Monday, January 19, 2009

I might be able to get my D'Souza fix after all

Dinesh D'Souza, the acclaimed pop-apologist who is more fleet-footed than a man with airplanes for toes, will be up against Dan "The Music-Man" Barker in a steel cage death match...with a podium. The one who is declared victorious will, once and for all, decide: "Can we be good without God?". And, icing on the cake, PZ "The Overlord" Myers will be there to watch. Reserve your tickets.

I personally can't wait to hear Dinesh repeat the same things that he has already stated in articles, books, and previous debates (including jokes for Christ's sake)! Will Barker finally make it clear to audiences everywhere that Dinesh is far from the scholar others make him out to be, and that he is no more than a polemicist with shoddy half-baked pseudo-philosophical arguments that could be torn to pieces by anyone with the slightest amount of knowledge of the subjects that he brings up? Or will it be like every other debate? We'll have to wait and find out. Ooooo...the suspense is killing me!

[Author's note: When I say that Dinesh is "fleet-footed", I am only referring to his ability to Gish Gallop and also to suggest that he is a coward, and I am in no ways suggesting that he is any better than other debaters at performing in track and field events. I am on record as saying that Dinesh might not beat my fat ass at a 50 yard dash, and I hope that others will see the bravery that it requries to take that position.]

21 comments:

Pliny-the-in-Between said...

You know it might just be a whole lot easier for everyone to just cancel the debate and let DD declare victory in the debate which is what he'll do anyway regardless of the outcome. He is protected by the intellectual aegis of Augustine; “Faith is to believe what we do not see; and the reward of this faith is to see what we believe." Pretty much covers his opinions of his abilities doesn't it ;)

Asylum Seeker said...

“Faith is to believe what we do not see; and the reward of this faith is to see what we believe."

Not only a good description of D'Souza's sense of self, but also reminds me of confirmation bias(well...to a degree. At least with confirmation bias, you have actual evidence supporting your opinion, rather than a natural inclination to distort things that almost support your belief until it appears it actually does. I guess since he never seems to listen to dissenting opinions and claims victory if a small amount of people say that he did better, that it does smack of the real thing though...).

mac said...

Yeah, Pliny's right.

It does not matter the the outcome of ANY debate involving D'Souza.

He'll just spout the same non-sense and claim victory when it's over.

Asylum Seeker said...

But...but...this time could be different!

It's funny, but I was actually considering looking at his "What's so Great about Christianity?" for dissection's sake. But, then, after watching a few seconds of the debate currently on his website, remembering how it sounded identical to the three or so other debates I've seen him in, realizing how pathetic all of his blog articles about religion were, reading a few reviews of the book that brought up familiar sounding arguments, I decided against shelling out money to do what we already do for free: laugh at D'Souza's inability to do anything but play an elaborate (but poorly performed) shell-game when it comes to religious arguments. I have no reason to believe that this debate will be any different. But, it'll be nice to see if he has changed his game (and especially his arguments) since he dropped off the face of the internet. I doubt he has (especially judging from that last Townhall post of his), but one can dream.

Richelle said...

gaaaaaaaaaawwwwwd i cannot stand dinesh.

he's like that really obnoxious college freshman that just finished his first semester as a business major and thinks he's suddenly an economic adviser to the president.

kind of like that chode with the pony tail that matt damon clowns on in the bar in "good will hunting". how do you like them apples?

the thing with dinesh is he argues using fallacies.

straw mans, circular reasoning, confusion of cause and effect, confusing arguing religious faith with arguing religious ethics. that last one is a biggie and is why he always thinks he wins these debates. it is absolutely impossible to win an argument about religious faith. not so with arguing religious ethics, but nobody has called him out on it yet.

i just hope someone will finally point all this out in a debate with him and just tear his pathetic arguments to pieces.

Asylum Seeker said...

"he's like that really obnoxious college freshman that just finished his first semester as a business major and thinks he's suddenly an economic adviser to the president."

Speaking from experience? I would honestly think that first semester business majors would fancy themselves to be a two steps away from CEO's. Which could be just as annoying, I'm sure.

"it is absolutely impossible to win an argument about religious faith. not so with arguing religious ethics, but nobody has called him out on it yet.

i just hope someone will finally point all this out in a debate with him and just tear his pathetic arguments to pieces."

Good point, but I doubt he will be torn to pieces anytime soon. Unless someone who debates them finally is smart enough to 1. study his incredibly overused arguments beforehand 2. study why each of those arguments are incredibly wrong in almost every conceivable dimension, and 3. figure out how to rattle off that information in a rapid fire and succinct manner in order to beat Dinesh at his own game of letting loose too many points for his opponent to address. That would be beautiful. But it's not gonna happen, sadly. Because Dinesh doesn't want a debate where he could actually lose without a doubt. He just wants some face time with other people with big names so he can get some publicity and get the true believers on board and interested in his books. It's why he went to such ends to try to goad Richard Dawkins into playing his game. Because he knew that Dawkins couldn't tear into him well enough(I have no idea why the famous "New Atheists" can't, but they just don't see his massive failings for some reason) and also couldn't care less about him. But, of course, he was able to spin even that into a victory by suggesting that Dawkins was afraid of him! Even if you don't play his game he wins!

GearHedEd said...

Are you aware that his last newsblogger entry is ove 2700 posts now? There's still alively discussion going on in there.

Asylum Seeker said...

Jeez. I'll have to take a brief glimpse, but I can never really stomach discussion that has gone that far, because it normally has degenerated into 7 or 8 tangential debates by that point.

Asylum Seeker said...

Okay, wasn't as argumentative as I thought. Though I have to admit, I've never seen Brian and Botts debate quite like that before. That was interesting.

GearHedEd said...

I put up some good stuff of my own, too. I hosed down Observant in post # 2044, then gave him a week to prove god exists, except that he can't use the bible. His week is up today, and he hasn't deigned to respond...

GearHedEd said...

But if you really want to see the big picture, you gotta go back to post #1682 where I first came in and poked at Observant's mangling of the English language. That set him off on a tirade that lasted until ~ post #2100. It's fun reading.

pboyfloyd said...

I guess D'Souza will finish with his 'Grand Design' prayer.

"Let us bow our heads and picture God sitting at a row of dials setting his Laws of the Universe to allow us to spring to life on one tiny ball of rock. Amen."

I mean really, do these debaters NOT do any homework AT ALL on Dinesh and his method of wording the debate carefully an then completely ignoring 'the question'.

Of course there is good without God(there is no God) and there is evil WITH God(in their minds) no doubt BECAUSE they know that God is entirely in their minds.

GearHedEd said...

I've said it before, too: that xians FEAR the concept of death being final, and claim that such a notion is without hope. I say, "If God deprives me of my well-deserved rest to sing hosannas at the foot of his throne for all eternity, I'm gonna go postal on him!"

Asylum Seeker said...

1682...alright, I'll look for it and go from there. I already that little Magic Space Pixie post that you left there, that was nice.

"I say, "If God deprives me of my well-deserved rest to sing hosannas at the foot of his throne for all eternity, I'm gonna go postal on him!""

Agreed. I'd much prefer Hell.

"Let us bow our heads and picture God sitting at a row of dials setting his Laws of the Universe to allow us to spring to life on one tiny ball of rock. Amen."

Heh. Somehow I doubt that he really believes that that is actually a good argument for the existence of a god. But, since when would that bother him if he convince others to believe otherwise? World class charlatan.

GearHedEd said...

Quickest way to get there is to load up page 113 (change the page number at the end of the URL string)

GearHedEd said...

But you already knew that...

Asylum Seeker said...

Funny enough, that didn't occur to me! But, I'm just leisurely reading through the posts from most recent to least right now. Which basically means that I am reading the posts in reverse chronological order (well, sort of, since I am still reading the 15 posts on each page from top to bottom). I'll get there eventually.

Anonymous said...

I've never wanted to visit Minnesota. This debate could give me a reason!

..... Nah.

Anonymous said...

Dinesh D'Souza can't be an apologist. One would think that requires an ounce of humility, of which I'm convinced he has none.

Does he really debate? Or does he more congratulate himself on being so...Dinesh?

Asylum Seeker said...

I've never liked the term apologist for that reason. Because most of the most well known among them lie unapologetically!

I think that Dinesh congratulating himself on having an incredible level of Dineshness, and for letting all around him appreciate the amount of Dineshitude that he is able to capture in his every syllable sums up the nature of these events quite nicely.

On a related note I can picture him only making love to people who wear a photograph of his own face as a mask. Ahhh...egotism is hilarious!

Anonymous said...

Okay, I just can't resist anymore or hold it in: I am STILL thinking of eating Thai food with Dan Barker. One of the most fun nights ever, AND I learned that I like Thai food. Barker is going to smash, like Hulk. :)