Other psychiatrists now find Norway massacre gunman Anders Behring Breivik ‘not insane’ – prison now possible

“The experts’ main conclusion is that the accused, Anders Behring Breivik, is not considered to have been psychotic at the time of the actions on July 22, 2011,” the Oslo district court said in a statement which reopens the debate on whether the self-confessed killer can be sent to prison.

“That means that he is considered criminally responsible at the time of the crime.”

The new evaluation counters the findings of an initial probe that found Breivik was suffering from “paranoid schizophrenia,” which meant he would most likely be sentenced to psychiatric care instead of prison.

Recall our first highly controversial post questioning:
Was Norway shooter a Social Darwinian terrorist? Read More ›

Passed by and noticed Dr Hunter’s post on Nagel’s forthcoming book.  (And, objectors, Nagel is a serious philosopher of mind, writing in his area of expertise.  As in, author of “What is it like to be a bat?”) Going to the Oxford University Press [OUP] book page, I noticed another name popping up: Plantinga. As in, the man who blew away the logical form of the problem of evil. Passed by my thread on It’s Friday, but Sunday is coming, and saw Axel’s comment. Clipping: . . . while on the subject of the materialists’ desperation to quash any theistic assumption from scientific consideration, surely the proven precedence of mind over matter in physics points unequivocally to a personal God. Read More ›

This week’s Darwinian Doublespeak award goes to Missouri professor Gavin Conant who describes the latest evidential absurdity—identical DNA sequences not only in animals but in plants also—as helping to “solve some of the mysteries of plant evolution.” Recall that long stretches of … Read more

Rodin’s Thinker. Musee Rodin, Paris. Courtesy of Andrew Horne and Wikipedia. (Part four of a series in response to Zack Kopplin. See here for Part One, here for Part Two, and here for Part Three.) As I argued in my previous post, if you want to call yourself a believer in neo-Darwinian evolution, then you have to believe that it is an all-encompassing theory of living things, just as the atomic theory is an all-encompassing theory of chemistry. You have to believe that the theory of evolution is capable of explaining all of the characteristics of each species of organism. The theory of evolution stands or falls on its claim to be a complete theory. As Theodosius Dobzhansky memorably put Read More ›

Leading thinker Thomas Nagel has a new book coming out later this year on why “the widely accepted world view of materialist naturalism is untenable.” Evolutionists will be treated to …  Read more

I admit that I am given to bouts of despair about the condition of Western Civilization. We find ourselves in the proverbial hand basket and it is getting warmer and warmer. Recently a friend asked if I thought he should get involved in politics. Eeyore has nothing on me, and I replied in a somewhat gloomy tone, “Of course, but don’t expect to win any more than you should expect to stand on the seashore and hold back the tide.” “Why even try if we can’t win,” he replied. In response I appealed to the somewhat fatalistic Norse ethos which holds that even in the face of overwhelming odds we should continue to fight until the inevitable end, and when we go Read More ›

The vast majority of people who live in Louisiana hold beliefs about the human mind and about free will which are broadly compatible with those of Darwin’s contemporary, Alfred Russel Wallace (pictured right), but diametrically opposed to those of Charles Darwin (pictured left). However, the National Center for Science Education wants Darwin’s materialistic version of evolution, which denies free will, to be taught in American high schools. Left: A photo of Charles Darwin taken circa 1854. Center: St. Louis Cathedral, New Orleans. Right: A photo of Alfred Russel Wallace in 1862. Images courtesy of Messrs. Maull and Fox, Nowhereman86, James Marchant and Wikipedia. (Part three of a series of posts in response to Zack Kopplin. See here for Part one Read More ›