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blasphemy

The blasphemy debate debacle

Posted April 29, 2009 by Jacques Rousseau

The debate on free-speech, blasphemy and the Sax Appeal controversy, scheduled for April 29th between Tauriq Moosa, Jacques Rousseau and Peter Hammond has been cancelled.

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Some loony rambling

Blasphemy debate (update)

Posted April 22, 2009 by Jacques Rousseau

“this is not vengeance”, so I’ll focus on the problems associated with burying one’s head in the sand more generally, rather than picking on poor Pastor Michael.

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Blasphemy debate

Posted April 21, 2009 by Jacques Rousseau

Tauriq Moosa and I will be representing the UCT Atheist and Agnostic Society in a public debate with the Campus Crusade for Christ.

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Dennett in South Africa

Posted March 30, 2009 by Jacques Rousseau

I’d urge anyone who is/can be in Cape Town (31 March) or Stellenbosch (1 April) to attend these lectures by Daniel Dennett. I went to Durban last week to hear his talk on Religion as a natural phenomenon, and will certainly be attending both lectures in the Cape – he’s a wonderful speaker, and as any of you who have read his books know, also a thinker well-worth paying serious attention to.

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Supernaturalism and threats to reason

Posted March 21, 2009 by Jacques Rousseau

Supernaturalism and religion create a climate of unreason, where we are allowed to hold unchallenged beliefs that may not prove advantageous to our survival or flourishing. It does so by allowing individuals to believe propositions that are not supported by evidence, or ones that are supported only by “evidence” provided by theoretical paradigms that are themselves supernaturalistic.

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