Monthly Archives: August 2008

Freud vs God; Round 2

I said I would look at the second of Freud’s categorical errors when discussing belief, and here it is. He thinks that idiots believe in the same sense as intellectuals: that what they say about God is an unclear expression … Continue reading

Posted in God | 4 Comments

Freud vs God: round 1

I have been reading Freud, for the first time in decades: Civilisation and its Discontents, which I have in a nice Dover paperback. Some of it is thought-provoking, and some is self-parody: “Psychoanalysis unfortunately has hardly anything to say about … Continue reading

Posted in God, Literature | Comments Off on Freud vs God: round 1

Bloody Nokia

I just bought — well, changed my contract to — a Nokia 6220: a very flashy phone with a nice camera, a GPS receiver, and in fact everything you could possibly want in a phone — except one tiny thing: … Continue reading

Posted in Blather, Net stories, Software | 10 Comments

Interesting graphs

One of the most thoughtful bloggers on religion is Razib, over at Gene Expression, and he has stuck up a whole series of badly formatted but thoroughly interesting graphs based on solid American statistics about the effects of religious belief … Continue reading

Posted in God | 1 Comment

Who we, white man? (part xxxvi)

Larry Moran quotes an interview with Dan Dennett: “The very fact that we agree that there are moral limits that trump any claim of religious freedom—we wouldn’t accept a religion that engaged in human sacrifice or slavery, for instance—shows that … Continue reading

Posted in God, War | Comments Off on Who we, white man? (part xxxvi)

Tour dates

I will be performing on the radio tonight, when the Viking slavery programme that Louise and I made is featured on Radio Four’s Pick of the Week: this would be your chance to learn why every smart Ukrainian family would … Continue reading

Posted in Blather, Journalism, Sweden | 1 Comment

A visit to Ammarnäs

The most important thing I saw this trip was a lynx, galloping across the road in front of the car about 40 km from Ammarnäs. The back legs seemed longer than the front ones, which made it look almost ungainly, … Continue reading

Posted in Sweden, Travel notes | 2 Comments

Back: fantastic reviews

I was watching the girls’ under 50kg arm-wrestling competition when my daughter texted me with the news of the Paxman review in the Guardian. A beguiling account of one man’s absorption in and by a country. … He writes a … Continue reading

Posted in Literature, Sweden | 2 Comments