…and this is a 
I confess. One of the staple sources of creationist lunacy I document here has always been Texas (with Florida as a close runner-up), which seems to be thickly infested with ignoramuses who get elected to high office. It's the kind of place that inspires the Molly Ivins of the world. Lately, we've been appalled at the idiots the Texas government wants to put in charge of science education, but there's another victim in the gunsights, too: history and social studies. The same abysmal talents that can muck up biology also want to turn social studies into patriotic mulch.
Alas, they can't get crazy enough in Texas, apparently, so the local ideologues had to go looking for greater loons, a national search for loons when the homegrown flavor just isn't piquant enough. And where does he go shopping?
Minnesota. Oh, the shame.
Don McLeroy wanted to bring in Alan Quist to join their social studies team. Quist is a former wanna-be governor of Minnesota (who got clobbered in a landslide defeat) with minimal education qualifications. He has a bachelor's in psychology and a masters in speech; he teaches (minimally) at a local bible college, and most damningly, his wife runs EdWatch, one of those awful anti-education advocacy sites that promotes the destruction of public schools so everyone can go off and be homeschooled. His pet obsessions are the usual, gays and abortions. He's ag'in 'em both. He will rant for food.
For an idea of the quality of his mind, you should read his disproof of global warming. He builds on an old map, the Oronteus Finaeus map of 1532, which shows the outlines of a southern continent, Antarctica (with many of the details wrong). From this, he draws the conclusion that Antarctica had been thoroughly explored in the 16th century, that it had been free of ice with flowing rivers, and therefore, the world had been much, much warmer than it is now 500 years ago, and therefore, global warming is a myth. The ice sheet in Antarctica is only half a millennium old, which discovery would rather radically mess up our understanding of climatology, geology, and physics…pretty impressive for a know-nothing wingnut.
Comments
Posted by: Thomas Lee Elifritz | July 21, 2009 11:06 AM
Retards.
They walk among US.
Posted by: Lynna | July 21, 2009 11:11 AM
I admire the way Alan Quist throws in bits and pieces of generally accepted history in order to flavor his stew of lies with reality. Hey, if this is true, then that must be true, right?
Here's an example:
Posted by: Joffan | July 21, 2009 11:16 AM
We were already laughing at Minnesota for Michele Bachmann. You got some top-grade kooks.
Posted by: Lynna | July 21, 2009 11:18 AM
oh, oh, oh... and at the link PZ provided for a real (as opposed to confirmation-bias version) assessment of the Oronteus Finaeus Map, Charlton Heston weighs in. It's a farce in the Moliere tradition.
Posted by: Aquaria
|
July 21, 2009 11:22 AM
Isn't David Barton, the guy who is ga-ga about presenting America as a Christian nation, always has been, always will be, part of this nonsense too?
Um... Yep, as a matter of fact he is, and that guy is certifiable.
Posted by: JefFlyingV | July 21, 2009 11:24 AM
So this is an example of Edwatch home schooling curriculum. Doen't seem to be setting high standards for education, unless they are training all their students to be evangelical ministers.
Posted by: Aquaria
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July 21, 2009 11:27 AM
Honestly, PZ, don't kick yourself about the out-of-state wackos coming into town and pouring on the stupid. 1) We've been putting up with that for nearly 30 years now. 2) Our homegrown stupid is still unparalleled. See: David Barton, who wouldn't know a history book from a hole in the ground. Or a hole in his head.
Posted by: Bill Dauphin, OM | July 21, 2009 11:27 AM
Right, because all that exploration could easily have happened without leaving any independent contemporaneous narrative descriptions. It's not as if we have any, y'know, writings from the 16th century or anything, is it?
Posted by: Glen Davidson
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July 21, 2009 11:27 AM
Of course no one would have noticed that the ocean went down by many meters over 500 years.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/mxaa3p
Posted by: Larry | July 21, 2009 11:27 AM
Is Texas so bereft of genuine, grade A, whack-a-doodles that they must import them now?
Posted by: Mozglubov | July 21, 2009 11:29 AM
@Joffan #3
Yeah, Michele Bachmann is absolutely bloody insane... I'm still chuckling in an appalled sort of way at her utterly idiotic question, "I just wondered that if our founders thought taxation without representation was bad, what would they think of taxation with representation?"
Posted by: NewEnglandBob
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July 21, 2009 11:32 AM
How did someone like Allen Quist evolve into an upright position? Or are his knuckles bloody from dragging and leaning on them?
Posted by: Aquaria
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July 21, 2009 11:34 AM
#10: Again, I must present David Barton as exhibit A of all that is stupid and crazy about Texas.
This guy is gonna speak at a church near my house. If I thought any of my fellow citizens would either put down their TV remotes/beer cans or even know enough to know how moronic this slimeball is, I'd organize a protest.
But it's San Antonio...
Posted by: raven | July 21, 2009 11:35 AM
OT but related.
Teen pegnancy and STD's rose during the era of abstinence only sex ed, by a lot. Teen pregnancy rates are an important indicator of social health, highly correlated with lifelong poverty and other ills and causal as well.
Of course, the highest rates are in the fundie xian areas, the south central USA.
Texas is way up there. Xian morality is a myth and a lie. When the McLeroy's see these statistics, they just lie and change the subject. They are nihilists. It really doesn't matter to them how much damage they cause to a society as long as they can control it for their benefit.
Posted by: Mena | July 21, 2009 11:40 AM
Wow, that's one of the two dumbest things that I have seen about global warming today. There's also a Facebook group called, smugly enough, "Global Warming Was Disproved A While Ago. Did You Miss It?". From their FAQ thing:
"- But CO2 is polluting our atmosphere and causing the earth to get hot!!!
A pollutant is something that contaminates. You may be confusing CO2 with carbon monoxide/methanol/etc, which are pollutants. "
CO isn't natural? Methanol polluting the atmosphere? That would be interesting. There's more but it's too boring to bother posting here.
Oh, I can't really make fun of people in other states for having goofy politicians. I live in Illinois and am represented in congress by that bastion of family values and protecting the flag and marriage that is known as Peter Roskam. Wheaton loons are a joke, why do they keep getting elected to Congress?!?!
Posted by: Ted H. | July 21, 2009 11:43 AM
Maps of North America from the same era show California as an island, so it must have connected to the rest of North America sometime in the last 500 years as well, I guess.
Posted by: raven | July 21, 2009 11:47 AM
McLeroy also brought in Dan Barton to fix the social studies modules.
Barton is the clown who promotes the "USA is a xian nation" myth. One of his tools is quotations from the founders, Jefferson, Washington, and so on. Many of those quotations are just made up lies.
Much of fundie death cult's agenda is The War Against Science. Texas has taken the next step. The War Against The Real World.
Posted by: Tony Denson | July 21, 2009 11:49 AM
YAAYY Keyword search WORKS Slam Texas in the title and the first paragraph for SEO and then charge off on the liberal diatribe. And YES we do have the resources and the POWER and the constitutional right to divest our support of federal idiocy
Tony descendant of Stephen Denison Alamo Defender
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution | July 21, 2009 11:49 AM
My sister made a map of our backyard when she was 9... It was painstakingly meticulous... the dimensions were fairly accurate, the trees were in the right place, the fence had the correct number of posts... it was pretty well done for the tools and knowledge she had at the time.
And in the back left corner is where her map indicated the unicorn stable was.
That proves the existence of unicorns!
Posted by: raven | July 21, 2009 11:53 AM
And they don't care.
Posted by: Tony Denson | July 21, 2009 11:55 AM
YAAYY Keyword search WORKS Slam Texas in the title and the first paragraph for SEO and then charge off on the liberal diatribe. And YES we do have the resources and the POWER and the constitutional right to divest our support of federal idiocy
Tony descendant of Stephen Denison Alamo Defender
Posted by: Geds | July 21, 2009 11:57 AM
Bill Dauphin, OM: Right, because all that exploration could easily have happened without leaving any independent contemporaneous narrative descriptions. It's not as if we have any, y'know, writings from the 16th century or anything, is it?
It's just like Gavin Menzies' 1421 farce. He found a map from 1424 with islands that could have only been Puerto Rico and Guadeloupe. Even though they looked nothing like Puerto Rico or Guadeloupe and were closer to Portugal than Florida.
From this discovery he made the mental leap that the Chinese had circumnavigated the globe in 1421 and that their Treasure Fleets were just a cover for colonization expeditions. But then they got back to China and the new dynasty suppressed every tiny bit of information about the voyages and cancelled any further attempts. And absolutely nobody had any idea that it had happened for nearly 600 years until this kook found a map in a library somewhere that had two random islands draw on to it that don't have any relation to anything in the Atlantic.
Never trust anyone who thinks they've uncovered a vast, historical conspiracy. Especially if it looks like they're trying to make a lot of bucks off of it...
Posted by: Thomas Lee Elifritz | July 21, 2009 11:58 AM
So do I really have to make nice talk to the Texas retard Tony Denson for two more posts?
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 21, 2009 11:58 AM
Can you translate this into English for those of us who do not speak what ever language that is.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 21, 2009 12:02 PM
Was that supposed to help your cause?
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 21, 2009 12:03 PM
Maybe what he has said will make sense one he has translated into English for us.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 21, 2009 12:05 PM
Being that I understood this one sentence rather clearly, I am curious what this has to do with anything?
Posted by: Russell | July 21, 2009 12:06 PM
Expect Quist's work to be plagiarized by Turkish creationists, who have only to substitute Piri Reis bogus map for Oronteus's fanciful chart to produce an Islamic bestseller along the lines of 1421
Posted by: Jojo | July 21, 2009 12:07 PM
Interesting approach, he must have picked it up from the alien kooks. I'm guessing he started off with satellite pictures and tried Photoshopping the grass and rivers on Antarctica, but abandoned that approach when someone pointed out that they didn't have cameras or satellites back then.
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution | July 21, 2009 12:07 PM
I hope nobody shows Allen Quist this.
It's quite a bit more recent than the Oronteus Finaeus map (1895)...
Posted by: raven | July 21, 2009 12:09 PM
Before we get into the "All Texans are morons who want to turn it into another theocratic state like Somalia, Afghanistan (life span 44 years and going down), or Iran".
It is only about half. Texas voted for Obama 43% to 56%. Roughly almost half.
It may well change in the future to the upside. Being very stupid has its drawbacks. They get run over crossing the street, get drunk and slam their cars into telephone poles, lose their jobs to people with high school diplomas, lose their money in penny stock scams and attempts to help out Nigerian princes, get pregnant at 15 and never get started in life, and so on.
It's possible that in a decade or two, the majority of Texans will have joined the 20th century.
Posted by: Aaron | July 21, 2009 12:10 PM
A bachelor in psychology isn't that horrible..is it?...IS IT?!
*Starts to question one's worth*
Posted by: Aquaria
|
July 21, 2009 12:10 PM
#24: I might be able to help with the Alamo loser crap. After all I'm a) a Texan, and b) live just a bit down the road from the building itself (unimpressive).
He has that curious delusion that thinks being a descendent of a historical loser somehow makes a moron like him superior to the rest of us. Or something. If you're British, just think of your average lord, who's proud of his ancestor who lost a big battle in some war that the country won. Same thing.
Chalk him up as a Legacy entry to SMU, at best (or more likely the meth-addled ravings of a F-150-driving Fox News junkie), and laugh at him. It's all he deserves.
Posted by: bam | July 21, 2009 12:12 PM
So Tony is proud of his several times great grandpa. No reason not to be. Although if one wanted to get nasty one could mention that his grandpa died because he joined in Travis' refusal to obey Houston's direct order to evacuate San Antonio. Houston was a smart man and didn't see any reason to lose 180-odd men to defend an undefendable position. Still, doesn't take away from the heroism of his ancestor.
But Tony, darlin', what on earth does the heroics of your granddaddy have to do with the lies some idiots are trying to tell my grandkids in public schools?
I mean you are entitled to tell what ever lies you like (as long as you are not under oath, of course) and if you want people to lie to your kids for you, you can send them to private lie schools or you can home school them and lie to them there. I admit I think it's sad. I mean, your kids will be under such a terrible disadvantage out in the real world. But I do believe trying to force the issue will cause more social harm than letting your kids do the best they can while living in the fantasy world you helped build around them.
Just don't try to feed that crap to the rest of Texas in public schools. Deal?
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 21, 2009 12:13 PM
I have an old atlas (Victorian) that is mostly blank in the internal regions of Africa and South America.
I used to think this was because the interiors of both continents were largely unexplored at the time the atlas was published but now I see I was wrong. Clearly the areas were blank because there was nothing there!
Posted by: AwesomeRobot | July 21, 2009 12:16 PM
Aw, I wanted to be the first person to mention Michele Bachmann. Can I be the first one to link the the autotune remix of her insane argument that the climate change bill debate was a debate of liberty vs tyranny?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Psfn6iOfS8
Posted by: Lynn Wilhelm | July 21, 2009 12:18 PM
Texas doesn't care about education but it does care about football.
A client (a former NFL player) of my company here in NC just got a job coaching high school football in Arlington TX. I heard they are paying him $80K and no teaching. He gets bonuses for getting to the playoffs.
Posted by: Doug Little | July 21, 2009 12:19 PM
What is it with teh English? This has got to be a measure of kookdom. If you can't put a meaningful sentence together and feel the need to caps lock everything you say you are officially speaking Kookish not to be confused with English.
Posted by: Aquaria
|
July 21, 2009 12:20 PM
It is only about half. Texas voted for Obama 43% to 56%. Roughly almost half.
It may well change in the future to the upside
No, raven, don't look on the bright side here.
I'd bet money that not even 10% of that 43% reached their decisions logically or rationally.
The same people who believe in ghosts, visions of Mary in tortillas, that crystals work, that some guy in a dress mumbling over crackers turns it into the flesh of a 2000 year old zombie, that think evolution might happen because we don't know how long one of their imaginary friend's days are, the people who vote the way mom or their best friend does, or because it was "trendy"...
These are the people who voted for Obama, too, not just smart people.
I work with them. I live amongst them. They are alarmingly moronic. Maybe 1 in 1000 could discuss any issue coherently, much less rationally. But I'd bet on 1 in 10K or more.
Fortunately, the abundance of stupid provides me with endless amusement.
Posted by: tsg | July 21, 2009 12:20 PM
and breed like rabbits and inflict their stupidity on their children.
I'm not optimistic.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 21, 2009 12:20 PM
No, but it hardly qualifies someone to decide on what get taught in Social Studies in Texas.
Actually by the time some has enough experience for such a role what they studied for their first degree is pretty much irrelevant.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 21, 2009 12:23 PM
Well I can see where this thread will probably end up.
Posted by: Aaron | July 21, 2009 12:24 PM
@#41
Ah, ok, yeah I can agree with that then
Posted by: Doug Little | July 21, 2009 12:27 PM
This is the real reason for abstinence only education. It keeps the numbers of the stupid up, to be later exploited by anyone selling snake oil.Posted by: MikeG | July 21, 2009 12:31 PM
I say we just let 'em...
Nah, I can't do it to ya' Rev.
Posted by: DLC | July 21, 2009 12:31 PM
PZ: If these people have their way, soon enough we'll have children learning how the founding fathers were evangelical Christians.
Matt Penfold @24: Apparently Mr Denison is going to defend Texas' right to be a state full of homeschooled ignoramuses, and his authority stems from having a defender of the Alamo in his family history. I've often wondered why it is Texans make such a big deal out of a military defeat.
Wouldn't claiming to be a descendant of one of the victors of San Jacinto be better?
Posted by: Pascalle
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July 21, 2009 12:34 PM
I'm wondering PZ, is the book you're writing about education and science?
If so.. may i suggest the title "Science and Education, or the descent into the American Dark Ages".
I'm so glad we have had our enlightment after our dark ages already in europe.
Posted by: Matt Penfold | July 21, 2009 12:37 PM
Well we Brits make a fair bit out of Dunkirk, and that was a defeat. I had to look up San Jacinto on Wikipedia. I am not familiar with the Texas Revolution.
But thanks for the translation.
Posted by: Pierce R. Butler | July 21, 2009 12:38 PM
... EdWatch, one of those awful anti-education advocacy sites ...
Uh-oh. Then who's keeping an eye on Mr. Brayton and Mr. Yong?
Posted by: anthuswilliams | July 21, 2009 12:39 PM
Utterly stupid article. He says himself that Finnaeus never actually WENT to Antarctica; he used the mathematical predictions of the Phoenicians to determine where it was. How then, could such a cartographer possibly know that Antartica had rivers flowing every which way?
That's why he only mentions his disproof of global warming in passing. The rest of his article is general historical detail that doesn't prove shit. The article is pure speculation based entirely on the pure speculation of another person.
Posted by: Linden Woodhead | July 21, 2009 12:43 PM
At one point, the U. of Texas was hiring a lot of
Nobel laureates. They said they wanted to have a
physics department that the football team could
be proud of.
Posted by: GilbertNSullivan
|
July 21, 2009 12:47 PM
Good work Don!
From Allen Quist's curriculum on EdWatch:
THE CHILDREN MUST BE TOLD!!!
Posted by: progressive homeschooler | July 21, 2009 12:50 PM
Michele Bachmann, Norm Coleman, and now this. Be careful or the idiots here in Florida will start to look downright normal.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | July 21, 2009 12:54 PM
YES!!!
Posted by: Daft Greg | July 21, 2009 12:54 PM
Oh, you can still mock Texas. Every state has their crazy people, but only Texas is importing them.
Posted by: littlejohn | July 21, 2009 12:55 PM
Just finished reading a new paperback edition of "The Mapmakers." It was standard practice, until surprisingly recently, to depict Antarctica in fanciful ways, since no one could sail close enough to actually map it. This was based on ancient stories of a southern continent.
This guy's map of Antarctica is no different from the old maps showing Atlantis in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, just because Plato said it was there.
Posted by: Aquaria
|
July 21, 2009 1:02 PM
I've often wondered why it is Texans make such a big deal out of a military defeat.
This one doesn't. It was stupid, as stupid as Goliad. But don't get me started on Fannin's folly.
Why is the legend so entrenched? I often joke that the contemporary fans of Davy Crockett and Jim Bowie couldn't let them die so stupidly, so the entire Alamo tomfoolery was glorified into something it wasn't. Of course, at least Bowie had the excuse of being ill. Crockett was just a moron.
Posted by: DLC | July 21, 2009 1:05 PM
Matt Penfold:
But thanks for the translation.
Re: Dunkirk and the Alamo: I guess people do like the underdog. Much has been written about The Three Hundred Spartans also. . . okay, I confess, I was indulging my mean streak. But it's such a ridiculous non-sequitur I couldn't resist a jab at it.
Posted by: Mena | July 21, 2009 1:07 PM
'Nuff said.
Posted by: Julian | July 21, 2009 1:07 PM
Raven: Exactly. Doesn't hurt that most folks who think like McLeroy are also classists who see no problem with policies which create a persistent under-class, just so long as they can tell themselves they aren't part of it.
Denson: You are a moron, and that's from one Texan to another. I highly doubt your family's really been here since the Revolution, because if they had, you'd know how terrible a bane on us the Comanches were, that it was the Union army that finally got rid of them for us, and knowing that, you wouldn't be spouting such secessionist nonsense. You'd also realize that it was the Union that paid for or provided most of the weapons we used to beat Santa Anna, as well as more than a few of the officers in Houston's army.
Of course, maybe you're just stupid; after all if you actually knew the history of this state you'd realize that it was federal monies that modernized it, irrigated it, electrified it, and built the public sewer system you use everyday, starting during FDR's Depression recovery measures and going all the way through to the end of the Great Society period. Our Federation has been nothing but a boon to this state, just as our membership in it has incalculably strengthened the whole, and those who speak against it are, quite frankly, silly, pampered, fools not worth taking seriously.
Posted by: Aquaria
|
July 21, 2009 1:10 PM
Well we Brits make a fair bit out of Dunkirk, and that was a defeat. I had to look up San Jacinto on Wikipedia. I am not familiar with the Texas Revolution.
Uh, the difference is that what made Dunkirk heroic was how many "ordinary" people pitched in to help bring troops to safety. At the Alamo, the troops got slaughtered.
Posted by: Watchman | July 21, 2009 1:17 PM
Yes. Day saved! :-D
Posted by: bam | July 21, 2009 1:18 PM
@57
Don't know that Crockett was a moron, per se. But I am sure he didn't expect to be murdered after the fight was over.
For those that don't know, Crocket and roughly 30 others surrendered and were subsequently shot. A Mexican army officer with Santa Anna tells about it*. He was outraged. As a professional, he knew that treating prisoners like that was just stupid. Immorality aside, killing prisoners makes your enemy decided they might as well keep fighting since they will die anyway. You want your enemy to stop fighting, to give in.
*With Santa Anna in Texas the diary of and an essay by José Enrique de la Peña, published in English in 1975 (trans. Carmen Perry) [needless to say the whole thing is purported to be a fake by those who prefer the "they all died fighting" story, but it has been authenticated by every available test to date.]
Posted by: Eric Dutton | July 21, 2009 1:25 PM
Give Kansas time. I'm sure we'll be ready with something juicy very soon.
Posted by: nichole | July 21, 2009 1:29 PM
lol. That "disproof" of global warming was heavily plagiarized from this guy: http://www.timstouse.com/EarthHistory/Antarctic/oronteusfinaeus.htm
somebody should email tim stouse.
Posted by: GilbertNSullivan
|
July 21, 2009 1:31 PM
Actually I was kinda looking forward to the upcoming unit 3 - I mean who wouldn't want to learn Allen's take on
How has Darwinism influenced American law and politics?
...until I remembered that someone's child really will be taught this shit as fact.
But then I saw Rev BDC's splendid dragon / zombie illustration was reminded that that child has a chance: once they realise that the same people who taught them that "Darwinism" leads to holocausts also believed that man and dinosaur coexisted, they may question the whole steaming pile of bollocks enough to make their way back to the sunlit uplands of objective reality.
Posted by: Kevin Beck | July 21, 2009 1:31 PM
I absolutely have to find a street corner where I can hold up a sign that says WILL RANT FOR FOOD. I love it. In the event I lack the spine to follow though, I'll hand it to someone who's already ranting. Such a person won't be hard to find in downtown Boston in this economy.
Posted by: Daniel Sanchez | July 21, 2009 1:38 PM
Texas is perfectly within her rights to take that kook Alan away from us. Maybe the other loons will follow him and leave us in peace.
Posted by: blf | July 21, 2009 1:40 PM
Antarctica ain't covered in ice. That's a gubermint conspiracy. They just says that to hide the UFO bases. That trues mappe of Antarctica will be disappeared soons, y'all see, downs the memory hole.
Posted by: Jon | July 21, 2009 2:04 PM
LOL. I've heard this guy give a presentation in front of a church group of mostly 60 year olds, who of course were impressed, while I audibly said "bullshit" at the end.
Posted by: Angel | July 21, 2009 2:08 PM
Oh, PZ, I think you can still keep on mocking TX. If anything,now you can mock them for having to outsource their stupid to another state. Anyhow, there will always be plenty of ignorance and stupidity in TX.
Best, and keep on blogging.
Posted by: Ploon | July 21, 2009 2:14 PM
So which is it? Denson or Denison? If he's really that proud of his ancestry, you would think he would take the trouble of not spelling either his own or his grandpappy's name wrong.
Posted by: Holbach
|
July 21, 2009 2:31 PM
RevBig dumb Chimp @ 54
Rev; Left a comment for you at # 149 "Atheist Bus Signs In Austria". Thought you would like to read it.
Posted by: Brownian, OM
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July 21, 2009 2:34 PM
Spelling and punctuation are Librul conspiracies. REAL men don't need to be literate--they let their fists do the talking.
Posted by: Douglas McClean | July 21, 2009 2:44 PM
When your methodology could be used much more parsimoniously---maps agreeing with a great many contemporary writings!---to show how successful medieval dragon slaying and sea monster hunting were, you might be a wingnut.
Posted by: Joffan | July 21, 2009 2:57 PM
Doug Little:
Let's see...
I'm hoping to get into the 2012 Kooklympics. Now I have to overcome my fondness for appropriate HTML tags and restrained punctuation.
Posted by: Holbach
|
July 21, 2009 2:58 PM
Brownian,Om @ 74
Real men don't need to be literate or use their fists; they can let their REAL god do it all for them, and let them take it like a real man in its image. "Why I'll knock you to kingdom come." Great, a free trip to heaven!
Posted by: RedPersephone
|
July 21, 2009 3:02 PM
raven: get pregnant at 15 and never get started in life
Aww, don't blame the kids for suffering the consequences of their parents/educators lying to them. If all I heard was to not have sex because condoms cause cancer and birth control kills babies, I might've gotten pregnant at 15, too.
Posted by: Raging Bee | July 21, 2009 3:05 PM
Notice how the only guy who stands up for Texas here, doesn't actually have anything positive to say about it? All he does is fling a few misspelled insults and run away. Not very proud of his state, is he?
Posted by: Mike Haubrich, FCD | July 21, 2009 3:06 PM
It's not bad enough that he is from here, but he used to be the Frickin' governor! This was before either PZ or I worked here so we can't be blamed.
Posted by: Stu
|
July 21, 2009 3:12 PM
I'm hoping to get into the 2012 Kooklympics.
Sorry, too late. All spots were assigned from the final qualifier.
Posted by: SC, OM | July 21, 2009 3:21 PM
Funnily enough, I knew what that link was gonna be before I even rolled over it.
Still laughing.
Posted by: Watchman | July 21, 2009 3:50 PM
Good luck to you, but I offer you this one caveat: If the Kooklympics are scheduled to take place in the later months of that year, I wouldn't bother.
Posted by: 12th Monkey | July 21, 2009 3:56 PM
"Tony descendant of Stephen Denison Alamo Defender" --- "Posted by: Tony Denson"
Too bad Tony can't spell his own name. But that's what we've come to expect from Tex-ass. Oh and as for the not so veiled threat of secession, don't let the door hit yer Texas sized ass on the way out.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, OM
|
July 21, 2009 4:07 PM
Kevin Beck #67
Will code HTML for food.
Posted by: BAllanJ | July 21, 2009 4:18 PM
Can I nominate Stu for a Molly on this thread? His comment at 81 combined with his stellar work at the qualifier in question deserves it IMO.
Posted by: Ben in Texas | July 21, 2009 4:19 PM
I'm a native Texan, so I'll proudly stand up for my state!
Just, uh, not for most of the people who live here.
I'll stand up for the trees and stuff, and maybe the cattle. The cattle don't cause many problems. They rarely push wingnut ideas, except for this one heifer who claimed to have spotted her true god Bevo on the mildewed side of a barn.
Posted by: Jon Pike | July 21, 2009 5:01 PM
P.Z. Thanks For The Hat Tip On Quist--
It got onto the Minnesota Independent:
http://minnesotaindependent.com/39870/gops-quist-says-antique-map-dissproves-global-warming#more-39870
Posted by: ad | July 21, 2009 5:12 PM
A better debunking, with pictures:
http://xoomer.virgilio.it/dicuoghi/Piri_Reis/Finaeus_eng.htm
Posted by: Doug Little | July 21, 2009 5:17 PM
Stu @81,
Whew that was some reading. The Kooklympics team from that site are going to be impossible to beat, Kwok will be the front runner for carrying the flag in the opening ceremony.
BTW I think someone broke Kwok's mind when he got relegated to the Dungeon over here.
Posted by: CatBallou
|
July 21, 2009 5:18 PM
Gilbert, could you just give us some more info about this?
Oddly enough, I haven't read anything about these ancient art works, and I have a subscription to National Geographic! Please please please don't make me go to that website. I don't even want it in my browser history.
Posted by: JJR | July 21, 2009 5:21 PM
I currently live in Denton, Texas, named for one John B. Denton, a Methodist minister, lawyer, and militia officer killed participating in a retaliatory raid on an Indian village in 1841.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Denton
I'm most proud of Sam Houston, who was later against secession in 1861; unpopular opinion, to be sure, but courageous.
Posted by: Vidar34 | July 21, 2009 5:21 PM
I recently watched an episodes of Fraggle Rock for nostalgia's sake, and stuff like this makes em think that Uncle Traveling Mack has it spot on when he refers to people as 'the silly creatures'.
Posted by: Brain Hertz | July 21, 2009 5:23 PM
for some reason I kept thinking of this (at 0:45)...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KFiqRput7cA&feature=PlayList&p=454E087281A7F000&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=22
Posted by: Hamilton Jacobi | July 21, 2009 5:38 PM
They do have a damn good physics department -- and not just the Nobel laureates, either. But I doubt if the football team is aware of it.
Posted by: amphiox | July 21, 2009 5:47 PM
Was that the same 1500's map of Antartica with its supposedly accurate shoreline claimed by some to be proof that the Chinese circumnavigated the world in 1421?
Or was that the same 1500's map of Antartica that was alleged to be based on the even older and conveniently missing map of Antartica with its supposedly accurate shoreline sans ice that is supposedly the unassailable rock solid proof for the existence of Atlantis?
Posted by: gaypaganunitarianagnostic | July 21, 2009 6:31 PM
The stand at the Alamo held up Santa Anna's progress and caused disproportionate losses to the Mexican army. It significantly aided the Texan independence effort.
Posted by: Lancelot Link | July 21, 2009 6:38 PM
Too bad Tony can't spell his own name.
He really is a dense 'un, isn't he?
(sorry, I couldn't resist)
Posted by: Stardrake
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July 21, 2009 7:17 PM
"Did dinosaurs and people live at the same time, and why do so many recently discovered ancient art works accurately picture dinosaurs?"
Ancient artworks? C'mon, Allen, 1960 wasn't that long ago!
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0053502/
Posted by: MadScientist | July 21, 2009 8:59 PM
So there's nothing new then - the less they know the more certain they are of everything. It sounds like Quist must be absolutely sure of everything. If ignorance is bliss, he's in heaven already.
Posted by: lordshipmayhem | July 21, 2009 9:23 PM
For those of you who wanted this translated into English:
Tony descendant of Stephen Denison Alamo Defender
Here goes:
"YAAYY": Yorkist Anti-Aircraft battery YY. Betcha didn't know that the Lancastrians even HAD an air force. ^_^
"Keyword search WORKS Slam Texas": When inputting the keyword WORKS into the Silk Loungewear Acquisition Metadatabase (whose servers are located in Texas), you will get the link to the William Orpington Ryder Kinesiology Study.
"The first paragraph for SEO": See page one of Volume XXII of the South East Observer Magazine. Dunno what he's trying to reference from that, unless he wants to draw our attention to the law of copyright as it applies to the printed word.
As far as divesting support of federal idiocy, that has been fervently wished by millions of victims of such idiocies as cutting back funding on the space program, and refusing to allocate monies to build up the dikes around New Orleans in the decades preceding Hurricane Katrina.
"Tony descendant of Stephen Denison Alamo Defender" - the author's pappy is a lawyer who handles litigation on behalf of one of the largest car rental agencies in the Western world.
You're welcome.
Posted by: Disciple of | July 21, 2009 9:32 PM
Willie Nelson, Eric Johnson, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Amon Carter, Molly Ivins, Stanley Marsh 3, and J.R. "Bob" Dobbs are all products of Texas. I hate having to point that out every time there's yet another tale of epic stupidity occurring in this state and tainting me by association.
Of course, Charles Whitman and the Branch Davidians were also products of Texas, so ne'er ye mind.
Posted by: Stardrake
|
July 21, 2009 9:40 PM
""YAAYY": Yorkist Anti-Aircraft battery YY. Betcha didn't know that the Lancastrians even HAD an air force. ^_^"
But the Lancastrian was an airliner....
Posted by: Nanahuatzin
|
July 22, 2009 4:06 PM
¿did you saw where he got the info?
He is referencing Charles Hutchins Hapgood, who searched in old maps to support his own theory of "polar shift", and to reject "plate tectonics".
Hapgood is "famous" for the "map of piris rei" famous because is used to support the claims that ancient astronauts have come in ancient times, and gave humankind "knowlege" of those maps...
(note: the claim of astronauts does not come from Hapgood, but it you will find it associated, Hapgood claimed there was an lost adn advanced ice age civilization)
wikipedia: Hapgood's Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings used numerous archival maps, including the Piri Reis Map, which he claims show a vast southern continent roughly similar to Antarctica in shape, to propose that a 15 degree pole shift occurred around 9,600 B.C. (approx. 11.600 years ago), and that a part of the Antarctic was ice-free at that time. By implication an ice-age civilization could have mapped the coast at that point in time. This has been debunked by cartographers.
A close study of piris rey map, shows that the coast of antartida... is really the deformed coast of sud america.
if you look at sudamerica in the map, you will find about 600 km of coast missing... that were put further in the south...
it is part of the "ancient astronauts" folklore...
So if this is what this guy is proposing, I think his site should be called
"for an america... free of education..."
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | July 22, 2009 5:29 PM
Ah, Alan Quist and the Quistian Right. Memories. That was when the Minnesota Republican Party went batshit. No more Arne Carlsons, Dave Durenburgers, Rudy Boschwitzes or Elmer Andersons. Now we get Alan Quist, Michelle Bachman and Arlon Lindner.
Posted by: Andyman | July 22, 2009 8:46 PM
PZ you need to stop writing misleading headline. I thought Texas actually did something rational for a change
Posted by: tv dinner | July 23, 2009 11:03 AM
Memories indeed. I remember when Quist was in the MN House of Representatives, and he spoke on the House floor about his own "undercover investigation" of a porn shop in Mankato, MN. Everybody's jaw fell to the floor as he detailed the sin and depravity he found there. "...and there are booths, with round openings between each one...and on the floor, pools of the most infamous fluids..."
The Mankato paper reported the next day about how Quist made the rounds of "Mankato's Tenderloin."