Archive for December, 2007

The Secret History of Hacking

Wednesday, December 26th, 2007

In junior high and high school, I never engaged in phreaking or other black hat activities. But I certainly could have, because I spent a good deal of time with that crew as I pursued my own computer-related interests. And I still keep the original hacker ethos alive in a lot of my current adventures. […]

Friends Church Sign of the Week

Wednesday, December 19th, 2007

Number 10 in a series.

Merry Christmas! Don’t be ashamed to say it.
Translation: Happy Solstice! Don’t be ashamed to help us bury the truth.
Winter Solstice
Embedding disabled on this one. Go and watch it here.
Reason for the Season?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FRcCEZflIP4

Vienna Teng — The Atheist Christmas Carol

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4wVRcE5gIs

Vienna Teng, from her album Warm Strangers
It’s the season of grace coming out of […]

The Four Horsemen

Wednesday, December 19th, 2007

The Four Horsemen is a video two-hour discussion among four of the most prominent atheist authors of our time:

Christopher Hitchens, author of God is Not Great
Daniel Dennett, author of Breaking the Spell
Richard Dawkins, author of The God Delusion
Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith and Letter to a Christian Nation

Hour 1

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-869630813464694890

Hour 2

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-225595257312538919

Claims vs. the Other Three C’s

Monday, December 17th, 2007

One of my recent posts attracted some attention in the comments section. A Christian questioner, when I challenged him with the contradictions inherent in the gospel accounts of the resurrection of Jesus, replied:
If you hear a story from 4 views and you were not there to witness the event then the next logical step is […]

Falling— With Style!

Thursday, December 13th, 2007

Alternate title: Rocky the Amazing Flying Squirrel
As if BASE jumping wasn’t already extreme enough.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttz5oPpF1Js

Catalog Choice: Stop the Flood of Catalogs

Wednesday, December 12th, 2007

I’m not as badly off as some. I only throw away about 8-10 catalogs a week that arrive at my office. Over a year, that’s around 500 catalogs. Now scale that to the entire U.S.: Americans are printing, distributing, and throwing away (mostly unused) about 19 billion catalogs each year.
53 million trees per year.
3.6 million […]

I’m Totally Scrooged

Saturday, December 8th, 2007

Right here! And you can too…

My Afternoon With Reverend Zero

Thursday, December 6th, 2007

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDZyEgx-0fc

via Spanish Inquisitor
And here is my favorite “real-life Reverend Zero”, Dan Barker:
Part 1:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cINIQqye0Hw

[Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4] [Part 5]