I don't know, but the T-shirt biz is probably pretty slow… even in a normal year, this is the slow season for tourists.

So, how is the tee-shirt business going? Have you learned any smart, new phrases recently.

Um, Ilion… Who's whining?

Armstrong has not apologized or explained the lie she told

Hi Ilion. If lying includes intention then you have a point albeit a technical one. The common useage of lie equates to untruth. I'm aware that there are actual differences in meaning but I've also observed that when people claim that a lie was told their intention is focused on the untruth rather than the secondary intention (in a grammatical sense) of the conveyor of the untruth. Were this a court case I can readily envision an attorney making the case that intent is not necessarily confined to a speaker or writer of the words in question. One can be logically consistent in arguing that intent was undeniably present in the Armstrong case even if the intent was not with Armstrong herself. It would have then be attributable to her source. In any case the real harm continues to accrue not just to the victim of Armstrong's untruth but to Armstrong herself.

Joy in OP: … Armstrong - who claims to be an internationally recognized "expert" on fundamentalism - told a bald-faced lie about what "fundamentalist Christians" believe in a column last month, falsely attributing a quote she'd fished from off some obscure internet site to a noted American fundamentalist [Paul Nelson] - betraying Armstrong's significant ignorance of that which she claims to be an "expert" on, as well as a willingness to lie about it blatantly with no apparent expectation of being called to account. There is no "middle ground" to examine when both positions are framed in self-serving lies by She Who Counsels Submission to the fiction she perpetuates.

Armstrong has not apologized or explained the lie she told (that I am aware of). She has simply gone forward with that lie uncorrected, as if it is 'important' to the furtherance of her wish to absolve Islamic terrorists of responsibility for their murderous acts by blaming them on the "arrogance" and "intolerance" of mainstream fundamentalist Christians like Paul Nelson. …
It makes me wonder all over again who fed Armstrong the lie she told, and why she remains silent despite having it brought to the attention of her publisher and her agents by at least three individuals, including Paul Nelson and Nick Matzke as well as myself. There are levels of gatekeeping at work here, obviously.
It makes me wonder whether she is even aware that she told a lie.

Joy in recent post: … so I doubt a careful scholar like Armstrong would knowingly publish such a lie or expect to get away with it.

Once again, we see that Joy is well aware — she *knows* — that she herself is in the wrong in accusing Armstrong of being a "liar."

As I made clear in posts yesterday — which posts were first tossed down the "memory hole" and have since been totally deleted, apparently by Joy herself — not one of us *knows* that Armstrong lied in making the false attribution to Paul Nelson. Not one of us *knows* that Armstrong is even yet aware of the false nature of what she wrote.

But we all do know that *Joy* is making accusations about Armstrong that she knows to be false. And we do have good reason to believe that *Joy* has intentionally deleted posts calling her to task for her intentional spreading of falsehood.

takuan: I know this will probably consign me to eternal perdition, but I saw a T-shirt the other day and, unbidden, the name "Ilion" flashed in my head the instant I saw it:
JESUS LOVES YOU
(The rest of us think you're an a**hole)
Lord help me.

"I know this will probably consign me to eternal perdition, but …"
Then it would seem to me that you reasonably believe you ought not do something you're apparently about to do. If you are determined to to what you reasonably believe will consign you to eternal perdition, the only advice I can offer is: "Take it like a man." That is, if/when you do find yourself consigned to eternal perdition, there really will be no point, nor possibility of good coming from it, to whine about how "unfair" it all is. And, such whining would be so indicative of immaturity, and worse, perhaps.

takuan: … I saw a T-shirt the other day and, unbidden, the name "Ilion" flashed in my head the instant I saw it:
JESUS LOVES YOU
(The rest of us think you're an a**hole)

I must admit to *extreme* confusion here. While it is doubtless true that it wouldn't take a great deal of cajoling on your part to convince me to say to you "JESUS LOVES YOU," I honestly can't think of any inducement that could possibly convince me to tell you that I "think you're an a**hole" (nor to assert that everyone else does, also).

"Lord help me."
Recognizing that you need the Lord's help is the first step to recovery … and de-consignment from eternal perdition.

Hi, Mark. If Armstrong didn't do her own research, and didn't bother to fact-check the material (a spurrious quote put into Paul Nelson's mouth), she might not know it's a lie. She'd have to trust the person who fed it to her, and then she'd have to be insulated from complaints about it (as lodged by Matzke, Nelson and I). I mean, surely if she knew she'd made such a glaring error of fact in one of her articles, she'd want to correct it a.s.a.p. and apologize for any damage to Nelson's reputation it may have caused.

Others don't act that way. Jonathan Wells is still out flacking his calumnous claims against Bernard Kettlewell's work.

I suppose we should expect higher ethics from scholars who understand evolution than from creationists and IDists — it's a double-standard, but a good one. Still, without anyone on the other side leading the way, how's Armstrong to know which way to go?

There are several scenarios we could imagine that might explain how the misquote found its way into the published essay. Nelson's a notable figure in the ID vs. NDE debates, which is not an area of Armstrong's expertise. It wouldn't surprise me to learn that an EA ideologue passed the fake quote to Armstrong at a seminar or such, hoping to later capitalize on it (even if just to discredit Armstong herself as a popular apologist for theism). I would expect that she knows - and trusts - the source quite well, since she didn't feel a need to check authenticity.

There are radical elements of Christianity, but how often do they detonate themselves in a crowded marketplace or blow up public transportation or fly hijacked airliners into buildings? Falsely attributing the words of a radical fringe website to Paul Nelson was bound to be caught, so I doubt a careful scholar like Armstrong would knowingly publish such a lie or expect to get away with it.

Fact is, NCSE publicist Nick Matzke was on it as soon as it appeared on The Guardian's website. He noted the error in The Guardian comments, complained directly to their editors, publicized it on Panda's Thumb, and participated in several threads to the topic here at Telic Thoughts. I do not presume that defending Nelson's sterling reputation was his motivation.

I disagree with Armstrong's opinions about terrorism, but I've no personal animosity to pursue. I don't mind if Armstrong tries to meditate up some peace-of-mind about being a target of the terrorists she claims to understand so well. What she can't do is libel Paul Nelson and expect not to have to explain herself.

She's got a good handle on the whole victimization excuse ("it's not my fault!"). Let's hear it.