Pharyngula

Posted by: Dan'sMother | August 29, 2008 4:38 PM

Many of you may have noticed that Dan no longer posts on this forum. But you may not know the full story. You see the other day we were praying together the family Rosary, and Dan broke down in tears. Such tears like you've never seen before! I think it was sometime during the Sorrowful mysteries. Oh dear, it got me in such a tizzy. He finally confessed that he had been tormenting some atheists. Can you imagine someone doing that? Well, he was heartbroken, and begged me to post and relay his apologies to all. So here I am.

You see Dan's father was a kind man. He was a secular humanist you see, and anyway he always said to Dan that a reasonable and intelligent man, or maybe it was a reasonably intelligent man, I just don't remember, it was so long ago. Anyway, he always told Dan that he should only believe those beliefs that can be tested and verified. But I digress....

While Dan's father was alive (God rest his soul) Dan was normal like any other little boy, but that all changed when Dan discovered his father dead! Please don't ask me about his death, it was all so horrible, what with the curling iron and the peanut butter. It was crunchy and not smooth. Such terrible bodily trauma that crunchy can do as oppsed to smooth you can hardly imagine. I had so much trouble getting that peanut butter out of the night gown. But I digress....

Such a look of surprise Dan's father had on his face when he died. Dying must have been a terrible shock, what with the curling iron, and all that. Dan never got over the look on his father's face, and to this day won't go near a curling iron. But I digress....

After Dan's father passed (God rest his soul) Dan began to try to take his father's teaching seriously and began to try to only believe those beliefs that could be tested and verified. I remember Dan begining to wonder whether or not the electro-chemical activity in the human brain had any parallels in things like automobiles. I told him that this all a bunch of silly nonsense, but soon after Dan experimented with some type of mushroom tea drink thingy, I began to catch Dan out kicking the tires of our automobile in the middle of the night. I remember it was a Ford Pinto, red with black interior. Not that fancy shmancy leather stuff, after all we are plain people and not snobs at all. We're midwesterners for gosh sakes! Oh yes, and Dan's uncle Rob glued a Mother Mary statue on the dashboard with that model glue glue, not that super glue glue because they hadn't invented that yet, and once I tried regular wood glue when the statue fell over, but that sure didn't work - I wonder what ever happened to that statue? Oh yes, and Dan always used to pat Mary on the head before buckling his seat belt. He did that so much that Mary finally had a kind of a bald spot on her head. But I digress....

Anyway, like I said, I peeked out one night and saw Dan kicking the car tire and then leaning over like he was saying something into the side view mirror. I caught him doing this every night until one night I just couldn't stand it anymore and I cracked open the front door. It seemed that Dan would kick the tire and then rush over to the rear view mirror and say, "hey can you feel that?" Well, I should say that THIS sure got my attention, and I put a stop to it right then and there, I tell you what....

Dan stopped the tire kicking, but everyonce in a while I caught him poking the headlights and peering intently at them. I never had the heart to tell him that I noticed, but I think that he was trying to see if that old Pinto blinked.

Later Dan began to worry whether or not there was such a thing as free-will. I often caught him taking what seemed forever in the bathroom just trying to brush his teeth. Between brushes, he would look in the mirror and mumble, "am I brushing beacuse I want to, or because I HAVE too?" However, I digress again...

Dan wanted me to apologize to everyone. Especially to Nick and someone named Holbach. Between tears, Dan brightened up and said that he is pretty sure that all three of you could be friends in some future life. You see Dan believes in reincarnation. In fact you should have seen the look on his face when he described how both Nick and Holbach and been wives of his in a previous life when he was a sheik in Arabia. In fact you Holbach, were the lovliest of his beautiful wives. And oh, Dan's decription of how wonderfully you belly-danced Holbach! It must have been a sight to see. Dan positively glowed as he described how all the men would almost make the tent fall with their cries of, "praise be to Allah and praise be to the doe-eyed one!" That's what Dan says everyone called you Holbach - "the doe-eyed one" - must have been a lovely sight.

But I digress.....

Well anyway, I have managed to get a priest to agree to give Dan an exorcism. Please keep him in your prayers....

Posted by: Brownian, OM | August 29, 2008 5:35 PM

Mmmmm. Dough-eyed. Nguhnguhnguhnguh....

Posted by: Kobra | August 29, 2008 6:12 PM

#1: Your attempts to garner attention for yourself have failed. People like YOU are the reason I'm pro-choice.

Posted by: Alan Chapman | August 29, 2008 6:17 PM

Just today a co-worker and I were discussing the movie Idiocracy.

Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp, KoT | August 29, 2008 6:33 PM

Dan's Mother

you get a 2, but only for length and for this line

Such a look of surprise Dan's father had on his face when he died. Dying must have been a terrible shock, what with the curling iron, and all that.

Posted by: jj | August 29, 2008 7:09 PM

Dan your family name is Bates, correct?

Posted by: dale | August 29, 2008 8:04 PM

All,
If I could be so presumptuous for a moment, I have a situation going on with a very well organized fundie who is a master a c/p and a comment I made to him has brought about a response that I would love to see a couple of you go over and deal with.
I am sure you are aware of what he is referring to and he says he has absolute examples of valid scientific theories (40) that cannot get published in peer reviewed journals because they basically disprove evolution.

The site is "Debunking Atheists" and the comment I made to him and his answer is under the post, "Truth."

I enjoy reading the posts and comments here and although I surely don't consider it "formal" education, I have learned a lot here over the last year. I have picked up on quite a few concepts that I have gone on to investigate. My degree of 30 years ago was in Eng but I have, at this late age, become quite interested in biology, as well as some other disciplines.

I would consider it a great help if you might take a couple seconds to check out this blogger's references.

Respectfully submitted,

dale

I do humly ask that you would address the madness that this dude is spilling out, and maybe have a bit of fun in the interim.

Posted by: Prof MTH | August 29, 2008 9:05 PM

Not to toot but to show that you, PZ, are an instrument of aide; I donated to DonorsChoose selecting a school in my area when you first posted about the site. I hope others have done the same.

Posted by: clinteas | August 29, 2008 10:58 PM

Dan trying to derail another thread,what else is new.

Did my clicking,like last time.

dale,fundies cant and wont be convinced of anything,thats why theyre called fundies.Why dont you read up on stuff and go do some refuting yourself instead of asking other people to waste their time for you.

Posted by: co | August 29, 2008 11:30 PM

Totally off-topic, but a whole lotta fucknuttery: http://danieldl.info/post/42743097/man-electrocutes-pickle-to-demonstrate-power-of

Posted by: efrique | August 30, 2008 1:42 AM

Hey PZ, I'm probably the 20th person to mention this, but did you see the Carnival of Evolution"?

(Excuse me if you already mentioned it and I missed it.)