This post is about the fundamentalist atheist (who's a bit sweet on Buddhism - "I don’t call myself a Buddhist. and yet, if you asked me ... I’d point you in the direction of Buddhist techniques of meditation, and to the Buddhist literature") Sam Harris. Before I even start, let me say, this is the post Sam Harris, self-promoter and shill for his own self, wants to have written - He's all about getting his name out there. He just loves drawing the debate away from the rational conclusion that what's out there can't yet be explained by science, but might be, and that belief in the possibility of explanation is faith, itself. He'd rather have it faith vs. "science" or whatever he's masquerading his faith as. When people, such as the Pope (even with his appearingly intentional stumbles), call for a dialog between faiths, Sam Harris isn't having it. His faith in his extremist anti-faith beliefs are making him almost as popular as Keith Olbermann, firefly of the left's popularity.

In Harris's droolings on the Pope's speech (Truthdig: 'God's Rottwieler' Barks) he does his own trite old hat tricks and pulls out some abused and weary rabbits, banging on the drum at the back of the bandwagon of Islam hatred while also showing a disdain for religion that really calls into question :

“Only thus do we become capable of that genuine dialogue of cultures and religions so urgently needed today....”

It is ironic that a man who has just disparaged Islam as “evil” and “inhuman” before 250,000 onlookers and the world press is now talking about a “genuine dialogue of cultures.” How much genuine dialogue can he hope for? The Koran says that anybody who believes that Jesus was divine—as all real Catholics must—will spend eternity in hell (Koran 5:71-75; 19:30-38). This appears to be a deal-breaker. The pope knows this. The Muslim world knows that he knows it. And he knows that the Muslim world knows that he knows it. This is not a good basis for interfaith dialogue.

The passages in the Quran he references in Sura Al Maedah (the Feast) say that idolaters will go to hell and that today's Christianity isn't the Christianity of Jesus. God isn't the Messiah, God isn't three, there's only one God. Christians have their own beliefs about the Trinity, but they won't say God is the Messiah or three or that there isn't just one God. Further, John 20:17 has Jesus saying to Mary Magdalen "I am going to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God." He's not going to himself. Sura 19, Mary, (that's right, haters, that chapter's called "Mary"), repeats a saying of Jesus similar to John 20:17 - "God is my Lord and your Lord; you shall worship Him alone. This is the right path." Regardless, Harris is baiting not only the Pope, but also Muslims, and further, his cheering ignorant followers. His persistence in a superficial reading and understanding of faith shows that he's got an inability to apply critical thinking skills to texts of faith. Or, he doesn't, and he's simply trying to be a dick.

He goes on and pops off some of his little buzzwords and tropes about Islam - "martyrdom" and "jihad" along with the herring "treatment of Muslim women throughout the world," how Muslims have an "inclination to breed themselves into a state of world domination" (a student of Eastern philosophies, doesn't he know about India or China?) and his favorite apostasy case which he blithely tosses around not bothering to define or explain, since we all of course know how evil Muslims are. Again, I'm sad at Stanford. This type of critical sloppiness in my philosophy classes at Washington University would've gotten me an 'F' whereas I'm sure he shaved an "S" into his chest hair, dyed it red, and beerbonged all night after receiving some hummer for a 'bold' paper on justifying facistic secular rationalism.

This one really got me, especially from a closet Buddhist like Harris, right after he criticises the Pope for thinking every natural process and every mystery can be reduced to God:

Nearly a billion Hindus place three gods—Brahma (the Creator), Vishnu (the Preserver) and Shiva (the Destroyer)—in the space provided. Just how intellectually illuminating should we find that?

I'm sure he knows, but for some reason think his readers don't know (that's intellectually illuminating): Hindus believe that their gods are manifestations and aspects of the (single) universe. Facets, just as the Buddah would have you believe, Samuel. If you think about it for a second, that's what you think science is - fragments and bits of the universe in little logical bites, just waiting to be put together, or not.

He says this, too, on the lead up to the Pope's unfortunate (un)intentional statement about Islam:

“The West has long been endangered by this aversion to the questions which underlie its rationality, and can only suffer great harm thereby. The courage to engage the whole breadth of reason, and not the denial of its grandeur—this is the program with which a theology grounded in Biblical faith enters into the debates of our time. “Not to act reasonably, not to act with logos, is contrary to the nature of God”, said Manuel II, according to his Christian understanding of God, in response to his Persian interlocutor....”

Please read that first sentence again. I hope it doesn’t seem peevish to point out that the West faces several dangers even greater than those posed by an incomplete epistemology. The West is endangered, primarily, by the religious fragmentation of the human community, by religious impediments to clear thinking, and by the religious willingness of millions to sacrifice the real possibility of happiness in this world for a fantasy of a world to come. We are living in a world where untold millions of grown men and women can rationalize the violent sacrifice of their own children by recourse to fairy tales.

I think that last sentence refers to Masada, the fort where Jewish Zealots killed themselves and their children in 73 CE instead of surrendering to the Romans, a highlight in Zionists belief in their righteousness. While not a "fairy tale," I think he's saying that religion kills children. He could've well said something about Waco. When I read that, I thought the guy had no balls. He hates Islam, and loves to piss on it by association, why annoy evangelicals and Jews?

So, there you go, Samuel. You've got your name in bits. Enjoy the profit from your intellectual dishonesty. When you've got your 501(3)c set up to embarass religions, give me a call.

As a last bit, Mohammed Khatami, a religious scholar and former president of Iran spoke a few weeks ago in Chicago. I was fortunate enough to hear him speak on the very same topic the Pope would take up and Harris wants to be a dickrider of: dialog between faiths. Here's a snippet (apologies for the awful translation):

... there is a great opportunity of dialog and cooperation of working among people of faith, people of religion, the religious community and the people of faith - truly people of faith and people of true religion, not the extremists or terrorists or people who exploit religion and they use the name of religion, those getting involved in the terrorist or extremist activities but the balanced view, the people who understand this, and then those on the other side - the people who have pain of humanity in their heart the secular people [haters], the leadership on the other part on who are not known as the leadership of the religious - these two communities can work together and can communicate to one another for the betterment and better understanding of the cause of humanity. Here is the time when dialog among civilizations can come in, the dialog among civilizations can help to bring these two communities or segments together – the people of true faith and the people who are truly concerned about humanity.