Monthly Archives: April 2007

Joined the Club

The Ubuntu As of yesterday, I have became a full-fledged Ubuntu member!

Ubuntu is the Linux-based operating system I use on my desktop at home and at work, and in fact I’m also using it to serve up this web site. I’ve been running for a year now, and started to become active in helping with development of the software, and with technical support, in August of last year. Being an Ubuntu member, though, will mean that I have a vote in the governance of the project. 🙂

Becoming an Ubuntu member isn’t so simple a matter as adding your name to some list. Official membership is given only to people who have demonstrated ongoing and significant contribution to the Ubuntu community. This could be helping to triage or to fix bugs, contributing artwork or documentation, offering help to users with technical difficulties, or actively advocating Ubuntu in your local community.

In order to become members, applicants need to appear before the Community Council, and concretely demonstrate that they have been and will continue to be a significant asset to the Ubuntu community. This pretty much means that you need to have been documenting anything important that you’ve been doing on your page in the Ubuntu community wiki (here’s my wiki page), so that you can point them at it, along with your launchpad page if your contributions tend to be related to bug fixing or triage. The Community Council is the small group of the community leaders who are directly responsible for the directions Ubuntu takes as a project. At this moment, there are only four members in the council (this is probably going to double very soon).

After successfully surviving the council’s scrutiny, you are then rewarded with:

  • an official ubuntu.com email address (mine will be micahcowan@ubuntu.com, but it won’t be set up yet for maybe a week);
  • the right to print and distribute official Ubuntu business cards; 🙂
  • a snazzy ubuntu/members/yourname hostname cloak for your IRC communications on irc.freenode.net; and, of course,
  • a vote in community government decisions!

The main reason I’m excited about obtaining membership, though, is that it’s the first step towards becoming an Ubuntu developer, something I’m currently pursuing. Being a developer means I can upload packages to the Ubuntu software repositories (that is, upload new software or new versions of software that will become part of the Ubuntu operating system—currently, I need to have a sponsor upload for me), and will require ademonstrated ability to package software for the system, which can be fairly complex sometimes. I already have some experience in this regard, as I have packaged fixes to existing software already (such as this package I improved); but I will need to do a good deal more.

Update: my micahcowan@ubuntu.com address is now working! 🙂

Prove It!

Increasing the risk that I’m moving closer to this site becoming little more than a mindless portal to DagoodS‘s excellent article posts, I simply can’t help but post about yet another very excellent article of his.

In Prove It!, DagoodS argues insightfully that theists and atheists will often walk away from debating, each feeling secure in the knowledge that their argument was won—and both being correct—because of a fundamental difference in their concepts of what the Standard of Proof is:

A good example of this is the[…] debate on inerrancy. What is it that we often see? A person proposes a contradiction.[…]

And what does the inerrantist do? Proposes a solution that, while technically possible, stretches one’s credibility. Then the person proposing the contradiction points out more details within the account that appear contradictory. The inerrantist proposes a solution that is logically possible.

Back and forth, each making essentially the same point over and over. Never moving. Why? Because they are using two completely different standards of proof!

The person proposing a contradiction is using the “more plausible” standard. Whereas the inerrantist is using the “any logical possibility” standard.

So the skeptic keeps talking in terms of how this claim is not plausible, or how this does not plausibly fall into line with the other account. And, frankly, is prevailing under their standard of proof. The inerrantist talks in what could possibly have happened, or how it is possible that Judas suffered three mortal injuries, none of which was fatal. And, frankly, the inerrantist is prevailing under their standard of proof.

Each walks away, thinking, “Gee, I won, because the other person failed under my standard of proof,” neither realizing what a waste of time it was.

Intolerance of the Intolerant = Hypocrisy?

So, I recently subscribed to the Answers in Genesis magazine, a publication dedicated to spreading the creationist and Bible-literalist viewpoints, and refuting new evidence that comes to light that supports the evolutionary standpoint. I’ve done this because, being a former Bible literalist and creationist myself, I was shocked to discover the degree to which information was carefully filtered, and evolutionist arguments were twisted or removed from context, in order to bring me to the desired conclusion: that (macro-)evolution is a hoax, and creationism is the only standpoint that makes any sense.

So now that I’ve come to see just how contrary to the truth creationism actually is, I’m trying to keep myself abreast of current thought and misinformation that is spread from some of the major sources of creationist propoganda, so I can research them properly, and compare them with the actual information they purport to be refuting (strawman arguments seem to be the most common way to argue against evolution—that is, refuting positions that the opponent isn’t actually arguing—so the easiest way to discredit many of the arguments is to actually look up the original sources, verify quotes, and put them in their context).

Anyway, I just received a copy of Answers Update, a “monthly newsletter equipping Christians to uphold the authority of the Bible from the very first verse,” and I started reading the very first article, Goose-stepping to Zion?, which defends the Answers in Genesis organization against direct attacks from a new book, American Fascists: the Christian right and the war on America, by Chris Hedges, who, according to the article, draws comparisons between Bible literalists and Hitler-era Nazis. But, I couldn’t believe my eyes as I came across this passage:

Who are the people manifesting fascist tendencies 60 years after Nazi Germany? It’s those who, in the name of tolerance, will refuse to tolerate those who are perceived as intolerant (i.e., those who hold to absolute standards, such as Bible-believing Christians).

In fact, Hedges quotes (sympathetically) the late philosopher Karl Popper, who once wrote that we can “therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to be tolerant of the intolerant” (p. 1).

The inconsistency is so glaring to us. Hedges’ self-proclaimed open-mindedness and tolerance absolutely falls apart when he attempts to rationalize his (clearly obvious) hypocrisy.…

He also does not appear to understand that while he howls at Christians’ attempts to impose their views on society, Hedges wants to see that it’s his views that should be imposed.

Now, it may be that Hedges’ viewpoint is on the extreme-side: some of the quote that I’ve elided with an ellipsis includes the claim that Hedges has “publicly chastised liberal humanists who believe in inclusiveness and who express any willingness to dialogue with evangelicals,” which, if true, would be a rather extreme viewpoint.

However, I’m simply amazed that someone could find “intolerance of intolerance” to be hypocritical; there’s no such thing as “absolute” tolerance. If one were tolerant of intolerance, that one would in a very real way be passively approving the intolerance, and therefore not a true tolerance at all.

Moreover, it’s abundantly clear that even the most tolerant of people cannot tolerate every viewpoint: it would be insanity to call it hypocrisy for one to simultaneously claim tolerance and yet at the same time refuse to tolerate child molestation.

How unfortunate that they choose to attack Karl Popper’s conclusion, without bothering to even mention his very reasonable supporting arguments, in apparent violation of the popular evangelical exhortation, that in Biblical studies, “whenever we see the word ‘therefore,’ we should check to see what it is there for.”

You can read the full article online at AnswersInGenesis.Com, which was co-authored by the founder and CEO of Answers In Genesis.

I sorta Liked the fellow, actually

Another excellent piece by DagoodS at ExChristian.Net, responding to a debate between Christian author and speaker Rick Warren, and outspoken atheist Sam Harris. DagoodS takes issue with Warren’s appeal to the tired argument that Christians are perpetually claiming about atheists:

You’re more spiritual than you think. You just don’t want a boss. You don’t want a God who tells you what to do.

(Warren also states, “I’ve never met an atheist who wasn’t angry.” Guess I’ll have to introduce myself sometime.)

DagoodS refutes the claim quite roundly, discussing how pleasant and comforting it is to know that God has your back, when you’re out of a job looking for work and trying to make ends meet, or is ensuring you don’t slam full-speed into a tree as you dodge deftly between them during a skiing outing, or is keeping your child safe as you begin to realize that you’ve lost him or her while together at the mall. He clearly misses these assurances, as do I.

“Want” has nothing whatsoever to do with my belief there is no god. It has to do with evidence. In fact, quite the contrary, there are many things I find pleasing in a god belief. It does not make a god exist, however.

Please do check out the rest of this very well-thought (as usual) article.