[escepticos] Los brillantes cotizan bajo

["Carlos Dominguez" <cdominguez@...>]

¿Recuerdan el movimiente iniciado por Dawkins y Dennett para utilizar el
término "bright" (brillante) como reemplazo de otros como "ateo",
"agnóstico", pero también "escéptico" (¡herejes! = :-o), "humanistas
seculares", etc?
Pues no les va bien a los "iconoclastas"  impulsores de la idea.
Además del artículo contrario de Chris Mooney en CSICOP
http://www.csicop.org/doubtandabout/brights/ se añade el de  Michael Shermer
en Skeptic http://skeptic.com/brightBrouhaha.html y el comentario de Carroll
en la newsletter del diccionario del escéptico. A éste lo reproduzco abajo.
(lean el último párrafo y la buena noticia que se anuncia  ...  ¿para
cuando? ¿llegará al mundo de habla hispana? :-))))))

Saludetes desde Buenos Aires
Carolus Magnus

It was a bad week for the Bright movement. Michael Shermer of Skeptic
magazine and Chris Mooney of CSICOP (Doubt & About) posted rather negative
articles on the idea of using the term 'Bright' (a noun) to replace such
words as atheist, naturalist, skeptic, agnostic, secular humanist, and
others similar terms. Mooney's title lets us know immediately what he think
of the idea: Not Too "Bright". Shermer doesn't back off from his earlier
stand in favor of the term, but he provides a lot of negative feedback from
those who let him know what they think of the idea. His essay is called "The
Big Bright Brouhaha - An Empirical Study on an Emerging Skeptical Movement."

Personally, I don't mind admitting I'm a Bright, but I feel much more
comfortable being called a Skeptic. And I agree with those who think this
one will not catch on simply because it is too natural to take the term to
imply that believers are Dims. I tell my students, when they ask, that I'm
an atheist. I also explain to them that I'm an agnostic in the sense that I
don't believe rational proofs for or against the existence of God can ever
resolve the issue, i.e., we can't know whether there is a Being beyond the
apparent universe that is the cause of the universe being here and being
like it is. I also tell them I don't see any reason for believing in such a
Being and that I consider God to be an unnecessary hypothesis, along with
souls and pixies. They don't seem to be too outraged at my confession but I
think they might giggle a bit if I outed myself as a Bright.

By the way, Shermer's latest Scientific American column describes his
involvement in the establishment of a Cable Science Network (CSN) that will
broadcast science programs and science news 24/7/365. I might have to plug
in my television again.