Oh, yeah, the party...

Dammit PZ, there's nothing I would have liked more than last night to have shown up, but you only announced it on here a few hours in advance, and I'm all the way out in Maryland.

PZ, don`t focus too much on godlessness. If someone believes that a god sparked the bigbang it`s at least for the next 100 years fine as well and you get to encompass a larger audience.

I think it is fine to have a believe in a god as long as it doesn`t interfere with the logic and reason of science itself.

Try to welcome reasonable religious folks, who feel more comfortable with a traditional god when it comes to "before the universe issues".

Netwon was a religious fundamentalist as hardcore as it gets, yet he contributed a great deal to science because in the end science itself dictates what`s useful and what rather gets scrapped or a serious overhaul.

You can`t speed up the social process of memonics. It will take centuries till religions in the way we know it gradually die out as ultimately the world is dominated by economy - which dictates social evolution. In other words you cannot work against nature. It would be smart to welcome people who need a god but at the same time get a kick out of reason and logic, that is people who are inherently curious in their nature.

In the end (and i may be wrong) you ultimately want to raise the number of good sciensts in this world, at least in the US not merely increase the number of atheists. You want others to feel the same excitement one has each and everyday when it comes to the wonders of nature and the joy one shares with others when nature`s inner workings are unravled one wonder at a time.

njoy the party,lorence

PZ, We'd love to come to your party but I found out about it the day of. It's a few hours drive for me... Could you notify us 1 day in advance?
We would love to hang out with you guys!

I live in the cities, love your blog, first time posting.

P.S. What did you mean when you said you don't want to destroy religion?

I disagree. The Big Bang was a natural phenomenon, like any other. If the "God being at work" is not an adequate explanation for hurricanes, earthquakes, or infections, there is no reason to see it as satisfactory for the initiation of life itself, or the Big Bang.
In fact, ideas exist as to what the Bang itself might have actually been(collision of so called "brane worlds" or the outcome of a "big crunch" beforehand). Whether any of these ideas is accurate, only time will tell. But attributing it to God(or Thor or Zeus, for all I care)is a complicated way of saying we don't know.

"Aftermath," eh? Exactly what kind of "aftermath?"

This really cracked me up, PZ...

I could have made it in time, but I had other plans. Friday is usually movie night with the neighbors and I had just told them which movies I found at the library. Hope everyone had a good time, but if your talking about an 'aftermath' then you probably did.

OK, next time I'll give more advance notice. We'll probably do it again in February.

Seriously, though, I don't expect people to make the long trip. We really are far, far away from everything, and it's about a 3 hour drive from any of the nearest metropolitan centers (Minneapolis, Fargo, and Sioux Falls). You have to like a little isolation to thrive out here.

Dude, when everyone heard you were gonna play those live Dead bootlegs, everyone was totally scared off.

Oh yeah, that and you live way the hell out in western Minnesota.

Well, I could help with the leftover beer, but aftermath?

I don't even do foremath.

I'd love to party with you PZ, but I don't have a car, can't afford bus fare, and I live in New Jersey. I could start walking, but I kinda got responsibilities right now. Let's just consider the party I threw last night to have been an extension of your party. It was "Dress like a Pirate" night, in honor of my college, Seton Hall, and we all got plastered on rum. 8^D

Had to drive for a field trip out to the Algadones dunes today and start early. Anyway, Yuma is a couple or three day drive from MN.

Hope you had a great time.

I'd've visited but I didn't know about it. Also I live in Maryland, which is about a zillion hours from Minnesota.

for my part, I had to make sure i was at home to catch the all-day giant cephalop extravaganza on the sci-fi channel on Saturday.

there on "Octopus 2" right now, with a new one coming on right after called "Kraken: Tentacles of Doom".

how could i possibly miss that?

Sorry, dude, but the closest we got to your place was Duluth, and that was two weekends ago. Seriously, we might even have made the detour if we knew, and the timing was right (that'd be what, about a four hour drive?). We're back in Otawa now (Yes, the trip around Superior was lovely, thank you. Trees are turning nicely up near Wawa. Also: MN state parks are really great).

Have you noticed what they were calling a "face" on Mars now looks more like a colossal statue of the Flying Spaghetti Monster?

(Covered in lots of Mars dust, of course.)

I may be a gal with a math fetish but aftermath just doesn't have the same glow...
By the way, the University of Minnesota front page sucks. I was just trying to get an idea where Morris is because I drive through Minneapolis and Fargo on my way to Saskatchewan but the page designers don't seem to realize that you can make links without javascript and not being able to use the back button to actually go back instead of getting the same page is really annoying. The links don't work at all in Opera. I take it that this isn't a very strong computer science school?

Computer science can be more theory than practice.

As you're driving between Minneapolis and Fargo, you pass through Alexandria. You get off there and drive south on highway 59 for about 45 minutes, and there's Morris. Here's a map.

Thanks for the map! Fergus Falls is about half way and I have been tempted to stay there a couple times but push on to Jamestown, ND because there's usually a long wait at the Canadian border. It seems like if you are travelling alone or know anyone there the car needs to be searched so I allow extra time for that and then I don't get in too late.

I would have loved to go, but livng in the Southern Netherlands makes it a tough slog. Perhaps next time my wife and I are visiting friends and family in Minnesota, if you have another shindig and it coincides, we'll be there...

jeez, GC, with the Dead-bashing.

Unused beer can always be donated to the Norwegianity Foundation which then undertakes the arduous task of recycling the fermented beverage and reintroducing it back into our ecosystem so that it can once again become life-nourishing rain for our crops.

Donations can be sent to the Norwegianity Foundation, P.O. Box 14264, St. Paul, MN 55114.