I get email

This forced Mr. Korn to escalate his outreach.

How can one sentence seem so cute and innocuous, yet chilling and ominous?

Someone is Kookoo for cocopuffs.

According to his Yahoo profile, he's a 48 year-old "Evangelist and Truth & Peace Seeker" (I can't make stuff like that up) named Michael from Colorado, so I would say chances are that you've got the same guy.

Gee, I always thought Christians are the ones who were persecuted rather than being the ones doing the persecuting. This must be some advanced form of Christianity that I'm just not equiped to understand.

I haven't removed any comments from my "message board" lately, and they aren't in the automatic junk bin, either. Someone is a little confused.

Indeed. His two comments are right here.

Man oh man, if ever anyone needed pharmaceuticals...
Risperdal and Depakote, by the bucket load, for Mr. Korn, please!

I have to say that the Monty Python "Gumby" background is perfect for this loony. "My brain hurts" indeed.

Shouldn't we start a donation drive so that this fella can afford his medication again? He's obviously been off them for long enough by now...

PZ:

At the risk of being paranoid, I think you should contact the authorities in Boulder and also provide a copy of this correspondence to your administration and campus police at Morris. The casual way that this message attaches personal information is disturbing. Most of the kooks I encounter focus on their own ideas, their persona, why they are so important. This fellow, on the other hand, refers repeatedly to his frustration with others and names names. That's not harmless village idiot kooky---that's Mark David Chapman/Squeaky Fromme kooky. When the fantasist starts focusing on what others do or don't do, they are potentially dangerous and should be treated as such.

Readers of Pharyngula who know anything about this character, I would encourage you to be similarly diligent.

Concerned...SH

"you pretend to be a macho Charles Bronson of truth, but you are really just a Hilliar(d)ious joker"

Macho Charles Bronson of truth......this man is a master of comedy!!! Pure genius!!

I (d)on't understan(d) the hillar(d)ious part though....

Now that this nut is throwing confetti all over, has Robert Crowther of the Discovery Institute had the decency to say, "It was a religious nut after all, not a Darwinist in disguise, naturally we disavow this person and what he's doing, he has no connection to the DI," or even "I was wrong, I apologize for what I said"?

I know the answer is nada, folks. I just wonder if these Christians who think they have so much to teach the rest of us have any real integrity or human feeling for anyone besides God. I have strong feelings of protectiveness toward people with whom I profoundly disagree (and with whom I've traded some bitter words). To me, that's just my nature - I don't need religion, and I don't see what their religion is doing for them when they obviously hate their "enemies" (their word, not mine). I guess when you disavow common descent you disavow common decency.

Look kids, a rambling idiot with some extremely poor sites about creationism, lets point and laugh.

Why is it so much worse to be descended from monkeys than to be made from dirt?

I was curious if the unusual word "devilution" (which I don't recall ever seeing before) came up elsewhere. An initial search found http://gbcdecatur.org/sermons/QuestionOfFirstCause.html with the great start (the "..." is in the original):

DEVILUTION:
(EVOLUTION'S EROSION OF MANKIND)
The Question of First Cause
(Genesis 1:1)
This week the Genesis Space Capsule came crashing down to earth...it's [sic] mission was to explore and find the origin of life and creation using unreliable scientific methods, unproven hypotheses and imaginary fairy tales! It's [sic] crash is symbolic of the crash the theory of Evolution encounters when it drives by the intersection of the Bible, God's Word!

And it gets loopier.

At first glance, not related; indeed, searching for "devilution"-plus-"Darwin" found very few hits (c.150), but I didn't have the stomach to look at any more. My irony metre melted down a few weeks back, and my B*S* detector pegged so hard I've still got a ringing sound in my ears!

The Boulder police have a reputation for not being the brightest bulbs on the tree.

I'm basing this on the botched investigation of the death of the 4 year old, Joan-benoit Ramsay. IIRC correctly, a report on the handling of the case was critical of the Boulder PD for hopelessly compromising the case. It has never been solved and likely won't be.

Out here (Pacific coast), the CD Boulder terrorist has broken enough laws that a restraining order at least would be granted for the asking.

The CD, Boulder administration should increase the security around the biology building at the very least. Security cameras at the entrances, increased patrols, maybe a permanent guard. If this guy does a Seung Cho, the admin. is going to look like idiots as they also look for new jobs. The university has a duty to protect students, staff, and faculty as much as possible.

For some reason, a quote from Dr. Evil comes to my mind:"It's Dr. Evil, I didn't spend six years in Evil Medical School to be called "mister," thank you very much."
I guess to these kooks PZ must bear a canny resemblance to Donald Pleasance's Blofeld (I bet they think the beard is just there to camouflage that huge scar).

I vote for psychriatric treatment of this concerned American christian, before anything serious happens.

The dude is clearly unstable.

Even after the police were brought in, and newspaper articles are written about him, he still doesn't get it.

If everyone thinks you're acting like a loon... maybe you need to do a little introspection.

you pretend to be a macho Charles Bronson of truth, but you are really just a Hilliar(d)ious joker.

Oh how clever these creationists are. Did you see how he placed the d inside Hilarious? SO that it spelled Hillard's name in the word.

Did you see it. The (d)? Right there in hillarious [sic]

Did you?

Awesome.

Why is it so much worse to be descended from monkeys than to be made from dirt?

There's no
CHUNK OF CLAY
in my family tree!

Would a good tutoring session do it? He obviously misunderstands biological science, and probably general scientific thinking and methodology as well, and feels persecuted because no one will let him air out his dirty laundry.

This may be optimistic, but why don't we just send him some really good evolutionary biology books, or have the professors he has written to give him a private lecture (with police protection, of course)?

It is seldom you get a case as factually easy to win as evolution, yet so hard to perceptually win with the (American) public.

I´ve been visiting Science blogs for long time and MartinM just taught me that you can link specific comments. It´s just too cool.

I've been getting these comments on mySpace saying "a growing number of scientists are subscribing to YECreationism and that there are a lot of problems with old earth neodarwinism"

Where is this happening?

I adjure everyone to go to Guide to Old earth

I hate to say it, but Scott Hatfield has a point(#9). I think you had better be careful and take some kind of proactive stance on this. This guy is obviously a dangerous psycopath and is capable of only GOD knows what.

If CU really is a place that encourages a diversity of balanced views, then the fault for whatever offense Mr. Korn caused the campus officials is entirely CU's.

If CU is anything like my university, it is most certainly not a place for balanced views.

I'm sure it is heavily biased towards truth as supported by evidence.

"Why is it so much worse to be descended from monkeys than to be made from dirt?"

I would be willing to entertain the proposition that some are descended from "monkey dirt".

Would a good tutoring session do it?

Probably not unless it involved a course of antipsychotics. This guy isn't merely misguided or misinformed -- he's actively harassing teachers and researchers in their workplaces, and obviously dedicating a lot of time and energy to the effort.

I'm with Scott on this. If someone were sending grandiose, insulting, and even vaguely threatening e-mails to me, and I knew that this person was also harassing other people, I'd make sure there was a record of it with local police at both ends. In fact, I'd go even further -- I'd contact the university legal office and make it clear that there would be financial repercussions for the university if this person slips through the cracks and harms anyone or destroys their property.

I agree that this guy is potentially dangerous, and you should forward the materials to the FBI (since this would now be an interstate affair). With copies to the Boulder police, of course.

Steve Fisher: The guy's probably not a psychopath (who would be more coherent and more direct). The pattern is that of a psychotic condition such as schizophrenia. Some of these conditions are treatable, but only if you can get the patient to keep taking their meds!

He's not insane. He made direct threats (quotes about "killing" and the skull and crossbones), then tried to deny their meaning. No, not that crazy.

Second the FBI suggestion, even just a heads up. Maybe they can light a fire under the Bolder Police Dpertment's arse. I'm pretty sure they don't want a repeat of James Kopp.

Why is it that religious kooks peddling make-believe silliness with no proof of its veracity ALWAYS have the word "truth" in their blog titles and/or email addies? AFDave's "Kids4Truth" crapucopia of Creationist comedy springs readily to mind and causes involuntary giggling.

Well, seems that Wired Science has received pretty much the same mails, directly from Korn. That post I linked to, is BTW addressed to answer this post.

At least we can give him the "using adjure correctly in a sentence" merit badge? Never seen anybody do that before. If he's keeping abjure and adjure straight, someone's clearly benefited from a classical education. Pity they didn't teach him logic.

raven wrote:

"I'm basing this on the botched investigation of the death of the 4 year old, Joan-benoit Ramsay."

You're confusing Jon-Benet Ramsey with Joan Benoit, the winner of the first-ever women's Olympic Marathon (Los Angeles, 1984) and the American record holder in the event for over 20 years. But I'm pleased you've heard of Joanie! She rocks and is still competing as she pushed 50.

PZ, have you run the message headers to see where the e-mail came from? Not that there seems to be much doubt who sent it, but...

Hold on guys. (#26 & #27) It's okay to joke and say he needs antipsychotics (mea culpa) but to diagnose armchair side or dismiss any disorder so glibly might be construed as unscientific and gasp....irresponsible.
Most people don't have the slightest clue distinguishing Schizo-affective Disorder from Schizophrenia, Borderline Personality from Bipolar I - IV or Cyclothemia, for that matter. Actually most people can't find their bunghole with both hands and a torch, but that's another matter, which may explain my dysphoria.
Saying, "He can't be this, because he said that or magically phrased it in this manner," is utter nonsense and is remeniscent of the "truthiness" crap we claim we hate about IDers.
His behavior does indicate the need for scrutiny by a certified Psychiatrist (or twelve) but please keep the "Psychiatry according to Tom Cruise" stuff under your hat.

Liars and shady hypocrites will have their day in court for all to see them shamelessly displayed like the infamous Emperor with No Clothes.

Oh, man! He must've missed the Kitzmiller case!

There's no
CHUNK OF CLAY
in my family tree!

Yes there is! Montmorillonite Clay!

Grrr-r!
"geologistsfortruth..." as an IDiot venue is a serious calumny on old lace-boot, gad point rock hammer, jake-stick and Brunton's pocket transit geologists. Don't forget the notebook- usually by K&E as embossed on the wearably thick cover. A "survey & sample" traverse gives y'plenty of time to chew on evidence an' probability from the library in your head. While you are on the lookout for rattlesnakes. The old Wallace & Tiernan anaeroid forgot where "sea level" was when a grandkit did a tumble with it here in Cretaceous country.
Awash in the past? Lookit the MRI unfolding of shale specimens! Lookit the Turkish dendro- samples with page-by-page calibration of C-14 scales that just simply outrun ANY bibliochronological interpretation. The creos have their "hoar frost" excuse for 850K years of ice cores. I think that Dawkins and Hitchens (with comrades)are right in finally blowing the whistle on the ecological hazard of our scrapped BS-O-Meters piling up. Meme flatulence is an environmental hazard.

Amen Skeptic8 (I think).
I'll have to reread you and go on a Yahoo search or two, But I think I get the gist, even though I am not a scientist.
Will whistle blowing to the closed minded (and closed nostrilled, evidently) ever really clear the air? After all, almost half the U.S. population believe that Hussein was a part of 9/11 and just as many believe the one about Rod Stewart getting his stomache pumped; old memes die hard, if at all.

I don't know. My guess is that this guy had some sort of severely tragic event in his past which shaped his current manner of thinking today. I suppose it could be like that former professor whose name escapes me and his sock-puppet.

As lytefoot points out, amidst all that addlepated rambling, atrocious spelling and abysmal grammar is a correct use of the word adjure. My mind she is boggled!

It's no wonder to me that such emails are full of logical errors and general incoherency; that rather goes with the territory of being a creationist. I do wonder sometimes why they so often have such terrible form though.

Presumably they want to be taken seriously, so why not take the time to spellcheck, or use appropriate capitalization at the beginning of sentences, or any of the other little things that could foster the impression that they are merely deluded rather than hopelessly idiotic?

ha - i'd be much more worried that he had your picture, Pee-Zed, if it weren't *right there at the top of your blog*. it's like he just saw an old Mafia movie or something.

Lepht

Apparently, since the original messages weren't enough to get Korn convicted of anything.

Oddly, they have become more and more vicious.

Why, they couln't be better designed to convict Korn, and smear Christians generally, than if they were written by an atheist himself...

IMHO only, of course.

Actually, the messages PZ posts are considerably less vicious than the originals. Indeed, I wouldn't call them vicious at all; merely incoherent and rather silly.

But whatever.

As lytefoot points out, amidst all that addlepated rambling, atrocious spelling and abysmal grammar is a correct use of the word adjure. My mind she is boggled!

Ah, but if a million nucases type a million threatening messages, could it be that one of them will result in correct usage of "adjure"?

If this guy keeps sending out threats, he's going to dig himself a hole. It's not often we get to watch one of these nutters actually Korn-hole themselves.

I suspect that Korn is neither descended from monkeys nor made from dirt, but is a byproduct of the atrocious state of mental health care in the US. He is surely a product of the cuts to institutions that took place in the 1980's.