God: No magic required

[lweisenthal]

I think everyone may have scared Larry away.

Hi Popsicle, by no means. I've been impressed and gratified by a number of the more thoughtful replies and comments.

I try not to get consumed with real time debating with a half dozen simultaneous debate opponents. It becomes a black hole, with regard to time. Yesterday, I had to do some actual work (medics have to work on weekends, not infrequently). Then I watched the Super Bowl. Today, I've got a lot of work to do on my day job. I'm very pleased that people are still sufficiently interested to wish to continue this thread. I'm happy to stay engaged, as long an anyone else remains interested in so doing. Many of the recent comments don't really require a response. A couple of these comments do appear to be asking me for a response, and I'll definitely reply, by and by.

I'm gratified that Resetsu is reading the blog I tried to link, but wasn't permitted to by this blog editor. It's great that Resetsu made the effort to actually copy and post one of the pages, and thereby facilitated the efforts of any others who wish to find and peruse my writings related to the current subject matter. In addition to the blog in question and Disqus, an easy way to see the sorts of things I write is to Google "Weisenthal/Huntington" or "Larry Weisenthal" or "Dr. Weisenthal" or whatever. There's also a ton of archival material on Google Groups, which can be accessed under my name or else under "runnswim," which is a part of the email address I used for my sports related discussions. As I wrote, my life is pretty much an open book, and I'm certainly not a closet conservative religionist, out to save souls from damnation. Religion-wise, you'll find that I've devoted a vastly greater amount of time arguing against the rigid doctrines of such religionists, than I've spent quibbling with atheists and agnostics about this stuff.

Note to blog editor: No, this wasn't a sneaky attempt on my part to circumvent the blog rules against advertising. It's simply that I don't want anyone thinking that I'm hiding an agenda. Resetsu posted a page from my blog, wherein all I do is to link to this particular thread on this particular blog. I think Resetsu's implication (I'm not great at understanding his/her thinking) is that I'm somehow trying to secretly "use" this atheist blog for some nefarious purpose. So I'm just trying to be transparent. I don't provide any commercial service relating to this stuff. I don't write self help books or run a counseling service or anything like that. It's just something in which I have an interest, and I personally find it much more stimulating to talk and debate with opposite minded people than to stay inside of a cozy bubble, with friends and like-minded people. I've had more than 20,000 posts to political blogs and virtually all of them have been on conservative blogs, arguing with political and religious conservatives, many of whom probably hate my guts even more than Resetsu (though seldom have I encountered a debate opponent with a higher ratio of personal invective to thoughtful counter-argument). Anyway, kind editor, if you find that anything in this post is in violation of your advertising rules, I'd ask you to simply delete whatever part of it crosses whatever line may exist.

- Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach, CA