…and this is a 
And all I take away from it is that Comfort is as sleazy as I thought. You may have heard that he has retracted his banana argument; not true, as you'll discover, he's kind of waffled around objections to it, but he still thinks the banana is an argument against evolution. He also denies that he makes a lot of errors when talking about science. Comfort is the fellow who made this claim:
Darwin theorized that mankind (both male and female) evolved alongside each other over millions of years, both reproducing after their own kind before the ability to physically have sex evolved. They did this through "asexuality" ("without sexual desire or activity or lacking any apparent sex or sex organs"). Each of them split in half ("Asexual organisms reproduce by fission (splitting in half)."
It's not only historically false, but is a complete misrepresentation of what the science says about the evolution of sex.
It's good that Hemant got him to say a few things that testify to his dishonesty, but I would have liked to have seen him squirm some more.
Comments
Posted by: Craig Shearer | December 1, 2009 8:10 PM
As a fellow Kiwi, he makes me feel ashamed!
Posted by: 'Tis Himself, Quel Dommage
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December 1, 2009 8:29 PM
Is Comfort still doing the "males had to wait until females evolved before they could reproduce" schtick? He's been told about the evolution of sex more than once on his blog.
He's even sleazier than that.
Posted by: Thomas Galvin | December 1, 2009 8:32 PM
Once again, the sheer weight of the stupidity in this quote threatens to collapse in on itself, forming a singularity. If they can't get the LHC back on-line, they should just have a team of physicists follow Ray around, checking for God Particles.
Posted by: Bob Gardner | December 1, 2009 8:33 PM
@1
As a fellow human being, he makes me feel ashamed.
Posted by: Biology Blogger | December 1, 2009 8:33 PM
I hate the banana man. He always cried how he can't get Richard Dawkins' to answer his questions (obviously this is b.s. I was at a RD book signing a month ago [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0sMT2KAxk_A ], and he took questions--Ray or his sidekick could have dropped by.
Does anyone realize the only his claims could be true, is if the scientific community is intentionally fooling us.
btw...you can see me in the video! Pause the video at 0:07 and look who is half way behind the wall.
Posted by: Alessa Mendes | December 1, 2009 8:34 PM
Unfortunately, he's not squirming at all.
Just take a look at his blog dedicated to Atheists: http://raycomfortfood.blogspot.com/
And what's also terribly unfortunate is that he has many followers who don't find him the least bit absurd. I received one such person on my blog when discussing Ray, and this is what I received:
"To warn someone of impending danger is indeed love. For the innocent to die for the guilty is the greatest expression of love. To spit in the face of such love is the epitome of foolishness. Running helter skelter to destruction with your fingers in your ears has its price." (http://alessamendes.blogspot.com/2009/11/lols-for-your-mid-week-blues.html)
Posted by: Felix | December 1, 2009 8:46 PM
Comfort has apologized for misrepresenting atheists's views, vowing to not repeat it. Less than a week later, he did. Same thing (except that he never apologizes for lying about science) for all of his claims about evolution. He simply doesn't care how often he lies, or to whom. Either he doesn't believe his own doctrine that lying is bad, he doesn't believe that lying is actually prohibited in his doctrine, or he believes that being 'saved' makes him immune to any consequences continued and very frequent lying would otherwise have for anyone else. So he's either a hypocrite, or a prime example why 'deep faith' is dangerous by giving the liar a general pardon for any misconduct.
I suspect it's the former. When he started street preaching and printing his first pamphlets and booklets back in NZ, he discovered how easily fooled people are if one appeals to their religious faith. Today his company (I hear that in the US many companies get to operate tax-free if they call themselves ministries) sells hundreds of different items to anywhere in the world, on a multi-million revenue scale. Ray and his family are luxuriously supported by their salaries (Ray isn't the only one getting regular paychecks from Living Waters). He charges remarkably high 'love offerings' for speaking at various events, which he does about a few times a week I estimate.
Exploiting the gullible is the oldest business invented by clever slackers. From the first shaman asking the returning hunters to leave some nice sirloin at his place OR ELSE, to Ray Comfort cashing in paychecks for money he gets by selling people pieces of paper with OR ELSE printed on them.
Posted by: Tom Foss | December 1, 2009 8:51 PM
Comfort has apparently been learning evolution from comic books, because this understanding just screams Pinkoski to me.
I can't wait until Ray replaces the Crocoduck with the Pygmidwarf.
Posted by: Bruce the Canuck | December 1, 2009 8:52 PM
Well the climategate/swifthack controversy has now brought out not just the ID enemies of science and rationality, but now the postmodernists as well:
BBC: ‘Show Your Working’: What ‘ClimateGate’ means
Warning: do not read unless you don't mind spittle on your monitor.
Posted by: T. Bruce McNeely
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December 1, 2009 8:58 PM
raycomfortfood? Is that the stuff that makes you fat and gives you gas and pimples?
Posted by: CaroCogitatus | December 1, 2009 9:09 PM
Good to see Comfort still thinks the banana's "perfect" shape for our hands is evidence for God.
I'd pay big cash money to see Comfort asked what it means that both mouths and anuses are the same diameter as penises.
Posted by: M31 | December 1, 2009 9:09 PM
I love the story about humans formerly being asexual. It's like someone really stupid is hazily remembering Plato's Symposium.
So a bunch of drunk Greeks are sitting around blabbing about the nature of love, and Aristophanes tells this story of how humans were turned into their present form:
"The original human nature was not like the present, but different. The sexes were not two as they are now, but originally three in number; there was man, woman, and the union of the two
. . .
In the second place, the primeval man was round, his back and sides forming a circle; and he had four hands and the same number of feet, one head with two faces, looking opposite ways, set on a round neck and precisely alike; also four ears, two privy members, and the remainder to correspond. He could walk upright as men now do, backwards or forwards as he pleased, and he could also roll over and over at a great pace, turning on his four hands and four feet, eight in all, like tumblers going over and over with their legs in the air; this was when he wanted to run fast."
Anyway, they pissed off Zeus who chops them in half:
"Each of us when separated, having one side only, like a flat fish, is but the tally-half of a man, and he is always looking for his other half. Men who are a section of that double nature which was once called androgynous are lovers of women; adulterers are generally of this breed, and also adulterous women who lust after men. The women who are a section of the woman do not care for men, but have female attachments; the female companions are of this sort. But they who are a section of the male follow the male, and while they are young, being slices of the original man, they have affection for men and embrace them, and these are the best of boys and youths, because they have the most manly nature."
I don't think the creationists would like that icky gay stuff, though.
I copied the text from here:
http://www.anselm.edu/homepage/dbanach/sym.htm
Posted by: Cuttlefish, OM | December 1, 2009 9:13 PM
@M31--I like my mythology better:
Percy would wander for years at a time;
He was terribly sad and incredibly lonely—
Percy was looking for love, but too bad;
The world had, so far, evolved male creatures only.
Percy was restless, and anxiously watching,
He knew what he wanted; he wanted a wife.
(Although, since the female had not yet evolved,
He had never seen women in all of his life!)
For long generations, his forefathers sought
For some womanly tenderness, softness, and mercy,
But cold evolution denied them their wish;
Now the burden was borne by poor, motherless Percy.
From Grand-dad to Father, from Father to Son,
Generations would pass, without calling for sex.
I haven’t a clue how they managed to do it;
The method, it seems, is a little complex.
Percy has walked tens of thousands of miles
In search of a hopeful mutation or two.
You see, he has parts that he thinks may be useful,
Which haven’t, as yet, had a damned thing to do.
Far away, on the shores of a vast, distant ocean,
A small population is camped by the water,
Where all by themselves, they just sit there evolving,
Granny to Mother, and Mother to Daughter.
Someday, perhaps, as he wanders and wanders,
Percy could find, with a great deal of luck,
He may stumble upon this remote population,
And finally end up with someone to love.
http://digitalcuttlefish.blogspot.com/2009/07/lonely-percy.html
Posted by: jose | December 1, 2009 9:14 PM
WAT
Posted by: Joel
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December 1, 2009 9:34 PM
Far too kind. You should call it what it is -- an abject lie, and utter nonsense to boot.
I would call it a strawman, except that most of the time Homo siliginis is constructed of halfway plausible stuff.
Posted by: Rachel Bronwyn
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December 1, 2009 9:34 PM
Maybe his arguments against evolution are convincing if you don't understand evolution and accept what he discusses as evolution. Sadly, it's not.
In order to effectively refute something, you need to be well versed in it. Comfort does not understand the theory of evolution whatsoever. He doesn't understand science. He is in no position to be debating the legitimacy of something he's so unfamiliar with.
Posted by: ProudMonkey | December 1, 2009 9:38 PM
I agree: Ray's "understanding" that males and females evolved independently in every species (in one list he mentions dogs, wolves, whales, lions, etc.; Dude! they're all mammals!) is quite bewildering. Indeed, such a notion is quite ludicrous. However, I am sure that it has been pointed out to him multiple times that this is not at all predicted from evolutionary theory, and has never been held (or even conceived of) by any scientist, anywhere, ever. Either he is a moron who cannot get this through his head, or he is purposely misleading his unread/unthinking audience.
I can't make up my mind if Ray is 1) the most idiotic person on the planet, or 2) a complete genius. On an earlier post I put forth the hypothesis that Ray might be a comedic genius (a la Andy Kaufman), doing a multi-decade-long "bit" solely to mess with people. Here is another one: Ray is actually a genius atheist. Think of it: he has succeeded in 1) exposing the idiocy of the fundamentalists through his deranged "leadership", 2) rallying rational atheists out of hiding (I know that I was more content to keep to myself before Ray came around).
Okay, I don't believe this hypothesis either...
Posted by: nigelTheBold, Minister of Spankings
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December 1, 2009 9:43 PM
Y'know the saddest part of the whole male/female co-evolution nonsense? There are some people who will nod and mutter, "Yeah, atheist evolutionists! What about them apples!"
Or whatever it is that boneheads mutter when they feel superior.
Posted by: BlueIndependent
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December 1, 2009 10:07 PM
There's something sadistically funny about that clip of his, it's so wrong. In fact I think it may be wrong to such an extent that even some creobots would give him the "are you serious?" eye. One would hope, anyhow.
In some ways I agree with Proud Monkey: Comfort is either a cask-aged kind of stupid, or he's the genius playing a special kind of fool and everybody's the butt of the joke. I still gravitate toward the former, but some days you have to wonder, when he can just waltz into and out of engagements as if the world revolved by his foot steps and the sun rose for his benefit.
Posted by: nigelTheBold, Minister of Spankings
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December 1, 2009 10:10 PM
@BlueIndependent,
I think he can be both stupid, and narcissistic. It works for Sarah Palin. I think folks like that actually believe their own version of the world, in a weird sort of solipsistic truth-building alternate reality.
It doesn't take intelligence to be arrogantly certain in your own ignorance.
Posted by: luna1580 | December 1, 2009 10:15 PM
i just want to pipe up with continued support for Hemant Mehta!
i'm too old to be a (non-uni) student here now, and have yet to breed (by choice, i'm 29), but he teaches in my city's public school system (naperville) where i went to all my k-12 classes, and i have cousins now in his school.
thank reason that he can still teach (as they haven't quite fired him yet for daring to have a blog, as far as i know). yea!
Posted by: bcoppola | December 1, 2009 10:26 PM
Ray Comfort is not only sleazier than we suppose, but sleazier than we can suppose.
Posted by: Eamon Knight | December 1, 2009 10:30 PM
Comfort seems to be trying to retreat into the familiar "It was only a joke!" defense re the banana (subtext: haven't you meeeeeaaaan atheists got a sense of humour?). Except he keeps hedging on it. Anyway, I ain't buying it. The banana argument also leads off his tract "The Atheist's Nightmare", along with the Coke can argument and similar stupidity -- it's more or less the dead tree version of the video with the same arguments. There's no hint that the banana bit is a joke, but the rest of the tract isn't. OR maybe it's all a joke -- along with everything else Comfort says! Works for me.
Posted by: Joshua Zelinsky
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December 1, 2009 10:35 PM
This interview more than anything else convinces me that Ray Comfort is just immune to things which might alter his worldview.
He repeats his strange claim about male and females of species. He claims that speciation can't occur even though the evidence is so overwhelming that even AiG lists it as an argument creationists should not use. And he can't list any piece of evidence that would convince him that evolution is correct.
I think there's something about him that renders him truly incapable of assimilating information that is at all contrary to what he believes. We should feel sorry for him.
Posted by: cameronsnipples | December 1, 2009 10:36 PM
PeeWee Kiwi did this 'interview' by email - if the squicky little weasel would have been live in front of Mr. Mehta, his title would have been changed to the Homicidal Atheist :)
Thunderf00t posted another Raytard episode on Youtube - look up episode 31 for some fun.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | December 1, 2009 10:42 PM
Not only historically false and a complete misrepresentation by also fucking batshit insane as any farmer's child would understand.
Apparently there are not that many children of farmers among us. Pity, that.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | December 1, 2009 10:44 PM
. . . by = but . . . no typesetter's son, I.
Posted by: Joshua Zelinsky
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December 1, 2009 10:49 PM
Also, it is very interesting to note that when they decided to take out chapters of Origin, he claims they picked random chapters. That shows how little actual thought went into this. I have to seriously wonder if Comfort ever actually read the book.
Posted by: Jarred C.
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December 1, 2009 11:16 PM
@28, Joshua
I find it hard to believe that he "randomly" chose the four most crucial chapters that would refute his introduction.
Ch 9: transitional fossils
Ch 11&12: biogeography (distribution of plants and animals)
ch 13: how evolution makes sense of classification, morphology, and embryology
Posted by: Zak | December 1, 2009 11:19 PM
To hijack a quote from JBS Haldane...
Comfort is not only crazier than we suppose, he is crazier than we can suppose. HAHAHA!
Posted by: Gyeong Hwa Pak | December 1, 2009 11:20 PM
As long as he ignores the argument, he's right!
Just as much as ignoring scientific evidence proves creationism right! Ignorance is his new best friend!
Posted by: Yubal
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December 1, 2009 11:36 PM
LoL! Independent evolution of males and females? How dumb is that?!?
I know who gave Ray his X Chromosome. HA! :P
Posted by: Michael | December 1, 2009 11:43 PM
One of the 3 books on evolution he has read is The Wild World of the Future with a recommended reading level for ages 9 to 11. Doesn't he feel at least a little bit of shame that this is one of the books he uses for his beliefs.
Posted by: Olorin | December 1, 2009 11:45 PM
Has no one yet circulated to Comfort the story of the evolution of the banana? How it evolved in 1836 in Jamaica from a nearly inedible red/green plantain?
Posted by: Eric | December 2, 2009 12:00 AM
As much as Ray likes to make the claim that he lives the life of a pauper and that he's only in it to save your everlasting soul from an eternity in hell, I've seen estimates on business sites that his company (Living Waters Publications) pulls in from $10 to $20 million in gross revenue a year hawking books, DVDs and seminars. His business makes it's money by playing on the insecurities, ignorance and vulnerabilities of his flock. Not bad for spending most of your day outside in sunny California on a milk crate, yelling absurdities at strangers.
What other occupation can you seriously see Ray Comfort qualified for? Maybe a used car dealer... (apologies in advance to any used car dealers reading this)
[1] http://www.spoke.com/info/c361cqp/LivingWatersPublications
Posted by: madbull | December 2, 2009 12:17 AM
I find the banana to be a perfect shape for some other activity as well.
How come the church finds that largely immoral? If God designed the banana to perfection to suit all purposes
Posted by: LinzeeBinzee | December 2, 2009 12:30 AM
I don't blame Hemant for wanting to do an email interview...it gets tiring fast listening to Comfort talk. But I wish he had been able to do some follow up questions. Not that I would have expected any more meaningful answers, but it would be nice to push him to answer at least one question thoughtfully.
I found it funny that I got a mention in the interview by Ray. Of course my question was somewhat dodged...I plan on taking him up on his suggestion to google the quotes he used, see how honest he was being. I'll blog about it hopefully this week.
I thought his banana answer explained a lot though, it makes me think he's slightly less of an idiot that the banana thing was some kind of comedy routine.
Posted by: BrianX | December 2, 2009 1:01 AM
The "comedy" excuse is as much bullshit as Rush Limbaugh claiming to be an "entertainer". You can't tell me he didn't mean it, even if he did intend it to be funny; he's just that ignorant.
What I have wondered for a long time: when he and Kirk debated the now-dissolved Rational Response Squad, did Kelly (now doing porn as Kasey Grant; GIS is NSFW) manage to get blackmail photos of one of them in a compromising position with her? I hope she did...
Posted by: Joshua Zelinsky
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December 2, 2009 1:18 AM
Jarred,
You make a good point. However, after reading this interview I have trouble believing that Comfort has enough understanding to realize that those chapters are the ones to take out.
Posted by: Ichthyic | December 2, 2009 1:25 AM
Has no one yet circulated to Comfort the story of the evolution of the banana? How it evolved in 1836 in Jamaica from a nearly inedible red/green plantain?
what do you think?
you can go to the original youtube thread where he first posted his "atheist challenge" and see for yourself by reading the comments.
I think it's mentioned in the first dozen comments or so, and then again about 200 times over the first several thousand comments.
a year later, he even admitted publicly to not knowing bananas were agriculturally selected product.
so now you know.
he's just a sham.
Posted by: Jewbacca | December 2, 2009 1:40 AM
Cuttlefish FTW. Makes me think Comfort's source isn't addled recollection of the Symposium so much as watching The American Astronaut as a scientific prehistory of humanity.
Posted by: Jarred C.
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December 2, 2009 1:49 AM
Joshua,
Bwahaa! You're probably right.
Posted by: Jarred C.
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December 2, 2009 1:54 AM
@ Ichthyic #40
Comfort has a response to the "banana proof against evolution" thing.
http://assets.livingwaters.com/presskit/BananaControversy.pdf
He basically states that the youtube video of the history of the banana is false, and anyone who believes it is gullible. Therefore, his original statement is correct. (I think?)
Posted by: Gyeong Hwa Pak | December 2, 2009 1:57 AM
A shame that he can't seem to come the same conclusion about his own belief in creation.
Posted by: Tyrtamus
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December 2, 2009 2:06 AM
Any credibility Ray had left (if any) is gone after that bit about how if the bible says so, the christian must come to accept it as fact.
That's it. Pack it in, Ray.
Posted by: Ichthyic | December 2, 2009 2:10 AM
Comfort has a response to the "banana proof against evolution" thing.
iow, he lied.
yes, i know :)
Posted by: Janine, She Wolf Of Pharyngula, OM | December 2, 2009 3:03 AM
There are times i am pissed off about the fact the there are people who willingly follow such a transparently stupid and deceitful man such as Ray Comfort. At other times, I am happy the it is a minority that pays credence. Perhaps the trick is to isolate the fools.
Sadly, some of these fools can get into positions of power. (Yes, I do mean George Walker Bush.) Or get in a position to influence the makers of laws. (Those group of assholes who are pushing that inhumane law in Uganda.)
Bleeh.
Posted by: rufustfirefly | December 2, 2009 3:17 AM
What other occupation can you seriously see Ray Comfort qualified for?
Carnival huckster? Man who places flyers under windshields? Jizz mopper?
Posted by: ambulocetacean
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December 2, 2009 3:28 AM
lol @ crudelywrott #27. Nice to see somebody who appreciates the the noble and ancient profession of typesetting.
(BTW, newspaper sub-editors/copy editors are also important, though they're increasingly being made redundant. They don't just fix spelling errors; they fix countless factual errors. If you saw the raw gibberish that many reporters file you would weep).
Anyway, have the anti-evolutionists heard about the observable evolution of E.coli or, even better, those lizards off the coast of Croatia or wherever it is?
Doubtless they have an answer for everything, like the fact that the koala's pouch opens near the bottom, increasing the risk of babies falling out of the trees.
I'd heard that it was because the koala evolved from a burrowing marsupial that didn't want to fill its pouch up with dirt. But Creation Ministries International says "It’s also possible that the Creator gave the koala a backwards-facing pouch to thwart man’s attempts to explain its origins by natural processes."
I guess that's evolution buggered, then.
Posted by: ambulocetacean
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December 2, 2009 3:34 AM
* "the the" should read "the". No typesetter's son, me neither.
Posted by: Richard Eis | December 2, 2009 6:10 AM
Ugh, the man is like a drunk:
Saying inappropriate things, randomly bumping into things and messing them up and apologizing for his idiocy. All the while thinking he's fantastic.
Posted by: colluvial | December 2, 2009 6:38 AM
Yes, Ray, and that's how we get smarter and smarter. You, on the other hand, have chosen to remain stupid. Through science, humankind has made incredible advances in technology and our understanding of the universe. Christianity, however, after two millenia, hasn't even figured out how to make prayer work.Posted by: Thomas Theobald | December 2, 2009 7:31 AM
You guys have to understand this by now - Comfort isn't doing this because he believes it, he's doing this to make cash.
Same as the fuckwits who sell homeopathy or any other snake oil, Comfort has his following of people who'll pay money for his tripe, and he will never allow his view to be publicly swayed by logic. He probably knows full well that what he's peddling is worthless, but if he admits defeat in any way he loses followers, therefore he loses money.
He'll never do that.
Why be shocked? Just treat him as the detestable prick he is, and continue to ridicule him.
T
Posted by: Craggsy89
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December 2, 2009 7:35 AM
The thing I dislike most about Comfort is that in his videos he denounces uncertainty and fails to see how it is an intellectually honest stance.
He claims to know, i mean actually 'KNOW', that god is real and that he created the earth as it is now. And if you say otherwise he simply says 'Were you there?'
Correct me if i'm wrong but isn't bearing false witness in the top 10 of the celestial 'don't do' hit list? Saying you know something that no-one could possibly know is lying. Unfortunatly i thought even seven year olds were aware of that.
In the U.K. we have a show called newsnight presented by the most blunt man you can imagine. He is a legend among interviewers. If you really want to get Comfort grilled and if you want him to be confronted with such blunt questions that will make him beg for mercy... then JEREMY PAXMAN is your man.
Posted by: bayamo
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December 2, 2009 7:56 AM
I have to admit it is difficult not to watch and comment on Ray Comfort but it has become apparent that we merely feed him and give him ammunition which he twists to his own ends when dealing with the gullible sheep he fleeces.I have been guilty of this on occasion by going to websites of those such as Ray to put in my 2 cents.
Would I be labeled an accomadationist if I were to request starting a campaign to Starve the Creationists by simply dropping reference to the names of those that make claims out of ignorance or outright lie to serve their own agendas? I am troubled by how much it seems that we give support to and ammo for the very people we need to make less notable in the public eye.
Perhaps I am too idealistic but we should maybe target only the poor arguements and misinformation and no longer feed the egos and pocetbooks of those that pray on the gullible.
Just a thought.
Posted by: Rachel Bronwyn
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December 2, 2009 8:17 AM
RE: koala pouches
They're actually unique beyond their positioning. Koalas have a muscle that functions like a drawstring, keeping the joey hidden inside or holding them in place like a seatbelt.
They almost certainly descended from a terrestrial wombat relative though. All marsupials evolved from arboreal possum relatives. Modern possums never descended from the trees. Kangaroos and wombats did. Critters like tree kangaroos and koalas demonstrate that many marsupials have moved back into the trees, despite having descended to the ground at one point.
Definitely a good chance koala marsupium positioning has to do with their terrestrial stage and trying to avoid dirty pouches though. Significantly more likely than Skydaddy demonstrating his awesome powahs.
I wish there were still giant koalas like there were 50,000 years ago.
Posted by: Opisthokont
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December 2, 2009 8:51 AM
I agree with Joel (#15): PZ is being far too generous to Comfort here. Comfort is not misrepresenting science (hah -- watch that get quote-mined!): he is not representing any kind of science at all. Pauli's famous quip comes to mind: "That's not right. That's not even wrong."
Posted by: nigelTheBold, Minister of Spankings
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December 2, 2009 8:51 AM
Reading that interview was like taking a crash course in missing the point.
Q: "What do you say to those who claim you get don't know a damned thing about science?"
A: "The law of gravity is a law! The theory of evolution is only a theory! And physicists agree with me on this."
*sigh*
He's really good at self-deprecation. He uses it to some effect to hide his arrogance, and to mask the fact that he's not answering the fucking questions.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | December 2, 2009 9:37 AM
Best rhyme ever.
Posted by: joe america | December 2, 2009 10:13 AM
The fact that God did not tell Ray that Bananas are domesticated, is evidence that God does not talk to Ray.
They should put that in the Biology textbooks.
Posted by: Mick | December 2, 2009 10:20 AM
This one is getting old. You can watch video after video of him asking on the street "How did sex occur in evolution? Did the man wait for the women or the women the man?" It is always just total proof of his vast misunderstaning (or refusal to understand) natural selection as a vital part of evolution. He always goes to tbe basic thought "we are here we gad to be created" beacuse apparently all things must be created except, of course, the creator himself.
http://www.dabreo.net/comfort/index.html
Posted by: Antiochus Epiphanes | December 2, 2009 10:27 AM
Wait...that doesn't rhyme.
Oh!
I love this.
Posted by: Sean | December 2, 2009 10:49 AM
Anyone know why Google is not linking to The Friendly Atheist today?
Posted by: Glen Davidson
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December 2, 2009 11:07 AM
At least this more recent twaddle about the evolution of the sexes seems to help to explain Comfort's amazingly ignorant past statements.
Now I want to know why he's so happy to remain pig-ignorant, and lying through his teeth.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/mxaa3p
Posted by: Aratina Cage
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December 2, 2009 11:20 AM
Sean, that is very strange! I googled for "god site:friendlyatheist.com" and no results. It works fine for "god site:scienceblogs.com". Looks like Hemant really has been removed.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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December 2, 2009 11:26 AM
I disagree. 'Luck' doesn't rhyme with 'love'. Clearly not Cuttlefish's best work.
Posted by: Aratina Cage
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December 2, 2009 11:28 AM
Brownian, that was sarcasm, right?
Posted by: lose_the_woo
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December 2, 2009 11:43 AM
Never before Ray have I heard of such a poorly developed, profoundly ignorant, stupid, stupid, notion. Ever.
How can a person of his age, in this time, walk this planet and think that evolutionary science is so absurd as to claim that males and females of a species developed on separate sexual paths?!
Dumbfuck Ray, if sexual creatures were not reproducing sexually, there wouldn't be any. Whether it's a teeny tiny microscopic organism (that evolves into something vastly different over the course of deep time) or substantial creatures, if they fuck to reproduce, then in order to reproduce, they better get to fucking, and fucking is probably how they got here to begin with.
Man, you are a dim wit.
Posted by: Steven Mading
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December 2, 2009 11:43 AM
I got the impression from reading this that the questions were all prepped ahead of time and Ray was sent them and answered them back in one pass, without interaction. Not so much an interview as filling out a questionnaire.
I got this impression because there were plenty of places for Hemant to raise a further question in reply to a completely evasive unsatisfactory answer by Ray, but he never once did.
Posted by: momentofsciencetx | December 2, 2009 11:45 AM
I heard an interview with Ray Comfort about a year ago on the Thom Hartman show. Ray was talking about life moving from water to land and made the comment of how did this happen, he asked did fish run out of the water take a few breathes and then run back in doing this over and over until they evolved the ability to breathe air? (Not his exact quote) All I could think was this idiot must think fish breathe water. He has no understanding of even basic life science.
Posted by: Richard Eis | December 2, 2009 11:49 AM
If we did what you said, we would be told we were being elitist and or HIDING THE TRUTH!!!1!. Depending on the flavour of creationist.
It makes no difference what we do. A stuck record is a stuck record. We are here to explain to others why it is a stuck record.
Don't worry, Ray does more harm to creationism than good.
Posted by: Brownian, Most Vicious & Petty of Pharyngulites
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December 2, 2009 11:54 AM
@aratina cage:
Huh? Sarcasm? Me?
I'm still confused as to why Cuttlefish doesn't use the time machine he clearly has in his possession to go back and right some of history's wrongs rather than simply using it to produce brilliantly satirical poems about current events and post them within minutes of the events taking place. He must follow some marine temporal prime directive or something.
Posted by: lose_the_woo
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December 2, 2009 11:59 AM
Not surprising. This is also the stunning mind that questioned why there are no crocoducks. He actually thinks that argument is a problem for evolution.
Complete. Moron.
Posted by: Sean | December 2, 2009 12:05 PM
Seriously, google search for "Friendly Atheist" does not bring me any link to Hemant's page. I find this very strange. Anyone else have this problem?
Posted by: lose_the_woo
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December 2, 2009 12:09 PM
Sean,
I've replicated that. The top story was a Boing Boing about his Comfort "interview". I even tried variations.
Interesting.
Posted by: Acronym Jim | December 2, 2009 12:11 PM
Perhaps Mr. Comfort is not being dishonest. Perhaps, instead, his brain is so full of cherries picked from the bible, that he is simply incapable of retaining any new knowledge.
This would also explain his verbal spewage, to which anyone who has over-eaten cherries can relate.
Posted by: Joshua Zelinsky
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December 2, 2009 2:02 PM
It looks like google has dropped Hemant's website for some reason. This sometimes happens if a website has been hacked to have malicious code or if someone has complained to google for some reason and google didn't check it well enough. Someone who is in contact with Hemant should let Hemant know so it can be fixed. This happened a few years ago with the Talk Origins Archive. Very unpleasant.
Posted by: Sean | December 2, 2009 2:09 PM
I emailed him about it.
Posted by: Ichthyic | December 2, 2009 3:01 PM
Saying inappropriate things, randomly bumping into things and messing them up and apologizing for his idiocy. All the while thinking he's fantastic.
wait, Ray Comfort is actually Maxwell Smart?
Posted by: sav | December 2, 2009 5:37 PM
Comfort is fucking insufferable. I couldn't even finish reading the interview. Smug and dumb.
Posted by: Alison | December 2, 2009 8:16 PM
As I quickly glanced over the post (multitasking, as usual), I misread Hemant Mehta as Harun Yahya. It didn't take long to mentally correct myself, but I've been quite amused at the idea of what vastly amusing lunacy might come from a meeting of those two minds.
Posted by: red rabbit | December 2, 2009 8:31 PM
Running it around in my head... I can't imagine he's stupid enough to actually believe that trash... but that is a whole level of cynical if he doesn't... around and around.
Posted by: Sarah | December 2, 2009 9:40 PM
Ray doesn't believe he's a human being. He thinks he doesn't have a blind spot in his eye(s).
https://www.blogger.com/comment.g?blogID=5823596693953871104&postID=5359784484253650376&pli=1
Posted by: Mack the Spife | December 3, 2009 10:30 AM
I had never actually been to Ray's site before this. After visiting it, I'm fairly sure that Comfort's brain was pickled many a year ago. Nothing else could account for...well, everything that is WRONG with it.
Posted by: ivo | December 3, 2009 10:38 AM
One day in high school phylosophy class I and a couple of classmates were in front of everybody else acting out part of the Symposium; somehow, we ended up doing the "round" people of the old days before envious Olympic gods created males and females (and homosexuals!) by cutting up everybody in two halves.
That was good fun.
Posted by: Steve D | December 3, 2009 8:50 PM
Aren't there some, er, highly unorthodox uses for bananas? And since bananas are so ideally suited for said uses, clearly God ordained them to be used that way. Right?
And bananas fit the hands of a chimp as perfectly as they do a human. Clearly God is giving us a sign of the truth of evolution.
Posted by: Mark Ahote | December 17, 2009 6:55 AM
Ths s nt stff. A lt f nfrmtn gvn n smpl mnnr. Nc. I ls chckd t nthr lnk dctn flshcrds. It mght hlp smn. Tk cr.