Welcome new Patheos blogs! Ex-Communications is an awesome group of people talking about leaving religion. Also we have Jonny Scaramanga of Leaving Fundamentalism, who run a series called Christian Rock Thursdays, Steve Neumann of Notes Toward a New Chimera, which is about his philosophical jounrney after leaving Christianity not once buy twice, and Jason Torpy of The Human Animal a vegan veteran atheist.
Scott Alexander: I Can Tolerate Anything Except The Outgroup.
BBC News – Islamic State crisis: The 13-year-old on ‘righteous path’.
Edward Clint: Carl Sagan’s stumbles.
A series of posts about a man who deconverts after his son becomes an atheist. Read them all.
Brynn Tannehill: 10 Misconceptions Every Trans Ally Needs to Understand.
BBC News – Can Islamic State survive without Baghdadi?
BBC News – And then Ron said to Maggie.
Some of Pakistanis are not that thrilled about Malala Yousafzai winning Nobel.
Dan Fincke: Top 10 Reasons I Write Long Blog Posts.
Why Read New Books? by Tim Park
Great Plains Skeptic: The Truth about Polygraphs. and Are Your Dreams Really Trying to Tell You Something?
NY Times: Obama, Down but Not Out, Presses Ahead.
Turner at Twilight by Jenny Uglow.
Infidel753: Trite supremacy.
Smilodon’s Retreat: 10 Questions… and my responses.
Danielle Muscato: Today, I’m Saying Goodbye to My Old Self. Congratulations, Danielle!
BBC News – What explains the continuing fascination with Charles Manson?
Stephanie Zvan: Not Just Fundamentalism.
BBC News: Erdogan’s ‘New Turkey’ drifts towards isolation.
NY Times: Mutual Suspicion Hangs Over Turkish Prime Minister’s Visit to Iraq.
Two Different American Futures: With an Iran Deal & Without.
Avicenna (not the Muslim philosophers): Rape Fantasies and Consent Explained.
Jonathan MS Pearce: Just world theory and oven doors. and Who are the true Muslims – all or none?
Dylan Thomas: Wilderness years in Oxford remembered.
Deacon Duncan: An important distinction.
Michael Stone: Atheism and the necessity of anti-theism for social justice.
No Cross No Crescent: Islam and the Unhindered Descent of Salon.com Into the Intellectual Abyss
Heina Dadabhoy: Leaving the House of Islam. and Representing One Ex-Muslim Is Better Than Representing None.
An analysis about the firing of Chuck Hagel. Here is another which compares it to Rumsfeld firing.
Wesley Fenza: Most Online Dating Advice is Terrible.
An obituary: P. D. James, 1920-2014.
James Croft: This Atheist is Thankful for the Clergy.
Neil Carter: Why I Quit Believing, Explained.
Please stop calling climate deniers “skeptics”. Thanks.
An obituary: Mark Strand, 1934–2014.
Hemant Mehta: The Best Atheist Books of 2014.
This is a very informative article. ISIS: What the US Doesn’t Understand by Ahmed Rashid.
Chris Hallquist: Roko’s Basilisk illustrates the problems with the LessWrong community.
Alex Gabriel: Jesus was not a queer ally.