I’m sorry to come off strong and all but as my school we have believers that follow this. I dont mind in what you believe in for all seriousness BUT the pictures, some are a mockery that you are apperntly trying to put on catholics,jews,lutherians,e.t.c. We dont blast on your religion DONT BLAST ON MINE OR OTHERS! You guys want to be taking serious? well then do it proffessional..
-chris
I’m sorry to come off strong
Published by Bobby Henderson December 29th, 2007 in Hate Mail (and concerned criticism). 135 Comments
135 Responses to “I’m sorry to come off strong”
@Captain NoBeard Scallywag
Yes you are right that argument has to be presented at some point. I was thinking of using it later, but now I see that it should go in early on, maybe where I refer to the reasons that those who are religious for believing that an atheist cannot have an objective morality. But here’s the main problem I see with your argument. You say
” if God says that things are good because they ARE good, then morallity is not arbitrary and is independant of God. This makes it just as accessible to athiests as theists. ”
The theist could then say yes, god says of those good things that they are good because they are good but, that doesn’t necessarily make it accessible to atheists because only god, for some reason, can see what is truly good. They would have to claim that reason isn’t enough to discover the truth about good and bad. But then I suppose we could respond with “what is the reason that only god could see the good, and that reason isn’t enough?” putting the burden back upon the theist, for there doesn’t seem to be any apriori reason to believe that seeing what is good directly should only be accessible to god. But minimally the theist has to admit that if there is right and wrong, then it is independent of god. I believe most educated theists buy that argument.
Your argument, might provide a reason to suggest that principle #3, “following God’s law, is really redundant” for the theist. But that would mean, I suppose, that in justifying an action the theist wouldn’t just be able to say “just because god said it was right”
Excuse the rambling. It helps to write this out for me to try to get clear on it. You’re right, this is important, and I should figure out how to present it and see what it means to my ideas. Thanks
@Eric
Thanks for looking at it. You think it’s a good read, but sometimes I feel like it might not be organized enough to flow smoothly. Like I’m rambling, like above. I’m thinking of adding more titled sections to each chapter to counter that feel. What do you think about those thoughts?
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@Captain NoBeard Scallywag
Thinking some more about the issue. Suppose god is a utilitarian, basically wants to maximize the good in the world, and because he knows everything, he’s done a calculation in complexity theory that shows that if man tries not to eat beans on thursdays, that in the long run things work out a little better. It would be impossible for man to figure this out because it involves highly complex calculations and man is part of the system he’s calculating within.
So god, says “try not to eat beans on Thursdays” (he’s already calculated the effect of his own action of saying that).
Anyway, it would seem that the theist could argue that God knows specific rights and wrongs that we don’t because it involves long term consequence. Just a thought.
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Yeah DO IT PROFESSIONAL… start like all other non eastern religions and kill a few million people, followed by a thousand years of murder, persecution, and raping small boys… for Christ sake do it RIGHT!. I mean the ONLY thing I see you are doing correctly with FSM is making some money off of it.
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@ Bill
Having more organization won’t hurt you at all (unless each section has 1 sentence. Lol). I agree it could come off as a ramble, but thats the kind of writing it is really (to me). Its like a lecture you would receive at a university. Morality 101.
I noticed two typos, (you put goggle instead of google) but that is easily erased with proper editing and revisions.
One way that I’ve learned to make writing more powerful is to get rid of the first person articles, no I’s and my’s. That could be one way to lose some of the “ramble” feel from it.
Its a great idea and I hope to see it finished some day soon. The title might dissuade some people from buying it, thinking it might be another xtian hatred book, but no need to worry about that too much. I think its a great title for its purposes.
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@Captain NoBeard Scallywag
I took and hour walk thinking about your idea and how to fit it in. Man, this is exactly the right idea at exactly the right time. It fits perfectly into the next chapter on what it means to follow God’s law. It also helps incredibly in an argument I now am going to make on why we shouldn’t believe important moral things on faith. Thanks so much. I should have a first draft of chapter 8 written by tomorrow. You’re going to like it. Let me know your real name so I can give you some credit in my article/book/whatever.
The Moral Atheist: http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
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“You guys want to be taking serious? well then do it proffessional..”
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This just kills me.
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okay, you don’t bash my religion
but other Christians do (of course, my real religion is atheism)
so I think I’ll just bash the religion of all the people that bash mine
oh wait, you share that religion, don’t you?
So, you share religions with them, you share religious bashing with them.
Not my fault,
I’m just not gonna take it from the other people who bash mine
catch what I’m saying?
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Man, what lag! It’s really not the forum that it was with this moderation thing. I guess the moderator sleeps. After a good 16 hours he should be refreshed enough to deal with a few hours work.
This was such a great place. I’m just wondering what the reason was to introduce a monitor. When I left here there were strange death threats or maybe that was a time I checked in later, I don’t precisely remember. Is that the reason.
Gosh, this was a great place. I guess I shouldn’t try to hold on to the past.
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Hi, Everybody…I just sent Bobby a nagging email asking why the moderating is necessary. (I must admit that I haven’t been on-site and reading for quite awhile…when school’s in session, my playtime on the computer is at a premium.) Was there really ugly stuff going on?
Hope everyone, ESPECIALLY WONDERFUL BOBBY WHO WILL ALWAYS BE DEAR TO ME AND WHO HAS A PRETTY FUNNY CHRISTMAS GIFT WAITING HERE FOR WHENEVER HE TIRES OF THAILAND, has a great 2008!
Martha
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@Bill
I see your point in that the theist could claim that we require God to let us know what is Good and Evil, but I don’t think this is what most are trying to say when they question the ability of atheists to be moral. Usually they seem to be saying that God is the base of morality and that without some god up in the sky there is no reason why one action should be good and another bad. For example I have heard many Christians say that Muslims are immoral (and vice versa) but I have yet to hear any claim that Muslims have NO GROUNDS for being moral. Theists seem to be saying of atheists, not that their moral structures are FLAWED (as the structures of other theists might be), but that without any god the atheist would have NO BASE for a moral structure. This is the idea that seems to prevail amongst theists who claim that atheists must be amoral and is the primary target of the Is-It-Good-Just-Because-God-Says-So argument.
Now a theist could claim, as you suggested, that only God can have direct knowledge of what is Good and Evil, but I don’t think this helps out much since for any given deity there is huge debate over what He/She says constitutes Good and Evil. For example, say you are a Christian and you want to know if killing your girlfriend is wrong so you consult the Bible. People come up with answers ranging from ‘Not ever’ to ‘Yes, if she is having an affair’ to ‘You are morally obligated to if she is Wiccan’. If imperfect reasoning is a barrier between atheists and morality it seems to be at least equally so for theists.
As for the possibility that God may be utilitarian, I don’t think this would help the theist for several reasons, not least of which is that it can easily be argued that the atheism of at least some individuals has led to increased utility. If then atheism is, in some cases, leading to increased utility, then atheism in those cases is (according to the arbitrary standard of Goodness) the morally correct choice; an uncomfortable stance for many theists. Another problem here is that while human beings may get the calculations wrong (how could we know that beans on a Thursday could lead to such disasterous consequences), we are still engaging with Morality when we try to make these calculations and are still moral people so long as we are TRYING to increase utility. I may inadvertently decrease utility by saving a mean person’s life, but if I was just trying to do good and was not aware how nasty the person was you would not say that I was acting immorally when I saved them.
So yeah, it is not a perfect argument but it certainly does cut off some lines of argument for those who would claim that atheists cannot be moral. I hope you have fun with it and with the rest of your writings!
Ramen
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@Eric
I’m going to look through it for “I”s and “My” and imagine changes and see what that does. What was the other typo or misspelling? I guess being a teacher would account for the textbook feel maybe. I was thinking that ‘ramble’ doesn’t describe it as well as ’stream of consciousness’.
I hadn’t though of the title as threatening, because I though of it as defensive. I’m merely trying to argue that it is possible for an atheist to be moral not that ‘all non-atheists are not moral’, but as you say even if it does seem threatening, I got to keep it. :-)
Thanks for your comments
@Captain NoBeard Scallywag
I see what you are saying. I have two parts to be argued against. That the atheist has no base for a moral structure and that even if he had a base there would be no good reason to be good. You are right that the first is easily dealt with and maybe I should have done that early on. Still, it is fitting nicely into the next chapter so I think I’m going to leave it there.
And I see your point that we could still be good people because of our intentions even though the results may not be that great. The theist could then argue, that if we are good people and there is a mechanism known to assure that our good intentions turn into good results, then ignoring that mechanism, would be irresponsible, and thus we would not be good people. But of course we have to have reason to believe that that mechanism really works. The theist may however claim that the mechanism is KNOWN” through faith.
From the theist’s point of view we may be well intended enough, and thus good people in the intentional sense, but not good people in the sense of doing things that make a better world. But as you suggest, the theist has a problem with knowing which God and which rules to follow, but they rarely acknowledge that, claiming that “faith” is sufficient justification, a rather peculiar contradiction, and to point out the contradiction is rarely helpful in the argument. Arguing with educated theists is a different enterprise presenting arguments to the average person. I think I’m trying to do a persuasive job with the latter. I think I’ll have chapter 8 up later today, pacific US time.
@Ramen
“Catch what I’m saying?” That you like presenting your arguments in sarcastic mode? I’m like that sometimes. :-)
I have no problems with people bashing atheism, if they bash it with good reasons. My claim is that there are no good reasons to bash atheism and I’m prepared to defend that position. However we may find some good reasons to bash some religions. We will see. It will primarily hang on the reasons, and being rational people we can assess the arguments in the open and let the chips fall where they may.
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@Everyone
Moving right along. I finished chapter 8 faster than I thought. It’s up now.
http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
@Captain NoBeard Scallywag
Another thing I wanted to emphasize is that your argument is a good reason why a theist should believe in an objective morality but doesn’t address why an atheist should. I try to offer an argument for that also.
@ Eric
“I hope to see it finished some day soon.”
I’m on a roll now. I hope to have a first draft done before my girlfriend comes home in 18 days, with you guy’s help of course. :-)
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The typo I found earlier was an “are” instead of an “our.”
In the beginning of the 8th chapter it says: “we may which” but I think you intended “we may wish”.
In the sixth paragraph of the 8th chapter, it says: “Thus God would know, for instance, whether not ” and I think it should be “whether or not.”
I really liked this newest chapter because I am in the middle of an ongoing argument with my brother on how religion is “good” because it gives “stupid people” morals. I argue that Religion is a weapon usable by the masses to get their means done that we can seriously do without and that we can find morals without looking to the “ten commandments.” The 8th chapter is starting to culminate all of the previous ideas into one.
I can’t wait for the next chapters. Good luck!
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hey jackass go read the pages of hate mail
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“I’m sorry to come off strong…”
Actually you come across as week and feeble.
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“…but as my school…”
Hold on! Are you saying you are your own school? Is that a metaphor for something, like ‘my body is a temple’? Do you encourage underage kids to enter you? What the fuck are you talking about?
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“…we have believers that follow this.”
What FSM? Well good for them.
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“I don’t mind in what you believe in for all seriousness…”
Sorry you lost me. Seriousness has nothing to do with us!
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… BUT the pictures, some are a mockery that you are apparently trying to put on catholics, jews, lutherians, e.t.c.”
We don’t need to mock those religions. They do it themselves, we just point it out.
.
“We don’t blast on your religion…”
Yes you do!
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“DON’T BLAST ON MINE OR OTHERS!”
Just try and stop me!
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“You guys want to be taking serious?”
I doubt most of us care.
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“well then do it proffessional..”
Well we would, but the idea of putting the fear of our god into small children doesn’t appeal to us. Nor does killing non believers. That’s just the crazy sorts we are.
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@Eric
Thanks Eric
I really appreciate your help and your encouragement. I hope to have another chapter done today, but we will see. Off to make those changes now. Thanks again
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@Eric and Captain NoBeard Scallywag and anyone else interested.
Well, again, I am cooking. Chapter 9 is up and I welcome criticism. I hope you find them as important as I do. I know there is a sense in which these thoughts are not truly profound and that everyone really knows this stuff after thinking about it, but the more I think about it the more obvious it seems.
I’ve seen strong hints of my proposal in everything from advice columns to movies. I just thought it might be nice to make it very explicit.
Be kind and respectful. It’s everywhere.
Anyway,
The Moral Atheist: http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
Ramen
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@billtomlinson Jan 3rd, 2008 at 11:04 pm: “…
The Moral Atheist: http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
Ramen”
.
Bill, could you PUHLEESE change that background of yours in something more eye-friendly, like flat-out light grey? That relief makes the letters dance and hide, or else it’s my eyes…
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@Jean Bart and others.
Jean sent me an email suggesting that my background on the site made the doc hard to read. I responded by putting up another version. http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA2 . In the future I will also include a downloadable MS word version.
Thanks for taking a look.
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@Bill
I am fairly new to the site, but have been having a great time here. I agree that the moderation is putting a damper on things.
.
I have just begun reading your book, and so far I am finding it excellent. Since you are looking for editing help, I have a few comments.
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I agree that the title might be a little off-putting. I think much of your target audience is made up of theists on the brink of discarding theism. Since most theists have it drilled into their head from a young age that “atheism” is a scary and evil thing, your title might stop them from picking up your book in the first place. I would suggest changing to a title that might appeal to that audience. I, alas, don’t know what that title should be, but I am thinking someone here can come up with just the thing. “Chicken Soup for the Questioning Soul” or “Morality for Dummies” would have serious copyright issues, but it would be nice to find something equally catchy.
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Secondly, I think that “I” and “my” references are entirely appropriate in your introduction, since you are talking about your purpose in writing the book. But then not in the rest of the text.
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And last, I see an awkward wording at the end of the introduction: “I care about the quality of life for humanity. I believe religion, especially religion based upon an afterlife, is a serious threat to this caring.” I don’t think that the religion of others threatens your “caring”, I think it threatens the “quality of life”. So you may want to reword this.
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I’ll keep reading more when I get a chance. I love the idea of asking for editing help here. If I ever get around to writing my book, I’ll have to use this same idea.
.
RAmen
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@Bill
I see where you think that this stuff might seem “obvious” but it would only come obvious to those who have actually sat down to think about these things. I was not as enlightened into thought like previous chapters but it did bring up good arguments, such as “why do people do good things?” Questions like these can be assessed although there is no one right answer.
I liked your idea of what “good” is. I think if more people thought “I wonder how I would feel if this was done to me?” then there could be a lot nicer people out there. I was introduced to this as a child with the “golden rule.”
Keep up the insightful writing!
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@Ubi Dubium
Hey there! Thanks for the help. When Eric told me about my mistake with “are” and “our” I went back and did a search on “are” to find it. I didn’t, but I found so many bad sentences that I fixed. I don’t want to go back now and re read it carefully and edit it, because that will take away some of my energy of getting my ideas down, but I do appreciate others finding problems for me. Thanks for that “quality of life” find. I’ll see what I can do with it.
I have another sentence I was trying to rework but didn’t find any good way to do it. First sentence in chapter 2 “One of the reasons that the theist’s argument that an atheist cannot be moral has appeal is because to be be moral is at least about following rules of behavior……” Too many “that”s
Sorry for all the typos guys and all the awkward sentences, but thanks for the help.
@Eric
I agree that the “golden rule” is a good tool for giving children a sense of morality and why it is important. It does have some technical problems, but probably not for the child. If you like a particular thing like peanuts and wish others would share them with you, does that mean you should share your peanuts with others? Some are allergic. So to clarify the rule would require some thoughts about ‘kinds of behavior’, or otherwise the sexual masochist is going to be treating people badly by treating them the way he would like to be treated. I don’t see how to clean it up, but as you say it is a good starting tool. Surprisingly, it came from the bible.
Speaking of the bible. I was wondering if there might have been a mistranslation over time. It is said that you should love your neighbor as yourself. This seems way too strong. It’s really not possible to love all your neighbors. Some of them make it difficult by their very nature. Besides it takes away the specialness of love. Maybe what was really meant was “Respect your neighbor as yourself” That would fit well with my proposal. Just a side thought.
Thanks again Eric for looking at my stuff.
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@Ubi Dubium
P.S. You’re right. It’s not a threat to the act of caring itself. All of a sudden I don’t really like that whole paragraph. I’ll see what I can do.
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Hi everyone, and especially Eric and Ubi Dubium and possibly Captain NoBeard Scallywag and Jean Bart.
Chapter 10 is Up. As usual, I welcome criticism. I believe I can benefit from that, even if I don’t like it. I hope you find it interesting. Let me know, please.
It is now all back on one page with no weird background.
http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
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Hello again, to Eric, Ubi Dubium, Captain NoBeard Scallywag, Jean Bart and all others who are possibly interested.
I just finished chapter 11 and hope you guys and gals have a chance to read some of it.
I’m happy with the way it’s going and looking forward to your comments. I think it’s going to end up about 90 pages. If I use large type, I could make it look like a book. :-)
Maybe I need more pictures, you know like pictures of God, Buddha (takes up a lot of room), Mohammed. That would make it popular, I’m sure.
The Moral Atheist: http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
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@bill tomlinson Jan 7th, 2008 at 1:06 am: “…Maybe I need more pictures, you know like pictures of God, Buddha (takes up a lot of room), Mohammed. That would make it popular, I’m sure.”
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You’ll never get the Jews nor the Muslim to give you pictures of their god, I’m afraid. But since it sin’t exactly a deities’ catalog you’re writing, that wouldn’t be much of an issue. Hindu Gods are very decorative, and the multple armed take up a lot of space too, especially when they hold something in each hand:
http://www.sanatansociety.org/hindu_gods_and_goddesses.htm
Since they come in various avatars, your book could become quite voluminous!
Roman and Greek gods are space-taking too, but they didn’t make it into our era in colour. Could make the book more classy, of course, since they’re more related to art, whereas the Hindu gods have a tiny bitsy kitschy side (outside India, that is: the Hindus themselves aren’t bothered by that aspect).
Front cover: a classy merge (morph) between a Greek (or Roman) and a Hindu god!
Back cover: an African god. Not to state that Africans are lesser than others, but to frighten the reader who closes the book after reading!
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Always to be found for typed nonsense, I say
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RAmen!
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I finished reading it last night and I thought that this chapter was very though provoking, for me at least. I started creating scenarios thinking to myself whether truth is relative.
Well you can of course publish a book with the size font that you want but I wouldn’t go over size 18 but I’m not sure.
You can put pictures, that would work to fill up some space. I’m having trouble thinking of more filler-options. Lol. But the book of course does not have to be the size of the bible for any kind of relevance or factuality. Hey, with less pages it might cost less to print. Lol
I wish I could have some constructive criticism but I’m at a loss at this moment. Keep up the good work, Bill!
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@Jean Bart
I was really joking about the picture of Mohammed, since that brought about a stir a while back, I thought I could be a little shocking. That cover idea is kind of fun though. We’d have to have a picture of FSM someplace too. :-)
Might be fun to have a book with pictures of all the gods of all religions, all that would allow it, that is. But I bet it’s been done (I say before I go to the internet and check)
@ Eric
Thanks again for the encouragement. I do need it a bit. It keeps me going to see that someone cares. You could think in terms of comments like ’such and such’ was unclear or needs to be expanded. This could be helpful.
I looked back at the earlier chapters this morning and they aren’t as bad as I thought I’d remember them to be. In all honesty, I don’t believe a small book is a bad idea. Most books, in my opinion, are too long. They usually could have said everything that they needed to say in about 2 chapters, but maybe that’s just my taste.
@Everyone interested.
I just finished chapter 12 and it’s up. My posts get buried sometimes here because the moderator seems to do mine first, probably because I live in U.S. time zone. So please check back here every day or two. I will continue to post at least every other day.
cya
The Moral Atheist: http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
billtomlinson@mac.com
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yeah come on you know the religion ‘rules’ – youve got to do it ‘professionally’ like all the other religions. didnt you do the ‘how to express yourself and your religion professionally’ course? how can you expect people to believe your ideas about faith and the afterlife if you dont wear a suit and carry a briefcase?
(PS. im actually christian, and yes everything above is written with extreme sarcasm)
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“…BUT the pictures, some are a mockery…”
Uh, those pictures in which geebuz has been replaced with the FSM aren’t snapshots of actual events.
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Hey man we certainly dont get crazy about others believing what they believe, so why should you?
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Hi Everyone,
I’ve got chapter 13 and half of chapter 14 up in my book ‘the moral atheist’ i try to argue, defensively, that being moral and being an atheist are compatible notions. I think I have some things to say here. I’ve taught philosophy for 32 years and with the tools of philosophy I have tried to sort out the important issues for myself. I think there some things of general interest here. I speak to you because last February, you people and our conversations were what inspired me to expand on my idea that an atheist or even a Pastafarian can still be a good person and I have reason to believe you guys could be interested and more than that, be critical enough to give me some help, which i probably need.
Some here have been encouraging, especially Eric. I think it’s an important notion and if you would like to see my progress so far go to http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA The TMA stands for ‘The Moral Atheist’ the title of my book. Some think it is a bad title for the audience it is aimed at, those trying to change from thesis to atheist or pastafarian, but I have a hard time dumping it because it seems to me to be a grabber title.
Thanks to Eric and others for your support. If you would like to send comments to me, send to
billtomlinson@mac.com
P.S. I update this doc almost every day. Check in if you find it interesting
billtomlinson@mac.com
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@ bill tomlinson – just started reading it, as I’ve got a bit of a quiet lunchbreak today. I don’t want to comment on each little bit as I go because I’d rather consider the document as a whole, but what I’ve read so far seems nicely thought-provoking. Well done on the concept and on actually managing to get it written out. However, returning to the editing/formatting comments made above, I did just notice one awkward phrase in paragraph 12 of chapter 1 – “If the followers can keep from considering the uncertainty of his choice” – either follower/his or followers/their would be better. It may also be worth in these early stages numbering paragraphs to enable you to easily identify issues raised, although this would be best removed by publication stage to make it sit better on a page. Please excuse my jumping in with these points as a first response – both very minor and don’t impact on the overall document – but you did appear to be soliciting comments variously from the assorted throng on editing matters as well as content.
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Just to add further editorial comments – in chapter 3, in your section on major ethical theories, part 1 of your own theory would be more consistent if you used considerately, rather than considerate. More generally in Chapter 3, personally I’d like to see further expansion on the 3 main theories you’ve identified. There’s enough there to provide a steer for someone to follow up in further reading, but you cannot assume that all of your readers have a familiarity with philosophical principles and ethical systems. At the moment you’ve given enough detail to form a jumping off point for future, but I’m not necessarily sure there’s enough in the text for someone new to the arguments to follow your own case at the time of reading it, without trying to look up stuff as they go. If you’re envisaging e-publication, or maintaining it online long term, now might be the time to consider hyperlinks if you would prefer to keep your own comments brief.
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And I think the our/are reference that someone else picked up on above but you then couldn’t locate at the time could be in paragraph 19 of chapter 4, where you have writen “relecting on are weaknesses”. Again, small point, but worth correcting when you have time. Hate to have it look like I’m only bringing up negatives, because I’m enjoying what I’ve read so far but I had a job a few years back where I was doing some pretty detailed proof-reading/editing and it trained me up to notice this kind of thing. For what it’s worth, 3 really minor points in 5 chapters is actually a pretty low rate and this cetrainly isn’t meant to be critical.
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Hey Jennyanydots,
Thanks for the comments. This is great. I’ll go back and change that stuff now. In terms of publishing, I think would like to go the regular route first. It would be nice if this could reach a wider audience. The online thing now is just because I wanted to get some feedback and use the fact that people might be reading it now as a motivator for me to continue at a good pace.
I’ll see if I can find an easy way to number my paragraphs. As I sincerely suggested I don’t mind criticism. I don’t think my sentences are as well constructed as they could be, so I welcome that. I wouldn’t welcome a criticism that suggested everything was all wrong. Not because I can’t believe it, but because it would drain my energies right now and I need to get down the first draft. If some part of it seems wrong, I would like to hear about that. Thanks again. Back to work. I should have chapter 14 up by 4 PM eastern US time today 1/10/2008
I’ve taken Eric’s criticism and tried to minimize the use of ‘I’ and ‘me’, except when there is no other way to say it. I’ve started to sometimes use “us” and “we” referring to me and the reader. It seems to capture the right mood. Sometimes upon rereading I’ve found it reads like the ‘royal’ “we” and I definitely don’t want that. Too pompous. So if you see any of those, please let me know. But another thing: try not to “work” on it in a way that feels like work. But if anything jumps out at you, I’d definitely like to hear about it.
cya later and thanks
The Moral Atheist:Http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
billtomlinson@mac.com
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P.S.
I’m not that happy with use ‘he’ all the time to refer to the general person, but ‘he or she’ seems bulky and ‘they’ seems to not in agreement with subject, as in the statement ‘If a person is good, then they will go to heaven’. I’ve see some books that alternate between ‘he’ and ’she’ and for me that seems distracting. It’s as if I’m scanning the work to find the next occurrence of ‘he’ or ’she’ to see if the patter stays.
Anyway, any thoughts?
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Oops,
Please excuse all the words left out. I guess I am too impatient to check for my mistakes.
:-)
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hey Chris… don’t worry, I’ll be taking serious, and I promise to do it professional !……. muh ha hahahahaahaha HA HAHA HAAAH! Go back to your rad school and learn some grammar !
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Glad to be of help, Bill. I’m certainly not treating it as work – it’s much more enjoyable to read than the documents I was paid to do a few years back! A friend of mine is just completing the first draft of a novel and I’m probably going to provide the same level of detail to him too pretty soon, once he’s passed me a copy, so it’s good to get back into practice on something that isn’t 90,000 words first!
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OK, just finished reading chapter 6, and picked up a few more errors, all of the easily-done-when-typing-but-not-recognised-by-spell-checkers-as-wrong type. Again, not major issues, and believe me, I’m as guilty as anyone of doing this but it’s always harder to spot them in your own work. Not major issues, but can detract from ease of reading if left in.
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In paragraph 2 – “They terms seem to form”
Paragraph 6 of the section headed ‘Experience is the foundation of value’ – “These seems to me”.
In the section on ‘Acting kindly and being kind’ – “The intended consequent results in an action” – perhaps either consequence or of an action, depending on which was you meant that to be understood.
And a couple of points for the section on ‘Judging the kindness of others: In paragraph 1 you’ve got “maybe the best advise” – should be advice – and “in this way be can become better people”. Paragraph 3, I think the word “though” has escaped to before “emphasis”, rather than after (currently reads “this should not get too great an though emphasis”). In paragraph 4 you’ve got another our/are (”we our the primary caretaker”). Finally, paragraph 5 “is the ultimate goal and kindness and caring” doesn’t seem quite right – either something needs to complete the sentence, or it’s the goal towards, or of, or for, or something. In this para, you also need to switch insure to ensure in both instances.
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On stylistic grounds it might be worth excising the word ‘kind’ in its meaning of sort or type from your vocabulary for the duration of writing this – I did pick up on “another kind of knowledge needed to be kind” in the section titled ‘Knowledge and the wise person’ which could get a bit clunky if repeated too often.
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Having got the minor negatives out of the way, I’m certainly not saying the whole thing is completely wrong. I’m really enjoying reading it, and finding it very helpful as a way of clarifying some of the ideas and thoughts I’ve half stumbled through in my own mind over the years without articulating. It’s good to get the opportunity to read something thought-provoking like this at an early stage and see how the ideas evolve in the writing.
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@Jennyanydots
Thanks again. I actually found that problem with ‘kind’ a few times but was not being all the time. I’ve got to fix that, you are right.
Thanks for the other remarks also. I’m going to go back in fill out the standard theories a bit after I finish. I’m thinking four more days until the first draft is complete. It shouldn’t be too hard to clean it up, I hope. In the later chapters you can expect to find a greater percentage of problems, I think. I wanted to get the ideas down as fast as I could.
By the way, my earlier remark about leaving words out is about a post I made that somehow is still waiting to be moderated. If it gets posted, you’ll know what that was about. This moderation makes things a little weird. I guess Aristotle was wrong when he said ‘everything in moderation’ :-)
Chapter 15 is up and there are 4 chapters projected after that.
Thanks again. This is really helpful.
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@Jennyanydots
You may wish to download the latest, to keep from going crazy with the ‘kind’s. they’ve been replaced
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@Jennyanydots
P.S. You may not want to read anything past chapter 11 until I go through and clean it up. There seem to be a lot of bad sentences in a superficial scanning. I’ll try to fix some of it up tomorrow. cya
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“We dont blast on your religion DONT BLAST ON MINE OR OTHERS!”
You might not, but I tend to get several hundreds of messages telling me to convert to Christianity or burn in hell a year.
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Only getting short time breaks to read in anyway, so suspect you’ll have no difficulty going through the bits after chapter 11 that you wanted to play with before I get there. Notes below on the editorial stuff for chapter 7, and looking forward to the next bit tomorrow lunchtime.
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‘Human Rights’, para 1– “The class of class of concepts”. Also, para 2 – the way it’s formulated could be read as meaning either that torture is such a flagrant lack of respect that it shouldn’t be used on animals, or that the right not to be tortured is not applicable to animals. I know which meaning I’m assuming you to have but it might be a good idea to rework this for optimum clarity.
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‘How much knowledge is needed etc’ – para 1 – “as we did” might be a better construct than “like we did”. Para 4 – “that have been” rather than “that have be”.
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‘Minimal levels of respect deserved’ – para 4 – too, rather than to in the sentence beginning “I’m not to embarrassed”. Para 7 – “Feeling, learning, reflecting, choosing life forms.” – I’d suggest this isn’t a full sentence capable of standing alone, and should perhaps be preceded by a colon and joined to the sentence before.
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Hope these help. Best of luck with your last sections
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Hey Jennyanydots
Are you still finding it interesting? Do there seem to be any boring chapters? Im going to start from 8 today to start cleaning. I don’t remember when I stopped rereading carefully.
That ‘class of class of concepts’ looks like some sort of replace for the word ‘kind’. I replace kind with ‘type’, ’sort’ and ‘class’ depending upon what looked best in the context.
Thanks Jenny. I hope to clean a lot today. I’m in L.A. Where are you? I was wondering what our time lag is.
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P.S. Since you are probably proofing chapter 8 today, I’m starting on chapter 9. I’m sorry if 8 is real bad.
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@ anyone who is interested.
9-11 are cleaned up as best as I could. I had some help with a program on my computer that speaks text. I could highlight a paragraph and have it read it out loud. It helped a lot to read it and hear it at the same time.
The Moral Atheist: http://homepage.mac.com/billtomlinson/TMA
billtomlinson@mac.com
cya
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None of it is boring, and I’m very much enjoying reading it. Based in the UK, so of course we’ve got a double time lag whereby I post at a sensible time for me here, then it gets through moderation at a sensible time for the Prophet, then you pick it up at a sensible time for you, going through three separate time-zones in the process! Just read over chapter 8, and comments pasted below. Sorry this is quite a long post, and I hope it doesn’t look like nit-picking.
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Para 1 – could be helpful to put in something here that clarifies what you mean by the term “null set”. I feel like this is a term that hasn’t come up before and whilst I can make assumptions for the purpose of reading it, I have no way of knowing if my understanding is correct. I’d also suggest that where you’ve written “Because he doesn’t believe in a God” this shouldn’t be capitalised – it’s essentially querying the overall existence of gods, rather than referring to laws passed by one particular deity, and it then brings your writing more into internal consistency (e.g. in Para 3, where you refer to ‘no god’ but God’s law’)
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Para 2 – should be aN intellectual dilemma.
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Para 3 – “buy”, rather than “by”.
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Para 7 (NB – I have included your two principles as separate paragraphs here for ease of counting them) – much as I personally try to avoid capitalising this as a matter of principle, I suspect you might need to write “He (or She)” in order to make it absolutely clear in the sentence structure that you’re referring to ‘God’ rather than ‘the theist’, or rewrite it to avoid having 2 separate subjects of the sentence.
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Para 8 – “on Friday” rather than “of Friday”.
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Para 10 – possibly “computer which” rather than “who”.
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Para 12 – can’t think of a quick fix on this one, but you might want to look more closely at “a human being being evil”.
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Para 14 – perhaps “although it has in the past” might sit easier there to avoid repeating “but” twice in quick succession.
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Para 17 – “faith does not rationally entail by which God is the correct one” – not sure about the word ‘by’.
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Para 19 – “if”, rather than “it” in the phrase “for if he really needs this rule”.
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Para 20 – atheists plural. Also, I’m assuming that the suggestion of anger management courses is made somewhat tongue-in-cheek, based on the rest of your style, but can foresee your good theist reader taking this as an internal justification for disregarding the reasons behind this indignation.
Summary, Para 1 – perhaps either “independent of God”, “not dependent on God”, or simply “God-independent” rather than “God independent”.
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Para 2 – Is morality the object/our object, or is it objective? I’d also suggest perhaps show, rather than see.
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By the way – just to give you an idea of times – unless the board time attached to my message is utterly random and changed noodly with each message posted, I’m 3 1/2 hours earlier than the site is (i.e. that says 4.30 and I make it 1. Future comments on next sections will be sent by me at a similar time of day.
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