The Carrier-McDurmon Debate: Which Worldview Produces the Better World?
Joel McDurmon is an odd fellow. Founder of American Vision, he is simultaneously an old school arch-conservative who thinks all taxation is theft and public schools must be abolished, and a passionate, well-reasoned advocate for liberal talking points like that the...The Real Basis of a Moral World
What worldview is better for the world? That’s a question I debated with Joel McDurmon of American Vision just the other day in Houston. I’ll announce the video when it goes live. But one of the matters that came up centrally in that debate was moral...Speaking in Cincinnati!
I will be speaking for the Free Inquiry Group on the science and philosophy of moral reasoning in Cincinnati, Ohio, this coming October 23rd, Tuesday 7pm, at the First Unitarian Church of Cincinnati on 536 Linton Street. Details on Facebook and Meetup. Description:...Intersectionality: A Guide for the Perplexed
Conservatives have really weird ideas about what “intersectional feminism” means. I’ve been running into it a lot lately. Up to and including that it denies individualism (in fact it’s about re-acknowledging individuality in the social system),...Debate in Houston This November!
I’ll be debating Which Worldview Produces the Best World? in Houston, Texas, on 10 November 2018. The theme: Does atheistic Naturalism or biblical Christianity offer true help for the world? I’ll be defending naturalism; Dr. Joel McDurmon will be defending...What’s the Harm? Why Religious Belief Is Always Bad
I’m often asked, “Christianity doesn’t really hurt anyone. Why is it so important? Just let people believe what they want. At least in religion. Why should we bother critiquing and opposing belief?” In some cases the question is terribly naive. In others,...The Problem with Nothing: Why The Indefensibility of Ex Nihilo Nihil Goes Wrong for Theists
I’ve argued before that if we presume there was once absolutely nothing, we actually end up with an infinite multiverse (Ex Nihilo Onus Merdae Fit). Which eliminates the fine tuning argument, by statistically guaranteeing any universe will randomly exist, no...The Mind Is a Process Not an Object: On Not Understanding Mind-Brain Physicalism
In a recent issue of Philosophy Now, Christian philosopher Grant Bartley argues “Why Physicalism is Wrong.” In which he exemplifies why it is the critics of physicalism who are wrong. Because Bartley commits basic fallacies in understanding the issue....Free Ticket Contest for MythCon 2018!
Want to get into MythCon for free, both the event and afterparty? The theme this year is multiple-sides, honest dialogue. So here’s what gets you in: produce a blog, vlog, or podcast that (a) examines any secular disagreement in politics, culture, or society,...How Not to Be a Doofus about Bayes’ Theorem
I’ve been dealing with a bunch of doofuses lately. And I can’t tell if they are alone in their quackery, or if their disease is afflicting anyone else. So here’s a primer on how not to be a total doofus about Bayes’ Theorem. I define a doofus...Dennett vs. Harris on Free Will
In January of 2014 Daniel Dennett, a philosopher and cognitive scientist who is renowned as a world’s leading authority on free will, wrote a lengthy critical review of Sam Harris’s book Free Will (Reflections on Free Will: A Review by Daniel C. Dennett). Sam Harris,...The Argument from Specified Complexity against Supernaturalism
Creationists may have bitten their own head off with their idea of specified complexity. Because there is a case to be made that if specified complexity can exist, the supernatural cannot. The creationist William Dembski famously contrived the concept of...Money Buys Happiness? Not After You Hit Six Figures
Five years ago I took Michael Shermer to task for pushing pseudoscience in his bungled attempt to argue (in agreement with Sam Harris and myself) that moral philosophy could and should be retooled into a proper empirical science, the same way every other philosophical...Your Own Moral Reasoning: Some Things to Consider
We all know the Golden Rule, taught supposedly by the Jewish Rabbi Jesus in the West and the Confucian scholar Mo Tzu in the East: “do to others as you would have done for yourself.” Or as the equally ancient Rabbi Hillel, or Confucius himself, said, “do not do to...Feser Still Can’t Read
Feser keeps trying. And keeps failing. Indeed, he is now making things worse, by demonstrating he doesn’t even understand what is going on here. To catch you up: I wrote a critique of his book. He wrote a reply. I wrote a response to that reply showing how he...Get Dr. Carrier’s Latest!
About the Author
Richard Carrier is the author of many books and numerous articles online and in print. His avid readers span the world from Hong Kong to Poland. With a Ph.D. in ancient history from Columbia University, he specializes in the modern philosophy of naturalism and humanism, and the origins of Christianity and the intellectual history of Greece and Rome, with particular expertise in ancient philosophy, science and technology. He is also a noted defender of scientific and moral realism, Bayesian reasoning, and historical methods.
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