"Listen, I was a Christian for these amount of years!" and Ed Feser's lack of peer-reviewed work.

Oh bless your heart. A Christian turned atheist says.

"I was born and raised in an evangelical Christian household and was one for 19 years," said A-Unicornist.

It turns out this atheist is a modern day liberal (totally supports the integration of transgenders into Boy Scouts of America) and even despises the Western philosophers (who ironically are majorly secular) for their narrow concentration, which he notes they're unfairly ignoring Eastern philosophy. Hmmm, well maybe because Western philosophy is probably the more influential of the two branches.

I don't really mind A-Unicornist since he comes across as well-read on the subject matter of arguments opposing the belief in a god, but his politics brings his delusion to a whole new level of SJW.

I discovered A-Unicornist's blog (it's been active since 2009 but his very first post mentioned he talked about religion vs science in a previous blog so I presume he's been blogging longer than seven years) when I googled Ed Feser and the cosmological argument. I won't talk about his rebuttal to Feser but I will mention the comment box. With much amusement I read one poster, named Mark, pointing out

"I think it's unfair to expect Mike [A-Unicornist] to address Feser's academic work on Thomistic metaphysics, because Feser hasn't really produced any quality peer-reviewed publications on Thomistic metaphysics."

 He goes on -

"If you look at Feser's publication list on his website, you'll see that he lists 98 manuscripts, in addition to 4 encyclopaedia entries. However, this list is considerably padded with a lot of works that would never be considered peer-reviewed academic works by any university that he sought employment at. Seriously, university staff run hiring workshops that teach us how to spot the tricks that guys like Feser try to pull in their CV's."

I can't believe he actually counted it all. It's like that one atheist confronting William Lane Craig of all the fallacies he supposedly committed. Anyways.

"Of the 31 "academic writings", 8 are books (which do not typically undergo any peer-reviewed vetting

. . . .

To put this into perspective, Daniel Dennett has published in journals with impact factors over 18.6 (e.g. Brain and Behavioural Sciences) with over 800 academic citations. Richard Dawkins has published in Nature (Impact Factor 42.3) with over 1000 citations."

But what does this have to do with whether or not Feser's stance on metaphysics are worthy of dismissal? Brain and Behavioural Science, and Nature, are not commenting on metaphysics. Whatever books Dennett and Dawkin wrote on metaphysics, let alone religion itself, probably weren't vetted by a committee of academic philosophers before it was published. It gets better.

I traced down more of Mark's comments. Apparently Feser's book is well known in the atheist community. Mark writes

 "Although rarely reviewed, The Last Superstition has actually been read by a large number of atheists like myself. I found that it was constantly recommended to me by theists during internet chats and I make an effort to acquaint myself with the best theistic arguments. It was billed to me as a "deeply intellectual and confronting challenge to atheistic beliefs, although the witty snark may be off-putting". But when I purchased and read it, I found it was the complete opposite; a shallow and poorly argued text that tried to convert arbitrary impressions into metaphysical principles. The snark, although unimaginative, was rather enjoyable (although Feser will never get a job hosting the Oscars)"

Mark continues on belittling Feser's work. By the "rarely reviewed status" are Dennet's and Dawkin's books about religion innately better because they're more reviewed? If Mark is trying to paint Feser as some insignificant player in the metaphysics realm due to a lack of peer-viewed articles (oddly Mark fails to mention the publish or die in academia) he's failing. If Feser is some wannabe major player in metaphysics why the involvement of trying to discredit his CV (the man took the time to actually count how many articles Feser listed)? It's an interesting question.

I'll tie in A-Unicornist in this as well. A-Unicornist is not a trained philosopher, not that it truly matters in giving an educated opinion on matters of religion, yet Mark takes A-U more seriously than Feser. If Dennet and Dawkins are intellectual and academic giants compared to Feser then A-U is a mental midget compared to Feser. No offense to A-U, but A-U states he is a personal trainer by day.

If we're strictly talking about academic penis measuring then A-U should not be even in the picture. He's an amateur like me just commenting on topics we find interesting and worth discussing. But, in Mark's mind, there's something more. It's, again, as I mentioned in previous posts, about elitism (lack of quality peer-reviewed articles, now this is key - that Mark mentioned quality, and the lack of book reviews by major academics). But as I said before if Feser is such a hack he wouldn't be taken nearly as seriously by atheists like Mark. Yes, Mark takes Feser seriously. If he hadn't he wouldn't have gone through the trouble of counting all of 98 Feser's articles.

How many philosophy professors teaching at community colleges have the CV Feser has? Not many. It's tough to get published. It's even more tough to get published holding the views Feser has with the status of a junior college professor. But this is all par for the course.

Those on the right must be perfect. Strangely enough (secular) Left is acting like a god and The Right as the unwashed masses. If you want to have an ounce of respect from The Left you must be perfect. This is why The Left does not attack Ryan T. Anderson's academic credentials (Princeton undergrad, Notre Dame Phd) - but they will call him a bigot. Same thing with Ben Shapiro. Both are articulate and don't have a twang. Sarah Palin? Butchered. Her accent and lack of prestigious CV were targets of The Left. Trump? UPenn. But he's an ass, right? Cruz? Stellar academic pedigree but he's a religious nut! With Feser, it's his lack of "quality peer-reviewed " articles. If you don't have the stellar CV you must present yourself at the podium with articulation. Even then you aren't safe from The Left's judgement. Case in point Milo Y. I don't know his academic pedigree but he pisses The Left off by attacking their church - academia - stepping onto their grounds and making their disciples (SJW's) cry, throw tantrums and worry - alot. What to do? Character assassination.

What Mark is trying to do with Feser is to paint him as an academic nobody.

Who are the purists and hypocrites again?

Note: I and another person agreed that Feser should be teaching at a university. This is not to say that teaching at a junior college is not worth one's time, but I feel that if he had the status of a professor at a 4-year institution being peer-reviewed would probably come easier and he'd be under pressure to as well (JUCO professors aren't nearly as pressured, if at all, to publish or die; they're there mainly to teach). Christendom College. Ave Maria University. Wyoming Catholic College. Franciscan University of Steubenville. Grove City. Hillsdale College. Heck, even Notre Dame. Get Feser a tenured track position at any of these places.

Meet Mike, the science nerd atheist.

Mike the atheist writes in his gravatar bio -

Hello,

I am an atheist because of reason and personal experience. I am a father of THREE lovely living kids and two dead embryos, married to a lovely Christian Catholic devoted woman. Yes, black and white can coexist as long as there is respect and love, which is something abstracted from any belief or religion.

I do not claim absolute truth and not 100% sure that a God does not exist somewhere out there. The scientific method is what I use to connect to reality. If there is something I don't understand, then it is because i don't understand, not because god exists.

In case you haven't noticed, I am a native Arab, and English is my third language (yes there is second language).

I like reading the Bible and the Quran and the critics of both of them. I also love watching documentaries especially astronomy, cosmology, Quantum Physics, and new discoveries in science in general, and Physics in particular.

I stumbled over Mike when he wrote this comment on another site.

"Why won’t this God manifest himself to me and the other billions of naked apes like me and reach people in very very very very questionable ways that nobody can check upon because they are personal?"

Respect and love, eh? Mike seems like a typical atheist douchebag. Proud that he's "the father" of "two dead embryos," and refers to humans as apes. Now if that's actually him pictured then he's just a man who gives off the impression that he's educated let alone reasonable.

His bio and his post, as well as his as site, broadcasts that he thinks (too) highly of himself. It's mightily ironic that his site's banner is of starving kids in Africa and the Middle East, telling us he's really torn about such a demographic and their plight given, if we're being generous, humans are basically advanced embryos. All of a sudden that if you can "see" the child that child is a human and therefore important (remember how he spoke of his three children versus his two dead embryos).

Academia's fetish, John Hopkins & Co. join "The War on Fracking."

Academia is a strange place. Whatever the The Right supports there will be a study or dissertation about it - not to support it, but to disprove the confidence of those that support it. Take for instance UPenn Religious Studies professor, Anthea Butler, who calls Ben Carson "coon of the year." Butler's UPenn profile reveals even more telling information about her research interests.

Professor Butler's forthcoming book, The Gospel According to Sarah: How Sarah Palin and the Tea Party are Galvanizing the Religious Right will be published by The New Press in 2014.

I also had a sociology professor whose interests included studying the "Christian Right." Granted, she was a lesbian, so it was to little wonder. Let's go back to UPenn. Sociology doctoral candidate Francis Prior. In his student biography he states the following -

His research interests include the sociology of crime and punishment, urban sociology, the sociology of race and ethnicity, and the sociology of social movements.  Currently, Francis is doing participant observation and interview research on service provision in prisoner reentry organizations and clients’ experience of release from incarceration.  For his master’s thesis, Francis did participant observation and interview research on organizers’ management of rank and file participants’ collective behavior in the Tea Party movement.  Before joining the sociology department, Francis received a BA in philosophy from Villanova University, with an emphasis on hermeneutic and critical approaches to historical and contemporary social and political thought.

I'll probably actually purchase his thesis in order to see what he writes about. I'm rather curious of his findings and his methodology since I feel he's approaching the Tea Party movement with post-modern lenses, painting the group as some extreme nutbags with highly questionable values. Too bad he didn't do an entire paper focusing solely on #BlackLivesMatter or Occupy Wall Streets (OWS). Oh no, that would be plain weird because such groups totally don't have questionable motives or backers. His personal website lists more information about his academic interests.

PUBLICATIONS

2014. “Quality Controlled: An Ethnographic Account of Tea Party Messaging and Action.” Sociological Forum 29(2).

UNDER REVIEW

"New American Populism: Tea Party and Occupy in Ethnographic and Rhetorical Comparison." with Shantee Rosado at Mobilization

ACADEMIC PRESENTATIONS

Panel at Eastern Sociological Society 2011: “The Tea Party Movement: Frames and Micromobilization”

But what about the semi-humans babies?

What's the tactic of leftists and liberals to slowly burrow their opponents into obscurity and to malign them? "Studies have shown ... "

This is all in the name of science, empirical evidence and "proof."

See here.

Expectant mothers have a lot to be concerned about, but those living near fracking sites have even more to fear, an expanding body of evidence shows. Most recently, a data review of more than 10,000 pregnancies has linked living in heavily fracked areas with a higher risk of premature births.

In the study, published Sept. 30 in the journal Epidemiology, scientists at Johns Hopkins University, Brown University and the University of California, Berkeley and San Francisco, analyzed data from the 10,496 pregnancies of 9,384 mothers in nearly 700 communities in Pennsylvania from 2009 to 2013. At the same time, they tracked shale gas drilling, fracturing and production in a 12.4-mile radius of each woman.

What they found was that mothers who had higher exposure to these operations and infrastructure -- in essence, those who had more drilling and fracking sites in the vicinity of their homes -- were 40 percent more likely to give birth to premature babies. They were also 30 percent more likely to have high-risk pregnancies, the researchers found.

"Any form of energy extraction that harms the well-being of infants and pregnant women has no place in society," Sandra Steingraber, a biologist with the organization Americans Against Fracking, who was not involved in the study, said in response to the new findings. "These data show that a ban on fracking is good prenatal care."

Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, is the process of injecting millions of gallons of sand and chemical-laced water into gas-rich shale below the earth to allow gas to be released from the rock. Those liquids are then brought back to the surface of the earth. Previous studies have linked living near fracking sites to infertility, miscarriages and birth defects. Researchers have blamed the increased risk of exposure to toxic chemicals and even radioactive materials.

More than 15 million people in the U.S. were living within one mile of a fracking well, Al Jazeera reported in 2014, as the practice has increased significantly in the U.S. in recent years. Advocates say fracking helps communities by creating jobs, while critics argue it can be detrimental for human health and to the environment.

Of course, if respectable institutions like John Hopkins, Brown, Berkely and U of SanFran say so, then we must not question their findings and must follow their warnings.

John Hopkins Hospital said no to transgender surgery yet the medical world and the LGBT activists and libertines gleefully ignored such warnings, but I bet this fracking news - accurate or not - will be picked up and used as ammo to both shutdown fracking and play the Big Oil card, in hopes to drive more money into solar energy.