Weirdness
pharyngula | August 23, 2010The indefatigable Kurzweil threads do occasionally spawn some interesting discussion, and the latest has gone down a few odd byways thanks to this comment by Cerberus:
Creating a robotic brain to "download your consciousness" into or the "I'll make a clone version of myself with all my memories" sci-fi fiction immortality ideas are kinda false immortalities.
It's at best, assuming a complete successful procedure a process of ending one's consciousness so that a puppet version of yourself can emulate your life possibly for all eternity.
Great, but what does that do for real you?
Real you…
pharyngula | August 18, 2010An ape will have sex with anything, as this video shows.
I couldn't laugh — I only felt pity for the poor frog.
pharyngula | August 14, 2010I was amused by this infographic about sex toys, especially by some of the data. Did you know that Mississippians buy more anal sex toys per capita than any other state? I always knew there was something squirmy about Trent Lott.
pharyngula | August 13, 2010I'm going to regret this…it's a site that teaches you how to swear in exotic foreign languages, like Tagalog and Australian and Latvian.
The comments section may become more profane, but it'll also become more unintelligible.
pharyngula | August 13, 2010A game company hid a tiny little clause inside their long boring legal disclaimer that gave them the ownership of your immortal soul. Apparently, Gamestation now owns 7500 souls.
This was not a good deal, though. If you'd read the legalese, there was a checkbox to opt out of the soul clause…and if you opted out, Gamestation gave you a £5 coupon. The only conclusion to be drawn here is that souls are worth -£5 each, and we ought to be paying Satan to take them off our hands.
pharyngula | August 11, 2010An Australian travel writer catalogs a few of the world's most craptastical tourist attractions, and one of them, naturally, is Ken Ham's Creation "Museum".
Here, true believers can learn about how the Earth was formed by the big man upstairs, who manages to explain away such potential roadblocks as dinosaurs, billion-year-old fossils, and that whole science thing with room after room of ultra-religious tackiness.
Notice, though, that here is an Australian travel writer commenting on American kitsch, and failing to mention that it is the brainchild of one of his compatriots. It made me…
pharyngula | August 11, 2010No, everyone who is sending me this photo, that is not a picture of my home life.
I'll have you know that the arrangement my wife and I have is that I do the cooking, she does the dishes.
However, I will concede that this picture might count as TrophyWife™ porn.
pharyngula | August 10, 2010Come on, journals. What kind of garbage are you stooping to publish now?
This paper in Virology Journal has to be seen to be believed. The entire data set for the "study" is a few brief lines in the Bible, where Jesus heals a sick woman with a fever. From this, the authors conclude that she had influenza. Huzzah! A completely unjustifiable diagnosis from hearsay.
And even more absurdly, the journal editors thought this superficial noise was worthy of publication.
I will say, though, that my favorite parts were the bits where the authors noted that Jesus did not take her temperature because…
pharyngula | August 3, 2010It's an illustrated guide to facial hair, and it contains many important True Facts.
It also has a survey of different beard styles, with a discussion of what they mean. Obviously, I have to agree with this one.
Don't even try to argue with me. I've got honor, virility, and wisdom on my side.
pharyngula | August 3, 2010I have often been told that 1) very few people believe the weird faith I mock, and 2) I should be more respectful of religion. So I guess the stands at this Benny Hinn spectacle were mostly empty, and this coat-waving miracle cure stuff is something I ought to consider serious theology.
Huh. It's like he's got a weaponized jacket or something.
pharyngula | August 1, 2010After listening to Ken Ham set to music, I never want to hear another complaint about auto-tuning Carl Sagan.
pharyngula | July 30, 2010The peculiarities of dietary restrictions by the religious are always entertaining. Catholics have their own weird practices: here's a bit of strange information from a Catholic agony aunt forum.
Do alligators count as fish?
As a Catholic who observes the custom of abstaining from meat on Fridays, I would like to know if alligator would be considered meat or fish. Recently, on a Friday, I was in a local restaurant where I was sharing a dinner of alligator. I thought upon this, and decided, as a reptile, alligator would fall into the fish category. I hope I'm not sounding too scrupulous, but…
pharyngula | July 28, 2010Some things just make you want to cringe under a table somewhere, they're so awful and embarrassing. And sometimes they're so bad I don't want to cringe down there alone, so I'm going to creep you all out, too. Behold, Andrew Cohen. His ex-girlfriend, who turned down his proposal of marriage for what rapidly become obvious reasons, was getting married to someone else — so he wrote her a 'wedding gift', a publicly published, soppy opinion piece on how wonderful she is and how much she's hurting him by spurning his deep, stalkerish obsession with her. For her wedding, he tries to hand her a…
pharyngula | July 27, 2010Wait, wait, this story makes no sense.
A gay netball coach fired from a Christchurch Christian school has gained compensation and an apology.
The 28-year-old man was employed as a girls' netball coach at Middleton Grange School in February, but said he was sacked by the board of trustees after members discovered his sexual orientation.
A gay man was fired from his job as coach of a girls' team? Wouldn't it have made more sense to fire him if he were heterosexual?
Oh, it's a religious school. They specialize in stuff that makes no sense.
pharyngula | July 25, 2010
This is disgraceful. A reader sent me a link to a Target catalog, and apparently they're now selling a Li'l PZ Action Set.
Think of the children.
pharyngula | July 24, 2010I've already complained a little bit about the poor availability of network connectivity at my mother's house. I looked next door at the Bible Chapel and discovered the source of the problem. We're jinxed.
No. No it isn't.
pharyngula | July 23, 2010This story is nice and sad at the same time. At an Anglican church in Canada, a parishioner attended with his dog, went up to take communion and his pet followed him, and after giving the man the magic cookie, the priest placed a communion wafer on the dog's tongue, too. Hey, he was just waiting there with his tongue hanging out, it was the most natural thing to do. Unfortunately, and entirely predictably, some prissy-pants whiner in the congregation didn't like it.
Days later, the church and diocese received a complaint from one parishioner, who felt the church offended the sacred ritual.…
pharyngula | July 22, 2010Westboro Baptist Church decided that they were going to picket Comic-Con, and Justin Kirchart sent me pictures. He also sent me a photo of the WBC picket — it's a sad and pathetic 4 people standing and holding the usual "YOU HATE GOD" and "GOD HATES FAGS" signs, and it wasn't very interesting, so I didn't bother to upload it.
Here, though, are the forces of Comic-con madness across the street. They're much more entertaining. Click to zoom in!
Justin liked "Jesus was nailed to a cross. Thor has a hammer." I kind of liked "ODIN IS GOD. Read Mighty Thor #5". Thor is always good for a laugh in…