Hi Oliver,

I must say that I agree with your observations about the inhumane practices of monotheism. To me it is very clear that monotheism acerbates problems and escalates conflict wherever it resides.

However, these facts are difficult to prove. For example, show Irfan an example of Islamic cruelty and he will then cite a supposedly worse example caused by Christianity/Non-theists. After that he will then say that 'real' Islam is not cruel and those Muslims aren’t following Islam 'properly'.

No, the reason that scientists like myself promote Evolution by Natural Selection is because it's a Truth with a capital 'T'. The story of human evolution as described by science surpasses all of the infantile stories found in the Bible or the Koran.

It is now blindingly obvious to anyone with an intelligent open mind that the claims made by the Bible or Koran cannot be true. That is, the Bible and Koran are useful in that they are a nice collection of fables, but that is all they are, a collection of fables. No sane person can possibly believe that angels really exist or that Virgins really get pregnant. Don't get me wrong, I love the stories of the Bible and Koran, but they are just not factually true.

This is why the story of the human race as told by science is light years in advance of the drivel found in the monotheistic texts - it is factual and Truthful. And this innate certainty is emotionally satisfying.

So here is the core metaphysical message and the only one that really matters;

Monotheism = untruth

Science = Truths

To StevenMeyer,

What us liberal ecumenical thinkers have been trying to get across for too long now, is that it was Islam which got us out of the Christian Dark Ages. Trouble is most wooden-headed modern Christians, especially the Dubya Bush backing Endtimes Christian Americans, as well as our local Pentocostals, will not hear a bar of it.

There is an excellent Humanities study manual, called the Rise of the West, and in it you will find that it was the merging of Socratic Reasoning with a dark dogmatic early Christian faith in the Late Middle Ages that opened the historical door to the so-called democratic enlightenment we Westerners now live under.

The key to the liberal Christian belief can be found in a thesis written by St Thomas Aquinas, who was influenced by a smaller thesis called The Search for Enquiry, written by a very liberal French monk called Peter Abelard, who like the earlier monkish Knight Templars had sought to learn from their so-called enemies, the Muslims, by mixing with them.

Rather sadly, however, what eventuated was that us Teutonic or Germanic barbarians whom had already accepted Christianity, through gladly accepting the faith/reason doctrine from the more educated Middle East Muslims, rapidly progressed to the point that it deeply disturbed the Islamic Mullahs to the point that they have gradually done away with softening Islamism with Socratic Reasoning and sank into a similar fundamental Dark Ages as the earlier Christians had

Cheers, George C, WA

My mind was once set against God - doesn’t do much for one’s thinking - muddles and confuses. The author has convinced me of that.

So muddled that the old Galileo canard science=heresy is the opening gambit. http://www.catholic.com/library/galileo_controversy.asp

So muddled that the author fails to mention where he thinks natural selection comes from, and if he is a cosmological Darwinist how this invisible hand came to be in the first place – or how it can select when there is originally nothing to select from.

Muddled about whether he agrees with the Roman Emperor’s religious toleration in his 313 edict or whether he would have preferred continued Diocletian like persecution. And what ‘bureaucracy’ existed in this climate during Christianity’s first three centuries.

Muddled such that Dan Brown is taken as an authority when he claims scripture was augmented, a brief course in textual science might help here.

Muddled as to what constitutes dogma ex-cathedra and what is theologically provisional as part of the teaching duties of the Catholic Church. And what dogma is per se. Or whether materialism/physicalism/scientism are to him dogmas? Perhaps the leader of the human genome project and Christian, Francis Collins can help.

Muddled as to the true state of the science in therapeutic cloning http://www.firstthings.com/article.php3?id_article=5420&var_recherche=condic+cloning and who is the know-nothing.

Muddled when speaking as a theologian about God’s judgment of a kind of book burning of theological texts.

Muddled about what his “straight forward scientific research” is. Does the author believe Mengele’s qualifies? (He thought ethics debates were silly blips in his relentless progress . . . toward the abyss.)

How does it serve Australia to allow mental burps on a site that venerates reasoned public debate?

Grief is my dominant emotion, for I was once where the author is, finding it much easier to make stuff up about God or ignore him than purify my heart and pursue him; preferring “mind control” by silly ideas formulated by silly men in opposition to Jesus (that most despised Nazarene) to intellectual honesty.

Is it my perception, or is modern public debate wallowing in fundamentalism more than it has previously?

Accepting the proven reality of evolution in no way denies the existence of god, which is the contention of theists and atheists. It simply disproves manipulative church dogma.

The debate should be about how, why, and where god exists, and how we relate to it, rather than fighting tooth and nail over petty egotistical differences.

So the writers solution to religion?...'I advise that there is only one way forward. The books should go into the bin' Wonderful...Censorship and banning have never worked and cannot work...why is your sulution so palinly stupid?.,..where do the sciencenazi's get off? extermination of all people of faith?

'Accepting the proven reality of evolution in no way denies the existence of god...'

Yes and no.

Evolution by natural selection devastates the existence of the personal monotheistic god. Dan Dennett makes this clear in 'Darwin's Dangerous Idea'. It's a fabulous book and I thoroughly recommend it.

Evolution does allow for the impersonal god of Einstein or the Eastern religions. This type of god is strictly hands-off and does not meddle with nature.