ريتشارد دوكنز's Blog, page 226

How Jerry Falwell Jr. found his MAGA religion

By Elizabeth Bruenig Jerry Falwell Jr. is once again spreading his uniquely modern, American version of a business philosophy roughly based on the religion known as Christianity. In an interview with The Post’s Joe Heim, Falwell claimed, among other things, that Christianity offers no guidance on how states ought to operate (“Jesus never told Caesar how to …

Catholic cardinal says any new NY law for abuse victims should avoid ‘breaking’ the church

By Corky Siemaszko With the New York state Legislature expected to take up a bill that could enable more victims of sex abuse by priests to sue, Cardinal Timothy Dolan is calling for a measure that avoids “breaking” the Roman Catholic Church. Dolan, who as archbishop of New York leads more than 2 million Catholics, …

There’s (Officially) Not a Single Open Atheist in the New Congress

By Hemant Mehta When the new members of Congress take their oaths today, we will once again see a House and Senate completely devoid of open atheists… at least officially. But wait! Isn’t Rep. Jared Huffman openly non-theistic? Doesn’t he call himself a “humanist”? Didn’t we make a big deal about that in 2017? Yes. Yes. Yes. However, according …

Proposed laws in D.C. and Va. would require clergy to report sexual abuse

By Michelle Boorstein In response to recent Catholic Church clergy sex abuse scandals, lawmakers in the District and Virginia say they will soon propose legislation that adds clergy to the list of people mandated by law to report child abuse or neglect. Both efforts hit at the hot-button intersection of child protection and religious liberty, …

NASA’s New Horizons Mission Releases Snowman-like Picture of Ultima Thule

By Kenneth Chang Ultima Thule, an icy world 4 billion miles from the sun, looks like a big snowman. At a news conference on Wednesday, scientists working with NASA’s New Horizons mission released several images that the spacecraft took as it flew by on Jan. 1. The scientists now say with confidence that Ultima Thule …

Employees Can Be Fired for Being LGBTQ in 26 States. Will the Supreme Court Make That Even Worse?

By Jessica Mason Pieklo The Supreme Court on Friday will consider taking three cases that could determine whether an employer can legally discriminate against employees for being LGBTQ. If the Court agrees to hear some, or all, of the petitions, it will be testing both the strength of employment discrimination law under Title VII and retired Supreme Court Justice …

Jerry Falwell Jr. can’t imagine Trump ‘doing anything that’s not good for the country’

By Joe Heim Jerry Falwell Jr., 56, took over as president of Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va., in 2007, following the death of his father, the Rev. Jerry Falwell, who founded the school. He lives with his wife, Becki, in Bedford County, Va. You said recently that conservatives and Christians should stop electing nice guys. …

Open Discussion – January 2019

This thread has been created for open discussion on themes relevant to Reason and Science for which there are not currently any dedicated threads. Please note it is NOT for general chat, and that all Terms of Use apply as usual. If you would like to refer back to previous open discussion threads, the three …

Why Nobody In Renewable Energy Had A Better 2018 Than First Solar

By John Parnell In mid-2017 Arizona’s First Solar was set up for a tricky 2018. It was overhauling its manufacturing facilities, juggling inventory, wary of the impact of Trump’s planned trade duties on all imports of solar panels and facing even stiffer competition from China. As the months rolled on and 2018 arrived, things seemed …

Shutdown: What’s Open at NASA?

By Patrick Attwell With no sign that it will be resolved soon, the ongoing partial U.S. government shutdown looks to continue well into the first days or weeks of 2019. As such, it is having wide-reaching effects on NASA’s operations. The shutdown started at midnight EST (05:00 GMT) on Dec. 22, 2018, when a continuing resolution to …