Weirdness
pharyngula | November 26, 2009By way of the endless thread, I have discovered this marvelous quote from Andy Schlafly.
There's a broader point here. Why the big push for black holes by liberals, and big protests against any objection to them? If it turned out empirically that promoting black holes tends to cause people to read the Bible less, would you still push this so much?
Forget that math and physics stuff; the universe is actually a giant propaganda piece for liberalism, and the only reason scientists huff and puff about what's actually out there is to get you to stop reading your Bibles.
pharyngula | November 22, 2009I have mixed feelings about this: a first-edition copy of Darwin's Origin of Species has been discovered, which is, of course, great — I do wish I had the pocket change to drop £60,000 to buy it for myself.
The weird part is that it was found in the guest bathroom of an old house in Oxford. Apparently, someone thought the Origin was perfect light, occasional reading for visitors attending to certain private physiological functions, which is nice, if a little trivializing. It's a bit odd, though, that they put the book there and no one seems to have bothered to notice it for 150 years. I am…
pharyngula | November 17, 2009It's an announcement for a new video game, and the website is totally deadpan.
I can't find the company "Prayer Works Interactive" on the web, which gives me some hope that this isn't real.
pharyngula | November 15, 2009Just recently, Stephen Fry achieved the landmark of one million followers on twitter (I have less than 1% of that). Apparently, that's the threshold for achieving a personal singularity.
pharyngula | November 14, 2009John Wesley, the Methodist theologian, also advocated 'natural' cures for illness, so he was kind of a quack. However, this account of Wesley's recommendations for treating the sick has one prescription I really like. No, not the one about holding a warm puppy against your tummy for stomach-ache (although that one is pretty good)…it's a couple of paragraphs below that one.
I'll let you figure it out.
NO! It's not drinking beer for tuberculosis, either!
pharyngula | November 12, 2009
No, I don't think I could do that. I'd rather my meals weren't conscious while I masticate.
pharyngula | November 8, 2009Gene Ray, of Timecube infamy, has a twitter account.
If he and Ashton Kutcher started following one another, that would be like crossing the streams. It would be bad.
By the way, he's not a very funny guy — more like a racist homophobe with an ego. Not a nice fellow at all.
pharyngula | November 7, 2009It's always good to be able to categorize and explain relationships in the world.
I'm going to have to ponder this further, though. The Mummy is clearly in the same region as Frankenstein, but does the infectious nature of lycanthropy put the Wolfman in the same category as Dracula? I guess if zombies count as converters, so do werewolves. Curiously, the modern monsters of slasher flicks, the Freddies, the Michael Myerses (no relation), the Jasons, seem to have avoided the converter/contagion element of other movie monsters.
Discuss.
pharyngula | November 7, 2009Some crazy lady in British Columbia named either Sonia or Tanja Jensen has me on a mailing list. I'm in good company; also on the list are the president of my university, Bob Bruininks, as well as Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, the Governor of Alaska, Greenpeace, Angela Merkel, and the German Balkan Trust. Strangely, NASA is not on the list. Without exception, all of her emails are raving mad. Here's her latest, which I think is one of the finest examples of her output.
COULD NASA CAUSE THE SUDDEN DEATH OF EVERY LIVING THING ON EARTH? - "... the moon will not give its light ..." Matthew 24:…
pharyngula | November 5, 2009Professor Thomas Tang of Middle Tennessee State University has broken the code of silence and revealed one of the vast powers which are conferred upon us when we land an academic job. It's true, professors can send you to hell.
Frustrated over cheating allegations, one professor at Middle Tennessee State University took the idea of a traditional honor code in a controversial direction.
Suspecting that one of his MBA candidates had just cheated on an exam, Professor Thomas Tang had each of them sign a pledge that said if they had cheated, they'd be condemned to an eternity in Hell.
The…
pharyngula | October 26, 2009At last, we have a simple definition of an atheist.
(via GrrlScientist)
pharyngula | October 26, 2009Gosh. I put out a call to vote for Biofortified in a blog contest, and you guys all did your part and registered and voted honestly, and now what happens? I'm accused of fixing the competition.
This group has been putting out the following messsage on Twitter: "Vote for Biofortified in Ashoka Changemakers contest".
Â
A Monsanto PR operator has discreetly done the same and now the votes for Biofortified have suddenly exploded, more than doubling in a matter of hours in a completely unprecedented pattern.
Uh, I hate to say this, but the surge in votes is thanks to ME, not some obscure tweet…
pharyngula | October 25, 2009Somehow, this story is just too cliched.
Pastor Marc Grizzard claims the King James version of the Bible is the only true word of God, and that all other versions are "satanic" and "perversions" of God's word.
On Halloween night, Grizzard and the 14 members of the Amazing Grace Baptist Church will set fire to other versions of the scripture, as well as music and books by Christian authors.
Book burning, sectarian intolerance, and overalls? Good grief, man, that is just playing to the stereotype of the southern good ol' boy. Every educated Southerner is cringing at what you're doing to…
pharyngula | October 25, 2009The web of lies was working away yesterday: apparently, some bored wankers created some twitter accounts and started injecting rumors into the internet that Hawking had been killed by a Christian fundamentalist, and they've been spreading everywhere — I'm getting all kinds of email from people wondering if it is true.
No reputable news source is carrying any story about it, and the only source is a couple of anonymous twitter accounts. So what do you think?
pharyngula | October 23, 2009When I picked up my mail this afternoon, I was surprised to find several large boxes waiting for me. I was surprised when I opened them, both by the nature of their contents and by the fact that there was no note to say who sent them. Whoever it was, thank you! I don't think anyone has ever given me a gift quite as unexpected. I now own…
…a set of disposable vaginal specula and a very nice LED illuminator!
Man, when you've got a speculum, everything starts to look like a vagina. I cocked an inquisitive eye at the Trophy Wife™, but she backed away quickly and is hiding from me now.
I am going…
pharyngula | October 23, 2009This is Ali, a six month old baby in Southern Russia.
It's a miracle! Every Monday and Thursday, fresh quotations from the Quran 'magically' appear on his legs, belly, or arms when he's home alone with his mommy and daddy, and then the pilgrims show up in the thousands to give the happy family lots and lots of attention. I simply can't imagine how red marks might appear on the delicate skin of a young baby while under the care of doting, attentive parents, or why anyone might cheat and fake a miracle…can you? The only possible explanation is that the omnipotent, omniscient master of the…
pharyngula | October 20, 2009Apparently, twitter tracks hot trends in the tiny little conversations flying about, and the #1 hot topic today was "No God". The amusing reason why is that someone posted that boring and fallacious cliche, "Know God…Know Peace. No God…No Peace", a lot of Christians retweeted it, and a few atheists contributed to the confusion by saying "no god", and that's all it took to single out that one phrase and turn it into the top few words being bandied about.
Just to make it even more hilarious, various Christian twitterers (or whatever they call them) freaked out and started frantically submitting…
pharyngula | October 18, 2009Last month, we were told that the Rapture was coming on 21 September. It didn't happen. You know that there must have been some little mistake in their calculations.
The prophets have double-checked their numbers and found the error, and fixed it. We now know without error the date of the end.
THE RAPTURE IS COMING ON 21 OCTOBER!!!!
Scurry and flee, everyone. They can't be wrong everytime, can they? This might be it.
pharyngula | October 14, 2009I suppose it's nice to know I'm not forgotten, but it's still a little weird that I occasionally get email from Bill Donohue, just out of the blue. Like today.
secular sabotage
PZ,
Just to let you know, I did not forget you when I wrote "Secular Sabotage." You made the cut the old fashioned way--you earned it.
Bill Donohue
I don't know what prompted that, but it is good to know that I have a reputation for working hard. I wouldn't want to be thought to be a mere welfare heretic, coasting along on handouts from theological anti-patronage, you know.