I noticed that the atheist section of reddit is publishing the South Park likeness of Muhammed:
Oh, here's that old post that I was following up on, just in case you wanted to know why Nelson Muntz is laughing about having AIDS. Actually, I'm rather proud of it.
HJ
...and I now know what sustain is.
I often have students who claim to not have enough time to read everything that we are discussing in class. I think that this usually boils down to time management issues. Regardless, I try to offer advice about how to be a better, more efficient reader.
"Our government engaged in a massive cover-up of what really happened, including its own ties to the hijackers. Unanswered questions remain about how the towers were brought down, and where a plane really struck the Pentagon. The Bush Administration either knew about the plan and allowed it to proceed, or they had a hand in it themselves."
"But here is what John Farmer, a Senior Counsel for the 9/11 Commission who drafted the original report, has to say in a new book: 'At some level of government, at some point in time . . . there was an agreement not to tell the truth about what happened.' What more do we need?"
Since posting a preliminary comment about recent reports that the remains of Noah's Ark have been found on Mt. Ararat in Turkey, Answers in Genesis now has more to say, while still remaining highly cautious in coming to a conclusion about what has supposedly been found. Throughout the week, AiG supporters have peppered us with questions about the validity of the reported discovery, especially as major media outlets (like ABC-TV news in the U.S.) have been covering the story and quoting one of the Ark hunters as saying he is 99 percent sure they have found what is left of the Ark.
What also makes AiG so cautious about the latest report is that we have heard such claims several times before, even as they were made by people who described themselves as Bible-believing Christians. Some “discoveries” were eventually dismissed as structures of geologic origin and were not of wood. The “crying wolf” syndrome has already kicked in this week, as non-believers are dismissing this Ark claim as yet another bogus one. The creationist movement in general will have its credibility undermined further if this Ark-remnant is shown to be a fraud, and thus the testimony we seek to have in the world will be hindered.
OK, so it's only a day of comparative infamy. This is like a new Pearl Harbor, only with suborbital balloons laden with astronomical equipment and nobody got hurt. And the balloon was made in America. Shit. We totally have to bomb ourselves. Shit.
I'm sorry, but of all the criticism that has come out of the South Park/Muhammed dust-up, the least informed of all is that of Pat Mahoney, who I will infer is illiterate. Of course, it is from OneNewsNow.
A ministry wants the public to formally object to the television show South Park."Publicly going to the bathroom on the American flag." Shitting. The word is "shitting."
The show ran its 200th episode last week, one which dealt with Islam. But due to pressure from pro-Muslim organizations, producers bleeped out the words "the Prophet Mohammed." One pro-Muslim website, RevolutionMuslim.com, had posted death threats against the show's creators if it was aired unedited. The director of the Christian Defense Coalition (CDC) sees an obvious double standard at play.
"For years, South Park has made fun of Christianity," Pat Mahoney points out. "They've shown Jesus as Rambo. They've made him look like a fool. They've had him publicly going to the bathroom on an American flag. The list goes on and on."
In effect, he summarizes, South Park has made a habit of mocking Christianity and the values of Christians -- but chose this time to sidestep any confrontation with Muslims.
"Pure and simple, it is bigotry and discrimination at its worst to protect one religious faith tradition -- in this case Islam -- and then mock, demonize, and trample on Christianity or other faith traditions," the CDC director contends.
He adds that producers of such material will continue to do so unless the Christian community rises up and registers loud and effective complaints.
The Bible tells us that God’s eternal power and divine nature are clearly seen in the things that He has made. One of the most obvious displays of His creative power is the human eye.Menton, you suck, you quote-mining turd-blossom. Seriously, can't Wash U take action against him for academic dishonesty (if not for staggering incompetency in the biological sciences)? Have they no standards?
Even Charles Darwin conceded that “to suppose that the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest possible degree.”
Nonetheless, having abandoned his Christianity, Darwin was obliged to appeal to the “absurd” to account for the origin of the eye by random change and natural selection.
"To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of Spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree. When it was first said that the sun stood still and the world turned round, the common sense of mankind declared the doctrine false; but the old saying of Vox populi, vox Dei ["the voice of the people = the voice of God "], as every philosopher knows, cannot be trusted in science. Reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a simple and imperfect eye to one complex and perfect can be shown to exist, each grade being useful to its possessor, as is certain the case; if further, the eye ever varies and the variations be inherited, as is likewise certainly the case; and if such variations should be useful to any animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, should not be considered as subversive of the theory."This is your poster boy, Ham? This feeble non-scholar? Oh, well. He can always publish in ARJ, I suppose.
I think that to be included on Worldview Weekend, you need to be a complete pillock. Let's start with the founder, for instance.
While liberal news outlets such as MSNBC were cynically exploiting the April 19 anniversary of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing by attempting to tie the terrorist attack to the anti-government sentiments of the modern-day Tea Party movement, investigative reporter Jayna Davis was setting the record straight in an exclusive interview on the AIM radio show, Take AIM. The Oklahoma City bombing was an Arab/Muslim terrorist attack on the United States, she says.
Davis, author of a blockbuster book on the attack, The Third Terrorist, has examined and presented the evidence showing that Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh was in fact a front man for Middle Eastern terrorists. The third terrorist, in addition to the two, McVeigh and Terry Nichols, who were convicted, was an Arab. This was the mysterious "John Doe" who was never found. But other members of an Arab terrorist network were involved, she says.
She says the evidence was ignored and dismissed because the Clinton Administration didn't want to go to war with Iraq, the likely culprit, and wanted to blame the attack on domestic right-wingers for political reasons.
The implications of what Davis has to say are that the case is still unsolved, that the FBI blew it, and that we may still be vulnerable to Arab terrorists infiltrating the U.S. and killing hundreds or thousands of innocent Americans.
Indeed, Davis suggested in her AIM interview that another attack on American soil may be coming, perhaps from the same networks which sponsored McVeigh.Until you give me evidence to the contrary, I will be forced to assume you mean "militias."
Liberal media like MSNBC have peddled the false notion that McVeigh was motivated by domestic hatred of the government, and that the Tea Party movement is motivated by the same. Hence, by extension, the Tea Party movement will probably spawn anti-government fanatics who will kill people. This claim justifies government repression of anti-Obama political dissidents who may in fact be entirely peaceful and simply exercising their constitutional rights.
One of the problems with the MSNBC narrative is that Davis makes a convincing case that in fact McVeigh "was a handpicked dupe, set up to take the fall in order to save his Islamic collaborators from prosecution." She documents that he had expressed a desire to be a mercenary for Middle Eastern terrorists, and that the trail of evidence that both he and his accomplice Terry Nichols left behind points in the direction of an Arab/Muslim connection to the attack.
Indeed, Davis portrays Oklahoma City as one in a series of attacks engineered by foreign enemies of the United States that includes the 1993 World Trade Center bombing as well as the 9/11 attacks themselves.
Over the years, Accuracy in Media has run numerous stories about Davis, her evidence, and other reports indicating a Middle Eastern connection to the Oklahoma City bombing. Wes Vernon wrote a 2007 AIM Report on the obstacles confronted by Davis as she tried to tell the story in the media, including on television.
As Davis noted in her interview with me on Take AIM, her book, The Third Terrorist, outlines details of sworn affidavits from very credible witnesses who link the convicted bombers, McVeigh and Nichols, to former Iraqi soldiers who had managed to settle in the U.S. These individuals turned out to be anti-American infiltrators who wanted revenge on the U.S. for our Middle East policy.Anecdotes? OK, like who? Head of the CIA? Some foreign operative who had knowledge of McVeigh's international connections? Someone on the inside who was squealing?
Davis provided similar detail in an article she wrote for AmericanThinker.com on April 23. Her interview with me the day before can be heard here. The transcript of the interview is here.
The decorated Bradley gunner openly expressed to an Army buddy during Operation Desert Storm that he "wanted to become a mercenary for the Middle East because they paid the most."
For investigating a foreign connection, Davis said she was called a racist. "I'm an NBC affiliated reporter, I was from the mainstream media, but I was branded a racist, and politically incorrect, because I was pursuing legitimate leads and evidence that led to foreign involvement in the Oklahoma City bombing," she said.That's not fair. You're a racist idiot. C'mon, "Accuracy" in Media. Correct the record here. Heh-heh.
I am thinking about doing a series of podcasts about museums around Atlanta. Why? Because we have a couple of rather odd offerings in this city, it seems. The three that come to mind: the National Museum of Patriotism, which is within easy walking distance of my apartment and is next to a bunch of porno stores, so I can save a trip; the Center for Puppetry Arts; and the Federal Reserve Museum, which I am sure will lay bare the plot of the Fed to overtake the world by filling Jews with money, or whatever the Ron Paul wackos are saying.
I freaking knew it! And, no, my commute is not that long.
'Allo 'allo! The forces of goof have again assaulted the gates of reason, only to be beaten back. I wonder if they will try again next week?
Seriously. What a piece of shit. A piece of shit molded into a grotesque, roughly female shape.
I am always looking for cutting-edge white supremacist poets and am yet to find even one. However, I do find lots of untalented people who are bad at expressing themselves, and out of what I prefer to call pity, try to help them with their writing. This week we have yet another feeble stinker:
Seriously, the Hokey Pokey used for mass hypnosis of Pentecostals(?). It has the rising and falling and coordinated group movement. It's fucking brilliant in a stupid way. (Make sure you listen to the testimonials.)
Do you still think that prayer is worth a turd if the hokey-pokey works just as well?
I just mean that he is a bad person who is an ass. I base this not only on the fact that even Jesus thinks he's an intolerable mistake, but also on this recent email:
April 22, 2010
DONOHUE REAPPEARS ON "SOUTH PARK"
Last night's "South Park" episode ridiculed Comedy Central for censoring Trey Parker and Matt Stone: the writers panned the station for not allowing them to depict Muhammad the way they do other religious figures.
Included in the episode was a character of Catholic League president Bill Donohue; he was previously featured in another show. But in last night's episode, Donohue had no speaking role, an indication, some are speculating, that Comedy Central is wary he might mimic his Muslim brothers if provoked.
When asked whether this was true, Donohue said, "I don't use machetes when I'm angry—I usually just reach for another cold one."
I am currently waiting to go to a...I don't know what it is exactly. Some sort of departmental, possibly College, function. There is going to be dinner and a reading from the Book of Armaments. I have no idea. All I know is that it is important that I put out the vibe while I'm there, being a "member of the department." I can do that. But first I'm going to go to the bookstore for a while. I've done all the grading I can stand, I don't have my RSS reader up and running (hence the title of this post), and sod-all is happening. I'm goin' to the bookstore and you can't stop me from buying a book or something.
Are you single? A conspiracy theorist? Sure, you want to meet girls/guys, but how can you be sure they're not government shills? Welcome to Truther Dating!
http://www.trutherdating.com/
HJ (with thanks to Animala)
It seems like only yesterday that Answers in Genesis started their novelty publication, the Answers Research Journal, and the interesting thing is that they don't seem to understand how marginal and disreputable their goofy monument to avoiding actual peer review is. Peer review, I would say, is not submitting something to people who already agree with you. ARJ is a place for idiots and half-wits to avoid scrutiny and quality control. Anyway, Andrew Snelling, Half-Wit-in-Chief of ARJ, thinks this is a good thing.
It began on January 9, 2008, with much controversy. Despite such an initial reaction Answers Research Journal has, in just over two years, grown from a humble start with three peer-reviewed papers to a popular destination for serious creation researchers, and as a fast-growing repository of investigations from those on the new frontiers of science.
ARJ launched early in 2008 with the goal of bringing the best in creation science to publication as quickly, efficiently, and accurately as possible. This research is not only at the cutting edge, but freely available for everyone. The journal isn’t the first peer-reviewed biblical scientific journal, though critics attacked it as if it were, but it is the first free technical journal to break though the academic censorship with cutting insights not limited by page length or other restrictions common to printed journals.
Understandably, the secular world has not been happy. A journal that shows how God’s creation affirms the trustworthiness of the Bible, eschews evolutionary propaganda, and offers peer-reviewed research to build the creation model is certainly not going to sit well with those who want Darwinian indoctrination to be the only viewpoint allowed.
Many secular journals chime in with mockery and derision (there have even been attempts to submit bogus papers),
but God has used such attacks to bring hundreds of thousands of people to the site and to generate more interest in creation research than ever before.
Finally, a theory is set forth that reconciles inorganic, organic, and animated matter with the metaphysical realities of both the creator and the created. By coupling the metaphysical implications of quantum physics with the biblical understanding of God’s attributes, the thesis is set forth that our immediate physical reality—consisting of empty space, electromagnetic energy, and information—is basically a hologram depiction of God’s intent. God spoke and it was so. Since creation, God’s Spirit has continued to energize and interact with the universe in an entangled nature at the quantum level. Similarly, the individual metaphysical reality (the spirit) of each animated being interacts with its individual corporal body via this same entangled nature at the subatomic level.
In fact, the number—and quality—of the papers submitted in the first two years has exceeded expectations (32 papers in more than 400 pages—and more on the way this year).
Tengrain totally scooped me on this one.
At the House hearing, state Rep. Ed Setzler (R-Kennesaw), who is shouldering the legislation in the House, spoke earnestly for better than a half hour on microchips as a literal invasion of privacy.
He was followed by a hefty woman who described herself as a resident of DeKalb County. “I’m also one of the people in Georgia who has a microchip,” the woman said. Slowly, she began to lead the assembled lawmakers down a path they didn’t want to take.
Microchips, the woman began, “infringe on issues that are fundamental to our very existence. Our rights to privacy, our rights to bodily integrity, the right to say no to foreign objects being put in our body.”
She spoke of the “right to work without being tortured by co-workers who are activating these microchips by using their cell phones and other electronic devices.”
She continued. “Microchips are like little beepers. Just imagine, if you will, having a beeper in your rectum or genital area, the most sensitive area of your body. And your beeper numbers displayed on billboards throughout the city. All done without your permission,” she said.
It was not funny, and no one laughed.
“Ma’am, did you say you have a microchip?” asked state Rep. Tom Weldon (R-Ringgold).
“Yes, I do. This microchip was put in my vaginal-rectum area,” she replied. Setzler, the sponsoring lawmaker, sat next to the witness – his head bowed.
“You’re saying this was involuntary?” Weldon continued.
The woman said she had been pushing a court case through the system for the last eight years to have the device removed.
Wendell Willard (R-Atlanta), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, picked up the questioning.
“Who implanted this in you?” he asked.
“Researchers with the federal government,” she said.
“And who in the federal government implanted it?” Willard asked.
“The Department of Defense.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
The woman was allowed to go about her business, and the House Judiciary Committee approved passage of SB 235.
Bing: I got a teaching citation today.
These come from Rebecca Watson. The first is great in its badness, and the second is somehow both parody and accurate.
So, Answers in Genesis has jumped Megashark vs. Super Octopus and now openly proclaims that their entire enterprise is basically Magic Fairy Land. Fuck the pretext of science. It's time to embrace the fairy tales, all of them.
Don't believe me? Check out their new billboard:
This is a fairly accurate representation of what is promoted as science at the Creation Museum, and I think that it just might be enough to shame the ever-loving shit out of people in the Cincinnati area out of imagining that this weird alternate reality has anything to do with science.
Bravo, Ken Ham. Bravo.
HJ
The turn around on this podcast was pretty epic by my standards. I heard about him yesterday, recorded a well-reasoned (if I do say so myself) and evidenced counter-rant last night, and mixed the sucker today.
VorJack at Unreasonable Faith has posted guidelines for what to do if you are the person to make first contact with the alien overlords. I saw it somewhere else earlier; in fact, I used some of the more humorous points this flyer makes in my class yesterday in our discussion of the prospects for extraterrestrial life. Very, very amusing.
Oh, funny stuff tonight. I'm having so much fun. First census boy steps in it (you'll hear) and then this. It came from something a few months ago, in February, when supporters of naturopathy had Wordpress take down valid criticism of a particular naturopath, Christopher Maloney.
He's a naturopath. Naturopathy is quackery. Ergo, Christopher Maloney = donkey douche. What's worse is that people who support this bullshit and the cowards at WordPress have decided to take down the website forthesakeofscience.wordpress.com, which published legitimate criticism of herbalist bullshizzle.
Naughty. Join the trillions of PZ readers who are now crapping down donkey douche Maloney's throat.
Send him a pleasant, encouraging email at: @#^$@#$*@#@hotmail.com, and tell him to encourage WordPress to reinstate valid criticism.
Anonymous said... Hello, zombie drone,
Perhaps you missed the cry of your master, PZ? It wasn't me, please try to keep up.
Dear Chris,
Lick it, fraud. How do you sleep at night? I mean, really? What's wrong with your conscience? Seriously, energy healers? Vaccine denial? You're a goddamned menace and deserve a damned thorough financial bankruptcy to go along with your complete moral bankruptcy.
I'll have you know that I have a long history of opposition to useless shitbags.
You will notice, you illiterate subnorm, that my original post says, "the people who support this bullshizzle" are the ones who did this, you ego-surfing sack of putrescence. This is because I was being as precise as I could be--notice I did not name you and that my syllogism (a logical argument) needs not PZ's assertions to hold true.
I vomit on your dog, you taint stain.
HJ
Anonymous said... After a diatribe like that, you have the gall to moderate my comments? Unfortunately, you display the standard level of intelligence of Myers' followers. Not a scientist among you, but you seem to know a good deal of profanity.
You don't know what gall is, but that's only because you aren't a real medical practitioner. And it's not just you, you self-centered glob of petrified rabbit droppings. All old posts are moderated after a few weeks. I was getting spammed by someone who was mentally ill and therefore had an excuse for being a trolling crap-monster, but that also means that other trolling crap-monsters like you, as well as useful members of society, have to wait before I automatically approve all comments, you fucking crybaby.
Intellectually and morally I am your superior, and I consider you a child. Yes, I swear, but, you see, only an infantile pigfucker would confuse the packaging for the content (even though I can sort of imagine you complaining that all you got for Christmas again were boxes covered with wrapping paper).
So, what I think I am saying is that you can drown in a toilet for all I care, you desiccated ferret uterus.
HJ
But there you have it. I inadvertently published the notes I was taking in a draft of a post that I did not mean to release. If you have google reader or get my posts via email, I suspect that you already know the topic. But an idiot needs an intellectual cock-punch and I'm feeling frisky.
As an American, this is usually my first reaction to international relations. Of all sorts.
Hot damn!
In Bill Gates' 2010 letter to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates opens his section on childhood vaccination:
"Vaccines are a miracle because with three doses, mostly given in the first two years of life, you can prevent deadly diseases for an entire lifetime. Because the impact is so incredible, vaccines are the foundation’s biggest area of investment—more than $800 million every year—and the return is substantial. We are working to get other donors to put more resources into vaccines because we still have big challenges. The first challenge is to invent them, and the second is to make sure they reach everyone who needs them. Achieving full coverage is hard in poor countries, where cost and delivery are big barriers."
The importation resulted in 839 exposed persons, 11 additional cases (all in unvaccinated children), and the hospitalization of an infant too young to be vaccinated. Two-dose vaccination coverage of 95%, absence of vaccine failure, and a vigorous outbreak response halted spread beyond the third generation, at a net public-sector cost of $10 376 per case. Although 75% of the cases were of persons who were intentionally unvaccinated, 48 children too young to be vaccinated were quarantined, at an average family cost of $775 per child. Substantial rates of intentional undervaccination occurred in public charter and private schools, as well as public schools in upper-socioeconomic areas. Vaccine refusal clustered geographically and the overall rate seemed to be rising. In discussion groups and survey responses, the majority of parents who declined vaccination for their children were concerned with vaccine adverse events.
To Whom It May Concern:
This letter is a request to exercise my right to waive immunization requirements for my son/daughter, ___________. This request is made based on my personal and philosophical beliefs.
I agree to hold _________________ harmless in the event of any possible illness or injury resulting from waiving my immunization requirement.
Better than the clock that leaps off of your nightstand and hides so you have to find it. Better than the alarm clock puzzle disassembles itself and makes you put it back together. Better even than the sonic hand grenade.
It's the Stephen Fry alarm clock!
HJ
We've been waiting a long time for these crazy kids to put out another podcast, and I think this mini-podcast officially kicks off their second season. Or perhaps it is like a Dr. Who Christmas Special, you know, so that it falls in between seasons and you don't find out where it properly belongs until you see which DVD set it is packaged with. They have been busy, frolicking in the sheets and helping with the Global Atheist Convention in Melbourne, which sounds like it was a fabulous experience! I think that I heard Kylie Sturgess in there, but I can't be sure.
HJ
This makes everything all better. I'm sorry Catholic Church. I should have known better than to suspect you of wrongdoing.
Seed Newsvine
