In case you do not know what Martin Willett is referring to with regard memes. Memetics is an evolutionary based theory which asserts traditional evolution based on a single replicator (the gene) to be insufficient to explain the 'oddities of humanity'. These oddities include our capacity for language, our oversize brains, altrusim and sexual behavour divorced from reproduction. A second replicator status is given by memeticsts to the unique ability of humans to copy the ideas, stories beliefs and useful ways of doing things etc. The copyable element of an idea or action is called a 'meme' and is said to have worked, and is working independently of the genes in the turbo-charging of human evolution. It must be noted straight away that memetics is a straight acknowledgement that traditional evolutionary ideas based solely on genes is unable to account for much of what it means to be human, which we Christians have known all along. Memetics is an attempt to rectify this un-publicised failure.

However the weakness of memetics is that it is still trying to give an atheistic evolutionary explanation, albeit in a modified form. Instead of the whole purpose of life being the furtherance of genes from one generation to the next, we now have a second replicator thrown in. Self-replicating ideas that build themselves up into things like culture, religions, ideologies and exist purely to replicate selfishly. Obviously this is a purely mechanistic explanation and falls straight into the usual atheistic pit that we are nothing but machines. A body and a brain, nothing more! It is interesting to note that your starting assumption dictates your conclusion. Start with atheistic assumptions then humanity disappears into machine.

Martin Willett gets all this from a book called 'the meme machine' by Susan Blackmore (co-habitee of Adam Hart-Davies the lycra clad cycling scientist sometimes seen on TV). It is appalling to see the bleak conclusion that Susan Blackmore is driven to in her book. She is nothing but a machine that is driven by the algorithmic processes of genetic and memetic co-evolution. And despite her disparaging remarks about 'religion' is found at the end of her book putting forth Buddhist like teachings. This seems strange when she sets out to put forward a scientific theory. Memetics reached it's peak in 1998, as a theory it is now in decline.

steve wilson

Very interesting and partially accurate.

Memetics is an extension of Darwinian explanations to account for more than one replicator. Genes are just chemicals that replicate, they survive because they have byproducts that make the chance of replication more or less likely, such as proteins, legs, sex drives, intelligence. The whole biological world you see is "merely" a byproduct of the idiosyncrasies of genes (bits of nucleic acid). Memes are also replicators, but have no physical form, they are ideas that can get copied, or not, depending on their effects on the factors that determine replication: fecundity, copying fidelity etc.

I don't get all this from The Meme Machine. I get it from the original source, The Selfish Gene by Richard Dawkins, who, if we want to trade info about sleeping arrangements is married to Lalla Ward, who played Romana in Dr Who. (Compromising picture available on my website.)

Susan Blackmore's book is good but I think it goes a little bit beyond the evidence and makes a few too many suggestions that will probably prove unfounded. Still, compared to anything in the Bible it is a riveting read, and much more accurate.

Ms Blackmore is a bit of a Buddhist. More details again on my website, including our correspondence on her book and the Buddhist tones.

The whole point about science is that it finds out the truth. If the truth is bleak TOUGH. If the truth is that there is no meaning to your life then that is what it is, the universe doesn't care whether or not you approve of the plan. So many people are scared of the truth. They think there might be a monster under the bed but they won't look. In my universe not looking for monsters or screwing up your eyes doesn't change reality. Those people who are finding out the truth are finding out that there is no place for God or fate or destiny or any of that stuff.

You have missed the whole point about the whole point. The point is that there is no point. We don't replicate in the interests of our genes. We just have, because we have ancestors who survived, tendencies to do things that might make our survival and replication likely. Memes too don't try to replicate, how can an abstraction try? Those which have survived have the factors that have ensured their relative success, or relative lack of success. Simple isn't it?

Martin

Thanks for your belated reply. I was beginning to conclude that you just 'drop and run' with your postings.

If as you suggest there is no meaning at all to our existence why is it that countless numbers of humans throughout history have searched for it and crumble if no meaning is found? Isn't it odd that blind chance plus time has thrown up an intelligent being that looks vainly for meaning that isn't there? Isn't this the cruellest of anomalies ever to have been thrown up by evolution?

Might I suggest that you too are scared by truth. The last thing you will admit to is the possibility that there might be an infinite and personal creator God and hold this as a presupposition. You take refuge in science and rationalism which can only deal with this physical dimension and can give no reason why anything at all should exist in the first place. Atheistic philosophy asserts that we briefly come out of nothingness into somethingness for a time, then return into nothingness. And in our brief time of existence we are machines that have only the illusion of personality and mind. As always, atheists can never live consistently with the barrenness of their philosophy and try to hang on to morals and the humanity of man.

Steve Wilson.

I usually try to follow them up, but the wife tells me I am on the blasted computer too much and sometimes I don't always catch every reply to my copious posting. At any time if you think I have ignored you just email me direct, I don't scramble my email address, spam is a good way of checking that your connection is working, a bit like roughage in the digestion system, come to think of it, a lot like it.

[why is it that countless numbers of humans throughout history have searched for it and crumble if no meaning is found?]

There is no Loch Ness monster either but people still look for it. Wonder and curiosity are not hard to comprehend. They are emotions or ways of thinking that have served us well. Without them we would probably still be scavenging and hunting in the Great Rift Valley, the total human population about equal to that of Basingstoke. Curiosity and wonder fill bellies.

I have a reasonable conviction that every intelligent civilization has developed wonder, curiosity and religion. I have put money on it. Admittedly I don't think it is likely that the bet will ever be won or lost but I think it makes a good statement. (Willett's Wager)

The phrase "blind chance plus time" suggests a careless approach to the subject of evolution, one that seems designed to be misrepresented. Evolution is understood by about 2% of the population, and about 10%, at best, of those that think they understand it. Use of phrases like that suggests to me that you are happy with this level of ignorance.

Why should I be afraid to admit that there might be a god? I admit it. There might be. My current state of knowledge on the subject leads me to the conclusion that this is unlikely. Physics has been doing some weird things recently, and there certainly seem to be several physicists who have some concept of a creator of the universe or a mind behind the laws of physics. I am not qualified to judge, it would take me ten years of study to get close to the basic mathematics required to understand the issues, even assuming that I could do it. I do not enjoy mathematics, I don't think in value or shape, I think in words. I certainly do not exclude the possibility of some form of a creator force involved in the beginning and framing of the universe. To do otherwise would be irrational. Not excluding a possibility and believing in something are billions of light years apart.

The idea that there is a force at work now in the universe I reject, at least as clearly as I reject any concept. But I don't have faith in it. I think faith is a terrible thing, for want of a better word it is a sin.

In my philosophy, I can only speak for my own beliefs as there is no synod for atheists, I do not believe we come out of nothingness into somethingness and then return to nothingness. That is putting the cart before the horse. There is no we before we exist, there is no we afterwards. Our consciousness is the state our brains are in. When we have no functioning brain there can be no us. This is such a simple concept to understand as long as you let yourself understand it and don't try to feel it.

Likewise if you forget about trying to feel answers the concept that there doesn't have to be a reason for something to exist becomes quite simple. "There's got to be more to it than that" is such a typical human response but it is not logical. Six is twice three but there is no reason for it, it doesn't want to be, it just is. Only because we have Machiavellian minds do we always seek motives for things. Children are always asking why is the sky blue but when you tell them the answer they don't accept it, "But WHY?" It is a fault of the way our brains work. For most people answers don't have to be right, they have to feel right.

Some people are wise to this and don't expect the truth to feel right, because they can see no logical reason why it should feel right. We have brains designed to solve problems and outsmart each other, to find food and impress mates. Nowhere in that process of evolving brains is there any mechanism for devising a brain capable of feeling and grasping truth directly. Our brains can do fantastic things because there is an evolutionary benefit; we can play cricket (a robot capable of playing competitive cricket will not be built in my lifetime, I'll bet enough beer to keep you drunk for a week) the mathematics involved are mind boggling, we can outsmart the second most intelligent reasoning engines ever seen (women), in real time, and even when pissed. We are good at such skills because we have evolved the tools for the job. Our bodies have evolved the hand eye co-ordination and speed that enable us to play cricket by our past survival leaping from branch to branch and sticking pointy sticks into unco-operative mammoths and the like. But philosophy? Forget it. We just don't have the equipment for it, not only can't we do it, we can't even get close to imagining what a philosophy machine or truth feeler would be like.

As for morality for me that comes down to playing by rules so all can enjoy the game. I don't believe in basic human rights or anything else of the sort but frameworks of morality have been built up, often with heavy input from religions and they do form a consistent shape, a bit like an arch, even when you take away the scaffolding that helped form them. With 6.1 billion people on the planet civilization and morality are not optional or decadent.

I think you miss the point when you mention 'curiosity and wonder' with reference to 'meaning'. When a person looks up from the business of living and thinks, why do I exist? What's the point of it all? It is this ability to ask and ponder these questions that sets humans apart from all other creatures. Your answer to these questions is don't even bother to ask them, there is no reason or point. In doing this you negate what it means to be human.

The position you set forth is very similar to that of a deist. A deist is one who accepts that the universe might have been created - at the very beginning. However he flatly denies that a creator has any input now. The mechanism has been set in motion and that is all that is required. Which are you, a deist or an atheist ? Do I also detect a hint of agnosticism, or is your real position that of a rationalist. You also use the phrase 'creator force', how exactly is a force able to act intelligently to 'create', as it is by nature impersonal? electricity is a power source, it obeys certain pre-set laws but has no intelligence.

The moral system you advocate is the 'as if' system. There are no morals in reality by this reckoning, but they are recognised to serve a purpose in society, so it is in our interests to act 'as if' there are morals. You are right in saying that religions have built morals, Christianity in our case, and you give a picture of a brick arch which maintains its shape when the support is removed. However as is the case in the western society, the moral structure is collapsing steadily as the influence of Christianity declines. It would be more accurate to say that once the foundation for those morals is removed steady collapse follows. The 'as if' system is useless as it is foundationless and in reality trades on the remnants of the Christian influence.

Steve Wilson.

That is insulting. Of course I ask these questions [why do I exist? What's the point of it all? ] all the time, I question things far more than people who believe they already have the answers. What I don't do is assume that when I have the right answer it will feel right and I will then have no need to keep re-asking the questions. I can see no reason to expect the truth to feel different from any other explanations. I have a brain equipped to reason, not to perceive truth in a pure form. My brain cannot reward me when I see pi expressed to a million decimal places with some terrific buzz that tells me I am in possession of some great insight or truth. Our brains cannot recognize truth in the abstract. Any feeling that you get that a particular idea MUST BE TRUE should be greeted with profound scepticism, our brains don't work that way, we cannot perceive truth, although we can deceive ourselves into accepting one explanation or another as having more relevance than it possibly can have. As an example think about falling in love, the process of deceiving ourselves into making a decision to bond to one person. That process has evolutionary utility. It is real, feels real, and can be reversed and re-applied again to another person, for some people with surprising alacrity. Our ability to love is proof of our ability to deceive our rational brains. Love usually works to a deeper unconscious rationality of its own, immune to the tinkering of the lesser powers of our conscious mind, a bit like a hidden system file under Windows.

By the way, I don't use the word 'creatures' to refer to animals, it is inaccurate. A robot or fictional character can be a creature, but not an animal that has evolved, even one that has evolved in a universe that was created.

Am I a deist? No. I am a rationalist. At my current level of knowledge and experience I see fit to have a working hypothesis that does not preclude the possibility of a vaguely deist or pantheist explanation for creation. But that is far more about keeping an open mind than it is any form of wishful thinking. Perhaps I am drifting towards agnosticism, the idea that I cannot know about such things so I shouldn't be so dogmatic about them. As to my beliefs, I don't believe in either a god or a deity or a universal spirit, but my rejection of the day-to-day force to answer prayers and distort the laws of physics at a whim is more profound than my rejection of the looser idea of some kind of force or spirit that might have been involved in creation. I don't believe in such a force but I feel less inclined to argue against it as it has much less relevance to the human future.

The morality we have in the modern world is based on concepts that have been developed alongside and woven within religions. Such as the respect for life, equality of respect and so on. Such concepts were built upon foundations of morality and quite literally supported by the fear of gods. Those foundations are no longer needed, the support can come from the fear of human just as much as divine retribution. And even if you doubt that, how can you argue for keeping up religions simply because they make it easier to keep the masses under control? That attitude, which I see in many situations, strikes me as profoundly immoral. It is exactly the same as telling children to behave or Father Christmas won't bring them any presents, a threat that I can never see as morally defensible if you don't believe in Father Christmas. I get the strong impression that a large section of the Church establishment, particularly in the C of E, is doing the direct equivalent of this, threatening a punishment from an entity that they don't really believe in.

It is time we grew up and stopped expecting God to solve our problems. God does not seem to care that we are expanding our population at a positively obscene rate or destroying the resource base of the planet. Every year trillions of prayers are made, God's performance seems indistinguishable to that of random chance, that is not a coincidence.

Martin

I haven't read 'The Selfish Gene' by Richard Dawkins, but he gives a lengthy forward to Susan Blackmore's book 'The Meme Machine'. In this book he says that he introduced the idea of memes towards the end of his book 'The Selfish Gene'. He gave me the impression that it was a tentative offering and did not expect much to come of it. He expressed his pleasant surprise when other evolutionists took up the hypothesis with enthusiasm and developed it. The distinct impression I got was that he came up with the basic idea, that is that there might be other replicators besides genes, but others have developed it.

Like Richard Dawkins you say Susan Blackmore goes too far, but I tend to admire her integrity. She has taken memetics to its logical conclusion by saying that the mind and personality is an illusion created by the complex workings of memes and genes and that all we consist of is body and brain. Susan Blackmore denies the reality of the mind because she can find no physical location for it in either the brain or body. Her ruthless anti-supernaturalism has forced this obviously highly intelligent woman to the conclusion that we are machines She is even trying heroically live with her conclusions, though I think she fails because she obviously is not just a machine. I concur with Dave Hunt in his book 'Occult Invasion' that there is a 'ghost in the machine'. By ghost he means a non-physical operator of the body and brain.

Steve Wilson

Do your brain a favour, read The Selfish Gene, it is a terrific book.

I think the idea of a ghost in the machine is the last gasp of supernaturalism and soon this will be swept away as science gets to grips with the last frontier of the God of the Gaps, the human mind.

Susan Blackmore is part of this onslaught, but it is being driven on several fronts as psychologists tunnel from one side and neurologists tunnel from the other. To stretch the tunnelling analogy to breaking point I suggest they can now hear each other's muffled pick axe blows.

Where I think she has gone too far is in the idea that the human mind has been made by, and for, memes. I think that assertion is not completely supportable. I incline to the belief that the human escalation of brain power is the result of a runaway arms race between competing humans, driven by sexual selection. Similar exaggerated organs and displays are seen across nature, such as the weapons of stags and the beetles named after them. The expansion of the brain driven by the need to out smart rivals in social (and by implication sexual) intercourse. Language was the key. Once the process of language development began it triggered an inevitable arms race of improving language ability and other spin-off mental developments. Just as computers were not made to distribute pornography and foster the illusory careers of garage bands via mp3 our brains were not built in order to invent religions or fly aeroplanes or write symphonies. All those developments are secondary spin offs. Just as in species of deer, size of the animal is in fixed proportion with the size and complexity of the antlers, if there is selection for one tendency you get the other one whether you wanted it or not, the Irish Elk wanted to get bigger but didn't want to have a set of antlers so heavy it could barely move its head. Brains don't just do one job, they do several, and selection can only pick gross trends such as size, not specific skills, unless they have very distinct genes, the music of Bach and the thoughts of Confucius are just evolutionary serendipitous accidents. But none the less beautiful or profound for that.

The take off along this course was not triggered by memes but perhaps memes were the main reason for the continuing trajectory. You could say that the rocket of evolving brain size was fuelled by sexual selection, memes were not primarily the gunpowder, they were the stick that kept it on course. But that is a minor difference of emphasis, in the main Susan Blackmore has got it right, memes are very much bound up in the generation of the tools we both need to continue this discussion, from words and brains and selves, through to the Internet.

Where Susan Blackmore goes beyond where I would like to go is in the leap from description to prescription. I cannot see any reason to want to thwart memes just because they are memes. I think this aspect of her world view is not a logical conclusion of her thinking on memes but is another memetic infection she has been carrying for some time, Buddhism. I think the two ideas can be and should be quite separable.

Why are you so screwed up about being "a machine", being explicable, reducible? Is it simply vanity that makes you feel more comfortable with the idea that you are the reason the universe exists?

Martin

Author of Correct Me If I'm Wrong

and happily reducible to 'merely' the sum of his parts.

Considering that science hardly knows anything about the nature of consciousness and the mind, yet boldly approaches this subject with the certainty of a naturalistic explanation, I doubt it [idea of a ghost in the machine is the last gasp of supernaturalism and soon this will be swept away]. I think a good dose of humility and circumspection is called for. However much we think we know now it is a sure bet that we actually hardly know anything. Bold and arrogant claims have been made before by science that later becomes embarrassing in the light of better understanding. I think your optimism is ill founded and is a product of your naturalistic worldview rather than observation of reality.

I think it is rather sad that science today is naturalistic. Modern science began on the foundation of Christianity, as you are aware, and scientific study was conducted on the basis of exploring a world created by God. The basic understanding Christianity gave was that God was separate from his creation, whereas in many other religions God is in the universe; so is held as sacred and scientific endeavour severely restricted. I'm sure you know all this. Modern science was originally an 'open' system that allowed for supernaturalism. Sadly science is now a 'closed' naturalistic system where the faintest hint of someone outside and beyond this physical dimension, especially the God of Christianity, is resisted strenuously. I can see no reason why a supernatural explanation of the universe should be deemed inadmissible other than man's innate hostility and hubris to the idea of someone infinitely superior to them. Hiding behind logic and science as the only determiner of truth is a cop-out because we are not in possession all knowledge and we are limited in our understanding. Again humility is required.

To use your terminology - Why am I screwed up about being a machine? I sense profound implications for mankind if we are in reality nothing but a body and brain, or machine as I have put it. It strikes at the very heart of humanity. Francis A Schaeffer the Christian writer said that the twentieth century was the century when 'humanity' died. People no longer know who or what they are as they increasingly understand themselves in a mechanistic terms. And despite your protestations this has profound consequences on how humans conduct themselves with one another. Once the human identity with a Creator God is broken and man no longer looks to the personal triune God for his real identity a course is chartered that leads eventually into uncontrolled selfishness and eventual barbarity. I see this happening already in society. Even Thomas Huxley the publicist of Charles Darwin and polemicist against Christianity admitted that a collapse in morals and self-restraint would follow the replacement of Christianity with atheistic evolution. Though I cannot now recall where exactly I read this. The problem as I see it is the inability of an atheistic evolutionary ethic, which is the source of the mechanisation of humans, to provide a strong motive for one human to place value on another. One may choose to place value on another, though without much basis, but if one chooses not to who can speak against it? It is a matter of personal opinion as there is no higher authority to appeal to. It emphasises that humans are an insufficient starting point.

I've managed to reserve a copy of Richard Dawkins 'The Selfish Gene' from the library. As I look at the pre-suppositions and philosophical beliefs of any writer do not expect this book to change me. You have previously 'waxed lyrical' about 'The Meme Machine' but I found it rather tedious because of its rationalistic and atheistic pre-suppositions. I don't see that this book will be any different.

Steve Wilson.

The work being done in the brain by neurologists and in the mind by psychologists is getting closer and closer together. Did you see the excellent BBC series about the brain, Brainstory? Now The Private Life of The Brain, available in a book by Susan Greenfield, which is sitting in my metaphorical intray of reading material. There is still much work to be done but the gap is getting smaller, more and more concepts of mind are being explained as brain states. The prospect of this stuff is intensely exciting, I bitterly regret not going into this field myself, I took a wrong turn into the humanities instead of staying with the natural sciences.

I cannot understand how science can be anything but naturalistic and rational. Supernaturalism and science cannot be reconciled without schizophrenic attitudes and habits of mind. Unfortunately for our species such habits are widespread in the extreme. People seize on the slightest crumb of information and use it to proclaim spaceships from the gods, descendants of Atlantis invading Ireland as fairies and other outlandish ideas. Why such ideas are attractive I will probably never understand. My brain doesn't work that way.

I think your analysis of why supernaturalism is unwelcome in science is flawed. Science seeks to explain. Supernatural answers are negations of explanation. I admit that this is a little bit closed minded and borderline hypocritical, as science always proclaims the virtue of an open mind but some line has to be drawn or no explanation has any meaning. "E equals M C squared, if it please God" is not much of a foundation for research or experiment. A totally rational and open minded science would be wide open to all possible explanations and would factor in the possible effects of all 3,789 postulated gods, make an allowance for all those that could also exist and be shy or otherwise undiscovered and then calculate the effects of the positions of all astrologically significant celestial bodies and whether or not Athena had PMT that week, not that is to suggest that PMT is a real phenomenon and not a phallocentric dogma put about by misogynistic so-called scientists... Science has got to put up boundaries otherwise it cannot achieve anything. And on the whole, judged by the success in prediction, closed minded thoroughly naturalistic science seems to be doing quite well.

Of course science does not understand everything or have all the explanations, the whole point of science is to provide an ever improving set of models which allow more accurate knowledge and prediction. Waiting until we have all the knowledge before we try to attain it is a little absurd to say the least.

Science means never being too big to admit you are wrong, and always inviting criticism. It is hardly any wonder that it makes a strange bed-fellow with any form of religion.

If 'humanity' was a false illusion then I am happy it is dead. Any concept that is false or ill founded should be swept away, starting with Father Christmas and going on through 'humanity', souls, spirits, gods, morality and whatever else is there on a pedestal with no good excuse. Truth matters. No matter how comforting an idea is if it is false it should be stripped bare.

Why do people assume that atheists are amoral monsters while Christians are living saints? Where is the evidence? Were the Middle Ages in Europe a time of great piety and no crime? Few suicide bombers are atheists. How many concentration camp guards crossed themselves and thanked their triune God they weren't Christ-killer Jews? The evidence is rather mixed, to say the least.

You don't need a religion to be moral. I am considerably more moral than most people I know who have woolly minded attachments to religions. A religion is no guarantee of morality. To my mind "don't do it because it is wrong" is a far more moral way of thinking than "don't do it because God will punish you". It works for me.

Atheistic societies (as opposed to their tyrannical governments) have not provided much evidence of a collapse in morality under an atheistic regime. Tyrants are immoral, people are people. Democracy protects against tyrants, religion doesn't protect you against people.

I think I know what you mean about finding a book written by somebody who doesn't share your basic beliefs hard to read. Atheists and religious people have so many differences it is rare to be able to communicate well.

Thank you for the rare experience of communicating, however imperfectly, across the great divide.

Martin

Thanks for the great debate. Not that I am saying it is over, carry on if you want. I have posted the material on my website, yes I know that is a little naughty but I am giving you the opportunity to object now if you want to. I have made a number of very small tweaks to the text, I think you will agree that they enhance the argument, I have corrected a few small errors of spelling and so on which we both made, please let me know if you think I have done anything that is detrimental (or if I missed any that you would like corrected). I have no desire to make you look foolish or inept, I hope I have been fair.

I think I can honestly say that you are the best theist I have ever debated with. Quite a refreshing change from the usual bible-basher, I didn't notice any biblical quotes or misplaced capital letters. Just out of curiosity, what flavour are you?

Yes it's a little naughty, it is usual to ask first, but I don't mind. I've checked up on it and you haven't distorted it. I am tempted to take your email as a complement, but I wonder if it is really an indictment of today's Christians. If you consider that I am one of the best you have debated with, I hate to think what the normal standard is. Although I am a strong Christian and therefore diametrically opposed to what you believe, I am concerned at the ignorance of Christians and can understand your contempt. I put the reason for this down to a growing aversion to thinking and using ones mind along with the growing tendency towards experientialism, or the chasing after inner experiences. These two tendencies seem to go 'hand in hand' and it is very non Christian. I would get a severe ear-bashing for voicing this in some Christian circles.

Although I have no objection to the use of Bible quotes sparingly, it is sometimes so over done that I wonder if it is being used as a smoke screen to hide a lack of real understanding. Anyway, in speaking to someone like yourself quoting the Bible has little value in and of itself as you reject it.

I'd be surprised if anyone would want to follow up from reading our exchange, but if there is I would prefer if you would forward any messages rather than reveal my address on the website.

I attend 'The Church of the Nazarene' which is a little known (in this country) American and Evangelical wing of Methodism. However I think it would be wrong to connect my perceived debating abilities to my Church denomination. I would describe myself as a Bible believing Christian (don't groan too much). I try to avoid the word 'evangelical' if possible as it has become so broad that it is now meaningless; but that is what I actually am in the older, narrower usage of the word. I would also like to think of myself as one who takes an interest in other religions and philosophies and how they differ from Christianity. This I find fascinating and is perhaps the reason for my slightly better performance in your eyes.

Likewise, thanks for an interesting debate, I think my stamina is waning a little but I'll see how it goes.

Steve Wilson.

Most MPs know that the opposition is on the bench across the other side of the chamber, but the real problems and the real enemy is often behind them.

If I was in your position I too would be despairing. However there are plenty of nutters and miscreants on the atheist side too, at times I really do think about dropping the label all together and adopting something that distances myself from some of the anarchist god-hating posers.

I won't actually stop calling myself an atheist but I prefer to call myself a rationalist now. A rationalist is an atheist with a mortgage, and no tattoos.

I will leave the debate as it is, the ball is in your court, I am not running away from a further debate if you fancy it. If anybody wants to contact you I will pass on the address but I will not post it on the site.

Martin