Paul Z. Meyers
pharyngula
Posts by this author
April 14, 2010
It looks like Michael De Dora is calling me out. The wishy-washy, sloppy-thinking director of the NY CFI, whose main claim to fame lately is a series of blog articles notable only for their fuzziness and willingness to accommodate any nonsense from religious BS artists, is now taking me to task for…
April 14, 2010
I have no idea what this is. I was sent the photo by a reader who discovered it in a jungle of ferns on Hawaii. It looks vaguely familiar, but perhaps someone here can identify it.
I have a feeling this feature might turn into something like a county fair on Discworld, where people bring in odd-…
April 14, 2010
He seems very surprised. I guess it's something he's never experienced before.
Chopra has a little story to tell. It seems colobus monkeys have discovered that eating charcoal absorbs some of the irritating toxins in their diet, so the monkeys have been chowing down on the stuff for several…
April 13, 2010
You're the first to meet an intelligent alien species. What are you going to do? Here's a brief, handy guide — I'll just excerpt a few points.
I like this idea: there's no way we're going to war with them. Our technologies will not be comparable, and we have to note the obvious: they'd be the ones…
April 13, 2010
The New Humanist has a poll that is being crashed by apologists for Catholicism…I think. The problem is that they've worded the alternatives so almost all of the choices (#3 clearly sucks) have some reasonable elements to them. Which means, as usual, you'll have to go over there and think about…
April 13, 2010
Then you'll like the new addition to Scienceblogs, Myrmecos.
I have to say, Needs More Squid, but then that's true of all of the scienceblogs. I guess arthropods are almost as cool, though, so I'll give the blog my blessing.
April 13, 2010
Then you must read this wonderfully written piece in the Atlantic. The author's argument is powerful, but the section with the excerpts from the declarations of seccession by various southern states settles the facts of the case. Here's what Mississippi had to say:
…Our position is thoroughly…
April 13, 2010
Lots of people send me essays they've written, asking if I'd like to post it on Pharyngula. I usually don't, simply because I'd be inundated (so don't take this as an invitation!), and in most cases, those people ought to start their own blog and put it there. I thought I'd make an exception,…
April 13, 2010
It hardly seems sporting, it's already sailing off in the right direction. But anyway, have fun with it.
Should the Pope be charged with 'crimes against humanity', over the alleged cover-up of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church?
Yes76.7%
No23.3%
My one reservation is all the focus on The Pope.…
April 13, 2010
There may be a few metal fans here and there…and this song is for you. If you don't enjoy music with lots of hoarse shouting and banging instruments into rocks, DO NOT PLAY THIS VIDEO. You will cry. I've got two sons, so I've been inured to this stuff — and at least this band, The Ocean, has…
April 13, 2010
The mayor of Malta is quite anxious to have a statue removed from a prominent place on the road from the airport, before the Pope arrives. He might be embarrassed, after all. That's the statue on the right; it's called "Colonna Mediterranea", and some people fear an obelisk is too phallic. Because…
April 12, 2010
You know, Ken Ham is fond of claiming that if Genesis isn't literally true, the entire basis of Jesus's redemption is lost — and he's right. And look, Jesse notices!
I'm a little worried that the blame for the pointlessness of redeeming an original sin that didn't exist is being placed on some…
April 12, 2010
There was much talk of music in the prior embodiment of the immortal thread, so I thought everyone would appreciate a special song. It's just like having a conversation with a god-bot.
By the way, for you statistics freaks: the last thread hit the round-numbered landmark of 40,000 (nice number,…
April 12, 2010
Another mobile element has been slotted into the SciBorg matrix: everyone say hello to The Thoughtful Animal, a blog on animal cognition. So far, Needs More Squid, but it could be interesting.
April 12, 2010
It's been a long term issue: a lot of vocal skeptics want nothing to do with atheism. They see it as a difficult issue that could sidetrack campaigns to encourage critical thinking, even though a lot of prominent skeptics are also atheists. I've never quite seen the logic: they're going to oppose…
April 12, 2010
The horrible evidence of a Catholic cover-up keeps piling up in these various sex abuse cases…what's going on? Certain minds are certainly drifting towards conspiracy theories, evil attempts to bring down the church with a web of deception. And if that's the case, who is behind it all? Isn't it…
April 12, 2010
I'm a little worried. Jason Rosenhouse wrote about this new paper by Peter Hess, the Faith Project Director (I'm already rolling my eyes) of the NCSE, and I learn that the first failing of Intelligent Design creationism is that it is blasphemous.
Uh-oh.
I am proudly and unapologetically blasphemous…
April 12, 2010
I'm a shoo-in now. Although my mind may have just blown up.
In what may come as a surprise for some, Huckabee agreed that an atheist could be fit to serve as president. "I'd rather have an honest atheist than a dishonest religious person," he said.
Don't worry. He didn't mean it. He's actually…
April 12, 2010
Michael Behe is a professor at Lehigh University. He's also a crank, marginalized and mocked and belittled in academia, and regarded as an ignorant ideologue. But he's still holding his position and he's still allowed to express himself. That's the principled position we hold in academia — he's…
April 12, 2010
Father Maciel was one of the most notorious influential pedophiles in the Catholic hierarchy — he led an order, the Legion of Christ, which seems to have consisted of likely catamites for his pleasures. Predatory sexual habits don't seem to be his only legacy, though: follow the money.
Maciel left…
April 12, 2010
Klotho (KL) is an interesting gene. It produces an enzyme which seems to be involved in repressing cellular senescence by regulating the p53 pathway, mouse mutations in these genes produce the symptoms of accelerated aging, and there are even a couple of known human alleles correlated with changes…
April 12, 2010
Kurt Zimmerman is pissed off. He's not a very bright guy, and he doesn't know much about biology or history, and he's extremely annoyed that not only is the local school teaching his kids stuff he didn't know, but they're actually telling them that his sources of information are wrong. You see, the…
April 11, 2010
The Connecticut legislature is considering a bill that would remove teh statute of limitations on child sex abuse cases. Guess who is opposing the bill. No, it's not NAMBLA. No, it's not a mob of sexually precocious toddlers. It's…the Catholic Church! You probably didn't see that one coming.
The…
April 11, 2010
I've been getting a few odd, cryptic messages on twitter from someone calling himself @spiritualgenome. I looked him up to figure out what the heck he was babbling about, and found his web page. Turns out he's a crop circle nut, and you might find a few minutes amusement in his delusions.…
April 11, 2010
Atheists don't believe in God. We deny the Holy Spirit. Jesus was just a man, at best, as were Buddha, Mohammed, and every other prophet and religious figure in history. That much everyone seems to be able to pick up on, but I think there's something even more important that we reject.
We don't…
April 11, 2010
Hello, Wisconsin! I'll be speaking at the University of Wisconsin Stevens Point on Wednesday. At least I don't have to suffer through airports this time — I'm driving, making a stop at UWSP, then briefly at Madison to drop my son off, then on to Chicago Thursday and Friday to talk morality with a…
April 11, 2010
I was a bit suspicious of this story that Dawkins and Hitchens were going to "ambush" and "arrest" the Pope when he showed up in England. It was just a little too sensationalistic, too out of character. I was right.
Needless to say, I did NOT say "I will arrest Pope Benedict XVI" or anything so…