pharyngula

A quick note of thanks to the UCF chapter of the Campus Freethought Alliance for the pleasant time in Florida (especially pleasant now that I've come home to the prospect of several inches of snow today). We did get a nice photo of our last supper together: pizza and beer, of course. (Click for…

At one of my talks this weekend, I was asked if there was a list of secular charities somewhere…and alas, I didn't have one off the top of my head. Now I have one: Techskeptic's Data Daily: Atheist Charities. Give!

This must be why he used a flood, last time.

For the first time ever, my talk at UCF actually had protestors. Here's photographic evidence: They were just lining the sidewalk at the entrance to the hall where I spoke, silently playing with their rosary beads. We invited them in, but none bothered — they quietly disappeared sometime around…

Cynthia Dunbar has written a book. It's typical wingnut nonsense: it "refers to public education as 'a subtly deceptive tool of perversion' and calls the establishment of public schools unconstitutional and 'tyrannical.'" It goes further and says that… …she believes public schools are…

It must be the season. The godless are popping up all over. Strange Doctrines is back after a hiatus. I suspect he was off in mystic Tibet studying the rituals of Dormammu. Go say hello to the Hooping Humanist. He's even got a picture of me! I don't know if we want to encourage this: atheists…

Austin Dacey is an interesting fellow who has written a book on the non-religious basis of morality, The Secular Conscience: Why Belief Belongs in Public Life(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll), and he is going to be on Atheists Talk radio this morning at 9am Central time. He'll be talking specifically about…

Yeah, I get odd threats. Apparently, I can now expect every Christian in the country to now inundate my university with mail accusing me of Marxism and telling us that evolution is dead. It's kind of a threat; if it happens, then I'll post Bonnie's full headers and we can wage a little internet war…

People are responding to my request to avoid stealing or damaging nativity scenes with the suggestion that adding to a nativity scene ought to be ok. Maybe so; note this fine Catalonian tradition and examples of reverent statuary that belong in your local religious display.

A columnist for the Cincinnati Enquirer is quite irate about the fact that we squelched the zoo/creation museum deal. If you read his article, you'll discover a theme. The live Nativity at the Creation Museum will have an actual, living, cud-chewing camel. Frightening. There will also be goats…

Seth Godin is a marketing guy, and he recently turned his eye to the evolution-creation wars and offered a marketing perspective. That's useful, but I don't think he looked deeply enough, and his suggestions don't really help much. In particular, he compares the acceptance of Darwin's theory of…

If you really want to know where the war on Christmas is being waged, he needs to look at the manufacturers of Kitschmas gifts. Ewww, ick. Although…should I get my wife the "Men on a Mission" calendar?

This is so sweet: Lyrics and more are available.

Christianist thugs stole the atheist sign from the Washington state capitol building. It's revealing of their mindset — that it's OK to censor anything that disagrees with their petty beliefs. However, I'm getting a few emails that hint that maybe this means it's now time for open season on…

No, no, no. This is what we do to convince them of evolution.

I'm about to fly away, and I got word last night that the Dean of the Chapel at Rollins is suddenly getting quite irate about my visit. Finally, someone is reacting to me as if I were the antichrist! Maybe we'll get some controversy Saturday night, although more likely they'll discover I'm this…

Representatives of the Antarctic and deep-sea genera of octopuses. (a) Pareledone charcoti, a shallow-water species from the Antarctic Peninsula. (b) Thaumeledone gunteri, a deep-water species endemic to South Georgia. (c) Megaleledone setebos, a shallow water circum-Antarctic species endemic to…

A few people are trying to put together some events for CONvergence, the SF convention that will be taking place 2-5 July in Minneapolis (I'll be going, too). They need volunteers to help with organizing — it's a bit tentative right now, so I can't give out all the details, but if you write to me I…

As part of an ongoing program of reducing their relevance and demolishing their credibility, CNN has just completely shut down their Science, Space and Technology unit. Who needs good science coverage, after all, since nothing important happens in that area…and as the US continues to dumb down its…

Simon Ings has written a wonderful survey of the eye, called A Natural History of Seeing: The Art and Science of Vision(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll), and it's another of those books you ought to be sticking on your Christmas lists right now. The title give you an idea of its content. It's a "natural…

Some men's magazine was planning a cheesy promotion: they were going to include inflatable breasts with an issue. Sad news, though: the crate has been lost at sea. There is some speculation that pirates are responsible. Very lonely, tasteless pirates.

I have a suspicion that that photo of squid guts in the last post is going to make a few people feel squeamish, and now I'm going to show something even worse: Bill O'Reilly. <cue frantic screams from everyone…"More squid guts! Please! Anything but Billo!"> Of course Billo is outraged at…

So you've got a 30lb. squid. What are you going to do with it? Follow along with the photo guide and turn it into something delicious.

Also, nice footage of the Indonesian Mimetic Octopus. (via GrrlScientist)

I'll believe them when I see them. Greg Laden says we should all vote on this idea: that we ought to rather thoroughly revamp how science is taught in this country by setting national science standards on the teaching of evolution. I'd like to see it if it could be done well, but I predict that…

The temperatures here in Morris are dropping into the single digits °F, snow is on the ground and probably not going away until the spring, and the lakes are all frozen over — we spotted our first icehouse on Lake Minnewaska last weekend. So what does that mean? I'm flying south this weekend, to…

It's exactly the same, except it's about atheists instead of Jews. Funny, but also grating.

Yeah, poor Ken — he's still distressed that his attempt to prop up his credibility with the Cincinnati Zoo's was foiled. He's also complaining about an "atheist (a professor from the University of Minnesota-Morris)" who engineered his defeat. I wonder who that might be? Even more foolishly, though…

It's a very happy song. See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die The resolution is a little too pat, though. One thing we've learned from the last 20 years is that people will gladly vote against their economic well-being to support bizarre social values.