Michael B. Paulkovich

Last updated
Michael B. Paulkovich
Born (1955-02-21) February 21, 1955 (age 69)
Washington, D.C., U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Education University of Maryland (BS)
Occupation(s)Author, editor, systems engineer
Website beyond.to/mbp/mbp.htm

Michael B. Paulkovich (born February 21, 1955) is a columnist for American Atheist Magazine , [1] [2] [3] a print and online resource for atheism, religion and politics. He is also a frequent contributor to Free Inquiry and contributing editor for The American Rationalist . Paulkovich is an inventor, editor, and space systems engineer for NASA.

Contents

Early life

Paulkovich was born in Washington, D.C. and grew up in Montgomery County, Maryland. He completed his Bachelor of Science in Engineering at the University of Maryland. [4] While in college, Paulkovich developed his first invention, the melodic telephone ringer and published it in Popular Electronics. [5]

Career

While at NASA he contributed to the Cassini–Huygens mission, the CONTOUR spacecraft, and development of the James Webb Space Telescope. In 2011 he was asked to be columnist for American Atheist Magazine, and then contributing editor for The American Rationalist. [6] [7] He has written for Humanist Perspectives magazine, [8] Popular Electronics , [9] Journal of Applied Fire Science, and Science . [10]

Books

Controversies

Candida Moss joined with Joel Baden to write an article in the Daily Beast about Paulkovich's No Meek Messiah book, [23] but other writers have pointed out that their article has many errors: the claim that Paulkovich had no web presence, and no Twitter account, that he claimed to be a “Bible Scholar” and that there is no biographical information on him. [24] [25] It has been suggested that Moss and Baden never had Paulkovich’s book in their possession; one writer asked, "Did anyone who wrote about No Meek Messiah ever read it? I don’t think so. Or if they did they hid their guilt well from the public." [24]

In their Daily Beast article, Moss and Baden suggested that consuls, generals, kings and emperors do not write, yet Moss and Baden seem unaware of Paulkovich’s appendix citing many who were prolific authors (e.g. Moss and Baden mention Vardanes and Tiberius; Paulkovich cited the publications of those men in his appendix on pages 347 and 348 of No Meek Messiah.) Moss and Baden also claimed that one of the 126 sources Paulkovich cited who should have written about Jesus (Asclepiades) actually lived 100 years before Jesus, but they referenced the wrong Asclepiades (even linking to the wrong man at Wikipedia from their Daily Beast article), seemingly unaware of Paulkovich’s references and appendix – there were over 40 men of that name in ancient Prusa, Bithynia [26] [27] and Paulkovich referred to the Asclepiades who lived during Hadrian, late first century. [28]

Other writers who read the Moss/Baden article but apparently had never read No Meek Messiah, yet published their own reviews are:

Michael Sherlock, now executive director of Atheist Alliance International [31] also critiqued Paulkovich's work, writing that Paulkovich "made a fundamental mistake with regards to the alleged reference to Jesus in one of Josephus’ works" but later admitted his error, and that he had never read Paulkovich's work; he published an apology stating "the error rests with the sloppy journalism of Jonathan Vankin and not with the precise research of Michael Paulkovich." [32]

See also

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References

  1. ↑ "American Atheist magazine, 1st Qtr 2013".
  2. ↑ "American Atheist magazine, 1st Qtr 2012".
  3. ↑ "American Atheist magazine, 2nd Qtr 2016".
  4. ↑ "Michael Paulkovich Biography". beyond.to. Retrieved 2020-05-07.
  5. ↑ "Popular Electronics, Nov 1981 (Page 57)".
  6. ↑ "American Rationalist, July/Aug 2015".
  7. ↑ "American Rationalist, July/Aug 2017".
  8. ↑ Young, Richard (2015). "Founts, Frauds and Forgeries of Religion". Humanist Perspectives. Autumn (194): 15–21.
  9. ↑ "Popular Electronics, Nov 1981 (Page 57)".
  10. ↑ Niemann; et al. (2005). "The abundances of constituents of Titan's atmosphere from the GCMS instrument on the Huygens probe" (PDF). Nature. 438 (7069): 779–784. Bibcode:2005Natur.438..779N. doi:10.1038/nature04122. hdl: 2027.42/62703 . PMID   16319830. S2CID   4344046.
  11. ↑ Loftus, John (2021). God and Horrendous Suffering. GCRR Press. ISBN   978-1-7378469-1-8.
  12. ↑ "Anthology: God and Horrendous Suffering, chapter 21".
  13. ↑ "Reviews".
  14. ↑ "Amazon". Amazon.
  15. ↑ "Goodreads".
  16. ↑ "Press Release". YouTube .
  17. ↑ "Goodreads".
  18. ↑ "Press Release".
  19. ↑ Pearce, Jonathan MS (2016). Filling the Void: A Selection of Humanist and Atheist Poetry. Onus Books. ISBN   978-0992600082.
  20. ↑ Paulkovich, Michael (28 March 2013). Amazon. Spillix, LLC. ISBN   978-0988216112.
  21. ↑ "Home page".
  22. ↑ "Goodreads".
  23. ↑ Moss, Candida (2013). "So-Called 'Biblical Scholar' Says Jesus A Made-Up Myth". The Daily Beast.
  24. 1 2 "Bible Scholars' Inability to Handle Mythicism: No Meek Messiah by Michael Paulkovich Vridar, Neil Godfrey". 20 October 2014.
  25. ↑ "Schooling Some University Professors". Free Inquiry. 38 (2): 24–25. 2018.
  26. ↑ Cocchi, Antonio (1762). The Life of Asclepiades. T. Davies. p. 2.
  27. ↑ Cocchi, Antonio (1762). "The Life of Asclepiades, p. 2".
  28. ↑ Paulkovich, Michael (2013). No Meek Messiah. Spillix. pp. 201, 331. ISBN   978-0988216112.
  29. ↑ "Billy Hallowell's Dishonest Review".
  30. ↑ "Erick Erickson's Foolish Mistake".
  31. ↑ "Michael Sherlock Appointed Executive Director". April 2020.
  32. ↑ "Not Michael Paulkovich's Historical Jesus Mistake: The Sloppy Journalism of Jonathan Vankin". 28 April 2018.
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