…and this is a 
The argument from oranges
Category: Creationism
Posted on: February 16, 2008 9:08 AM, by PZ Myers
What is it with creationists and fruit? I hope you've had your coffee already, because this is an unpleasant way to wake up. The clip below is from a public hearing in Orlando, Florida, in which citizens had a chance to stand up and state their opinions of evolution. Are you braced to handle a little smug and stupid this morning?
I'm sure this guy thought he was rhetorically brilliant, with a knock-'em dead argument against evolution. Why, nobody with any common sense could possibly believe that people (or their pets) could be related to an orange! Just pointing out the obvious to everyone, that round orange fruits don't look anything like furry mobile animals, will reveal the absurdity of evolution.
Unfortunately for Mr Dallas Ellis, we really don't have any problem seeing the similarities between oranges and kitty cats — scientists look a little deeper than he does. Slice an orange and put it under a microscope, and what do you see? Cells. Slice a cat and look at it under a microscope, and what do you see? Cells. We find similar organelles: cytoplasm, nuclei, mitochondria, etc. The contents use similar metabolic processes, and we find the same chemicals. The nuclei contain DNA, and we can compare the sequences — and we find similarities there (they are related) but many differences as well (they are distantly related — one estimate for the last common ancestor of plants and animals says they diverged roughly 1.6 billion years ago). Mr Ellis is relying on his profound ignorance of the basic building blocks of biology to make a superficial case.
Let's not even get into his closing remarks, trying to compare evolution to trucks full of poultry and garbage colliding, and spontaneously fusing maggots and turkeys to produce the school board. It's simply more evidence that he's a clueless old git.
I'm perfectly comfortable with the idea that I'm a distant relative of every creeping, crawling, blooming, squirming organism on the planet, but I do have to admit to some discomfort at being related to Mr Ellis. An orange has evolved no neurons and at least has an excuse for being unthinking, and hasn't evolved speech and so spares us its mindless gibbering.
Comments
How embarrassing for him.
Posted by: Escuerd | February 16, 2008 9:23 AM
Anyway, you can deny the 'reality' of cells and DNA. If scientists are wicked enough to defend evolution, they can also have fabricated all the 'evidence' of the cell theory and the DNA theory of biological information.
So to speak, human language allow us to defend virtually anything.
Posted by: Dídac | February 16, 2008 9:25 AM
I don't know how you do it PZ. I watched about a minute and became too aggravated to watch anymore. Such smugness combined with such ignorance and the "AMEN"s in the background. YEC! I mean YUCK!
Posted by: ChemBob | February 16, 2008 9:26 AM
Now that I actually did need first thing in the morning. NICE!
Posted by: Bob | February 16, 2008 9:29 AM
If it weren't with these people in the background, I would have thought this was a scene from a movie taking place at the end of the 19th century.
You know sometimes, I start wondering about this American value called "fairness".
I mean, there's one side of me that says, ok, let's be fair, let's give idiot ignorant people like this guy a chance to express their opinion. But there's the other side of me that says, why bother ?
Does anybody else share the same dilemma ?
Posted by: negentropyeater | February 16, 2008 9:32 AM
What a beautiful display of utterly barefaced ignorance.
Posted by: Kris Verburgh | February 16, 2008 9:32 AM
...and that video is solid observable evidence of the complete and utter failure of general education in the USA (at least in Florida.) What a shame and pity. We all have much work to do to correct this shameful ignorance...or we may be doomed.
Posted by: Rick Schauer | February 16, 2008 9:36 AM
Pastor Ellis....
his church
Posted by: really | February 16, 2008 9:38 AM
I'm glad you're here to tell us about these things, PZ. I can't bring myself to watch creationist videos....
Posted by: Matt | February 16, 2008 9:39 AM
I feel sorry for the educators who have to attend these hearings. Imagine having to be confronted by so many examples of abject failure on the part of your system.
Posted by: John Pieret | February 16, 2008 9:49 AM
Clearly his "evidence" does raise some important concerns. Like, this guys vote counts the same as mine. Like, this guy represents the base of the republican party. Like, morons like this are the reason I hear more about the presidential candidates' faith than their policies.
Coffee PZ? You should have warned us to have some scotch on hand!
Posted by: Lorax | February 16, 2008 9:50 AM
How coud a orunge an my kat be rulated? Their not even the same culur!
Posted by: Joe Bob | February 16, 2008 9:56 AM
Yeap, Ed Brayton commented extensively on this yesterday. I think he was referring to the same guy (?) Is it ever possible that there exist two such complete idiots that make the same stunningly stupid statements?
Posted by: Stavros | February 16, 2008 9:56 AM
Well I didn't read all the literature he read, but I'm convinced that the orange is more intelligent.
Posted by: Aaron | February 16, 2008 9:59 AM
I thought it was bananas that were the atheist's nightmare.
Posted by: Anon | February 16, 2008 10:00 AM
Errr #2, Didac:
If scientists are wicked enough to defend evolution, they can also have fabricated all the 'evidence' of the cell theory and the DNA theory of biological information.
You are not possibly serious right? This is only a joke? Get a microscope and see the cells. Follow up the experiments and "see" the DNA double helix. I am sure PZ can be more specific as to how to "see" these, but you get my point...
Posted by: Stavros | February 16, 2008 10:04 AM
Shouldn't have paused it in the middle...politicians are turkey-maggot hybrids? I'd buy that one.
Posted by: Aaron | February 16, 2008 10:05 AM
Yikes.
Also, I challenge someone to find Interstate 60. But then, why get any facts straight.
PS My uncle, the coffee maker, laughed at me for not consulting him before I watched that.
Posted by: jimmiraybob | February 16, 2008 10:06 AM
Hot damn. I used to have lunch every week with that guy. Well, not that exact guy, but his clone. (And not an orange, I might add, although oranges were occasionally also in attendance at lunch.) He was a friend of a friend and would drop in to exert his influence on the lost souls of the secularists who attended the lunch group. He gave me a copy of Strobel's The Case for Christ (for which I was grateful, since that way I got to write a blog post about it without having to buy my own copy). He was forever offering his "proofs" for the existence of God and the impossibility of evolution. Once he brought a creationist tract claiming that trilobites were "witnesses against evolution" because they had never evolved. Later I brought a copy of Richard Fortey's excellent Trilobite! Eyewitness to Evolution as a refutation, but it was ruled out of order by my acquaintance because Fortey was an evolutionist and thus not to be trusted. Victory for creationism!
If only he had known the argument about oranges, too!
Posted by: Zeno | February 16, 2008 10:06 AM
Scientists who actively debate religion, christianity in particularly, would have better knowledge of what the bible says that do christians. creationists who actively debate evolution know so little of evolution that they can claim that it is like two trucks colliding and the school board walking out of the wreckage.
kind of tells you something about the attitude of the two groups, doesn't it?
Posted by: croor | February 16, 2008 10:08 AM
Ah, the Chewbacca Defense in action. Did anybody actually tell him that episode of South Park wasn't a documentary?
Posted by: Joe Shelby | February 16, 2008 10:09 AM
I had an orange tabby... and he was sweet. Doesn't that blow his argument out of the water? =^_^=
Posted by: GodlessHeathen | February 16, 2008 10:14 AM
Maybe it could become sport to think of two very different plants and animals for the Creationists to use as ammo against evolution. Of course all life on earth is related if you look far enough back, but the Creationists will love ridiculing the common ancestries of a worm and an oak; a fruit fly and a humpback wale; or a toad and a Creationist!
Posted by: Rick | February 16, 2008 10:16 AM
What was this fine upstanding Floridian doing at a rest stop chatting up truck drivers? Is there a certain creationist rest stop signal or is it just foot tapping like the rest?
Posted by: mojoandy | February 16, 2008 10:28 AM
I'm insulted. My mother was an orange and my father was a banana.
Posted by: idahogie | February 16, 2008 10:28 AM
HEY! It could be worse. What do you think that guy thinks about witches and witchcraft?
I'm sure he thinks the day the death penalty was abolished for witchcraft was the downfall of civilization. And despises the Republican party for being "soft on witches."
The difference between him and the Taliban or the Mutaween religious police in Saudi Arabia, is....hmmm, well, what is the difference?
Guy was born in the wrong millenia. Rather than join the third millenia, he wants us to recreate the first.
Posted by: raven | February 16, 2008 10:37 AM
Over 20 comments and no one's made a "but that's comparing apples and oranges" joke yet? For shame.
Posted by: Carlie | February 16, 2008 10:38 AM
"What is it with creationists and fruit ?"
Well, seeing as how they are all complete fruitcakes, the relation should be obvious....
Wikipedia: Fruitcake is also used, especially in the United Kingdom and the United States, as insulting slang for a 'crazy person' (e.g. "he's a complete fruitcake").[4] It is derived from the expression "nutty as a fruitcake", which was first recorded in 1935.
Posted by: Snark7 | February 16, 2008 10:40 AM
As I pointed out elsewhere re: this moron, he is actually more closely related to fungus than to an orange.
It is amusing that when an atheist has an insufficiently nuanced view of a particular version of the invisible friend mythology, he just doesn't know what he is talking about. OTOH, a creationist can talk in apparent seriousness about turkey trucks colliding with waste trucks as a cause of evolution.....
Posted by: BaldApe | February 16, 2008 10:49 AM
Ladies and gentlemen of this supposed jury, I have one final thing I want you to consider. Ladies and gentlemen, this is Chewbacca. Chewbacca is a Wookiee from the planet Kashyyyk. But Chewbacca lives on the planet Endor. Now think about it; that does not make sense!
Posted by: Michael | February 16, 2008 10:51 AM
I'm still staggered by the appalling arrogance of the ignorant. Yes, here in the UK 'nutty as a fruitcake' is indeed an apt term for creationists. If anyone, even at a local politics level, behaved like that in England they'd be laughed at. At least, that's what I sincerely hope. Fingers crossed...
Posted by: Valdemar | February 16, 2008 10:52 AM
"I'm perfectly comfortable with the idea that I'm a distant relative of every creeping, crawling, blooming, squirming organism on the planet, but I do have to admit to some discomfort at being related to Mr Ellis."
Says it all...thank you!
Posted by: Megan | February 16, 2008 11:10 AM
You know, he's not even related to the orange itself, he's related to the tree that dropped the orange.
And since it's probably seedless and non-reproductive, he might as well hold up his cat's nail trimmings.
Posted by: chancelikely | February 16, 2008 11:19 AM
The orange is a citrus fruit.
Citrus fruits contain citric acid.
Acid burns.
Mr.Ellis is a Creationist.
Creationists are stupid.
[The] Stupid [it] burns.
Therefore Mr. Ellis and oranges are related.
QED
Posted by: Stephen D Moore | February 16, 2008 11:29 AM
Posted by: Reginald Selkirk | February 16, 2008 11:30 AM
ok, as a non-native english speaker, let's see if I get this right
Origin of the species says that everything is related. Therefore, if I get the gist right, this man thinks that all things are *relatives* and therefore the orange (which, btw, is just a bearer of seed and not an individual) should be related to a diseased pet.
This kind of word-play always drives me nuts in this kind of "reasoning".
The sad thing is that this person probably comes from a corner of the world where anybody is related to anybody else in a given area, so the idea might be too strong in his mind.
Or did I get it wrong?
I, too, had to pause the movie, find a way to relax before I could continue the next part. This is so mind-numbingly stupid that I my brain can't handle it in one go.
Posted by: Eddy | February 16, 2008 11:53 AM
No political or public figure in England could even be seen to consider creationism. In Northern Ireland, however, it's another matter.
In the following transcript, the excellent Matthew Parris struggles not to call the NI Culture Secretary a 'nutter'.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/ni/2007/12/are_religious_politicians_nutt.html
Posted by: Don | February 16, 2008 11:57 AM
I have not yet had my coffee, and my mind, she don't work so gud without it. Did I really just see that? I had the same reaction I get when I'm home for the holidays and my parents watch Judge Judy or People's Court on TV--I can't actually look at the screen to watch the people embarrass themselves.
What keeps going through my mind is why did he choose pets? Of all things, why the household cat or dog? Is it just because the horror of even suggesting oranges are related to humans was too great? Or was it because he knew he'd quote Darwin saying that "all animals and all plants" are related to each other and couldn't bear to include humans in that phrase?
BAH! I don't know why I'm trying to probe the creationist mind when my own is so poorly caffeinated.
Posted by: Form&Function | February 16, 2008 12:05 PM
PZ,
Don't dja know? If you look a cells in a mikroscope yere doin the Devil's work! All them things yew see are just the Devil putting the hankerchief of dulusion upon ye. God gave us the nekkid eye to see with. That's enough fer me. 'Organelles'!
Ha!!! That's just the devil gettin' yew to look a pornografy!
Confess yer sins and be saved!
This message brought to you by the good folks at 'The Discover Family Focus on American Creation Renewal Institute'! We witness for the Home Schooled Faithful Classes found in basement Universities across God's Green America, The GREATEST country in the Universe!!!!
Posted by: Ken Mareld | February 16, 2008 12:14 PM
I live in Orlando, and I attended that particular public meeting. Man, were my eyes opened. We've got some seriously scary (and disturbingly well organized) folks in this state. Mr. Orange was indeed one of the more colorful speakers.
Sadly, the speakers were about 2:1 anti-science. I'm simply amazed at the level of idiocy here in my state, and with two school-aged kids, I am very interested in seeing these new standards implemented. Some of the nutty things that were said in that meeting did a great job of reinforcing just how bad we need to readdress the teaching of science here. Unfortunately, I don't think that any of those folks would be able to see the irony in that.
I've got my fingers crossed that on Tuesday when the Board votes, we won't be turned into another Kansas or Dover.
Wish us luck.
Posted by: BobH | February 16, 2008 12:14 PM
I'm so embarrassed for my city... sigh...
I, and many members of our local atheist/freethought org, have been emailing and signing petitions and some have been appearing at these meetings... We are so very outnumbered down here.
Posted by: dalai_lala | February 16, 2008 12:15 PM
Croor said: "Scientists who actively debate religion, christianity in particularly, would have better knowledge of what the bible says that do christians. creationists who actively debate evolution know so little of evolution that they can claim that it is like two trucks colliding and the school board walking out of the wreckage.
kind of tells you something about the attitude of the two groups, doesn't it?"
That's because when a creationist learns as much about evolution he becomes an evolutionist. The reverse almost never happens. That's why they try so hard to keep their kids from learning.
Posted by: Dennisr | February 16, 2008 12:18 PM
Well, if you compare the techniques used by the International Citrus Genomics Consortium and the Human Genome Project... Dobzhanski said that modern biology has no sense without evolution...
But if we turn the reasoning, we can ask the Creationists: How it is possible for one single Creator to create beings so different like an orange and a man?. And if you believe in the Bible you must cope to the fact that all human diversity originated from a single family 4500 years ago! But, perhaps modern creationist may believe African and Asian people are not Noachides, at all, but "beasts saved by Noah".
Posted by: Dídac | February 16, 2008 12:18 PM
LOL, I love the guy rolling his eyes in the background.
Posted by: EMR | February 16, 2008 12:19 PM
Good grief! Senility coupled with insanity in the ever-
present state of deranged Florida
Posted by: Holbach | February 16, 2008 12:20 PM
Now you know why they don't have any problems with cousin marriages in that neck of the woods!
Oh, and a little off-topic diversion: answersingenesis is now subjecting US military recruits to anti-evolution indoctrination, presumably with official approval. You can read AIG's little blurb about pitching creationism to a bunch of US Marine recruits at http://tinyurl.com/2yytz8
Posted by: caerbannog | February 16, 2008 12:20 PM
Chewbacca may have been at that meeting to present his own defense. At two minutes, Bigfoot wanders through the video, and the amen-shouting loons are too enraptured by that compelling orange-vs-kitty argument to even notice. That's some good arguin'!
(My use of "loons" was entirely figurative and not intended to disparage any actual birds, living or dead.)
Posted by: clarence | February 16, 2008 12:28 PM
Posted by: Tom Foss | February 16, 2008 12:29 PM
Although it's very risky to draw conclusions about particular individuals from statistical trends about populations, I'd say that--provisionally, and contingent on any later evidence that may contradict it--there is an excellent chance that, given his creationist beliefs, he also holds the patriarchal male-supremacist attitudes that seem to correlate so neatly with creationism.
Regarding that Y-chromosome that I'm guessing he's so fond of, I'd love to be the one to introduce Mr. Ellis to Ray Ming's work in Hawai'i, and watch his head explode:
Posted by: thalarctos | February 16, 2008 12:30 PM
This is the same group which is claiming that belief in evolution leads to racism and genocide, because it lacks the "all men are specially-created children of God" premise which must be established before you can apply the Golden Rule. So, if being created by God means that you're closely related brothers and sisters, as it were, then isn't it wrong to eat Brother Orange or Sister Apple?
If you can make one dumb argument, then it seems to me you can flip it over and make a similar dumb argument on the other side -- and even more easily.
The underlying subtext to the Orange Man's sermon -- and many creationist arguments on ethics -- is that only God has a value and worth which can't be disputed and doesn't need to be defended. It's the only thing with inherent importance. Everything else is an undifferentiated series of matter in motion with no point or goal.
Therefore, the reasoning goes, if even your own baby was not "created by God" (or you don't think it was), then there is no logical reason that you, or anyone else, should assign it any value or worth. You might as well kill it as kiss it, because meaning only flows down from something universally meaningful -- like God. Who gives it meaning, from itself, as a special gift.
To them, it's all a command hierarchy.
Posted by: Sastra | February 16, 2008 12:35 PM
You are not possibly serious right? This is only a joke? Get a microscope and see the cells. Follow up the experiments and "see" the DNA double helix. I am sure PZ can be more specific as to how to "see" these, but you get my point... - Posted by: Stavros
To NORMAL people who are not at war with rationality your proposal sounds sane Stavros but these people are trying to help Adam 'un-eat' the apple. Everything bad in our world stems from our ill gotten intelligence acquired when Eve purloined yet another magical fruit from yawehs garden. You say saying is believing?
They say believing is not seeing.
Posted by: Eric Paulsen | February 16, 2008 12:35 PM
"You say saying is believing?"
SEEING. SEEING. Now just how hard was that? Dang!
Posted by: Eric Paulsen | February 16, 2008 12:40 PM
Did you notice how, even as he was mocking the very premise of evolution, he couldn't bring himself to say that the oranges were related to human beings?
That's the key point that is unacceptable to creationists. Not that an orange might be a distant cousin of your pet dog but the implication that we are no less part of the tree of life than chimps, dogs, cockroaches, and oranges. It turns their stomach even to think about it.
Posted by: tacitus | February 16, 2008 12:48 PM
Having grown up and being subjected to this type of crap every Sunday while I was growing up, it took me about 5 seconds to spot that this guy had to be a preacher. It was very difficult to make it through this whole thing.
And to think that several dozen people are probably willingly heading off every week to listen to this idiot on purpose...
Posted by: Neslock | February 16, 2008 12:55 PM
So! Not content to dissect zebra-fish, now you're slicing up kittens? Oh you scientists are so cruel!!!
Posted by: Mooser | February 16, 2008 1:00 PM
To quote Christopher Hitchens in regards to this type of religious inspired, willful stupidity, "There are no statements worth arguing here... All you can do is underline them!"
Posted by: Zak | February 16, 2008 1:00 PM
Wow, it's a triple-header of heart-break! I love Florida and yet there is the shame of having such wackos. I love oranges and yet I have to see the poor innocent fruit so abused by this twisted man. And I love evolution and yet I have to see it so plainly misunderstood and mangled.
Posted by: Diego | February 16, 2008 1:02 PM
Im going to show my highschool class this. It shall be a grand old time. Perhaps it will be their Evolution test project - "debate this mans speech".
Im embarassed for the Young Christian Foundation members dangling thier crosses around their necks with no clue as to what it means, and no clue as to what they are ignoring.
Posted by: Monkey | February 16, 2008 1:04 PM
"You say saying is believing?"
The statement is perfectly correct, just the way it stands.
"If you can say it, it must be true" is the very essence of religious thought. And fiction-writing.
And that's the point, they just say it, they don't even believe it themselves.
Posted by: Mooser | February 16, 2008 1:11 PM
I know I would be more blissful if I were that ignorant, But I still don't want to go down that road. What's so depressing to me is the willful ignorance evidenced. You see it over and over with these type. It may be christianity, supply-side economics, gun ownership (as evidenced in a very recent post), or any other of a thousand things. The lack of looking into a topic, of letting others do your research and then doggedly following that belief, is incredibly sad.
I know their only argument, that we who hold to evidence and logic as a god are just as bad. Ya know what? I'm more than happy to be labeled someone who always looks to logic instead of another answer. Blissful or not, thank reason I'm not that fruit guy.
Posted by: Dahan | February 16, 2008 1:12 PM
He should have used peaches instead--at least they're fuzzy.
Posted by: Susan B. | February 16, 2008 1:18 PM
"What was this fine upstanding Floridian doing at a rest stop chatting up truck drivers? Is there a certain creationist rest stop signal or is it just foot tapping like the rest?"
HA!
Posted by: Alec T | February 16, 2008 1:28 PM
If this is an example of someone with power, all I can say is no wonder you'll went to war with the wrong country.
Posted by: sailor | February 16, 2008 1:52 PM
Speaking of Northern Ireland, as an NI citizen I don't know whether to laugh or feel embarrassed at this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGF2AxlQsYE
Counciler Paul Givans: "What about Ian Derthal man"
Kevin Connelly "I wen't to school with Ian Derthal"
Richard Dawkins, sounding bemused "I'm sorry, I don't know what you mean"
Counciler Paul Givans "You know Ian derthal man, what about him"
Richard Dawkins"Oh, you mean Neanderthal man !"
Doh !
I'm not sure if Givans is worse, or not as bad as Ellis. The sad thing is he's well educated and has a University education:
http://www.dup.org.uk/CanProfile.asp?CandidateID=83
Posted by: Peter Henderson | February 16, 2008 1:58 PM
People,
Don't u think tht PZ can earn millions in
fiction ? The last paragraph of this post was
too cool !
btw not judging tht guy....but he is the biggest
argument against humankind as an "advanced species"
Posted by: astrolieber | February 16, 2008 1:59 PM
I think this is a fake. Notice how he introduces his tirade about colliding trucks: "something funny happened to me as I was coming here". Come on, boys and girls, everybody knows that's a standart opening line for stand-up routines. This guy is not a preacher, he's a comedian. He's trying to develop the "Mr Ellis" persona in the same way that Sacha Baron Cohen developed Ali G and Borat.
Posted by: Luis | February 16, 2008 1:59 PM
Personally, since I don't give it much thought dating my cousin, a couple thousand generations removed, I also don't have much of a problem eating my dog's cousin, several million generations removed.
Obviously this man is a bit more squeamish about ancestral cannibalism, but unfortunately, the white blood cells in his body are attacking and murdering his cousins a few hundred trillion times removed. I suppose original sin isn't such an absurd concept after all :P.
Posted by: -R | February 16, 2008 2:10 PM
Anyone with some knowledge in the area care to take a shot at this one?
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_are_orange_cells_similar_to_human_body_cells
Posted by: Corey | February 16, 2008 2:13 PM
i suggest that next year the Darwin Day feast will consist of peanut butter and banana sandwiches with a glass of OJ. Seeing as how peanut butter, bananas and now oranges have all been used to attempt to disprove evolution.
Posted by: Brian W. | February 16, 2008 2:26 PM
Teh Stoopid, it burns, oh how it burns. It says something when an orange appears more intelligent than the idiot holding it. As has been noted many times on here, it has become almost impossible to distinguish parody from the real thing as they automatically self parody most every time their move their lips.
Posted by: John Phillips, FCD | February 16, 2008 2:44 PM
#64 anyone you are dating is likely to be much closer than a common ancestor a few thousand generations ago. The most recent common ancestor for all humans (excluding possibly some very isolated populations) is likely to be less than 8,000 years ago and possibly as low or lower than 3,000 years ago (estimating 20 years/generation about 150 to 400 generations). Between Europeans it is likely to be less than 1,000 years ago (or 50 generations at most).
Posted by: Erp | February 16, 2008 2:48 PM
Hey, that's one of the more plausible explanations for the existence of creationists on school boards that I've seen so far.
Posted by: Ktesibios | February 16, 2008 3:17 PM
#68,
Your figures are way, way off the mark. Read some more on the topic before you make comments. Your numbers are well in sync with genesis, though!
Posted by: paul lurquin | February 16, 2008 3:17 PM
Hovind's version , itself no doubt culled from other creationists, involved bananas...
Posted by: PeteK | February 16, 2008 3:30 PM
Eddy wrote: "Therefore, if I get the gist right, this man thinks that all things are *relatives* and therefore the orange (which, btw, is just a bearer of seed and not an individual) should be related to a diseased pet."
The latter part of your statement is a perfect observation of either the ignorance or dishonesty of the creationist speaker. He would have gotten the same 'shock' value by bringing in a bottle of human semen and saying, "See this sperm? This is somebody's parent." One really big problem: you can't be a parent until you've got a functioning reproductive system, so you can't use the present tense. The orange example is of course even worse because an orange tree will never give birth to a pet dog.
In other words, he's using a pretty pathetic straw man argument.
Posted by: gg | February 16, 2008 3:41 PM
P.S. When I was watching the clip, I couldn't help but imagine a little thought bubble above the orange, reading, "Hey, leave me out of this, you wanker!"
Posted by: gg | February 16, 2008 3:43 PM
I do not know about anybody else but I really want to hear him explain with what the orange mated, how it mated and how this cat was brought to term. It cannot all be the result of speeding trucks crashing with each other.
Quote Bob Dylan: You're an idiot babe. It is a wonder you still know how to breathe.
Posted by: Janine | February 16, 2008 4:00 PM
That twit in the video leaves me no choice but to pull up the one immortal quote from "Billy Madison":
Posted by: MRL | February 16, 2008 4:06 PM
It's worth noting what little concern fundies have for mere human ethics. Only God was going to tell this guy when his time was up.
Posted by: truth machine | February 16, 2008 4:20 PM
Hm. I only managed to view half the video before my brain imploded - and now I find that the video has been withdrawn. Presumably after strong representation from the Florida Citrus Growers Association?
Posted by: DiscoveredJoys | February 16, 2008 4:38 PM
Ooops! The Video is back.
Posted by: DiscoveredJoys | February 16, 2008 4:40 PM
What happened to the video?
Posted by: Troy Gavazzzi | February 16, 2008 4:40 PM
In other words, he's using a pretty pathetic straw man argument.
You guys are engaging in a silly quibble ... a strawman of your own. Oranges and dog ova are related, whether they are, strictly speaking, "cousins" or not (of course they aren't first cousins, nor parents).
And for those who say that they guy couldn't even bring himself to suggest that oranges are related to humans -- you're just plain wrong; he explicitly does so twice, plus his story in which turkeys + maggots + big bang + mushroom cloud + gene pool mixup + mutations = members of the DOE (not their pets). The way to counter this guy is not to be as intellectually dishonest and sloppy about the facts as he is.
Posted by: truth machine | February 16, 2008 4:41 PM
The video was pulled from YouTube but I found it here
http://www.videosift.com/video/Creationism-The-Argument-From-Oranges
Posted by: Troy Gavazzzi | February 16, 2008 4:47 PM
It would have been interesting to watch his face as someone explained that for the orange tree, the fruit he was holding serves roughly the same function as a womb does in mammals. If the response went on to describe male pollen penetrating to the ovary of the flower and uniting with the ova, he might have had a conniption over all the dirty words.
Godidit certainly takes all the hard work out of thinking, doesn't it, Pastor D. Ellis?
Posted by: JohnnieCanuck, FCD | February 16, 2008 4:48 PM
the fruit he was holding serves roughly the same function as a womb does in mammals.
Uh, no; the fruit often gets eaten by some critter who carries the seeds away to some other location. If anything serves that function, it's the warm moist earth in which the seed germinates.
Posted by: truth machine | February 16, 2008 5:07 PM
Mr. Orange didn't bother me so much. I've seen blinding stupidity like that before. What I found most disturbing was the lack of laughter in the room, or the thwacks of frustrated forehead slapping. I understand the need for decorum in certain settings, but some reactions are simply irrepressible.
Posted by: Ragutis | February 16, 2008 5:07 PM
I'm with #63. He was not as dumb as he pretended, not with using words like 'equidistant' to precisely set up the big bang collision joke. His parting metaphor was to keep the apple in the hands of the teacher, not the orange. Not bad for 'an idiot'.
Posted by: June | February 16, 2008 5:30 PM
truth machine wrote: "You guys are engaging in a silly quibble ... a strawman of your own. Oranges and dog ova are related, whether they are, strictly speaking, "cousins" or not (of course they aren't first cousins, nor parents)."
Um, I fail to see where I'm making a strawman argument. Who said oranges and dog ova are not related? I sure didn't.
The big dishonesty with Mr. Orange's argument is that people commonly use the word 'related' to refer to family relations (brothers, sisters), while biologists use it to refer more generally to relationships between species and more general biological connections. Mr. Orange is using the biologist's observation that organisms are 'related' to reach the uncharitable conclusion that biologists think that an orange is a dog's parent. That's a strawman.
He makes the strawman worse by comparing a fully developed organism (a dog) to a seed of another (an orange). He didn't mention dog ova at all. I don't see how you can call it a 'silly quibble' to correct utterly meaningless comparisons.
Posted by: gg | February 16, 2008 5:52 PM
June, nice little touches like that means nothing when the argument is bad. And, frankly, he is arguing from the "idiot" position. It can only appeal to the ignorant. I feel secure calling him an "idiot" because he allows his faith to curtail his intelligence.
Posted by: Janine | February 16, 2008 5:57 PM
This is what happens when you let brothers and sisters make babies - they give birth to morons who read a book they cannot understand and then stand up in public and make fools of themselves.
Just further evidence that inbreeding doesn't work.
Posted by: Strakh | February 16, 2008 6:16 PM
I again advise new recruits to the ESC (Evil Scientist Conspiracy) to release the tiger.
Posted by: So Laris | February 16, 2008 6:56 PM