Can we invite Bill Maher to TAM III??

I'm not sure. I don't see the reason to invite somebody famous, just because he/she has strong opinions against religion.

I've said it before, I would much prefer it, if TAM/JREF would concentrate on testable claims. There are plenty to pick from.
 
I feel the same way. Let the Secular Humanists do their thing and organizatins like JREF and NYASk can concentrate on claims supposedly based on evidence, not faith.
The doesn't mean that I don't support efforts to loosen the stranglehold that religion, especially fundie +ianity has been increasing on our necks here in Bushland.
Or other religions, elsewhere.
 
ALthough I didn't go to TAM 1 or 2, I would like to cast my vote for "no," because Bill Maher is the suckiest, waffliest, cryptopseudoatheist of all time. He's a theist when it suits him, and he's not when it doesn't.

Check out http://www.celebatheists.com/index.html. No mentions of Mr. Maher, and for good reason.

Edited for spelling.
 
I find Bill Maher to be entertaining, and often better informed than other celebrities. Bill is not a fan of organized religion (as he has often said on his HBO show), but that does not really make him a skeptic.

For one thing, he has taken the position (sometimes with a twinge of humor) that he doesn't believe anything "the government" says. Well, it's a swell idea not to take any official pronouncements at face value, but it's a pretty stupid idea to dismiss every official pronouncement out of hand. Government spokespeople sometimes lie, and sometimes they tell the truth. A good skeptic applies his brain to determine which scenario is most likely.

For example, "the government" says aliens did not crash at Roswell in 1947. Would a skeptic adopt one of the fantastical Roswell scenarios merely because "the government" has denied them?

More to the point, Maher has said that he doesn't buy the official government position that a single gunman killed JFK. Why? Because "the government" says it was a single gunman. This is hardly a skeptical point of view.
 
I really do not know much about Bill Maher perhaps he would be great at TAM III but I still do not think that atheism and scepticism is the same thing. I am with CFLarsen, Jeff Corey, Michael Redman, and Brown on this one; unless there are some other qualities to Mr Maher than his dislike of religion.
 
Brown said:
For one thing, he has taken the position (sometimes with a twinge of humor) that he doesn't believe anything "the government" says. Well, it's a swell idea not to take any official pronouncements at face value, but it's a pretty stupid idea to dismiss every official pronouncement out of hand. Government spokespeople sometimes lie, and sometimes they tell the truth. A good skeptic applies his brain to determine which scenario is most likely.

For example, "the government" says aliens did not crash at Roswell in 1947. Would a skeptic adopt one of the fantastical Roswell scenarios merely because "the government" has denied them?

More to the point, Maher has said that he doesn't buy the official government position that a single gunman killed JFK. Why? Because "the government" says it was a single gunman. This is hardly a skeptical point of view.
Click to expand...

He sounds pretty skeptical to me!

Your example about aliens... are you saying that Bill Maher has adopted a Roswell fantasy?
 
tamiO said:
He sounds pretty skeptical to me!

Your example about aliens... are you saying that Bill Maher has adopted a Roswell fantasy?
Click to expand...
No. I'm saying that Bill Maher has publicly taken the position that government pronouncements are wrong. But in fact, some government pronouncements are correct. It is possible that Maher's actual position is that government pronouncements should be presumed to be wrong, which I would consider to be a skeptical postion. In other words, Maher's actual position might be closer to "I won't accept something merely because the government tells me it's true, but I may accept the government's position after I evaluate the matter myself." But Maher has not clearly taken this position, in my judgment.

I'm wondering if the interview with Maher may have been a rerun. From CNN transcripts, December 17, 2003:
Talk about religion and how stupid it is -- it [same-sex marriage] would not be an issue except for the Bible, except for religion. That's what is so bad about religion. It stops thinking. It makes people not exercise common sense. Common sense tells you that two gay people are not being gay, why, just to tick off Jesus? Why are they doing it? Why would a young teenage boy become gay, so he gets beat up more? There's no reason for someone to fake it. People are gay. It's in nature.

This idea that we have to punish people or somehow proscribe homosexuality only comes from religion. There's nothing else that could convince people that is so anti-logical. So I'm for it.

...

I think religion is bad and drugs are good.
Click to expand...
Later, in response to a caller, came the following:
CALLER: And I agree with you on so many issues, but I have a question. I'd like to know what's happened in your life to make you so bitter against God and religion. I mean, do you -- you sound like you just hate religion and faith and...

MAHER: Right. And I'll tell you, one thing that you should always be aware of is lumping those two things that you mentioned in together. You said I'm bitter about God and religion. I'm not bitter about God. I believe in God. I just don't believe in the bureaucracy that people think they need to get through to him.

Why do you think you need religion to talk to God? Why do you think that someone who is no smarter than you are, because I promise you, we all have the same brain in our head -- how come that somebody knows what happens when you die and you don't? You believe them? Why? Because they got a pointy hat on?

I mean, I just don't understand why people think that they need to go to another person to get to God. God doesn't need an agent. You know? That's what a priest is. He's an agent. And, obviously, the opportunity...

KING: So when you say you believe in God, you believe what? That there is a creator? That there is a being?

MAHER: Absolutely. But I don't know what it is. What I do know is that I will not know as long as I'm alive on Earth. That's the deal. While we're here on Earth...

KING: We don't know?

MAHER: We're not going to find out. And anybody who tells you different is lying. They don't know either.

One thing I know heaven won't be. It won't be the way people perceive it here, religiously, like it's just kind of a better version of Earth, you know, where everything is air conditioned and you're with the people you liked all the time and you don't have any hunger or your favorite food is there. You know what? If that's what heaven is, I'm going to be so disappointed.

KING: So I gather then you're not in league with these people who communicate with the dead.

MAHER: That's different, though. That's not necessarily religion. I believe that there might -- yes. I believe that when you die, you pass on to another world, another form. I don't know what that form is. But I don't dismiss that. You mean like John Edward?

KING: Yeah.

MAHER: I don't dismiss that.
Click to expand...
 
Brown said:


I'm wondering if the interview with Maher may have been a rerun. From CNN transcripts, December 17, 2003:Later, in response to a caller, came the following:
Click to expand...

I hate to sound like a Bill Maher apologist, but he seems to be in the process of examining his own beliefs. He didn't sound like a believer in John Edward. I think he is on the fence and needs to read some skeptical opinions on John Edward and his like. :)
 
I get the impression that Maher is not concerned so much with examining things skeptically (beliefs included) as he is with stirring things up as a fringe Libertarian. And a lot of the time he comes off as a contrarian with little substance behind his ideas. His view on religion is a good example. He is anti-religious because he hates organized religion, not because he has looked deeply into its foundations and found nothing that warrants its existence in the first place.

I do like his show. It's very entertaining, and he seems like a very bright person, but I don't know that he would fit the bill, so to speak, as a skeptic.

BTW, didn't he win Randi's Pigasus award a few years ago for believing in ghosts?
 
I agree with tamiO in that Maher did not claim to be a believer in folks like Edward. He just said he wouldn't dismiss the possibility of communication with the dead. Many great skeptics say the same thing, holding that communication with the dead is possible. Skeptics usually temper their remarks, however, by saying that there is little or no evidence that this phenomenon is genuine, or that the "phenomenon" could have non-supernatural explanations.
 
Brown said:
I agree with tamiO in that Maher did not claim to be a believer in folks like Edward. He just said he wouldn't dismiss the possibility of communication with the dead. Many great skeptics say the same thing, holding that communication with the dead is possible. Skeptics usually temper their remarks, however, by saying that there is little or no evidence that this phenomenon is genuine, or that the "phenomenon" could have non-supernatural explanations.
Click to expand...

He was on Larry King Live. John Edward and Sylvia are big draws for Mr. King and the network. He may have felt awkward in replying. I do wish he spoke with more conviction. He has his moments, though.

What an opportunity wasted... to be asked that question by Larry King himself. We must get to this Bill Maher and teach him how to reply next time. :D
 
Maher's interesting, funny, unconventional, and skeptical about many things....but not about the military.

What was with that "Clark and Kerry are "entitled" to be the candidate because they've served in the military" stuff? :confused: I've never heard military service mentioned as a prerequisite to the Presidency by -anyone- before. He seemed very caught up in it.
 
I like Maher a lot but I wouldn't say he's a particularly good skeptic and I doubt he could teach us much. In addition he had James van Praagh on his old show (introduced him as a "psychic"), and that alone should rule him out.
 
He wasn't going off about whether there is a god or not, he was going off on the stupidity of religion. Did a nice bit about how much better the world could be if we channeled all the energy that goes into religion into something useful. Gave the example of the thousands of muslims who walk hundreds of miles to Mecca, then when they get there they walk in circles around a black rock. It's just stupid. What if we redirected all that energy into something productive.

Personally, I think he would be a great speaker.
 
exarch said:
Is there a specific reason for the use of purple, red, green and yellow, or is that just aesthetic?
Click to expand...

I have no idea. You could ask the designer:

ORIGINAL TEXT & WEB DESIGN
COPYRIGHT © 1995..2001
Reed Esau
r e e d *a t* infidels ! organization

(He had his email as an image and I didn't want to ruin his efforts.)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom