brainwashed god

Internet Dumb Fuck Discovers, Via Google, 'Occham’s Razor' and 'Just-So Stories.'

2010-01-29T14:34:00.000-08:00

PEOPLE IN THE NEWS
by guest columnist, DavidM
Originally published at talkrational.org

Internet Dumb Fuck Discovers, Via Google, 'Occham’s Razor' and 'Just-So Stories.'

A Close Shave: The 14th century Franciscan monk, William of Ockham, has narrowly failed to avert having his name and idea co-opted by a fucklord.

TALKRATIONAL.ORG (Internet News Service) — A douchebag with access to a computer has accidentally discovered, via random Google surfing, the terms “Occham’s Razor” and “just-so stories,” and can’t get enough of using them even though he doesn’t know what they mean, it was revealed Friday.

“That’s a just-so Story,” the douchewit, Socrates, declared in a post at Talk Rational.org.

He went on to demand: “What about Occham’s Razor?”

The fuckwit emphasized “What about Occham’s Razor?” by tagging it in bold type.

“The bottom line is that the idea of empty niches is just a just-so story,” Socrates added, with respect to the theory of evolution. “And not worth arguing about.”

“Of course,” the pontificating and ill-educated jackass asseverated, “all of this is a showstopper problem for evolution theory.”

The rubes who make up about 85 percent of the American public were impressed.

“Ebbolution be just a just-so story,” Bobby Layne Breathard, 39, of Buttfuck, Ark., drawled at his local school board while chewing chaw, during a debate about whether to replace biology texts with the Bible in science class. “Whaddabout that there Occham’s Razor and some nice Occam’s aftershave and cologne?”

The school board voted unanimously to require that biology classes teach “The Total Theory” instead of the theory of evolution.

Internet Fruitcake Reveals That The Sun ‘Is God’s Giant Wood-Burning Campfire in The Sky”

2010-01-09T10:38:00.000-08:00

By Guest reporter davidm

BREAKING NEWS
(link to original)

TALKRATIONAL.ORG (Internet News Service) — A mentally retarded habitué of Internet Message Boards revealed Saturday that the sun was actually a gigantic wood-burning campfire tended by God.

“There is not much doubt that the sun is simply a gigantic wood-burning campfire,” the retard, Socrates, posted at the Talk Rational message board. “But it is not an impersonal object that produces energy by fusing hydrogen into helium, as the materialists claim. That is a fake.”

Socrates explained that the wood for the campfire is collected in The Plenum, and then transferred into the sky via quantum fluctuations produced by a team of “campfire girls” appointed by God. God, he went on to explain, tends the fire, periodically stoking it by applying a flame produced by a Bic lighter the size of Europe.

“This is obvious,” Socrates said.

Pressed for evidence that the sun was actually a gigantic wood-burning campfire rather than an object that produces radiant energy via the well-understood process of nuclear fusion, Socrates said, “People wish to engage me in discussion by these mischaracterizations. It will not work.”

He added, "Nice try. All the points I have been making have been backed up. You will have to do better."

The sun is a giant campfire, it was first realized on Saturday.

It is tended by God.

The Lord keeps the fire burning with a Bic lighter.

The lighter is roughly the size of Europe.

Lest any accuse me of biased coverage!

2008-05-01T15:19:00.000-07:00

I composed a brilliant, though brief essay for the wiki at rantsnraves.org. outlining the general gist of creation theory. I expect to have it published in AiG's peer reviewed publication someday. Here it is:

Creation Theory

Things are pretty complicated, therefore there is a God. Since therefore, there is a God, this God is just like us only really big. Really really big. Huge. Outside of time and composed of everything in the universe but just like us. Only gigantic. Infinitely gigantic. And he can have individual conversations with each person in the universe at the same time just like us only we can only carry on one conversation at a time. Therefore, since God is just Like us only bigger, much much bigger, he likes us. He likes us the same way we like our pets. Only if our pets were just like us except smaller. Since God likes us, he wants us to worship him because we want to be worshiped and God is just like us only way bigger. Infinitely bigger. Since god wants to be worshipped he also made everything. He made everything really really big because he couldn't help it. He is really really big so it was only natural. But he made Earth (in blissful ignorance we spin round her tiny center) the right size for us to live on because it would have been mean to make her really really huge because we wouldn't have been quite as much like God then. We would have been tiny compared to our world. Then we wouldn't have wanted to be worshiped so much because the bigger things would be stepping on us too often. God wanted us to know how it feels to want to be worshiped because he likes us because we are like him only we are a lot smaller. He is huge. And outside of time and space. God thought for a while about being outside of time and space and that's why he put us in time and space. So, that is Creation Theory. Proven.

God busts Bush, Cheney and Condi doing coke and having a 3-way.

2008-03-05T12:59:00.000-08:00

During our weekly interview with God, he revealed to us that not only were the president and vice-president snorting cocaine off Secratary of State Condoleeza Rice's inner thighs, they also engaged in sinful outside of wedlock and abominable behavior. "For all their talk about believing in me, they sure forgot that I'm all fucking seeing and all knowing. Dipshits. If they don't give some good ol' fashioned repentance, I'm gonna blow the whistle on the trick they're planning to pull on America just before the election." said God, alluding to an even more dastardly plan the threesome may be hatching.

When and if God decides to reveal the information, our reporters will share it at the earliest possible convenience.

Jesus issues a memo. Seeks to distance himself from the right.

2007-04-10T15:10:00.000-07:00

In a memo leaked to our staff reporters this morning, Jesus Christ, son of Joseph, disavowed any affilliation with the republican party in America.

I didn't have my frickin hands and feet nailed to a cross just so these bastards could come along and steal in my name. These bsastards [sic] who call themselves Christian in America are in no way a part of my organization

the memo said.

Man Takes LSD, Sees God

2007-04-03T10:13:00.000-07:00

A young man from Salt Lake City, Utah visiting his cousin in San Francisco took LSD last Saturday night and actually talked to God!
"God wants to tell everyone how much he loves them. He doesn't mind that I do the stuff that I do. He said no one gets judged up in heaven so don't worry, be happy."
The young man said that God turned into a fire hydrant immediatly after conferring the good news.
"I'm just really glad hew said that." The young man explained. "Because I really wanted to have gay sex with this guy who lives upstairs from my cousin but I used to think God didn't want me to. Boy, as soon as I found out that it was alright, I was up there faster than sliding on butter. Um, he he, well, you know."
Folks, I don't make the news, I just report it.

Woman Converts to Christianity before Skydiving. Reverts to hedonism upon landing safely

2007-04-02T15:25:00.000-07:00

Christy Jesuis decided to go skydiving for her 40th birthday. She made sure to get a good night's sleep the night before, "just in case I needed to be alert". She also decided to accept Jesus Christ as her personal savior just before takeoff.

"Well, you know..." She says about her decision.

Upon her safe landing she immediately reverted to her old religion of hedonism.

"It's like, well, you know. It's just a lot more fun to get drunk and have sex on Sunday morning." She said, talking about her renewal of her commitment to the hedonistic lifestyle. She waved to the other skydivers as she headed to her car to smoke a joint saying, "Have fun you guys! Maybe we can party sometime."

Antichrist Alive, Addicted to Gambling, Lost All His Money-Revelation Thwarted

2007-04-02T10:20:00.000-07:00

The Antichrist offered to give our news crew an interview "for just couple of bucks. I could start out on a penny slot and get my pile back."
When asked about the prophecies in revelations He replied "Well, being the Antichrist has sort of hindered me a little. I'm all over the sin thing and I was blazing through Las Vegas on my way to Hollywood to set up shop in the most godless place when I got sidetracked with the flashing lights and all. Oh yeah, Trixie, can't forget Trixie. God you should see Trixie. I'd do anything just to pass out flyers on the strip for her. In fact, I used to pass out flyers on the strip for her. Oh Trixie, she only loves you when you've got money, you know what I mean?"

When we pressed him for answers about heaven and hell he looked a little confused but smiled and asked if he could borrow a couple of bucks to start his way back up. "Heaven and Hell? Here we are." He murmured, looking furtively down the street. "Never play dice with god. That's my best advise. In fact, I'd just try to avoid the guy. He's pretty moody."

He said he doubted if he'd ever get around to the end times now. But noted one of the merits of being the antichrist is that it's no big deal to perform degrading homosexual acts to pay off gambling debts. "Did you hear about the guy who won 4 million dollars on a quarter slot? Damn I'd like to be that guy."

Man calls religion an "ignorance fed throwback to a time when god was the only good explanation we had." -Church groups angry.

2007-04-02T08:33:00.000-07:00

Members of the First Reformed Envangelical Holy Bible Church reported that a young smelly hippie mockingly smiled and in a fake polite way claimed not to be interested in literature being offered by the church members downtown on the corner of 5th and Main. "We could tell just by the way he looked with those "John Lennon" style glasses and the "books" in his backpack that he was a smelly hippie. That buttoned shirt and dockers he was wearing didn't fool us." said Yvonne Sheldon, leader of the youth outreach committe that was handing out the literature. "At first he just smiled in that sneering way that those Starbucks(R) materialists do. 'No thank you.' That's what he said. Sheesh, you'd think we were handing out the plague or something."

After offering the literature several more times the man still refused to take it. "We were all gathered around the guy, you know, trying to figure out why he didn't want us to tell him about everlasting life in the comforting arms of our holy father, Jesus when he looks right at Sam (Johnson) and says, 'religion is an ignorance fed throwback to a time when god was the only good explanation we had to phenomena that we can understand now. In the old days, we thought god did stuff that we know now that isn't the case at all. But you aren't going to believe me anyway so it doesn't matter.' Yeah something like that anyway." said Marie Wilson. "Boy oh boy is that guy gonna get a load of God's wrath. He's gonna get a plague, or drown in a flood or something cause God's gonna give it to him. Just like New Orleans fell under Katrina for it's godless pursuit of music and parties. God did it to them and he'll do it to this guy too. Boy when God hits him with a lightning bolt or turns him into a statue of salt or something, he'll wish he knew about god's love all right."

Several Church groups from across the city have condemned the man's behavior and a town meeting style event will be held thursday night in the Six Days seminar room at the Fundemental Christian Church on NW 23rd and Clay.

South Carolina: Thousands Starve Praying for a Fish while atheist fisherman watches in disbelief

2007-04-01T09:17:00.000-07:00

Atheist fisherman Randall MCCrakkin went to the sprawling compound of one of S.C.'s most prominent fundementalist colonies and discovered them wasting away for lack of food. When he offered to teach them to fish and give them hooks and line and other acoutriments, he was rebuffed.

"Yeah, it was really pretty wierd. I was all like 'y'all, the bay is full of fish. Why are you starving?' And they just sat there on there knees around these cast iron frying pans. They had butter and lemon and salt and pepper all laid out and they were just prayin' fer a fish. When I offered to go out and show them how to catch the darn things they just looked at me like I was crazy. One guy asked if I love the lord. I told him I wasn't gay if that's what he meant but that I didn't go for all the religion stuff. Two security guards, all wobbly and shit 'cause they were starvin' I guess, escorted me to the gate. It's too bad they all starved to death. When I heard about it I was surprised. I mean, I left them a bunch of line and hooks and sinkers and bait shrimp and stuff. I figured they'd all go and wait till I left so's they wouldn't feel stupid'n all. But I figured they'd use the stuff. Man."

All 2,421 members of the church of god and the infallible word died.

Atheists score a full 20 points lower in IQ scores than Real Christians!

2007-04-01T09:03:00.000-07:00

In a research project funded by Christians for Truth, scientists at Boob Jones University have discovered a not so surprising trend in the general population: athiests are stupid.

"Morons" says Dr. James Duke, one of the principal designers of the experiment. "Mostly they couldn't even tie their own shoes."

The full results show several important trends. Real Christians score a whopping 91 average on the IQ test while none of the misguided athiest included in the study scored above 80. The average was 71. A funny thing that we discovered also was that Christians who aren't Real Christians scored a little lower than Christians who were Real Christians. Christians who weren't Real Christians scored an average of 89. "We included Catholics, Episcopalians and Unitarians, as well as all those stupid muslim and Eastern religions in with the athiest because, you know, we KNEW they were gonna be stupid," said Rick White, an intern who worked on the experiment.

that's how it was done.

2007-03-19T13:17:00.000-07:00

JESUS APPEARS TO THOUSANDS IN VENEZUELA-APPOLOGIZES

2007-03-02T09:38:00.000-08:00

In other news...

JESUS APPEARS TO THOUSANDS IN VENEZUELA-APPOLOGIZES

Thousands of people working in Venezuela’s capital city of Caracas witnessed a miracle as Jesus Christ descended from the clouds surrounded by a heavenly white mist and began asking for president Hugo Chavez.

“Excuse me, “ one excited woman heard him ask, “ Do you know where the president is?” Then after he noticed her trembling in fear he continued, “Don’t worry, I’m not American. As a matter of fact, that’s why I’m here. I just wanted to apologize for what I said through my Patsy Robertson. Uh, I was having a really bad day and I don’t know what came over me.” She says she pointed him towards the capital building.

Old Testament Original document found! Not In Hebrew!

2007-03-01T17:42:00.000-08:00

A couple of boys interned in an israeli guarded palestinian "neighborhood" unearthed what religious scholors are calling the "Greatest Find In History"- A perfectly preserved scroll which turned out to be the original copy of the old testament. In Swahili! The various translation difficulties that have plagued translators throughout the ages are resolved. For example, many famous scholars have argued that Yohm can mean either "Era" or "day", chief among them is a man named Mr. Lando Calrissium who published a brilliant scholarly endeavor proving conclusively that it means "Era" in Genesis so we don't have to think that the earth is only 6000 years old. THis emmensely important work reconciled huge swaths of scientific investigation with the words of the Bible. Other important contributions have included his much more accurate translations of the flood story to show that it was definitely describing a local event and therefore also was not contradicting important scientific discoveries.

Imagine our surprise when we discovered that there were serious errors in the Hebrew translation. "All our work is bunk" lamented Lando. "After reading that disclaimer inside the front cover we were all feeling pretty foolish."

The scrolls had a sticker, stuck to the top of each scroll. The sticker, made of ultrafine lambskin and affixed with a clearish milkyish glue, read:

This scroll contains material on the chronology and events of creation. This information is not a fact regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered as the pure allegory for the human condition that it indeed is.

Approved By
Yamashukalevi, grand Archmage of the tribe of israel written in the language of the swahili, the language which brings the listener closer to this god that we are making up.
Thursday, March 28, 4021 BCE.

Lando is busy at work on his new translation of the Swahili where he will prove conclusively that aliens built the pyramids.

Science Cannot Make Claim That God Didn't Create the Earth!

2007-03-01T16:31:00.000-08:00

If science by definition, cannot posit the existence of a supernatural force, then science cannot be used to prove the absence of a supernatural force. For instance, if I determine a priori that no matter what I observe, I shall never observe X, I cannot then turn around and argue, "Ah ha! In all of my research I have never observed X, so I have now proven that X does not exist."

Creationdesign

That's it. Case closed. Since creationisn and religion make no claims, science cannot refute those claims that were never made.

"We're gonna make darn sure that no one on our side of salvation ever claims anything." Remarked Dean Thoroughby of the anti-discovery institute. "If we just sit down and shut up, they're gonna have to do the same."

"They walk around so High and mighty saying that god didn't make the earth. Were they there? Huh?"

Atheism is a tool of the Pansy-Assed Liberals

2007-03-01T11:39:00.000-08:00

(opinion)
those posting [to evolution sites] in support seem to be far left liberals, often times FRINGE in their liberal views. They also seem to be mainly composed of those who are militantly anti-religious/religion. Ulterior motives?

I whole-heartedly agree. Not just far left liberals but Pansy Assed Liberals who wouldn't get in front of a bullet to save mother teresa. Out there having sex with dogs and calling it "freedom to choose"! They wear the flag of cowardice and they hide behind atheism because if there is no god then no one could possibly say that what they do behind the closed doors of their houses is wrong. WRONG! But we know that they are smoking marijuana , Drinking french water and wine, blaspheming the name of the lord by hiding from their duty to god and country in the military, now when we need brave boys more than ever the liberal Pansy-asses trot out their flag of the nation of cowardsville and point to their athiest manefesto and say, there is no god! We don't have to go to war! ANd they use their atheism as a sheild claimin "respect" for arab lives. They go and cry sissy just because our mission, though accomplished for the most part, still has a few bumps to flatten out.

2006-06-21T23:42:00.000-07:00

I'm from Missouri: Judge Jones the hypocrite

2006-05-10T23:26:00.000-07:00

I'm from Missouri: Judge Jones the hypocrite

Judge Jones is taking Cues from Judge Dredd and whuppin on the darwin hating rat bastard mutherfockers on the christian-wingnut cousin-fuckin 3-toothed political righties. It pisses them off that they know how we all look down at them and laugh. It bothers them that we can feel pity for their kids but only contempt for them. And it bothers them that they are wrong

Let's Make Science Stupid. That'll even things out

2006-03-24T18:24:00.000-08:00

pandas thumb has an interesting post that is far too intellectual for this blog but worth a comment I think.

Should Science Pursue Methodological Supernaturalism?

An interesting question. Consider for example, Uri Geller and Pat Robertson. Both make claims that defy explanation by the physical laws of the universe. And both are lying.

From Antievolution.com

2006-02-14T13:36:00.000-08:00

A man named Mr Christopher posted this at Antievolution

Although I was never a fundamentalist I was once a believer as well and Robert Ingersoll's writings did more to expedite my atheism than any other person or ideology. Ingersoll was my first glimpse into knowing there were in fact others who thought (and doubted) like myself.
Evolution had absolutely NOTHING to do with my decision to drop kick my faith. The creationists should be trying to ban Ingersoll and leave evolution alone :-)
For those unfamiliar -

Robert Ingersoll complete works
And...
Robert Ingersoll Wiki Pages
And I'll leave you with this Ingersoll quote:
"The man who invented the telescope found out more about heaven than the closed eyes of prayer ever discovered. "

I was fascinated with the reading and it got me to thinking, How many authors have really influenced my thoughts on religion. Granted, I never was a believer, coming from liberal academic parents who, like all good liberals, politely declined religious services, but I was interested since I was born with the God Gene and since we lived waaaaay out in the forested mountains in the North Cascades part of Washington State where god is all around.

William Blake gave me my first images to manipulate the concept of religion with The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. Wierd for a kid to read this but my dad was a history professor so that's the kind of stuff we had lying around. Next came Mark Twain's "Letters From the Earth". My all time favorite is the rant from philip wylie called "The Magic Animal".

I love Ken Wilbur's idea that spirit is what we are evolving toward and the 9 insights from the Celestine prophecy were especially illuminating for me when I read them.

Any way, after providing all these links (I have read both bibles, the book of mormon, the bhagavad gita and etc but they are alittle too political for me :), I wonder, what authors have affected your religious thought?

Bush is not HELPING.

2006-02-05T11:18:00.000-08:00

If you follow this link, you will see an unlikely source of criticism for Bush's State of the Union adress,

Today, I feel compelled to bring you a few words of encouragement as you may need them if you choose to watch tonight's State of the Union Address by President George W. Bush.

Throughout yesterday and today I have heard snippets from the Bush cheerleaders in the managed media and in so-called "Christian and conservative" circles which seek to prepare you for the supposed "attack dogs" of the Left who will demonize our beloved conservative and Christian President. Thus is the stage set for the dismissal of all criticism of the speech as emanating from biased, left winged, hateful, Bush bashing liberal Democrats.

Such posturing, I think you see, is meant to convince you that the (two?) major parties are the only choices you have. This is what we have termed "Boogie Man Politics"! You are supposed to ignore the evidence which is so plainly before you that this President and the men who surround him have no intention of following the Constitution, defending America's sovereignty, securing America's borders, ending the national disgrace of abortion, limiting the size of government, or anything else that you are wishfully thinking they stand for.

Finally, Someone is Doing Something About It!

2006-02-05T11:09:00.000-08:00

http://www.ChristianExodus.org is moving thousands of Christians to South Carolina to reestablish constitutionally limited government founded upon Christian principles. It is evident that the U.S. Constitution has been abandoned under our current federal system, and the efforts of Christian activism to restore our Godly republic have proven futile over the past three decades. The time has come for Christian Constitutionalists to protect our liberties in a State like South Carolina by interposing the State's sovereign authority retained under the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

The foundations of the United States of America were laid upon these principles, that the rights of man are God-given and inviolate, that the sole purpose of government is to secure these rights, and that the only just powers of government are those specifically delegated by the people. The federal government is restrained by Constitutional Law, the Sovereign States, and the Citizens of those States, each one made in the image of God, with individual rights to life, liberty, and property.

The federal government was created to protect us from the very tyranny it now practices against us...

This is not a drill. True Christians are encouraged to follow.

Go for it. This is the kind of crap they come up with.

2006-01-27T15:16:00.000-08:00

Have a field day with this one. I haven't been getting too many comments lately so I figured I'd plop this one in.

Intelligent Design is Original Source of Life –ID- Series IV

California - The issue of Intelligent Design (ID) has come so closer to the human heart now that it has never been before. The main reason is that the verdict given by a Judge in America against the use of ID looks to have given a blanket power to the followers of Darwin’s theory of Man’s evolution.

“ The scientists recent finding on the chimp that it has stunning similarities with man having a difference of 3 to 4% in DNA test has revived the controversy. It has not only made it live but also set a proper battle to be fought between the champions of ID and supporters of Darwin’s theory of Man’s evolution.

Dr. Raj Baldev, Cosmo Theorist from India, the head of SAROUL (Scientific Advance Research of Universe and Life) is quite confident that the discipline of ID is a scientific reality. He said, “It is the strongest of the strongest, and I want all the champions of Intelligent Design (ID) to come on one platform to counter them with a proper argument so as to save the people from being misled by Darwinism.

Dr. Raj Baldev said, “If the Supporters of the ID take it light and let the eminence and usefulness of ID overlooked or neglected, it can surely affect our lives. It may lead to a state of in-discipline in our moral and spiritual life all over the world and may deteriorate the moral standard of all the coming generations.

Why should I follow you?

2006-01-12T14:10:00.000-08:00

Can someone out there give me a good reason to believe the tenets of a religion? I don't care if I go to hell so please use another one. Or what do you think? Is god a being equipped with emotions? How do we know? Is your holy book really the word of god? How do you know? If you know because your parents ar another human told you then don't you think that's a little suspect? Tell me a little bit about god then tell me how you know. If you do that I will return the favor. I do know a little something about god and I'll show you mine if you show me yours.

Religion is the Wisdom of the Ages

2005-12-15T08:56:00.000-08:00

Long, long ago, before your mother or your grandfather were born child, before humans began to use wheels to move things about, before anyone had learned that the earth is a sphere, before humans knew about electricity and magnetism, before we understood that the contenents drift about on the surface of our globe following the currents deep within Earth's surface, the smartest people in the tribe were assigned the task of speculating about the causes for the events around them: earthquakes, lightning, seasons, wild animals, agriculture, the sun and the moon and other thing which we now know are formed through natural causes. But they had no way of knowing because they lacked the technology to investigate thoroughly. Their mind was their main investigative tool. Most of the phenomena they witnessed were so terrible and awesome that they ascribed them to magical beings who, depending on their emotional state at the moment, could either grow the crops or bring a drought. These beings could kill an infant in its sleep or hurl thunderbolts down from on high. They could be pleased or displeased with our behavior and bring abundance or dearth accordingly.

As time went on, those wisest among us began to make discoveries into how our natural world worked. They discovered that the earth is a planet and not the "firmament" upon which all things are built. They discovered that it revolves around the sun and that the other planets do too. They discovered the properties of electricity and eventually they discovered the elements. What they observed became so complicated they invented new math and better ways to observe and measure the world around us until the idea that magic could influence our natural world became a colloquial fantasy, one not shared by those who seriously investigated the fundamental nature of our universe.

The great mythologies which had served so well before became quaint and one by one they fell out of favor. Who among us still believes that Zeus or Thor hurls the thunderbolts? Who among us believes that Achilles or Jesus were the product of a god and a human? We understand now that that doesn't happen. We know that even if we blaspheme an old god, the floods will not come down to punish our towns. With that knowledge came a difficult responsibility; we had to police our own actions. Since we know that we will not be punished by a god or gods for our transgressions, we must learn how to satisfy our wants and desires while still living together in society in relative harmony using just our moral sense to guide us. We must discover the rules that work to keep society working. Many of those rules can be found in the moral code of the ancient mythologies including Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Confucianism, Taoism, Buddhism and the like. We should not forget that this information is brought to us by the smartest people of their times. It is, in fact, the wisdom of the ages.

But now our investigations, though they have shattered the myths of creation, have created equally as profound of questions as those proposed by religion. The unfortunate and difficult part is that, although investigation can show us some of what the universe is like, it has yet to tell us why. In all likelihood, we will never know the mind of god because it is simply outside our experiential world. We do, however, know that superstitions that attribute magical causes to events in our history are unfounded and false.

Intelligent design could do very well as the principle for the creation of the universe as a whole but in terms of what happened after that, it falls only into the realm of superstition. The wisest among us are now pursuing the same goal as always, just now the method has been refined and we call it science.

Vacuous minds make vacuous thoughts

2005-12-06T10:45:00.000-08:00

Vacuous minds make vacuous thoughts. THe air rushes in to equalize the pressure. DI-ID people are right: the universe does seem designed. It does. If you consider that space and time are rushing out into something that is neither space nor time in a giant shock wave of orgasmic release, that from a singularity which could aptly be referred to as an idea all the particles are born and get cooked in star ovens to become the wonderful cakes and pastries of planets and ultimately life, that if you are travelling the speed of light and you hold up a mirror, you can’t see yourself because you haven’t happened yet, that these are frightening thoughts because we are so small and helpless in the face of this awesome and terrible reality, then you begin to see that a god that can exist within these bounds that is really only a little bigger than our solar system, that can hold our hand as our parent should have when we were frightened children, whether this god is a fancy is unimportant, this god must be there because we simply couldn’t bear it if it weren’t true, and the real god, the god that lit the fuse on the giant firecracker is a terrible and fearsome god and most of us have not reached the critical juncture where we can meet this god face to face, unafraid of our cosmic insignificance. So we deny the existance of this god using duplicitous arguments and encouraging hate and fear in those who would listen to us, those who, like us, are utterly unable to allow that we are alone on this journey, are unable to smile as our lives and the lives of the ones we love snuff out after some infitesimal blip on the cosmic timeline. It is a terrible burden, to know that we must love with all our might while we are alive because there is no rulebook for loving at the other side of the singularity which we all share in loneliness and alone, life.

So, although the arguments are false, although the motives are fear and the method’s are fear’s twin brother hate and their cousin anger, although they seek to shut out the noise of those who would examine what they see, although they would rage against their terrible, inevitable loss, they ultimately will collapse under the weight of their own fear. THe light will become too bright and they will retreat into their caves and gaze at the shadows of life cast on the rear wall, not dark enough to cover the art, handpainted on the walls that claims that there is a purpose that can be known.

And those of us that choose instead to follow the light, will have to find happiness only in the fact that it feels better to be happy. Not for any other reason. We can still see the hand of god, but we won’t be able to presume to know it’s motivations.

Yee Haw.

Contest Winner!

2005-12-01T22:28:00.000-08:00

Andrew wins the guess the Passage contest from a while ago. Yeah Andrew and he even told us how to tell deuteronomy passages:

because it's a weird rule with horrifically violent punishments for breaking it.

I'm sorry it took so long Andrew but You can finally bask in the glory.

Science faces 'dangerous times'

2005-12-01T08:45:00.000-08:00

In his final speech as president of the Royal Society, Lord May of Oxford will say scientists must speak out against the climate change "denial lobby". Here is the article.

THis article touched a nerve with me. I found it as a link on a blog by a guy calling himself "odograph" where he and I (I think it's a he) and a guy named ralph had a brief discussion. You can read that here.

Some of the things he says just make me want to cry when I think of what we partly are as a species. Other times I shrug it off to just the way things are. I, unfortunately possibly, have a hard time shrugging it off. It is the basic point of this whole blog. That no one seems to be commenting on it much leads me to wonder if I am in the minority. Nevertheless. AAARRRGGGHHH!!!!!!!!

"There are serious problems that derive from the realities of the external world: climate change, loss of biological diversity, new and re-emerging diseases, and more.

"Many of these threats are not yet immediate, yet their non-linear character is such that we need to be acting today. "And we have no evolutionary experience of acting on behalf of a distant future; we even lack basic understanding of important aspects of our own institutions and societies.
"Sadly, for many, the response is to retreat from complexity and difficulty by embracing the darkness of fundamentalist unreason."

'Denial lobby'

Lord May will say that fundamentalism applies not only to organised religions but to lobby groups on both sides of the climate change debate.

The climate change "denial lobby" and non-governmental organisations (NGOs) opposed to nuclear power are not exempt from a denial or misrepresentation of scientific facts, he told reporters in London.

2005-11-28T20:18:00.000-08:00

So I understand that I don’t understand God. That’s why I am doing all this reading. Ok, this is taking me nowhere. I don’t want proof, I want experience. Let’s try the next site, http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/06608a.htm. Let’s click the Nature and Attributes of God link. The summary reads “In this article, we proceed by deductive analysis to examine the nature and attributes of God to the extent required by our limited philosophical scope. We will treat accordingly of the infinity, unity, and simplicity of God, adding some remarks on Divine personality.” The material is pretty good.

When we say that God is infinite, we mean that He is unlimited in every kind of perfection or that every conceivable perfection belongs to Him in the highest conceivable way. In a different sense we sometimes speak, for instance, of infinite time or space, meaning thereby time of such indefinite duration or space of such indefinite extension that we cannot assign any fixed limit to one or the other. Care should be taken not to confound these two essentially different meanings of the term. Time and space, being made up of parts in duration or extension, are essentially finite by comparison with God's infinity. Now we assert that God is infinitely perfect in the sense explained, and that His infinity is deducible from His self-existence. For a self-existent being, if limited at all, could be limited only by itself; to be limited by another would imply causal dependence on that other, which the very notion of self-existence excludes. But the self-existing cannot be conceived as limiting itself, in the sense of curtailing its perfection of being, without ceasing to be self-existing. Whatever it is, it is necessarily; its own essence is the sole reason or explanation of its existence, so that its manner of existence must be as unchangeable as its essence, and to suggest the possibility of an increase or diminution of perfection would be to suggest the absurdity of a changeable essence. It only remains, then, to say that whatever perfection is compatible with its essence is actually realized in a self-existing being; but as there is no conceivable perfection as such -- that is, no expression of positive being as such -- that is not compatible with the essence of the self-existent, it follows that the self-existent must be infinite in all perfection. For self-existence itself is absolute positive being and positive being cannot contradict, and cannot therefore limit, positive being.

This general, and admittedly very abstract, conclusion, as well as the reasoning which supports it, will be rendered more intelligible by a brief specific illustration of what it involves.

Good. I need something a little more intelligible. Now they shine some light on what they mean:

(i) When, in speaking of the Infinite, we attribute all conceivable perfections to Him, we must not forget that the predicates we employ to describe perfections derive their meaning and connotation in the first instance from their application to finite beings; and on reflection it is seen that we must distinguish between different kinds of perfections, and that we cannot without palpable contradiction attribute all the perfections of creatures in the same way to God. Some perfections are such that even in the abstract, they necessarily imply or connote finiteness of being or imperfection; while some others do not of themselves necessarily connote imperfection.

Oh. Ok. Well then, on to the next site. Oh, oh, wait. There is a section on The Blessed Trinity, I have always sort of wondered how that works. I'll save that part for tomorrow's post.

Guess the Bible Passage of the Day

2005-11-21T22:09:00.000-08:00

Do not harm the land or the sea or the trees until we put a seal on the foreheads of the servants of our God." ⁴Then I heard the number of those who were sealed: 144,000 from all the tribes of Israel.
⁵From the tribe of Judah 12,000 were sealed,
from the tribe of Reuben 12,000,
from the tribe of Gad 12,000,
⁶from the tribe of Asher 12,000,
from the tribe of Naphtali 12,000,
from the tribe of Manasseh 12,000,
⁷from the tribe of Simeon 12,000,
from the tribe of Levi 12,000,
from the tribe of Issachar 12,000,
⁸from the tribe of Zebulun 12,000,
from the tribe of Joseph 12,000,
from the tribe of Benjamin 12,000.

How Christianity Entered My Life As A Child

2005-11-17T12:02:00.000-08:00

I knew two families with kids who were Christian. I just figured it was their flavor of insanity and didn’t think much of it. I guess I figured it was harmless. The only two times it ever entered my life were when my dad asked one of the neighbor kids if Jesus or Superman was stronger and when my other Christian friend and I read his Christian comic books up in his room. In hindsight, those were both pretty funny experiences. Riding home in the backseat of our Oldsmobile station wagon- the great big kind from the late sixties/ early seventies- and seven year old Billy was talking about Jesus. My dad asked him who was stronger, Jesus or Superman. Billy immediately answered “Jesus”. My dad responded, “but Superman can fly”. That stumped Billy. I wonder if he ever thought about that question again.

The other time, I was staying the night at my other Christian friend’s house, we read his Christian comics while he told me about god. The comics had the evil Satanists imbued with supernatural powers fueled by their blood sacrifices and so on pitted against the weak and lowly Christians who only had one power and it seemed like a pretty pathetic power to me. They could call on Jesus when they were captured by the powerful Satanists and the Satanists would die. The Satanist had super strength from their god. The Christians had squat. When I suggested to my friend that the Satanists seemed like they had the better deal, he replied, “but the Christians can kill the Satanists!” So the lesson I took away from that was avoiding Christians if you happen to be a Satanist. They want to kill you.

Enough clowning around.

2005-11-17T09:13:00.000-08:00

Enough clowning around. I have a lot of ground to cover if I want to find out about god. It might take me a while and I have some background to catch up on.

You see, I was raised without official religion. I remember as a young child having to fill in the name of my church in school documents. (In those days that was important information for the school, like my credit score is now). My mom told me the name of the church we went to, but it was a lie. We’d never been to church. I take that back. According to my parents, I was taken to church once when I was two. I screamed the whole time in nursery school or wherever they take babies who might scream, and the nice lady who probably also ran the potlucks and other church functions asked my parents not to bring me back. And because that was a church close to home, the name of the church I was supposed to fill out was far away. One that none of the other kids in the school probably went to.

That was my first impression of religion; something you needed to tell people you did because they expected it of you. Not because you really did it. Religion is about filling in boxes.

2005-11-16T17:19:00.000-08:00

When I type “God” into Google, I get this : “about 68,800,000 for god [definition]. (0.11 seconds)”. That means I got approximately sixty eight million, eight hundred thousand “hits” or references to god in Google’s database of the internet. If I click on the word “definition” I am transported to the site http://www.answers.com/god&r=67 where I am given the definition :

1.God
a. A being conceived as the perfect, omnipotent, omniscient originator and ruler of the universe, the principal object of faith and worship in monotheistic religions.

b. The force, effect, or a manifestation or aspect of this being.

2. A being of supernatural powers or attributes, believed in and worshiped by a people, especially a male deity thought to control some part of nature or reality.

3. An image of a supernatural being; an idol.

4. One that is worshiped, idealized, or followed: Money was their god.

5. A very handsome man.

6. A powerful ruler or despot.

[Middle English, from Old English.]

Who’d have thought to go to a dictionary? The search took 0.11 seconds. Perhaps not surprisingly, when I type “sex” I get this: “about 91,400,000 for sex [definition]. (0.07 seconds)” where I get this definition:

1. Sex

a. The property or quality by which organisms are classified as female or male on the basis of their reproductive organs and functions.

b. Either of the two divisions, designated female and male, of this classification.

2. Females or males considered as a group.

3. The condition or character of being female or male; the physiological, functional, and psychological differences that distinguish the female and the male. See Usage Note at gender.

4. The sexual urge or instinct as it manifests itself in behavior.

5. Sexual intercourse.

6. The genitals.

tr.v., sexed, sex·ing, sex·es.

1. To determine the sex of (an organism).

2. Slang.

a. To arouse sexually. Often used with up.

b. To increase the appeal or attractiveness of. Often used with up.

[Middle English, from Latin sexus.]

Although sex outdoes god by two million, two hundred sixty thousand, “love” returned one hundred seventy nine million, outdoing sex by eighty seven million, six hundred thousand. If, as my wife claims, God is love, then God beats sex hands down. (Money had two hundred one million hits. Maybe you can buy love.)

Winner: Bible Passage of the Day!

2005-11-16T15:11:00.000-08:00

13If any man take a wife, and go in unto her, and hate her,14 And give occasions of speech against her, and bring up an evil name upon her, and say, I took this woman, and when I came to her, I found her not a maid: 15 Then shall the father of the damsel, and her mother, take and bring forth the tokens of the damsel's virginity unto the elders of the city in the gate: 16 And the damsel's father shall say unto the elders, I gave my daughter unto this man to wife, and he hateth her; 17 And, lo, he hath given occasions of speech against her, saying, I found not thy daughter a maid; and yet these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city. 18 And the elders of that city shall take that man and chastise him; 19 And they shall amerce him in an hundred shekels of silver, and give them unto the father of the damsel, because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel: and she shall be his wife; he may not put her away all his days. 20 But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel: 21 Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father's house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you. 22 If a man be found lying with a woman married to an husband, then they shall both of them die, both the man that lay with the woman, and the woman: so shalt thou put away evil from Israel. 23 If a damsel that is a virgin be betrothed unto an husband, and a man find her in the city, and lie with her; 24 Then ye shall bring them both out unto the gate of that city, and ye shall stone them with stones that they die; the damsel, because she cried not, being in the city; and the man, because he hath humbled his neighbour's wife: so thou shalt put away evil from among you.

I will post a list of everyones name that correctly guesses the book in the bible that these passages come from.

Photo by modifiedenzyme

Pat Robertson- Can we just call him Crazy?

2005-11-11T23:34:00.000-08:00

"I'd like to say to the good citizens of Dover: If there is a disaster in your area, don't turn to God; you just rejected him from your city."So, um..., I'd like to say to the good citizens of Dover, nice job voting out those morons.

So is ID really just religion in disguise? Do both biology and astronomy support ID? And who are these people promoting ID?
To answer those questions, we went to the Discovery Institute in Seattle, the major proponents of ID.

And to answer my burning question of whether burning fossil fuels is potentially harming the environment, I called the headquarters of ExxonMobile. The nice lady who answered the phone said it was just a bunch of hooey that some godless communists were spreading in an attempt to create dissention in this, the greatest nation on earth.

2005-11-09T10:35:00.000-08:00

Fox News is a little bit on the ... Um ...It seems a little nasty to me. It's funny because these guys at Cornell are actually starting a debate. The debate seems like maybe something like, "Is stereotyping blacks as criminals helpful? SHould we avoid blacks in general the same way we should avoid police, because they are potentially dangerous?"

What apparently irked Smith is an article in the American decrying the lack of media attention to black-on-white crime in the area.

Cornell American Article

Other interesting findings of the study include:

Blacks are as much more dangerous than whites as men are more dangerous than women
Blacks commit violent crimes at four to eight times the white rate. Hispanics commit violent crimes at approximately three times the white rate, and Asians at one half to three quarters the white rate
There is more black-on-white than black-on-black violent crime
Hispanics are a hate crime victim category but not a perpetrator category. Hispanic offenders are classified as white, which inflates the white offense rate and gives the impression that Hispanics commit no hate crimes.

If all of these numbers are correct, then why don’t we hear more about black-on-white crime from the media? The answer is because it would be deemed politically incorrect and racist to point out a minority’s shortcomings (i.e. a 70% illegitimacy rate, grossly disproportionate assault, murder, rape, and armed robbery rates, etc). Who’s to blame the media though? Such a gross detail of violence would most definitely spark NAACP backlash or Jesse Jackson tongue-lashings.

It is also common-knowledge that, regardless of one’s race, greater precaution is taken when traveling through black neighborhoods than white neighborhoods. In the words of prominent black economist Walter Williams, “I carry two friends with me when I go into New York [city]. And my friends are... Smith & Wesson.” So what is stopping people from realizing this and calling a spade a spade? The answer is nothing except the hesitation to “perpetuate stereotypes” and the possibility of being termed a racist because of it.

Anna Marie Smith' response:

We, the professors and administrators, are also responsible for creating the sort of enduring infrastructure that will enhance the power of the anti-hate voice, for we do not have a level playing field when it comes to free speech and the exchange of ideas. The Supreme Court has affirmed the legitimacy of our interest in genuine diversity — that is to say, the presence of a critical mass of individuals from groups that have faced historical discrimination. We should take The American incident as a reminder that we must re-double our effort to build a diverse university community that establishes a critical mass of African-American and Latino/a faculty, senior administrators, and students.

I normally don't wager into fox news territory much. I found this one above the J-word one. (worth a read) But something in it struck me as worth reading. My experience in the Pacific Northwest has not left me with the feeling that blacks are especially dangerous, it's the cranksters we have to worry about here. Now there's a stereotype: People who fidgit like an earthquake, holes in their skin, hair falling out, teeth,- well, bad teeth, faint odor of formaldyhyde, and audibly grinding their bad teeth are more likely to steel, rob, urinate in public, die of infection and the like. So what's to stop us from calling that spade a spade. Or maybe in the case of the ones who have buck bad teeth, a rake. Or am I going over the same edge? It's all a little complicated. Anyway, it does seem in bad taste to phrase it the way they did but, hey, they're kids, right?

-peace out

Some Kansans Are Shit-assed stupid.

2005-11-08T21:44:00.000-08:00

"Kansas State Board Votes to Teach Intelligent Design in Schools"

"The board voted 6 to 4 in favor of the guidelines, which say schools should teach that doubt exists about the validity of evolution, a theory that originated with British biologist Charles Darwin in the nineteenth century." -Bloomberg

Can you imagine being one of theose 4? I mean, were they dragged away screaming and swinging their school district folding chairs? Jesus Fuckin-A Christ. I'd be pissed.

I added this picture I took of a trailer because it reminds me of the six jackasses that voted for stupidity and willfull ignorance. La La La La La La I can't Heeeaaar Yooouuuuu.