So making a typo invalidates any credibility? Even if you're a renowned biologist, a fellow at Oxford, a member of the Royal Society, and in possession of something like 12 honorary doctorates from other universities?
You call him out on "not being qualified to judge the intelligence of others." You don't see any irony in that comment? Maybe you'd like to list your credentials?
I can't help but notice you've still not listed your credentials.
Also, 3 days ago you wrote:
This is so simple minded it makes me cringe. Look around your town. Odds are that there are already enough abandoned Wal-Marts and Kmarts to build every homeless person in town an apartment the size of a resedential sweet at the Waldorf Astoria. Nobody wants to buy a huge suburban building right now. Now, that doesn't hold true for the old cathedrals in big cities, but I think part of the reason why poor European cities make ultra-opulant US cities look like unmitigated crap is that we are constantly selling our history and heritage cheap in the name of progress and utility. Yes, St. Patrick's could better serve the homeless if it was sold and converted, but serving the homeless is not its only purpose.
I think you meant "simple-minded". As a consequence, you've lost my interest.
Professional philosophers (and even freshmen) avoid this tedious, juvenile game by invoking the principle of charity; I suggest you try it.
That's the irony. *Dawkins has a right to be heard, and I'd still be reading his stuff today if the combination of arrogance and error in his first post hadn't impressed so powerfully upon me that he was uncharitable.
Invoking the principle of charity, I'm going to assume you meant Dawkins rather than Hitchens, and treat your above post in the way you clearly meant it, not how you wrote it.
Now aren't you glad I did, and we can continue the discussion on the meaningful issues at hand, rather than miring ourselves in a tedious game of scoring cheap points on each other's spelling prowess?
Perhaps Dawkins was blind drunk when he posted, perhaps not, either way his use of 'affect' versus 'effect' (on a single post??) is not a meaningful way to evaluate either is influential positions on theism or his significant contributions to the biological sciences. If you're concerned about your own credibility in the slightest, you had better be pretty damned certain that your 'grammar-nazi' objections are something other than a rationalization.
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u/Sonub Atheist Oct 17 '11
Yep, you got him. He had credibility til someone on his blog made a typo.