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« Two cultures? | Main | The latest atrocity to spur right-thinking Christians to action! »
Category: Humor
Posted on: April 28, 2008 11:28 AM, by PZ Myers
So you're pining away for ERV, hoping either that her site will be restored or that she'll bring her new site up quickly. Don't sit there weeping and wailing, she'll be back online soon enough. Cheer up and laugh! Here are a few links to help you out.
Conservapædia discusses "professor values" (this one is not intentionally humorous, but it still gets the job done.)
You feel better already.
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Comments
Says you, not me!
Posted by: minusRusty | April 28, 2008 11:45 AM
er.... (insert "v" if you like) - message says "blog has been removed".
Any chance due to her being 'expelled' for some reason only known to insiders in the big science/media system?
I assume removed/expelled are equivalent here.
Posted by: marc buhler | April 28, 2008 11:46 AM
Conservapedia is always good for a laugh on a Monday morning.
Posted by: Tom | April 28, 2008 11:49 AM
Ah, Conservapedia. Even better is the page on 'Liberal Friedship', about our heinous crime of being more likely to be friends with (gasp) other liberals!
I love how they don't just claim to have a different bias than Wikipedia, but to be completely unbiased.
Posted by: Olaf Davis | April 28, 2008 11:52 AM
The fact that Conservapedia describes itself as "The Trustworthy Encyclopedia" is good reason NOT to trust it.
Posted by: Tim Tesar | April 28, 2008 11:58 AM
Two things I love about Conservapedia:
1. all of the most-viewed and most-edited pages concern homosexuality. Closeted obsessions, anyone?
2. the number of comments on the talk pages that address how full of shit Conservapedia is
Posted by: Tom | April 28, 2008 12:00 PM
I went browsing around Conservapedia until I read about dinosaurs qand all the proof of coexistence with man. Then I wept bitter tears. Thanks for ruining my morning, PZ.
Posted by: aiabx | April 28, 2008 12:06 PM
Why does Conservapedia hate professor Roger Schlafly?
Posted by: Ken Cope | April 28, 2008 12:10 PM
The Conservapedia version of the Serenity Prayer:
(If only they were honest enough about themselves to admit it...)
God grant me the rigidity to ignore the things I cannot change,
the naivety to accept the things I shouldn't,
and the guile to know the difference.
Posted by: brokenSoldier | April 28, 2008 12:21 PM
My current favourite piece of conservapedia hilarity is the explanation for where slugs came from:
Of course!
Posted by: Rob Hinkley | April 28, 2008 12:22 PM
the conservapedia site was a laugh. it lists 15 cases of professors caught doing something illegal and draws conclusions from that list.
also, does the 'law' work both ways? i am an undergrad student now; but i seem to have all the qualities they ascribe to a professor. does that mean i'll get a professorship? i hope i do!
Posted by: croor | April 28, 2008 12:24 PM
Or you could always take the John Cage challenge at my blog... it's WAY better than Conservapedia, that's for sure!
Posted by: DaveX | April 28, 2008 12:26 PM
Dang it, people. . . well, at least PZ is spelling Conservapædia correctly.
(-;
Posted by: Blake Stacey | April 28, 2008 12:27 PM
That Conservapedia article is indeed the best, but I liked their reference to "liberal grading"
Their evidence? The Duke Lacrosse player who got an F after being accused by the teacher of being a rapist.
I don't know if his case had any merit, but the unintential implication is that rape is a conservative value, or at least, the suspician of rape.
Posted by: Ryan F Stello | April 28, 2008 12:30 PM
Wow, a list of professor who committed murders certainly proves the point about professors being socialist censorship fiends.
Quick, someone please show me a profession that did not have a murderer in the group.
Posted by: Janine ID | April 28, 2008 12:39 PM
Conservapædia says: "Professors' common value system typically includes... promotion of sexual immorality."
You know, this is true. I was giving a lecture on electrostatics the other day, and said, "Gauss' law tells us that the electric flux through a closed surface is proportional to the charge enclosed by the surface. Therefore you should all go out and have sex with anonymous strangers. Preferably gay sex."
Posted by: gg | April 28, 2008 12:47 PM
The numbers (and proportion) of professors committing crimes and participating in "Immoral, Unethical or Bizarre Behavior" is DWARFED by the numbers (& proportion) of clergy involved in the same.
(I have no idea if this statement is true, but it has about the same standard of evidence as does Conservapedia -- i.e., it was pulled out of someone's @ss.)
Posted by: susan | April 28, 2008 12:49 PM
Now, I feel better.
Posted by: student_b | April 28, 2008 1:02 PM
I love the claimed cite that "90 percent of United States professors called themselves liberal or moderate .[1]" - clearly this is proof that being conservative makes you too dumb to have a career in academia.
Certainly a statement as valid as the claim...
Posted by: tim rowledge | April 28, 2008 1:03 PM
gg said: "Conservapædia says: "Professors' common value system typically includes... promotion of sexual immorality."
You know, this is true. I was giving a lecture on electrostatics the other day, and said, "Gauss' law tells us that the electric flux through a closed surface is proportional to the charge enclosed by the surface. Therefore you should all go out and have sex with anonymous strangers. Preferably gay sex.""
And I was discussing gender determination in my non-majors' bio class today, and I told them about birds doing it backward. Does this count?
Maybe it's just evidence of bias on my part 8^O After all, it's only backward from *our* perspective. I *should* be considering the *birds'* perspective as well!
Oh, wait. That sort of thing is completely contra-indicated by a good, solid conservative approach.
Lynn
Posted by: Lynn | April 28, 2008 1:10 PM
Speaking about Professor Values:
The values, they are being expelled!!111!!!
Posted by: student_b | April 28, 2008 1:29 PM
"Founded initially in November 2006 as a way to educate advanced, college-bound homeschoolers, this resource has grown into a marvelous source of information for students, adults and teachers alike."
I always feel so sad for all the home schooled kids out there. Picturing the "advanced, college-bound" ones using this website makes me feel much worse.
Posted by: suzette | April 28, 2008 1:40 PM
I tried to edit the professor values page, but I bet my edits won't go through.
one of my edits was about how criminally stupid condoleeza rice can be sometimes, with source.
But I tried to bring balance to the page.
surfing around I found disturbing things about dawkins that perhaps shake my trust in him a bit, but I"m not sure, as it is from conservapaedia and they probably dredge up all kinds of wierd pages.
the strongest criticism was that since he wasn't tolerant of moderate religion he as hurting the promotion of science.
Posted by: matt | April 28, 2008 1:43 PM
I am somewhat amazed that such a thing as Conservapaedia exists at all. This is not reverse-Poe with a capital P? You are not all in a conspiracy to make me, humble Dutchman, believe it really does exist?
Posted by: Eddie Janssen | April 28, 2008 1:45 PM
Now someone needs to make a counter-page about Conservative politicians. I'm sure you can find way more than 15 of them who have been convicted of crimes...per state! And I bet they're a bit worse than mooning some kids at a fair (I actually found that one hilarious - I would have paid the guy's fine and bought him a beer, or whatever other evil atheist drink he preferred).
Posted by: Scott | April 28, 2008 1:57 PM
My choice of Wallace Shawn in the Ben Stein role has been questioned. Please allow me defend my choice. The average person sees, or saw, Stein as intelligent, nerdy, wise even, and may know something about his "expertise" in politics and economics. I think most people never would have imagined that Stein was capable of such numbskullery as Expelled.
I argue that the same goes for Wallace Shawn, who is also an 80's icon with economics training. They are both known for their distinct speaking styles. They are both known for playing teachers (Shawn was in Clueless). Shawn is clearly a better actor and more intelligent. Brilliant even in my opinion. I did not mean to slight the man, only to use his similarities to Stein and the equal degree of "from left fieldedness" if that makes any sense.
Any suggestions on a better choice?
Posted by: Zoo Knudsen | April 28, 2008 2:04 PM
I'm surprised he resisted the temptation to use "leftist grant whore" in place of "professor".
Posted by: Emmet Caulfield | April 28, 2008 2:18 PM
That Conservapedia's entry ... well, honestly, all I'd like to see is a list of "Crimes by Religious Leaders" to see how it compares with their "Crimes by Professors". I suspect that the former would be good enough of a rebuttal.
Posted by: Inky | April 28, 2008 2:22 PM
I bow down before Zoo Knudsen for coining the expression "Big Reality". It reminds me of a time on another forum when we were discussing some free energy scam. I wrote a sarcastic post where I lamented the suppression of perpetual motion by "Big Energy". Someone replied that it's not "Big Energy", it's "Big Entropy"!
Posted by: 74westy | April 28, 2008 2:35 PM
Posted by: Midnight Rambler | April 28, 2008 3:05 PM
I have a very serious question that involves Poe's Law: is Conservapædia a comedy site or do the people that contribute to it actually believe what they say?
Posted by: Loki | April 28, 2008 3:49 PM
#29
parody?...reality?...parody?...reality? I give up.
It's a sharp stick. Let's go poke the conservatives with it.
Posted by: chriss | April 28, 2008 3:54 PM
I agree with #7: thanks for ruining the rest of my day PZ!! OK, the other two links were great, but even with my sarcasmometer on, the Ennervapedia stuff is really depressing! I'd read a few things before that were easily ignorable (like the dinosaur stuff), but this whole attempt at discrediting professors is crazy! It's a "documentary" here, an online entry there, and it seems we really have a whole conspiracy of religious nuts trying to discredit all that academics work so hard for. Am I exaggerating? Is this whole crap just gonna go away without affecting us? I'm a TA at UConn and anyone who is in contact with undergrads has been noticing this uprising trend in "I'm entitled to my opinion" and "all ideas are equally good" and "tenured professors get lazy" etc etc, all of which ends up affecting public opinion towards academics. Yes, there are the elitist ones. Yes, there are the ones that won't listen to any ideas that contradict them, but this is not the majority. My conclusion is that non-academics have no idea how the whole scientific/academic process works, how much evidence and accuracy and control is needed for you to be "entitled to your opinion"!
(Sorry about the rant, it's just that reading the Ennervapedia stuff right after looking at a site saying that you can get your "PhD in Theological Whatever" in as little as 120 days didn't do any good for my sorry-low-self-esteemed-grad-student's ass!)
Posted by: cynthax | April 28, 2008 3:57 PM
After reading the Conservapedia article you should click on the link for "philosopher" there :)
I love it. It seams to be copied straight from a kiddie's encyclopedia.
Well at least that way there might be a chance that conservatives understand it.
Posted by: Bobby | April 28, 2008 4:00 PM
And I should take a kiddie's spelling course.
"it seems to be copied" is what I would have liked to type
Posted by: Bobby | April 28, 2008 4:03 PM
#29
Frighteningly enough, I'd wager that it's a bit of both...
Posted by: Mark | April 28, 2008 4:06 PM
I periodically check Conservapedia's statistics. They still have an inordinate obsession with Homosexuality. They did have two items besides the home page that didn't deal with it: #4 Wikipedia and #8 Adolph Hitler.
The page about Adolph is particularly egregious because it proselytizing Expelled's argument that Darwinism = Holocaust.
For grimaces I checked their page on Expelled. It's every bit as awful as you can imagine it. Their gist is that the movie is all about academic freedom (to be ignoramuses).
Posted by: Chris | April 28, 2008 6:17 PM
#24, #29, etc.:
Conservapedia's founders and a core following are completely serious... However, it also happens to be high-profile, derided-and-mocked wiki. So it's got plenty of "self" mockery inserted by rogues and n'erdowells. (Yaaar.) The core group gnash their teeth and remove as much of it as they can, but often times they fall victim to Poe's law and fail to recognize the subtler mockery.
Posted by: Nentuaby | April 28, 2008 6:59 PM
Any suggestions on a better choice?
Well, Jerry Lewis is getting on in years, but he also had a very well-known role as an educator, and the general tone of his movies would neatly match a sequel to Expelled.
I had to admit that I had the same reaction as others. "Not Wallace!" Wallace Shawn is in fact very brilliant. I've had the unique good fortune to have met him once during a run of his play "The Fever" (which is one of my favourite political plays of all time), and he is intelligent, educated, and insightful in a way which Ben Stein can only dream.
Posted by: Nullifidian | April 28, 2008 7:41 PM
Well I guess it's all the more absurd and (hopefully) funny. One interesting thing I learned about Wallace Shawn because of this post is that he claims to have no sense of humor and did not get the jokes he was saying in Princess Bride. Kind of hard to believe.
Posted by: Zoo Knudsen | April 28, 2008 8:02 PM
Damn you PZ! I had forgotten all about Conservapedia. There goes my evening
Posted by: Andrew Campbell | April 29, 2008 12:43 AM
"For example, a $100,000 "environmental" prize was awarded for work on a politically correct "theory of convergent evolution.""
Those liberal heathens! How dare they support the untested theory of reality!
Posted by: Lightnin | April 29, 2008 12:49 AM
And now for something completely different: looks like someone made you breakfast, PZ.
http://quadruped.us/matt/inkfinger/matt/06.30.06_pancake.jpg
Posted by: Flamethorn | April 29, 2008 6:35 AM