And how many times have you argued from:
Fear - Gay marriages will be bad for our society.

Never. I have gay friends that have been living together for 16 years. I knew about 10 gay couples when I was in High School, most of them from parties held at my house. Not personal friends, I admit, but welcome, none-the-less. I’ve probably had more gay men hit on me than you have, and I’ve likely been kinder in my rejection of them than you would have been. The fact is, you don’t know anything about how I live my life, Brock. All you know is that I believe that Homosexual behavior is a sin. And I don’t think you even know what I mean by THAT. I don’t fear you, or gays in general, anymore than you fear polygamists. If anything, my heart cries out for you. I know you don’t understand that, but that’s OK with me too.  I’ve never brought this up because I don’t think it matters, and it shouldn’t, to you.

Prejudice - a child of two people of the same gender would be mocked and ridiculed.

To what possible end? First of all, so far as I know, there is no child of 2 people of the same gender. I’m not particularly for the adoption of children into gay unions. It has nothing to do with prejudice, to the contrary it has everything to do with experience. I’ve met way too many kids that without one sex or the other in a mentor role in their life that are incapable of having solid relationships with people of the opposite sex. I don’t think that’s a good thing. Having a parent of each sex is a great way to avoid that problem, and it seems sorta natural to me too, as (I don’t know if anyone has pointed this out to you before Brock) it takes one of each sex to produce the child in the first place.

From an appeal to authority?
From an appeal to common belief?

Work with me, I’m not getting how appealing to an accepted authority is a bad thing. Nor appealing to a common belief.

From the straw man fallacy?

Pot, kettle, you know the rest.

How often have you made a statement and failed to assume the burden of proof?

Have to admit, I’m not recalling any. But I get questions from a lot of angles and I try to hit them all. Sometimes I think they are rhetorical and I ignore them, sometimes I feel I’ve already provided a proof. If I missed one you felt attached to, just let me know, I’ll do my best.

GeekMom and elwedriddsche may be applying reason and attempting to forgo bias, but they hardly deserve your gloating over it.

How was I gloating? I certainly didn’t mean to. I honestly have a new found respect for people I watched go out of their way to misrepresent many things I wrote and put words in my mouth (as you have done here – see fear). I really didn’t think they were capable of anything but slapping themselves on the back and being smug in their own sphere think-a-likes, err, sorry, free thinkers, yeah - that’s it. So pardon me for saying so, but they aren’t quite as one-sided as they first appeared to me.

you make the extraordinary claim that 70+ millions of Americans are mentally ill. The burden of proof is squarely on you and to avoid any misunderstandings, since you specifically use the phrase ‘mentally ill’, you’ll have to support a clinical diagnosis

Easily done.

im going to start one or two things at a time til we have agreement otherwise im wasting my time.

As for the approx 70 Million.

There are roughly 295+ Million people in the USA correct?
Various polls show approx between 72-80% of the USA claiming to be Christian correct?
http://www.religioustolerance.org/rel_comp.htm
This poll was taken in 1991, % have gone down since then from 86% to in the low 70s.

The percentage that believe the Bible 100% cover to cover word for word in teh USA is approx 30-33% correct.
That leaves somewhere between 65-70 Million Christians that believe the Bible 100% everything in it absolutely, correct?

Psychosis :n : any severe mental disorder in which contact with reality is lost or highly distorted.

You agree that is definiton of Psychosis?
Do you agree Psychosis is a mental disorder?

now if we can agree up to this point or at least come to a consensus then we can go further.

Thanks to Stefanie, Brock and (as always) Elwedriddsche for the illuminating posts.  Okay, even to David, to whatever extent.
The problem I’m having with Nunyabiz is fairly basic, and it’s the same problem I have with the poll-happy worldwide, conservative or progressive.  Statistics are a great way to organize information, and politically they’re very useful in creating anxiety and divisiveness.  That’s what wins elections, after all. But Nunya, the numbers you’re tossing around ignore a a pretty human fact-- you can’t quantify ‘belief’.  I’ve been living in SoCal for over a decade, and I’ve run into more ‘fundamentalist’ Christians here than anywhere else I’ve spent time.  They run the gamut from the truly scary Revelations nuts to generous-hearted, flexible people who want to simply connect with those around them.  But they ALL consider themselves conservative christians. 
For that matter, if you were to poll agnostics, you’d end up with a wide spectrum of ideologies, too. 
Of course, I’m as creeped out by the ‘Biblical Law’ people as anyone (outside of the Taliban, who they so closely resemble.)
But those guys are a christian minority.  I still think most people, if given over to a moment of empathy, will arrive at a humanistic
conclusion, if only because it’s so freaking hard to escape from from other humans and our utter connectedness to each other.

Dude--pass that bong!

I haven’t said much yet as I’ve been waiting to see a few more of Nunya’s posts before I drew any conclusions. While there is much about what he says that I do agree with (to an extent at least), I must say that his methods leave much to be desired. Whether what he says is true or not, he comes across as much the same sort of Fundamentalist as any believer and that worries me as much as it worries me when I hear believers talk in the same fashion.

Which isn’t to say I can’t be a hard nose myself. I’ve told believers that they are living in a self-delusion, but even I don’t equate that with being truly mentally ill. Rationalization of illogical and unlikely possibilities is a standard human coping mechanism we all engage in when dealing with daily stresses. Religion functions, in my mind, much like a security blanket and time saver. Doesn’t take much thought and gives some comfort, but that’s not the same as being truly unbalanced though it could get to that point if taken to extremes.

If nothing else, though, Nunya demonstrates ably the many times I’ve said that there are atheists out there who can be as bad as any believer in trying to get their views across. It’s my hope by engaging in discussions such as these that maybe I can get a few of the fence sitters to consider my side of the argument (as it’s unlikely I’m going to change anyone’s mind who has it made up already) or, at the very least, get people to think a little and be a little more tolerant of opposing ideas. Nunya makes that effort harder, not easier, and leaves me wondering what he hopes to accomplish with his approach.

im not trying to quantify belief, the people being asked the question “Do you believe in the Bible as absolute truth 100% and have no doubts?”
are quantifying themselves, so either alot of people are lying for some reason or the polls should give a fairly close aprroximation of their belief.

Yes they are the minority iv never said otherwise, they represent approx. 30%.
but 30% of roughly 225 million is still one hell of alot of deluded people suffering from psychosis walking the streets.

on top of that you have freaks of nature such as Pat Robertson & Jerry Falwell constantly reving them all up spreading hatred just as hard and fast as they can.

So since these good ol Christians no matter what or how many believe whatever they do, are just as good and nice as they can all be according to all of you here, then explain to me please the hundreds of Christian based hate groups. I’ll just list a few
Then compare that to all the “Atheist hate groups”
http://stop-the-hate.org/rel-body.html
http://users.rcn.com/kyp/bcfenatl.html

Ohhhhhh wait thats right there are’nt any Atheist hate groups DOH! (least none iv ever heard of)

Here is a good little website that explains just some of the hatred that gets directed at US by muslim countries. Brillaint idea, hire a group of idiots diametrically opposed to Islam to proselytize them out of their delusion into yours, Oh yeah good job Dubya.

http://www.aljazeerah.info/Opinion%20editorials/2003%20Opinion%20Editorials/November/15%20o/Christian%20fundamentalists%20employed%20by%20the%20US%20government%20to%20produce%20news%20in%20Arabic%20to%20Iraqis%20William%20Hardiker.htm

Christian fundamentalist hard at work.

Top ten signs that you are a Christian Fundamentalist.
http://grgaud.exchristian.info/topten_fundie.html

Now all of you claim that just these so very few nutcases are virtually harmless or not nearly as widespread, keep in mind just how many are in public office! namely ol George Dubya, Trent Lott, Jesse Helms, Dick Armey, Tom Delay, Walter jones, John Hosstettler, Robert Anderholt, Todd Akin, Henry Brown, etc etc,
http://www.cc.org/index.cfm

If you dont view this as scarey then i hope your the first to bend over when these freaks of nature accomplish their agenda.

Nunyabiz,

what Les said.

I doubt we’ll reach a consensus other than to agree to disagree. I’m afraid you haven’t done your homework; remember, a claim of mental illness requires you to make a clinical diagnosis and you have to provide the psychiatric definition as a reference.

Nunya, Dubya, what’s the difference… It looks to me like you’re well on your way to form your very own atheist hate group.

Hmmm yeah almost the same.

I list cold hard proveable facts backed up by numerous sources unaffiliated with each other as to where i get my opinion on how many delusional Christians there are suffering what can only be descibed as Psychosis, and im just like a Fundamentalist.

which “believes” the Earth to be approx 6000 years old, the entire planet was engulfed in a great flood merely 3500 years ago or so killing every living thing “except” for 8 individuals of which we all came from, that some omnipotent invisable being spoke a few choice words and magically created everything, and all this absolute truth and knowledge all came from a few scriptures a few 1000 years ago as their irrefutable evidence.

Mkay.

NP there Elwed, believe whatever you like.
as will I.

I stand by every word iv said, and i can back up every bit of it.
Thats alot more than i can say about most of you here.

Im not preaching hate in anyway, i leave that to the Christians since they are so good at it and have a couple 1000 years first hand experience at
getting it just right.

Im merely pointing out what should be obvious and wishing them to get the therapy they need.

Prove that 70+ millions of Americans suffer from clinical psychosis. That is, so to speak, the bone of contention. Is it possible that are evading an answer?

Les,

it occurs to me that there’s an extension to the religion-is-a-crutch analogy.

Some people are perfectly capable to walk without a crutch, but carry one anyway to beat up passers-by with it - those that use the wrong kind of crutch or dare walk without one. That doesn’t imply that the crutch is to blame, unless it’s manufactured with barbs on.

There’s plenty of gullible people out there. Just consider how many people consult a magazine or television show to see what they should spend lots of money to wear next.

I guess the major difference here is that I can’t be arrested for wearing stripes with plaid or last years fashions - Not yet anyway!

My biggest beef will always be that religions usually attempt to limit individual rights. Once religious zealots manage to get into office we’re halfway to hurtin. The good they accomplish will easily be eclipsed by the harm.

Let’s see a DSM-IV number there, Nunya.  Otherwise you’re just spouting opinions without clinical definition, and not very good ones either.

I think that small subset of religious people who are truly, clinically delusional are obviously delusional about other things too (like that woman who decided God told her she’d get a free car).  It’s all of a piece, and not caused by religion per se.

People who are believers are deliberately pretending that something is so; they’re just not aware that they’re committing an act of pretense.  Most of them realize that they’re committing an act of will to believe (and pat themselves on the back for it), as if there were something external out there and all they had to to was accept it.  (As Alan Watts says, “Belief is the fervent hope that certain things are true.")

But they don’t realize they’re actually CREATING the thing themselves that they’re believing in.  (You can make this phenomenon appear yourself by simply sitting alone at night and deciding that any noise you hear is the sound of someone about to break into the house.  You can work yourself up pretty good, and pretty soon any creak or pop you hear will fit into your worldview very nicely and reinforce your belief.  People do this to themselves all the time.  The trick is to RECOGNIZE when you’re doing it.  And the other trick is to realize that when you stop doing it, it all goes away.  Sadly, this is NOT the case for clinically delusional people, who can’t escape their hallucinations even when they try really, really hard.)

Kids understand this better than we do.  They pretend all the time, and tend to give up the pretense much more easily when someone reminds them that real life isn’t really the way they’ve decided it ought to be.

Getting back to David’s request for a clarification:  my lovely and talented hubby currently has our copy of Voodoo Science (excellent book, Les, thanks for the pointer), so I’ll have to paraphrase Robert Park, but I think his explanation is the most straightforward:

We humans are hardwired as a survival mechanism to figure out cause and effect—it’s how we figure out that we ate this plant and got really sick, therefore we shouldn’t eat that plant any more.  We do this matching up of effect and cause all the time, even when it’s not warranted.  Just because B follows A doesn’t mean it was CAUSED by A, but our reflex pushes us to assume it anyway.  (This is how we buy in to a lot of things that are wrong; hence the book.)

We do this so much that we get really uncomfortable whenever we can’t figure out a cause for something that we observe.  We’ll grasp at anything to explain it.  And most people are constitutionally incapable of accepting the notion that there might not BE a “cause” as such for everything we see.  The notion of something happening randomly really upsets some people.

Couple that with the fact, as I mentioned before, that some people keep trying to enforce their ideas on others who won’t listen to them because they’re all grownups and consider themselves equals.  You can try enforcing rules by force, but the (slightly) more peaceful way, and at least less physically dangerous for you if you happen to be smaller, is by creating a super-parental authority to appeal to. 

So you’ve got a pretty big world sitting here, nobody back then knew how it got there, you’ve got random things happening and you can’t explain them rationally, and you’ve got a temperament that just won’t stop searching for an answer even if you have to make one up out of wholecloth.  Et voilà!  Le bon Dieu.  (I did that French part just for David. )

Most arguments for why people believe boil down to:

- The world had to come from SOMEWHERE, so someone must have created it.

- A whole lot of people have believed in this for a very long time.  They even wrote this book here.

And those just aren’t compelling arguments for someone whose responses are:

- Not necessarily; and
- Just because someone else wants to believe it doesn’t make it true.

I might consider this self-delusional tendency of ours a perversion of a perfectly good and useful survival mechanism, but I wouldn’t call it insanity.  What makes this built-in “religion reflex” worse, of course, is our primitive tribalism, which is still alive and thriving, as anyone in most countries around the world can tell you.  Religion is just another outlet for the violence that tribalism can create, but it’s certainly not the only one.  The Serbs and Albanians are back to pounding on each other in Sarajevo; there are massacres occurring among ethnic groups just about every day.  It’s not enough to pretend a certain deity exists; you end up using it to bash in the head of someone else who’s different from you and won’t accept your claim to superiority.

So even if we didn’t have religion, I fear we’d still have plenty of outlets for both our creativity and our violence.  The only way I can possibly think of to address it is to use what we’ve always used to conquer our baser human nature:  our minds.  And that means thinking critically, rationally and with a large degree of self-awareness.  If we taught a lot more of that in the schools, I can’t help but think we’d be doing our society the biggest favor of all.

(I would like to point out that this whole posting was written without the benefit of caffeine.  Whew.)

Good musings there GeekMom. I don’t believe the caffeine part though.

Let’s wear T-shirts that has naked women and big black dildos on it, then let’s march to the next Disney animated feature in the theatre. I hope your kids will be sitting next to me.

If you think you can do so without getting arrested, be my guest.

My own presence on this site notwithstanding, (sometimes anger gets the best of me) I’d rather not spend time provoking those I disagree with so mush as attempting to engage them in discussion to enlighten myself as to the reason for their position.  Entertainment being a different realm, I leave films to the “chior” as it were.

But I don’t think Darth Vader at Star Wars is an appropriate analogy, given most viewers accept that world as fantasy. (Though I’m guessing most of you view the Passion as fiction/fantasy.) Christians viewing the Passion believe the atrocity to have actually occured, therefore, it might be more akin to showing up to Shindler’s list in a Gestapo uniform , or Farenheight 9/11 (wich I consider fiction) as Bush or one of his campaign (wich I might do in good fun).

Given this analogy, (granted the work is satire so ALL of this is hypothetical,) I think the response was commendable.  If someone showed up as Gestapo at Shindler’s List I might do more than dump a coke on him!  How would I forgive that guy while watching the painful death of others at the hands of those he’s dressed as?  If I were saintly with no emotion I might sit next to him & engage him in discussion, but if I were that cerebral, I’d likely also realize that he’s not one for discussion given his actions.

What is forgiveness & mercy anyway?  I’ve spent a lot of time contemplating & attempting to apply these concepts to my life, & I don’t think it’s either ignoring or accepting the unacceptable/dangerous behavior from others when they show no remorse & show propensity to continue.  Without that measure, where is your forgiveness/mercy for Bush?  Granted, if you don’t claim to hold those values, there’s no reason you should.

I think people are missing the point: people that show up for any show and have it upstaged.  How would you like it if you went for your first screening of Fahrenheit 911 with your bible, I mean your copy of “Rush Limbaugh is a Big, Fat Idiot”, in your lap, only to find me and a friends of mine dressed as George Bush, Osama Bin Laden, and Michael Moore.  And then we get up and give each other big hugs at random intervals in the movie?  (Before anyone accuses me of being gay, let me remind you that only Christians are supposed to be anti-gay homophobes).

People don’t mind disagreement, but they do resent being forced to consume it when they don’t want to, and especially when they’re trying to consume something else.

And people who believe that studies can prove that religious people are crazy will believe anything that 1) agrees with their preconceived ideas, and 2) is preceded by the words “studies show that”.  I can show you studies proving that women and blacks are inferior to white men.  There are lots of them.  I can show you extensive studies that the greenhouse effect doesn’t exist.  I’ve had peer-reviewed research papers published before, believe me:  I can show you extensive studies to prove anything I want.  Next time you feel superior about not believing in God, go get a position at Oxford like CS Lewis.  Or inspire as many people as he has.  Then share your wisdom about stupid Christians in a silly blog somewhere.

I wish atheists would show Christians the same tolerance they want to show to, say, radical Islamic fundamentalists.  Perhaps hating Christians, and possibly the whole USA altogether, is something you both have in common.  I guess that’s the silliest thing to witness: bigoted ideas against religious people in general being expressed by people who claim victimization by Christian’s not being “tolerant”. 

By all means, don’t let open-mindedness prevent you from living in your delusion.  Maybe one day, Christians will abandon their faith and all that has brought them for the life of blogging resentment.

I’ll do you one better though: I do not believe you have a mental disease, nor do I have any other paranoid explanation for your comments.  I just thing your egotistical.

I wish atheists would show Christians the same tolerance they want to show to, say, radical Islamic fundamentalists.  Perhaps hating Christians, and possibly the whole USA altogether, is something you both have in common.  I guess that’s the silliest thing to witness: bigoted ideas against religious people in general being expressed by people who claim victimization by Christian’s not being “tolerantâ€?.

If radical Islamic fundamentalists were actively seeking to dismantle the Judiciary, rewrite the Constitution, codify their religious beliefs into law, teach their superstitions in science classes and generally force recognition of America as a Muslim nation, I’m sure YOU wouldn’t stand by and shut up about THAT, wouldja?  Of course not.

Since your belief system is just as whacky to US as that of fundamentalist Muslims is to YOU, perhaps you can get a feel for why those of us who reject the idea of the governance of ALL American people being tied to the superstitions of SOME refuse to just sit idly by while the Dominionists and Reconstructionists turn our secular nation into Jesusland.

My tolerance does NOT extend so far as to give Christians MORE rights than anyone else, and that is what the REAL agenda is.  They like to claim persecution and discrimination, but last time I looked, there’s certainly no dearth of churches and crosses in America, and I’ve yet to live a single day in my almost-43 years on this country without hearing/seeing/reading something about Jesus or God.  In fact, not a single month goes by where I’m not approached at least once by someone whose job it is to bring me to salvation through Jesus. THAT is a major annoyance, but as a staunch defender of our right to religious freedom, I’d never fight to have such proselytization outlawed.

These people bringing their Jesus pitch into schools and otherwise Christianizing MY government, however, is something I’ll NEVER stop fighting against… because it’s ILLEGAL and morally WRONG.

People don’t mind disagreement, but they do resent being forced to consume it when they don’t want to, and especially when they’re trying to consume something else.

Exactly.  So tell me again why I’m an asshole for wanting the Pledge of Allegiance restored to its pre-1954 version, without the illegally-added “under God” nonsense I DON’T believe in, because it makes a lie of the the “indivisible” part I DO believe in?

Let’s see what we’ve got here:

I think people are missing the point: people that show up for any show and have it upstaged.  How would you like it if you went for your first screening of Fahrenheit 911 with your bible, I mean your copy of “Rush Limbaugh is a Big, Fat Idiotâ€?, in your lap, only to find me and a friends of mine dressed as George Bush, Osama Bin Laden, and Michael Moore.  And then we get up and give each other big hugs at random intervals in the movie?

First I should point out that the entire thing turned out to be satire, something I mentioned in the entry itself. Not that someone didn’t end up going out and attending a showing of The Passion dressed as Satan as that’s what Normal Bob Smith did. Folks were a bit better behaved for him, though, with only one Coke being tossed his way.

Still, the point being that as long as the people dressed this way aren’t being disruptive and interrupting the movie then I don’t see the problem. In the original satire the guy just went dressed as Satan, he didn’t jump up during the movie or make any comments. He just sat there. If it were a true event, which it isn’t, but if it were then the reaction of the people around him is not justified. By comparison in the scenario you describe you’re going beyond merely dressing up to being obnoxious in the theater in which case it would be perfectly appropriate for the theater to remove you. People show up at various movie events dressed as different characters all the time. As I pointed out in the original entry should people dressed up as Darth Vader or the Stormtroopers not be allowed into Star Wars movies because they’re dressed as the bad guys?

(Before anyone accuses me of being gay, let me remind you that only Christians are supposed to be anti-gay homophobes).

I have no idea what thought processes are at work with that statement, but you being gay was the last thing to cross my mind. Not even sure how it’s relevant to your discussion.

People don’t mind disagreement, but they do resent being forced to consume it when they don’t want to, and especially when they’re trying to consume something else.

Actually there’s a lot of people out there who do mind disagreement, believer and non-believer alike. I hear from a lot of them all the time. Tell you what, once you convince all those anti-abortion Christians to stop trying to force their disagreements onto people trying to access an abortion clinic then I’ll go out of my way to convince all those atheists dressing up as Satan from attending showings of popular pro-Christian movies. Of the two examples of having someone force their ‘disagreement’ on someone else I think your side is way more obnoxious.

And people who believe that studies can prove that religious people are crazy will believe anything that 1) agrees with their preconceived ideas, and 2) is preceded by the words “studies show thatâ€?.  I can show you studies proving that women and blacks are inferior to white men.  There are lots of them.  I can show you extensive studies that the greenhouse effect doesn’t exist.  I’ve had peer-reviewed research papers published before, believe me:  I can show you extensive studies to prove anything I want.

So you’re saying there are no crazy religious people and that studies are useless for determining anything at all? You make a big claim at the end so I’ll bite: show me an extensive study that proves God exists.

Next time you feel superior about not believing in God, go get a position at Oxford like CS Lewis.  Or inspire as many people as he has.  Then share your wisdom about stupid Christians in a silly blog somewhere.

So now you’re saying that only people in positions of authority are allowed to share their opinions on religious people and the existence of God? You cite C.S. Lewis in your argument from authority. Do I need to point out that the majority of scientists holding positions of authority at various universities are atheists? The fact that C.S. Lewis held a position of authority and inspired a lot of people in no way justifies or excuses Christians who act like assholes either. You’re the ones who aren’t supposed to be judging others, I’m not bound by any such rules.

I wish atheists would show Christians the same tolerance they want to show to, say, radical Islamic fundamentalists.

Who says I show any radical Islamic fundamentalists any tolerance at all? Personally, I have a hard time with all fundamentalists regardless of what they’re being fundamentalist about. I’m one of those people that you tend to get back what you give. If you’re tolerant of me then I’ll be tolerant of you, but if you’re going to push your views on me then I’m going to push mine right back at you.

I’ve said many times that I really don’t care if you want to believe in your magic sky fairy until it makes you into a problem. The vast majority of Christians, Muslims, Shintoists and so on aren’t a problem. They go about their lives and they do their little worship thing without bothering anyone and I’m happy they’re happy. Most of the folks I end up writing about here have made themselves into problems.

Perhaps hating Christians, and possibly the whole USA altogether, is something you both have in common.

I don’t hate Christians and I certainly don’t hate the USA. If I hated the USA I’d get the fuck out. The fact that I love the USA is the reason why I get so angry at the Christians who are trying to turn it into a theocracy. There’s very little that most atheists share in common with most radical fundamentalist Islamics. The same can’t be said for most fundamentalist Christians though. The similarities between those two groups is frightening.

I guess that’s the silliest thing to witness: bigoted ideas against religious people in general being expressed by people who claim victimization by Christian’s not being “tolerant�.

Please enlighten me on how my ideas are bigoted? And I’m not claiming to be a victim, I’m just tired of being expected to put up with the assholes being assholes regardless of whether they’re Christian, Muslim, or whatever. You let me live my life the way I want to live it and I’ll let you do the same.

By all means, don’t let open-mindedness prevent you from living in your delusion.  Maybe one day, Christians will abandon their faith and all that has brought them for the life of blogging resentment.

No delusions here. I gave them up when I left my religion behind. I seriously doubt that Christianity will ever go away completely. It’s simply too comforting and useful for it to dry up altogether and there are too many people in this world who don’t want to have to make tough decisions on their own or accept personal responsibility for it to ever go completely out of style.

As for blogging resentment, I blog a lot more than resentment. It wouldn’t be very popular if I were a one-trick pony.

I’ll do you one better though: I do not believe you have a mental disease, nor do I have any other paranoid explanation for your comments.  I just thing your egotistical.

That’s a bold statement to make from reading a single entry on my blog. I’d say that makes you somewhat arrogant.

Still, there is a certain amount of ego involved in running a blog, but that’s not the same as being egotistical by a long shot.