationism row that blew up last week

The Reverend Michael Reiss, the Royal Society’s Director of Education, is in trouble because of his views on the teaching of creationism.

Although I disagree with him, what he actually said at the British Association is not obviously silly like creationism itself, nor is it a self-evidently inappropriate stance for the Royal Society to take.

Scientists divide into two camps over this issue: the accommodationists, who ‘respect’ creationists while disagreeing with them; and the rest of us, who see no reason to respect ignorance or stupidity.

The accommodationists include such godless luminaries as Eugenie Scott, whose National Center for Science Education is doing splendid work in fighting the creationist wingnuts in America. She and her fellow accommodationists bend over backwards to woo the relatively sensible minority among Christians, who accept evolution.

Get the bishops and theologians on the side of science – so the argument runs – and they’ll be valuable allies against the naive creationists (who probably include the majority of Christians and certainly almost all Muslims, by the way).

No politician could deny at least the superficial plausibility of this expedient, although it is disappointing how ineffective as allies the ’sensible’ minority of Christians turn out to be.

The official line of the US National Academy, the American equivalent of the Royal Society, is shamelessly accommodationist. They repeatedly plug the mantra that there is ‘no conflict’ between evolution and religion. Michael Reiss could argue that he is simply following the standard accommodationist line, and therefore doesn’t deserve the censure now being heaped upon him.

Unfortunately for him as a would-be spokesman for the Royal Society, Michael Reiss is also an ordained minister. To call for his resignation on those grounds, as several Nobel-prize-winning Fellows are now doing, comes a little too close to a witch-hunt for my squeamish taste.

Nevertheless – it’s regrettable but true – the fact that he is a priest undermines him as an effective spokesman for accommodationism: “Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he!”

If the Royal Society wanted to attack creationism with all fists flying, as I would hope, an ordained priest might make a politically effective spokesman, however much we might deplore his inconsistency.

This is the role that Kenneth Miller, not a priest but a devout Christian, plays in America, where he is arguably creationism’s most formidable critic. But if the Society really wants to promote the accommodationist line, a clergyman is the very last advocate they should choose.

Perhaps I was a little uncharitable to liken the appointment of a vicar as the Royal Society’s Education Director to a Monty Python sketch. Nevertheless, thoughts of Trojan Horses are now disturbing many Fellows, already concerned as they are by the signals the Society recently sent out through its flirtation with the infamous Templeton Foundation.

Accommodationism is playing politics, while teetering on the brink of scientific dishonesty. I’d rather not play that kind of politics at all but, if the Royal Society is going to go down that devious road, they should at least be shrewd about it. Perhaps, rather than resign his job with the Royal Society, Professor Reiss might consider resigning his Orders?

Richard Dawkins, Fellow of the Royal Society

My own take on the matter is in the previous blog.