One of the mysteries of my email is that there are noticeable waves of like content that come through. Right now I'm getting a lot of hate mail that rants and raves about how clever I must think I am … which is definitely not a theme that I've been pushing, so all I can assume is that somewhere out there is a website or email chain that is talking about my horrible egotism.
Either that, or they're all just suddenly feeling very inadequate and are lashing out.
Here's one that not only accuses me of parading my mighty brains about, but of also pretending to be "'cool' and 'hip'" — but anyone should know that if you use the word 'hip' anymore, you aren't. I've made that mistake myself a few times. What's special about this one, though, is the fatwah envy.
What a cretin you are. Feeling oneself 'cool' and 'hip' does not make one so. Gee ... I'll bet you are one of the movers-and-shakers of intelligent thought! Sheesh man ... all you do is spew the same rhetorical consensus developed by those, who agree among themselves, that they are smarter and more intelligent than anyone else who may disagrees with your strongly held faith in evolution. It follows that since you arrogant simpletons know all there is to know - any other idea must therefore be false. You're so fuc**** smart it's laughable! Remember that, at its core, the faith of evolution mandates that a species completely changes into something completely different in both appearance and functioning. Evolution is not adaptation.
Since you are such a hip, highly-intelligent dude, why don't you also grow a pair? Attacking Christian beliefs is so ho-hum ... it's the popular and safe thing to do nowadays.
You can gain the notoriety you crave by attacking Islam with the same public vigor you've shown in your attacks on Christian beliefs! WOW! ... just think about it! If you're not afraid you can actually make CNN with all the agitation you'll stir! When you publicly attack Islam people may no longer think of you as a boring intellectual-wannabe! Instead of the little sap-headed woosey from Morris you can become, simply, the laughable sap-head from Morris. Wouldn't it be nice to eliminate the 'woosey' title from the description of PZ Meyers?
Think about it! WOW!
Best regards,
Tom Allen
Isn't that sweet? He's got a completely invalid definition of evolution, and he thinks I ought to mock Islamic beliefs because Christians are so friendly they don't get dangerous when picked on. And he's making fun of me because he thinks I'm intelligent!
I do appreciate the "best regards".
Now this one starts by accusing me of being representative of human stupidity. Then what does he do? Abuses the word "theory" and claims that Richard Dawkins is afraid of Ray Comfort. It's so damning when someone claims to be an authority on stupidity and then cheerfully brings up Comfort as a hero.
Hi Professor Myers,
I recently came across your science blog and was compelled to share with you a quote from one of the greatest minds of all time.
Albert Einstein said, "Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
If you aren't catching his view let me help you. He's talking about you.
I also wanted to write a word on your "friend" Richy Dawkins. He came across as ridiculous in Expelled the movie. When he was sitting in the theater I bet he was red in the face with humiliation. He's also scared to face Ray Comfort in a debate. If he was certain of his argument at all, he whould be more than willing to except the invitation and crush Ray. But no, he knows that there isn't a single piece of evidence. That's why it's called the THEORY (def. contemplation or speculation) of Evolution. So he pulls some $100,000 for his charity bogus. How much did Ben Stein give him? Or was his embarassment at no charge? "Extra Terrestrials sowed the human seeds on Earth," IS HE REALLY SERIOUS!
Chad
Mankato, MN
Hang on…no cheerful signoff? I'm crushed. Devastated, even.
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"Extra Terrestrials sowed the human seeds on Earth," IS HE REALLY SERIOUS!"
Inaccurate quote, no he wasn't, and Chad thinks the magic sky fairy creating people out of dirt is indeed serious and plausible.
That mirror Chad's got is so bring I need shades...
I love the way the first one got the ideas about what evolution isn't and what it is totally the wrong way round. That's a gift - complete 180 degree inversion.
As for the second, well, RD IS "excepting" the invitation, by not "accepting" it.
When you think about it, it's pretty sweet that even Einstein was talking about you!! :) What an honor.
oops; "is so bright"..
(hitting post when I intended to hit preview first makes be wonder if I really have 10 (opp.) thumbs some days...)
I've been thinking for a while that the total volume of these letters received over a given period of time, say 2008, would make for (?)interesting reading if compiled into a volume.
Letter 1 gets five bananas and letter 2 gets four bananas.
No, no they wouldn't. They get very boring after the first few hundred.
#2 quoting Einstein comes as no surprise; I'll bet the writer only ever came across that quote on the momentous occasion when Ray Comfort compared himself to Einstein.
"Right now I'm getting a lot of hate mail that rants and raves about how clever I must think I am … which is definitely not a them ..."
hey PZ, was the misspelling intentional?
I love it. Richard Dawkins posts the conditions on which he will make and exception to his -long standing policy- regarding creationist wack jobs, ray refuses to meet those conditions, and Dawkins is the one who's afraid.
Seriously, what is it like having your own little world?
PZ, you are a far stronger man than I am to continue to read that crap. Cool and hip. Haven't heard that for years, but I also thought it was hep. What do I know about that stuff anyway?
Maybe it's encouraging that they think pointing out the flaws in magical beliefs like christianity and intelligent design is "hip." It could be that younger or more interesting people in their own lives are talking about being skeptical. Or that they recognize Dawkins and PZ are in the zeitgeist right now.
I feel like "the new thing" that everyone is talking about often becomes the mainstream accepted thing in our culture, eventually. Think about how the modern feminist movement got started, and compare any advertisement with women now with one from the fifties or early sixties. (Of course, atheism, skepticism and the fact of evolution are very old, but I think powerful ideas can keep hitting the mainstream in new ways.)
Man, you get all the good mail. I only get coupons for discounted oil changes.
Alas our Chad doesn't seem to know that anyone, with the right editing, can be MADE to look ridiculous. Especially when your target audience is a group that make a bunch of honking seals look fairly cultured.
My guess is that all the 'ure a big smarty-pants' letters are coming from people who are aghast that someone, somewhere, is using their brain to think for themselves.
"If he was certain of his argument at all, he whould be more than willing to except the invitation and crush Ray."
Gee, I wonder why Dawkins didn't "except" the invitation?
Apparently these morons are illiterate in multiple areas, not just science.
Giggle. #2 reminds me of the Simpsons "Homer Thompson" bit. The last line in particular...
I wonder if this has anything to do with the apparent recent influx of creationist morons. It's like Pharyngula is on a troll migration route. You might as well change the banner from Pharyngula: Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal to Apologetics Outhouse: Shit on your keyboard and call it a post for Jesus!
PZ:
So...what? Einstein had a crystal ball, he could see into the future?
Chad's missing a few brain cells.
Fairy stories need an unknown to keep an audience of believers, L. Ron had the right idea by putting his 4 billion years ago (Won't be far enough). What you are getting is people lashing out at those who question their favorite stories. Some godbotherers have felt which way the wind is blowing and faded back about 14 to 20 billion years to the singularity, where they'll only annoy the occasional cosmologist. I think of those e-mails as a cry for help, and faith expiring. If they require pseudo-scientific reassurance, they had little faith to begin with. May the poor bastards meet oblivion painlessly.
I get email too. And it's way cooler and the people sending them are much more legit that the clowns you get.
Apparently there are a number of Nigerian princes who find my character so trust worthy that they would like to transfer a large sum of money to me to hold for them.
I'm thinking about going for it.
Yeah man, you're not hip and cool like, you're just another square!
;P
A society where many believe it's bad to be educated and informed, is a society that is not ready to be a democracy.
Dear Mr. Allen:
If you were a regular reader of Pharyngula, you would already know that Prof. Myers has taken on Islam just as energetically as he has taken on Christianity. You would also know that some of your like-minded fellows have sent Prof. Myers' blog posts around to various Islamic groups in the hopes of getting them to attack him. However, PZ has, last I checked, yet to get a single nastygram, much less a death threat, from any Muslim.
Yours in the eventual hope that you might realize just what sort of impression you're making,
Phoenix Woman
" Albert Einstein said, "Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former."
If you aren't catching his view let me help you. He's talking about you."
PZ, I think you should feel honored that one of the greatest minds in history, Einstein, was talking about you!
What I can't stand about people like you Professor is that you use your intelligence like it's a good thing. Curse you with your "literate" posts, your "smart" rebuttals to arrant nonsense, and your "hip" rejection of false, antiquated ideas! How many nutcases will it take you to realise that you don't know everything about everything?
Well I know nothing about anything, and since you can't get anything from nothing, I am living proof that Darwin was wrong!
I will pray for you.
But not very hard.
Or at all.
Ever.
Amen.
< Shrug >
The letter writers seem to operate with no sense of self conscious chagrin.
I wonder what it is like to live under a burden of such righteousness?
Love Always
Gil
Tom wants you to be as critical of Islam as you are of Christianity? I guess he didn't read your recent post on the UN Resolution against defaming religion....
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/02/talk_fast_we_might_be_crimin…
C'mon Tom, read a little!
--------------------------------------
Cool? Hip? Yea, we know that's all yesterday's fashion, but this IS 2009 and Nerd is the new Cool and Geek is the new Hip. You do refer to yourself as a nerd though...
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/03/wild_night_on_the_town_for_a…
How cool is that?!? I'm hup, Daddy-O!
Whenever I hear the term "hip" used, and used particularly with improperly used single quotes around it to set it off, I can't help but think of the fine film Saving Grace.
"I'm the hip one--You're a bit more hip replacement."
--Matthew
Sounds even better if you can deliver it in a Scots brogue.
I [Pee Zed]… assume is that somewhere out there is a website or email chain that is talking about my horrible egotism.
Option c) “Hearing voices in their pointy little heads”, and assuming it's a message from their magic dog.
Well, if they want to prove their point, to prove that they are not stupid, then they ought to establish their validity in Science or Nature, or something like that. Of course, everything is a conspiracy to them anyways.
Ayup - god done gived you your intelligunce, but you waren't s'posed to use it. LOL.
Did the first author actually redact the "fucking"? How odd that a Christian would make an obvious use of the word but simply star out the last few letters -- does that mean it wasn't a sin?
I cannot suppress my curiosity as to how the first e-mailer distinguishes "intellectuals" from "intellecual wannabes".
Seriously, though, this is an obvious case of projection. These people either cannot or do not try to imagine how anyone might be motivated differently from them. The one that I run into most often is people who assume that anyone doing science is in it just for the money. What sad lives they must have.
These emails are so mind-numbingly stupid I wonder if they're not some kind of a joke!
Oh, wait...they are!
part of me wants to get mail like that so I can answer it (as if that would do any good) then I am grateful that it is you Professor and not me that is on the target list.
I am glad that you post a selection from time to time helps to keep me from getting complacent or paranoid.
The profoundly ignorant are still ignorant and proud of it!
Well, Dr.Myers, seeing as you live near the Canadian/U.S. border, you could be Tragically Hip!
http://www.thehip.com/mp/index.html?UserID=
Give a listen to "Grace, Too" and "Gift Shop".
Everybody knows that evolutionists and atheists are just in it for the indie cred. Sure gets me a lot of respect down at the local college radio station, though!
I cower before this colossus of cognition.
"So he pulls some $100,000 for his charity bogus."
Come on, look at this moron, giving away a hundred thousand dollars for charity. Who does he think he is, trying to help out society like that.
I always love it when they resort to challenging notable atheists to attack Islam, as if the big bad terrorist boogeymen were going to come knock down their door and murder their family for saying anything bad woo oo ooooo.
Atheists in America more consistently attack christianity because that's what we are forced to deal with every day. The in your face ignorance is thanks to getting their half-wit representatives in government and them giving the halls of power purple nurples till they get their way. If America had a large muslim minority like a number of countries in Europe, I'm sure the public face of Atheism in America would be targeting that religion with their criticism just as much.
Don't try to act as if christians in America are so civilized, it wasn't so long ago Americans were committing genocide on their way out west in the name of their invisible friend. Abortion clinic bombings, intolerant violence towards minorities, and likely contributing to our going to war in Iraq without justifiable cause. Thank you kookoobananas christians.
My own theory: you trigger extra waves of antipathy because you write so well. (Hence, of course, the Guardian gig.) Tisn't only the expertise, devastating ability to summarize argument or snark that sets off the holy-rollers, but your command of cadence and pitch-perfect word-choice. I note some boffo writers among the commenters, as well.
OT here, but I'd love (if not addressed in archives) to hear the answers to:
How did you and members of the commenting community develop as writers? What literature did you read as kids? If not much, what then served as examples of effective, vivid writing? What non-science writing have you done?
Finally, what do any of you recommend as remediation for college-age kids who, like one acquaintance, scored 5 on AP Chem yet "doesn't understand" metaphor?
I had to stop reading the first letter at "feeling oneself". Reminds me that all they do is practice mental masturbation.
On a another note, I just picked up a Hitchens book at the local public library today. Got to the counter. Clerk announced it out loud. "Christopher Hitchens, God is not great!". I felt like a 13 year old buying condoms. "Can I get a pricecheck on the the 'Lifestyles Ribbed'?" It was great.
Best Regards,
S.A.
PZ, just pick up the phone and call Jehovah and complain about his minions harassing you.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7929799.stm
I bet Chad won't let you play on the jungle gym, either.
The people who write those kinds of letters are an embarrassment to the United States and our founding fathers.
at some point getting posted on this blog is going to become a badge of honor , if it hasn't already.
You know like getting your article published in playboy?
Nice. Perhaps, bearing this in mind, PZ might call his intended book (how's it going Prof?) something along the lines of "Creationists are Morons"?
"I'd like a copy of Creationists are Morons please"
"Creationists are Morons?"
"Yes, Creationists are Morons. Do you have it?
"I don't know hey guys..Creationists are Morons - do we have that?"
And so on, Heck, I'd buy multiple copies just to hear that said.
@ blf #30:
No, because they'd still have to get knowledge of PZ's existence and email address from somewhere. Unless you're proposing that there genuinely are supernatural beings (be it someone's version of a god or some other critter) capable of putting accurate new information into people's minds, those people still have to have come across mention of PZ somewhere in the real world.
New Rule: If you cannot write in your native language properly, you do not get to criticize other peoples intelligence.
Here comes the clue train, last stop you. Since the God of Abraham (the Jewish, Cristian and Muslim God if you need it spelled out for you) doesn't live on Earth (he lives in heaven) he is by definition, an extraterrestrial. If only you understood how ironic it is that you're making fun of something Richard Dawkins said in jest, yet is the exact same thing you in all seriousness believe.
"Dear PZ,
... you are one of the movers-and-shakers of intelligent thought!
It follows that since ... You're so ... smart ... that ... you are a hip, highly-intelligent dude.
Think about it! WOW!
Best regards, Tom Allen"
There, that's better!
Jeeshh. OK, if this is such a problem, I'll stop sending the letters, OK?
SEF@49, no I'm not proposing imaginary critters are real. And yes, obviously they have to have knowledge of Pee Zed. But the motivation for actually going to effort of writing something and getting Pee Zed's e-address could easily be—and let me be very clear here—an imagined voice in the head.
Having said that, I was actually trying to make sarcastic comment about the apparent inability of the the writers to distinguish reality from fairytails.
Forget shakespeare, joyce, bronte and their ilk. I got my love of writing, wordplay and tuns o' puns fron the Bumper Book of Jokes, circa 1973.
I guess he proved that with the rest of his email.
AnthonyK, I like it!
"Creationists are Morons? Sold out. We'll have to order more. Hey, Eric more Creationists are morons!"
"How many?"
"All of 'em! Er, I mean gross."
I always thought it was the "fuck" part that was naughty, not the "king" part. Is that an American anti-George thing?
As for the waves of like emails, it is conceivable that that's totally random, and not instigated in any way. I'm not saying it's not caused by anti-PZ literature, but random things can come in waves, of course.
The utter stupidity of these people is plain to see. and also their utter frustration at the battering their ignorant world view is taking by intelligent and humourous folk like PZ and Richard Dawkins. Intelligently and scientifically dismantling the sky fairy fantasies of these cretins is a very cool thing indeed!
"Debating creationists on the topic of evolution is rather like trying to play chess with a pigeon - it knocks the pieces over, craps on the board, and flys [sic] back to its flock to claim victory." ~ Anonymous reviewer of Eugenie Scott's Evolution vs. Creationism : An Introduction. See ScienceDaily
GBM,
Sometimes a typo is just a typo. :)
My guess is that at least some small part of these stupid letters are secondary traffic from the blogs of the never ending stream of blog whores we attract.
These two set off the tragic-twat alarm in so many ways it's hard to know where to start. The best part of both letters is that they are not only totally science-impaired, but fully and utterly snark-impaired. It's like when I was a kid and "old people" would try to use our slang to be "hip" and "groovy". This always led to near crippling bouts of laughter between my siblings and me after the lumbering oafs left the room.
I am frequently impressed by the caliber of snark displayed here by the Pharyngulites, where book learnin' and snark are seamlessly blended to edify and amuse. "Richy Dawkins?" *SNARKFAIL* or as we used to say in the 70s "burn on you." The godbots seem to forget our motto: "The more you disapprove of me, the more I like it". Can anybody translate that into Latin for me?
These two need eating.
I suspect your wave of emails are from Ray Comfort fans. He posted a blog entry yesterday on how you called him an "incompetent idiot," which probably explains the "so you think you are so clever, huh, HUH!" theme of your emails.
Shouldn't that be “The more you blither, the more I laugh with my head on my desk”?
I found an online English→Latin translator http://www.tranexp.com:2000/Translate/result.shtml which produced this: Quantum vos abdico mihi , quantum EGO amo is. Translating back, that is claimed be: How much you to renounce me , how much I to love this.
Comfort has an article at WingNutDaily responding to PZ's criticism of his notion that males and females of new species have to evolve at the same time.
http://worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=90950
It's really quite amusing as he simply repeats his error by pushing it back further in time.
For no particular reason at all, the article mentions Crackergate.
PZ,
A sincere thanks. I quickly tire of reading such misinformed and opinionated words such as you get in email, never mind having to discuss anything with such people. Just the same, someone has to do it or they will continue to be woefully ignorant. Some days I read your blog and think "Damn I'm glad PZ is working on this because I just don't have the patience or desire to educate such people"
Just wanted to say thanks.
Best Regards, Mr Z
Thank you so much for the belly laughs. I absolutely LOVE this stuff when it is not written by my students (when it is, it just get frustrated).
I have to take issue with Pundit's rating, though. The second is better than the first, but they both deserve more bananas that that!
Rev BDC bragged:
You must know the same bunch of Nigerians that I do. Just today I got an impassioned email from the widow of the assassinated Nigerian oil minister asking me to stash $12.9 million in my checking account. However, I had to refuse her. The other widow of the assassinated oil minister wants me to hold £14.75 million (or $20,978,135 in real money) so I'm already committed.
*Checks dictionary.*
"No results found for woosey:
Did you mean Woosy (in dictionary) or Woose (in reference)?"
Mr. Allen, you fail at insults. Along with knowledge and sanity.
You do appear to be marginally competent at stupid ranting, though.
Is there a list group one can join and receive this kind of mail? It's not fair you are having so much fun while I have to deal with penis enlargement and other ordinary boring spam.
"Here's one that not only accuses me of parading my mighty brains about, but of also pretending to be "'cool' and 'hip'" — but anyone should know that if you use the word 'hip' anymore, you aren't."
Aww, no worries, PZ. You'll always be totally fresh to me! :)
Remember that, at its core, the faith of evolution mandates that a species completely changes into something completely different in both appearance and functioning. Evolution is not adaptation.
Well, he is right about that. The faith of evolution does mandate all that stuff. Creationists have constructed their own "faith" version of evolution. And for some reason it looks a whole lot like creationism! Go figure! They made a whole nother religion out of it. Good going, creationists...
That's pretty funny when you think about it. Creationists took the science of evolution and twisted it around so that it looks a lot like creationism, and then called evolution a "faith" and a "religion". And they did it all by quote mining and credulous fleece flocking. Just like they do with the Bible too! Pretty freakin hilarious...
I hate when they use Einstein as their flag, ignoring
than on his age american christians hated him.
He had some idealistics ideas too which some find really dangerous. Like making a global govern to manage the
world as a whole, without pitty nationalism or egotism.
All of us strugling for a better humanity.
Betcha no one of them as ever read his easily avaliable
books of letters either. His personal mail is enjoyable
to review.
I wonder if someday we will see the personal writings of PZ ? That would be awesome indeed.
Or maybe he'd have the cajones to lay all of his thought out in book form where everyone could read it...
oh...
PS. Did the author of the letter really spell "would" w-h-o-u-l-d?
Someone could introduce Tom Allen to Chad. They could meet and we could see what happens when the number of people in the room exceeds their combined IQ.
Yep, Tom Allen, everyone knows more than you.
Chad, Einstein died 2 years before PZ was born. That makes you a fuckwad.
If you hang out on teh intertubes enough it's impossible to escape the ugly realization that there is a substantial demographic which believes ignorance and belligerence to be virtues. If you need evidence of this, just go to Godlike Productions and have a look around. It's best to go to a hardware store first and buy a good wirebrush to use in washing your brain afterwards.
This phenomenon puzzled me greatly until recently. I think that I may have figured it out:
If you know nothing you are free to believe anything.
Knowledge imposes limits on this freedom.
Therefore knowledge is bad.
Chad here's another one for you buddy.
I'm willing you are composed of an unproportionately large ratio of that building block.
OMFG.
You have GOT to go read that WND article. INCREDIBLY, he directly addresses the scientific explanation, repeating it thoroughly in ways that imply he understands. He starts walking the population scenario back through history...and then wraps up asking the exact same question. I am not kidding:
"Comfort continued, “Let’s go back even further (100 million years ago) to pre-pre-elephants that also contained males and females. At what point of time in evolutionary history did the female evolve alongside the male? And why did she evolve?"
I know I shouldn't be surprised by his stupidity anymore, but...he still manages it. I don't know how he's missing it. My best guess is he's assuming that the historical populations remain in stasis and the only way to go from elephant (as we recognize elephants) to non-elephant is through massive, spontaneous mutation in an individual...who then has no mate. Or perhaps he has no understanding of genes spreading in a population?
Can he TRULY be this dense? Yet again I wonder if Ray isn't the Andy Kaufman of creationism.
oh damn it.
"willing to bet"
fuck it, I'm going outside.
blf, # 65,
I set it to English - English, and it came out:
These letters remind me very strongly of the "Radio Equalizer's" (Google, I don't want to give him free traffic) rants on Rachel Maddow. The insults are striking similar.
He meant "wussy" regarding his fatwa envy, but actually "woosey" is a good way to make "woo" into a modifier.
Yeah, if you were smart you'd believe in the theory of talking snakes!
As for "Remember that, at its core, the faith of evolution mandates that a species completely changes into something completely different in both appearance and functioning.", does that make him a stromatolite with mad typing skillz? Maybe we are wrong, things don't actually change over time, especially life forms? I'd sure love to see a picture of this "guy"! That and to be able to draw a cartoon...
PZ,
I admire you. Both your blog and unreasonablefaith.com (where i found the link to yours) have only given me more insentive to read about this subject.
So i want to thank you.
Please keep the posts coming.
Of course your email comes in waves of similar insults; these are stupid people responding to some rant on a woo site. I'll bet you could track traffic in the flake-o-sphere by checking headers and content of your email.
I agree the emails originate from the WND piece. Ray Comfort must be having an existential crisis. He seems to be lashing out in all directions of late. My guess is that the economic downturn is hurting his bottom line, so he's trying to drum up more business from his acolytes.
Chad is so awesome!!!
"He came across as ridiculous in Expelled the movie."
As was exactly intended by Ben Stein. Kudos to Stein for skewing a scientist's words instead of refuting the evidence he provided. Bravo!
"He's also scared to face Ray Comfort in a debate. If he was certain of his argument at all, he whould (sic) be more than willing to except the invitation and crush Ray."
Chad's obviously never seen Dawkins speak; he's as absolutely certain as possible of his argument. But that's beside the point. ANY atheist and/or scientist and/or person with a fully functional brain could crush Ray, and we've all done so time and time again. AHHHH!!! ...Oh, sorry, I thought I saw a banana. (What a nightmare that would've been!)
"But no, he knows that there isn't a single piece of evidence [THAT I'M WILLING TO ACCEPT]."
There. Fixed! :)
"That's why it's called the THEORY (def. contemplation or speculation)"
HAHAH, that's definition number SIX from dictionary.com ... Definition number ONE says "a coherent group of general propositions used as principles of explanation for a class of phenomena: Einstein's theory of relativity." I guess he skipped that part.
""Extra Terrestrials sowed the human seeds on Earth," IS HE REALLY SERIOUS!"
Hahahah, hahahahahhahahah! Oh, Chad! You're just too cute!
.........I just realized... What's with all the Dawkins-bashing? Wasn't this email sent to you, PZ??
Tee fucking hee. The second idiot, Chady, is so thick he doesn't see that Dawkins got a veiled shot in at his own belief system. Yahweh, an extraterrestrial, in fact an extrauniversal (or would it be extraversal?), if you will, seeded all life according to the model this bozo subscribes to. "Hi, my name is Chad. I enjoy date rape and not understanding my own beliefs. I also like UFC, because I could probably take those guys."
I don't want to debate the meaning of the word theory any longer.
I don't want to present evidence any more.
I just want to stab them.
Welcome to cousinavi-land...willful blindness is a capital offense.
At #42 JMartin asked:
Have these kids been diagnosed with any type of brain-based disorder? Because the inability of otherwise highly intelligent individuals to understand metaphors (as well as jokes, irony, sarcasm, and other non-literal language) is a noted characteristic of individuals on the autism spectrum, notably Asperger syndrome.
I don't know much about what kind of remediation is done, as I'm not in special education, but I do know that explicit instruction WRT the meaning of common metaphors is sometimes done.
An example of a teaching tool used for individuals with Asperger syndrome are these cards, What Did You Say? What Did You Mean?
You know, I really don't have a problem with folks like Comfort drawing inspiration from nature like this. However, when they want to pass it off as science--particularly in the classroom--they have invaded my territory and committed an act of war.
I personally like the strategy of pointing out that by their logic, the "designer" of the human spine was either a sadist or incompetent when he used it for a critter with bipedal motion. And the human body must have been designed for the malaria parasite and the small pox virus.
There is no scientific need or merit to ID, so scientific arguments against it are useless. Pointing out that its implications are inevitably blasphemous on the other hand is not only fun, but hits its proponents where they live.
I love it when these wackjobs use the word "faith" as a derogatory term. Then, in the next breath, they'll tell you that faith is a good thing. It's a virtue. It's very important. You gotta have faith.
It's a perfect example of doublethink.
(although they do seem to have a distaste for vowels)
Letters written by dozens of authors widely separated by time and place yet amazingly consistent in their message? The probability of this happening due to blind chance is vanishingly small.
A roomful of monkeys randomly hitting typewriter keys would take 10 TO THE 47TH POWER BILLION CENTURIES to produce the irreducible complexity of EVEN ONE such letter. Could a tornado in a junkyard create EVEN ONE TYPEWRITER, let alone enough for roomful of monkeys?
Clearly this is the result of Unintelligent Design.
PZ. Though these letters are boring, your analysis is not. That is what would make such an annotated collection of these letters valuable and interesting.
Some people are Christians because they REALLY want to do and be good. Those are the ones that would be/do good without it. Many more are Christians simply because they want to be perceived and admired for being/doing good without really doing any good (in fact, quite the opposite, such Christians have caused great psychological/emotional/physical harm to others in the past, and unfortunately are doing so in the present and will continue to do in the future.)
Their puffed up and ill-conceived self-perception is being ruptured finally, via best-selling books, films and videos, loudly and consistently. So, yes they are lashing out. Their crutch is being kicked out from underneath them. They are being faced with the reality that religion is no longer getting any respect, and that they no longer live in god's country (and if they don't watch it, they will find themselves in god's ghettos because all the curious and bright individuals--including religious believers who embrace secularism--may give up all hope and leave the rabidly religiously infested areas).
And there is no established institution to handle these great numbers of angry, disappointed, bitter, exposed-for-their-dangerous-and-unconstitutional religious activities, emotionally and mentally crippled cowards. These people need help and assistance in handling their emotions and learning ways how to cope with reality. But, most likely they are not going to get it.
I think I can help poor, stupid Tom out:
"all you do is spew the same rhetorical consensus developed by those, who agree among themselves, that they are smarter and more intelligent than anyone else who may disagrees with your strongly held faith in the Bible. It follows that since you arrogant simpletons know all there is to know - any other idea must therefore be false."
Congrats, Tom, you've explained your side to a "T."
It's amazing how nearly every "argument" from these morons is nothing but typical projection. Something from nothing; animals just "appeared"; unquestioned acceptance of dogma and a belief in the absolute completeness of their knowledge; etc. Jesus H. Freud.
Everyone does. With my e-mail address carelessly posted all over teh intarwebz, I get around 10 such e-mails per day, and another 15 times per day I win in a couple of lotteries. I know someone who counts the megabucks he's promised and... well, look for yourself.
Of course.
Seen here on Pharyngula almost two years ago:
"Creationists are not just more stupid than we suppose, they are more stupid than we can suppose."
-- chuko
I can just imagine groups of businessman Christians sitting around tables in a conference room, with some leader saying, "Okay! These are our talking points this week, and this is our focus!" With the nutty Fellowship of Christian Businessmen types nodding as they paraphrase the talking points in their emails. Probably somebody with a marketing degree from a Bible college heading it all up.
I know bad spelling is just normal these days, what with declining investment in education and all, but I got tripped up over that "woosy" word. At first, I thought it might be a misspelling of woozy, meaning dizzy and on the verge of fainting. Then, I realized it's probably a misspelling of wussy, that macho synonym for coward that relies for its insult power in part on the fact that it rhymes with pussy, a coarse synonym for vagina. Such an admirable Christian the writer is.
re: "hip"
Several generations of scholars have spent careers trying to capture the meaning and connotations of the term. Indeed, the International Journal of Hipness Studies was published from 1957-1973 specifically to explore the issue. I am a little surprised that few people seem to know that the question "What is hip?" was definitively answered back in 1973 (hence the journal's demise). I am pleased to add this knowledge to the public thoughtstream.
Q: What is hip?
A: What it is!
The vast majority are just Christians because they grew up that way.
I refuse to believe that people are that stupid.
...is what I would have said 15 years ago. My realism has grown since then, and so has my cynicism.
What I still don't understand is why such people are still allowed to vote.
Nice Sven. I knew that's what your link was going to be when I saw your comment.
Nobody seems to have noticed the irony of calling PZ a
"cretin". What it means is no secret, but it comes from
a Latin word for christian.
23 skidoo.
@PZ
Either that, or they're all just suddenly feeling very inadequate and are lashing out.
**Checks pants**
**notes that peener hasn't shrunk**
Wasn't me!
You DO get all the good mail! I'm jealous.
@Sven DiMilo
+1 for the TOP!
Sven DiMilo
And sometimes hipness is...
what it ain't.
Nobody says "cool" any more. Mr. Krabs daughter, Pearl told me that all the kids are now saying, "Coral." I checked with my teenage daughter to see if I was coral and she laughed at me. But I think being laughed at by teenagers is the new black. Or something.
2nd email is a poe, I think. Read it again.
Oy! PZ! You're getting messages from Chad?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGTAnXqn9Jc
I'd be afraid, VERY afraid!
You are being vilified here:
http://www.catholic.com/appeals/new_atheism_appeal.asp
WOOT! I love being smug!
Woot!!! Rabble Rousers too!
And of course. The plea for money.
I'd send 'em a "sacrificial gift" if I had a dead goat at the moment. Alas, I do not.
All these Catholics who just don't have faith in the power of their god. You'd think that he'd be strong enough to fight us smug rabble-rousers himself.
*sigh* … with the usual misrepresentation of what the whole thing was about.
And the vast majority of those neither understand the implications, nor possess particularly indepth knowledge of what it is they claim to adhere to beyond the point of ticking the box labeled 'Christian' on things like census forms and surveys.
I say the true measure of Christianity would be to make people have to pass a simple test to qualify as such. That'd separate the wheat from the chaff.
Awesome - maybe Mr. Hawkins is mistaken and time travel is actually a piece of cake? I mean, Einstein must have hopped all the way into the future to be able to make a statement about you! What a lot of effort he took for you - you must feel so honored!
I read a lot. And then I started writing stories for fun. I had some great English teachers, and read several books about writing.
I read everything as a kid. By second grade, I had read everything in the school library, and the school granted me special privileges to use the jr. high library. I read encyclopedias. Heck, I read dictionaries, sometimes!
Vivid writers? Well, it depends on what you'd like to read. To me, poets are among the best for that. Byron, Keats, Coleridge, Shelley, TS Eliot (before he went insane), Robert Browning, Edgar Allen Poe, Marge Piercy, etc. For novelists, I would include Toni Morrison, Salman Rushdie, Umberto Eco, Natsuo Kirino, and Ian Rankin. But there are so many...
But reading isn't enough. The only way to get good at writing is...to write. A lot of books can help, but they're not necessary, really. Not when you can get, at no cost, George Orwell's "Politics and the English Language." I can't recommend it highly enough.
As mentioned before, I'm writing two novels.
Other than that, I've usually ended up as "the writer" just about everywhere I've worked, mostly technical writing.
Sorry, but that's way beyond my field of expertise. The only thing I can think of that might help is something like "The Artist's Way," by Julia Cameron, "Bird by Bird" by Anne Lamott, or "Writing Down the Bones," by Natalie Goldberg. Those won't teach metaphor, per se, but they'll teach the kind of thinking that makes metaphors more understandable.
I think Egnoe responded to the latest post about himself too. Another source for the loon migrations too.
I recently ran across the proposal that God is all for evolution, and has sent His angels in the form of Ham and Behe to make creationism look bad. I get the feeling it's not just major creationist figures. :)
This makes PZ a God-like figure in that he, like God, enjoys fucking with the stupid.
cousinavi #91
It gets like that. teh stoopid just keep coming. Why must the long proven be defended all the time? How long did it take flat-earth deniers to die out? You just need to see youtube to discover that people think planets travel in circular orbits or other fundamental misconceptions of oh so many things.
Faith based schools and home schooling with whatever wacko "world view" is indoctrinated into kids has to take major blame. School boards run by ignorant creotards and science teachers that don't undertand science themselves (thankfully rarer these days) probably cover the rest.
The unlearning of new converts is still something I don't fully understand (except in terms of the inherent surrender and mindless bliss that comes with certainty).
I have seen the way long dead threads resurrect (rarely after exactly 3 days however), comments flow in over a few days then they languish for another month, year, whatever. It doesn't just happen here either. As Patricia OM @61 states:
"My guess is that at least some small part of these stupid letters are secondary traffic from the blogs of the never ending stream of blog whores we attract."
Somebody on the net gets hold of a really old topic, links to it and then readers flood it. The same thread, if on a controversial topic, may get ripples, then more waves, more ripples etc for years. There is probably some wave propagation formula to cover it ;)
imo its going to take a lot more than donations to a catholic website to club down "New Atheists". I noticed that having attracted me to the site, I couldn't download this killer document for free - surely cheaper than the $45K+ they are seeking to print it physically and distribute by what, snail mail, papal carrier pigeon or a relay network of runner priests?
PZ btw has posted articles using the word "dude" before, clearly hip. The geek shall inherit the earth.
While I agree that we are smarter than those who think that an invisible man (named "God") poofed assorted species into existence, I didn't know we had formed a "rhetorical consensus".
Thanks to Tom Allen, I now know. Of course that leads me to wonder how HE knew!(Twilight Zone music)
I know lots of Christians, some even serving as priests, nuns, ministers and deacons, that believe that evolution is valid. They also dont believe that God is a wizard.
124:
[snark]
I'm pretty sure the "flat-earth deniers" are still with us in great numbers. I certainly deny that the earth is flat.
[/snark]
bugga. Yeah, guess I'm a flat-earth denier too lol.
read what I think, not what I write!!! ;) should be:
"round-earth denier
Dear Tom,
You're a big poopyhead. *raspberry*
Best regards,
Miguel
PS: The magic man you idolise is a big poopyhead too. *raspberry*
Opisthokont (#34)
I've been trying to figure this out lately and I think their (incompetent and atrocious) reasoning goes something like this:
Being open-minded is a quality of a good person.
I am a good person.
Therefore, I am open-minded.
-
Open-minded people make decisions by being open-minded.
At some point, I decided Christianity was true.
Therefore, I must have decided that by being open-minded.
-
Being open-minded means changing my mind if what I believe isn't true.
I still believe in Christianity.
Therefore, Christianity is true.
-
Open-minded people believe things that are true.
Athiests and evolutionists* do not believe Christianity is true.
Therefore, atheists and evolutionists are not open-minded.
-
Being open-minded is a quality of a good person.
Atheists and evolutionists are not open-minded.
Therefore, atheists and evolutionists are not good people.
-
*Apologies to Christians who accept evolution.
~*~*~*~
D'oh! (#64)
His fans have been in a tizzy for a while now over the whole Dawkins debate and the grand atheist conspiracy to one-star Comfort's latest collection of verbal vomit on Amazon. I've been shredding their five star reviews for fun, which is what got me puzzling over how they can come to the conclusion they're the open-minded ones.
~*~*~*~
Aquaria (#121)
I love this essay. It demands clarity and content over strict adherence to rules. Of course, my writing's no better for having read it several times. I'm especially prone to violating the bit about pretentious diction.
Dr. Fred, thanks for the laugh. Amazing how they keep getting the facts wrong. It couldn't be that they're lying maybe. Nah, of course not, they're all good xians and lying is one of their really really mustn'ts, isn't it?
A couple of weeks ago, I confronted Ray Comfort on a blog talk radio program. It started out with him claiming there are no transitional fossils, and ended with him trying to save my soul.
It was quite bizare.. but what is really unsettling is that Comfort and his clones think I'm the crazy one.
A. Noyd #130
FTW
the truly scary thing is that these people vote
Tom: "...since you arrogant simpletons know all there is to know - any other idea must therefore be false."
Obviously he plagiarized that oft-expressed rebuke from atheists because it sounded like a pretty good shot to him and he figured it could be just as effective when lobbed in the other direction.
He adds the phrase 'arrogant simpletons' to make sure nobody notices he swiped the line, for he wishes to be regarded as a man of honor and virtue and stuff like that.
Of course he doesn't realize how hilariously foolish he looks when he aims it back. It reminds me of a scene in the film 'Robinson Crusoe' (the one with Pierce Brosnan) where Friday points Crusoe's captured blunderbuss butt-end toward Crusoe during their first encounter.
Most people graced with average intelligence would be red-faced with embarrassment to realize they are aiming to blow away their armpit.
Not Tom, though. He really believes he's been clever about giving atheists a dose of their own medicine. What is taking place in his mind is much simpler, rather more like, "Take THAT you atheist dogs!" and feels as gratified as a lout who kicks an unconscious man because it feels goo...um, no, because the bastard deserves what's coming to him. Anyway, it feels good to dispense justice. Or something.
I mean, really...what would Jesus have done? He rampaged like a bull amongst the money-changers in the temple, didn't he? He showed those assholes a what fer, didn't he? He could be pretty tough. He frowned a whole tree to death once.
Same deal with Chad: "Albert Einstein said, 'Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.' If you aren't catching his view let me help you. He's talking about you."
[Flash on the same scene in 'Crusoe']: evidently there is quite an epidemic afoot of backfiring blunderbusses blowing away blockheaded bozos. It is mildly entertaining.
Perhaps Tom and Chad ought to form a comedy team.
"And of course. The plea for money"
RevBDC, two weeks ago at my wife's church, the priest went on and on about how our economic crisis can be laid, in part, to people's never-ending desire for more, more, more, whether or not they can afford it.
"If you, and I mean all of you, would reign in your spending, your desires for physical things that will not, by themselves, make your life better, you would be doing your part to bring our country out of its economic troubles."
Some of that made sense. But, not five minutes later, came this.
"Now I realize that many of you are concerned about keeping a job, and some of you may have lost a job. While this is true, it has led to an unfortunate result: your offerings have declined. You do realize that your primary responsibility is the health and welfare of the church, right? You do realize that you have commitments to this church? Your first responsibility is to MAINTAIN YOUR LEVEL OF GIVING to the church" (emphasis mine there) "so that we can continue our building improvements, and our services to the community. Services that some of those among us today have accessed, and may continue to access."
I've told my wife for some time that money is the bottom line for these assholes, and she's written it off to, well, me being me. However, even she made a comment about the stupidity and contradictions of that little diatribe.