I believe that Prof. Wilson has described himself as a cultural Christian, although I can’t recall where I heard that. I may have seen him make such a statement in a talk he gave at TED or in an interview I downloaded from the web. Just for the information of Mr. Kwok, Richard Dawkins also has stated that he is a cultural Christian who likes Chrismas carols and the religious music of Bach. As another example, Jason Rosenhouse, who is certainly a pretty vigorous non-believer, describes himself as culturally Jewish.

It is presumptuous on your part to even conclude that E. O. Wilson is a “cultural Christian”. Your analogy this time is almost as bad as some of the risible commentary you wrote elsewhere online when I commented on who I had seen present at last year’s Science Faith Religion session at the World Science Festival.

Not to be pedantic with Mr. Kwok but the statement that Prof. Wilson is no longer a Christian doesn’t mean he is no longer a believer. He could have converted to Islam or Judaism for instance. A statement which is both correct and accurate would be phrased as follows: Prof. Wilson is no longer a believing Christian but is a non-believer who still considers himself a cultural Christian.

You said his conclusion completely ignores the role of media. For him to completely ignore something, that would encompass all his writings. That’s obviously not true. They’ve already addressed the role of media and may do so again.
Your demand that they specifically reiterate previous positions in subsequent articles is unrealistic. Read the book.

Talk about striving in futility, as if people weren’t already the most cost effective and efficient means of producing bad music already.

If you choose to antagonize them in the new atheist manner, eating up the limited time you have to make your case in about the worst and most counterproductive way possible, you might as well save yourself the effort and cede them to the other side. Why do you think Comfort was so hot to debate Dawkins?

Getting back to smart vs. stupid ways to do this, it is so aggravating to see people who are smart, who have the facts beaten by people because they are too arrogant to learn lessons that a even a mediocre salesman would have long ago learned. That Dawkins practiced that amazingly clueless form of advocacy while he was drawing pay as an Oxford chair for the public understanding of science has to rank as among the most ridiculous cultural features of the last twenty years. But no where near as ridiculous as watching so many intelligent people, made foolish by their conceit and arrogance, following him up Cemetery Ridge, doing your opponents work for them.

Don’t feel bad, though, I’ve been frustratedly watching parts of the political left make the same mistakes for decades, though never as obviously. If I was in the habit of tearing my hair I’d be bald.

I think that would be one of those whom can’t be reasoned with… I also think Bruce is referencing normal people who are interested and willing to engage in the conversation (not willing to use the conversation as an excuse to try to preach –which I would say goes for both sides). I generally enjoy science and try to keep somewhat current (I have life to deal with and as science isn’t my profession there is only so much time to devote to such things). I can attest what I ran into on most the blogs wasn’t pretty and almost made me come close to saying “screw it”, I’d rather stay in the dark then deal with these @sses… (I expect that from the fundamentalists – getting it from the supposed scientists was a whole new experience).

Anthony (@13),

I agree with the gist of your comment. I really fail to see how alienating the majority of the world’s population is going to make any headway. Of course I’ve also always giggled when I watch them try to get computers to generate music using mathematics. They may pull off a pop tune someday, but I doubt they will ever get close to anything more involved. If only it were so easy (not classically trained, played drums in bands until well after college though – and yes, you’d best not annoy the crowd if you want them to support you…)

Brian (@12)

Yes, that’s about how they felt about it. I lived in Flagstaff for awhile (actually went to school with one of the leads working for the USGS on the mapping for that project – have some pictures somewhere of a Grand Canyon river trip we took together, couldn’t ask for a better person to be down there with!). It wasn’t a very popular idea even a state away (it was actually a regular topic of conversation when it first came up as a possibility)…

GM (@2),

I wouldn’t say the view “trumps” the facts – rather the view trumps the provided “solution” and again, once you’re at that point it is a comparative value kind of thing. They may well be rejecting your “solution” as being in any way better than what you are telling them will surely happen if they don’t. Why do you insist such is not allowed?