That’s not a specific enough link to be helpful. I have no idea what article at Coyne’s site you intended to reference.

Coyne’s at it again

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com/

This sort of thing is why I am no longer an atheist. Theists always equivocate between their actual religion and the definition of “religion” as meaning “the belief I am obliged to be moral” and “God” as “the personification of Good..” If you’re against obligation to be good and despise Good Himself, you’re not really an atheist, you’re a libertarian. Even worse, practical atheism is an essential proposition in metaphysics. Most people aren’t doing science, so they don’t need a grip on philosophical materialism.

Yeah. You know, theists are always equivocating between “following god” and “following teachings” of a particular religion. I’m also aware of their belief that following god means “I am obliged to be straight” with “God” as “the personification of the head of a family (father)”. If you have an obligation to be straight but reject Patriarchy itself, you’re not queer, you’re a hedonist. Even worse, practical queerness is an essential proposition as a metaphysical comparator to even *define* straightness, hence all the rules against cross dressing and queer men’s sex in various religions. But most people aren’t doing sexology, so they do need a grip on philosophical sexual orientation.

This sort of thing is why I am no longer a lesbian.

You don’t seem to have a good grasp of English, so I am not sure you are making mistakes in communicating. But it doesn’t look like you read Gabriel’s piece or are interacting with any of Gabriel’s actual points.

I stated that THEIR MORAL CODE BOOK says ‘kill who you don’t like’ (paraphrased).

So does the moral code book of Christians and Jews (e.g. Deut. 12-13).

A point Gabriel actually made.

Yet somehow you missed that point.

How?

You can do that yourself, BTW.

I just tried posting a comment, but I can’t tell what happened to it (if it’s in moderation or something went amiss).

Oh, good. Thought I was being piled on. Sorry, Hankstar!

Well, I will correct you on one point: I do think that 4 percent is a problem. Rather, it’s being a problem does not justify blanket assertions that this sort of thing is true of all Muslims or even common among them, any more than if 4% of American Christians thought atheists should have their citizenship revoked would we be justified in condemning all Christians as fascists and traitors and a threat to American liberty.

This is exactly the kind of reply that, had Godfrey made it rather than just hiding behind “I didn’t say that!” might have sparked a fruitful dialogue. He didn’t.

Yet I found that in one minute of googling.

Why didn’t you?

Godfrey took you to task for proving nothing, not knowing what you were talking about, and arguing by assertion, as well as engaging in hyperbole and straw man and other fallacies. He was right.

Godfrey already provided a source for his claims (Atran), which it looks like you didn’t consult or interact with at all (beyond Godfrey’s paraphrase). And Godfrey took you to task for that as well. He was right.

You were simply wrong about Harris, you had no evidence to back anything you claimed about Harris, and didn’t even parse Atran’s sourcing (did you even read Atran?) or get what he said right (as I’ve noted). Godfrey said these very same things. And he was, again, right. But you did nothing to correct your approach. That resulted in Godfrey getting tired of you.

If you can’t figure out why that was justified (and why your weirdly extreme, borderline-libelous accusation against Godfrey here was way out of line and not justified), then you might need to lay off commenting anywhere for a while until you know how to do it properly.

(And in case you forgot, this is what you said: On this topic, [Godfrey] treats anyone who disagrees with him as ignorant and irrational, and will not afford you the basic respect of engaging seriously with your objections. He’ll just insist you don’t understand and need to read more, no matter how carefully you lay out your case, and no matter how many times you explicitly ask him to clarify specific points. I, and others, only had a “visceral reaction” to Neil’s condescending and evasive treatment of our disagreements with him on this topic, *not* to the post itself, or to the work of the scholars he cited. That he portrays it this way after the fact is amazing, and yet more disrespect. I asked for an example backing this rather scathing generalization. You gave me one. I checked it. And I did not find any of these accusations true. It seems now the only accusation you have left against him is that he would have won his argument against you had he cited Greenwald. That’s pretty weak tea in light of what you were accusing him of. Particularly since you should have found Greenwald yourself. Because you should have checked your claims before making them.)

Again, you are ignoring what Godfrey was actually objecting to, getting his response to you wrong, and in the process ignoring almost every point I made and focusing instead entirely on the least relevant one.

You need to mind that behavior. That’s going to get you banned or berated in every comment thread on earth.