My Favorite Martians
Life is supposed to be fun - so for a change of pace I'd like to share with you another one of my favorite pseudoscience cults (in the least menacing sense of the word): the Unarius Academy of Science. When I first saw this stuff on cable access television in the 1990s, I thought, "Oh, how cool, some has made their own science fiction film - low production values, and laughable plot, but amusing, and you get to dress up in Star Trek outfits."Well, I was wrong. These people are serious.
Meet Uriel.
And who are "they"? Well, hazard a guess willya? Meet Uriel's followers.
Poor Tesla. Still, why should Newton, Einstein, Galileo, and Dawkins be disproportionately hit with quote mines and distortions? Hell, I give the Unarians some credit for recognizing Tesla! (Just don't show this video to an, ahem, you know, an electrical engineer or anyone, *cough! cough!*)
Here's part one of one of the Unarius Academy of Science's "educational" videos.
Rumor has it that Turkana Boy's relative, who appears in this film, is so upset at his rotten performance that he's suing UAoS for posthumous emotional distress and humiliation due to the fact that 1) everyone assumes he's a Neanderthal, and 2) everyone assuming that he's a Neanderthal is the reason that they call him such a suckwad actor, when in fact, this acting just plain sucks. Sorry, man, but this scene blows goats.
You should have stuck to 1970s Bigfoot shows, man!
Labels: cable access television, frolic, humor, pseudoscience, Tesla, Unarius Academy of Science, Uriel
posted by Kristine | Sunday, December 16, 2007
11 Comments:
"Just don't show this video to an, ahem, you know, an electrical engineer or anyone, *cough! cough!*"
*whimper*
Not only am I an electical engineer, but I also have a Tesla mug and a Tesla portrait (both from Jin Wicked) on my wall. And I have a comic that stars Tesla, too. (The Five Fists of Science. I guess you can make that two if you count the fact that Tesla created the title character of Atomic Robo...) So, yeah. It smarts a bit.
And don't forget the purple Teslamawhatsit from Orac's Friday Dose of Woo.
Poor guy. Just because he lost all his money and went a bit nutty in the '30s, all these woo woo wackos feel they have license to sully the name of probably the greatest single electrical engineer to ever live.
Ah, another demonstration of Asimov's Axiom: "There is no belief, however foolish, which will not gather its faithful adherents who will defend it to the death.
Scotius
I have tried more than once to engage in parodies of young-earth creationists or cdesign proponentsists. It seems that no matter how hard I try to come up with something outlandish, it turns out there is some group actually promoting it.
I would love to be able to believe that the most extreme groups are really run by people who want to discredit religion. That is much less painful than concluding that people who genuinely adhere to a particular faith are ruining its reputation and are completely oblivious to their actions and their consequences.
The sad truth is that many of these extreme groups are run by people just out to line their bank accounts with the shekels of the credulous yokels stupid enough to buy into the line of bullshit these charlatans dispense.
I hope that there is divine justice in this Universe, so that such montebanks can sweat in some unpleasant, uncomfortable corner of a purgatory with no fluid to drink but a beer-colored liquid, but it isn't beer. It's not cold either.
Scotius
Kristine: I don't have time to savor this post at the moment, but I'm sure it's going to give me lots of pleasure.
(Monty Python voice)
"And now for something completely off-topic..."
You may recall that we had discussed some sort of mashup of 'Drive' for dance accompaniment and I asked about what sort of cues I should look for in traditional music. Your advice was something on the lines of 'go see what's out there'.
Which I did. Having only skimmed the surface, I now realize that there is a tremendous diversity of b. dancing styles in terms of both performance and practice. I noticed, for example, that many performances featured a high degree of synchronization between the dancer and the musicians, usually percussionist: the belly undulates with the tambourine's trill, that sort of thing. Very impressive, and not the kind of thing that just happens, but which has to be planned to some degree.
So, my new question is, do you attempt to inject such synchronization in your routines? If so, then perhaps in the design of the 'mashup' I should incorporate similar sections. As things stand, 'Drive' is around 84 beats per minute. I've looped the opening eight bars, and can bring in the chorus or the instrumental solo whenever desired, so we could make the thing as long as desired. It's just that, in order to be of greatest utility to you, I think I should solicit some input from the artist.
How about dropping me a line at:
epigene13@gmail.com
Thanx...SH
I guess this is as good a place as any to be off-topic, and strike.
Blog memes are fun, eh?
Bob
Slightly off topic, but has you guys ever seen anything so darned cute?
http://www.kloudiia.com/wp-content/uploads/2006/09/Puppy.JPG
I cans be off-topic, too...
Grr! Here.
Grr!
Here's the video for that.
:P
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