h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

A good deed Edward!

A fascinating piece of editing by Malik; getting people to talk not in each other's presence gives endless possibilities for misrepresenting their reactions to one another!

However, 'humanism' is probably as indefinable as 'religion'. Everybody knows what those words mean, and everybody knows different.

I am wary of statements like "the world has improved". Certainly studies of distant pre-urbanised groups show worse murder figures than Chicago or LA or any city; but I share Wittgenstein's caution -- the world is too big a thing to speak about sensibly in generalisations. (If that egregious generalisation makes sense to you; I hope it may.)

A quote from a student during Beckett's year as a lecturer in TCD (1930-31):

". . . he said you can never quantify how a human being will react. You can put a bunch of tongs in the fire and they will all turn red. Ten human beings faced with a situation will react in different and unexpected ways. As he said 'we do not know what a human being is made of.' . . . "

God he could put his finger on it, couldn't he?

Cutting and pasting to Atheist Fundamentalism, because I have some comments of my own...

Oh...and you must pass that Wittgenstein quote - and, indeed, the Beckett on to Jack N. On another thread he's recommended a book called 'The Tyranny of Numbers' - which sounds just the ticket for me, with my education in statistics.