it just seems that way in a lot of instances. But Sam Harris is living proof that belligerence and irrationality respect no sectarian boundaries.

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Sam Harris is so hung up on scattershot unorthodox spirituality that he has lost contact with inherent human compassion and real rationality. He is one twisted brother. But he is correct that Rapture, etc. is bullshit. He is a little correct and a whole lot incorrect, a poor role model indeed.

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This is just a screwed up guy who is trying to make his ideas as provocative and controversial as possible, in order to sell as many copies of his books as he can. I doubt whether he actually cares what he writes, or knows what he believes.

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In some ways I like Sam Harris and in some ways I don't. The more I read the end of faith the less I liked him, he does seem very biased and controversial in alot of his views and it does seem like he wants attention. He does also seem to dislike muslims more than he dislikes christians, which is silly, considering what he says his views are. And his evidence on that supposed metaphysical stuff probably isn't much more concrete than the evidence that the stories in the bible were true.

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No one is perfect. I also was disturbed by Harris' unorthodox views on torture and mysticism, but that's no reason to dismiss the tremendous good work he's done with his two groundbreaking books on the tyranny of religion.

He and Dawkins have voiced the frustration and outrage of millions of us rational folks who are fed up with the evils of religion and impatient with those who continue to empower it even though they should know better.

Of course, most religion is not about religious belief at all. It's about tribalism -- our most primitive social instincts dressed up in fancy vestments and fueled by self-righteousness.

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Wow, I don't know what to say to the Moonray comment. Torture sucks, sure, but he makes some cool points about religion... Wonder if you'd be so kind to Rumsfeld's, Yoo's or Gonzales' "other" philosophies...

I see Harris as a threat to atheism, a very valid thing. Once you jump to saying that religion is evil, or intrinsically bad, you are on the right wing bandwagon. Atheism ought to rise from its infancy and pull out the pacifier. Letting the bleating of religion-bashing continue makes it look very, very, well, like the religionists they abhor...

Moving on... I'm glad Gorenfeld's first-rate article referenced Voltaire, who was not, contrary to common wisdom, an atheist. He was a deist:

"What is faith? Is it to believe that which is evident? No. It is perfectly evident to my mind that there exists a necessary, eternal, supreme, and intelligent being. This is no matter of faith, but of reason."

Free lollipops to the first commenter who says that if he were born today he wouldn't believe this...

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It seems that the writer of this article is a master of double talk and total bullschitt. I would say he was related to George Bush but he does handle a lot of big words better than our village idiot. Maybe this is a draft for Bush's new stay the course crap.

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I am a recovering catholic who also had a less than stellar experience with a seminarian when I was maybe 14. That was then, this is now. In my quest for healing, I have explored Religious Science, Unitarian Universalist, Buddhism. I've read John Shelby Spong and John Dominic Crossan. Recently I happened upon Freedom From Religion Foundation. They featured an interview with Sam Harris. What struck me about those who oppose religious institutions is the lack of compassion for humanity in general. I am an EMT. I don't discriminate. When the pager goes off, I go. I don't ask what a persons religion is. I just try to open the airway and make sure the heart is pumping. Religions have been responsible for great evil and suffering and at the same time have done many good things. I worked in Louisiana after Katrina and Rita. I didn't see Sam Harris, but I did see religious groups. At the same time many religious groups cause great suffering to women. I guess there needs to be evolution within religion. Keep the good. Get rid of the bad. Spong's book 'Sins of Scripture' is a good step in the right direction. Crossan's 'Jesus a Revolutionary Biography' is a wonderful book that looks at the human side of Jesus. There are scholars trying to tweak out the real Jesus, not the creation of Constantine and the Roman Empire. Anyway, I appreciate Alternet's thoughtful article on Sam Harris. As for the torture, Jesus words do unto others as you would have them do unto you are meaninful whether you believe he was a god or just a man.

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The kind of reasoning this lunatic is using is similar to the one used by Hitler and its hordes of thugs. So many contradictions and hate make Harris another "little fascist american."

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Nobody is perfect. But pointing out imperfections without a balancing appreciation of the overarching brilliance of the man is just spin doctoring: Like discrediting Einsteins theory of relativity on the basis of his womanizing, or Mother Theresa for her failures in promoting gender equality.

Harris and Dawkins are spearheading an assault that should have been made a generation ago. The fundamentalists can - and should - be discredited. There are few things more repugnant than theocracy and the world will be a better place if organized religion is slapped down and put in its place.

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What utter garbage. I wonder if the man even knows what he's talking about.

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As much as I like AlterNet, I can't help but detect some kind of agenda in this article. Sam Harris is undeniably difficult to swallow, particularly when he comes out swinging against "liberals" and their "tolerance" of religious differences. And while his manichaean approach can be frustrating, his core premise is no doubt correct: religious dogma (i.e. faith), despite the good it may seem to do, is (like any other human enterprise that forces you to delude yourself) simply bad for humanity in the long run. What's interesting about Harris is that he has undeluded himself so much people can't understand or relate to him anymore, and yet he's not afraid to keep saying (out loud!) what he must know will be misinterpreted, particularly with respect to relative morality (something religionists often don't "get"). For this reason I tend to agree Harris can be bad for atheism, particularly after reading somewhat skewed articles as this. I recommend people read, at a minimum, Letter to a Christian Nation for it's clear-headed arguments for reason. If you continue to read The End of Faith keep in mind the guy's not afraid to admit there are things we don't know about the universe, but all we have to go on is the evidence we have so far.

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Harris speaks of the value of nondualism as taught in the Buddhist tradition. Nondualism is about knowing who you are. That knowing is very difficult for most people. It is, in fact, self- torture. We do whatever we can to avoid it. Finding the faults of a group of people is one way. Such an approach makes the fault-finders feel nice, normal, and accepted. We transfer our own need for torture -- which would bring us knowledge of who we are -- elsewhere.

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Mr. Gorenfield's list of published stories on AlterNet -- up to and including this one -- speaks to his center, which is scared and judgmental, exclusionary and hypocritical. I wish him true enlightenment.

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Typical of our pop culture society. America has become a disgusting place.

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... That Atheism too boasts celebrity-hungry, hateful, self-contradictory morons within it's ranks as well?!?

Say it ain't so!

I am shocked, shocked, Alternet. How dare you imply that the Fundieathiest Sect has it's own share of dubious Selfish-Helpers! You had almost finally brow-beaten me into the belief that Atheism was the One Truth, founded on pure, perfect (if blatantly condescending) Logic. Wherever should I place my blind faith now? What's next, an admission that there may be actual decent human beings among the ranks of the Republican Party?

I'm sorry, Atheist Youth, I just can't resist...

"Where's your (no) God now?" ;-)

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Sam Harris seems to want to jettison Religion while at the same time, keeping a personally defined religious belief that boils down to a mish-mash of ideas he has selected. His mish-mash is factually inaccurate when he maligns Muslims or sees Buddhism just as a "tuning in" to peaceful mental states. He is a bit like a very disappointed scientist, who when he cannot find God, still has to make him up somehow. At any rate, who cares, except if people listen to him or his justifications for torture and the like.

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SPIRITUALITY; which connects us to God within ourself and all of Creation.

Religion gives the rules, dogma and doctrine and has been used to divide people and control them.

Spirituality liberates and connects.


The following is excerpted from
"Memoirs of a Nice Irish-American 'Girl' in Occupied Territory"

Before Emperor Constantine brought Christianity into the mainstream, all the early Church Fathers taught that Christians should not serve in the army but instead willingly suffer rather than inflict harm on any other. St. Augustine was the first Church Father to consider the concept of a Just War. Within 100 years after Constantine, the Empire required that all soldiers in the army must be baptized Christians and thus, the decline of Christianity began.

With the justification of war and violence supplied by Augustine’s Just War Theory, wrong became right. Nothing much has changed in two millennia, for in today’s Orwellian world politicians claim the way to peace is through war and that nuclear weapons provide protection. I don’t care who wears the uniform, or how noble they believe their cause, war is the ultimate form of terrorism for any civilian caught in the crossfire of violence. Even as a kid, I could not understand the logic that promoted the need for Hiroshima and Nagasaki to save American lives; and why there was never a mention of repentance for the innocent that died. Eisenhower warned America not to bind our economy to the Industrial Military Complex. But, like most prophets, he was ignored.


In 313 AD, Emperor Constantine legitimized Christianity and thus, those who had been considered rebels and outlaws began to enjoy political power and prestige. Jesus’ other name is The Prince of Peace, and with the marriage of church and state, his true teachings were reinterpreted. The justification of warfare and the use of state sponsored violence corrupted what Christ modeled and taught. Jesus was always on about WAKE UP! The Divine already indwells you and all others. Christ taught that to follow him requires that one must love ones enemies; one must forgive those who hate, curse and revile them, without a thought of payback.


"Memoirs of a Nice Irish-American 'Girl' in Occupied Territory" will be in print Feb. 2007
http://www.wearewideawake.org

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Let's put his claim that torture works to the test. In 1690 several people were tortured in Salem, and gave all kinds of evidence that people around them were witches. Maybe Harris' belief in psychic phenomena will explain how people who had never mentioned this before were suddenly seeing the light, but I gues they were all in on the witch conspiracy. But the people tortured testified that women flew through the air and sickened cows. I guess somewhere between now and 1690 we lost that particular technology.

Yes, torture works. It lets the interrogator hear what he wants to hear, and forces the tortured to tell them what they want to hear. That what the torturer wants to hear might diverge from reality Harris doesn't seem to understand.

We don't just oppose torture on moral grounds--we do so on practical grounds. If I torture people into telling me something I will never know if they are telling me what they think I want to hear as opposed to the truth. Just because I believe that someone planted a bomb in the Empire State Building doesn't make it true-especially if I am tearing out his fingernails.

End of story.

Now, this means that you have to weigh what people tell you answering questions against, oh, I dunno, reality. Like evidence. It actually helps catch people once in a while. That's why our court system, which can seem so illogical to non-lawyers, is designed the way it is. The point is to make sure information isn't tainted, by planting evidence, for example (this is why there are loads of rules about the chain of custody of evidence gathered at crime scenes).

But people like Harris don't get it. They are caught up with their own brilliance. This guy isn't an atheist any more than I am a practicing Hindu. He's a mishmash of Neitzsche, spiced with Deepak Chopra and Voltaire, and mixed badly with Dawkins and Huxley.

Sheesh. The guy doesn't even seem to understand that when legit scientists were looking for ESP phenomena in an experimental setting, they found nothing. The experiments have been done, and the results are no better than chance. The xenoglossia phenomenon has been debunked long ago.

(The short version is that humans have similar noses, vocal chords and throats. Given that, any string of sounds I make can be parsed into words in some language, someplace, and it is likely to even make sense if one is very generous about syntax).

Guys like Harris belong in the dustbin of the self-help section.

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Let's not compare Sam Harris with Richard Dawkins. The former is an intellectual midget next to the latter. I read half of "The End Of Faith", got pissed off by his cruelty and never read "Letter to a Christian Nation".

Harris tries to talk about torture AND about his supposed Buddhism. What a joke. The Buddha was totally -TOTALLY- non-violent and never condoned any kind of violence, much less torture.

And since Harris missed it: the foundation of Buddhism is the Four Noble Truths, which are: the existence of suffering, the causes of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the path to the cessation of suffering. No room for torture in there.

I'll read Dawkins and forget Harris.

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I've read various pieces on Sam Harris, although none of his major publications at this point. This article however, seems to cherry-pick its points the exact same way it accuses Harris of doing.

This doesn't seem like a news piece, but rather a personal and unbalanced attack aimed at discrediting Harris.

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...can one make a comfortable living, achieve fame, and reach high office despite being a raving lunatic. I suppose a Fox segment featuring Mr. Harris and Pat Robertson would count as "balanced", no?

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I thought some of the ideas in The End of Faith were fascinating, although I didn't agree with alot of it. Maybe we don't need to look for The Truth in anything anyone is writing about these subjects, but become more willing to read critically, let our own ideas be shaken up when they need it, and be able to say, "hogwash" when an author is totally off the wall. Americans on both sides of these debates often seem to look for an all-or-nothing reiteration of what they already believed to begin with. I wish to high heaven that Harris didn't think the nonsense he thinks about torture and Muslims (and he wouldn't were there a chance in hell that he himself could ever face such things; it's really easy to approve of what you'll never encounter and he's like many Americans in this regard) because his interesting thinking about the problems religion has caused could him seem at least readable to more people.

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It is sad that Mr. Harris knows only of the Christian beliefs of the right. There are Christians who are spiritual, meditative and who believe in the ability of the mind to connect with what is not seen in the universe. hmmmmm - some just might see prayer as a mystical experience. Christianity is about community, can the same be said for Eastern religions and the paranormal?

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"Some propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people for believing them."

Is this meant to be one of them?

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I read Harris "The End of Faith," and I agreed with his premise that religion does more harm than good, specifically since it lures people away from seeking realityand mires them in fantasy. But it was when Harris made distinctions between Middle-East terrorism and U.S. terrorism that he exhibits a ethnocentric, white-supremacist naivete'. Harris says that when suicide bombers kill civillians, they do so with the intention of harming innocent people, but when the U.S. carpet bombs third world countries, that is unintentional. He never considers that U.S. foreign policy is predicated on dominating people and their resources so that no power dares to rival that of the U.S. He does not see this as terrorism, and even manages to paint the U.S. security state as the victim. He should read some Michael Parenti or Noam Chomsky even to get a better view of what is really going on with acts of terror in the name of religion, or worse, imperialism. Harris is so apologetic of "Christian Nation" acts of violence but recommends we torture and kill "Islamic Nation" acts of violence--he has fallen into the trap most Americans spiral into--it is what Chomsky calls not the double standard, but the "single standard"-- that what we do is always right, and when our competitors do essentially the same thing, they are morally reprehensible...

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Sam Harris has got to be one of the fuzziest-headed thinkers I have ever encountered. How anyone can take him seriously is beyond me. I wonder why he has attained such a celebrity status within the news and press (and even to some extent, here on Alternet)? I think he is popular because he is easy to understand (and he is rather handsome). People tend to get excited whenever someone is talking about "something deep" and they suddenly understand it (hence the sucess of Deepak Chopra, et al). Harris is this same sort of charlatan to pseudo-academics. He is all window dressing. He is a second-rate philosopher who doesn't understand anything of the history and development of any of the religious traditions he writes on. I know of nowhere within academia where Harris's books are really taken seriously, and heaven help us if they are!

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I recently received both of Harris's books as a gift. I read Letter to a Christian Nation before reading The End of Faith. I really liked most of what he had to say, so I went on to read The End of Faith. Like the author of this article, I was quite disturbed by Harris's violent animosity toward Islam and his apparent support of torture.

I was not bothered, however, by Harris's discussion of spiritualism or mysticism. I agree that there is more to life and the universe than that which we can readily identify or conceive of. In fact, I was gratified to see that he did not rule out all spiritual possibilities.

But by far, to me, one of the most illogical and irrational scenarios in The End of Faith was Harris's evaluation of his own encounter with a group of men who were attempting to assault a woman. He was in a foreign country (sorry - I can't remember off-hand which one it was) and, instead of trying to rescue the woman with force, he used a subterfuge of pretending to need directions and acting confused in order to allow the woman to escape. His ploy worked beautifully. However, in retrospect, he believes that his approach was completely wrong because it used a lie (that he needed directions) and did not confront the men directly. He said that the men would go away from the incident without having been told that what they were doing was unacceptable.

His fallacy (obviously, at least to me) is that Harris could have wound up dead or seriously hurt. Considering that there were several men and only one of him, the woman would still have been assaulted or abducted and probably also seriously hurt. The perpetrators would likely have walked away believing that they were capable of not only doing as they liked with the woman, but also of overcoming any opposition.

Is Harris so delusional that he actually believed his confrontation would have stopped a crime? If so, his case against pacifism was an empty argument.

In general, Harris does make some good points, but his comparison of the excesses of Islam to (his view of) the lack of comparable violence on the part of the American invasion casts doubt on his entire exploration of that subject.

As a "militant agnostic" (I don't know and you don't either), I was prepared to be enchanted by Harris, especially after reading Letter to a Christian Nation. But I was disappointed at his dogmatic, irrational assessment of Islam and found much of what he said in The End of Faith to be little more than a rant.

Perhaps the most problematic issue is that Harris presents so few ideas in the way of resolution aside from torturing Muslims and bombing Islamic countries. How are we to stop tolerating religion without banning or discriminating against the faithful? I basically agree that religion causes more harm than good, that debunking the irrational mythology of virgin births and original sin should be socially acceptable, and that the widespread lack of critical thinking when it comes to matters of belief is detrimental to our society. I'd just like if if Harris had come up with solutions rather than just appearing to have an axe to grind.

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... the voice of radical atheism. The problem we face is not religion... or lack thereof... but of zealotry for BOTH and a lack of any REAL compassion or tolerance from the zealots of either.

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Mr. Harris's abiding interest in non-Western philosophies, the paranormal, etc., only lends credence to the "God-shaped vacuum" theory, which blows his arguments out of the water and makes him, personally, look rather ridiculous. Moreover, atheist jihadists like Harris and Dawkins are guilty of the very crime they claim to abhor among the faithful--i.e., zealotry run amok. They may very well prove to be the vanguard of a new "Preacher vs. Scientist" Thirty Years' War.

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Maybe, one day... we will be able to understand that faith is a tool for people to use, and that there are many different tools out there. One that works for one person, might not work for another. If we wanted peace in this world we would let people to pick the tool that worked best for them and let it be.

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He's probably getting big bucks to be a stalking horse for the religious right.

Stalking horse: A sham candidate put forward to conceal the candidacy of another or to divide the opposition.

It'll be, "LOOK at those AWFUL atheists and how they sanction torture! And they believe in reincarnation!"

You know: Michael Moore stands for all liberals, Barbra Streisand stands for Hollywood, those Eye-racki guys with them funny names are all terrorist bombers.

Sam Harris stands for anyone who doesn't worship the Christian god.

Harris' book will be quoted like Protocols of the Elders of Zion: "LOOK! This is who your leader is! THIS is what you and all atheists believe! LOOK, before we string you up!"

Don't give Sam Harris any of your money, time, or attention.

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Wouldn't it have been better to just say there is no G/D and cross your fingers in the hope that it's true? Instead we get the disconnected meanderings of the fool who says in his heart that there is no G/D. Poor Sam it seems to me is crying out his fear that he just might be wrong. After all.... either there is or there isn't some things that defy explanation. Things that some accept and express as simple faith in a G/D of creation. What is the harm if you're wrong that G/D doesn't exist? You wake up one morning and discover that you're dead and the guy sitting on your bed is G/D Himself wanting to know why you took those views. Imagine He ain't happy with your positions. Seems to me you risk much more in not believing. As a Christian I choose to believe in the G/D of Creation because the arguments against His existence have been examined by me and found to be wanting. Too many things that defy explanation with odds of random occurence so high as to be impossible without a Creator G/D. I know this disturbs you non-believers...... and that's OK. Some day you'll discover that you're wrong. I pray it won't be too late for you to discover the truth because the consequences of your unbelief won't be pleasant.

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like a high school term paper i once wrote. you'd think that a maturity might have set in by now. check your walls, i'll bet nothing is sticking.

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The point of Harris' writing is to consider all angles of a social problem without relying on conventional wisdom or faith. His is critical thinking at its best. Harris is an explorer in human behavior and seeks the naked truth. Come on folks, Harris is not a nut case. We are a sea of humanity with a myriad of thoughts and ideas, confusion is the norm. Fear of pain and death and the unknown is common as, well, as common as anuses. Harris seeks answers while attempting to cut away the dogma that muddies the waters of truth.

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I was disappointed with the sarcastic attacks on Harris. The facts speak for themselves, and certainly there is discrepancy between buddhist teaching and justification of torture, just as there is discrepancy between atheisism and belieif in paranormal activity (miracles are paranormal activity--if in fact they occured).

But, a book review would have been a better genre for the delivery of this criticism. As far as the inverview model, this piece digs a hole and forces Harris into it, and it is so heavily biased by the writer that it fails miserably.

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This critique of Sam Harris is unfair. Briefly, I would make the following points:

(1) One could conceive of a 'ticking nuclear time bomb case' where some suspect is known to be a bad guy with sufficient certainty that it makes some kind of moral sense to use some form of torture. This is at least a logical possibility. However, I am against any use of torture simply because of the inevitable government incompetence and bias.

(2) Eastern religions have the inestimable virtue of tolerance, which is sorely lacking in the orthodox version of the three 'Abrahamic' faiths. The Eastern religions do not demand blind faith. At their best, they say to try something like meditation and see if it works for you. Believing in some kind of deity is an option. There are rational reasons for believing in some kind of deity, such as 'Why is there a universe?' You may not agree, but it is fanatical to deny someone else the feeling of a great mystery that needs to be explained. Stop being so anal about any trace of metaphysical speculation.

(3) Christianity has a violent history, but Jesus didn't set the example. Mohammed most defintiely set the example for the violence in Islamic history. That's an important distinction, which continues to this day. Where are the right-wing Christians sawing of heads and blowing stuff up? -- unless you think this is what Bush policy amounts to! I think the war was an irresponsible gamble and blunder, but it was at least superficialy in the name of democracy rather than religion.

(4) A little psychic research won't hurt anybody. Of course, it needs to be verified by independent teams again and again, but getting hysterical about it is another kind of fanaticism.

There is much to dislike in the Iraq war, in the current Republican party, in conservative Christianity, and so on, but don't let your hatreds turn you into fanatics in your own right. Well, I guess that wasn't so brief.

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The End of Faith was a combination of clear thinking and BS. By highlighting the BS, you have performed a great service. Thank you.

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What a horrible piece of writing. Reminds me of the type of fact twisting that the Bush Regime would come up with. For all of you dim-wits out there notice that this author never quotes Sam Harris by more that 3-7 words at a time. In the very few instances where he does quote him at length it lends no credence to the authors main contentions. Seriously, this author quotes words that could have been used in any context and then fills in his words between. Is this a high school term paper? My guess is this author has some serious beef against athiests.

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our country's foremost promoter of "reason" is also supportive of ESP, reincarnation and other unscientific concepts.

O NOEZ! THIS CANNOT BE ALLOWED! We must all stick our noses as far up Richard Dawkin's butt as we possibly can!

While I agree with the points the author makes regarding Harris' anti-Muslim prejudice, Orenfeld himself comes off as a enormous bigot. Not to mention racist.

Just goes to show that atheists can be mouth-breathers too.

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This sorry story reminds me of a visit to affluent Marin county where I found a culture of escapism. Zen Budhism, Yoga, anything but dealing with what America is.
The sad fact that these excuses for torture come from somebody with a Quacker background is quite disturbing and demonstrates just how demented America has become.
Exceptionalists who fail to empathize with the victims of their supremicist system.

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I agree that nobody's perfect. Harris' book just makes people uncomfortable. Even my liberal, well-educated, well-intentioned "interfaith" friends. And it isn't just his imperfections. It is quite clearly his central argument that is the root source of the discomfort. Everyone, without exception, with whom I have shared his ideas has responded with an ad hominem argument: a slice, a swipe, or a diatribe against Harris. Nobody has undertaken any solid rebutal of his central argument, that I have seen or heard. Sam Harris may pick his butt hairs and eat them, for all I know. What about his central line of argument? So, instead of taking on his central argument people attack his Buddhism, or his antipathy to Islam, or his "smart-aleky tone" as one friend put it. That way, we can dismiss him and put him back in his box without really taking on the center of what he says.

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The creation and success of religion is based on our physiological state. Pleasure and Pain...Heaven and Hell... that is the world all humans are born into. We are small, looking up at and to these huge beings in charge of our every move and need. They are our Gods...its as simple and banal as that, I am afraid. And no matter how tall or golden your temple or shrine, religious belief and the affinity for it, is forged in the (desperate) hours of infancy. That said, I must admit, that it took me 40 years of wishy washy mumbling when asked about my own 'beliefs', to finally come out as an atheist. Only 40 years, I might add, after looking at Mr. Harris. Growing up with a quaker as a father, I'm sure, is no easy task. Liberating oneself of such intensity in doctrine most likely even harder. Yet one thing is clear: Humanity is at a point where the transcendence of religious delusions is not only mandatory but possible. We have the brain capacity to grasp our physiological dependence at the start of our lives. We have the capacity to see and understand the similarity of the depiction of our deities and the large looming all powerful faces and voices hovering over our cribs, deciding if we're eligible for life on a moment to moment basis. From the perspective of 'baby' time is infinite and the material world an utter mystery. Mom God and Dad God deliver the holy templates, literally from heaven down to us. It is the easiest thing to see and understand, if you've done one thing first: acknowledge the infant conditioning and imprint we all share as tiny vulnerable dependent creatures we are at first, and then dethrone our parental Gods WITHOUT SUBSTITUTING THEM WITH ORGANIZED RELIGIOUS ICONS!!! And that is very hard to do. Especially in a society like ours, which prides itself on keeping its public discourse at an infant level. No surprise, therefore, that Mr. Harris appears to liberate himself in steps...baby steps, that is.

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Either Gorenfeld did not actually read Harris' books or he demonstrates a rather staggering amount of bias, to the point of aggressively spinning facts and quoting out of context to suit the authors point of view. Either one simply lends one to discredit this article in its entirety. Does Alternet vet these articles at all? I will allow Alternet some critical room here, as Harris' opinions on liberals is clearly at odds with a lot of the Alternet editorial position, but can we at least keep the commentary accurate?

Harris does NOT promote torture in his books. Rather, he presents the ethical dilemna that we construct through our own actions by tacitly approving (or at least not loudly and consistently decrying) the huge number of innocent deaths in Iraq, yet react in revulsion and horror at the thought of torturing a single person. Harris goes into some depth in examining the social mechanisms that allow this dicotomy of action on our part. His point is accurate and valid.

Harris' attacks all Abrahamic religions, but does single out Islam for particular attention, with good reason. While any religion can be corrupted for political purposes, and most have at some point or another, Islam is the one religion that has the aggressive behavior hard coded into its doctrine. Harris merely recognizes and points out the huge potential threat inherent in this doctrinal structure.

Lastly, Harris does not promote mysticism as such. What he does do, however, is recognize the human need for spiritualism. This concept is becoming increasingly accepted within scientific/athiestic circles, even by such renowned persons as Richard Dawkins. Eintstein himself subscribed to this view. The trick is to seperate the spiritual need from the doctrinal religion that typically encapsulates it. Harris is correct in his statements that the Eastern philosophies are far superior to the Western ones in this regard. Harris allows that the Eastern practices suffer from their own shortcomings, but are far closer to acheiving a practical, functional spirituality than any doctrine developed in the West. Harris also recognizes that science cannot explain everything under the sun and goes on to suggest that we take a closer look at certain 'supernatural' claims in an effort to determine if anything is actually there, rather than descredit them out of hand.

Do I agree with all that Harris presents? No. But at least present his ideas accurately and then discredit them if you can. I suspect any unbiased, openminded reader will find that Harris is difficult to rebute on most points, unpleasant though they may be.

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The author makes two stabs at discrediting the messenger:
A) He's in favor of torture! (Ergo: he's a radical nutcase)
B) He's a Buddhist evangelist! (Ergo: He's a hypocrite [or self-serving] for critiquing Abrahamic religions.)

Neither of these is legitimate, IMO.

In the first case, Harris only argues that torture would be ethically permissible in "in rare circumstances." In practice, he's derided all cases of torture from Abu Ghraib to Gitmo. The main point about torture is that it's better (less ethically suspect) than bombing innocent civilians. (See Harris' "In Defense of Torture" for clarification.) [Personally, I disagree that torture is ever permissible, but Harris makes a respectable, well-reasoned argument.]

Secondly, it's not as though he's trying to be a "missionary" for Buddhism or eastern religions. The author seems to want to compare his personal brand of "spirituality" to the organized religions he criticizes. That's unfair. His only advocacy about Buddhism, comes from the conviction that it's more amenable to "reason," "evidence," and "commonsense."

Lastly, Harris does not call himself an atheist -- he doesn't like the term and rarely uses it. In fact, he writes, "we do not have a term for a person who rejects astrology, nor do we need one. If legions of astrologers sought to bend our public policy to their pseudo-science, we wouldn’t need to dub ourselves 'non-astrologers' to put them in their place...So should it be with religion."

I encourage reflex-critics to actually read End of Faith. It's not as far out or condescending as this article would have you believe.

--Axl

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I haven't had the opportunity to read any of Mr. Harris' books, but I have read some articles about him. My biggest exposure to him and his ideas is from watching the documentary "The God who Wasn't There", where he was one of the persons being interviewed. I do think this article focuses on bits and pieces of negativity about Mr. Harris. Overall, his ideas about religion need to be addressed and discussed.

There are thousands of right-wing religious fanatics (of all religions) out there creating noise. We need people like Sam Harris, for all his faults, now more then ever.

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Sam Harris seems to me to be arrogant, ignorant, dogmatic and violent --- Is he the New Age answer to Anne Coulter??

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But, man, doesn't Harris look exactly like Ben stiller?

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Sam needs to get together with Bobby Henderson (also a recent author of a book on faith, belief, torture and general blather) and work on a book with him. They'd be able to broaden their audience, and spread twice the amount of BS in half the time!

OF course, Bobby's a legend for not retuning contacts, only talking to his merchandising reps and stabbin' folks in the back, but they might be able to work something out, if Sam's got a good lawyer.

The two just seem to be destined to work together.

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Surely better chemical means than physical torture to elicit the truth have been found. Prisoners could be fed chocolate ice-cream laced with sodium pentathol or whatever the most up-to-date drug is and made to feel loved and wanted. The problem is, that the people who use torture, in spite of the unreliability of the information it gains, really like inflicting pain.

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Like TJ with the Bible, I wanted to take an Xacto knife to EoF and separate the brilliance from the BS.

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Hey,
So what if Harris is flawed and flaky in a couple of spots. His arguments regarding religion are valid and well supported. Who is flawed worse--religious folks with their hateful, irrational dogma or someone like Harris who thinks torture OK and promotes spiritual nonsense after having figured out much of religion is a hoax?

Maybe they are all just inherently flawed, because they belong to a foolish species that is busy destroying the planet based on political, religious, economic myths that continue tribal behaviour. Harris follows the line of atheist, Colonel Ingersoll in the 19th century who said much the same but to no avail.

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... interesting as are the thinking of many divergent thinkers, but he strings together a potpourri of great looseness and inconsistency. His views about Islam are horrible, but reflective of people like BushCo and the Neocons and the Theocons, all of whom are wrong in my estimation. As a result of the first gulf war I bagan reading Islamic writings and found them to be quite beautiful and not much different than what I was taught as a catholic. In fact both religions are so similar I was amazed. But then Confucius, Hilel, Christ and the Prophet Muhammed said many of the same things as regards what we christians call the Sermon on the Mount, praying quietly without self aggrandizement, doing good works and taking care of the family, relatives, the poor and the sick. 'What you do to these the least of my brethern you do unto me'. I think I got it correct. Only Bush and the Republicans and those who vote rethug believe in torture and killing, including my fellow catholics who all seem to be rethuglikkkans because Pope John Paul, Pope Benedict, Mother Angelica, and the Franciscan Priests say so, which is a very bad reason. While other catholic clergy like Cardinal McCarrick and Archbishop Mahoney proudly exclaim that it is okay to break american laws regarding illegal immigrants, and if so I must ask just exactly when do these guys stop breaking laws that keep our country a nation of laws. We, in america have a legal way of doing things and changing laws. Only those radical right wingers would propose such lawbreaking but then that is one aspect of Harris's points that I agree with, namely, the damage done by those who are absolutely convinced they KNOW the mind of God, but who really commit the cardinal sin of PRIDE('the worst of these') and heresy, sacrilege and blasphemy. I live in the firm and total belief that we are all children of a loving God, and that includes Muslims, and all are equal in His eyes. While, at the same time, I am convinced that the killing of others is against the laws of God and the teachings of Christ. Radical religious extremism is EQUALLY wrong whether Muslim or Christian. Those who claim to be Pro-Life and yet kill by voting Republican and for Bush/Cheney are really not Pro-Life at all. They are merely Pro-Birth and Pro-Death.
If the Pope really is Pro-Life then why does he support the death of women(Jiminez Bojorge and her unborn child) in countries over which he has enormous control. If the Pope is really Pro-Life why does he not put tremendous pressure on Bush and the Rethuglikkkans to bring about acceptable wages for american families so the parents can provide a basic level of health care and education for all. If the Pope is really Pro-Life then why does he not put tremendous pressure on the Mexican government to end it's corruption and do everything to raise it's people out of their unending poverty which came about because catholic Spain invaded the americas'. If the Pope is really Pro-Life why is he and the Catholic Church the single institution most responsible for keeping women in second class status. If the Pope is really Pro-Life why does he not chastise american corporations for keeping the people of Mexico, Central and South America in poverty. If the Pope is truly ProLife why does he not chastise the american gov't for it's use of the CIA and other U.S. Forces for destabilising, toppling and killing people all over the world, especially during the last century and even more so during this new century. If the Pope is really Pro-Life why is he not putting full support behind the South American countries who are seeking to end american control over and impoverishment of the many millions of people in South America. If the Pope is really Pro-Life why does he not loudly protest the Bush/Republican gov't of kidnapping Jean Bertrand Aristide and removing him from his democratically and popularly elected post as president of Haiti. If Pope John Paul

PRAY FOR PEACE

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If Pope John Paul II was really Pro-Life why did he not protest the torture, rape and death of so many innocent nuns and tens of thusands of people by Central and South American gov'ts.

If PJP II was so Pro-Life that he was willing to sell the catholic church and his papacy out to the Republican Party and Reagan, I realize he had a personal agenda of using the U.S. to get the communists out of Poland, (also exactly why is there a secret CIA torture prison in Poland which is supposed to be such a catholic country) why did he not loudly protest the torture, rape and near killing of Sr. Dianna Ortiz OSU by the CIA and U.S. Embassy in Guatemala and all of which occurred under the Reagan and Bush41 presidencies. If american catholics(Tim Russert, Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, Sen. Sam Brownback, Robert Novak, Peggy Noonan(speechwriter for Reagan and Bush41 during the torture of Sr. Ortiz, and who claims to be such a paragon of catholicism though being divorced, but is really nothing more than another vicious conservative who should be working for Fox News), Phyllis Schlafly, John Boehner, Rick Santorum(another vicious conservative, in my estimation), Rep. Jean Schmidt(R-Oh), ex-Sen. Mike DeWine and all the other so called and self proclaimed Pro-Life Catholics do all of the above mentioned good works instead of being vicious conservative rethugs and dedicated to the vicious actions of Bush/ Cheney. And what about the other 132 catholics in congress will do about these and similar issues now and in the future. Instead I have to constantly write about and remind people of these facts on an almost daily basis in order to protect our beloved america from being theocratized and split apart, demonized and destroyed by these so called Pro-Life Catholics. Now we will see what Pelosi and the Dems do about these kinds of issues and as a result keep america from being destroyed from within by the viciousness of Catholic Conservative Republicans who will adhere to their dogma no matter the cost to america or the Iraqi people. My firm belief is that the Popes and these Pro-Life Catholics are merely Pro-Birth and Pro-Death as long as it is others who suffer and die as the blithly go about torturing people, including american citizens, as they USE their phony Pro-Life agenda for nothing more than politics, money and power. The catholic allies, the white southern confederate states fundie Baptists are just as rabid as the radical catholics and equally guilty. But I m not a Baptist so I don't critique them as much. Interestingly enough People such as Jimmy and Rosalind Carter, Bill Moyers and Jim Wallis can speak for me anytime as they reflect my my religious and political beliefs far more than any catholic. In the last six years of the Bush/ Cheney/Rethug/Catholic administration I have not read or heard about even a single catholic or catholic organization that doesn't support the Bush/ Cheney/ Bush family oil and war machine. There must be at least a few catholics that think all this killing corruption and rethug crime are wrong for america, hopefully Nancy Pelosi does. May God our heavenly Father bless her for what she has accomplished in becoming a top ranking woman legislator and thus doing for women in america and the entire world what all the Popes have never done for women. We have passed a huge milestone in advancing the cause of all women and girls and hopefully getting mankind one step closer to what God wants of all mankind. One of the greatest tragedies of religion is their regard of women as second class citizens and expendable. A catholic mens organization that I no longer belong to is financing a group that is working hard to bring about legislation that will outlaw all abortions for any and all reasons, even including the death of the mother. America will one day find itself knee deep in dead women should this legislation ever pass.
America needs a lot more Nancy Pelosis' ...

PRAY FOR PEACE

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America needs a lot more Nancy Pelosis' in congress to protect and advance the protection, value and values of women, and prevent such vicious antiabortion legislation that would just allow pregnant women with complications to die. I sincerely hope that I would be dead before any such vicious legislation would ever be enacted by my church or my gov't. I really do despise and disavow those who would seek to endanger the lives of women via such legislation which is and abomination unto god and women.
Sorry I got so wordy.

PRAY FOR PEACE, and against american fear and war mongers who are the rethugs and bullies in america and the world. These kind of bullies never grow up and never rise above their own personal evils. THUGS AND BULLIES, one and all.

PRAY FOR PEACE

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This is the third inaccurate hit piece I've seen about atheists on so called progressive websites in two weeks. If this is what you call progressive then you can count me out. I know progressives and you're no progressives.

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While I agree that suggesting torture is acceptable, Gornfeld's criticisms of Harris' metaphysical "search" isn't accurate from my reading of his work.

Sure, he meditates, etc. but it appears Harris doesn't buy into the religious aspects of Buddhism, etc. Meditation is a search for peace and understanding within oneself -- and how "mind" is related to the universe... Most of Buddhism doesn't even qualify as religious belief (there is no god, per se -- but many traditions do have supernatural belief. Whether or not Harris ascribes to them is indeterminate from his writings) and it is not dogmatic: Buddhism doesn't teach "truth", but a path that is to be investigated by the practitioner -- who decides for him/herself what is useful and what is not.

This last point makes it a far cry from Islam, Christianity, etc...

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I agree that Mr. Harris' dabblings in mystical phenomenon is a bit distracting, and I could live without it. But I think he is trying to say that there are ways that humans can connect to the universe and not be all bound up to literal interpretations of religious texts. That's why I am a Unitarian Universalist. We pick and choose from all types of different traditions along with science. We take what makes sense and leave the rest.

I do believe people want to connect with something beyond themselves, and to the extent Harris is encouraging that, well, that's fine. But he could creep too close to the abyss in this area, that's for sure.

The stuff about torture and killing some people because of their beliefs, yeah, that's disquieting stuff, and not what I really like about Harris. I mean, he sort of has a point. To the extent those guys who flew into WTC were doing it because of their faith, well, one can see where Harris is going. I personally don't believe that violence is the way to combat violence. For instance, if we stop suicide bombers before they are about to do their thing, I am not for sentencing them to death or for torturning them, but I sure would support them being sentenced to natural life in prison. If one of them had amazingly survived the crash I wouldn't have supported the death penalty for the person or torture, just a fair trial and natural life in prison if convicted.

It is like with Saddam. No doubt he was a bad, bad man and deserved some punishment. But he also deserved a fair trial and the extent of his sentencing should have been natural life in prison. We don't solve violence in the world by adding more to it. I just heard about that kid who apparently hung himself because of Saddam's hanging, a rather graphic example of how violence begets more violence.

I agree that Mr. Harris is probably exaggerating some of his more controversial thoughts in order to drum up interest, sales, money, etc. While that is a debatable way of conducting oneself, I can see why he is doing it.

And, he is making us think about these things. I agree that Sagan and others like him were kinder, gentler atheists, and that's the kind I generally want to be, but I sometimes like to see a little atheistic red meat served up, and I do it now and again in pieces I sometimes write for my local progressive paper. It is a fine line, not wanting to incite and infuriate but, at the time, wanting to spur debate.

The main thing I am concerned with is it seems like Alternet loves to run these pieces that take on atheistic folks like Harris and Dawkins. I mean, yeah, they are open for criticism, but, damn, we atheists are a pretty downthrodden group. Most folks say they wouldn't vote for an atheist for president and pretty much think we're the dregs of the earth even though my experience is that we are a pretty moral bunch who seek to make this life work as opposed to frittering away time worrying about some nebulous post-death life.

So, we have a few folks out there stirring the pot for atheism. If Sam and Dawkins just nicely and sweetly wrote about atheism no one would hear about it. At least they are making folks look at their stuff. Faith in ancient, often largelyl insane religious texts is just counterproductive. Yeah, they can be useful; you can find some good stuff in there. But you've got to go through all sorts of mental gymnasitcs to work around the overwhelming amount of drivel they contain.

To Sam Harris I say, "Preach on, brother."

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Sam Harris is very persuasive in his intonations against faith and as a champion of reason, but his reasoning ignores vast arenas of human experience and understanding. We're obliged to ask him: How are we to go about educating the irrationality out of billions of believers and where in this madness of Empire and Militarism is there an ethical rationalism?

State terror is driven through the forces of reason and rationality and, most importantly, amorality. Religion, when its virtues are intoned by the state, is used only as a persuasive hammer to sway the population into compliance. The calls to prayer to a God that will applaud our self-righteous wrath and calls to a patriotism that will give us a moral high ground in spite of contradictory evidence are precisely the same thing - propaganda to sway the public will in support of the goals of the ruling class, a ruling class devoid of the basic ethical and moral prohibitions given to us by every great religious movement, and equally devoid of the fundamental precepts of modern humanism.

If we succeed in banishing belief in gods will that make humanity any less susceptible to the irrationality of patriotism, jingoism, militarism, unchecked capitalism, communism, or totalitarianism? Will that banish all the urge of men who seek power for power’s sake? Will it wipe out the ego's drive for historical account?

Greed, inhumanity, thoughtlessness, exploitation of the masses, torture, murder, deceit, propaganda, treason, the usurpation of civil liberties, the undermining of democratic republics (both foreign and domestic), the Military Industrial Complex, ad nauseam ... are all products of reason carried out by an elite but amoral minority. How will any outcry against crazy belief systems halt that mechanism, give it humaneness, give it an ethical life? How will practicing intolerance of religious belief reverse the course and consequence of corruption? How will intolerance of religious faith unload the weapons of the defense industry? How will intolerance of religious faith feed the starving masses, clean the water, reverse global warming? Reason, certainly, is needed. But how does this instructive intolerance heal our failed institutions and alter the course of this death march we're on?

The largest body of humanity that believe in gods are not killing, maiming, corrupting, dehumanizing; they're running from the bombs; they're refuges and victims of the bombs. Though there are exceptions, they are not the primary force for evil in this world.

Billions of people practice religions of peace. Billions practice spiritual fulfillment. The handfuls that perpetrate terror (at the behest of the agents of the elite, or at the behest of the agents who are no longer capable of tolerating the suffering inflicted by the behemoth) are comparatively so few in number it maddens us to think that the only thing that prevents us from taking peaceful recourse to their control is the sheer might and ubiquitousness of their weapons systems, the vastness of their expertise in manufacturing consent.

In Harris' view the primary source for the problems in the middle east and the entire scope of 9/11 can be chalked up to Islamic extremism (the response to its violence to Christo-fascism or Jewish fanaticism) but his view is held without recourse to historical context and the consequence of empire building; the scientific principles of cause and effect are forgotten in preference to killing an idea. This view ignores history and the behavior of the ruling classes. It holds up morality and ethical validity only for the so-called rational, which are mysteriously clear of irrational thoughts. The human heart, the essential nature of suffering in the human spirit, the inner will that drives us to seek a higher ground of illumination, seems held out, again, to ridicule and anachronism.

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Sam Harris misuses both science and religion. The methods of science produce statistical truths, not absolute certainty. Science uses things like double blind tests and repeatable, impersonal results to be as accurate as possible, and these methods work pretty well most of the time. Science is based in hypothesis, which is why paradigm shifts can occur (from Newton to Einstein, for ex., or Lamarck to Darwin). When something is judged a fact in science, like penicillin kills bacteria, this is not 100% certain--so we get anti-biotic resistant germs.

Religion is not a matter of certainty or fact, since the existence of abstract or nonphysical realities, like love or justice, cannot be tested for truth or falsity, but they can be understood and experienced. The point of religion isn't certainty, but a way of relating to reality that is greater than the individual self (ie it isn't all about me, me, me and my experiences alone). Religion is not something that is simply believed by individuals against all contrary evidence (that is the definition of insanity). It is a framework of meaning and values, a paradigm, that gives human life social and cosmic meaning. Many Christians believe in evolution and the truths of science because they believe God created the natural world and studying science can tell us things of value and truth.

If Harris were serious about wanting to use science to overcome human problems like war, torture, terrorism, and violence, he has missed the most obvious scientific solution. Eliminate all Y chromosomes. ;-) That is a more statistically reliable way of getting rid of the largest group of people who do all those horrible things. And the means to reproduce without Y chromosomes now exists. But reductionistic, simplistic solutions to huge problems are rarely satisfying or interesting...

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I have not read the book they are talking about. I'm just starting Letter to a Christian Nation. I don't trust these hit-piece articles that alternet seems to like so much.

But anyway, more importantly, here is Kirk Cameron on Atheism!
(what is a "Top Atheist" anyways?)

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I think this guy is paid by the establishment to make athiesm look bad. That's the only way I can parse his mish-mash of morals and beliefs.

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It was interesting reading the article and the responses.. Here are some interesting positions...

Most of you are using "faith" and "religion" interchangeably. As of today, inclusive of all major religions of the world, there is not much agreement in defining what a "religion" is. Is scientific value system a religion? It is a religion without faith. What about Buddhism, then? Could we say as simply as a "culture"?

Faith would be different. It would mean acceptance of a set of positions that needs to be accepted without question. We need a "leap of faith".

The question comes next with Science. Is science a religion. Yes it is (in a way). It has its own "culture", its belief in scepticism and its own methodology of gathering knowledge. And BTW, to correct a early post. Science does not test for right and wrong. It can only test to debunk a hypothesis.

Sam Harris may have an affection for Buddhism over the Abrahamic systems. And he is fully entitled to do so. And he is fully entitled to say that it is a superior religion as it has no "God" and instead based in reason and compassion.

I have some question for all: When god or gods are so ill defined how can there be a term called "atheism". How come some believe something that is so ill defined?

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On the part of the writers and editors on alternet? The last article on outspoken athiests involved something about bullying the faithful and now this article, which while might be interesting, doen't have any bearing on whether Mr. Harris is right or wrong about religion....

I think what we have here is a case of writer-envy. The writers here are jealous of a man who, seemingly no more skilled than they, is making money hand-over fist and gets invited to the Colbert Report and The Daily Show while they toil away for the meager wages that Alternet and other left-wing sites pay them.

Isn't that a commandment? Doesn't God command us not to covet, or does that only apply to donkeys and wives?

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As a practicing Buddhist, I just wish to clarify that both Sam Harris and the author of this article are espousing (in the first case) and ridiculing (in the second) a caricature of Buddhism that is lightyears away from the real thing. The harebrained ramblings of Harris about reincarnation or ESP have no more relation to real Buddhism than the rantings of Pat Robertson have to do with the authentic Christianity--i.e. discipleship-- of people like Thomas Merton or Martin Luther King, Jr.

Likewise, of course, for Harris's smug and sickening rationalizations for torturing Muslims who object to US imperial domination. Such views are likewise anathema to any real Buddhist, for the practice of universal compassion admits no exceptions whatsoever--and that includes compassion for religious fanatics, Christian, Jewish, or Muslim. As my teacher, the venerable Thich Nhat Hanh, says, Buddhists should not seek to impose their views on anyone, but "through compassionate dialogue" seek, as we can, to wean people away from fanaticism of any type. And that includes the fanaticism of flatland atheists like Sam Harris, who, like any religious fanatic, denies value to, and would happily torture or kill, anyone who does not "see like him, feel like him, or be like him."

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I have yet to see where Mysticism and Spirituality claim we all came from two spontaneously created beings--Adam and Eve.
I have yet to see where M&S claim factual natural selection is a myth and the truth is spontaneous species creation.
I have yet to see where M&S claim the sex drive as sin.
I have yet to see where M&S claim there are fully concious souls in the egg and the sperm, or the zygote for that matter.
I have yet to see where M&S deem it a sin for the choice of an abortion in reasonable and practical matters.
I have yet to see where M&S promise the perfect fantasy life after death.
I have yet to see, and on and on....

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I have read both of Sam Harris' books, and all of his articles. The position of this AlerNet article was taken completely out of context, in my opinion. And, was a total mis-interpretation.

I would encourage anyone interested in this subject to read Sam's books and draw your own conclusions. I think you will be pleased and impressed with Sam's intelligent and logical conclusions to the world's problems with religion. And, I don't think you'll find Sam recommending any kind of torture or mistreatment of fellow humans.

Again, I noticed that John Gorenfeld really paraphrased. Perhaps, John Gorenfeld is afraid to look his own religious comfort zone directly in the eye.

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Stevenson did a great deal of research into reincarnation phenomenon using scientific methodology. He headed the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Virginia and his work is not so easy to disimiss as silly ancient desert tales of floods and pregnant virgins.

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It's fairly obvious that many people making comments on Sam Harris have not read his work. Harris cuts through the fanciful nonsense and sacred cows of religion with a sharp knife and makes it quite clear if we human beings intend on surviving on this planet we will need to transcend religions of all kinds. Gorenfeld is some sort of hit man - patching together semi quotes with his own personal agenda. I'm dissapointed in Alternet for letting this kind of garbage article pass. To the moron who called Harris a Nazi I say---READ THE BOOK 'End of Faith"

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I read somewhere that 29% of U.S. voters would be WILLING to vote for an atheist.
How many don't realise they have?
Come out, come out wherever you are.

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The other day I announced to my daughter that I had taken to reading the Bible for a short time every evening. Before she had her mobile phone out to call for the guys in white coats I hastened to explain.

The full story of why God and the Abrahamic religions were invented is told in the Heptateuch - the first seven books of the Old Testament. The social drivers for it still persist.

Even in the funny old proto-English of the King James version the purposes are clear once you find and join the dots. This is why I am reading through the Heptateuch to find these dots, the reality that underlies all the sugar coating. Essentially the purpose of the then tribal rulers’ exercise was to construct in credulous minds a God to grant power to a bunch of authoritarian robber barons to forbid any independent quest for knowledge (that starts way back at Genesis 3:3,5), to initiate racism of the vilest kind (elevating one tribe above all kindred tribes and the kindred tribes - "chosen people" - above all the rest of humanity, considered to be lesser breeds without the law) and to grab and hold the lands and accumulated wealth of the Middle East for a racist homeland of their own.

Even in the chosen top-dog tribe(s), women are second-fiddle, property (e.g. Exodus 21) not to be coveted (Exodus 20:17). Women outside the chosen tribe(s) are mere booty of war.

Can Christianity be blamed for all this? Well there doesn't seem to be anywhere in the New Testament that Jesus repudiates any of it - right to the point where he was murdered over a doctrinal dispute.

Here's a very preliminary list of where some of the dots can be found (in addition to the above): Exodus 15:3, 13-17; Exodus 22:18 and Leviticus 20:27; Numbers 13: 26-30; Numbers 31; Numbers 33: 52-56.

Dawkins and Harris have validly challenged religion on epistemological and behavioural grounds, but have largely missed the social evil that gave rise to it and perpetuates it to this day.

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I read "the end of faith". I tend to agree with a lot of what he says. I read the Bible both the old and the new testaments and found there is nothing religious or spiritual or moral in them, especially if you are bright. Religions tend to exacerbate differences between people and those religions that have stupid books to rely on make life worse. Sam's point is exactly that, that we should be allowed to question, debate any and all faiths and not keep silent about it out of the so-called respect for other religions. Even Sam's own convictions have to be debated in an honest way. Investigating psychic phenomena is one thing but to believe that "some people are chosen by God and God deeded them someoneelse's living space" or " somebody came back from death and so if you don't believe in that you will go to hell" or "God spoke to a guy and if you don't believe in it, you will die" is preposterous. It is time to get over squeamishness and say honestly that all that is bunk, crap, unhelpful, not redeeming. I hope Gorenfeld is trying to point out that Sam is not the new Messiah. He is working too hard for it. I know Sam has not got evrything figured out, he is just trying to understand and in the process he found that the socalled western philosophies and philosophers are superficial and really of no help to anyone. Surprisingly I found that much before Sam, certainly being older and wellread helped.

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Sam Harris isn't perfect; but this article distorts and caricatures his work in order to denigrate him. This is a cheesy and shallow piece of attack journalism from which we learn nothing useful and which is not worthy of Alternet.

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Wonder what the agenda is here?

Gorenfield clearly knows nothing of Mr. Harris' beliefs and, judging from this article, may not even be able to read.

I know Mr. Harris and have spoken with him on a number of occasions and this piece doesn't even slightly resemble his views.

It's an attack piece, period. It may take in a few people who themselves can't read or have a pro-religious dogma agenda, but everyone else should disregard this drivel and read the source if they're at all interested.

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The real torture here is what this article's author has done to Sam Harris' views. Mr. Harris has posted a Response to Controversy on his website with his true views.
Click Here for Sam Harris Response to Controversy

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This is a gross distortion of Harris's views, constructed by taking quotations out of context. Disagreement is good, but malicious libel--which this is--is not. John Gorenfeld has no integrity.

In brief, Harris's stance on torture is that it no less harmful than willfully killing and maiming, which is what we decide to do when we go to war. Thus it is hypocritical to support war (ever, under any cirmcumstance) while at the same time maintaining that torture is never justifiable.

His stance on "spirituality" is this: Supernatural beliefs have been ASSOCIATED with Buddhism, but, quite unlike Judeo-Christian religions, they are not the point. The can be jettisoned entirely, and you still have Buddhism. What Buddhism is about is the human mind. While "religions" are fundamentally belief systems, Buddhism is fundamentally a collection of techniques aimed toward the goal of altering our psychology. The changes that these techniques produce are quite real, observable, subject to scientific scrutiny, and have nothing whatsoever to do with belief in supernatural beings or powers.

I suggest that you actually read Harris's book, The End of Faith, and come to your own conclusions.

I say again, this article is clearly intentional and malicious distortion. You, John Gorenfeld, are a spineless, venemous liar.

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It's transparent that this interview was butchered. Anyone that has read Sam Harris' work assuredly knows this. Then those unaware of the facts take John Gorenfeld's (what has he contributed?) word.

Sam Harris stresses intellectual honesty and truth, and as if playing a joke on himself, John Gorenfeld credulously elucidates his own lack of honesty whether in regard to an interview or misconceptions of a concept of something unnecessary; God. Needless to say I am disappointed in the site and most of all how ignorance is continuously embraced to triumph.

How many people actually question the validity of a manipulated interview before accepting it?

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Link to Sam Harris site

A few of the subjects that I raised in The End of Faith continue to inspire an unusual amount of malicious commentary, selective quotation, and controversy. I’ve elaborated on these topics here:

My position on torture:
In The End of Faith, I argue that competing religious doctrines have divided our world into separate moral communities, and that these divisions have become a continuous source of human violence. My purpose in writing the book was to offer a way of thinking about our world that would render certain forms of conflict, quite literally, unthinkable.

In one section of the book (pp. 192-199), I briefly discuss the ethics of torture and collateral damage in times of war, arguing that collateral damage is worse than torture across the board. Rather than appreciate just how bad I think collateral damage is in ethical terms, some readers have mistakenly concluded that I take a cavalier attitude toward the practice of torture. I do not. Nevertheless, there are certain extreme circumstances in which I believe that torture may not only be ethically justifiable, but ethically necessary. I am not alone in this. Liberal Senator Charles Schumer has publicly stated that most U.S. senators would support torture to find out the location of a ticking time bomb. While rare, such “ticking-bomb” scenarios actually do occur. As we move into an age of nuclear and biological terrorism, it is in everyone’s interest for men and women of goodwill to determine what should be done when a prisoner clearly has operational knowledge of an imminent atrocity, but won’t otherwise talk about it.

My argument for the limited use of torture is essentially this: if you think it is ever justifiable to drop bombs in an attempt to kill a man like Osama bin Laden (and thereby risk killing and maiming innocent men, women, and children), you should think it may sometimes be justifiable to torture a man like Osama bin Laden (and risk torturing someone who just happens to look like Osama bin Laden). It seems to me that however one compares the practices of torturing high-level terrorists and dropping bombs, dropping bombs always comes out looking worse in ethical terms. And yet, many of us tacitly accept the practice of modern warfare, while considering it taboo to even speak about the possibility of practicing torture. It is important to point out that my argument for the restricted use of torture does not make travesties like Abu Ghraib look any less sadistic or stupid. Indeed, I considered our mistreatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib to have been patently unethical. I also think it was one of the most damaging blunders to occur in the last century of U.S. foreign policy.

It is not clear that having a torture provision in our laws will create as slippery a slope as many people imagine. We have a capital punishment provision, for instance, but this has not led to our killing prisoners at random because we can’t control ourselves. While I am opposed to capital punishment, I can readily admit that we are not suffering a total moral chaos in our society because we execute about five people every month. It is not immediately obvious that a rule about torture could not be applied with equal restraint.

I may be true, however, that any legal use of torture would have unacceptable consequences. In light of this concern, the best strategy I have heard comes from Mark Bowden in his Atlantic Monthly article, “The Dark Art of Interrogation.” Bowden recommends that we keep torture illegal, and maintain a policy of not torturing anybody for any reason. But our interrogators should know that there are certain circumstances in which it will be ethical to break the law. Indeed, there are circumstances in which you would have to be a monster not..

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(cont'd)
..to break the law. If an interrogator finds himself in such a circumstance, and he breaks the law, there will not be much of a will to prosecute him (and interrogators will know this). If he breaks the law Abu Ghraib-style, he will go to jail for a very long time (and interrogators will know this too). At the moment, this seems like the most reasonable policy to me, given the realities of our world.

While my discussion of torture spans only a few pages in a book devoted to reducing the causes of religious violence, many readers have found this discussion deeply unsettling. I have invited them, both publicly and privately, to produce an ethical argument that takes into account the realities of our world—our daily acceptance of collateral damage, the real possibility of nuclear terrorism, etc.—and yet rules out the practice of torture in all conceivable circumstances. No one, to my knowledge, has done this. And yet, my critics continue to speak and write as though a knock-down argument against torture in all circumstances is readily available. I consider it to be one of the more dangerous ironies of liberal discourse that merely discussing the possibility of torturing a man like Osama bin Laden provokes more outrage than the maiming and murder of innocent civilians ever does. Until someone actually points out what is wrong with the “collateral damage argument” presented in The End of Faith. I will continue to believe that my critics are just not thinking clearly about the reality of human suffering.

My views on the paranormal—ESP, reincarnation, etc.:

My position on the paranormal is this: While there have been many frauds in the history of parapsychology, I believe that this field of study has been unfairly stigmatized. If some experimental psychologists want to spend their days studying telepathy, or the effects of prayer, I will be interested to know what they find out. And if it is true that toddlers occasionally start speaking in ancient languages (as Ian Stevenson alleges), I would like to know about it. However, I have not spent any time attempting to authenticate the data put forward in books like Dean Radin’s The Conscious Universe or Ian Stevenson’s 20 Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation. The fact that I have not spent any time on this should suggest how worthy of my time I think such a project would be. Still, I found these books interesting, and I cannot categorically dismiss their contents in the way that I can dismiss the claims of religious dogmatists.

My views on Eastern mysticism, Buddhism, etc.:

My views on “mystical” or “spiritual” experience are extensively described in The End of Faith and do not entail the acceptance of anything on faith. There is simply no question that people have transformative experiences as a result of engaging contemplative disciplines like meditation, and there is no question that these experiences shed some light on the nature of the human mind (any experience does, for that matter). What is highly questionable are the metaphysical claims that people tend to make on the basis of such experiences. I do not make any such claims. Nor do I support the metaphysical claims of others.



There are several neuroscience labs now studying the effects of meditation on the brain. While I am not personally engaged in this research, I know many of the scientists who are. This is now a fertile field of sober inquiry, purposed toward understanding the possibilities of human well-being better than we do at present.



While I consider Buddhism almost unique among the world’s religions as a repository of contemplative wisdom, I do not consider myself a Buddhist. My criticism of Buddhism as a faith has been published in essay form, to the consternation of many Buddhists. Available here: X

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This is a deliberate and malicious misrepresentation of Sam Harris' views. Every single quote is taken out of context and mismatched with unrelated quotes and the author's own material in an outright slander.

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I've read both of Sam Harris's books and don't find any accusations/assertions that John Gorenfeld has written as valid. Assertions made by Gorenfeld on the opinions and position of Sam Harris are TOTALLY ficticious!
This article is chock full of misquotes and actually comes off as a malicious attack without merit, on Sams ideas and position. It would be hard to misquote and mis-state Sam's position in so many areas without doing so intentionally.
While some print articles make minor misquotes or mistakes; this article is so off the path of Sam's writting and position I have to consider the author, Gorenfeld has serious credibility problems. Gorenfeld should be held accountable; Alternet should offer Sam Harris plenty of space for a rebuttle.
LogicalBob.

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I find it starange that so many people believe that discrediting the source of a comment discredits the comment. If anyone, whether Sam Harris, George W. Bush or a six year old, says anything that is detuctively sound, the arguement itself is still good regardless of whatever else the person who said it believes. This is the logical fallacy of "argument of authority", where the validity of the argument is based not on what is being said but on who said it.
I in no way think Sam Harris is a fool, just as I don't think Muslims, Christians or Jews are foolish. I do know that people must find reasons that make sense in order justify their beliefs and so far God, by any name, is not justifiable with logical arguments.

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Taking the supporting statements that are made by Sam Harris out of context is cute. It is also telling. Sam Harris has written a book within which he writes regarding the dangers posed by religion. Dangers that are undeniable. His defense of these statements are inarguably acurate. I'm guessing if he could have found fault with them, Mr. Gorenfeld would have addressed a more intrical portion of what Harris has to say.

Permitting people to know that Harris's primary problem is with the violence that tends to result from religion, and the opportunities opened up for this violence by modern technology is important. That he acknowledges that the unreasoned attachment to one religion versus another is a huge problem that needs to be addressed is important.

To the left on this screen there is an add speaking of the problems in Darfur. This is directly related to the problems that Harris speaks of. If he focuses primarily on Christianity, Islam, and Judaism it is because they have been key contributors to violence in the world. That Islam is a key focus at the moment should not be a surprise. Christianity has in large learned to live by more reasoned standards that do not involve violence. This is not universal of course. This is not to say that they haven't taken to different underhanded methods of promoting their perspectives that are decietful.

I can't account for a portion of The end of Faith in which Harris promotes violence, I think he advocates Self Defense, but not violence as a pre-emptive measure. If he makes a point of excusing Buddhism so be it. Buddhism doesn't have a great track record of engaging in violent activity. This simply amplifies Harris's original complaint. Violence inspired by religion.

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I think it's easy to take words out of context and apply them to create what you choose for your readers to believe. It's unfortunate that this seems to be unbalanced and that an attack is being made against Sam Harris that is not warranted. I hope that those readers of this article will consider that the person being interviewed is relying on an honest report of his words and thoughts. Are you hoping to bring Mr. Harris down to your level? I am hoping most people who read this article will take the time to read about Mr. Harris and reserve their opinions of him with the appropriate knowledge it takes to make a judgment if that is even warranted.

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After reading Sam Harris' books, watching all his lectures and reading all his articles, I can say without question that this article freely distorts the spirit of Sam Harris' arguments. It's a shame that anyone reading this article who has not explored Sam's work themselves would be swayed to think that this is a good representation.

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position on torture:
In The End of Faith, I argue that competing religious doctrines have divided our world into separate moral communities, and that these divisions have become a continuous source of human violence. My purpose in writing the book was to offer a way of thinking about our world that would render certain forms of conflict, quite literally, unthinkable.

In one section of the book (pp. 192-199), I briefly discuss the ethics of torture and collateral damage in times of war, arguing that collateral damage is worse than torture across the board. Rather than appreciate just how bad I think collateral damage is in ethical terms, some readers have mistakenly concluded that I take a cavalier attitude toward the practice of torture. I do not. Nevertheless, there are certain extreme circumstances in which I believe that torture may not only be ethically justifiable, but ethically necessary. I am not alone in this. Liberal Senator Charles Schumer has publicly stated that most U.S. senators would support torture to find out the location of a ticking time bomb. While rare, such “ticking-bomb” scenarios actually do occur. As we move into an age of nuclear and biological terrorism, it is in everyone’s interest for men and women of goodwill to determine what should be done when a prisoner clearly has operational knowledge of an imminent atrocity, but won’t otherwise talk about it.

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This piece is highly distorted. Shame on you Alternet.

A potted form of Harris' position can be read at:
www. samharris.org /site/ full_text/response-to-controversy2/

(take the empty spaces out before pasteing into browser)

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Clearly John Gorenfeld’s only motive is to discredit Sam Harris by any means possible. Taking quotes out of context, making claims about Sam’s beliefs with no evidence to back up his claim, and making comments intending to enrage people in as many different groups as possible. If you are hurt, Gorenfeld that Harris made fun of the mythology that you call religion, then fine, but at least let people know what mythology that you support so people can recognize the religion of liars. Your beliefs should be able to stand alone on its own reasons instead of resorting to name calling of the opposition.

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More malicious lies in the name of God? This article is a fine example of how people can lie and misquote and misunderstand and misrepresent and mis-characterize a person or idea with which they disagree. How can this happen? This is not at all what Sam Harris stands for but rather an absolutely disgusting rant by someone who might as well be a Muslim chanting against Infidels.

As the son of a Baptist minister I have heard some vain and un-Christian things preached in the name of God, but this article is so completely biased and bigoted that it takes the cake. Talk about a giant leap from reason, honest debate and loving your enemies. Why? Why do people like John G. think it is okay to lie just to make their own case? I am going to report my disdain for this supposedly honest critique of an idea. Liars should be discouraged from lying. Mr. Gorenfeld, in my opinion might as well deny the holocaust too.

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Amen, Sam. You have stirred the religious cauldron and as you know it will take many decades before the roiling waters will settle to reveal the truth that lies within. "Breaking the spell" is a difficult task and will only come about by - dare I say - "Evolution". Logic and reason will forever fly in the face of sectarian religious followers just as "faith" flies in the face of non-believers.

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the word I got from a Harris newsletter is that his interview comments were twisted and misquoted by the Alternet interviewer.

from what I have read of Harris writings, I am inclined to believe him when he says his comments are twisted.

In my experience, folks that need mythologies tend to protect their personal myth at the detriment of other myths and as a consequence, when someone like Harris comes along and points out their weaknesses, the mythologists get defensive.

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I've read Sam Harris' books and articles and viewed various presentations he has made. This article seems to be totally at odds with everything Mr. Harris has written and said on the subject of religion, faith, terrorism, and reason. I cannot believe that anyone who has actually read or listened to Mr. Harris will believe the vicious representation portrayed in this article. I hope AlterNET's management will review the article for truth and accuracy to determine for themselves whether or not they want the slanderous bile represented in this article to be posted on this site.

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Indulging in misquotation and distorted paraphrasis for the purpose of portraying Sam Harris as a evil lunatic is unprofessional. Sam Harris' The End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation are courageous, well-argued and products of integrity and a high-level of intelligence. I intend to complain to AlterNet Management for allowing Gorenfeld's malicious distortion.

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I have read Sam's books. This article does not respresent his views or writings in anyway. I would suggest that the article is a cheap attempt to take away some of the well earned respect the thinking populace has given Sam. I suggest that the article be deleted and ignored; we should be talking about all these issues but fabricating lies is not a good start. In the guide lines for ths site it says "personal attacks on our writers or readers " will not be tolerated. Why is this rule not applied to the published articles?

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I find Gorenfeld's comments regarding Sam Harris's written and verbal positions to be grossly false and disingenuos. Sam Harris is not a proponet of torture. What he does speak about is the differences between moral relativism and absolute morality. His views regarding Moral Ethecism should be read by all. He does not anywhere embrace mysticism however he frequently suggest that we should be open minded and make up our minds based facts that can be tested. It is not mysticism that he advocates or subscribes to but rather a belief that humankind can be spiritual with out belief in a "Sky God".

For those of you that have found Gorenfeld's critic meaningful in someway, I strongly suggest you read or perhaps re-read Harris's works. Taking statements out of context and building an arguement against Harris, as Gorenfeld has done, is intellectually dishonest. Your acceptance of these falsehoods would also be intellectually dishonest. Those of you who have actually read Harris in an honest manner are to be credited. Those of you who rely on Gorenfeld to help form your opinions are subcribers to dogma.

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In April of 200 I had published a neo-Ten Commandments for the 21st Century based on Spiritual optimism below

Ten Commandments for the 21st Century - Based on a Paradigm of Spiritual Optimism*
1. To thine own self be true-know thyself, love thyself, be thyself
2. Honor thy parents who have given you the gift of life and who have raised you from infancy
3. Honor and protect the planet earth which is your home
4. Honor and protect the holy temple of your body- your human flesh
5. Seek, experience and celebrate the beauty of everyone and everything
6. Enjoy thyself that thou might be enjoyed
7. Cherish and protect your individual freedom
8. Find and do meaningful work throughout all the days of your life
9. Prepare for a quality and dignified death from the very beginning of your life - cultivate gratitude
1O. Give and receive as much love as you possibly can including the unconditional and infinite love of God

Dr. Rick Lippin
ralippin@aol.com

April 2000

* with gratitude to high priestess extraordinaire- Dr. Joan Borysenko who gave us all the gift of the transformational words- “spiritual optimism”

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A fundamental rule of honest journalism when quoting is that when presenting someones opinion NEVER BE SELECTIVE!!! So while reading this peice did readers automatically trust the author? Maybe this answers the personal question about mr harris- as to why he decided to study neuroscience: why are people so gullable and stupid?. when we first read something, esspecially on political or religious topics we must first ask "hold up, is this crap true?" When looking at the way this was sourced and looking at the facts this article turns out to be BS.. This article is at a complete lack of literal integrity. If these were trully the beliefs of SH or if he truly was that much of a hypocrite in reference to his beliefs of eastern culture than his books would not be best sellers and he would be largely ignored by this point. just because he found comparatively positive aspects of easternphilosophies doesnt mean he practices them.. remember, he's an atheist, who strongly denounces all forms of terror and ignorance in his writing, read it before you state otherwise... if your going to make strong opinions about someone based on the book they write, read what they write first and test their work to see if its true or not... Dont follow selective misquoted bullcrap journalism given to you by some cheap no-name failure of a writer with an obvious special interest... i ll stop wasting everyones time now

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I'm paraphrasing J. Krishnamurti, a man of great insights and deep personal flaws. I don't know how deep Harris' flaws are, but whatever they are, I'm willing to look past them - way past them - because, a few inconsistencies aside, he's a badly needed and generally on-target Voice in the Wildnerness of Superstition and Ignorance that is the U.S. I too was dismayed to see him subscribing to some loopy and disproven psychic phenomenon theories (doesn't the man read "Skeptical Inquirer" or "Skeptic" mags!?), and the position on torture he puts forth in End of Faith is a tad labored and not real solid, but he is a national treasure in any case, and has HAD IT with the smiling, head-nodding okie-dokie acceptence Americans - and to my liberal shame, mostly liberal Americans - profess for childish mythologies, from Christianity, through Judaism, past Islam, over the jaw-dropping idiocies of Mormonism and Scientology, and all the rest. WAKE UP, you Morons, it's the 21st century. We can no longer afford to believe in superstitous mythologies just because we're allowed to. What it comes down to is just that - the only reason grown people believe in god is because they're allowed to. If they were allowed to believe in the (no more absent) Santa Claus as adults, they would. I go past Harris in this - I feel that anyone who believes in God is the enemy. Period. Thank God for Sam Harris. Oh, there I go again, being inconsistent.

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...and Gorenfeld must have tried like the dickens, because he managed to miss the essence of Sam Harris' book completely. Calling it an accurate synopsis of "The End of Faith" makes about as much sense as describing the Bible as being nothing more than a long story about slavery.

If you read anything written by Sam Harris with a truly open mind, you'll see that he doesn't's advocate anything even close to what is being stated in Gorenfeld's article.

But that's really the problem, isn't it? An open mind; without it, you can only see attacks on your own belief structure...

Fragile belief structures deserve to be shattered; if they don't happen to hold up to the light of reason, don't blame reason and don't blame Sam Harris. You can choose to believe the Earth is flat, but it doesn't make it so.


"But what if we chose the wrong church? Then every week we're only making God madder and madder!" - H. Simpson

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Not to say I believe whole heartedly with all of the views held and expressed by Mr. Harris, but I do tend to side with him in many respects. That said, anyone who's read "The End Of Faith" could tell you that Gorenfeld skews the intent of the passages he quotes to make Mr. Harris seem like a monster. I implore anyone who'se takes Gorenfeld’s account seriously to consider the true context from which his examples are taken.

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What a crock. Lies, half truths, spin and bullshit. Is that what Alternet has fallen to? If John Gorenfeld worked for me he'd be unemployed. Can't really blame Gorenfeld though unless he became the editor who should have thrown this trash in the circular file.

Next time I read an Alternet article I'll keep both eyes open looking for lies and spin. Everyones looking for fifth columnists, I think I found one!

Heil Smirky?

Your radical, Atheist, blue state pal,
Ernest Stewart

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I fail to see how focusing on possible shortcomings in Sam Harris' books should consume so much of John Gorenfeld's time and energy -- to the exclusion of any real mention of the core theme of Hasrris' two books..
The truth is that we would be much better off without faith in fabricated nonsense about the nature of the universe and our place in it. For a huge percentage of the USA population and virtually all Mulims to reject the occurrence of evolution and claim that their prophet points the way to salvation and the other religions prohpet does not is a complete travesty of rationality and a frightening tragedy.
.
I don't agree with evertyhing that Harris writes (nor should anyone) but the main thrust of what he writes is crystal clear , relevant and timely. I would not wish to stick my nexk out and say that Islamic dogmatism is worse than Christian dogmatism or vice versa but there is more than enough evidence to indicate that Islamic extremsim is a very real and imminent danger to mankind.

Formal dogmatic religions involve living a lie and to imagine that this does not matter and should not be critiqued is plain silly. As for mysticism, anyone poking fun at it has simply never had a mystical experience. Such experiences have no connection with faith -- despite what those with fiath imagine.

All in all Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins and others deserve credit for speaking out clearly against baseless and indefensible religious dogmas which hold mankind back more so than any other single phenomenon.. Obviously the end of faith would not bring utopia but it would sure reduce the occurrence of utterly unnecessary conflicts. all over the globe.

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This Article is biased and full of distortion as are many of the comments directed at Sam Harris. I am amazed at the Ignorants of people who think they are intellegent and well informed. Your all frightened little sheep you know nothing of the real world.

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The most prominent case of a logical fallacy here is the straw man argument. The article completely distorts Harris' views. Harris doesn't ever state in the End of Faith that he believes in Easter religions or even ESP. He does state that Eastern religions are more compassionate and more logical about that "something else," or spirituality. Having the feeling that there is a mystical aspect of life that we don't have a good idea about is not irrational, it's simply a feeling. When you define spirituality through religion is when you run into problems, because you're making unsupported claims, such as the Bible. As for ESP, he uses this as an example to show that there may be more to our mental powers than we know, and that recent researchers have been trying to see if this is true.

Furthermore, the article makes it seem as if Harris is a violent/sadistic lunatic in his support of torture. I'm not saying that I support torture, however Harris' argument is logical. If we're willing to use weapons such as bombs and missiles, then we should be willing to use torture. After all, bombs and missiles have a known collateral damage of many lives in order to accomplish their goal: kill a specific person or persons. Torture has a known collateral damage of pain in order to accomplish its goal: obtain information that will lead to the prevention of death. The collateral damage with weapons, however, is much greater.

Aside from the straw man arguments, the article as a whole uses the ad hominem (attack on the person) fallacy. It basically goes to say that because of the beliefs of Harris (that he doesn't actually hold, but that the article states that he does), his other arguments are invalid, illogical, and wrong. This simply doesn't follow logically. Just because someone is wrong about one thing or is flawed in some way doesn't mean that they are automatically wrong about everything else.

In fact, Harris' arguments against religion are completely logical. The whole purpose of a religion is to explain something which we do not or can not know as human beings, also known as spirituality. But in explaining these things, it has to do so without evidence. Simply because the Bible says that Jesus rose from the dead gives us no reason to believe in its validity. The fictional writing of people who had learned from Jesus' friends is backed by zero evidence, has had many parts removed, and has been translated time and again as to leave interpretation completely up to the translator.

Simply put, a religion claims to know that which we don't or can't know. When I reject all religions, I'm doing the same thing as any religious believer, except I'm rejecting just one more religion than they are. It's time that we stop pretending to know that which we don't, and in doing so we can eliminate another false identity that keeps us at each other's throats. If we want to know more about the unknown, we can discover it without having to make something up blindly without evidence. For this reason, Harris offers meditation as a potential window into the spiritual world, where a person gains first hand knowledge about his/her own consciousness. Furthermore, meditation fosters compassion and understanding for fellow human beings.

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Sam Harris has brought up different mystical or paranormal instances and ideas to point out that there is much to the world we don’t understand, and atheist are not claiming to have all the answers.

He also brings up other religions beliefs and practices to compare and contrast their ideas with Christianity and some of the ideals of American culture. This is often done in an attempt to provoke us to reflect on our own cultural and religious beliefs that we believe to be true, but may not seem reasonable to others.

This article takes many of Harris’ ideas out of context. These are not the arguments Harris builds a platform on, but rather ideas to give us perspective of our own beliefs.

You’re disregard for journalistic integrity sickens me. I encourage others to read Harris’ work on their own and make their own opinions on his claims.

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Although I do not completely agree with Sam Harris, I must say you have deliberately misrepresented Sam Harris and his position. This is also a textbook example of Ad Homonym, attacking the person instead of addressing his position. I am assuming that you are trying to distort his position or make personal attacks because you either do not truly understand his arguments or you are incapable or refuting his position. I suspect it is the latter. In my mind your hateful representation and deliberate obfuscations are indicative of the behavior that lead to the murder of Madeline O’Hare. Try to be intellectually honest if you can.

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John Gorenfeld has either not read Sam Harris' books or he deliberately falsified facts in regards to them. There is no other explanation for so blatant an attack on Mr. Harris. I suggest to any reader of this article to rush out and purchase a copy of either of Mr. Harris' books and draw your own conclusions, because I personally guarantee they will differ from Mr. Gorenfeld's (unless of course you already have your mind made-up, as it seems Mr. Gorenfeld did).

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I think this is a simple case of jealousy. Mr. John Gorenfeld is a semi successful wannabe and he wants a piece of Sam's well earned fame. Instead of trying to do a good job, being open minded, being a preofessional journalist or maybe even doing his homework he tries to grab headlines with child like spite.

Pathetic . . . .

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It seems that this writer and most of the people commenting on the article either never read Sam Harris' book(s), or, at best, completely misunderstand him--though I suspect it more likley that they are deliberately misrepresenting his words.

I can say that I couldn't expect more from you people. Thank you all for reaffirming my opinion of religion and those who subscribe to such nonsense.

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This Gorenfeld twat is so full of shite, it's unbelievable. This is clearly a malicious attack on Mr Harris by someone who is either too stupid to understand his work, or deliberately hostile.

Sam Harris has demonstrated his passionate commitment to the discovery of truth. He is open-minded and genuinely enquiring, which of course means he sometimes makes mistakes. However, his dedication to studying actual evidence and interest in understanding why it is that humans make such errors of thinking makes him a great example of someone who lives by the scientific method.

Blow it our your ass, Gorenfeld. We're not fooled by your fearmongering.

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This article presents such a gross mischaracterization of Harris and his work that it is both unethical and disgraceful.

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This author of this article has either not read either of Sam Harris’s books because if he had as I have he couldn’t possibly have printed the inaccuracies he has in this article. It’s a shame his editors let him ramble as he did with out checking his facts… I use to enjoy your website...

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I prefer to read Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins et al, rather than relying on people with agendas spewing vituperation and vitriol. The Xtians appear to be over reacting to a remarkable degree that borders on the inane. Unfortunately so many have a public voice and the rest of us can only post comments.

I might add that special interest groups have a tendency to misquote, take out of context and develop their arguments based on spurious bases. Not just in the religious world either. Special interest groups will use every wile they can to push their specific agendas through local government bodies, school curricula makers and other agencies.

Those who make a difference do it with properly formulated and researched data, well presented and with honesty.

Those who scream like a banshee and distort data, misquote etc. deserve the return onslaught.

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I am very familiar with Harris' work and I find this to be specious and distorted. This is not an accurate account of his views or position but a manipulation and malicious twisting of what Harris does say.

As a federal law enforcement agent, I find Harris to be right on target regarding his perspective on most issues; a lot of people just prefer to live in ingnorant bliss.

I would suggest reading this before making a judgment: www.samharris.org/site/full_text/response-to-controversy2/

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After reading this article, Sam Harris seems a hypocritical, biased man preaching things that make no sense and certainly do not possess the reason he claims. Luckily for me, I read his books. For someone who has not read either of Harris' books and knows little to nothing about him, your impression of him will probably be similar to what I stated above. However, if you've made the effort to read his books and not blindly trust this article, you know differently.

His criticism of Jewish torture in Medieval times does not mean that he supports torture of only Muslims. His whole purpose in mentioning the event in the first place was to verbalize his distaste for unnecessary torture. Medieval Jewish torture occurred on the false belief that Jews drank the blood of Christian children. Torture of anyone-- Muslim or otherwise-- is rationalized only when it is known that he/she being tortured could potentially provide some sort of information. The torture of someone based on misunderstandings and half-truths is clearly not what Harris supports in any way. It is fact that those responsible for 9/11 were motivated by many things; religion being a large percentage of those motivations. Christians can be found dangerous to society as well-- which Harris also explains in a detailed way-- but not in the same violent ways that Muslim terrorists are. And please note that I say Muslim terrorists, and not merely Muslims. A Muslim with no thought or intention to kill nonbelievers is not dangerous. Extremists who do believe this are very dangerous. And that is why extremists with information that could potentially protect people (of any religion) is necessary.

In addition, the idea Gorenfeld puts forth that Harris is a believer in paranormal events is a tad outrageous. Anyone reading the book could find a way to understand that any credence Harris gives to the paranormal is purely because there have been a numerous amount of paranormal occurrences that have actual proof that such a thing happened. And many of these things could be attributed to the many unused parts of the human brain rather than some unexplainable cosmic force-- which is why research in such an area could explain many aspects of the paranormal.

It is also clear from his writings that Harris does not consider himself a Buddhist. In fact, Buddhism is not and was never meant to be a religion. It is a philosophy, a way of thinking and living so as to find happiness. While it may be true that many Buddhists believe in gods and goddesses, such a belief would be going beyond the true roots of Buddhism's purpose. The way the works of Socrates or Aristotle are viewed should be the way Buddhism is viewed, because that was its initial purpose.

Gorenfeld makes this statement, "Like any religious moderate, he has picked and chosen what he likes from a religion", which seems to have no actual truth to it at all. Harris is not a religious moderate, to start with, and picking and choosing from a religion is not actually a bad idea, so long as you are picking the parts where the religion talks about equality, love, and compassion and rejecting the parts about killing "blasphemers" and "nonbelievers". But if religions only kept parts stating that we should all love one another as we love ourselves, then there would be little reason to criticize any religion.

This article is merely a piece of yellow journalism that exaggerates things to no end. A quote is not a quote when it is used in context that does not support the actual meaning of the quote itself, or the belief of the quote's author. Harris was quoted, yes, but in the wrong context, and he was thus totally misrepresented.

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This is probably the biggest pack of junk I've ever read. If you really took the time to READ and understand what Sam Harris says, you could not have come to these conclusions. My only feeling is that you have not fully done this. A total distortion of the actual Harris writings, don't believe a word of this stuff. Read Letter to a Christian nation instead.

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-
** www.samharris.org/site/full_text/response-to-controversy2/ **
-

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Man did alternet get this wrong, who let this person take up so much space? You guys should be ashamed of yourself, unless by posting this crap you hope to get more readers. I can't think of any other reason

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In an ideal world, Sam Harris could comment favorably on some aspects of eastern mysticism, without those who believe in God or any other equally utterly false idea using Sam's words taken out of context to attack him. However, Harris as the most eloquent of those who argue for reason and against superstition, should know that believers have no compunction about using the most immoral means to defend their imaginary God.

Richard Dawkins, a more pedestrian writer who also advocates reason and sanity, clearly express admiration for the positive things that could be considered aspects of religion, while making it clear that those aspects in no way negate the fact that there is no God and all scripture which says otherwise is false. That some religious people help the poor and sick and some religious rituals seem to give solace and comfort to the less intelligent among us, does not make their superstitions true. Dawkins can comment favorably on the contributions religious that texts have made to literature, without leaving an opening for the believers to twist his words. Harris should find a way to express the obvious facts that some eastern spiritual practices such as transcendental mediation might be beneficial to some and that torture has the intended effect in some circumstances, with leaving an opening of believers to twist his words.

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No decent thinker should treat another as John Gorenfeld has done here. This is a very flawed hit piece on Sam Harris, and quite shocking coming from a writer whom I used to respect.

Maliciously, John Gorenfeld has started with his premise -- 'Sam Harris supports torture and believes wacky things' -- and proceeded to filter all of the evidence he can collect through this obviously false idea. The comically distorted result would shame even Fox News.

Anyone who has read Sam Harris's work can tell that the tiny snippets that Gorenfeld quotes are pulled grossly out of context and twisted to mean what Gorenfeld wishes Harris said, rather than what Harris actually said. And when he can't use this dishonest technique to smear Harris, Gorenfeld resorts to quoting others and then weakly linking those others to Harris. Even Bill O'Reilly is rarely this craven.

But Gorenfeld's sham attack is easily exposed. Sam Harris's view on metaphysical claims, for example, are published on his website (emphasis added):

"There is simply no question that people have transformative experiences as a result of engaging contemplative disciplines like meditation, and there is no question that these experiences shed some light on the nature of the human mind (any experience does, for that matter). What is highly questionable are the metaphysical claims that people tend to make on the basis of such experiences. I do not make any such claims. Nor do I support the metaphysical claims of others."

Would you have guessed this was Harris's position from reading Gorenfeld's article?

Click here to read more of Harris's actual, clear, quite public positions on the issues that Gorenfeld writes about.

Given what I already knew from Sam Harris's work, and given what Gorenfeld falsely tried to portray to AlterNet readers as Harris's views, I'll never be able to trust John Gorenfeld again.

His distortions here are truly beyond the pale.

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From Sam Harris:

"John Gorenfeld, has taken a ninety minute telephone interview, along with selective passages from my books, and made of them a poisonous mash of misquotation and paraphrasis for the purpose of portraying me as an evil lunatic. While some level of innocent distortion can be expected in print interviews, this case appears genuinely malicious. "

If you want to alert the management at Alternet of your displeasure, the contact page can be found http://alternet.org/about/contact.html

As you will see, Gorenfeld distorts my views on torture, spiritual experience, and the paranormal. For the record, I have summarized my views on these subjects on my website: http://www.samharris.org

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Sorry, that hit piece could not have come from reading either of those books. I must now assume Mr. Gorenfeld is a writer without integrity.

Both, Letter to a Christian Nation and the End of Faith were great reads by a rational thinker and I highly recommend them to anyone who would like a different view of the dogmatic religion many of us grew up with and have come to view in a more reasoned light.

John Gorenfeld, you have no credibility with me.

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This article is a character assassination. It is totallya misrepresentation, mis-characterization, malicious and false. How Mr. Gorenfeld can so blatantly lie about another person's view which is in disagreement with his own is beyond me. I thought dishonesty was wrong. The worst is that hundreds of people are believing what Mr. Gorenfeld has written here without checking the facts. Gorenfeld's statements are not only misunderstandings and misquotations, they are malicious and hateful. He might as well deny the holocaust, too. And I suppose there would be readers who would believe his statements if they sounded logical.

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I've read Harris's books, and seen him speak a few times. Gorenfeld distorts Harris's views all over the place in this article. He's either malicious or too stupid to understand well written, well presented ideas.

Read Harris's work for yourself.

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John Gorenfeld should simply be fired. His obnoxious rant of lies, misrepresentations, misquotes and miserable (as in mean-spirited) misconceptions is a malicious (verging on the criminal) and cowardly act of (and a bad attempt at a) character assassination. Sam Harris is, quite obviously (for anyone in their right mind), a wonderful thinker and philosopher, in most instances extremely reasonable, clearly highly ethical, and his only intention with his books was to make this world a much, much better place. If you don´t think so, just read his two phenomenal works with an open mind, and decide for yourselves. His determination to help rid us all of the global existential risk that these old religious fictions represent when coupled with modern (and near-future, as in bio- and nano-) weapons is an immense act of courage, and we should all simply thank and praise him for it. Keep going strong, Sam!!! Those of you who are critical of him should, really... get REAL! (and, do yourselves and everyone else a favor, and learn some memetics - Aaron Lynch´s "Thought Contagion" is a good start). Those of you who write the kind of crap we just experienced (or endured) should, really... get FIRED! (and probably fined). Do our children -who would love to live long lives- a favor and vahish from the serious contemporary ideoshpere. Lunatic.

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I think Gorenfeld and, more generally, Alternet management owe Sam Harris an apology for these incredible misrepresentations. Those who've bashed Harris here on the basis of Gorenfeld's article need to read (carefully and thoughtfully!) S.H.'s books to see what he really thinks. Or just visit his website: www.samharris.org .

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John Gorenfeld just says bad stuff about everyone! Check out his other diatribes..the pattern is clear!

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http://alternet.org/columnists/story/45767/

Great Article here by Matt Taibbi. This is the sort of mentality Sam Harris rightfully castigates in The End of Faith. Read for yourself instead of relying on second-rate reporter/writers like John Gorenfeld.

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Those who 'follow' religion, have no idea about leadership or thinking for themselves. They just follow. Thus, the moment someone comes forth and expresses an idea that challenges their 'blind faith' turns them into a spin and either, as the posts on Harris illustrate, preach condemnation or offer violence as a silencer. I guess the people who express such comments are fearful of allowing their own brains do work and realize that religion is only a fairy tale with big bucks and politics behind it. In other words - WAKE UP AND READ HIS BOOK to learn the truth.
And by HIS BOOK I mean Harris' The End of Faith not the one that has 'gen-o-slush' as the first chapter and ends with 'a-flop-o-lisp' AMEN!!!!

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I have read Sam Harris' books. And now I have read John Gorenfeld's piece on the same and a 90 minute interview with Mr. Harris. While it Mr. Gorenfeld is certainly entitled to his opinion, his attack goes against the very nature of the AlterNet mission which makes primary "the integrity of our information sources". By misquoting, quoting out of context, and cherry-picking, Mr. Gorenfeld has sacrificed the integrity of those information sources. It is clear that Mr. Gorenfeld has violated AlterNet's Terms of Service, which state:

AlterNet will not tolerate:
• personal attacks on our writers or readers

Also from the ToS:

We seek to encourage intelligent, thoughtful and respectful conversation and debate in these forums

Mr Gorenfeld's is anything but intelligent, thoughtful and respectful. He has launched a personal atack on Mr. Harris by quoting him out of context and distorting Mr. Harris views.

Therefore, by the Terms of Service agreement, the management of AlterNet is obliged to revoke Mr. Gorenfeld's privelege to post here.

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I have read ALL of Harris' books and interviews not only once but several times. That might be because I'm not that quick in picking up everything that is being said the first time around. I underline, make notes and in places of where I find that I might be confused, etc. about what Harris might be saying, I take some time to reflect on it for several days. So what has this got to do with the posting above? I didn't come away with the results that he did. I suspect that the author has done what a lot of religious people do...they "cherry pick" the words/phrases that suit them and then place their spin on it, taking it totally out of context. I wonder how many respondents here are approaching this topic with their brains tightly shut. Their is a saying, "it is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it." Change the word "salary" here for beliefs...or your religious group. I don't know about you but my brain is always open to understanding. I would like to hear Mr. Harris's response...if he so feels the need to do so.

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Please do not post unless you have read "The End of Faith". This article misrepresents Sam Harris to an astonishing degree. If you would like to understand Sam's real position on torture, mysticism, etc. then please read "The End of Faith" yourself, or at least read this www.samharris.org/site/full_text/response-to-controversy2/ a response from Sam. If after you truly comprehend Sam's position and then you still reject him that is, of course, more than ok. However, I think to base your opinion of Sam Harris solely from this obviously bias and misrepresented piece of crap, disguised as journalism, would be a terrible mistake.

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By supporting the publication of John Gorenfeld's pack of lies about Sam Harris, AlterNet casts doubt on the veracity of all of its contributing authors and violates its own stated standards for published content. You should be ashamed. Anyone who has read the books of Sam Harris knows that Gorenfeld has committed egregious libel. Gorenfeld should be ostracized by the community of honorable writers at AlterNet. Failing that, it signals the demise of a previously respectable entity.

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"The National Museums of Kenya has a strong case for the evolutionary theory of the origins of mankind. The collection it holds is one of Kenya's very few global claims to fame and it must be forthright in defending its right to be at the forefront of this branch of science." Leakey was for year’s director of the museum and of Kenya's entire museum system.
The museum's collections include the most complete skeleton yet found of Homo erectus, the 1.7-million-year-old Turkana Boy unearthed by Leakey's team in 1984 near Lake Turkana in northern Kenya.
The museum also holds bones from several specimens of Australopithecus anamensis, believed to be the first hominid to walk upright, four million years ago. Together the artifacts amount to the clearest record yet discovered of the origins of Homo sapiens.
Religion is a way for childish men to con people out of their money.

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Gorenfeld is a narrow-minded, religiously brainwashed individual who has lied and misquoted and twisted Mr. Harris's views on religion. Gorenfeld's writings on any subject, but especially on religion, should never bee published on any web site or any magazine or newspaper because his words are poisonous. I agree totally with Sam Harris' views on religion & think that religion has been endegering the world. But I am surprised and offended that the management of Alternet for publishing Gorenfeld's malicious and sitorted article on a gentleman like Mr. Harris, who should be praised for his valor and courage.

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I’m a Sam Harris fan. I also know that many folks find comfort in religion. I have no quarrel with comfort. Having said that, on to the meat of the matter at hand . . .

No I won’t cherry-pick John Gorenfeld’s essay regarding Sam Harris that I found on AlterNet today. I suspect, however, that Mr. Gorenfeld did a bit of cherry-picking while assembling his essay. Cherry-picking as abasis for criticism, either positive or negative, is not a technique I admire. Well, maybe a little bit is OK . . .

I must admit that the lead: “Sam Harris’s Faith in Eastern Spirituality and Muslim Torture” strikes me as a bit strange. I think this would be profoundly misleading to anyone planning to read one or both of his recent books. My reaction after reading both The End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation was quite different, more like:

“Hallelujah! How refreshing to hear a strident voice of reason.”

Perhaps I missed the parts about killing the Muslim hoards, promoting Hindu gods, and 20 cases of reincarnation. Or, perhaps these things simply came from Mr. Gorenfeld’s interview with Mr. Harris and were not in the books at all. Having no first-hand knowledge of what was said in the interview, I cannot comment on that. In any event, based on what I recall from the books, I think that many of the quotes sited in Mr. Gorenfeld’s essay are probably w.a.y. out of context. I’ll read the books again in an effort to clarify.

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Gorenfeld has deliberately cherry picked a few lines out of context and written an entire article about these, ignoring everything else, despite the fact that Harris clarifies these statements in his books and other articles. The dishonesty of Gorenfeld's ad hominem attack is staggering.

Harris's statement on torture is made in the context of our support of bombing to target terrorists, which inflicts pain and death on innocent bystanders. Torture is no worse. Don't like it? Don't support bombing, then. As for the ticking time bomb scenario, this scenario envisages a grinning fanatic who has already admitted to knowing where the bomb is, but won't tell you. Even for this, Harris believes that torture should be illegal (the current POTUS thinks it should be legal--why isn't Gorenfeld screaming about him?) The would-be torturer should have to defend his actions in court. In other words, he'd better be damn sure he's got the right guy.

Harris's defense of spirituality is by no means a defense of any particular religious dogma, and he is certainly not a believer in the Hindu pantheon--this is an outright lie on Gorenfeld's part. What Harris is arguing for is essentially what Dan Dennett is arguing for: a scientific inquiry into the practices and effects of religion, with an eye to preserving the beneficial aspects while curbing the harmful tendencies. Apparently, there's no pleasing his critics. Harris is pilloried as much for saying that religion might have some good points as he is for pointing out its bad points.

As for Harris's view of the Muslims, consider this: there are only 9 Muslim Nobel Prize laureates, only 2 for science. There have been 178 Jewish Nobel Prize winners, 156 for science. 1.2 billion people vs. 15 million, and look at the difference. Scott Atran, at the Beyond Belief conference last November, argued that Muslim terrorists do what they do not because of their Muslim beliefs, but because they are marginalized and crave respect. Yet he, and everyone here, seems to ignore the elephant in the room. The reason that there are so few Muslim Nobel Prize winners, the reason that the infrastructure in Muslim countries is kept running by imported western labour, the reason that the Middle East served as a chew toy for every world power that took an interest in it, and the reason that they are marginalized and that no one respects them, is that they are saddled with a religious ideology which makes them culturally, scientifically, politically, and economically sterile. Nobody respects someone who contributes nothing.

The Muslims are oppressed by Islam. Or did you think they were genetically inferior? Racism takes many forms. White Man's burden has been given a whole new packaging; we feel responsible for the downtrodden and oppressed--which makes us just a little bit superior to them, doesn't it? My, how wonderful and powerful we must be to control the destiny of everyone else! But it never occurs to anyone to wonder whether the reason they are oppressed is that we play into it by our patronizing attitude. We treat them like pets. The only way to continue to exploit the victim card is to remain a victim. You cannot demand pity and respect in the same breath, and expect to gain both.

We regard only children and the insane as not responsible for their actions. So which are the Muslims--children, or lunatics? Let's start treating them as adults, stop patronizing them with pity, and expect them to take responsiblity for their own fate, just as we would anyone in our own society, anyone we considered equal. Islam is even more of a problem for them than it is for us. Stop making excuses for it.

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I would be surprised if John Gorenfeld has read any of Sam Harris's books given that his comments have so grossly misrepresented Sam's message. The central theme of Sam's message is that religeon is a divisive medeival mentality that has no place in the 21st century. Sam points out in his book how religeon has managed to stiffle rational debate and that is why, for example, that many people in the US actually believing that Christ is going to return in blazing glory - without any evidence other that some ancient literature written by a few tribesfolk (which can be interpreted in almost anyway the reader wishes). This same literature that invites us to massacre people and take their lands, kill gay people, murder children and rape women - and all because people think that the creator of the known universe has actually dictated his wishes to the "unbiassed" pen of the biblical scribes.

John Gorenfeld says that Sam "invites the reader to feel comfort at the deaths of its believers". This is not only untrue but is a shameful misrepresentation of what Sam actually says. I can only recommend Sams book " The End of Faith" to your readers, so they can find out what Sam has ACTUALLY written.

It appears that Sam Harris is "exactly on the mark" - why else would John Gorenfeld have to result in such misrepresentation in order to to make cheap scoring points. Stick to the FACTS John - not fiction - after all this is not a bible class!

Richard Murphy

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Obviously you have not read his books or listened to him speak. You've completely and blatantly misrepresented him. I like how not a single one of your quotes is an entire sentence. So what are you pissed about? Or did someone pay you to write this? obviously you have an agenda that doesn't include fair and accurate dialog. Thankfully most people aren't naive enough to simply take your word for it.

Read the books or listen to Sam on his website. He doesn't advocate torture or any such bs. This has to be the most absurd and laughable rebutle to Sam's argument that I've heard. And that's saying a lot because they're all pretty absurd.

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Sorry for the exclamatory title. Here I have provided a better apology than John Gorenfeld will ever relative to his article. I encourage those who read this strange rant to read Sam Harris's works in their entirety. While typing this response I came across a response by Sam Harris himself. I hope the editors of AlterNet can salvage some editorial respect and post Sam Harris’s response to this "hit" piece that is far to similar to a Fox News report. Feel free to read it at: www.samharris.org/site/full_text/response-to-controversy2/

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It should be no surprise to understand Gorenfeld's motive for this trash piece against an atheist. After all, it is John Gorenfeld, who, at his very own website advances the notion that
EVOLUTION IS MYTH!

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I have, after reading in theology, also read, indeed studied, most of the literature surrounding the falling away from religion. I have been particularly attracted to the logic, common sense and clear reasoning expressed both by Dawkins and Harris. By contrast, Gorenfield's article is rubbish, obviously cooked up tendentiously to discredit Harris and other nonbelievers. Not worth dignifying by commenting on in detail.

However, on the larger questions raised by implication: the theory of the Big Bang and evolution and natural selection are rigorous explanations accepted by most scientists and thinking people after more than a century since Charles Darwin. They provide more than sufficient answer to the age-old questions: how did we get here, who am I, how was the universe made. Not the 'why' because there may be no why beyond the fact that we are products of a very, very, long process of genetic development. There is a passage I read somewhere that when scientists approach the problem of 'what was before the Big Bang?" they encounter theologists approaching from the opposite direction. Both should have the courage to say, "I don't know and may never know."

We are part of the process, particularly the magic moment when one of millions of sperm combine with an ovum to make a unique creature - you and I. If one fails to do that, the chain of life will follow someone else's conception and subsequent experience in his or her environment.

The remaining important topics for philosophy and ethics then are, I think: how do we interact beneficially with other humans, with other species, and what do we do about the larger questions of the environment. If we accept the beauty of the universe, our world and the manner in which it and we developed, we would approach all these questions with reason and sensitivity and find better answers than those provided by religion, which usually claims to have all the answers bundled up as "God" and a mastery over the environment, not a stewardship.

Religion offers nothing much different than any other superstition; supernatural aspects of Christianity are clearly an adaption of Egyptian religion, Greek mythology and Zoroastrianism. The Golden Rule espoused by Jesus of Nazareth, was in place long before he came on the scene with his teachings. His teachings on dealing with one's brother that he is reported to have made are, are mostly, fine thoughts, but the religion and the churches that were founded in his name have often perpetrated more evil than good; some of the worst was by the religion-that-became-empire. Now the fundamentalist, literalist evangelical movement merging into prominence in the southern and south western US and parts of Canada threatens even more damage.

The attempt by the early church (about the 4th Century BCE) to present the supernatural aspects of the Jesus story as "history" rather than "allegory" discredited any intelligent discussion of Jesus. The story has been in place so long and is so much a part of our tradition and any attempt to approach the subject is brushed off by the church as "Oh we dealt with heresy centuries ago. Not worth discussing."

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Why do you insist on believing anything you read on the internet and then feel empowered to comment and add to the ignorance without being knowledgeable of the subject of an article's polemic claims. In the future, please use the informed delight of ignorance as a catalyst for learning. Maybe you can use this wonderful InterWeb to research viewpoints - dare I suggest - even views that don't match your own. In the mean time, go back to sending emails about urban myths packaged as cold, hard facts that the government doesn't want us to know. Please send this comment to at least 5 of your friends in the next 5 minutes or you will be cursed. I wish you peace.

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This piece was obviously a cheap and sleezy attempt to destroy Sam Harris with completely erroneous and fraudulent characterizations.

Gorenfeld has succeeded only in demonstrating where his own religious god beliefs lie, and that Harris is but one of those who are making people like Gorenfeld very uncomfortable by paving real inroads in exposing those beliefs as the ignorant and ancient delusions they are.

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On the face, Gorenfeld argument seems only an intellectual argument against atheism. In reality, Christianity has created many brainwashed Christians who would do or say "anything" to counter-attack when their dogma is attacked. Although Western religion has succeeded to manipulate its followers to self defend its religion under any circumstance like any cult, this time I feel sick to read this "unfounded," "out of context" accusations on Sam Harris' books. Obviously he has not read any of them. Why all the Right wingers and fundamentalists are all the same in terms of twisting reality to get public attention when they are cornered.
But I think this is the last draw of dying culture, so I wouldn't worry, but hey, at least have some intelligence to legitimately back up what they are saying.
Normally, I don't even bother to respond to a piece like this and probably never will. Oh, man!

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This screed by Gorenfeld, a religious extremist, shames alternet, an otherwise brilliant website. Gorenfeld’s screed speaks for itself to those who have read and are familiar with both the writings of Harris and the religious hysteria that is predominately the only response to it. I find no need to comment further, this is a fallacious and vitriolic screed as produced by a religious extremist. I’m only sad to find such ignorance on alternet.

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Dear John,
I was raised as a catholic in Ireland. Like my certainty that Santa Clause existed I was also certain of the existence of God. At about the age of 9 I began to experience the pleasure of realising that I in fact had permission to think my own thoughts on these matters-that permission I realised I could give to myself.
I stood up in school one day and declared to my religion teacher that I no longer believed in Santa or God. When asked by him why, I replied that there was no evidence that convinced me that either was real. The teacher (a very kind and religiously devout man whom I loved) asked me to come to the head of the class to discuss the matter further. The next 40 minutes or so were my first opportunity to publicly display my new individual mindset to a captive audience. I enjoyed the experience immensely and know that the boys in the classroom enjoyed it also (because they told me so).
I was lucky because I was educated in a milieu where my individuality was respected and even celebrated. Others were not so lucky. In the Ireland of recent decades people were told what to think by the church. If they disagreed they paid the price through social rejection. They were taught about the God of wrath who dished out punishment to the noncompliant. One method the church used locally to keep people in line was to read from the alter, publicly how much money each family in the parish had contributed to the local church tax. People complied with this system because they were afraid to be noticed as different, and because they believed that the church was righteous .Since those days the church has been exposed for wrongdoing itself (hypocrisy, child abuse etc)and this fact has given ordinary people permission to stand up and say no, something is wrong here.
One result of this upheaval is that people –good people-are confused .They are confused because they for the first time are challenged to think for themselves. They don’t like this because the old certainties are gone and they are without a guide in whom they can trust and respect. We all need a guide sometime in our lives and what we need most from that guide is someone who will enable us to discover ways to live honestly and happily. In my opinion a good guide is one that teaches us to think for ourselves .One of the most exciting ways of discovering how to think for one self is to adopt the scientific methodology – i.e. to take a proposition and to put it to the test
Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins attempt in the spirit of honesty and compassion to be such guides. Many people perceive these men as being hostile to their belief systems and therefore hostile to them. This is not true. Both thinkers are offering people a way of looking at the world that is honest and ultimately pointing to a safer world one in which people are free to talk and disagree without fear of reprisal or social rejection. Both remind me of my friendly teacher who invited me to the top of my class to debate a proposition that he disagreed with but yet allowed me the pleasure of expressing.
For I believe that free inquiry is a joy to be cherished.
To admonish Sam Harris for discussing the disturbing reality of armed conflict is to miss his intention. Harris is clearly interested in promoting intellectual honesty and I for one celebrate his courage and integrity. I also would like to thank him for writing such stimulating books – I wish I knew of such reading material all those years ago in religion class, which would have provided I’m sure, endless hours of pleasurable debate for me and all the boys in my class.
My question to you John is this – what kind of guide do you want to be?
Kind Regards
David Byrne

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Evidently John Gorenfeld doesn't have the ability to read and understand. I've read all of Sam Harris' books, and I found none of the things mentioned by Mr. Gorenfeld. Sam Harris does not support torture on anyone, he does not support atheism, which is a nonsense word, and he does not support paranormal or spirituality, which are also unrealistic. He states his position with clarity and reasonableness.

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I'm glad to see so many defending Sam from this jealous hate monger. I've been reading Sam Harris's writing for quite some time and I must say it's like a breath of fresh air in this bible thumping hell hole. I have questioned religion and blind faith since I was a kid. I tried a half dozen or more religions to see if any of them made sense. They all teach the same old thing. I finally said the hell with it. I refuse to worship something that has never been seen.

I have been told that I will fry in hell if I don't worship their god. But then along comes George Bush claiming to be a Christian. If there was ever anything or anyone who proves that there is no god it's Bush. If there was a god, would he really torment those who had worshipped him all those years by making them spend an eternity with George Bush?

So Mr. Gorenfeld, why don't you take the time to read Sam's books & articles and educate yourself. Of course it would be poetic justice if you had to spend an eternity with Bush!!

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When Harris’ book first came out I was at first delighted at the provocative language but I got really pissed at his chapter where he dissed the left and people like Noam Chomsky. The whole chapter was garbage, it made so little sense that I stopped reading. (Later, I also skipped his metaphysical musings). Then I noticed the endorsement by Alan Dershovitz, law prof at Harvard. Dershovitz on the book’s jacket. My suspicion is that there’s a connection between Dershovitz and Harris. The endorsement of torture, the irrational hatred of Chomsky, those are trademark Dershovitz traits, as anyone can confirm who has heard him rant and rave (actually, many many years ago Dershovitz was barred by the editorial board of the Boston Globe from appearing in that paper on the subject of Israel because Chomsky had shown that he was deliberately lying to make his case.)
That said, I’ve heard Harris speak in Boulder, CO, and listened to his speech again afterwards. In person, none of that nuttiness was apparent, and his argumentation was reasonable and not aggressive.

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Seriously...it's clear you've taken pieces of your interview w/ Harris out of their original context and recast them in favor of your unfavorable opinion of him. I dare you to reprint a transcript of the interview you had with him. No doubt it would reveal a very different conversation than the one you purport to have taken place.

I've read Harris' published and unpublished work. As a Catholic I find it challenging in the most positive way. You've misrepresented his point of view, obviously intentionally and with malice.

People like you contribute to the internet's bad reputation. For shame.

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this article is unfair, and distorts Harris's books. too many instances to detail, but here are a couple: he is not advocating Buddhism or Hinduism as religions, but correctly points out that they both have many valid ideas and methods for personal transformation, more so with Buddhism, which does not have a personal deity concept. He specifically mentions the conflicts and violence of Hindu/Moslem comflicts. Harris criticizes the West for not admitting the truth, that the biggest threat to our survival is from Islam, and to claim that it is a "religion of peace" is a willful lie and denial of reality. He does not advocate torture of Moslems, rather, he argues that torture of someone to prevent another 9-11 is a moral decision (and Dershowitz has written a book with the same argument). We delude ourselves when we think we are somehow purer when we maim men, women and children by dropping bombs on them. Or, I would add, sending our own men and women to be mutilated, blinded, and burned by IED's, while we pussyfoot around with the al quedas. I don't know that he's written on this question, but: why is our government sending a "surge" to baghdad when the Iraq governmment doesn't want us, and the most horrific killing is by the Sunni/Baathist terrorists - are we going to tell the legitimate government not to go after them with everything they've got?

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I read this pathetic attempt to discredit the courageous and brilliant Sam Harris and just smiled myself silly. Thank you for setting a public example of the kind of lunacy that needs to be eradicated from the human race if we are to survive and live happy, meaningful lives. People like you, Mr. Gorenfeld, just make the rationalist's case stronger. I appreciate your assistance with furthering our cause.

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Sam Harris' arguments regarding the ethical use of torture is convincing. The problem raised is an "ethical conundrum" and should be discussed because of that. I would have tended to provide more details about the actual situations and the precise methods that would be used to extract information. The effect on the person carrying out the procedures would also be a concern. In a public statement of my views on this, I believe that I would want to be specific about cases where an acceptable form of torture could be used. I would also need evidence which indicates that torture helps solve crimes in cases deemed extreme. The peripheral rules would also have to be documented in law before I would partake in the role of interrogator. Along these lines, powerful psychoactive drugs might be an acceptable form of torture for extreme cases. I would personally feel less ethically stressed if these medications were used instead of hot pokers. LSD torture, for example, would likely produce some usable information if the interrogation was sufficiently managed. I would not use instruments like pliers or bamboo slivers or hot irons, because those are crude instruments of torture and cause horrific physical pain and permanent damage. I don't believe I could bring myself to administer procedures like that. Psycoactive drugs like LSD, however, produce less consequential damage to the recipient. With a medical understanding that there would be no lingering physical effects, I myself could probably administer the procedure if I had the knowledge of the proper conduct of a torture session which leveraged powerful drugs. Obviously, I would have to be very convinced of the guilt of the criminal and I would have to believe that he knew what was needed to solve the crime. It is still horrifying, beyond a shadow of a doubt, but if I absolutely knew that the person being interviewed was a heinous villan about to torture my daughter, I would seek to extract the information using a drugging procedure. Anyone who will not admit this is probably just being wishy-washy.

I am grateful that Sam Harris has the compunction and courage to deal with this subject. I hope that I will never be in the position to administer a torture procedure. In fact, the administrator himself would have to be prepared and trained in drug torture techniques, so that he himself would not feel tortured by administering the procedure.

Anyway, I believe Sam is "correct", albeit not quite as thorough in the discussion as I would like. I also feel very ambivalent about the discussion, because of the concept of responsibility.

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Religion is not a primary cause. It is like a malignancy that has got into the lung from elsewhere in the body – injurious to the host but one must search for the primary source. Dawkins and Harris have focused on religion, but its ultimate origin within an evolved species remains a mystery (one to which Dawkins, at least, has alluded). The human malfunction that has led to religion also leads to other ills at least as serious.

The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was militantly atheist and extremely authoritarian. It divided urban non-capitalists into “true proletarians” and “petty-bourgeois intellectuals”. Proletarian virtues, to the communists, included credulity, incuriosity and obedience – much like the qualities promoted by the religious faithful. “Petty-bourgeois intellectuals” could be useful but had to be watched – they tended to ask questions and be individualistic and disobedient.. Yet historically, human progress has come from the voices in the wilderness, not from the wilderness.

What is the origin of this malfunction that makes people suckers for faith, whether religious or communist or whatever? Is it an evolutionary mistake? Such mistakes do happen – this is why countless species have become extinct during the time of life on earth. Chiropractors say our skeletons suffer chronically because human beings required, for survival, to walk on two legs long before their skeletons evolved to take the strain (they haven’t adapted even now). A compromise – an evolutionarily successful development at the cost of a an acquired, wired-in malfunction.

Intellectually, human beings evolved way past other animals which is probably why such physically disadvantaged animals survived. All animals are curious within the limits of immediate necessity, but human beings learned to reach out to the limits of their observations and try to predict what would be found beyond the immediate time, place and field of observation. This led to science but it meanwhile made people suckers for short cuts. Hence the myths and superstitions. Social forces provided the operators who exploited this to invent “answers” to questions people were asking. Enter religion and other faith-based world-views like communism, fascism and neoliberal economics. All springing from a malfunction arising from the evolutionary process itself.

I am indebted to Scott Balogh and Jimsabis, who contributed in the thread “It’s all in the Bible” for prompting the above

(The communists, by the way, ascribed the “proletarian virtues” to the discipline of factory labour – in learning to cope in that environment, workers also learned characteristics that were their own undoing. Fortunately, like religious faith, “proletarian virtues” infected only a proportion of those exposed to the generating conditions) .

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I have read Sams books. I have heard him speak many,many times. I have read new articles writen by him for major news papers. This columnist has completely taken Sam out of context. No...and I mean no intelligent person could read his books and listen to him talk and write this without an agenda. Disagree with Sam's ideas, disagree with his tone, but don't distort him, beacuse you could'nt last 5 min. in a debate with the man...even with your distorted talking points.

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The only difference between Harris and other anti-Muslim, anti-Arab hate mongers is that he pretends to dislike Christians and Jews as well. His excuse for literature should be barred as hate propaganda. He is an obvious liar - what Buddhist would promote torture?

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This article is not warranted at all and I believe Gorenfeld discredited himself and has shown a great lack of integrity misstating things. It is amazing that someone like Gorenfeld can put words so intelligently together and still come across as a wounded child fighting back with exaggerations and falsities. I would expect this from the typical immature theocrat that can not defend or prove the ridiculousness of their faith and respond this way. I hope for the day when mankind can put their fairytales and immaturities behind itself.

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I'd never heard of Gorenfeld.
His article on Sam Harris tells me why. He's a hack and obviously has his own weird agenda.
He distorts the truth rather like Fox news does.
I urge others to read Harris's books which are quite brilliant.
Harris argues that as far as we know there is no god and no supernatural world. And he chooses reason rather than faith.
So do I.And according to a recent poll in The Guardian UK,so do most British people,64% of whom do not believe in a skygod.
Hopefully the 21st century will see the end of superstition once and for all.

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John Gorenfeld wriggles & twists the words of one of the rational world's most erudite voices into a jumbled mess more in keeping with the O'Reilly Show than with AlterNet. Harris' openness to alternate definitions of reality coupled with Gorenfeld's ridicule of such possibilities speaks volumes in regard to the intelligence of both minds.

Please.... AlterNet can do better.

Gorenfeld states:

"We all need our illusions"

Don't speak for me, pancho.....

i've sought, indeed laboured, for almost 60 years to free myself from "illusion" and i'm not interested in some uptight twit telling me that i "need" anything other than what i am able to establish as truth...

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If this article is your only exposure to the works of Sam Harris, then do yourself a favor and actually read his books. This article totally misrepresents what Harris actually writes. The author of this article has either purposely or naively misread Harris's books and then presented his misreadings as if they are actual representations of Harris's work. Here's a quote from The End of Faith regarding torture (p.198 in the 2005 paperback edition for those who want to follow along):

"Most of us feel, intuitively at least, that if we can't quite muster a retort to Dershowitz and his ticking bomb, we can take refuge in the fact that the paradigmatic case will almost never arise. From this perspective, adorning the machinery of our justice system with a torture provision seems both unnecessary and dangerous, as the law of unintended consequences may one day find it throwing the whole works into disarray. Because I believe the account offered above is basically sound, I believe that I have successfully argued for the use of torture in any circumstances in which we would be willing to cause collateral damage. Paradoxically, this equivalence has not made the practice of torture seem any more acceptable to me; nor has it, I trust, for most readers."

His argument about torture (which is, by the way, only a tiny point in his overall argument about religion) is not 'for' or 'against' torture; it's about the moral equivalence of torture and collateral damage. He's basically saying that if you support killing women and children with carpet bombing, why would you be against torturing a few people here and there, especially in a circumstance in which millions might be saved (the 'ticking bomb' argument)?
Look, Harris is a philosopher; this kind of rational thought experiment is what he was steeped in for years at Stanford. I hope that Gorenfeld's misreading of Harris was merely a naive misreading (in which case he can go back and read these books more closely), because if this was a purposeful misreading, then I wonder what his motivation was for misrepresenting Harris in such an embarrassing way.

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This is nothing more than a "swift boating" of Sam Harris and everybody who doesn't want to see his name slandered should go the alternet website and demand an apology. When people say courageous but provocative things like Sam Harris the people who agree and are thankful for his courage must defend his reputation against slander. This is a right wing, fundie tactic that is used to discredit an author, and sadly it often works because if no one speaks up, many will mistake the silence as acceptance.

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I've read both of Sam Harris' books, as well as listened to several of his lectures, and never once did I get the impression that he was a raving lunatic. So, either my direct interpretations of his views are accurate, or John Gorenfeld's portrayal is. I will go with my own assessment and just have to wonder what sort of agenda or insecurities this article is meant to protect.

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Atran's remarks are devastating...check it out:
linked text

NB The hyperbole of Harris 'smack down' is SOLELY
my doing...Atran would no doubt be far more modest
and not bother with anything remotely 'personal'.
Moreover I may very well take issue with Atran on
some issues.
But I'm not passing myself off or being passed off as
an 'expert', as is the case with Harris.

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It would help in the discussion if both the author of the article and those who comment would focus on the issues and the fact rather than judgements and speculation.

As to the discussion of religion speculating on what Sam Harris does or does not believe is irrelevant to the issues he wishes to discuss. Unfortunately the bulk of the responses I have read related to the discussion on the facts underlying religious belief chose not to debate the facts.

For those who would like to focus on the facts I would pose a simple test of the underlying religious belief that God (whichever version you chose to believe in) created man.

Assuming God created nature, please provide 1 example of a benefit to nature that man has provided on earth.

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On his site Sam spells out more clearly what he thinks on these issues.

Response to Controversy

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Regarding Buddhism, ESP, and reincarnation, Sam Harris demonstrates another example of disingenuous cultural appropriation.

The premise is, a religion’s value can be measured in its appeal to white Western liberals. By this yardstick, Islam doesn’t cut it. Buddhism and Hinduism can work -- hey, the Beetles were into it -- as long as they are “cleaned up” and reassembled for Western consumption. It’s hip, it’s trendy, and it's a status symbol of one’s cosmopolitanism, one's "open mind".

(I’m not suggesting that religion is inextricably tied to culture and time. There is always a give and take between religion and culture, and this latitude allows it to be practiced by widely diverse cultures. And cultural exchange, including intellectual exchange of social, political, and religious ideas, has been going on from the beginning of time. But I digress...)

How revealing it is to see a "logical" and "enlightened" intellectual who has transcended the barbarism of religion now calling for torture in the name of “reasonable men and women” and musing flirtations with genocide ("Some propositions are so dangerous that it may even be ethical to kill people for believing them.")

In the end, you shall know them by their fruits. If you unleash a whirlwind of human rights abuses, it makes no difference whether these atrocities are done in the name of Christianity, Islam, communism, patriotism, democracy, or "freedom".

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Finding the weak point/hot button that can be emphasized and distorted is a well-known technique for discrediting one's perceived adversary. (Think 'abortion', 'prayer in the school', 'gay marriage'.)

Harris' books are not about torture, they are about contemporary religion and modern society. Similarly, he may have an interest in Eastern thought (perhaps a confused one), but that plays a very minor role in the books.

Harris' key point -- as I see it -- is that there is an irreconcilable conflict between the self-centered world view of the world's major religions. That "We have the true word" perspective is particularly ridiculous for Christianity, Judaism, and Islam, since they all claim to have the same founder and God and still relish killing each other.

Harris' second key point is that the world's billions reliance on obviously ignorant (by today's standards) and conflicting scripture poses a clear and present danger to civilization. I would suggest that that danger is somewhat greater than the apparently scary prospect of mass meditation.

It is easy to tear someone down through distortion and exaggeration ... how about addressing the main points of the thesis next time?

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If Gorenfeld had not identified the book and author as he did, I would never have known to what title/author he was referring! So much has been taken out of context and so many clearly expressed ideas by Harris have been twisted that I did not otherwise recognize this amazing book as described in this article! One word: Misrepresentation! Read it (End of Faith) for yourself. It's a breath of fresh air in a country which has lost its way and its common sense.

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I read End of Faith, and suggest one should read it before commenting on this article.

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Those who are familiar with Sam and his works knows that the gist of this article is quite far off base from his actual beliefs on torture, ESP, or any of the other confusing beliefs attributed to Sam.

Sam makes it clear in both his books that only stance he supports is evidence based decision making. He is against anything--torture, political persuasion, religion--that requires a dogmatic view of the position in order for it to be successful.

This article is as confusing as it is incorrect. I suspect that the author had a point to make in writing it that has nothing to do with journalistic honesty.

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Another non-discussed issue is Harris' run-of-the-mill ignorance about Islam and what it means. This is not to say that many Muslims are not also ignorant about the faith they believe they espouse. By categorizing Islam and Muslims in one lump sum, however, and "Eastern spirituality" in another lump sum simply highlights his lack of true credibility on the subject of religion. Even if one despises religion(s), a truly rational discussion on the subject requires that one gain even a modicum of genuine knowledge on it, something Harris obviously has no intention of doing.

For those who don't know, there are many allegations out there regarding the content of the Qur'an, by both Muslims and non-Muslims, that are incredibly misleading. In fact, much of its content is quite universal - I can show, to anyone who cares to know, its confirmation of what is considered to be "far eastern" thought, and of pro-democracy and even to some extent pro-feminist thought. For example, the famous excerpt recommending wife-beating is actually based on a mis-translation of the original - the recommendation was for separation, not battery at all. The problem is getting actual Muslims to understand this, though.

As many comments rightly agree, the issue is not so much religion as society and culture, and how folks heavy-hand the way religion is applied.

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I've read both books. This is a crazy distortion. The writer should be embarrassed.

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I'll bet Gorenfeld wouldn't release a transcript of the interview. It would certainly reveal just how much of a hatchet job he did here. But why destroy whatever credibility you may have once had by doing this trash. Is the worship of your god delusion that strong that you decided to become a "suicide writer"?

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I have read both of Sam's books, "The End of Faith" and "Letter to a Christian Nation" along with a number of his essays and op-eds. I have listened to several of his interviews and debates. Sam basically makes the same rock-solid argument over and over again: faith-based reason is a very bad idea. He thinks we ought to use evidence to make decisions rather than mystical fairy tales. What a crazy idea. Mr. Gorenfeld's cherry-picking of information reminds me of the Bush Administration's cherry-picking of evidence for WMDs in Iraq. Sam Harris is a courageous visionary that isn't afraid to speak truth to numbers. AlterNet should be more selective about what they choose to publish.

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Harris point is the Muslums in the Middle East seem to put their honor before love.
Love for ones own daughter or sister should be paramount over their own honor. These people murder their own family member if their raped etc. What kind of of barbaric people are we dealing with?

In the Lucifer Principal by Howard Bloom, he points out that are own moral high ground will be used as a weapon against us by barbarians. I believe we need to exterminate and let those with irrational belief systems be thinned out. I believe George Bush is using a war where the U.S. kind of holds the high moral ground but the collateral damage aspect of our invasion of Iraq is a weapon in itself by unstablizing the region resulting in a civil war. What better way to wage a war than to get the Muslum denominations that are tribal and barbaric to wage war against each other. Most of the muslums in the middle east are very tribal and their tribal leaders all seek some sort of cupidity and use religion to further their own agenda. Of course Christian leaders in the west also use religion for cupidity purposes but they dont' murder their our own daughters who become victims of rape. Think of Escape from New York, the government gets the criminals all in one place and lets them kill each other and then the govenment can stand back and say it wasn't the goverment that did the slaughtering but the very criminals themselves that killed each other. We can then see how barbaric the muslums of the middle east are due they kill women and children which we have seen on 9/11 and to what is going on in Iraq right now and other muslum societies. Torture of someone who first is admitting that they know of a WMD that is about to go off but what tell us is reasonable if it saves lives. If we bomb buidlings to get at a terrorist, innocent men, women and children will be killed or maimed which is a form of torture also.

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I have read everything Sam Harris has written, & listened to every lecture by or interview of him that have been posted online & I am appalled by the smear of him & his ideas & writings by Mr. Gorenfeld. He misquotes Harris, twists his words & ideas, & is generally mean & spiteful towards him. Instead of dealing with Harris' carefully reasoned arguments regarding very difficult, thorny issues such as torture (not for fun but in aid of protecting innocent lives) his approach is to mock Harris as though he, Gorenfeld, knows the "right way" & the "truth of the matter" & thus has no need of thoughtful, rational discussion.
Instead of reporting accurately Harris' comments on parapsychological subjects, he makes fun of Harris for even discussing such subjects as though he, Gorenfeld, knows (in his political correctness) what's what regarding these matters & has no need to even consider them for discussion.
Having read Harris' actual remarks, I know where Gorenfeld twists them & am disgusted so much space has been given to such a spiteful, meanspirited, misleading review of Harris' work. But read Harris for yourself--you may find you disagree with his arguments/ideas, but at least you will have arrived at that position for yourself, from rational thought, rather than taking the word of a "politically correct" pseudo intellectual (one who thinks blah blah equates with rational consideration of something & emotional positions constitute well-thought-out argument).

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I think much time and energy are wasted on Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins. Their mission, conscious or not, seems to be calling attention to themselves, not to their cause.

Why is it that Rationality and compassion never seem to marry in the public discourse?

Harris´ writing is borderline insane. His views are equally matched with the religous fundamentalists that he so passionately opposes.

Violence begets violence, eye for an eye = a planetful of white canes etc..
That is rational! Simple math! So often sung, never adhered to.

As for Dr. Dawkins. All I´ve seen and read that has to do with him paints a picture of a pompous man, infected by his self-proclaimed genius. Sarcasm will never solve a problem.
At least not a problem as big as religion.

-An Atheist.

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Sam, You have ‘Cherry Picked’ the good parts of Buddhism, so in that, you are no different from the religious Christian, Jew or Moslem. In practice Buddhists generally are like all the other denominations and will use violence to support their causes when necessary ignoring Buddha’s ‘Thou shall not kill a single living thing’ as impractical. Take a tour around some of the cruel and horrific depictions of Buddhism in Thai shrines and your eyes will be opened. You cannot be ‘little bit’ of a Buddhist Sam!

You mention several conflicts and claim they are being fought mainly over religion completely ignoring the political and economic factors that are the main reasons for these wars. I will take only two of those you mention as examples but I suggest there are parallels with most of the rest on your list.

Firstly Palestine. For hundreds of years those of the Moslem and Jewish faiths lived side by side peacefully with unusual tolerance given by the practicing Moslems in regard to the minority practicing Jewish Palestinians. The Moslems regarded the religious Jews as ‘ People of the Book’ both denominations are Abrahamic, both are of the same Semitic ethnicity. The present conflict is the result of Europeans entering Palestine by force using terrorism to remove many of the Moslem inhabitants from their businesses, land and homes which were then allocated to the invaders. This dispossession was, and still is backed by the U.S.A. for strategic reasons. Sure religion is used by the dispossessed and the invaders equally for motivational purposes like patriotism but the main cause is not, nor never was religion but was and is for purely for Political, economic and super power hegemony reasons.


Secondly Northern Ireland

The partition of Ireland was a result of the ‘Divide and Rule’ policy of the government in London which was used to maintain its unpopular rule there. Religion was used by the British governing political party in order to prevent the Irish people achieving independence which eventually came but at the terrible cost of partition. (The British Empire survived for a long time by the policy of ‘Divide and Rule” which ended up with the partition of India, Cyprus, Palestine etc .which has always engendered violence wherever it has been imposed ) The post war violence started in the North of Ireland in opposition to a ‘Civil Rights Movement’ which struggled for equal opportunity for the minority in education, housing and jobs. Those in the position of privilege opposed this violently and the situation escalated from that point. Religion is used of course by the rulers to create division in order to hide the real reasons that are purely economic!

Imperialism

The atrocity that was 9/11 remains vivid in your mind but the atrocities committed by the super powers seem to have not even registered with you. You fail to understand that 9/11 was not as a result of constant religious indoctrination and a visit to a Mosque just before the deadly deed, as you state but because the U.S has been killing Moslems in their own countries and interfering in their governments for many years. Sam study their statements please before jumping the gun! Peter Ustinov said, ‘Terror is the way the poor wage war, war is the way the rich wage terror’ Arab terrorists are sustained by their religion, what are the rich war makers sustained by Sam? Please do not say ‘Freedom and Democracy.’


Sam you condone torture but by openly stating that torture is officially justified on some occasions opens the flood gates to torture. Sam remember that tortures are like tracer bullets in that they reveal the source of an attack providing a good target for return fire.

You really are a strange atheist

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It was fairly irresponsible on your part publishing John Gorenfeld's 'article' about Sam Harris. Gorenfeld misrepresented Harris' writings and opinions, twisting his words and applying the switch and bait tactics so prevalent in Bill O'Reily's TV show. Your editors should've checked facts before allowing this sloppy attempt at denigrating Harris got through. This shows that whenever someone becomes popular or relevant in our culture, the best way to ride that person's coattails is to attempt to misrepresent them and make them look bad. It's sad that Alternet has fallen for this practice. You risk losing your legitimacy as an alternative and serious news source by employing people like John Gorenfeld, who obviously in a bout of envy has done more to discredit himself and Alternet than any damage he may have wished to do to Mr. Harris.

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Harris' brief section on the torture scandal isn't at all characterized correctly. Although this isn't stated, for his premise to work he gives GW Bush the benefit of the doubt and assumes that the people the CIA, coalition forces and foreign spy agencies put in detention centers (GITMO, Abu Ghraib) and secret prisons must have some evidence presented against them that suggests they are terrorists. These are "suspected" terrorists. Contrast this to average Iraqi citizens, for whom there is no evidence they are involved in any terrorist activities. These are "innocent" Iraqis. The number of innocent Iraqis now killed numbers in the 600 thousands. Immense. Disgustingly unbelievable. Now, despite overwhelming opposition to this war among the US public, a significant portion of Americans have not spoken out against the killing of innocent civilians (collateral damage). In a western/Judeo-Christian moral system, the killing of innocents is considered a much graver evil than the killing of the guilty/bad or people who we see as a threat to our bodies/possessions. Killing threatening or guilty people is seen as justice and defensible action, whereas killing an innocent person is seen as a crime. Because the number of "innocent" Iraqis killed is so heinous and large and because we value their lives more than we values the lives of people who are trying to harm us, if we don't get upset at collateral damage, why on earth would we get upset about threatening people getting killed? If you don't care about the lamb, why care about the wolf? Harris isn't saying this is a good thing - merely that this is largely the moral structure of our culture and that we shouldn't be shocked suspected terrorists are getting tortured when perfectly decent women and children are getting their flesh burned off by white phosphorus and napalm. (See Fallujah.)

The author of this alternet story may have spoken with Harris, but this article is in no way representative of Harris' views. Just google him or go to his website. There are some great video and radio interviews of him discussing the differences between religion and spirituality and other topics as well. Fascinating.

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