Now they're just teasing me

I hear and obey. A "no" vote has been cast. That'll show them!

yes, master. i mean, no master. i mean.... *headexplode*

I don't see the poll

Google the question - it's the wrong link. It goes to Panda's.

If you don't see the poll immediately, fear not! Scroll down, for it is near the bottom of the page.

It's on the right halfway down the page or so. Do a ctrl-F search for it.

Of course PZ will not crash the poll. How can one man count as "crashing"?

Just because some unthinking mob horde Pharynguloid ilk people happen by and vote does not mean that PZ himself is crashing it.

Well YOU might not crash it but we, on the other hand.....

There once was a man called PZ
Who crashed online polls merrily.
He directed his minions
To rate all opinions
As beholden to his, as you see.

There once was a man called PZ
Who crashed online polls merrily.

When I first read that, I thought "that doesn't rhyme." Then I remembered that Z is pronounced Zee in the US, thus bastardising the english language and enabling that limerick to work.

Ooh, that's devilish. The more Pharynguloids vote "no", the more the answer is "yes"! ;)

So ordered!
#9 Love the limerick :)

Then I remembered that Z is pronounced Zee in the US, thus bastardising the english language and enabling that limerick to work.

Fucker's even crashed the language!

What, when I do it I'm beneath notice, but when someplace that probably doesn't need the traffic as much does it, they get linked? Obviously, PZ is not only the great Cephalodpodian overlord, but also an asshole.

Sorry about the off topic. what do you guys think about this book? has anyone read it? is it nice?

Kate Jackson. Mean and Lowly Things: Snakes, Science, and Survival in the Congo

Then I remembered that Z is pronounced Zee in the US, thus bastardising the english language

If you prefer, you may use the phonetic alphabet where the last letter of the alphabet is ZULU.

Poll? What poll? I see no-oting. I know no-oting.

For Kel @#10:

There once was a man named PZ
Whose minions were easily led--
By the thousands, for him,
They would bow to his whim
Until pollsters were all filled with dread!

If you prefer, you may use the phonetic alphabet where the last letter of the alphabet is ZULU.

that doesn't rhyme either.

Fucker's even crashed the language!

Here in soviet canukistan, it can be both Zed and Zee. Language evolves, and survival of the fittest works in the vernacular.
I'll say "PZed" to make the distinction that I'm not from the US, as others here do but that's it. All y'all are lucky I don't type "Newfanese". :)

The colour of the cape doesn't matter. The bull would vote anyway.

For Kel @#10:There once was a man named PZWhose minions were easily led--By the thousands, for him,They would bow to his whimUntil pollsters were all filled with dread!

Ahhh, much better.

This poll http://potomac9499.wordpress.com/2008/11/11/can-i-get-pz-myers-to-crash…
has been hanging around for nearly six weeks waiting to be crashed.

It only has 17 votes so far...

Chris P wrote "Google the question"

Thanks. I was able to find it by clicking on "Cached" from the 1st result from a "Will PZ crash this poll?" google search.

I voted NO but I'm not sure why us minions were instructed to do that.

If PZ won't take the bate, its because he's a gentleman in all things. Did anyone see his eloquent contribution to the edge question?

http://www.edge.org/q2009/q09_15.html#myersp

Maybe I'm just being like Ted Turner on Family Guy here ("[The Aces] go both ways." (laughter) "Like a bi-sexual." "Yes Ted, that was the joke."), but isn't the main point of crashing polls to highlight the fact that they are not scientific and don't actually provide any useful information? In that case, there's no point in crashing this poll, because it's not claiming to do so.

On the other hand, PZee did say the words "crash" and "poll" in the same sentence. Crashed it is. I'm so glad PZed thinks for me so I don't have to. Thank you, PZulu.

Actually, I sometimes refer to PZ as PZed regardless of the fact that I'm in the US.
I just think it's adorable.

"Ahh, I see said the blind man"
And here I was wondering why I had a sudden boost in traffic on my blog the last hour or so.

Thanks for the mention Quidam, I had given up on that poll ever getting any attention. I actually put it up just after meeting PZ back in November, just in case he happened to ever stumble across my blog he'd have something specific to comment on. Took a while, but it seems it's finally been found, lol...

Ok, since this is a post on pointless polls and there really isn't a topic here, did anybody watch the kooks on Larry King Live last night? I can't stand King, he's a terrible moderator, and usually uninformed on any given topic, but when I channel flip to kooks, I can't help but watch the train wrecks.
The subject was UFOs. The kooks were hawking books, and a documentary, and one the skeptics they had was Bill Nye The Science Guy. Bill actually did a pretty good job, all things considered, with being continuously cut off by King, and mocked for being a skeptic by the other panelist. When Bill was saying that making the jump from unexplained lights, or things that were unknown, to alien visitation was a pretty big leap, one of the panelists asked Bill if he was going to break out the vinegar and baking soda. Funny line, but Bill was asking the right questions, and this was how these "experts" responded. Another panelist suggested that because he had a PHD after his name, that he should be taken seriously... and continuously held his book so the camera could see it.
Comments? Opinions? Should King be put out to pasture?

Larry King should have been taken out behind the studio and put out of his (I mean our) misery years ago...

That said, at least he did allow a skeptic in the studio, I'm so sick of seeing woo people on TV with no critical views expressed to give the other (I mean correct) side of things...

Well, it is to be expected that people who live in a magical world would mock skeptics.

I just voted "Maybe"... Bwahahahahaha. I'm Evil.

There once was a man named PZ,
Who turned English rhyme on its head.
In the US, you see,
We pronounce it PeeZEE,
Not the way you pronounce it instead.

;)

There once was a man named Paul Zachary
Who said, "Polls are statistical quackery."
Having voiced his opinions,
He commanded his minions,
"Go crash them--then bring me a daiquiri."

There, is everybody happy now?

Kel #10
Do you say Aee or Aed? Do you say Bee or Bed? Cee or Ced?

So why not Zee instead of Zed? Mabe you're the ones who are backward.

Run for the hills, it's contagious!

RamblinDude wins.

So why not Zee instead of Zed?

Why not say Jee instead of Jay? Because the different pronunciation of the letter leads to different uses. We don't need Zed to sound as Zee because See gives almost exactly the same sound.

Mabe you're the ones who are backward.

Mabe thuh langwage is called Inglish, and u speek 'merycun inglish? :P

oooh, I like Bill Nye. He's the King of Nerds. He's almost worth watching Larry King :-p

PZ, I got confused and said "Maybe". I'm banished, aren't I?

All y'all are lucky I don't type "Newfanese". :)

Oh, c'mon. Newfanese (Newfiese?) is a wonderful language, if somewhat unintelligible to those of us here in the West. Now, the Fort McMurray dialect of Newfanese is another beast altogether.

(I've met many from the Rock who do everything they can to lose their accent in favour of generic Standard Canadian English, only to have it come rolling out after tipping back a few.)

Eh, I come from country Queensland (Australia), but you wouldn't know that by listening to me talk; I no longer sound anything like the late Steve 'The Crocodile Hunter' Irwin - though I'm not sure I was ever quite that rustic. Living in Adelaide helps, 'cause we're more English sounding than the Australian east-coasters.

bulls are colour-blind, you know!

Wowbagger,

I'm from the deep dark north of Queensland and I assure you've I've never uttered that "crikey" crap in my life. It did howeever take two years of elocution lessons,a speech pathologist and two years in a GPS boarding school to knock the habit out of me of saying "ay" at the end of every sentence.

Anyway I thought all you croweaters spoke Germanic languages while you sipped on your merlots. Ay.

Samantha @37, RamblinDude wins

Nay.

The Dude built on you who who built on Cuttlefish who honored Kel who commented on Kimpatsu.

You all win! Viva Pharyngula!

I joined the agnostics and said "Maybe."

I wish in the U.S. we would say "Zed." I grew up watching Canadian TV (in northern Minnesota.) It made so much more sense, and they never had to have this conversation:

"Did you say 'c' as in 'cat?"
"No, it was 'z' as in 'zebra!' Clean the wax, Dad."

I voted maybe, just to be difficult.

Voted no. That'll confuse 'em. Also, this sentence is false.

Steve Irwin was a kid in Victoria, and "crikey" and "cripes" was probably more common here. I knew more than one person who was just like Steve, who ended up in Darwin or Queensland. Not a long-lived personality type.

People say 'zed' because of the letter 'zeta' from whence Z sprang.

They used to say 'zed' in America, until people started saying 'zee'. N ow the zee-ists are winning.

Bride of Shrek OM,

Anyway I thought all you croweaters spoke Germanic languages while you sipped on your merlots. Ay.

As an appropriately bibulous resident of the Barossa Council, I note Shiraz (Syrah, for you foreigners) is the flagship variety.

Just sayin'

RamblinDude wins for several reasons.

1. His limerick solved the problem by lateral thinking.

2. His rhyming scheme was tricky and ingenious.

3. His was the one with the correct rhythm scheme for a limerick. It was a limerick.

Daiquiri! brilliant man, just brilliant.

Daniel, I suppose that was in some time when we said alph instead of Ay and Bait/Beat instead of Bee? Zed for Zeta makes little sense when all the other letters are modernized far from the original Greek (which is better served for when one uses those actual Greek letters, as in mathmatics)

And John Morales, thank you! :)

The Bard said it best: "Thou whoreson zed! Thou unnecessary letter!"

Commented a man named PeeZee
"Now they're just teasing me!"
After which, a man named andee...o
went to the link, not to find it
but instead "evolution of hiccups", which
he always wondered abeehout.

And he continued a long-dead meme... post
Thanking this man, PZee
For the previously unfound link.
and he made it a bit
TOO FREAKING LONG!

Damnit, you lot have me confuzzled. If zee is zed, does that make a zebra a zedbra? What if I know someone named Zed, does he become Zeded? WHY MUST ALL YOU COMMIES MESS UP THE ONLY TRUE LANGUAGE. ENGLISH ONLY OR HELL 4 U.

[also: ramblindude wins]

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=this-old-body

This is what I was talking abeehout. Still haven't read it, but it's by Neal Freaking Shubin.

I prefer zed to zee, because I absolutely suck at voicing my consonants.

Yes. Sink and Zink are homonyms in my idiolect unless I enunciate. Rather unpractical for a chemist.

I said this meme is long-dead
but thank you, man called PZed
oh wait, shit, no, "PeeZee"
(Yeah, that is what I meant.)
for starting this very fun thread
of hiccups and things si-lly

though
excuse this man andee-o
he knows dick about poetry
much less what's a limerick

In Scotland the letter J is pronounced 'jai' to rhyme with eye, buy, cry etc.

A while ago some troll stopped by and was referring to "Sleazy" Myers. This Canadian didn't get it at first. He also referred to Greg 'Osama bin' Laden. I think he was just aping Rush Limbaugh.

This reminds me of a (possibly true?) story about President Coolidge. Someone at a White House dinner once said to him, "My wife bet me that I couldn't get more than two words out of you tonight."

To this Coolidge replied, "You lose."

Uber-dork that I am, when people use the word "zed", it just makes me think of Rodney McKay from Stargate Atlantis - being Canadian, he calls their ZPM power devices "Zed Pee Em", whereas everyone else says "Zee Pee Em".

Also, Bill Nye was on a recent episode.

I refuse to be confused. Since you suggested the answer was no, then the answer was yes, so I voted the way my preacher said I should.

There once was a man, Papa-Zulu
A scientist and skeptic who all knew
And when questions were reared
The pollsters all feared
Him worse than the Great Old Cthulhu!

A limerick free of Z (and pronunciation ambiguity):

We know that a professor named Myers
To world domination aspires.
The polls he may rattle
By minion-fueled battle
To piss off evolution deniers.

None of those limericks qualify, because none of them are in the slightest bit *dirty.*

A weak effort at best, but:

A randy professor named Myers
Thought internet pollsters all liars
His minions would crash
Any poll in a flash
While the Trophy Wife slaked his desires

Jared,
Actually, for me, it brings up the Hitchhiker's guide series, when they are talking about the location of Earth (sector zed zed nine plural zed alpha). It actually brings a little clarity to that.

None of those limericks qualify, because none of them are in the slightest bit *dirty.*

Not "dirty"? I beg your pardon! My limerick has the word "piss" in it. That's right, I said it. Piss.

I know. The rank obscenity shocks even me.

Zeno @ #67

Isn't the official pronunciation of Cthulu comprised of only 2 syllables? Or is the popular pronunciation now considered the official pronunciation? Or should the creator dictate that? Or should corn really be eaten side to side rather than up and down? Wait...where am I?

Er...Kylinn @66 that is.

KRiS @71, no, it's 3. Wikipedia is your friend :)

Isn't the official pronunciation of Cthulu comprised of only 2 syllables?

"Lovecraft transcribed the pronunciation of Cthulhu as "Khlûl'-hloo" (IPA: /ˈkɬʊl.ɬuː/ ?).[2] S. T. Joshi points out, however, that Lovecraft gave several differing pronunciations on different occasions.[3] According to Lovecraft, this is merely the closest that the human vocal apparatus can come to reproducing the syllables of an alien language.[4] Long after Lovecraft's death, the pronunciation kə-THOO-loo (IPA: /kəˈθuːluː/) became common, and the game Call of Cthulhu endorsed it."

This is a perfect thread for a Friday evening. About the fourth limerick, I LOL'd. It's good to be indoors: brass monkeys are running for cover.

Happy (Friday) monkey!

Did y'all notice that Rowan Atkinson (Mr. Bean) has come out in favor of freedom of speech and against coddling religion?

"To criticise a person for their race is manifestly irrational and ridiculous but to criticise their religion - that is a right. That is a freedom. The freedom to criticise ideas--any ideas even if they are sincerely held beliefs--is one of the fundamental freedoms of society. And the law which attempts to say you can criticise or ridicule ideas as long as they are not religious ideas is a very peculiar law indeed. It all points to the promotion of the idea that there should be a right not to be offended. But in my view the right to offend is far more important than any right not to be offended. The right to ridicule is far more important to society than any right not to be ridiculed because one in my view represents openness - and the other represents oppression."