The Missionary Position
P.O.V. on PBS tonight follows a group of young Mormon missionaries as they, after having been severely indoctrinated in the bizarre religion that is Mormonist theology, go to Germany in an attempt to convert Deutschland zum Jesus.
These poor, befuddled kids get a lot of Türen slammed in their Gesichten, not the least of which is the door of opportunity that their nutball religious Führers in America sadly slammed in their young minds. Following up with these young men today, the camera rolls as they express a mixture of gratitude for the discipline and embarrassment about the silly ideology that they had to mouth. If you missed it, check the link for when it will re-air, because it's exactly what Salman Rushdie meant when he said, while speaking at the University of Minnesota a few months ago, that surrealism is the true realism of today.
"The truth about the Church of Latter-Day Saints is that it is a corporation, and it's run like a corporation, and at the bottom of it, it has no heart."
Speaking of surrealism, and of corporations... I got what I wanted: heartless DaveScot was booted from UberCommon Dissing and William Dembski has started posting more. I've heard so much about Dembski's reported sense of humor despite his crazy beliefs, but the dude has been so whiny lately that he's losing his amusement value for me. Okay, I tease him a lot and get a little coquettish even though he's absolutely safe from me, but ever since the Dover decision he's waving his wet handkerchief so vehemently that it may as well be a white flag. So give it up, Bill! Switch sides already, man.
Why does a giant of evolution, like Coyne, need to sully himself with an extended critical review of Coulter’s GODLESS? Can you imagine Einstein reviewing a popular book by a journalist critiquing his general theory of relativity? Why does evolution need so much defending? [Because lies are easier to believe, my boy.]
By the way, I received my first PhD, in mathematics, from Coyne’s institution, the University of Chicago. It’s in my capacity as a mathematician, rather than as a theologian, that I make my primary contribution to ID. [Oh, yeah?] Also, Lehigh is, as I recall, one of the top 50 research institutions in the US, and Behe is a full professor there. So calling him a third-rate biologist seems a bit much. Can Coyne point us to any third-rate biologists who love evolution as much as he does? [What, first-rate not good enough for you? Well, okay...] Does evophilia automatically make one at least a second-rate biologist? [Huh?]
Oh, boo, hoo, hoo. Poor foppish I.D.! Everyone picks on it (or id). It can't even cross the road without being called a chicken. It's better funded than many legitimate scientific institutions, and yet it cannot throw a punch without knocking itself in the cheek! And this has been called by UD and Dembski's Disco Boys "the only alternative to Darwinism"?
Well, so much for this "youthful, rebellious" movement formerly known as the movement formerly known as scientific creationism, which was going to "go back to the lab" and displace evolution in ten years. (That clock is still ticking, Bill, baby.) I guess that's what happens when you try to dress up your own Goliath (or how about Go-LIE-eth) as David--you're forced to aim your slingshot at your own eye just to get a little attention!
Perpetual victimhood, like perpetual fringe status, is not impressive.
These poor, befuddled kids get a lot of Türen slammed in their Gesichten, not the least of which is the door of opportunity that their nutball religious Führers in America sadly slammed in their young minds. Following up with these young men today, the camera rolls as they express a mixture of gratitude for the discipline and embarrassment about the silly ideology that they had to mouth. If you missed it, check the link for when it will re-air, because it's exactly what Salman Rushdie meant when he said, while speaking at the University of Minnesota a few months ago, that surrealism is the true realism of today.
"The truth about the Church of Latter-Day Saints is that it is a corporation, and it's run like a corporation, and at the bottom of it, it has no heart."
Speaking of surrealism, and of corporations... I got what I wanted: heartless DaveScot was booted from UberCommon Dissing and William Dembski has started posting more. I've heard so much about Dembski's reported sense of humor despite his crazy beliefs, but the dude has been so whiny lately that he's losing his amusement value for me. Okay, I tease him a lot and get a little coquettish even though he's absolutely safe from me, but ever since the Dover decision he's waving his wet handkerchief so vehemently that it may as well be a white flag. So give it up, Bill! Switch sides already, man.
Why does a giant of evolution, like Coyne, need to sully himself with an extended critical review of Coulter’s GODLESS? Can you imagine Einstein reviewing a popular book by a journalist critiquing his general theory of relativity? Why does evolution need so much defending? [Because lies are easier to believe, my boy.]
By the way, I received my first PhD, in mathematics, from Coyne’s institution, the University of Chicago. It’s in my capacity as a mathematician, rather than as a theologian, that I make my primary contribution to ID. [Oh, yeah?] Also, Lehigh is, as I recall, one of the top 50 research institutions in the US, and Behe is a full professor there. So calling him a third-rate biologist seems a bit much. Can Coyne point us to any third-rate biologists who love evolution as much as he does? [What, first-rate not good enough for you? Well, okay...] Does evophilia automatically make one at least a second-rate biologist? [Huh?]
Oh, boo, hoo, hoo. Poor foppish I.D.! Everyone picks on it (or id). It can't even cross the road without being called a chicken. It's better funded than many legitimate scientific institutions, and yet it cannot throw a punch without knocking itself in the cheek! And this has been called by UD and Dembski's Disco Boys "the only alternative to Darwinism"?
Well, so much for this "youthful, rebellious" movement formerly known as the movement formerly known as scientific creationism, which was going to "go back to the lab" and displace evolution in ten years. (That clock is still ticking, Bill, baby.) I guess that's what happens when you try to dress up your own Goliath (or how about Go-LIE-eth) as David--you're forced to aim your slingshot at your own eye just to get a little attention!
Perpetual victimhood, like perpetual fringe status, is not impressive.
posted by Kristine | Monday, July 31, 2006
11 Comments:
A friend of mine is a carpenter and he was remodeling a church a couple years ago. Can't recall which denomination - not Catholic. He was talking to a pastor or a layperson who said that he was organizing a mission to Mexico. My friend said that Mexico is already Catholic. The reply was "Exactly."
Like all atheists, you'll believe just about anything.
After all, if enough lucy break mutations...that ended up being beneficial, even though most aren't... occured in 600 million years (and how many hundreds and hundreds of millions of mutations would that be???) or so to allow for the development from the single cells to human beings (ignoring where the cells came from) then we must really be lucky.
I like the way Jacques Monod said it..."our number came up in the Monte Carlo game."
Bahahahahahahahahahaha!!!!!!!!!!
Like all atheists, you'll believe just about anything.
Like all brainwashed fundamentalists, you can't see through the fog of faith.
We rely on proof and evidence not blind allegience to a book.
How's the Chick Tract distribution goin?
Yeah, crazy me, I "believe" that "Banned" exists, despite the fact that I've never met nor seen him/her, but only received some virtual missive that could be a joke by one of my friends. Yeah. "Banned"'s existence is unproven! Now, that's the way to deal with trolls.
Palmer, I grew up Protestant, and I'm familiar with such attitudes, but they are much more pronounced now. After the Mormon documentary on PBS last night, there was a shorter documentary about missionaries who distribute cassette tapes of Bible stories to indigenous people in their own, disappearing, languages. At the end, a Mexican scholar spoke of how these extreme evangelical, Protestant missionaries are, by offering their converts food and money, forbidding Catholic and indigenous practices and festivals, which emphasize collectivism and sharing, to steer them toward consumerism and rabid individualism. I'm not a religious person at all (as "Banned" will tell you), but I prefer gentle traditional rituals to the sobbing and faith-healing hysteria that I saw in these evangelical churches. It's sad.
After all, if enough lucy break mutations...that ended up being beneficial, even though most aren't... occured in 600 million years (and how many hundreds and hundreds of millions of mutations would that be???) or so to allow for the development from the single cells to human beings (ignoring where the cells came from) then we must really be lucky.
And this, my friends, is why statistics needs to be a required part of all elementary school curricula.
This looks like a job for Mark over at Good Math, Bad Math.
At first I thought it was dissing Lucy--sure way to get me mad--then I realized it meant "lucky." Then I saw the phrase "break mutations" and thought, Huh? Like, break wind? Lucky-break mutations! You know, if people like this character really want to insult me, they need to make a concerted effort not to spell like a hundred monkeys typing comments at random.
I like the way Jacques Monod said it..."our number came up in the Monte Carlo game."
Well, yes, that's exactly it. Someone will win the game, and whoever that is is the lucky one. Should the winner of the lottery say "The odds of me winning are so infinitesimal, it was virtually impossible, so I must have been selected intelligently"? Only if they are an incredibly arrogant IDiot.
Good point, truth machine!
Too many people suffer from this incredibly silly confusion between "unlikely" and "impossible." It's like saying that Ben Wallace shouldn't bother practicing free throws, since he's going to miss most of them anyway.
What people don't understand about probabilities is that the probability of a particular event happening is only statistically meaningful before it happens. After it happens, it doesn't matter how unlikely it is. It happened.
Dan, what gets me is, these same people will say "Reach for the impossible!" and "Believe in miracles!" as long as there's a supernatural explanation for it. But unlikely, but possible, things happening? Nah!
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