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Salon: My secret debate with Sam Harris

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Morrigan Stark

Arrogant Smirk
Good lord Harris is an embarrassment.

*snip long list of ad hominem*

Sam Harris is the best argument for theism I'm aware of.
This post is an embarrassment.

What the hell?

What's that hateful shit? If Sam Harris is the best argument for theism, want to highlight how he stands up against shit like Crusades, Spanish Inquisition, and Jihads?
Sam Harris said a stupid thing once or twice, and he's rude sometimes! That's way worse than all of those things.

"I'd vote for Ben Carson over Noam Chomsky."
That is perhaps the strongest indictment of Harris.

There are simple questions no one actually asks him:

1. Can you read/speak arabic fluently?
2. Have you read the Qur'an from start to finish?
3. What are your general qualifications?
...That, however, isn't. Speaking Arabic isn't necessary to refute Islam, come on.
 

haxamin

Member
I feel like collating all the responses in this thread that are beyond lunacy, to show exactly whats wrong with a lot of the rhetoric thats spewed whenever islam is mentioned.
 

aeolist

Banned
Liberals are going to have to get comfortable with the skeptical critique of Islam if they want to be on solid ground in fighting the genuinely bigoted attacks on Muslims that Drumpf and the far right figures in Europe are espousing.

People aren't stupid. They can see that there are problems in the world. If certain conversations are walled off, they'll find the people who are willing to have those conversations. People like Drumpf get to look brave because they will talk about things that the left is terrified to touch. The problem is that people like that are dangerous demagogues who seek the loyalty of bigots and legitimate racists. They have no answers, but they are canny enough to recognize an opening and latch onto it. An honest conversation would deny them that advantage.

It is a real failure on the part of some of the liberal press (Salon, Green Greenwald, and The Young Turks) that they can't seem to distinguish the incredibly real difference between liberal intellectuals like Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris, and genuinely dangerous forces like Drumpf and Le Pen.

sam harris openly agrees with eu fascists about islam

http://articles.latimes.com/2006/sep/18/opinion/oe-harris18/2

The people who speak most sensibly about the threat that Islam poses to Europe are actually fascists.

https://soundcloud.com/samharrisorg/on-the-maintenance-of-civilization

Take the personalities of the people on the right out of the equation. Is it crazy to express, as Ted Cruz did, a preference for Christians over Muslims in this process?
...
Given a choice between Noam Chomsky and Ben Carson, in terms of the totality of their understanding of what's happening now in the world, I'd vote for Ben Carson every time.
 

Erevador

Member
"I'd vote for Ben Carson over Noam Chomsky."
That is perhaps the strongest indictment of Harris.
It's worth noting that he also described Carson as a, quote, "religious idiot." He clearly views Chomsky's world view as actively suicidal in the face of the present global situation. One doesn't have to agree with that, but he's no fan of Carson. Harris is planning to vote (with reservations) for Hillary Clinton, if people want insight into his actual political convictions. He voted for Obama twice.
 

haxamin

Member
Good lord Harris is an embarrassment.


*Records a 4 hour long heated debate about Islam*

"It's, uhhhhhhh... too boring to release. Sorry guys. No, I can't let you hear it and decide for yourself."

"I would never edit Omer's contributions to the conversation, nor would any good journalist."

*Releases edited snatches of the conversation*



I used to think Sam Harris was maybe the least ridiculous of the New Atheists. But I just hadn't read enough about him. From his years bumming around Europe getting high on his mother's dime, to that shockingly inept experiment he conducted to get his neuroscience PhD, to his total lack of actual contributions to the field of neuroscience (at least Dawkins used to be an important biologist!), to his absolute ineptitude in philosophy, to his weird bastardization of Buddhism, to his bizarre unskeptical insistence that drugs, like, totally help us understand the world better, man, to his unbelievable bloodthirsty and gleeful discussions of killing, torturing, and nuking Muslims.

Sam Harris is the best argument for theism I'm aware of.
he did also do a 3 hour interview with Cenk, where he tried to contextualise the genocide in the old testament.

There are simple questions no one actually asks him:

1. Can you read/speak arabic fluently?
2. Have you read the Qur'an from start to finish?
3. What are your general qualifications?
It's a shame the New Atheist movement of intellectuals consists of morally dubious who lament the immorality of religion. We can do better.
Obviously, this means both Muslims and feminists are terrible and the only people we can really trust to tell us the truth are (largely white and male) atheists.

As for Nawaz, from this article (https://newrepublic.com/article/128436/maajid-nawaz-really-believe), he largely sounds like a guy going wherever the money is.



Let me guess, you also think only class matters, right?
but he has consistently revealed a vast ignorance of what is actually happened in the islamic world, while repeatedly producing apologia for the hegemonic butchery of the US and israel

islam is disgusting because all life is sacred unless it's snuffed out by an american drone strike because that's just unfortunate necessity i guess
Jonathan Haidt and Sam Harris on the same podcast? Have we reached peak douchebag?
Sam Harris bingo, checks topic for racist and biggot, BINGO!

Anyway, the conversation with Dave Rubin does well to address the profiling and other criticisms normally thrown at Harris https://youtu.be/zQqxlzHJrU0
If this shit is freethinking throw the fucking cuffs on me and swallow the key
Your ignorance is staggering.
Of course he is. He's an atheist ideologue, he thinks islam sucks.
Sam Harris is boring.

Self-appointed intellectuals quarreling should be something you pay to see in a dingy warehouse somewhere so you can place bets and drunkenly jeer.

Harris has been a super shitty racist/bigot recently so I'm not inclined to believe anything he says about the encounter. I still want to read what he has to say, though.
I don't really know who Sam Harris is and what he does, but everytime I hear about him or from him its something stupid.
He is one of the people who through around the term "regressive left" because people on the left don't share his xenophobic views.

I think "pseudo liberal" describes him very well.
neogaf.gif
 
I think the regressive left is a thing and has led to problems as of late especially online. Liberals need to start being, well liberal and discussing the issues in the middle East in an open and honest way. There is a hard line to walk but the way the regressive go about it does hurt people overall perspective. It can lead to things like voting for Donald Trump who plays off people's fears. That scares me.

You know this past season of the xfiles wasn't bad. But the second to last episode kind of got to me. The first half the episode showed Muslim bigotry in the USA which is a real thing, and dealt with what extreminsits could do if you drawn the prophet in an offensive way. I was watching this knowing that many liberals would be pissed off and I was right as I do follow a few friends who are like that. I stuck it out through that episode (Mulder got high) because I felt that x files was a better show than that. At the end of the episode it showed the mother of the bomber crying because she couldn't believe that her son was capable of doing this sort of thing. It's a tragedy for her as well. The very last scene Mulder tells Scully that he doesn't want to believe that mothers are raising their sons to commit these horrible acts. They managed to walk a fine line between being bigots and regressive. I think liberals are capable of doing this as well and should. I do agree Sam can change his approach sometimes when debating. However I haven't really seen anyone have a good debate with Harris. His last podcast the female guest was being really off.
 

Erevador

Member
sam harris openly agrees with eu fascists about islam

http://articles.latimes.com/2006/sep/18/opinion/oe-harris18/2
Come on, quote in context.

While liberals should be the ones pointing the way beyond this Iron Age madness, they are rendering themselves increasingly irrelevant. Being generally reasonable and tolerant of diversity, liberals should be especially sensitive to the dangers of religious literalism. But they aren't.

The same failure of liberalism is evident in Western Europe, where the dogma of multiculturalism has left a secular Europe very slow to address the looming problem of religious extremism among its immigrants. The people who speak most sensibly about the threat that Islam poses to Europe are actually fascists.

To say that this does not bode well for liberalism is an understatement: It does not bode well for the future of civilization.
That's Harris in 2006 accurately predicting the rise of Trump and the far right in Europe, and saying it doesn't bode well for civilization. He's issuing a cautionary statement to his own tribe (liberals) about their blindspots.

EDIT: Brilliant minds think alike, Henkka. ↓
 

Henkka

Banned

I feel like that quote should be in context:

Increasingly, Americans will come to believe that the only people hard-headed enough to fight the religious lunatics of the Muslim world are the religious lunatics of the West. Indeed, it is telling that the people who speak with the greatest moral clarity about the current wars in the Middle East are members of the Christian right, whose infatuation with biblical prophecy is nearly as troubling as the ideology of our enemies. Religious dogmatism is now playing both sides of the board in a very dangerous game.

While liberals should be the ones pointing the way beyond this Iron Age madness, they are rendering themselves increasingly irrelevant. Being generally reasonable and tolerant of diversity, liberals should be especially sensitive to the dangers of religious literalism. But they aren't.

The same failure of liberalism is evident in Western Europe, where the dogma of multiculturalism has left a secular Europe very slow to address the looming problem of religious extremism among its immigrants. The people who speak most sensibly about the threat that Islam poses to Europe are actually fascists.

To say that this does not bode well for liberalism is an understatement: It does not bode well for the future of civilization.

It makes no sense at all to paint him as a fascist. He is a liberal, who often disagrees with other liberals when it comes to Islam.

As already said, he's voting for Hillary. If I recall from his podcast, he said he's doing so because he thinks it's the best way to avoid a Trump or Cruz presidency, which he called a terrifying prospect or something to that effect. He doesn't think America will elect a socialist atheist, so Hillary is the next best option.
 

aeolist

Banned
i didn't say he was a fascist, i said he agrees with fascists when it comes to islam. that's a correct statement and is backed up by the full quote.
 

Erevador

Member
^ and the cycle continues...
1. Attack Harris with lies and misrepresentation
2. People respond with corrections.
3. "Harris fanboys are a creepy cult! Why are they so concerned about misrepresentation? Where there's smoke there's fire!"

Glenn Greenwald would be proud.
 
The same failure of liberalism is evident in Western Europe, where the dogma of multiculturalism has left a secular Europe very slow to address the looming problem of religious extremism among its immigrants. The people who speak most sensibly about the threat that Islam poses to Europe are actually fascists.

i didn't say he was a fascist, i said he agrees with fascists when it comes to islam. that's a correct statement and is backed up by the full quote.

No....it really isnt.
 

Jonm1010

Banned
Come on, quote in context.


That's Harris in 2006 accurately predicting the rise of Trump and the far right in Europe, and saying it doesn't bode well for civilization. He's issuing a cautionary statement to his own tribe (liberals) about their blindspots.

EDIT: Brilliant minds think alike Henkka.

He beats up a generalization while simultaneously making some of his own and offering up his intellectual allegiance to fascists that have built their views on similar generalizations and assumptions. That, not surprisingly, he supports because they reinforce his own biases on the subject. Thus to him, because he is falling victim to such biases, they are the sensible ones in his eyes when it comes to this matter.

That whole quote really only reinforces numerous issues I have with Harris. His critiques stem from different assumptions and when people don't hold his same assumptions constant, he wants to tear people down through whatever means it takes til they give up.
 

Maxim726X

Member
I don't really know who Sam Harris is and what he does, but everytime I hear about him or from him its something stupid.
He is one of the people who through around the term "regressive left" because people on the left don't share his xenophobic views.

I think "pseudo liberal" describes him very well.

'I don't know him, nor have I read anything by him, but he's probably a xenophobe'.

Amazing insight. Any other subjects you would like to share your opinion on without any relevant or necessary information?
 

aeolist

Banned
ok, i think i'm done here. i've made some pretty extensive posts that have been ignored in favor of drive-by nitpicking.

PM me if you really want to discuss anything.
 

Erevador

Member
He beats up a generalization while simultaneously making some of his own and offering up his intellectual allegiance to fascists that have built their views on similar generalizations and assumptions. That, not surprisingly, he supports because they reinforce his own biases on the subject. Thus to him, because he is falling victim to such biases, they are the sensible ones in his eyes when it comes to this matter.

That whole quote really only reinforces numerous issues I have with Harris. His critiques stem from different assumptions and when people don't hold his same assumptions constant, he wants to tear people down through whatever means it takes til they give up.
I can't really respond unless I know what you mean specifically when you refer to generic "biases" and "assumptions."
 

Jonm1010

Banned
ok, i think i'm done here. i've made some pretty extensive posts that have been ignored in favor of drive-by nitpicking.

PM me if you really want to discuss anything.
You have made some great posts. Should be said before you leave. I wish you wouldn't but I understand why. it seems to be a thread of numerous posters trying to attack the low hanging fruit. Which in and of itself is an indication of intellectual dishonesty. And you shouldn't be stuck having to argue with that crap.
 

thelatestmodel

Junior, please.
No he doesn't. He doesn't want to have a debate. He wants people to blame Islam, just like he does. A debate would imply that he would be willing to change his position if provided with sufficient evidence against his position, but thats not the case with Harris.
He made out Islam as the root cause of a very complex problem, with that position he is very alone in the academic world, which is probably why he took this BS to the internet.

He is basically hiding a borderline fascist, arrogant ideology behind a pseudoscientific and pseudorational spiel.

People like him give atheism and science a bad name.

I'm sorry but this is just absolutely not true. His entire platform is based on wanting to have fair and balanced debate. He's an academic, he doesn't give a shit what the truth is as long as that's what gets promoted.

He does point the finger at Islam quite a bit, but only because it is, actually, the most aggressive, repressive and problematic religion in the world today and needs to have questions asked of it. That's the whole problem, he just wants to ask the questions and have the discussion but no-one can even question it without being labelled a bigot. A lot of religious people are seemingly incapable of discussing the facts.

He is not alone in the academic world. Lots of people support his position. He's one of the most level-headed thinkers out there and we need more people like him.
 
Tooo <cough> much -keughr- stra-awaw! <thud>

Saying "not all muslims" doesn't make his statements any less xenophobic, stupid or arrogant.


Oh, I'm sorry. You're obviously more educated on Islam than a former radical Islamist who runs a counter-extremist think tank. We should all just listen to you instead.
There are countless of academics with way more impressive vitae who strongly disagree with Nawaz' simplistic views on islam and extremism.

You don't see academics discussing the issues in the middle east and around the world like these guys do, because thats a criminally simplistic and subsequently wrong way of looking at it all.


Come on, quote in context.


That's Harris in 2006 accurately predicting the rise of Trump and the far right in Europe, and saying it doesn't bode well for civilization. He's issuing a cautionary statement to his own tribe (liberals) about their blindspots.

EDIT: Brilliant minds think alike, Henkka. &#8595;

Thats really not a hard prediction to make. Everytime there are actual or perceived problems in europe the far right rises. Its like a reflex.

The context doesn't make this quote any less problematic.
First of all, saying the far right in europe is "sensible" in any way is ridiculous.
The far right in europe uses the dullest xenophobic narratives you can imagine.
I don't know what in the world he is refering to, but there is nothing where it would fit.

The far right didn't address any actual issue. They just fearmongered and are now reaping the rewards.

What he said there was wrong and xenophobic. There was no nuance, no reason, none of all the things he always talks about.
 

Audioboxer

Member
'I don't know him, nor have I read anything by him, but he's probably a xenophobe'.

Amazing insight. Any other subjects you would like to share your opinion on without any relevant or necessary information?

Sadly this is how many are spoon fed in our fantastic information digital age (no sarcasm there, we do genuinely live in a great information age). Instead of getting off your own backside and doing some research via websites or YouTube it is much easier to simply believe everything you're told by your friends, family or favourite commentators.

Sure we do not all have enough time to research everything, and have to regularly trust educated individuals, but when it comes to fairly large public intellectuals being painted as something sinister go and fact check your sources. It's what led to Ben Affleck throwing a tizzy on Bill Maher. I fully believe someone backstage or in the lead up to the meeting fed him some ammunition on someone he may have heard of, but didn't really know, and he went in gun cocked and embarrassed himself with the racism card.

Genuinely grave and serious words such as bigot and racist are just thrown around like candy these days, and said candy is gobbled up by masses not interested in doing intellectual research, but holding witch hunts to hide from serious debates on things that can be hard to hear. The sad thing is if the challenging debates get drowned out by petty squabbles and victomology it usually hurts our chances at globabl reform to try and make our race better at coexisting. Cause in many parts of the world we are quite shit at it, putting women, homosexuals and other minorities at risk of death every day. That's how it is, don't like hearing it, then let those who want reform try to make a difference without you butting in with unfounded claims against individuals you simply don't like.
 
You don't see academics discussing the issues in the middle east and around the world like these guys do, because thats a criminally simplistic and subsequently wrong way of looking at it all.


It wouldnt have much to do with criticism of Islam being a punishable offense in many parts of the middle east, would it?
 
I'm sorry but this is just absolutely not true. His entire platform is based on wanting to have fair and balanced debate. He's an academic, he doesn't give a shit what the truth is as long as that's what gets promoted.
He is a neuroscientist. What does that matter in a discussion about anthropology, religion and politics?

He does point the finger at Islam quite a bit, but only because it is, actually, the most aggressive, repressive and problematic religion in the world today and needs to have questions asked of it.
Its the predominant religion in one of the the most aggressive, repressive and problematic regions in the world. Correlation &#8800; Causation. He is making a very simple mistake, which is why he isn't taken seriously by people who are actual experts on the topics.

That's the whole problem, he just wants to ask the questions and have the discussion but no-one can even question it without being labelled a bigot.
The "Just asking questions"-game...
Thats intellectual dishonesty if I ever seen one.
Its btw what Trump does all the time. That way he defended the birther movement and even a Sandy Hook Truther. He is just asking questions...



A lot of religious people are seemingly incapable of discussing the facts.
I am an atheist and most of the middle east experts I know of aren't muslims either.
The only fact is that he is making a mistake by focussion on Islam as the root cause of the problems in the middle east.


He is not alone in the academic world. Lots of people support his position. He's one of the most level-headed thinkers out there and we need more people like him.
Thats wrong. You show me one middle east scholar who supports overly simplistic views like Harris'.


It wouldnt have much to do with criticism of Islam being a punishable offense in many parts of the middle east, would it?

I'm not talking about middle eastern academics.
 

Erevador

Member
You don't see academics discussing the issues in the middle east and around the world like these guys do, because thats a criminally simplistic and subsequently wrong way of looking at it all.
Well, you're onto something when you use the word "criminal" because in some countries this kind of religious heresy is punished very harshly.

Even in the west, there are real dangers inherent in any sort of vigorous critique of Islam. You could ask Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh about it, but unfortunately he was murdered for making a film that criticized the ways women are abused as a result of Koranic doctrine.
 

Audioboxer

Member
It wouldnt have much to do with criticism of Islam being a punishable offense in many parts of the middle east, would it?

Yeah, of course it has. For anyone interested watch this recent get together with Maajid and Ayaan

https://youtu.be/SV_GMeZ_XmA

Besides sharing similar views, what do they both have in common? Death threats against them and the need for security.

It's a great conversation to watch as well.

Recently on the Rubin Report a girl, Lubna Ahmed, was interviewed from inside Iraq. The video had to be pulled for safety concerns. Her biggest crime? Simply being an athiest talking about issues we have the freedom to in the West.
 

haxamin

Member
Saying "not all muslims" doesn't make his statements any less xenophobic, stupid or arrogant.

Actually it does. Muslims arent one homogeneous group. Its a spectrum:
Ranging from secular muslims that believe their faith to be personal, all the way to violent extremists that seek to impose their faith on others.
And every muslim will fall in many different positions within this spectrum.

It is arrogant to deny that there is a problem with wahabbism. And salafism.

When you have an instance in which an ordinary imam who preaches peace is killed by people linked with ISIS, you know that this is a problem that you cant sweep under the proverbial xenophobic rug.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/651186/anti-terror-police-lead-murder-investigation-Rochdale-imam-Jalal-Uddin-ISIS-material-found
 

Audioboxer

Member
We shouldn't even need to pre-face every single conversation on religion with "but not every insert x". It's pandering to those just sitting in excitement to pull the racism card.

Quite obviously when an intellectual discussion happens on illiberal practices, violence, abuse or anything troublesome those that it is being aimed at are those carrying out the atrocities. You're not in the firing line for throwing gays off rooftops if you aren't throwing gays off rooftops, so why the need for the "but not every" disclaimer.

I understand why it's always said though, the minefield of idiots you have to face with said disclaimer is only 10x worse if you don't throw it in there. Thing is though saying it or not saying it still doesn't stop you from being a racist merely for criticising bad ideas within doctrine.
 

Jonm1010

Banned
It wouldnt have much to do with criticism of Islam being a punishable offense in many parts of the middle east, would it?
No, it has to do with the silliness of trying to simplify a complex and layered issue like the Middle East, Terrorism and Immigration down to one causation. A causation many academics rightfully disagree on its level of Importance when weighed against other likely causations.

I agree wth Harris when he says the Koran is objectively the most problematic widely followed religious text, it's where he takes that conclusion and how he applies it that I often find problems with him and his arguments.
 

Erevador

Member
We shouldn't even need to pre-face every single conversation on religion with "but not every insert x". It's pandering to those just sitting in excitement to pull the racism card.

Quite obviously when an intellectual discussion happens on illiberal practices, violence, abuse or anything troublesome those that it is being aimed at are those carrying out the atrocities. You're not in the firing line for throwing gays off rooftops if you aren't throwing gays off rooftops, so why the need for the "but not every" disclaimer.

I understand why it's always said though, the minefield of idiots you have to face with said disclaimer is only 10x worse if you don't throw it in there.
Faisal Saeed Al Mutar talked about this quite intelligently. He mentioned talking about certain issues within Muslim communities and being told he was generalizing Muslims. He then rattled off a number of precise numbers from polls and studies, about exactly how many believe people certain things. But again, he was told he was generalizing Muslims. People simply weren't listening.

If quoting exact numbers gets you accused of "generalizing" then there is simply no way to avoid the charge if you venture anywhere near the topic.
 
Actually it does. Muslims arent one homogeneous group. Its a spectrum:
Ranging from secular muslims that believe their faith to be personal, all the way to violent extremists that seek to impose their faith on others.
And every muslim will fall in many different positions within this spectrum.

Yeah, thats the case for basically any group. But you don't see people insulting billions of people(thats exactly what he does when says "Islam is the motherload of bad ideas") based on the actions of a tiny fraction of a group.
You don't see people saying christianity is the motherload of bad ideas because of pedophile priests, the KKK or the anti abortion extremists.

What Sam Harris does is comparable to the people who campaigned against video games back in the day claiming they would cause violence. The falsely assumed causation and generally judged a diverse group.

It is arrogant to deny that there is a problem with wahabbism. And salafism.
Its stupid to assume Islam is the root cause of extremism like that. Take Islam away and the people in these socio economic circumstances would find other ways to justify their violence and extremism.

When you have an instance in which an ordinary imam who preaches peace is killed by people linked with ISIS, you know that this is a problem that you cant sweep under the proverbial xenophobic rug.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/651186/anti-terror-police-lead-murder-investigation-Rochdale-imam-Jalal-Uddin-ISIS-material-found
So extremists killing muslims shows how Islam is the problem?
 

Audioboxer

Member
Yeah, thats the case for basically any group. But you don't see people insulting billions of people(thats exactly what he does when says "Islam is the motherload of bad ideas") based on the actions of a tiny fraction of a group.
You don't see people saying christianity is the motherload of bad ideas because of pedophile priests, the KKK or the anti abortion extremists.

What Sam Harris does is comparable to the people who campaigned against video games back in the day claiming they would cause violence. The falsely assumed causation and generally judged a diverse group.


Its stupid to assume Islam is the root cause of extremism like that. Take Islam away and the people in these socio economic circumstances would find other ways to justify their violence and extremism.


So extremists killing muslims shows how Islam is the problem?

The problem for your opening remarks is the statistics and polls do not paint illiberal practices or beliefs as definitely minorities in Islam. More so in the Eastern world, thankfully a lot of the troublesome behaviour is simply stamped out by Western governments being prochoice, free speech, freedom of religion and in favour of gay marriage.

Christianity and Catholicism have largely gone through reform, and extremists in said groups have been getting marginalised. However Christianity in America is still widely criticised so don't play that down. Many of Harris' videos on religion, and books, are aimed right down the scope at Christianity.

The criticism of Islam is simply the headliner however as we are at a stage where it's hard to retain the ability to freely critique it in the West as easily as it is to critique Christianity and Catholicism without blowback. I hardly see anyone criticising Christianity as being called a racist. It's almost exclusively and incorrectly may I add reserved for critique on Islam. Incorrectly as Islam isn't even a race... Probably why it doesn't fly calling out Christianity as racist.
 

haxamin

Member
Yeah, thats the case for basically any group. But you don't see people insulting billions of people(thats exactly what he does when says "Islam is the motherload of bad ideas") based on the actions of a tiny fraction of a group.
You don't see people saying christianity is the motherload of bad ideas because of pedophile priests, the KKK or the anti abortion extremists. Damn thats one heck of a false equivalence

What Sam Harris does is comparable to the people who campaigned against video games back in the day claiming they would cause violence. The falsely assumed causation and generally judged a diverse group.Holy shit another one


Its stupid to assume Islam is the root cause of extremism like that. Take Islam away and the people in these socio economic circumstances would find other ways to justify their violence and extremism. 13 year old girls will flee to syria because of uhh...

Honestly this is a terrible argument.

So extremists killing muslims shows how Islam is the problem? I was pointing out how ignoring the issue is escalating the scenario further.
.
 

nynt9

Member
He is a neuroscientist. What does that matter in a discussion about anthropology, religion and politics?

His BA is on philosophy. That's relevant. His PhD is on neuroscience, and his work was on how belief affects the human mind. He is absolutely qualified to speak about matters of faith.
 

injurai

Banned
Come on, quote in context.


That's Harris in 2006 accurately predicting the rise of Trump and the far right in Europe, and saying it doesn't bode well for civilization. He's issuing a cautionary statement to his own tribe (liberals) about their blindspots.

EDIT: Brilliant minds think alike, Henkka. &#8595;

I feel like that quote should be in context:



It makes no sense at all to paint him as a fascist. He is a liberal, who often disagrees with other liberals when it comes to Islam.

As already said, he's voting for Hillary. If I recall from his podcast, he said he's doing so because he thinks it's the best way to avoid a Trump or Cruz presidency, which he called a terrifying prospect or something to that effect. He doesn't think America will elect a socialist atheist, so Hillary is the next best option.

Great posts.

1. Attack Harris with lies and misrepresentation
2. People respond with corrections.
3. "Harris fanboys are a creepy cult! Why are they so concerned about misrepresentation? Where there's smoke there's fire!"

Glenn Greenwald would be proud.

Yup, it's like clockwork.
 

Morrigan Stark

Arrogant Smirk
It's worth noting that he also described Carson as a, quote, "religious idiot." He clearly views Chomsky's world view as actively suicidal in the face of the present global situation. One doesn't have to agree with that, but he's no fan of Carson. Harris is planning to vote (with reservations) for Hillary Clinton, if people want insight into his actual political convictions. He voted for Obama twice.
Sure, that's fair, but I still don't think it was a good statement to make at all. Ben Carson pretty much has no redeeming values, lol.

You don't see people saying christianity is the motherload of bad ideas because of pedophile priests, the KKK or the anti abortion extremists.
Well, actually, I wouldn't be against claiming that Christianity is a motherload of bad ideas, but to be fair, Christianity today isn't comparable to Islam today. Unless you can show similar percentages of Christians who hold the beliefs that homosexuality should be punishable by death compared to Islam (among other anti-liberal beliefs), I don't think you have much of a case.

Plus, of course, Sam Harris has been a vocal critic of Christianity, so the whole "b-b-ut Christians!" argument falls even flatter on its face.

What Sam Harris does is comparable to the people who campaigned against video games back in the day claiming they would cause violence. The falsely assumed causation and generally judged a diverse group.
Not even close.

Its stupid to assume Islam is the root cause of extremism like that.
No, it's really not, and this becomes apparent when you look at Islamic texts, hadiths, and so on.
 
Not really sure what point 1 and 2 achieve. Half of the religious followers around the globe haven't even read their given texts from start to finish. Even reading from start to finish as a religious person doesn't really achieve much, the big problems facing religion is how easy it is for everyone to interpret passages in their own ways and say others within their faith are wrong. Nearly everyone is an expert on what given God states is to simply show a message, and what is literal. Shame said Gods can't be questioned directly, eh?

Absurd. Must we all be able to read Latin to criticize the doctrine and real world impacts of the bible?

1 is irrelevant.

2, yes, he certainly has.

3, he has a BA in philosophy from Stanford and a PhD in cognitive neuroscience from UCLA. He has actually done work examining what brains of believers look like in fMRI. He is the founder of Project Reason, and is on the board of Secular Coalition for America, a humanist advocacy group that lobbies for separation of church and state. He is the author of several award winning books (including NYT bestseller) on science, faith, spirituality and tolerance. He is frequently invited to give talks and participate in debates.

He is pretty qualified. That doesn't make him correct on every issue, but you asked for qualifications specifically.

You must have read every single holy book in existence in order to come to your conclusion of which is true?

...That, however, isn't. Speaking Arabic isn't necessary to refute Islam, come on.

Wasnt this taken out of context as well? I believe he was saying that he would vote for Carson in the specific example of dealing with Islamic extremists.

neogaf.gif

Doesn't disqualify him from conversation. Clearly shows the limits of his knowledge.

Again, his relevant qualifications aren't particularly present. Doesn't make him wrong necessarily, just clearly limited.

"Malala is the best thing to happen to Islam for a thousand years"

I have a BA in Philosophy, his thought experiments are basic to say the least.

I am of course guessing here, I don't actually think he has read the Qur'an.
 

Yamauchi

Banned
Harris is an asshole and Salon is an embarrassing click-bait generator. I can only imagine the utter vacuum of nothingness we could have gotten had we actually gotten this "debate," be it as a conversation or as the line-by-line takedown.
Indeed. Even though I agree with Harris on certain points, I greatly dislike him as a human being. On the other hand, I have no respect for Salon as an organization.

The best way to deal with Harris is the way Chomsky did. Until Harris can defend his support for state terrorism, he has not earned his right to attention.
 

Foffy

Banned
In his latest podcast with Jonathan Haidt, Sam explains and releases audio of the buried discussion with Omar. Listening to it now.

https://soundcloud.com/samharrisorg

Blegh. If Omar was much like he was in the second clip, I think I'd actually get mad listening to words from my speaker.

He got incredibly salty incredibly quick while Sam talked about publishing short books, and didn't even let him finish before spiking in his anger. For someone at Yale Law School, I am astonished he has such weak skin. He almost came off, for lack of a better example, as the archetype of tumblr that gets triggered at little nothings: mad at words but not their intention, context, pointing, or meaning.
 
Blegh. If Omar was much like he was in the second clip, I think I'd actually get mad listening to words from my speaker.

He got incredibly salty incredibly quick while Sam talked about publishing short books, and didn't even let him finish before spiking in his anger. For someone at Yale Law School, I am astonished he has such weak skin. He almost came off, for lack of a better example, as the archetype of tumblr that gets triggered at little nothings: mad at words but not their intention, context, pointing, or meaning.

Didn't Harris say they spent an hour talking about this point?

And you say he got salty very quickly?
 

Shai-Tan

Banned
Apparently they had talked in circles about that for an hours, however I don't see why Sam can't release it somewhere anyway. I'd listen to it.
 

Foffy

Banned
Didn't Harris say they spent an hour talking about this point?

And you say he got salty very quickly?

If you listen to the clip, he cuts off Harris immediately when he says "let me educate you on-" regarding book publishing, which Omar even stated he knows nothing about. He took offense to that phrase.

Cutting someone off mid-sentence over that is getting salty very quickly, because you can hear in his tone how hostile he became just at those words, as if they were to denounce his intelligence and make him a primate.
 

thelatestmodel

Junior, please.
Yeah, thats the case for basically any group. But you don't see people insulting billions of people(thats exactly what he does when says "Islam is the motherload of bad ideas") based on the actions of a tiny fraction of a group.
You don't see people saying christianity is the motherload of bad ideas because of pedophile priests, the KKK or the anti abortion extremists.

What Sam Harris does is comparable to the people who campaigned against video games back in the day claiming they would cause violence. The falsely assumed causation and generally judged a diverse group.


Its stupid to assume Islam is the root cause of extremism like that. Take Islam away and the people in these socio economic circumstances would find other ways to justify their violence and extremism.


So extremists killing muslims shows how Islam is the problem?

You are a very confused individual.
 

Erevador

Member
It is incredibly ironic that someone from Salon is upset that Harris hasn't released the whole interview, when they themselves did an interview with him and cut out the parts in which he criticized their site specifically. They even lied about it on the top of the page, claiming his remarks were only edited for "clarity and length."

The Salon Interview - samharris.com
 

ElFly

Member
There is clear, blatant intellectual dishonesty from the Harris supporters here.

You guys cannot say with a straight face that Harris would never condone torture, when the very first fucking google result of "sam harris torture" is an article called "in defense of torture" by sam fucking harris.

But of course it is probably out of context or something.
 
If you listen to the clip, he cuts off Harris immediately when he says "let me educate you on-" regarding book publishing, which Omar even stated he knows nothing about. He took offense to that phrase.

Cutting someone off mid-sentence over that is getting salty very quickly, because you can hear in his tone how hostile he became just at those words, as if they were to denounce his intelligence and make him a primate.

Might not have been the first time he used it then?

Would be nice to have the podcast to listen to to find out what happened.

Edit: standard Harris "thought experiment" - pick hot topic, say its disgusting and it shouldn't be used.

Then say, it should be allowed in certain situations.


He ties himself in knots when it comes to intention as well. The Chomsky emails were embarrassing for him to say the least, when he was trying to weigh one atrocity against another.
Appeal to Stanford encyclopaedia on philosophy then claim he was misquoted.

Ignore empirical evidence for thought experiment proving inefficacy of experiment.

Rinse and repeat.

Final edit: the reason why I find his so particularly woeful is that he doesn't actually think his thought experiments through, profiling being a good example.

People fall over themselves to say well hed be a target himself but neglect to figure out that the wider use of profiling, would they be comfortable in other circumstances?
 
The problem for your opening remarks is the statistics and polls do not paint illiberal practices or beliefs as definitely minorities in Islam.
Because there are always more people just following along without actually taking action.
How many people are actually trying to kill abortion doctors? Maybe a dozen.
How many people would generally agree with such measures? Thousands, tens of thousands.



More so in the Eastern world, thankfully a lot of the troublesome behaviour is simply stamped out by Western governments being prochoice, free speech, freedom of religion and in favour of gay marriage.
Does that say anything about Islam? A similar socio economic environment with a predominant christian/atheist/hindu/whatever population would react in exactly the same way.


Christianity and Catholicism have largely gone through reform, and extremists in said groups have been getting marginalised. However Christianity in America is still widely criticised so don't play that down. Many of Harris' videos on religion, and books, are aimed right down the scope at Christianity.
And that cristicism is just as misguided. He is mistaking religion for bigotry, which initself, is bigotry. Thats the reason why I, as an atheist, hate the new atheist movement. They're hiding their bigotry behind science and reason or even worse, they're trying to abuse science as a tool to justify their bigotry.


The criticism of Islam is simply the headliner however as we are at a stage where it's hard to retain the ability to freely critique it in the West as easily as it is to critique Christianity and Catholicism.
Oh come one. You will be called out if you publicly say something ignorant. Don't spin it like that is somehow an infringement on you're free speech or freedom.
Harris can say whatevr he wants, but if its something stupid he has to live with the consequences of saying something stupid while pretending to be smart and reasonable.



You know, you have to actually argue in a discussion. You can't just shrug counter arguments off without justifying it.
Tell me why Harris' views aren't generalisations based on the false assumption of causation between Islam and extremism.
Pro Tip: Him saying he isn't generalizing isn't proof that he isn't generalizing.


His BA is on philosophy. That's relevant. His PhD is on neuroscience, and his work was on how belief affects the human mind. He is absolutely qualified to speak about matters of faith.
I don't see why philosophy would be relevant here. The only philosophical question we face is whether or not the West should throw its own core values under the bus in order to be able to act out its xenophobia. And thats not a hard one.

His work says nothing about a connection between religious teachings and a formation of a particularly violent society.
In fact, history has show that similar societies fromed all over the world under all kinds of religions and even during absence of religion. One obvious thing we see is that advanced technology allows for advanced violence. People can fly planes into building or kill hundreds with guns or bombs now. Is killing hundreds with a bomb more violent than killing 5 with a sword? No, the motivation is the same, but advanced means allow for more efficient violence.

Well, actually, I wouldn't be against claiming that Christianity is a motherload of bad ideas
I'm sure he isn't either. Thatswhy I said his views are borderline fascist.

Unless you can show similar percentages of Christians who hold the beliefs that homosexuality should be punishable by death compared to Islam
Take christians and muslims from similar socio economic backgrounds and you'll get the same percentages.

Comparing groups from different socio economic backgrounds just shows you that there are differences between groups of different socio econimic backgrounds, duh. You'd also find that westerners are generally better at math than Iraqis, does that mean Islam has a negative effects on peoples math abilities, while christianity doesn't because it went through enlightenment 300 years ago?
 

thelatestmodel

Junior, please.
There is clear, blatant intellectual dishonesty from the Harris supporters here.

You guys cannot say with a straight face that Harris would never condone torture, when the very first fucking google result of "sam harris torture" is an article called "in defense of torture" by sam fucking harris.

But of course it is probably out of context or something.

Yeah, it is. "In Defence of Torture" is a thought experiment. Sometimes philosophers do this. We did it all the time in undergrad. "What is less evil, X or Y". Basic ethics.

Some people apparently can't handle this and equate it to him actually supporting torture.

I can with an absolutely straight face say that Sam Harris does not condone torture, because he says it right in the fucking article:

I hope my case for torture is wrong, as I would be much happier standing side by side with all the good people who oppose torture categorically. I invite any reader who discovers a problem with my argument to point it out to me in the comment section of this blog. I would be sincerely grateful to have my mind changed on this subject.
 

injurai

Banned
There is clear, blatant intellectual dishonesty from the Harris supporters here.

You guys cannot say with a straight face that Harris would never condone torture, when the very first fucking google result of "sam harris torture" is an article called "in defense of torture" by sam fucking harris.

But of course it is probably out of context or something.

Heh, this again.
 
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