Book Review: The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From The Front Lines, by Dr. Michael Mann, Ph.D

Book review By DarkSyde for Daily Kos

The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches From The Front Lines
By Dr. Michael Mann, Ph.D
Columbia University Press; Cost $10 to $30 (Available in paperback )

Imagine a place where you and your family are threatened, your employer pressured by the most powerful people on earth to fire you, your email hacked and posted by the usual suspects in accusatory snippets, and where a mysterious letter containing white powder mixed in with tons of traditional hate mail land in your inbox. A suspected communist sympathizer during the McCarthy era, or a Muslim in the wake of 9-11? Nope. All because you helped make one of the most important scientific discoveries in a generation. That’s life in the land of the free and the home of the brave for prominent climate scientists these days, which is why I’m personally thrilled to feature one today who not only didn’t shrink an inch, he is fighting back, hard. . . .

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Principles of New Atheism

• All faith is folly, including moderate faiths

• Stop giving religion special treatment

• Bible offers no answers to suffering

• Religion is not the source of morality

• The universe is matter and nothing more

• Atheism is a positive philosophy

• Atheism is growing, coming out of the closet

• Godless societies happier, healthier

Source: Victor J. Stenger 

Where Are the Women? (Video)

[Thursday, 02.16.2012] on Capitol Hill, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform assembled a panel to discuss the birth control mandate in President Obama’s Affordable Care Act. The panel consisted of eight male anti-choice, anti-contraception religious leaders and one female anti-choice witness. None had health credentials. . . .

California [Reactionary] Darrell Issa chaired the panel, and because [Reactionaries] hold a majority in the House, he was able to choreograph the entire proceedings. He thoughtfully assembled a diverse group of men who don’t necessarily have any real, fact-based reason to oppose birth control except for the fact that it made them feel icky. Invited to testify were five men. And no women. The whole thing was, to put it as succinctly as possible, depressing as fuck.

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The Inevitable Triumph Of Reason Over Religion

But reason has an enemy…

Its name is religion. Religion has the ability to amplify the desire to be understood, but nearly nullifies the desire to understand others who are not like-minded. Religion retards intellectual growth, represses individual thought, is the adversary of science, the restraint against invention and the stalwart of what would otherwise advance our species into a peaceful existence, without want.

The Incredible Shrinking Apology…

Every day the pool of apologetics gets smaller while the ocean of evidence that counters religious doctrine, dogma and superstition grows deeper. Every day, by default, the fundamentally religious become more willfully ignorant.

Progress…

The voices of reason are getting louder, more prevalent and numerous. We are making slow and steady inroads into areas of our existence that, fifty years ago, would have seemed impossible.

Mightier Than The Sword…

But we will prevail, because if evolution has taught us anything, the desire to explore new ideas and learn new ways of doing things is almost unavoidable. From the time some of our ancestors started to write things down, other ancestors carried those words abroad, bringing new ideas and instructions for new technologies with them.

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