Even zombie Hitchens is more eloquent than most people

Hitchens.

Watch the debate on Catholicism with Hitchens and Fry on one side and a bishop and an idiot politicians on the other. The pro-catholic side are so unbelievably outclassed it's not even a contest.

To everyone else... Gay Byrne deserves a lot of credit.

He was host of the Late Late Show in Ireland for decades and during that time he presided over some incredibly contentious debates on a number of issues in Irish society (contraception, homosexuality, divorce, abortion, child abuse, the north, political corruption, etc.). Looking back it was a slightly bizarre mix of Letterman, Bill Maher and Questions and Answers on the BBC. Despite the fact that Byrne himself would be a reasonably mainstream guy, he IMO hosted the debates fairly (and frankly, considerably better than most modern debate shows).

The platypus was the joke part. (I think you got that);-)
Please...first that's not proving a negative. That's about understanding the definition of a word....and second it is wrong...divorced men without children (but that had been married) are bachelors, married men with a bachelor's degree are bachelors, young married knights that follow another's banner are bachelors, as are married landless knights. D'OH! ;-)
I don't have to prove the universe isn't designed, nor do I say anything that definitive. (because one could say that the laws of physics are a form of design, so in that sense I do think the universe is 'designed', but not by a 'designer god'). If you feel the need for others like me to believe as you, it's up to you to prove it IS designed, and by who.
I do say there's no need for a 'designer', and it seems incredibly unlikely as well as completely unnecessary. I will also say all I've heard about 'god' only references stories told by men long ago (or anecdote), and trying to 'prove' some of those stories is not proving god. I can't say what might prove god...if he existed omnisciently he might know, but he's keeping quiet about it! ;-)
I also say incredible claims require incredible evidence, not anecdotal 'evidence'...conversely 'that which can be asserted without evidence can be discarded without evidence.' (Hitchens)

this was a great discussion.
i was never a huge fan of sam harris as being a solid representative of an atheist viewpoint until a fellow sifter pointed some great essays by harris (waves to qwiz).my narrow opinion was mainly due to only watching short clips of harris,which is pretty unfair to harris and not indicative of his approach.

so i have gained a modicum of respect for harris in his ability to be reasoned in certain instances,though i may still disagree with many of his conclusions,for a multitude of reasons.

that being said i had two problems with this interview:
1.the first 5 minutes was harris whining and crying.that was total turn off.
2.at approx the 2hr mark he makes the argument that islam needs to experience a reformation,great argument and one i agree with,but in the VERY next sentence out of his mouth he criticizes reza aslan as not suggesting that islam is desperately in need of a reformation.

this is an out and out,bold face lie;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_god_but_God:_The_Origins,_Evolution,_and_Future_of_Islam

the entire book is an argument for reformation of islam!!

props to cenk for calling harris out on his draconian imaginary policies (if he were in charge).the arrogance of harris needs to be challenged at ever step and cenk did a great job.harris spent the majority of this interview back-pedaling.

there are some amazing atheist thinkers out there and throughout history,harris,at best,is mediocre.

i have read hitchens and harris is no hitchens.
*promote

What a naive bunch of Noam Chomskey'esque - "it's all the Wests fault" - apologists.Lucky for them Sam Harris was not there to educate them and Damn lucky that the late, great, Christopher Hitchens was not on the panel, he would have ripped them a new one.

@eric3579 And thanks for posting it, it was a good read and a nice rounding off of the discussion here for me. I will always think of Hitchens as a hero who I can channel when I'm feeling like swashbuckling with idiots. But the more cool/calm head of Harris is something that is better conveyed in writing.

Each discussion method (Harris vs Hitchens) has its own place. Here, I think Hitch would have slapped Benny Boy down, and Harris' calm was taken for weakness because he was letting himself be interrupted by Affleck.

It's sad that the discussion turned into "IF I TALK LIKE THIS I CAN MAKE YOU LOOK LIKE THE BAD GUY" But Harris shouldn't have been so complacent.

On TYT's thumbnail, Affleck's facial expression bears a striking resemblence to that of David Silverman (aka WTF-guy) when O'Reilly made his point about "tide goes in, tide goes out -- you can't explain that".

Intent or coincidence?

Also, anyone else miss Hitchens right now?

What is Islam? Who or what are Muslims?

It seems every single debate over whether Islam is a religion of peace or of violence comes down to this same argument over who or what defines those terms and there is never an agreement. Indeed, much of the conflict in the middle east is due to followers of Islam arguing over who's particular interpretation is correct. Meanwhile in the western world religion is something that, as the late Hitchens put it, we take "a la carte". It seems you can no more describe a person by revealing their particular faith than you could describe what food you had last night by giving somebody the whole menu to the restaurant. You might ascertain that it was perhaps Thai food... but little else.

Still though, when we go the texts we do find quite unequivocally immoral preachings. I think the religious really have to find an answer for this. We aren't buying the alternate interpretations or the lost in translation theories. When you describe yourself as a Muslim or as a Christian, or as any other faith, it seems to me you don't really have much of a right to get upset when we call you on the evil shit in your holy books. You might protest that you are not that "kind" of Christian, but the speed at which you dismiss any given passage is only matched by the speed at which you declare divine truth for another. We understand the vast plurality of beliefs, which is why it baffles us that you subscribe to a particularly narrow set of ideals whilst simultaneously admonishing us for tarring you all with the same brush.

I tried, I really did, but I only got a minute or two into before I just wanted to punch him in the face.

I'll try again.....

nope, can't do it. He's just so fucking self-satisfied.

That doesn't mean I agree with David Cameron either (terrible excuse for a human that he is), simply that I wish we had someone better than Brand.

I've said before that he can be eloquent and impassioned when he's talking about something he has experience with, but he's just mugging it up here and I have no interest in it.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3625970/

Doesn't look like parody at all. Here is some text from the writer's bio:

"After a successful Kickstarter..."

Holy shit, this thing had a Kickstarter? OMG here it is...

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jrralls/rpgs-are-evil-dark-dungeons-the-movie

"The movie will make its world premier in Gen Con..."

That is like Christopher Hitchens doing a film premiere at the Vatican. This should be good.

Thank you @shinyblurry for the contribution. Even if I disagree on the basic message, it was interesting input that this discussion was IMO lacking so far. Now somebody's might post something dismissive now (I have to admit, asshole that I am, my fingers are actually itching in way trolls know too well) but I found that worth reading. Which brings me back to the point Mitchell made.
The issue is dialogue and how disruptive the selfrighteousness of those who found their definitive answer can be. We can argue semantics even further than already done here but it doesn't matter how gnostic or theistic one is. There is a silent majority consisting of various levels of belief and disbelief and at the fringes of both sides people tend to get loud, sometimes unbearably so.
What the screaming people at the edge like to do is to get bogged down into dogmas and discussions of detail but in the end both kind of extremists would like to force their worldviews on everyone else. I think it is certainly not acceptable to insist that people seeking solace in religion must be idiots who don't know how the world works. If a woman who just lost her child wants to tell herself that this is part of gods plan then I have no right to walk up to her and tell her she's full of shit. Even though I know this to be true. We all live in a world we're poorly equipped to understand and have to make sense of it somehow.
The problem starts once you force yourself onto somebody. The point I made before is that one side's extremists is assholes who walk up to grieving women and tell them their full of shit, the other side is people executing that woman for praying to the wrong god. It's easy for me to pick a side here.
However, most people aren't that extreme. Most people are more civil than that and I believe/know that a more civil and understanding approach is better. It necessary to push back against those who are harmful in executing their beliefs, be it Osama Bin Laden or Rick Santorum (Santorum he he) but everyone else is better dealt with in a respectful manner. Antagonism doesn't feed dialogue well.
That is why I resisted my urge to make fun of the deeply religious guy posting here. I really wanted to because I disagree with his worldview so strongly but all he did was stating his journey to where he now in his life and on top of that, he did it without telling anybody else here off. I would be the asshole if I would react like a Hitchens. I'd rather behave like a Tyson (not the rapey one). LIke most humans, I want to be one of the good guys. It's just not that easy to figure out how to be one.
In the end it all boils down to this (and several posts in this thread truly showed it): Why can't we be friends? Why can't we get along?
Because we're humans. That's how we roll.

The late, great, Christopher Hitchen's said that; "All religious people are atheists in relation to other gods, because they believe only in their god. I just happen to have gone one god further."
He also used the term anti-theist to describe himself as one who is against the very idea of there being a god, which was anathema to him. An atheist, on the other hand, simply sees no evidence for one.

While I agree with what NDT said in the linked video and the points made here (by Mitchell especially), I must also point out that it's quite understandable that some atheists turn out to be obnoxious douchebags. While people like Hitchens might be prime examples of that we shouldn't forget how the other end of the religious spectrum looks like when it comes to extremety and obnoxiousness. Let's not forget, nobody straps on an explosive vest to prove there is no god.
I take douchebags over murderers any time.

Regarding woman in comedy, I yield to the late, great, Christopher Hitchens.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7izJggqCoA

Actually, I'm an atheist because my local pastor was a cool guy who used to play table football and billiards at my grandmother's pub. And when he realized that many of us couldn't take the stories of the Bible seriously, he never pushed any of his beliefs onto us. So you might say it never took root with me.

The humanistic education of a German gymnasium did the rest. When the internet came along at the turn of the century, with its ready access to the likes of Bertrand Russell and, much later, Hitchens, Dawkins, Harris, deGrasse Tyson, it merely pushed my attitude from not caring about organized religion into open confrontation with it. Though to be honest, I prefer not to bring up religion in a discussion, ever. It has the uncanny tendency to derail any conversation.

That said, science, specifically my training as a computer scientist, had no part in it. I was a passive atheist long before I took any of my education seriously, aka university.