Guess who caused the recent earthquake in California?

Actually, it was my new radio show premiering. Thanks for taking the heat, Deepak-- you're a mensch!

I really don't know what's stupider. Earnestly believing your woo caused a fatal earthquake, or being proud about it.

Ah yes: Both, and posting it onto Twitter.

Oh. Another natural disaster.

Round up the usual suspects. Atheists, gays, Moslems, Democrats, Obama, Universal Health Care, or evolutionary biologists.

Who gets the blame or credit this time?

These used to be called, "Acts of god". I guess god is getting lazy in his old age and letting other groups take up the slack.

I think he was trying to be cute... not sure he meant it seriously...

Either way,your characterization is spot on... he's a buffoon.

One of my more recent statuses, yet appropriate: When plans involve people, always adjust for the stupidity constant, so called because it can be variable.

He calls it "meditation?" That's euphemistic.

I usually just call it a BM. That is, when I feel I have to announce it to the world.

You'd think he'd at least take credit for something good. If I had a twitter I would be tweeting right now about all the Earthquakes I had prevented by watching Arrested Development just now.

the dude was joking, come on.

Funny, I was thinking "Chopra's a moron," and a supernova went off.

Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/mxaa3p

I think he was trying to be funny -- but that was pretty damn lame.

Twit

I'd recommend judging a chili contest if you're interesting in lighting off a round of fire and brimstone. Works every time for me.

I was actually meditating when it happenned and thougt" Whoaaa!"

I can only read that in the voice of Keanu Reeves.

SatyaFX recently dubbed Chopra with the anagram, "Oh, Crap". I think it is highly appropriate as nearly everything he says or tweets is quantum diarrhea.

the dude was joking, come on.

Yes... joking about accidentally causing a deadly earthquake is hi-LARIOUS...

As has already been stated... the guy's a buffoon.

re 8

the dude was joking, come on.

Yes he was; as I'm sure PZ was well aware, still warrants the "buffoon" comment.

Quick O/T -- Guess who got thrown under the bus in Pope Benedict's efforts to absolve himself of any blame in the metastasizing worldwide church sex-abuse scandal?

Yupper -- his old (and conveniently dead) boss and predecessor, JPII:

Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger — who became Pope Benedict — had tried to investigate the abuses as head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, according to Schönborn. But his efforts had been blocked by “the Vatican”, an apparent reference to John Paul.

Asked by The Sunday Times whether John Paul’s role in the cover-up of abuse should be investigated, Schönborn said: “I have known Pope Benedict personally during 37 years of amiable acquaintance and I can say with certainty that ... he made entirely clear efforts not to cover things up but to tackle and investigate them. This was not always met with approval in the Vatican.”

The Groer affair became public in 1995 when former pupils of an elite Catholic school accused him of sexual abuse.

After an outcry, Groer was replaced and made the prior of a convent. He was never punished and issued only a vague apology in 1998 before retreating to a nunnery where he lived until his death in 2003. Some of his victims were offered “hush money” from the church.

Michael Tfirst, 54, one of Groer’s victims, claims to have reported the abuse to highranking church officials from the 1970s onwards. He says the church paid him £3,300 in 2004 under a contract that obliged him to keep quiet.

“There is no question that Ratzinger knew all the details of reports on abuse within the church, as there is no doubt that John Paul, his superior, took part in a massive and systematic cover-up,” Tfirst said.

Somehow I don't think that "I was only following orders" will work here, especially for those folks who either remember the Nuremberg trials or were taught about them in grade school.

But setting aside that, the whole effort on Benedict's part to pretend that the abuse scandal is all the fault of his papal predecessor falls flat when one notes that abuse scandals were being covered up in Germany in the 1960s -- long before JPII ascended to the Papacy.

It doesn’t matter that he was joking; it’s the third comment that puts it over the top. It injects a note of slight authenticity to the New Age nonsense promulgated by people who really do believe that meditation is a powerful tool that must be handled with care because it can alter the flow of energy in the universe.

Even the guy’s sense of humor is irritating.

Hey, we all know it wasn't Shiva in his incarnation as Deepak Chopra who generated that quake.

The real cause was somewhere along the French border, when two large hardons collided. (Damn gays!)

To the barricades, defenders of science! Are you ready for the war on physics?

Well, hey! Now we know who to send all of the insurance claims to.
Oh and some people were killed? That's a manslaughter charge for Deepak.

So where are the cops?
Maybe they're just being carefull. You have to treat super-human beings who can cause lethal earthquakes by accedent with care, after all.
Watch out Deepak! Just as soon as the police figure out how to arrest you without you destrying the world they will be coming.

If he admits he caused the earthquake, can't we just humor him and charge him with negligent homicide for the guy that died in that quake?

Yo, Deepak -- how about using some of your superpowers to cure cancer, or to avert a natural disaster instead of causing one?

I'll have to let this one slide. I could easily have made the same joke, if I'd been the lab while it happened for instance.

Or dropped a hammer.

PZ! Don't do it! I tried th ebean burrito one recently, and many times before, especially when you add beer to the mixture, the mudslide is far more localized than deepak would want you to believe.

Sili

I'll have to let this one slide. I could easily have made the same joke, if I'd been the lab while it happened for instance.

Or dropped a hammer.

Would you have tweeted it to millions?

Can someone please explain who listens to anything Chopra says and why?

Followed by a typhoon.

Now that would be remarkable. Only one hurricane, and only two tropical storms, have hit California during the last 150 years.

Point, CE. I shoulda factored in the audience.

Though ... given the chance, most likely yes.

If he had anything to do with it, it was because even the earth couldn't take anymore of having contact with this dolt. It was at best a screaming escape from the stupid, or a revolt against it.

Take your pick.

All kidding aside, has any scifi author written about a sentient planet--and not the inhabitants, the planet itself?

Seems like the kind of thing someone would have done by now.

Solaris
Stanislaw Lem

Keep it up Deepak. Because making a joke about an event that killed two people and injured over 100 is just sooo funny and shows what a compassionate guy you are.

James Lovelock?

Deepak Chopra is an absolute fire hose of nonsense, and it's appalling that he keeps on getting so much air time.

Also, Midworld

Alan Dean Foster.

Not as good a novel as Solaris, but it hasn't been made into two bad movies, either.

There is at least one planet like that if not more in the world ofcomic books. I don't remember the name right off hand.

Although I still don't see why more people aren't discouraging PZ's bean experiment.

Oh, there are so many charlatans these days.

I actually friended Chopra's posting on HuffPo so that I can get fair warning.

Answer to my own question at 26 about what Chopra is for and who listens to him:

taking money from cancer patients by telling then he can cure cancer with mind-body ayurvedic yoga freaking nonsense

Healing Cancer Through Mind-Body Medecine

cf. Barbara Ehrenreich

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jan/10/smile-or-die-barbara-ehrenr…

Maybe he was kidding. He can't be THAT stupid.

He'd have more credibility if he'd posted before causing the quake - you know, like XKCD.

Chopra is probably "joking" in the same sense that Greta Christina's Wiccan friends were only taking their religion as a "metaphor." Meaning, he is -- and he isn't.

When people are looking -- and he assumes he is being held accountable for what he's saying -- then of course it's just a silly joke. He knows it's a silly joke.

But if and when he is surrounded by other supportive, credulous, committed people who believe that reality is a giant field of consciousness and our thoughts change the fabric of experience, then this 'coincidence' is very suggestive, a synchronicity which hints of the powerful connection between meditation and the physical world. He knows, that this is significant.

So this little tweet's probably another example of the inherent confusion of basic "spiritual" doublethink.

So, do we get to send him the bill?

#29

I believe there is one (two?) mentioned in the Star Wars EU.

Also Orson Scott Card's "Homecoming" series has the earth being sentient (at least by one interpretation, anyways).

I also vaguely recall a short story by JMS set in the Babylon 5 universe with a sentient planet in it (though it might have been the biosphere rather than the planet in this case).

#42

yes, the guys who killed chewbacca. Their planets were sentient no?

That's absolutely hilarious! It's just like those TV shows where the generation-blech guys with the vandykes walk around in a dark house and say, "Woo! Did you hear/feel/smell that!!!1111!11?"

I'm feeling very (epi-)centered today. Pass me that bag of woo, and I'll roll you one.

#44
No, i smoke 'woo' everyday, and I don't think up ridiculous stuff like this.

I was actually meditating when it happenned and thougt" Whoaaa!"

Sounds like a line straight out of Dude, Where's My Car?

When a computer programmer discovers a career shift into buffoonery, which multiplies his income by several orders of magnitude, what would he care if people think he really is a buffoon. Pile it on and watch the bank balance rocket.

Sentient planet? Cybertron!

List of sentient fictional planets

What an ass. A few of my ex-coworkers and I had a bad habit of mocking people (or putting their books on clearance) right before they died, and we joked about "killing" them, but we KNEW it was just a coincidence because a) it never worked on the people we wanted it to, and b) we weren't complete morons!! I especially like that he seemed confused as to why that might have upset people. Really, dumbass?

#49
Thanks! That was very helpful, although I'd like to point out that a few of those are planets controlled by a single being or organism, not necessarily a sentient plantet in and of itself, although the context for most of those was probably limited in their stories and didn't expand much on the organism itself.

Although I will say this, if it turns out Depak has any ability to control anything outside of himself and people he can get to believe him, then this planet is pretty doomed.

I had a powerful meditation this morning, but all it did was annoy the dog. I told her "You're the one that followed me in here."

When a computer programmer discovers a career shift into buffoonery, which multiplies his income by several orders of magnitude, what would he care if people think he really is a buffoon. Pile it on and watch the bank balance rocket.

His bank balance is only rocketing because there are a significant number of people who don't think he's a buffoon.

You know who else claimed to cause earthquakes?

Charles Manson.

There was a medium-sized quake during his murder trial, and all his followers went around telling reporters that Charlie had caused it.

That's some nice company you're keeping there, Deepak.

--Nurse Ingrid

So it was you, PZ, who caused the rainstorm last night that scared one of my cats into climbing to the top of a bookcase, then launching herself at my computer desk, causing my telephone, a Jonathan Coulton CD, a roll of packing tape, a Decemberist CD, a pair of glasses and this week's grocery store advert to end up under the treadmill?

For FSM's sake, PZ, lay off the damn burritos. Or aim the results at Texas.

Well, PZ, if you can't produce fires with the hot sauce, your method at least ought to produce a methane event.

OMG. Deepak Chopra is God.

------------

off topic:
http://jonathanturley.org/2010/04/05/fifteen-year-old-girl-dies-in-exor…

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hWAiZO1EflNUBKtrDjUrD…

Why does he write like a 15 year old emo girl??

Well that's just stupid. I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that I caused it. I was working at my computer; I hit the escape key and everything started to shake. No more escape key for me. It's just too damn dangerous.

re 53:

His bank balance is only rocketing because there are a significant number of people who don't think he's a buffoon.

Which, of course, does not necessarily make him any less of a buffoon.

Thanks, everyone for the answers about the sentient planets. I don't read much sci-fi, but I thought there had to be somebody who'd come up with that.

Now to weed out the entries for RPGs & comic books (sorry, not my thing).

Nope, my fault, I had a bug in my program that resulted in a divide-by-zero

Which, of course, does not necessarily make him any less of a buffoon.

Yes. What I meant was Chopra should care if people really think he's a buffoon because his income will plummet when those who believe he's not full of shit realize he is.

Nope, my fault, I had a bug in my program that resulted in a divide-by-zero

I thought that caused black holes, not earthquakes.

"When I fart, the mountains tremble"
- Don Genaro.

Very likely the dumbass didn't realize that the epicenter could have been somewhere else, cause here in LA the quake was felt very low-frequency, like a rocking boat, but no damage whatsoever. Hey, it was even kind of fun. The water in the pool at my workplaces tsunami-ed out! Hence, he thought he might just joke about it.

tsg, #63

Yes. What I meant was Chopra should care if people really think he's a buffoon because his income will plummet when those who believe he's not full of shit realize he is.

Have you listened to the guy? I don't know how more ridiculous he would have to be for his followers to finally call bullshit on him.

On a related note, did you know that Bono kills kids in Africa by clapping?

#17:

“There is no question that Ratzinger knew all the details of reports on abuse within the church, as there is no doubt that John Paul, his superior, took part in a massive and systematic cover-up,”

In tonight's X-Files Benny XVI plays Mulder and JP II plays the Cigarette Smoking Pope.

If he understood humor, Deepak's second tweet would've been "What? Too soon?" and he'd have left it at that.

This is why they used to burn witches, of course. If you honestly believe that some people are capable of this kind of mischief, then it's only prudent to put them to death.

DEEPAK CHOPRA
HE POKED A CRAP

Anagrams are fun.

PZ, the Del Taco Del Meat burrito with two packs of their hottest salsa makes for the best mudslide ever! Please don't aim for California, though, you might reach it, and there's enough shit to slide on around here already- it's an election year.

Incidentally, Paul Zachary Myers as an anagram translates to "Purchase lazy army" while Richard Dawkins comes out as "Dishrack Darwin." Deepak Chopra can also come out as "Cheap poke Dr."

I wonder if there's some sort of cosmic significance to these anagrams? Fuck that's creepy.

Shala:

Incidentally, Paul Zachary Myers as an anagram translates to "Purchase lazy army"

PZ doesn't need an army, lazy or otherwise. He has the horde.

;p

We should have a religious dipshit of the year award for people who claim they caused the quake.

Newsflash: Earthquake hits California as atheism fails again

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRawZ27qS4I

I am sure Pat Robertson will have some blinding insights any day now.

I knew Chopra was crazy, but until now I didn't think he was Count Chocula crazy.

Well, Deepak Chopra is a natural disaster, so maybe there's something to what he's saying. Like, maybe a diagnosis of schizophrenia.

Does this mean he is liable for the damages the earthquake caused?

@13: You win.

I enjoyed McCaffrey's "Powers That Be" series ("Powers That Be", "Power Lines", "Power Play"). Petaybee sounds like a cool place to live!

The best earthquake story (no significant injuries to my knowledge) I've heard was from my husbeast. He was sitting on the toilet when he heard the five-note theme from "Close Encounters" from the TV in the next room, and then everything started to shake! Quickest cure for constipation he'd every found...

I think I'll go eat a burrito and see if I can cause a mudslide in California ...

Okay, so mudslides aren't funny. But that was. Well played.