News and Notes: 11-13-05

Comment Weirdness

Blogger normally emails me when I receive comments, but since Friday, I have gotten at least seven comments to posts that have not also appeared as email. Unless I am very busy, I ordinarily reply to comments. If you've commented on something and are wondering why I have said nothing, this could be the reason. (HT: Gideon Reich)

I emailed Blogger Support Friday night, but my answer so far amounts to: "No Comment".

If anyone has experienced this problem before and/or knows what I can do to fix it, please drop me a line.

Return to Sender, Postage Due?

After reading this Bubblehead post, I wondered briefly whether this guy might have done his nuclear prototype training in Idaho, but though the pages resemble each other stylistically, they appear to be by two different authors. (HT: Oakes.)




Give Idaho back to the British, eh? That might be a quick way to get two (newly-minted) Brits onto my blogroll.

Unintelligent Redesign of Science

Over at Riding Sun, the Gaijin Biker notes that Creationists in Kansas have effectively admitted that Intelligent Design is not science by altering the standards for what constitutes "science" in Kansas public schools.

So the ID'ers are saying that science shouldn't be limited to discussions of provable causes and effects. They are specifically demanding that science be re-defined to admit explanations that don't depend on cause-and-effect relationships.

This is indeed just such an admission. I would imagine that the Creationists felt the need to do this only for legal reasons. The entire "argument" for intelligent design is, after all, not a scientific one, but a new application of very old (and long ago discredited) theological one used to "prove" the existence of God, the "argument from design". This argument basically asserts that the universe must have had a creator due to its complexity, but begs the question of who created the creator. Both the argument from design and the argument for Intelligent Design make this same error.

It would amaze me that ID'ers never get called on this but for the fact that this is exactly why ID'ers are making so much progress today: Many people do not do much critical thinking of their own, nor will many listen to such arguments.

Den Beste is Back

And while over at Riding Sun this week, I also got wind of news that fellow fans of Stephen den Beste will appreciate. He has returned as a diarist at RedState.org.

Moslems are starting to get (part of) it.

One important thing has become clear after the recent al Qaeda bombings in Amman, Jordan: Other Moslems are beginning to appreciate, at least, that al Qaeda is not merely a menace to non-Moslems.

While it is encouraging to see popular support for al Qaeda on the wane in the Moslem world, it is not encouraging that this might be merely because al Qaeda is seen as having started to target Moslems.

There were even larger demonstrations on Friday after the weekly midday mosque sermons in Amman and at a mass funeral for victims. "We came to support our nation and our unity," said Ibrahim Haniya, 22, who marched with a group of friends. "These bombers didn't differentiate between Muslims, Christians or Jews. They were against the world."

So was al Qaeda's only flaw that they didn't selectively pick off the non-Moslems at the three hotels? Moslems are beginning to see that they are themselves are also targets of al Qaeda, but while some hold that this shows that we are "winning minds" in the war, I take it to be that al Qaeda is merely losing hearts.

Or, to examine this turning against al Qaeda from another angle:

"Killing is only justified in war," said Muzadi, the head of the Nahdatul Ulama, in remarks carried by the state news agency Antara on Sunday. "Terrorists who are acting in the name of Islam are ruining the religion's reputation as a blessing to the universe. Islam's followers both in Indonesia and abroad are being cornered as a result," he said.

Yes. The terrorists are not making Islam look good, but neither do many of the pronouncements of that religion. What is essentially wrong with what the terrorists are doing is not that they are blaspheming Islam, or making Islam look bad, or killing Moslems. Yes. They are doing all of these things and some of these things are wrong, but the greatest sin is that they are killing human beings, Moslem or not.

This turning against al Qaeda is good news, but it will not alone end the conflict between Islam and the West. What needs to occur is for Moslems to accept the idea that some do not and never will regard Islam as a "blessing to the universe", and that even these people have rights that must be protected by the state. Given that a huge majority of Moslems are, in addition to still focusing on how terrorism hurts Islam, also against separation of mosque and state (HT: TIA Daily), it would seem that we are a long way off from where we need to be.

Still, implicit acceptance of the American Dream -- of the right to pursue one's happiness -- seems to be catching on even in some parts of the Moslem world:

Marchers said they took to the streets to show they support the moderate, pro-Western path the country has taken.

Jordan is sneered at by the region's hard-liners because of its Westernized pro-business atmosphere, its close relationship with Washington and its peace treaty with neighbouring Israel.

"Jordan is the only country in the region that is safe, but some people don't want us to be safe. Some people don't want us to be happy," said Manal Hyari, a 21-year-old university student who stood outside the Grand Hyatt yesterday afternoon, silently clutching a Jordanian flag.

But this is implicit. Until most Moslems explicitly adopt a live and let live attitude towards non-Moslems -- until they reject the premise (common, by the way, between many interpretations of their religion and those of terrorists) that non-believers must submit, convert, or die -- Islam itself will remain in conflict with the West.

All this brings to my mind the following famous poem, concerning Nazis and the Holocaust.

First they came for the Jews, but I am not a Jew so I said nothing,
Then they came for the Catholics, but I am not a Catholic so I said nothing,
Then they came for the Unionists and Industrialists but I am neither so I said nothing,
Now they are coming for me and there is no-one left to say anything!

The message of this poem is, of course, that no one is exempt from being targeted by any group which, like the Nazis, declares open season on other human beings -- even if said group hasn't yet declared you a target (yet).

In this recent news, it appears that some Moslems might realize that they "might be next". On the other hand, I think that they haven't quite wrapped their minds around the idea that so long as they regard their own religion as more important than their own humanity, they are still in trouble. This would be the next step on the road to an Islamic reformation.

The West must fight for the minds of the Moslem world: al Qaeda losing their hearts will not be enough to stop a more discriminating band of murderers from winning or reclaiming the popularity that al Qaeda is busy losing.

Tax Post Facto

Alex Nunez points to an interesting stunt being pulled by the Massachusetts state government: a retroactive tax increase.

The Massachusetts Department of Revenue began notifying 48,000 taxpayers yesterday that they owe capital gains taxes on the sale of assets that occurred nearly four years ago, outraging consumer advocates and business leaders who called the retroactive taxation plan unfair.

I also wonder whether this is even legal.

More on the "Pirate Cruise"

Paul Hsieh points to an article on how the Seabourn Spirit, a cruise ship that was recently attacked by pirates off the coast of Somalia, successfully deployed a military-grade sonic weapon to repel the attack.

The liner used a sonic blaster to foil the pirates. Developed by American forces to deter small boats from attacking warships, the non-lethal weapon sends out high-powered air vibrations that blow assailants off their feet. The equipment, about the size of a satellite dish, is rigged to the side of the ship...

Meanwhile, Bubblehead notes that there might be another way to handle a huge pirate mother ship hanging around off the Horn of Africa.

One Question for Dennis Prager

Dennis Prager, writes a column called, "Five questions non-Muslims would like answered," in which he continues the theme of gross evasion from his "Case for Judaeo-Christian Values" series. Here, he addresses the Moslem reader as if his religion had -- like Christianity -- already undergone a reformation.

The answers to all the questions he asks are related to the very definition of Islam: submission. When one discards reason and submits instead to authority, then whatever that authority wants, that authority gets. In other words, Islam is the only major unreformed religion in the world. Its followers accept religious dicta without question.

One question remains unasked in this column, and that is because someone needs to ask it of Prager: "How can you see the consequences of unadulterated religion in the world today and throughout history, and yet consistently fail to give credit where credit is due: to the ancient Greeks, who discovered the rules of logic, thereby giving us the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and industrial civilization?"

I suspect that the answer might be a more positive form of Pat Robertson's recent "argument" in favor of teaching Creationism at public expense. Namely: Prager needs to pretend that the arbitrary dictates of religion have some tie, causality, to the real world. His way of doing this is more sophisticated than Robertson's, who makes a laughingstock of himself by claiming disasters past and future as evidence of God's wrath. What Prager does is pretend that reason -- and all its demonstrable benefits -- are a "consequence" of the ill-defined system of "Judaeo-Christian values" he espouses. In other words, he tries to pass off reason as faith.

Intellectual Property Blog

Of note to myself and my friends Raymund and the General: Glenn Reynolds points to a very good-looking intellectual property blog.

-- CAV