/lit/ - Literature

>>2510709
Arguably Essays is pretty good.

read whatever book of his sounds interesting to you, i mean fuck, it's not like there's anything challenging about him

>>2510718
This. It's all pop bullshit.

Letters to a Young Contrarian

>Where do I begin with Hitchens?

Anything of his that isn't related to international politics or religion, I suppose. He didn't know jack shit about either of those subjects.

You should begin with this bit of knowledge: Hitchens was a self-identified neoconservative who often praised the Bush administration. He also self-identified as a Jew despite not having little Jewish ancestry and not practicing Judaism.

You should really ask /sci about these things, /lit can't stand non-fiction.

>>2510777
Please go on.

>>2510868
/lit/ only reads obscure nonfiction, and nonfiction classics, not this pop crap for plebs.

The definition of a pseudo-intellect.

I didn't know /lit was so religious.

>>2510917
Not really. It's just that Hitchens was to atheists what Falwell was to theists.

/lit/ is full of critical theorists who hate New Atheists for not bowing down to Islam, so don't expect any support here.

>>2510946
Don't forget the self-hating American Chomskyites.

>>2510946
Are you kidding me? New Atheists blame all of the world's strife on Christians instead of all theists, since they're too pussy to say anything critical towards Judaism or Islam.

>>2510958
no they say bad things about jews and muslims too

I dunno the very mention of Hitchens just angers me for some reason. Maybe with the whole Afganistan / Iraq fiasco. I any regard I can at least respect Dawkins for being a consistant populist writter, Hitchens is just a pure hypocrite.

>>2510960
Was. Mr. Hitchens, he dead.

Out of the four horsemen, Early Dawkins and Dennett seems to be the best. I'm not sure about Harris, as he comes off as very vague, even in his own field of science.

>>2510946

Atheism was and continues to be a silly reaction to enlightenment-era values.

>>2510946
>for not bowing down to Islam,

da fuq

>>2510777
>>2510960
Good fucking god, you, and the rest of your lot ITT are so shallow!
Seems everything the man said just sailed clean over your pointy little heads.

OP. I can personally recommend
-Letters to a Young Contrarian
-The Trial of Henry Kissinger
And after seeing my fair share of theist vs. atheist (and some anti-theist) debates, I'm sure God is Not Great, and The Missionary Position, (a pamphlet) will be some solid fun.
I think I'll try Arguably, next, and maybe his bios on Jefferson and Paine.

>>2510983
No.
Laughably no.

>>2511038
more like under my large, strong feet

don't bother, you'll only watch the same video over and over again, all he does is trash any theism and religion, based on his belief that there is no god

>>2511040

You don't know anything.

>>2511061
>trash any theism and religion, based on his belief that there is no god

>theism and religion
Oxymoron
>belief that there is no god
Its not a belief its a knowledge. If there's any kind of god-thing in the universe, it is not all-knowing and/or even present.

>>2511073
And what god are you a slave to?

>>2511090

The Catholic one.

>>2511094
What do you think of the Mother Theresa issue?

>>2511094
Hey Adorno, where's the best place to start with Catholic philosophy?

>>2511102

Depends.

Do you want a primer of sorts? Or do you just want to delve right in to the thick of it all?

I would suggest Augustine's Confessions as a starter for anyone not all that familiar with Catholic philosophy. Seems kiddie I know, but it does the job of acquainting you with the Aristotelian shitstorm you'll encounter later on,

>>2511099

I think she was a handsome lady.

Lookers breed envy.

Hitchens was no looker.

>>2511094

>>2511038
>Seems everything the man said just sailed clean over your pointy little heads.

Not really; I'm just familiar with the Middle East and with the history and anthropology of the world's religions. His writings about different religions are disingenuous and rife with doctrinal and historical inaccuracies. His portrayal of 'Islamofascism' and the War on Terror was patently silly and ignorant. It irks me that there are people like you who accept his nonsense uncritically and then get upset whenever someone criticizes him for being uninformed.

>>2511117
Why do you waste our time?
The charges of being a fraud. Do you concede, think she's a saint, what?

>>2511133

Fraud in what sense?

Non-Catholics will always view 'miracle workers' and 'saints' as frauds, no? What's the point?

His angle was more regarding the mentality she reflected regarding poverty and the economic injustices the people she worked with were dealing with. Some misquote about embracing an impoverished life on earth at the cost social justice. I find it funny coming from a failed Trotskyist like Hitchens.

>>2511085
how can you be so sure? you're just as bad as him
im not religious, but i acknowledge the fact that there is no way you can prove there is one, or that there isnt

>>2511145
>Sweeps it away as dust.
Oooo, I see how furious you really are from here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9WQ0i3nCx60
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iKkcDgeYBdk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGuzFUeDDgY

>>2511131
>I'm just familiar with the Middle East
Nope

>with the history and anthropology of the world's religions
Honey, you're embarrassing yourself.

>>2511168

Having fun are we?

>>2511160
>i acknowledge the fact that there is no way you can prove there is one, or that there isnt.

Have you even read anything from any of the four? I mean, even just an article?

>>2511170

>Nope

نعم

>Honey, you're embarrassing yourself.

Even if that were the case, I'm posting anonymously.

>>2511183
i got raised on shit like that, and my dad is the same bigoted and cynical person he always was
not to say i changed my views because of him, just that i knew somehow he was wrong, and that you're wrong, and theres obviously no convincing you of otherwise
some day you'll know theres something bigger than you, and it isn't 'a' god, I'm sure you're hell bent on the idea that god is a 'person' rather than just 'god', which i would define as energy, and I'm sure I'm not alone in that interpretation

>>2511131
>'Islamofascism'
I've not read up on his exact words surrounding this term and the rest of his political works, but this made up compound word makes perfect sense to me. Doesn't it make sense to you?

>>2511205
Maybe if you are dumb enough to view "fascism" as some sort of synonym for tyranny, same as how they use "nazi" nowadays too.

>>2511197
Come back when your days as a teenage rebellion ends.

Actually, don't come back at all.

>>2511160
>[H]ow can you be so sure?
How can I be sure the universe wasn't invented by Cthulhu, for his food?

Or the Pink Panther! Don't you believe in the Pink Panther? He HAS to be real!! THERE'S PROOF!!! PROOF I TELL YOU!!!!


>[I']m not religious, but i acknowledge the fact that there is no way you can prove there is one, or that there isn[']t
I expressed my slim chance doubt above, if there is a god-think, it is not all-knowing or all-present. The burden of proof is on the the believer.

>>2511210
Americans don't know what fascism is.

>>2511240
how about you come back when you're no longer a smug asshole, that thinks he knows it all?
>>2511254
you're the reason everyone hates atheists, i hope you know. you'll use anything as an argument as long as it ensures you seem to come out on top

>>2511261
this sinclair lewis is clearly some sort of leftist faggot.
Only a retard would think a fascist america would be a bad thing.

>>2511275
>[Y]ou're the reason everyone hates atheists,
No. The reason people hate atheists is because they theists or agnostics of some stripe.

[Y]ou'll use anything as an argument as long as it ensures you seem to come out on top
I will "come out on top" every time because I've thought this all through already and have come to the logical conclusions. Faulting me for using "anything" is a very weak argument. Its not like I'm cheating by making you think.

>>2511254
>God-thing
meh

>>2511292
Go back to /pol/ you weekend warrior.

>>2511296
so by repeating the same argument used by anyone who has ever thought about this more than 30 seconds, you're making me think now? well shit, professor, teach me more
and because you've already thought it out means you have the privilege to keep it all to yourself and let others find the way proves you're nothing more than a pitiful and self centred person

i wonder why people ever bother debating god on the internet at all.

you spit and cackle at each other, then retrench.

nobody has changed their views, only strengthened their own conviction in the idiocy of the other.

the point of argument is eventual persuasion, and it has been proven empirically over the years the internet has existed, that this persuasion as yet remains a rara avis.

please stop arguing, in the end the only person that can change your mind is you

instead of mindlessly throwing arguments to and fro, do your own, uncritical, research of the opposing position, and allow yourself to form a conclusion, rather than clinging to your own nebulous ideals in an internet shitslinging match

>>2511205

It's a buzzword and a pejorative term with no clear definition. It can be (and has been) used to stigmatize an extremely broad range of Islamic political ideologies. It's utterly useless except in the production of propaganda. I remember one Hitchens article that attempted to justify his use of the term by rattling off a number of traits that the more violent strains of Islamism supposedly share with fascism; exactly none of them could be applied to every ideology that is commonly affixed with the 'Islamofascist' label and some weren't true at all.

What really bothered me is how he encouraged viewing the West's involvement of the Middle East within the context of a clash of civilizations. The notion that Islamofascism exists and represents some sort of ontological threat to 'Western civilization' is ridiculous and dangerous.

>>2511309
He keeps using the same argument, and the New Atheists in general keep using the same argument, because it is effective. When using that argument, opponents don't respond with a well-reasoned counter-argument; instead they just spit out some vitriol and embarrass themselves.

>>2511275

I'm sorry, but this is not a valid response. Your previous appeal to skepticism (I think it was you anyway), concerning how one cannot know whether something exists or not, is true for any negative proposition about any positive claim.

There is nothing in this world that positively proves the non-existence of some positive proposition x; it is a rather awful logical problem, and my opinion is that Moore was right: "I know x, therefore y", i.e. "I know that there is no entailment of God anywhere, therefore no God exists".

Naturally, that is a dogmatic claim because I am begging the question of how I know that there is no God. I think it is an intuitive answer obtained through the study of organized religion and its utterly ridiculous nature. Religious followers might disagree, but at that point I prefer to turn the tables on them and inquiry about how they know that, on the basis of the premises that we cannot know that there is no God, why is it that they engage in all of their odd rituals? If they make a faith-based claim as a response, I follow up by asking how they feel about others doing completely different rituals to allegedly different deities using the exact same faith-based argument. I usually continue by asking them how they feel about the fact that the very same procedure used to be practiced by presently extinct religions.

>>2511407

cont'd.

As a response I usually get that 'all religions actually believe in the same God, and I know this because I have faith'. I then ask them how they respond people who believe that their God is their own, and how they know that because they have faith. At that point it always turns to that someone else's faith is wrong and some other faith is right, which is when they lose the argument.

What I am attempting to show here is that organized religion, at any rate, cannot seem to justify itself on the basis of a epistemologically skeptical claim.

>>2511345
>The notion that Islamofascism exists and represents some sort of ontological threat to 'Western civilization' is ridiculous and dangerous.
There is a threat, but there's also a threat of neocolonialism. The issue is complex but there is a type fascism found in religion. All very simple.

>>2511345
>The notion that Islamofascism exists and represents some sort of ontological threat to 'Western civilization' is ridiculous and dangerous.

Where have you been for the last few decades? Or are you one of those cultural relativist, muslim apologists?

The correct answer is don't even begin with Hitchens. Life's short and there are so many better public "intellectuals."

>>2511345
>cultural relativism
I KNOW THEY STONE THEIR WOMEN TO DEATH FOR BEING RAPED BUT ITS THEIR CULTURE SO ITS OK