Paul Z. Meyers
pharyngula
Posts by this author
December 17, 2008
Oh, no — more hysteria over Christmas from Bill O'Reilly, joined now by Gretchen Carlson, the blinkered bigot host of some other Fox program. The dialog is hilariously stupid.
Billo blows it early, claiming that Christmas marks "the birth of Jesus Christ, which is what the holiday is based on",…
December 17, 2008
Here's an interesting new blog, Moneduloides, that seems to have an emphasis on human evolution, if you're into that sort of thing, and it currently has a short list of good texts for Christmas presents. <moan> I've done absolutely no Christmas shopping at all this year, so if the economy…
December 17, 2008
There was an atheist sign among the holiday displays at the Illinois capitol — and it was stolen! How strange — I guess the Ten Commandments are only a set of rough guidelines that Christians can throw out when confronted with uppity atheists. They've got the ethics of convenience, I guess.
December 16, 2008
This cute, innocent little 3-year-old just wants his name in frosting on his birthday cake, and the bakery refused to do it. Harsh, man. Poor little guy. And he's probably going to have to deal with this blatant discrimination for the rest of his life.
He's also stuck with a pair of dingleberries…
December 16, 2008
Everyone is wondering what happened to the TalkOrigins Archive — it's currently inaccessible. Don't panic! The commercial host juggled servers around a little bit, it got its IP address changed, and those who run the show are are scrambling to update the IP with the domain name registrar. It shall…
December 16, 2008
If you haven't been keeping up with the New Humanist Advent Podcasts, there are many new ones since I last mentioned them: Ben Goldacre, Martin Rowson, Chris Addison, Ben Miller, Andrew Collins, , Eddie Izzard, Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant, and Laurie Taylor. I do have to mention that Eddie…
December 16, 2008
Man, it's getting to the point where a fellow can't even build a death ray or an island fortress shaped like a skull without someone getting pissy about it. Take this account, for instance, of a few people just playing around with skeletons and lab coats:
A group of students had their 'Mad…
December 16, 2008
Lots of people complained that throwing shoes at the president was an act of violence, and therefore beyond the pale of what should be allowed. I think they're wrong, that it's a harmless expression of naked contempt, and that there ought to be more contempt expressed towards this president, but…
December 16, 2008
About half* my ancestry is Scandinavian — equally split between Sweden and Norway — and one of the nice things about the Christmas holidays is the reconnection with family and tradition, so it's only appropriate that I urge you all to crash a Swedish poll. It's asking, Do you think schools should…
December 16, 2008
…then the gospels would have been written like this.
December 15, 2008
Put them on the first step to a lifelong obsession, and let them play with the Build A Squid game on the Te Papa Museum website. It's very easy and very cute.
December 15, 2008
No, not really, but this is still a cool result: investigators have used an MRI to read images off the visual cortex. They presented subjects with some simple symbols and letters, scanned their brains, and read off the image from the data — and it was even legible! Here are some examples of, first…
December 15, 2008
In these times of economic crisis, war, and uncertainty, it is reassurring to know that our diligent representatives are hard at work in congress to make the country a better place.
Behold, House Resolution 847.
H. Res. 847
In the House of Representatives, U. S.,
December 11, 2007.
Whereas…
December 15, 2008
Evangelists are suddenly experiencing rapid growth, and wow, are they happy about it!
"It's a wonderful time, a great evangelistic opportunity for us," said the Rev. A. R. Bernard, founder and senior pastor of the Christian Cultural Center in Brooklyn, New York's largest evangelical congregation,…
December 15, 2008
I must object to this list!
The differences are obvious. If you're good, Santa brings you toys every year, and if you're bad, you get a lump of coal. Jesus, on the other hand, offers nothing but vague promises that will only be redeemed after you're dead, and neither alternative (hovering about in…
December 15, 2008
America is kind of a land of thugs, isn't it? Here's the latest sordid story: two Ecuadorian brothers are walking down the street, an SUV full of morons mistakes them for a gay couple, and they jump out and beat one of them to death.
[Jose] Sucuzhanay (suh-KOO-chen-eye) and his brother Romel, 38,…
December 15, 2008
The blizzard is over, and now we're just buried knee-high in snow. It's also finals week at UMM, and we've just received a note from the administration that classes are not cancelled, but that "students, faculty, and staff should use their judgment when deciding whether or not travel to campus".…
December 14, 2008
Our president, the wretched villain who threw away our economy and our people's lives in a wasteful, failed war, skulked into Iraq and tried to pretend he was a hero. Nobody was fooled, and he got a rude surprise.
Bush had just finished his prepared remarks in which he said the security agreement…
December 14, 2008
John Holbo is determined — nay, obsessesed — to add a new holiday to the pantheon of midwinter festivals: it's Haeckelmas. I can actually understand this, since the artwork Ernst Haeckel masterminded is worthy of obsession, a beautiful celebration of life in a Victorian vein.
If you're tired of…
December 14, 2008
Santa looks frightened. Do you think he will be eaten next?
December 14, 2008
Our first blizzard of the season is hitting us right now: snow is pouring down, the wind is howling, temperatures are in the single digits °F and dropping, and we're nearing white-out conditions. We're staying indoors.
I don't think our snowflakes look anything like the picture above (from this…
December 14, 2008
All the smart people in the 56267 zip code will be tuned in to Atheists Talk radio this morning at 9am, to hear about the winter solstice and godless bus signage. You can too!
Oh, and at noon we're all going to tune in to Nic McPhee's and Susan Gilbert's radio show on KUMM for an eclectic mix of…
December 13, 2008
Cruel, cruel readers. Everyone is sending me links to this recent episode of The View, in which four women babble inanely about something or other. In this case, it's evolution. Do you people like to see me suffer? This was horrible.
OK, Whoopi Goldberg is wishy-washy, rather than stupid: she…
December 13, 2008
Australia has taken an interesting step forward: they're going to allow instruction in humanism in their schools, apparently in place of traditional religion classes.
Victorian state primary school students will soon have an alternative -- religious education lessons taught by people who do not…
December 13, 2008
Yeah, and next we'll have a really important poll on what color socks I should wear. Right now, you'll have to settle for answering this question: What do you think of the decision to block the "I Believe" license plate? The results so far:
Good. The plates are a violation of church and state 18.16…
December 13, 2008
That's a good question. After all, how can someone get seriously upset when they're wished "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas"? It's been ridiculous from the get-go. Well, Max Blumenthal has traced the meme back in an article on who started the War on Christmas, and you probably won't be…
December 12, 2008
I thought Expelled was an awful concept, but now there's another movie that's come out that is even worse: The Day the Earth Stood Still. I haven't seen it, and I don't plan to, since I was horrified by the trailers … and now Gary Farber has collected the key points of many reviews. There ought to…