Reza Aslan, Ben Affleck, Bill Maher and Sam Harris walk into a bar... (Atheism, Islam and liberalism: This is what we are really fighting about)

[Perspicuo]

That's interesting. Please produce a quotation of Harris where he states that all Muslims are of the same mentality.

Again, when you can't address peoples' points, your fallback seems to be to misrepresent them. It's not a question of whether every single Muslim in the world thinks the same way, it's Harris' claim that the inherent tenets of the religion and mainstream views are such that

"The only future devout Muslims can envisage—as Muslims—is one in which all infidels have been converted to Islam, politically subjugated, or killed. The tenets of Islam simply do not admit of anything but a temporary sharing of power with the “enemies of God."

And that's hyperbole and bullshit, which is not supported by the evidence either you or he have cited.

Well, you might be entirely correct but I fail to see where he says "all Muslims". Please help.

 

[Warpoet]

Well, you might be entirely correct but I fail to see where he says "all Muslims". Please help.

I can't help you if you do not read or seriously attempt to comprehend what is actually being argued.

 

[Perspicuo]

Well, you might be entirely correct but I fail to see where he says "all Muslims". Please help.

I can't help you if you do not read or seriously attempt to comprehend what is actually being argued.

I am. But I understand why you wouldn't want to continue in the search for the all-encompassing statement where he says "all Muslims". Because it frankly

is

not

there.

 

[Warpoet]

I am. But I understand why you wouldn't want to find the encompassing statement where he says "all Muslims". Because it frankly

is

not

there.

It's also not the point, but you seem to have missed that by a mile anyway, so this is going to get us nowhere.

 

[Perspicuo]

I am. But I understand why you wouldn't want to find the encompassing statement where he says "all Muslims". Because it frankly

is

not

there.

It's also not the point, but you seem to have missed that by a mile anyway, so this is going to get us nowhere.

But you were the one who made the point!

Warpoet: So you don't think one can be worse?

"They are all the same." Let that phrase sink in. They are quantitively and qaulitatively different on so many levels. But they (somehow) are all the same.

Very, very improbable indeed.

Excuse me, but I don't think you need an agenda to see them as different. I am so sorry if you don't see that and if that is the case it is beyond my abilities to convince someone out of the very obtuse belief that they are absolutely the same thing in any given regard.

Except that's not what I said. I am objecting to Harris' broad-brush characterizations of how Muslims think, and the notion that this is the only important factor in the equation, because that does not comport with reality. I did not say that all religions are the same "in any given regard."

Is what you said.
Not liking what you stated? That was recent. Quite a fast change of mind I'd say.

 

[Warpoet]

Not liking what you recently stated?

Why wouldn't I? The point stands, and you've still failed to address it: Harris is making broad-brush generalizations about mainstream Islamic thinking, and neither he -- nor you -- have produced the evidence to back them up.

If you took my use of the term "broad-brush generalization" to refer to every single Muslim on Earth rather than mainstream Islamic thinking, there was obviously some misunderstanding, but I'm pretty sure the problem was on your end.

 

[Perspicuo]

Not liking what you recently stated?

Why wouldn't I? The point stands, and you've still failed to address it: Harris is making broad-brush generalizations about mainstream Islamic thinking, and neither he -- nor you -- have produced the evidence to back them up.

If you took my use of the term "broad-brush generalization" to refer to every single Muslim on Earth rather than mainstream Islamic thinking, there was obviously some misunderstanding, but I'm pretty sure the problem was on your end.

Again: WHERE?

I fail to see where he states "all Muslims" are so and so. Again you do not produce that essential piece of evidence. You just restate yourself. You allege something about Harris but do not produce the evidence.

 

[Warpoet]

Again: WHERE?

I fail to see where he states "all Muslims" are so and so. Again you do not produce that essential piece of evidence. You just restate yourself. You allege something about Harris but do not produce the evidence.

You really, REALLY need to learn to read more carefully; either that, or you're just dicking around -- in either case, this is going nowhere.

 

[Perspicuo]

Again: WHERE?

I fail to see where he states "all Muslims" are so and so. Again you do not produce that essential piece of evidence. You just restate yourself. You allege something about Harris but do not produce the evidence.

You really, REALLY need to learn to read more carefully; either that, or you're just dicking around -- in either case, this is going nowhere.

No, I am not "dicking".

Yes, this is going nowhere. So in short:

Sam Harris did not say "all Muslims" anywhere. And since the prosecution cannot produce the evidence, case dismissed.

 

[Warpoet]

No, I am not dicking.

Yes, this is going nowhere. So in short:

Sam Harris did not say "all Muslims" anywhere. And since the prosecution cannot produce the evidence, case dismissed.

And since you obviously are either extremely confused or deliberately obtuse about what the case being argued is to begin with, your judgment on the matter holds no weight in the first place.

Have a nice day.

 

[Perspicuo]

:laughing-smiley-014

 

[blastula]

Haven't watched this yet, but Harris was interviewed by Cenk Uygur yesterday about all this. 3 hours long.

[YOUTUBE]WVl3BJoEoAU[/YOUTUBE]

 

[Perspicuo]

Nice video, Blastula. It's Sam Harris being interviewed by Cenk Uygur from TYT (news and comment YouTube program by Turkish-American journalist and co-hosts), who has criticized Harris in the past for his words. BTW Uygur is also an atheist.


Minute 12:44; Harris: "I am not saying Muslims I'm talking about Islam as a set of ideas with its logical and behavioral consequences."

12:47: "They wouldn't matter if no one believed them, right?, ..."

13:00: "... to the extent they believe them. There are people who believe in all of it, there are people who don't believe it at all [...] there's a whole range of cognitive commitment to certain doctrines"

At 16:20 and following: (I will not transcribe but it gives important conceptual points about the liberals who don't see the differences in religions and Harris [and Perspicuo!] who see massive differences)

At 18:00 and following: (Cenk attempts to refute Harris on the previous point. At 18:50 Cenk Uygur becomes absurd defending the absurdity that all absurdities are equally absurd or that the more absurdities you believe does not make your mind more absurd. Which is absurd. The example used is Mormons.)

At 21:40 Cenk says: "You don't say all Muslims, you're very clear about that..."

At 22:00 Harris says: "The irony is that in the light of these interviews, the Maher interview, people say I paint all Musilms with a broad brush..."

At 22:45 Harris: "THe whole point about polls is that say 30% of Muslims in Indonesia want stoning for women adulterers and you criticize that you are criticizing the belief of those 30% of Muslims... that is the one reason why one would point to poll results and that is what I do..."

At 23:29 Cenk quoting/reading Harris: "The truth about Muslim extremism is that it's not extreme among Muslims... Islam is all fringe and no center..."

At 24:32 Harris replies: Islam holds that the Qur'an is the perfect word of the Creator of the Universe that is incredibly well subscribed, [and] all polls I've read puts that around 90% ... and among Christians that would be half..." Cenk Uygur seems to agree on this point.


---And I don't have time to view the rest---

 

[untermensche]

At 18:00 and following: (Cenk attempts to refute Harris on the previous point. At 18:50 Cenk Uygur becomes absurd defending the absurdity that all absurdities are equally absurd or that the more absurdities you believe does not make your mind more absurd. Which is absurd. The example used is Mormons.)

I would say he successfully refuted him.

All Harris can say is "ask mathematicians".

And we can and Cenk said it. 0 + 0 = 0

total nonsense + more total nonsense = total nonsense

Harris wants to give a value to the total nonsense of Christians but it has none.

 

[Shadowy Man]

Well, you might be entirely correct but I fail to see where he says "all Muslims". Please help.

You can still be using a broad brush even if you haven't painted the whole fence.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

The interview TYT did earlier this month with Resa Aslan

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Reza and Sam 2007

 

[untermensche]

The interview TYT did earlier this month with Resa Aslan

To me he is an apologist for irrational thinking.

He claims that religion is some special language in which people express ideas they can't express in other ways.

To me, his ideas on religion are just a bunch of nonsense.

He also claims that atheism is what drove Mao. Again that is just nonsense.

I do agree with him that Sam Harris does read the Koran exactly as a fundamentalist would read it. And in that Harris presents a fundamentalist viewpoint of Islam.

 

[Perspicuo]

At 18:00 and following: (Cenk attempts to refute Harris on the previous point. At 18:50 Cenk Uygur becomes absurd defending the absurdity that all absurdities are equally absurd or that the more absurdities you believe does not make your mind more absurd. Which is absurd. The example used is Mormons.)

I would say he successfully refuted him.

All Harris can say is "ask mathematicians".

And we can and Cenk said it. 0 + 0 = 0

total nonsense + more total nonsense = total nonsense

Harris wants to give a value to the total nonsense of Christians but it has none.

Please be joking because I would find it rather sad that you make such a elementary mistake. An absurd statement is not zero information. You can accumulate absurd statements and be much more mistaken than your next door neighbor. The fact that you assign a value of zero to an absurd statement is arbitrary. Ask a mathematician. There must be one "in the house" here, I guess.

 

[Perspicuo]

Well, you might be entirely correct but I fail to see where he says "all Muslims". Please help.

You can still be using a broad brush even if you haven't painted the whole fence.

In such case one still needs evidence or a good argument based on evidence. You are free to supply yours, although I am not very enthusiastic about playing cat and mouse with someone who will move goalposts (I hope you won't). Because quite frankly, either one (Harris, in this case) says something or one doesn't, and if somehow you (Shadowy Man) consider not directly saying something is still saying it (perhaps you mean tacitly?) then you are going to have a hard time convincing people.

In debates (such as the one Mr Harris is having with Mr Uygur) it is considered inelegant to hold a man accountable for something he did not explicitly say. I believe Harris has done a magnificent job (albeit not perfect) of delimiting his criticism of Islam to Islam, and when addressing Muslims themselves sticking to poll information as his rival and critic Uygur accedes he does.

Then again I didn't watch the entirety of either Maher's interview nor Uygur's. Perhaps you have and would like to enlighten us with your findings?