On Tuesday night, I joined my VAA fellows in going to Richmond to see Frank Turek and Christopher Hitchens debate the existence of god, as mentioned in an earlier post. And I took notes. Boy did I take notes. I was jumping up and down in my seat at some points with retorts and comments bubbling out of my brain! I don’t know why I’m so darn hyper sometimes. I’ve written about it and it’s appearing as a two-part post on Brother Richard’s Life Without Faith. Many many thanks to him for taking me on as a guest blogger!
Thanks again to the fabulous guys and gals of the VCU United Secular Alliance for hosting this incredible event. And a “hello!” to their president, Roy, who I finally met in person but have known as the “bionic atheist” online. And of course, to the VAA people who were just great and witty and fun and intelligent and entertaining on the drive there and back, before the debate, after the debate, and at dinner.
Also, *fangirl moment.* So we were waiting on this huuuge line to get Hitchens to sign our books and chat and such. And I knew what I wanted to say, which I wrote about in my long post above, but what I didn’t mention is that I’m an idiot when talking to people I admire and stumble over my words, but I think it came out okay. However, when I went to shake Christopher Hitchens’s hand, he took it up and he kissed it! So of course I’m stumbling even more like a moron, but I think he took my compliment and understood my point. Anyway, that was charming and cool.
Off to go play with my new iPod Touch… I mean, get work done.
I’m a 7th (and final!) year
2 responses so far ↓
Caroline // September 17, 2008 at 17:24 |
Bravo, Nicole! I was abroad last week and missed the debate – kudos to you for posting this summary.
Greywolf // September 19, 2008 at 12:02 |
Nicole, thank you very much for putting together such an informed and only slightly biased in-depth report on the Hitchens-Turek debate.
I blog on a site called Christopher Hitchens Watch, which is devoted to what my confederates and I refer to as “the Glorious Hitch Hunt”, and which takes a critical and fairly lighthearted look at Hitchens’s work. Looking around for some info on the debate, I came across your post on Life Without Faith and judged it by far the best account of the debate currently available. So I ‘ve taken the liberty of writing up a post of my own that quotes liberally from yours and also includes a link back to it. I hope you don’t think I’ve been over-liberal because I think what you wrote deserves to be as widely read as possible.
http://christopherhitchenswatch.blogspot.com/
I doubt whether this subject will capture a lot of attention on our blog, as Hitch has been “debating” religious types regularly for over a year now and the phenomenon of both sides talking past each other and refusing to engage has been in evidence from the start.
On the subject of morality, like your correspondent Ajita Kamal, I unreservedly recommend Robert Wright’s The Moral Animal, which takes episodes from the life of Charles Darwin to illustrate and explore human moral sensibilities.
I envy you being able to work in astronomy as it has always been my favorite science, and I wish you a long and successful career in the field.
Yours agnostically!
Tim Groves