Category: Cephalopods
Wired has a pretty gallery of images from the recent Colossal Squid necropsy. If you've ever wondered what a pile of squid guts would look like on a table, here you go.
It's too bad the images aren't quite large enough to use as wallpaper on my laptop.
Oh, and those colors—that's exactly what slug guts look like, too. We natives of the Pacific Northwest have many opportunities to get familiar with those.
Posted by PZ Myers at 10:09 AM • 39 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Creationism
This is the Friends of Brooker Creek Preserve website — it looks exactly like the kind of organization I would support, a community effort to protect a local wildlife area. They lobby, they educate, they offer opportunities to hike and experience nature.
One problem: it's in Florida. That seems to mean the organization is infected with stupidity and cowardice.
As part of their educational mission, they were going to have a speaker come in next last Febrary, Dr Lorena Madrigal of the University of South Florida. She studies genetics and human evolution, and was going to speak on 12 February, Darwin Day. To the Pinellas County bureaucrats, this is a problem.
"Biology without evolution is not biology," she suggested, which obviously explains, at least in the mind of William Davis, the Pinellas County director of environmental services, why the professor's speech would be problematic.
"Her topic was about evolution," Davis said. Well, yeaaaaaah! "I flinched on that."
"I canceled her out after discussing it with my supervisors," he said. "We are not the platform for debate on creationism versus evolution."
Right. Talking about evolution might annoy the creationists, so the county's response is to shut down and silence efforts to educate and inform by an environmental institution which relies on evolutionary biology to perform its mission. This is a perfect example of how creationists work to keep people ignorant, and create an environment free of legitimate information about a subject that contradicts their absurd literalist beliefs.
Posted by PZ Myers at 8:43 AM • 101 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Cephalopods
Figure from Cephalopods: A World Guide (amzn/b&n/abe/pwll), by Mark Norman.
Posted by PZ Myers at 8:10 AM • 29 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Kooks
I've tuned into KKMS, although to be honest, I lost all respect for these evangelical radio cretins when they had that Simmons "debate" and left me out. We'll have to see if their guest's attempts to criticize atheists in their absence will be as effective.
I'm trying to grade exams while simultaneously listening — it's like listening with half my brain tied behind my back.
The host claims that it is important to understand the perspective of the "New" Atheists…so why are they inviting this Aikman clown on, instead of an actual atheist?
Aikman claims the atheists are bringing "pestilence", and claims that we only pick on Christians (what? What about Hitchens?) because Christians are so good and kind and generous and won't blow them up. We're already in stupid territory: the atheists criticize Christians because they are the dominant element in our culture.
We get some whining about how Christianity is portrayed in the media (ubiquitously?), and an uncontested claim that the religion is a benefit to society.
So far, I'm still waiting to hear a real criticism of atheism and atheists.
Oh, yeah…"I used to be an atheist". I knew he'd say that eventually. It's amazing how 99% of the evangelical world seems to have been godless, once.
Now we get another predictable claim: atheists have done all the evil of the 20th century, and communists and Pol Pot get dragged out.
Another predictable point: there is no basis for atheist morality. To which I always wonder, if there is no god, then there must be no basis for Christian morality either.
These guys are completely clueless. This isn't an exercise in learning more about the New Atheists, it's 3 ignoramuses making up stuff with one another.
Good — August Berkshire called in to criticize, and hit them with a good question: if god is a source of morality, what is the Christian position on the death penalty? On contraception? Would you believe the Aikman clown tried to claim that the death penalty is not a moral issue? The DJs tried to run away and claim that their belief in the crucifixion is the core of their belief...which is not a moral issue, either. Aikman tries to dig up Hitler, and claims everything is about the basis of morality, while avoiding the simple fact that Christianity does not provide simple moral guidance.
Berkshire throws their own claim that the ten commandments are the basis of morality by pointing out that the punishments for violating most of those rules was death. When they try to duck and weave by saying they don't follow the Old Testament rules anymore, Berkshire hammers on the obvious fact that there has been a rather substantial change in the treatment of moral issues.
Another caller: Jeff from Maple Grove, who babbles a bunch of apologetics for the Old Testament. God Hates Sin. He didn't change his mind! Dear dog, I'm feeling my brain leaking away as I listen to these idiots.
Now Damon in Las Vegas calls in. Points out that atheists can't disprove the Christian god, but Christians can't disprove the other gods, but dismiss them — how do they do that? Aikman answers (?) that Christians believe they can have a relationship with god mediated through Jesus, and that the historical evidence for Jesus is strong, and then makes up a bunch of bullshit about evidence for the resurrection (making it up all the way). Then he claims again that he used to be an atheist.
He doesn't answer the question!
Bob calls in to address August, and again, he claims god didn't change, the people did. August clearly hit a nerve with that one.
Tony (Toni?) calls in to explain that she lost her Catholic faith and is an atheist, and her old associates all think she's going to burn in hell. She asks how a loving and just god could do that. Aikman chickens out and refuses to answer. The DJs try to dig into her Catholic background, and then basically tells her to accept it, and that you have to be perfect to live forever, and that's Jesus's gift…they're essentially telling her that she gets to burn in Hell. Aikman butts in and tells her to read Strobel. Strobel! That guy is awful.
I must apologize for mentioning this radio show to everyone. It's pathetic. It's three buffoons babbling on the air. I didn't learn a thing about atheism (how could I? They had no knowledge between them), but I was reminded once again how foolish theology is.
Posted by PZ Myers at 4:58 PM • 189 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Creationism
Guess what? He didn't like it, nosir.
"Expelled" is a shoddy piece of propaganda that props up the failures of Intelligent Design by playing the victim card. It deceives its audiences, slanders the scientific community, and contributes mightily to a climate of hostility to science itself. Stein is doing nothing less than helping turn a generation of American youth away from science. If we actually come to believe that science leads to murder, then we deserve to lose world leadership in science. In that sense, the word "expelled" may have a different and more tragic connotation for our country than Stein intended.
That's timely, since it's also a theme of Miller's new book, which argues strongly that creationism has destructive consequences for America's scientific enterprise.
Posted by PZ Myers at 3:15 PM • 112 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Communicating science
After all, the big squid are washing up on Puget Sound beaches, so I, too, feel the call. I'm going to have to make the journey.
It also helps that the Northwest Science Writers Association has invited me to come out and give a talk. I'll be speaking on 2 June at the Pacific Science Center on communicating science, somehow. I think I'll also be spending several days visiting family and friends…and maybe some of those poor lovely tentacled denizens of the Sound who find themselves stranded on the shore.
Posted by PZ Myers at 2:42 PM • 39 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Personal
My last class for this semester was today. I'm done with the teaching part, now all that's left is the dry, husky, tedious, boring administrative part: final exams and grading and the passing of final judgment on the efforts of my students. I get to become a mindless bureaucratic drone unenlivened by creative thought for a little while.
Anticipate continued incoherence, with light and scattered posting for a while. But there is hope, and none too soon.
Posted by PZ Myers at 2:07 PM • 25 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Humor
So Jason Rosenhouse finally gets tenure (entirely on the basis of his craven obedience to the bidding of the jack-booted atheist thugs of academia, of course…) and then what happens? He reveals the man behind the mask. We've been played.
Most tenure contracts have some kind of 'moral turpitude' clause so you can still get rid of criminals, dangerous lunatics, and disgusting creeps. Does being openly religious qualify?
Posted by PZ Myers at 11:42 AM • 132 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Weirdness
If you thought Christian rock was horrible and unlistenable, you have not yet heard the Christian demo tapes — the stuff that is so awful it never even made it to the exalted ranks of famous artists like Creed.
Nah, you really don't want to listen to those. It's a version of audio torture. Maybe KKMS can use these songs, though.
Posted by PZ Myers at 8:37 AM • 135 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Godlessness
Minneapolis's own little broadcaster of inanity, the evangelical radio station KKMS (Remember them? These are the guys who hosted a debate between me and Geoffrey Simmons, and when that didn't go so well, let Simmons debate dead air, where he fared better), is having another wacky program this afternoon at 4pm Central, on "Refuting the Arguments of Atheists."
David Aikman, Broadcast Journalist and Author will offer effective ways Christians can respond to the claims of atheists and why the new atheism is a threat to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Listen in and get refuted! Call in at 651-289-4499 or 888-332-5169 and testify! I'm sure this guy will persuade droves of atheists to let Jesus into their hearts.
Posted by PZ Myers at 8:03 AM • 206 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Science
There's a clumsy little two-step move creationists like to make: first, point to dissent in the scientific community over real and often interesting issues at the edge of knowledge, and second, swap in their dissent over basics, like common descent, and pretend that the scientists are actually sharing in their ignorance-based concern. John Timmer has a good summary of a few genuine scientific arguments, contrasted with the bogus arguments creationists pretend are important.
There are some good and interesting questions out there. The creationists, and I include the phonies at the Discovery Institute among them, never ask them.
One other point Timmer brings up at the end: should the real scientific controversies be part of the public high school curriculum? He thinks not, and I agree — I'd rather the high schools prepared students with a general understanding of the most basic principles, rather than rushing off to pursue details with which the students won't yet be able to cope, anyway.
Posted by PZ Myers at 3:40 PM • 111 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category:
The Catholic church is always ripely ridiculous, and it's a fine fillip on the rococo elaborations of their dogma when some silly news organization tries to turn them into a poll. Here you go, two, count 'em, two polls at once on the absurd entity called the Virgin Mary. You get to vote on "Do you believe the Virgin Mary has appeared as an apparition?", which is silly as it stands, but then there's also this ambiguous question, "Are you surprised the church officially recognized the Virgin Mary sightings from the 1600s?". So we've got "do you believe in ghosts with hymens?" and "are you really surprised at how stupid religion can be?".
I had to vote no on both. Vote according to your reason now!
(By the way, don't expect dramatic shifts in the results on this one — they've got over 150,000 votes each right now.)
Posted by PZ Myers at 11:29 AM • 219 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Books
Hey! Carl Zimmer is giving away free copies of his brand new book, Microcosm: E. coli and the New Science of Life(amzn/b&n/abe/pwll) — all you have to do is ask a good question in a comment to stand a chance of winning one.
I don't need to enter; my copy is sitting on my desk right now, begging me to read it. I keep barking back at it that I want to, but I've got 3 exams to give in the next week, and there is no time right now. And then it reproaches me with those big gentle puppy-dog eyes and weeps sloppy proteoglycan tears and threatens to adhere permanently to my shower tiles. It's persistent and ubiquitous, so everyone better read it soon.
Posted by PZ Myers at 9:29 AM • 27 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Religion
Sid Schwab considers the meaning of eternal torment. Even a moment's thought should make anyone realize that eternal punishment, besides being literally unimaginable, cannot possibly be just. Yet this principle is dogma in Christianity — Jesus himself said, "And these shall go away into everlasting punishment" — and even worse, those who are good and are admitted into heaven are going to be eternally aware of the torments inflicted on their unsaved fellows, and will be going out to witness the punishment of the wicked (according to St Augustine, anyway…I hear he's a fairly highly regarded source on doctrine.)
I suspect that the truly good would be in rebellion against such a tyrant god, but then, we always knew Christianity was a death cult for sheep, that rewards submission to the odious and the unlikely.
I'd add to Schwab's rejection of the principle that it isn't just eternal punishment that is a problem, but the whole idea of eternal life. There can be no such thing. People change all the time, and the I that is here now will not be the same I that could exist in 20 years; my mortality is a part of my being, and removing that would be an event so traumatic and so life-changing that it would produce an identity even more substantially different than the vast revolution I went through 51 years ago, when I gastrulated. Immortality is meaningless and achieving it is impossible.
That's not to say we don't want a long life and will fight off death as long as we can. It's just that life itself represents a kind of incremental dynamism that can't be frozen without destroying it.
Posted by PZ Myers at 9:05 AM • 183 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
Category: Academics
And it's actually enforced? Two teachers have been fired for refusing to take an oath…an oath that was put in place during the McCarthy witch hunts. Apparently they just left it on the books, but now it's a hook that can be used to eject troublemakers.
You know, like those rabble-rousing, dangerous Quakers.
The most incredibly ironic thing about this whole controversy is that non-citizens are not required to sign it. Says Marianne Kearney-Brown, one of the fired teachers, "The way it's laid out, a noncitizen member of Al Qaeda could work for the university, but not a citizen Quaker."
That's America for you: the important things are the superficial, meaningless expressions in service of great ideals, and if it means throwing away the actual implementation of those important ideas like civil rights, freedom of expression and conscience, and a faith quietly and sincerely held in order to promote noisy but meaningless demonstrations of loyalty, so be it.
Posted by PZ Myers at 7:45 AM • 93 Comments • 0 TrackBacks
…and this is a 
