I do feel a little embarrassed that the most active comment thread on all of scienceblogs is often the endless open thread on Pharyngula, which is about nothing at all but what you crazy people want to say…and that’s in spite of the fact that I keep closing the old thread and opening a new one. Anyway, here we go again.
So say something.
Palin has helpfully clarified in our earlier discussion about calling people ‘retards’. Here’s the rule: it’s okay if you’re making fun of them, but not if you’re serious.
Also, Obama should bomb Iran if he wants to win again.
Oops, wrong story in #2 — that is a response to this story.
If Palin were to, somehow, win a nomination and then the presidency, would she be a 3 year president or a 7 year president? (No point in serving out that final year when you know you won’t be in the job next term.)
But.. The most active post is the last never ending thread, not this one. We must try harder!
Whoa! Early portcullis on that one; took me by surprise.
Poor form there Marjanović. You know< how teh CO feels about firsties posts. I hope he deletes it.
…how teh CO feels about firsties posts. I hope he deletes i–ah, already done.
Let that be a lesson to us all.
Continuing the discussion re the portrayal of unbelief in religious communities:
Fair enough. Or more than. Because I quite agree. I was thinking specifically of my experiences in said denominations specifically about just general unbelief, not so much creationism, and averaging, too.
And come to think of it, I’m probably being a bit too kind even in that context when I say that ‘no one’ just actively and consciously chooses to tell a huge howler. Some of them, depending on how much exposure they’ve actually had to unbelievers, or how hard they’ve thought about this stuff themselves, almost certainly do. In those cases, it probably just is a simple and very conscious copout, the easy thing to do under a form of peer pressure they live under. Because they know saying, honestly, ‘actually, they’ve got some really quite excellent reasons’ is as good as saying they’re an unbeliever themselves. And in that sense, they might actually be, come to think of it. But still closeted, stuck in the social situation of it, for whichever complicated reasons of their own.
I’d add that thinking about this really does focus me on that attitude we hear so much that what’s objectionable to people isn’t unbelievers, but unbelievers who won’t just remain politely silent about the whole deal. Because you’ll note in this situation, the whole point of the deceptions that spread out (see again comments re the similiarity here to propaganda spread) is they’re entirely a defensive strategy: it’s not going to fool anyone who doesn’t believe–these are deceptions passed around within the community of believers to prevent erosion by the existence of unbelievers and the actually quite good reasons they do have for rejecting the rather absurd claims the religion makes.
And that whole thing really does start to break down if too many people in the community have actually been exposed to people who really can present and have presented good reasons for rejecting the religion’s overtures. It only works well in an environment where you can prevent that–or at least count on the exposure being isolated and rare enough that you can pass on the various lies and half-truths without them being too directly exposed as such. Just like that spreading propaganda, you need repetition, and an environment in which people can pass on those little lies themselves and not too obviously have to face the fact that that’s what they are–and if they haven’t met anyone who’s a living contradiction to the claim–or at least haven’t met too many, or not too recently–that’s a lot easier. If unbelievers become too numerous and too visible, people are going to start to notice too much, the claims are going to start sounding way too much like the deceptions they are, and the spread may well start to break up.
So, shorter, no one should be too surprised there’s a lot of pressure in that direction, and especially from relatively ‘moderate’, mainstream denominations, even. That’s their modus operandi you’re fucking with, when you’re happy to live too out loud.
Although it has rendered #2 oddly self-referential.
Not sure how Palin got into this but since she is rather keen on leaving a lot of Americans to die I suppose remarking on the fact is always allowable.
What? DM called firsts? Tsk, Tsk. Still, this was a pretty abrupt change over. I figured another hundred post on the old thread.
666 is the new magic number. When I see a thread reach that many comments, I close it and open a new one.
Sometimes it goes way over because you rascals run up the numbers while I’m sleeping or trapped on an airplane or am in a dance marathon or something.
[Thread Cop posts stupid rant]
Laden:
Yeah, that’s enough. I’m done with them.
[Thanks for putting up with me. I thought there was something worth salvaging (with Greg, not Stephanie). Now he’s gone even further and insulted other people I respect. Alas.]
***
OK, so I found the jar! (I’ve moved several times recently.) It’s now out on the counter, mocking me. I don’t want to open it until I’m planning to use it, but I may make something Mexican tonight. I’ll keep you posted (so to speak)!
“666 is the new magic number. When I see a thread reach that many comments, I close it and open a new one.
I KNEW IT! PZ has latent superstitious tendencies.
We need to get some one in to do a exorcism. Poor thing.
They shoot horses, don’t they?
So it is the Number of the Beast that (theoretically) triggers the portcullis. Good to know.
The first anniversary of teh Thread is approaching rapidly; the original Science of Watchmen post went up at 22:28 (EST) 24 Feb. 2009. Just under 2 weeks away.
At the current rate of about 3.5 d per subThread, we ought to be able to get at least 4 more subThreads in before then. Let’s go for 6.
Ahh, it feels like a new day! Between a couple hair-on-fire busy days at work and then the Snowpocalypse That Wasn’t©¹, I mostly missed the last subThread, and the thought of getting caught up was rather daunting. Nice to have a clean sheet of virtual paper!
¹ I recognize some folks got truly swacked by Wednesday’s storm, but for most of CT other than the NY metro area and the shoreline, it was an exercise in headscratching and wondering why we closed all those schools and businesses. I did shovel my driveway, but what I was shoveling was so meager I honestly worried that my neighbors would think me daft.
Yes! I finally got in the last word on an endless thread incarnation!
I wonder if I can put that on my annual evaluation.
Even in a college town there is a baptist church. My daughter went to a youth group, and asked some pointed questions of the counselor. Some girls had some problem answering my daughter’s questions, so I think there is some hope for some of baptist youth.
The future is certain
Just give us time to work it out
There you go!
Fuck ’em.
Speaking of Sgt. Z., btw, I keep thinking about her first comment on that trainwreck, which I asked about here when it first appeared.
Doesn’t it suggest strongly that the Sarge, Laden’s editor-in-another-context and indefatigable defender of his Honour and clarity, actually thought the post was about capital punishment?
Seriously, I can’t parse it any other way. I think that’s decent evidence for the complete opacity of his stupid, stupid metaphor.
In the past I had seen it the opposite; Stephanie has written a few really brilliant things. But now it seems those were a fluke.
Day after the Snowpocalypse in lower Manhattan. It was a pretty good snow storm here. This AM the streets and sidewalks are almost all plowed/shoveled. I’m quite impressed with the sidewalks. They’re clear in front of apartment buildings, abandoned construction sites, federal buildings, state institutions, buildings housing tiny businesses…in fact, everywhere except for the large, ostentatious church on the corner. It hasn’t been shoveled at all. Perhaps they’re waiting for god to do it.
I am so far behind I may never catch up, but I did want to send a shout-out to Smoggy Batzrubble.
Smoggles, your post #517 in the previous chapter of the endless thread was prime Grade A snark. It was so good that I copied it and sent it to my children. Being the excellent progeny that they are, the scarring will probably not be permanent.
Particularly contemptible if they actually appear first, too.
Meanwhile, in Flatland the ongoing attempt to understand the third dimension is proving even more futile (as though such a thing is possible):
Mad, you say?
How is mad, good?
We got ‘pocalypsed pretty good here on Lon Gisland. I should probably go out and disinter the Jeep. I think I have to teach this afternoon.
Theme for the next endless varietal: you can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.
A thread about nothing.
oy, the Eagles.
“Peaceful Easy Feeling” was my Class Song in high school. (Of course, we called them the Iggles, but that’s a ‘Burgh thing.)
Bwahahahaha, just wait until PZ is on the plane to/from Austrailia.
the endless open thread on Pharyngula, which is about nothing
Since the endless thread is about nothing, wouldn’t posts early in a new sub-thread saying things like “first” technically be on topic and therefore not subject to deletion?
Carlie, I am sorry but I have to respond.
NSFW. But some might guess exactly what it is.
Feynmaniac (@25):
Was there a link to Seinfeld¹ missing there?
¹ As usual when I post from work, that YouTube link is a blind posting; I hope it means what I think it means!
technically, schmechnically
It’s, like, the only Rule so I don’t feel too bad that it’s irrational and arbitrary. Also, such posts annoy the hell out of me too.
Janine – but we’re not allowed to dissent from each other! Hive mind! Hive mind!
Every semester for about the last 15 years, I have tried the hilarious joke that the Loop of Henle was “discovered by the lead singer of the Eagles.”
Fewer and fewer people laugh every year.
Come to think of it, this is true of a lot of my “jokes”.
The future is certain
Just give us time to work it out
Problem is, by the time we’ve worked it out, the future is past.
I am the voice of the beehive.
I almost cried the time I used a Monty Python reference in class and no one got it.
Details, please.
Hello all… just dropping in to say sorry I haven’t been by much to comment… but I was involved in a serious accident… out of the hospital now but still recovering. I’ll be keeping up but probably not posting much for a while. More details at my blog.
Cheers to all, and good health!
Also, such posts annoy the hell out of me too.
There is that…in the context of a thread that’s a killer argument.
CAB
The Dude, in the back seat of a taxicab that rocks and squeaks with every bump,is gingerly touching at sore spots on his face and scalp.
“Peaceful Easy Feeling” is on the radio.
DUDE’S POV
The back of the driver, a large black man with rasta dreds under a knit cap.
DUDE
Jesus, man, can you change the station?
DRIVER
Fuck you man! You don’t like my fucking music, get your own fucking cab!
DUDE
I’ve had a–
DRIVER
I pull over and kick your ass out, man!
DUDE
–had a rough night, and I hate the
fucking Eagles, man–
DRIVER
That’s it! Outta this fucking cab!
Aaaaaand FREEZE.
The Eagles, Sven? AND the Dead? What evil did rock and roll ever visit upon you to make you reject it so utterly?
No, but it probably would have been better to include one. Dangers of posting before morning coffee.
It does.
/thinks of something witty to add
/starts brewing
I have a suggestion for eliminating firsties although I don’t know if it is technically feasible. When the number of posts exceeds some predetermined number, in this case 666 (or my favorite 668 – the neighbour of the beast) start the new thread with the overflow.
C_U, trapped for an hour? That must have been scary. At least you are around to tell the story. I always have a fun time telling my story of the plate and seven screws in my right wrist.
marcelogreco (@37):
Yah, I was wondering about that, too. I’m imagining some sort of Dancing With the Secular Humanist Stars.
Of course, it could’ve just been crafty misdirection on PZ’s part.
That’s awful, C_E! I’m glad it wasn’t worse, and that you’re back home, but wow. Hope you’re feeling better soon.
(Dude, are you posting and responding to DM’s insanity?)
CHIMPY!!!!!!
C_E (@38):
Oy! Sorry to hear about your troubles; get well quickly!
We have Mollies here, and a Poet Laureate, and we’ve talked about Tentacle Clusters; I think we need a Pharyngulan equivalent of a Purple Heart for our walking wounded, such as Lynna and now C_E!
huh wha?
I’m with the Dude on this one. man (as on so much else). “Peaceful Easy Feeling” was my class song by vote. At the time I would have likely thrown away my vote to make an elitist statement like “A Love Supreme” or something. In fact, I did reject “rock” music along with “pop” almost completely for many years (always excepting teh Beatles, Santana and Steely Dan). It was the improvisation of the Dead that made me start listening, then I started appreciating the songs, and that started a process of opening up to everything from Radiohead to Nanci Griffith to Gregory Isaacs to sometimes even Counting Crows.
I still don’t care for the Iggles, though they did not make my recent list of bands I white-hot burning hate. For the record.
Crafty misdirection? Yeah, I don’t dance. You caught me.
It was a kissing marathon.
Yes… it was very scary… and yes, I am very lucky it wasn’t much worse…
But I can think of no better place than here to state plainly, it was NO miracle. It was the wonderful effort and dedication and hard work of the medical and emergency professionals on the scene. I didn’t need prayers nor help from on high, just the quick and professional response of the people who helped rescue me and get me safely to the hospital.
To them I give my highest thanks and gratitude…
Deciding that I should at least try to stay in the theme suggested by our cruel tentacled overlord, here is a happy Star Wars themed song.
CE, glad to hear you’re going to be OK. That must have been a tough hour!
Heal up, now, here?
Oh… his death threats on my blog, you mean? I forwarded them along to the proper authorities some time ago…
Wrong time of the year but it is a happy Star Wars themed song!
C_E (@50):
Not “fixed,” but enhanced!
Forgive me for piggybacking a political point onto your personal crisis, but it bears repeating, against the din of Reagan’s “government is the problem” echoing down through the decades, that government fucking saves lives!
And thank FSM for that, eh? ;^)
CE:
Oi! I’m relieved you are feeling relatively chipper about that whole thing, and saddened you had to go through the whole ordeal.
Best wishes for healing up and getting on with your life.
For those of you on Facebook. Can this dung beetle get more fans than Glenn Beck?
Cue the Kw*k jokes.
To Cicely @636 on the previous thread. The first, and least expensive test, is well-covered, with money left over. Thank you to everyone. For the CT Angiography of my head, I have about half of that covered — It’s way too expensive if you ask me, $1302 for the CT, plus $93.75 for the contrast. That’s almost $1400, and I’ll have to ask Rorschach about this, but a little research online shows other countries doing the same test for about half that. I’m also having trouble getting the imaging company to agree to a discount — however, I haven’t given up on that route. Maybe they will offer the discount if I wave cash in their face — you know, “Look, no paperwork for you! No follow-up bills? Now can I have a discount?”
I’ll post the results of the first test, rescheduled now for February 16th as soon as I have them. AFAIK, my doctor has to interpret them before I get a result.
I’m sure everyone is dying to know what my carotid arteries look like.
chicka-wow-chicka-wow-wow
Lynna,
Thanks for the updates. But I hope you don’t feel like you have to: I don’t think anyone who contributed to the diagnosis fund thinks they’re owed any information about the results, if you’re not comfortable sharing.
CE – rest up, and be kind to yourself. Glad everything worked out.
Well, I’ve gone another round with Greg and Sgt. Z, if only to emphasize that the lack of respect is quite mutual, and yes, we’re at an impasse, and that if I should “grow up” Stephanie should get her condescending head examined. (I said that last bit twice.)
Naturally I took a few extra words to say that, and said a few other things along the way, as is my wont.
To Katrina @644 on the previous chapter of the endless thread. Yay! That was damned speedy for “media rate” mailing. With your mother living in Idaho, and your grandfather having been a park ranger, your family are ideal readers — what luck to have an audience like that. Let’s just hope they don’t find any mistakes. I’ll pass your comments on to my brother.
If you’d like to expand a little on “Your descriptions of the Idaho wilderness around the places that I remember took me right back to my own childhood” I’d love to add your review/blurb to the website.
Xīn nián hǎo! The canteen was decorated for the Chinese New Year today, and Cantonese rice was one of the available choices. (Not for me, though – there are peas in it.)
That‘s it, Paul W. for Molly.
Also, snow – but still only a few mm.
The problem here is that Intelligent Design isn’t science. It’s just not.
It’s hard not to make this look like a “holier than thou” insult, but please bear with me. There is no hypothesis of ID, nothing to test, just “an unspecified number of designers* did unspecified things at unspecified times in the past; there’s no way to figure out what the designers were thinking, so there’s no way to test anything here**, but teach it as an alternative to the scientific theory of evolution anyway”.
And then there’s the Wedge Document, which spells out that all this ID stuff is just a front for Christian Dominionism of the most sickening kind.
It’s not surprising that ID proponents don’t even try to find evidence for ID and instead look only for evidence against the theory of evolution. Their lack of knowledge about the latter has so far prevented them from succeeding even in this completely irrelevant goal.
* Actually, they always imply there’s exactly one such designer, which I find very telling, but they never try to find out what the number of designers is. They just… so… assume it’s 1. Just assuming things without testing them isn’t science either. It’s not surprising, therefore, that not a single scientific publication supports ID.
** This goes so far that the ID proponent Michael Behe testified at the Dover Trial that, if ID is to count as science, the term “science” needs to be redefined for a meaning so broad it includes even astrology.
:-)
Repeated for truth.
That’s not true in theory, but, nowadays, almost true in practice – almost all scientific journals and edited books are consistently peer-reviewed these days.
Strange how they split their preferred answer in three and left only one for the sane people. Usually they’re sneakier than that.
Last time I checked (months ago!), Laden posted so much every day (more than PZ when he doesn’t have tests to grade) that this doesn’t really surprise me.
Unsurprisingly, I didn’t. It’s lack of long enough good sleep in general… of which sleep apnea is, however, among the leading causes.
=8-)
Evidently, stories to explain all the ruins in the countryside were coupled to stories about “worship Yahwe or else”…
Priceless.
Please tell us!
Depends on the denomination, and on the individual(s) he talked to.
Not heddle. heddle doesn’t believe for any rational reason; he literally believes it’s a miracle that he believes, and completely ineffable why he believes and you or I don’t.
I do think that most of them really believe at least part of what they’re saying – Wells, though, is lying and proud of it! Check him and Moon out in PZ’s quote list.
At least some seem to be genuinely scared shitless that the devil might leap off the page or screen and into their faces. Alan Clarke for instance.
Lynna (@58):
I’m vastly relieved to see your ability to estimate simple sums remains unimpaired! ;^)
Also, let me second Carlie (@60): I’m sure none of us who contributed to Project Diagnose Lynna© feel our mite boxes entitle us to any of your private medical information. Just let us know if you’re OK, and if/when you need more help. And be well!
@63: if the ID people were really honest they’d be looking for evidence _against_ ID, wouldn’t they?
Re the topic of Palin, here’s my favorite quote: “We really do love our trees,” Palin said. “I named my daughter Willow. Isn’t that granola enough for them?” – Associated Press
Only if the took Popper’s epistemology seriously. Which if they did, they wouldn’t just blithely accept “the Bible says it, so it must be true,” as bats aren’t bugs! Or birds.
Intentional self-deception is the worst kind of dishonesty. I believe all creationists are essentially dishonest. They just try to rationalize their dishonesty through the acceptance of poor philosophy and the delusion that they must be correct, because everyone else is against them.
I was living in the northeast for the big storms of 79 and 88. The talking head twits are all crowing that this somehow disproves “Global Warming”, when anyone who’s really spent some time studying the issue knows full well it does not.
Now.. global average temperatures decreasing over the next couple of decades — that would go far toward disproving it. But how many of you think that’s going to happen?
No fair. I did put in an incredibly relevant mention of how I had to catch up. <pout>
+ 2
Also, it’s CEO (Cephalopod Evil Overlord), not carbon monoxide.
:-Þ
?
*overwhelmed by cuteness*
Not me – just for the record.
Favourite Palin quote (during her resignation):
DLC (@68):
I can’t hunt up the link from work, but Rachel Maddow had a most excellent smackdown on this point as part of last night’s show (or maybe it was Tuesday’s show; I listen by podcast, and sometimes the lag confuses me).
FOR GREAT JUSTICE.
I was amused by Colbert’s bit about peek-a-boo-ologists.
We need an Eye on Myers camera, our own version of the lidless eye, so that we know when to run up the endless thread numbers.
On another subject, I’m still chuckling over Mike the Christian admitting in the previous thread that he was confused by Smoggy. Smoggy is God’s way of making christians suffer, while simultaneously entertaining atheists.
I could get into this business of crediting god with everything.
damn, beat me to it. Yes, “the only thing that can ever happen is what ever is happening, right now”
The Daily Show‘s take on it was pretty funny also. And Sunday’s The Simpsons also presented the same point when Homer declared Global Warming a myth because Springfield had just been hit with a huge blizzard.
More Star Wars flotsam and jetsam.
Janine:
If one of those Star Wars links-I-can’t-follow isn’t to Eddie Izzard’s bit about Darth Vader in the Deathstar cafeteria, it should be!
Celtic_Evolution @38:
Fucking aiyiyiyiy! So sorry to hear that. It took them an hour to get you out of the car! Not fun, not fun at all. The tree is probably fine.
I hope you have someone to look after you. Busted up like that, you’ll have a hard time moving around without causing pain.
Fader Gladiator – Battle of the Planets
I assumed that CO meant Commanding Officer in that context.
Re DLC:
I think you meant ’78 (and I think ’89, but I’m less sure of that), and I don’t remember any noise about GW back then (’78), much less that the blizzard disproved it. But then again I was a pretty oblivious college student back then, so maybe I just wasn’t aware.
Thanks, Lynna (and of course all of you wishing me well. You guys are the best.)
The tree is apparently none the worse for wear.
And yes, I am being well looked after… don’t know what I’d do if I weren’t.
As demanded by Bill Dauphin. Just one question; can’t Vader dry a tray with his thought?
I’ll second that. And I especially liked Paul W. writing that Greg was doing a Glenn Beck. That’s perfectly apt.
Diane G. (#662)
Well, thanks. I got a chuckle when you twitted Sharon about Ehrlich. I wish I’d made more of an earlier effort to steer things back toward the point I was making. I still have no idea if dewey understood it and was deliberately dragging things off into the land of vague and fluffy excuses for religion or if he really thought there was some connection. I think what irritated me most was his insinuation that there is some source of knowledge beyond science coupled with his refusal/inability to give an explicit example.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Antiochus Epiphanes (#671)
Hell, he was having trouble putting conflicting ideas together from within his faith!
~*~*~*~*~*~
Carlie (#60)
Seconded. (Thirded?) I’d be curious whether you (Lynna) get some answers for yourself, but I definitely don’t need details if you want to keep that private. On the other hand, if you get something out of sharing, go for it!
~*~*~*~*~*~
David Marjanović (#69)
In the USA (and various other countries), your next door neigbor’s street address is yours ±2.
Thanks to Bernard Bumner, I saw a Storm Trooper doing The Pelvic Thrust. I had to find a Star Wars/Rocky Horror crossover.
Kind of NSFW.
Our address here is done hierarchically: city, ward, neighborhood, (section), building #, apt #. Population density determines which of these can be omitted. Building # usually depends on the order in which the buildings were constructed, not on relative geography.
He wasn’t talking about heddle’s religious beliefs, he was talking about heddle’s way of discussing other Christians. If you ever describe a conversation where you, an atheist, describe stumping a Christian with your superior Biblical knowledge, he either calls you a liar or implies the Christian is of the No True variery. It’s sickening to watch, and the main reason I don’t reply to heddle anywhere he posts anymore.
oh, my, no. The poopyhead’s authority does not receive any such respect. The formulation is Evil Cephalopodian Overlord, and when feeling charitable toward the guy I leave off the E.
They named Bristol and Willow after places, not things. Back in the 70s or 80s, there was much talk of moving the state capital from Juneau to Willow, which is about 50 miles from Anchorage.
Palin being disingenuous? No! Say it ain’t so!
Miki Z (#87)
Yes, it’s one of the most insane addressing systems ever. Which is why there are little “how to find X place from Y station” maps attached to absolutely everything and a zillion ads for the latest in personal GPS guidance systems. And why big city cab drivers are almost always assholes towards foreigners. Madness!
Bill Dauphin, OM @ 72 : I saw the same segment, Wednesday night, with Bill Nye “the science guy.”
SteveM @ 81:
Sorry for the confusion, I was just doing a bit of “Dammit, back in my day, we really had trouble!”
(and I walked to school, too… uphill, both ways… in the snow)
the latter part of my comment about AGW should have been a new paragraph. However, the first studies on global warming were published around 76-80. Google Scholar only goes back to 1991, but if you look in some of the papers you’ll see references to works going back to 1976. Also, AGW gets mentioned in one episode of Carl Sagan’s “Cosmos” series, in Episode 4 “Heaven and Hell.”
Not so much as today’s AGW, but as a cautionary tale in the line of “this could happen to earth, if we allow it.”
Or at least so my memory tells me.
Peeve #1 of the day: people with snowblowers who choose to blow the foot and a half of snow off of their private driveway and into the middle of the public street.
Peeve #2: People who are too lazy to brush the foot and a half of snow off the top of their SUV, which they then take onto the parkway, where the unbrushed snow comes off in a huge, hurtling slab of whiteness that slams into the windshield of the unlucky driver following just behind.
Peeve #3: oh, just people in general. Present company excepted.
People ain’t no good!
I think that is well understood.
Sven,
Yet another round with Sgt. Z in at Gregs… and I used the bit about her misunderstanding Greg’s analogy and nattering about capital punishment.
The irony’s pretty serious given how she and her ilk make Greg’s post out to be so clear that we’re stupid to think it’s about us, when it explicitly is, but not just us, and not that way… and besides we deserve it and are in denial.
Sven (@93):
IIRC, Peeve #2 has the force of law, at least here in CT.
A new one?! But I haven’t even read the old one yet! (Or the one before that, or the one before that, …)
Speak for yourself. I want my money’s worth.
Hope you have a happy reëvolution, Celtic.
Paul, #88
In this case you are, well, a liar.
I have never said that an atheist cannot stump a theist with biblical knowledge–I have seen it and and have myself been on the receiving end of many a good butt-kickings. And I have never said that Christians who cannot respond to knowledgeable atheist are not True Christians.
What I have said is that anecdotes from atheists (or theists) that fit this pattern: I spoke a magic sentence that left my opponent speechless and decomposed into a pile of quivering jello are bullshit.
So you are, in fact, a liar. As such, I am glad you don’t reply to me. Please continue the practice.
Don’t know if the CC can hear this, but give it try at about 44.00 in.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00qgsgc/PM_11_02_2010/
heddle, in the cases when an atheist stumps a theist, isn’t it probable that sometimes there is in fact a particular idea (likely phrased as a sentence) which leaves the theist confounded?
Bill, that’s not a good argument. I don’t think even the most dyed-in-the-wool libertarian would deny that people who work for government agencies can save lives. Of course government can save lives; it can also destroy them. Much the same could be said of corporations, and of virtually any other powerful entity you care to name.
I’m not saying that emergency medical services should not be a government function – indeed, I’d say they are a good example of something which the state can legitimately provide. I just don’t think that you can make a categorical statement like “government saves lives”, and imply from this that government intervention in general is a great thing. It would be as simplistic as me pointing to the war in Iraq, or the Farm Bill, and saying “government kills people”.
In keeping with the theme: Vader Sessions.
strange gods before me, OM, #101
Can you get someone flustered? Sure. But generally they will respond with something, not matter how stupid. Perfect stories a la I like to say this to Christians [whatever the magic sentence is], you should see their jaws drop! — usually spoken with smugness and superiority emanating from the pixels, never happen. Of course they are often told in the other direction too– And I said, well, OK, then tell me, wouldn’t evolution lead to nobody ever being homosexual since it provides no reproductive advantage? Ha ha! You could almost hear the gears grinding! I don’t believe that variety either.
A Moment of Mormon Madness, courtesy of Steve Benson:
And in a similar tattle-tale moment, über mormon, Daniel Peterson reported that most of the people in his Singles Ward had confessed to him that they masturbated. He didn’t name names, so I’m sure it’s okay for him to report that bit of personal information to the world at large. Peterson makes the point that he didn’t ask about masturbation, but that “more people than I could possibly count have voluntarily brought it up to me…I support the Church’s teachings on sexual behavior — including what it has to say about masturbation…”
For the Canadians, the National Geo channel aired “Inside Polygamy”, with a focus on the FLDS community of Bountiful. It aired February 10, but should show up as a rerun soon. The FLDS community in Bountiful is connected to Warren Jeff’s polygamist compound in Hilldale/Colorado City. The leader in Bountiful, Winston Blackmore, has 121 children… so far.
The documentary film that details the LDS Church’s push to pass Proosition 8, “8: The Mormon Proposition”, has been bought by a distributor. It was well-received at Sundance, and it’s great to see that it will be getting wider distribution.
Something.
@ Walton,
My thought is that certain goods/services (indeed, most of them) are fairly distributed by the market pricing model. Some goods/services, however, are so integral to the functioning of the community, state, or nation, that their disbursment simply by cost is inimical to society. In these cases (I would include primary education, utilities, health care, security, and some others) the government has an obligation to society to provide them. In many areas I think that governments should stay the hell away, but in others I think that the government is the only way to go.
In the US, this approach makes me a Communist, apparently.
We’re in an ECO chamber?
Why, yes! Yes, we are!
Why, yes! Yes, we are!
Breaking World news
Afghanistan defeats USA!!
(at 20/20 cricket)
@108
Amen & likewise.
And now they’re attacking you because of that story you told about the grad student. That’s just perfect. I would be careful of posting anything about your personal life over there.
I recall reading several articles/blogs in The Grauniad that the Afghan cricket team is extremely good. For example, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/apr/01/cricket-afghanistan-world-cup (I don’t know if they actually qualified for the World Cup or not?).
Rice.
Die Ostküste hat zu viel Schnee. :)
We had a snowpocalypse here today.
Well what we might call a “snowpocalypse” on the French Riviera, 12 inches of snow that held all day.
Total chaos, this hadn’t happened for the last 30 years. A normal year is no snow at all. We have nothing planned for this.
Most villages and towns have no equipement to deal with this amount of snow on the roads. There are cars parked all over the place along the roads in our very hilly country side : drivers who abandoned their cars because they couldn’t go any further. Very few cars even had snow tires. Shops were sold out of wheel chains in a matter of a few hours. No public transports apart from the train are running.
And to make matters worse, the demand for electricity has been so immense (what do people do when they can’t drive and go anywhere : they stay home, put the heater on, watch TV or the internet, take a warm bath, etc…), that the network had to be rationed : 1 hour shut down for each district, rotating. We expect more shut downs during the night (and my house is all electric).
Our local government and the electricity company don’t budget their investments to cater for such a mess that happens only every thirty years. Most people just don’t want more taxes but they get really pissed off when shit happens.
I have read that one of the predictions of climate change for our area is that winters are going to become shorter and colder and snowier, whilst summers are going to become longer, hotter and drier.
So far we’ve had two exceptionally cold and wet months preceeded by eight exceptionally warm and dry months.
I predict that most people here are going to continue resisting more taxes and government investments, whilst climate change will increase the chance of chaotic situations : we are going to be slow at reacting, at adapting to our new environement.
And I’m talking about here, the French Riviera, one of the most fortunate and temperate places on earth. It is going to get much worse elsewhere.
At this rate, I will go to bed early one night and find a whole incarnation of THE THREAD has whisked past by lunch time the next day!
How far can this be extrapolated?
PZ opens a new thread but everyone is waiting for him and within the hour it’s full? This needs the Viral Theory of Thread Relativity (VTTR).
Can the everlasting thread speed up so much that the Special Theory of Thread Relativity (STTR)has to be established to explain it?
Closely followed by the General Theory of Thread Relativity (GTTR) to explain how THE THREAD bends the whole of internet space.
Will a whole new alphabet be needed to explain the phenomenon? (NATTR)
Will it out-evolve all attempts to control it?
Und es kann halten Sie es! (Übersetzt mit Hilfe von Google Generalissimus.)
Where I am it’s not too bad. It’s only started(?) snowing (c.7pm), and so far there’s only a light dusting of the stuff on the parked cars, with it immediately melting elsewhere (as far as I can tell in the dark). We’ll see what happens overnight.
Was her name Hyacinth, by any chance?
Obviously not necessarily.
I doubt perfect stories too, especially after seeing how YECs — and other believers — can ignore and shrug off counterarguments.
It might be an artifact of people not being mind readers. If someone on the receiving end has not heard the argument before, they could well be silent simply because they have no immediate response, and are thinking, “There must be some counterargument, even if I don’t know what it is.” And they don’t say it out loud because they don’t want to admit ignorance.
That would look like stunned silence.
Someone might get caught on the wrong end of a Gish Gallop; a long tirade of blunt assertions that is overwhelming in how many distortions it contains. Where do you start?
People sometimes ignore counterarguments, as well.
Muss die dritte Person der Dativ sein?
blf,
here (I’m near Cannes, up in the hills), it started snowing at 11am and it stoppped around 5pm.
Where are you ?
Wenn ich mich erinnern konnte, dass ich nicht verwenden würden Generalissimus Google. Oder habe ich einen Tippfehler?
What did you mean to say ?
Owlmirror,
That’s not how these “slam dunks” are described. Not that the loser is lost in contemplative silence, but that he is stunned and utterly and totally destroyed when the brilliant rhetorical trap is sprung.
As for the Gish Gallop–that’s but an unpleasant memory. I tend not to argue with YECs anymore. Mostly I argue with atheists or with other Christians about theology, but not over creation. Generally in both cases (atheists and theology debates) people argue reasonably. But YECs are, by far, the most annoying people on the planet to argue with (over creation).
USA has a cricket team?
negentropyeater, I’m very near La Ciotat (which is East of Cassis, West of Toulon, and South(-ish) of Aix-en-Provence). I’m about 100m from the Mediterranean Sea, at or just below sea level. It wasn’t snowing up in the hills (at least on this side) today (up to c.6pm); I have no idea what it’s doing now up there. I imagine (without checking) that it’s snowing in Aix and maybe Marseille, since it seems to be the pattern that if there’s a bit of snow here, there’s a lot more snow there.
Where I live, we don’t get too many Yecs (I like that spelling better), but one can get to argue with many annoying astrology and homeopathy firm believers. They are often the same btw.
Something like (I don’t recall the exact words now) And it can keep it! (Translated with the help of Generalissimo Google.) In context, that was intended to mean the East Coast (of the USA, I presume) can keep its snow—We’ve now got our own… ;-)
Classic Star Wars lines sound better when you substitute the word pants in the appropriate place.
As in:
– A disturbance in the pants. The last time I felt it was in the presence of my old master.
– The ability to destroy a planet is insignificant next to the power of my pants.
– She must have hidden the plans in her pants. Send a detachment down to receive them. See to it personally, commander.
– Don’t worry – Chewie and me have gotten into a lot of pants more heavily guarded than this.
Luke: Lock the door.
Han: And hope they don’t have pants.
– I find your lack of pants disturbing.
– Jabba has no time for smugglers who drop their pants at the first sign of an imperial cruiser.
– I have just received word that the Emperor has dissolved his pants permanently.
– We should be able to get a reading on those pants, up or down!
– You are unwise to lower your pants.
– Away with your pants! I mean you no harm!
– Han will have those pants down. We gotta give him more time!
– Search your feelings Father. You can’t do this. I sense the conflict within you – let go of your pants!
Leia:Stop that. My pants are dirty.
Han: My pants are dirty too – what are you afraid of?
– I cannot teach him. The boy has no pants.
– I am altering the pants. Pray I don’t alter them any further!
Walton (@102):
Spoken like someone who’s never stood on a streetcorner in a U.S. town, holding a sign that begs people to vote for the town budget. While I’m sure the people you talk politics with at Oxford are thoughtful and intelligent (even those who come to conclusions with which I categorically disagree), that doesn’t really reflect the street-level political dynamics here in the U.S.
I’m not talking about principled discussions of whether this or that social good is most appropriately supplied by the public sector; I’m talking about the pernicious meme — most conspicuously trumpeted by Reagan and carefully nurtured by movement conservatives ever since — that says government never effectively provides anything of real worth, and thus all taxes are waste (at best), if not outright theft.
The result of decades of this I got mine indoctrination is that many Americans — including even many who vote Democratic and think of themselves as liberals — thoughtlessly accept the notion that government can’t do anything well, and the corollary belief that less government is always better.
As a consequence, when local government faces a revenue shortfall — as my town does at the moment, because of cuts in state aid and the generally crappy economy — we can’t even talk about raising taxes to adequately fund vital public services… including the very sorts of services that rescued C_E, and possibly saved his life…. because the public has been carefully trained not to see any of the benefits government does provide.
The fact that government fucking saves lives is in no way contradicted by the fact that it sometimes kills people, too. I’ve put in my days protesting the Iraq war, and working to turn the people who jinned it up out of office, but the burr under my saddle on this particular day is the extent to which people fail to see or value all the good government, at all levels, does on a daily basis.
Those who have been participating in the ongoing catastrophe at Gr*g’s place may need to hang around a little longer: the investigators from the NTSB should be on-site shortly to interview the participants. There’s no official statement from NTSB but off-the-record comments indicate that Gr*g and St*ph may have caused the biggest train wreck since the Hammond Circus Train wreck.
Completely off topic: My mama always said I was a day late and a dollar short. With advancing age I’m now a couple of threads and a handful of Euros short. I realized in the middle of a bout of insomnia that the ultimate ear-worm song had been missed in that thread. Here it is.
Word. Especially when the opponent begins the argument in that state.
RBDC: I was just about to ask that very question.
Sure; I was just pointing out how (mis)interpretation can occur.
I would include access to the internet in ‘utilities’, myself, but that would probably make me a double secret uber-terroristic commienazi of the Splodey-Head Squadron.
That was an infuriating few weeks. Had to press him time and time again to see if he even understood what evolution is, and he comes back with “evolution is that God doesn’t exist”. I really didn’t get how someone could possibly say such a thing and not even bother to look up wikipedia on the matter considering how he decided to argue against it so strongly.
Upon reflection, I’m reminded of those conservatives who rallied against Obama’s healthcare because of “government death camps”. Do lies told by “trusted” authority figures have more weight under conservatives?
negentropyeater:
You might check to see if there’s a mini-baby-boom in nine months.
#114 blf
This was part of the qualifier for the World Cup. Ireland, The Netherlands, Afghanistan and the United Arab Emirates are through to the “Super Fours” with the top 2 going to the World Cup in the West Indies.
#127 Rev. BigDumbChimp
Oh yes! USA has indeed entered the civilised world. It’s just that so far they are not very good! They have yet to master the fact that they have to shuttle between the plate and the pitcher’s mound instead of setting off towards square leg!!
However, USA did beat that great cricketing nation, Scotland, by 20 runs.
“Something full stop/period” (for US readers?)
DLC Author | February 11, 2010 12:10 PM:
True. Explanation here.
Jadehawk (from the last thread):
In no way am I “allied to a group of people whose job it has been to make life harder on immigrants and poor people”. I have no idea what you’re talking about.
And which of my proposed policies would cause “more poverty and misery”? Ending agricultural subsidies and tariffs, and giving producers from the developing world a fair chance to compete? Closing the asylum “detention centres”, and guaranteeing the basic civil rights of refugees and asylum-seekers? Open immigration policies? Decriminalising recreational drugs, and abolishing the insane practice of imprisoning non-violent drug users? Supporting gay marriage, gay and transgender rights, and abortion rights?
I hope you’re not going to say what strange gods is saying, and accuse me of conspiring to hurt the poor and oppressed merely because I support the Conservative Party. The UK Conservative Party is not dominated by wingnuts. Someone like Tom Tancredo would be thrown out of the party on this side of the Atlantic (and would probably be relegated to one of the fringe far-right anti-immigration parties). We are a sane, modern, progressive, reality-based party. And good people, with a sincere desire to do good, can be found within all the major British political parties. Human decency and compassion is not a monopoly of the left.
Bill Dauphin, OM | February 11, 2010 3:19 PM:
The link I have added does not refer to Bill’s town. Yet.
That’s only because their in opposition and going for the moderate crowd. The second they get back into power, it’ll be BAM! wingnut city.
The money quote from llewelly’s link (@143):
I’m mindful of (but not qualified to pass judgment on) Walton’s insistence that mainstream conservatives in the UK are a different breed of beast, but this certainly seems an apt description of conservatives here in the U.S. Especially if you understand that suckers, in this context, really means people who think they might be millionaires someday, and are therefore willing to vote against their own interests today.
true. but policies that result in improving people’s lives generally tend to come from the left, not the right. which is the whole point: your intentions are irrelevant, the results are far more important. And the left has consistently delivered more humane and compassionate results than conservatives, whose main job everywhere seems to be at best to maintain a status quo, and at worst roll back advances achieved by the left.
and please, stop whining at me about the things you’d LIKE to see happening, but which won’t happen, won’t happen by allying yourself with conservatives, or could happen but only have the results you’d like them to have in your own mind. it all doesn’t matter. really.
Celtic_Evolution,
Glad to hear you are alive! Heartiest wishes for a rapid recovery, with thanks to the good work by the rescue and medical personnel involved!
I will invoke an old anecdote: years ago, a very good friend and I were scheduled to attend a reading by Harlan Ellison at a small college in the Chicago area. We both had our hardback copies of one of Ellison’s books ready for an autograph and were looking forward to the event. The day before, my friend had to go in for emergency surgery, and was convalescing in hospital, so could not attend. I took both books, and asked Ellison if he could sign both mine, and the one for my friend, owing to the circumstances. Ellison asked my friend’s name, agreed, and scrawled the following on the title page:
“Derek,
SURVIVE!
Harlan Ellison”
So, Celtic_Evolution, from myself (and I hope the other Pharyngula readers, as well) I bid you SURVIVE!
Still learning,
Robert
@#649 on NWSTNETN:
This is hella fun.
Sven,
As a former resident of both Maine and Chicago, I sympathize. I suspect some people, in addition to laziness, simply assume, “Well, it’s snow! It can’t do any harm! After all, it comes down in dainty flakes soft as kitten kisses!”
Clearly people in need of some edification re: the strength of the hydrogen bond and the weight of water.
Safe driving!
Still learning,
Robert
Jadehawk,
Maybe you’re right. I’m not really sure. On the things I know a lot about (human rights, civil liberties, the criminal justice system, etc.), I seem to have become massively liberal in the last couple of years. These days, I’m really only a “conservative” on economic issues, and I’m conscious of the fact that I really don’t know enough about economics to trust my own judgment.
For example, right-leaning economists tend to say that Thatcher’s reforms in the 1980s saved the UK economy from disaster by eliminating unsustainable public enterprises, cutting taxes and creating an entrepreneur-friendly economy; equally, left-leaning economists tend to say that the same reforms stored up economic problems for the future by eliminating the manufacturing base and creating over-reliance on services and the financial sector, as well as creating mass unemployment in the short term. They both seem to have a point, but I just don’t have enough knowledge of economics, or enough understanding of the facts and figures, to evaluate their claims and tell who’s right. I just wish the right answers were more obvious.
Lawlz.
Quality choice of video, P.Z.
And what of these dance marathons you speak of?
Surely there must be video footage of this?
Saw this coming: Critique of ‘Primordial Soup’ Vindicates Creation Research.
Oh, of course, thanks.
Und sie kann ihn (sich) behalten – “and she [the east coast] can keep him [the snow] (for third-person-self)”.
Didn’t happen in the famous New York blackout. Apparently everyone used protection.
Epic. :-)
Josh, Official SpokesGay (Last thread) #649
I don’t know why people think I’m an expert on railroad trains. I have a mild interest in them, but I don’t know that much about them.
I do know why diesel-electric and electric locomotives replaced steam locomotives. The reason is one word: money. A diesel-electric is cheaper to build, operate and maintain than a steam engine of comparable power. For instance, each steam locomotive requires an engineer (engine driver) to run it even with an automatic stoker or an oil fired boiler. This lashup requires just one engineer to run all three locomotives (these are EMD GP50s).
Steam locomotives look impressive (2-10-4 “Texas” locomotive, circa 1935). Everyone admits that. But impressive doesn’t put money in corporate coffers.
I just posted this:
http://saltycurrent.blogspot.com/2010/02/indefensible.html
Walton, if you’re interested I can recommend some basic economics books to read. However, since you’re already going to that impressive institute of thinkology, you can take an introductory economics course.
Tried checking in on other thread. Was not allowed comment. (Now commenting this thread.)
‘Tis Himself, OM | February 11, 2010 5:45 PM:
Link fixed for ‘Tis. (Protocol changed from ‘ttp’ to ‘http’ .)
I do not like the smell of melons.
You are quite mistaken my friend. The casaba melon has no aroma.
Ooh! What have we here? It looks like John Mashey–one of the early UNIX pioneers and amomg my favorite writers on how science actually gets done–has tackled the current climate conspiracy.
http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/plagiarism.conspiracies.felonies.v1.0.pdf
Rutee, this is one you should probably look at. I’ve just started, but John takes no prisoners with this one. A good read.
I guarantee that the Discovery Institute is following this very closely, and given the butt-kicking they got in Dover, it’s likely they will resort to a lot of these tactics. The one advantage biology has is that there isn’t a big, baby blue target like the IPCC on which they can focus.
Latest on the trainwreck at Greg’s:
It got to the point of me telling Stephanie to fuck off, in so many words, and her saying she wouldn’t waste any more time on me.
Let’s hope it’s true. What a mess.
a mild degree of hedonism called “Take Back Sunday”– It goes like this. Sunday is awesome when you don’t believe in God. – Antiochus Epiphanes
That’s real wisdom there, AE. Thinking about it, that’s what started me on the road to atheism as a nipper – being pissed off at having to waste Sunday morning at Sunday School. Mind you, I think getting us 4 kids out of the way was a bit of hedonism for my parents!
Ban that Fucking Holiday! Ahem. Saudi Arabia bans Valentine’s Day.
If Smoggy or one of the sock puppets are reading this, I hope they took no offense from the previous thread. It’s just that the vile jokes are offensive to sensitive people who don’t like the vulgar language. But yes, they are very funny.
Paul W., I wish I could give you a giant sundae with three kinds of topping and plenty of whipped cream. Kudos to you for trying over there.
Celtic_Evolution @38,
Very sorry to hear that. Get well soon!
llewelly #159
Thanks. Now for some pictures of BIG steam locomotive:
The 4-6-6-4 Challenger was used to haul freight over the Rocky Mountains.
The Pennsy 6-4-4-6 Duplex was an oddball design.
This 6-6-6-2 Allegheny pulled heavy coal trains in the Allegheny mountains.
Paul W:
I’ve been following that thread and wishing I could contribute to it; there isn’t, however, much I could say that you haven’t already. I admire your determination and the way you’ve expressed yourself.
Train-wreck is right. The whole thing is just baffling.
Get better soon, CE.
I couldn’t agree more. Thanks again, Paul.
I really don’t know whether to be angry or amused. The rhetoric about this Very Important Issue seems to be escalating. You’d think that for such a serious and abiding problem, the people writing blogs posts about it could muster, y’know, a couple of actual examples.
Who cares if that’s what he was arguing? What knee-jerk reactions? What opposition that borders on hate speech? What rhetoric? What the hell are you talking about?
Just for ‘Tis Himself.
SC@156,
A comment at Salty Current awaiting your approval! I finally got an ID that doesn’t reveal my secret identity!
Goodnight all.
Greg’s initial “people might get the idea” post was almost a “have you stopped beating your wife” statement. When challenged to support SC’s supposed or apparent or possibly perceived or “whatever the hell Greg was referring to” anti-semitism, neither Greg nor his partisans could find actual anti-semitic remarks. Rather than admit to this failing, Greg et al went on the attack. Everyone questioning Greg were still beating their wives.
Your real name of Augustus Quincy St. Abelard Dorkoff-Buttmunch III is still safe.
I am glad to see people are finally standing up to bad traffic habits in Cambodia.
The last time I was there, people still refused to stop on red. Of course, traffic rules are subjective.
I was approving it as you were posting! Goodnight!
#172
Thank you for that.
If you like articulated steam locomotives (and who doesn’t?), here’s a video for you:
I think Greg’s evasive approach to who he’s describing can be described as him seeming to want to both have his poo and fling it, too.
This kind of evasive shuck-and-jiving [paraphrasing] – ‘I mean people like Pharyngulistas, but not just Pharyngulistas – I mean the regulars on all the blogs out there named for something scientific and with a science professor as its owner/figurehead who includes a significant proportion of hard-science posts along with atheist topics; you know, the vast number that meet that criteria‘ – makes me wonder if he’s not thinking about entering politics.
:-) :-) :-)
:-) :-) :-)
@ Tis
I guess I just thought you were a train expert because I was skimming the previous comments too fast. Anyway, I was just indulging in some mechano-romantic fantasizing. I love steam locos – they make me all googly-eyed and weak-kneed. I know they’ll never come back, but couldn’t you just lie to me and let me indulge? Is that so wrong?
Once I get this out of my system, I’ll start up mourning the death of Kodachrome, and then everyone will be sorry.
I walked by Greg on the street the other day, and saw him slip into a dark alley. He went to scratch his chin, which made his Greg Laden mask slip just a little bit. I could swear a caught a glimpse of Chris Mooney behind it. . .
You guys really need to go over to Omegle.com and start telling people there is no God. It takes a few tries before you get a Christian nut, but once you, it’s a whole lot if fun.
Thanks to all the well-wishers both here and over at my blog… I can’t express enough how much it means to me, but really, after all the years I’ve been coming here I’ve learned to expect nothing less. And not a one of you offered to pray for me… brought a tear of joy to my eye. ;^)
Godless indeed!
CE;
I’m kind of a newbie here, but I wanted to send along my good wishes for a speedy recovery as well.
Having been in a similar spot myself, I know how much of a pain in the butt the process can be. When I recovered from my injuries I found as many of the rescue personnel as I could locate, and thanked them personally. I can’t stress enough what an excellent, and necessary job most of the guys do.
most of THOSE guys, that is, and gals too.
The Milwaukee County Zoo has a miniature railroad that runs a steam locomotive. It’s pretty cool, takes you on a ride around the perimeter of the zoo.
Josh (OSG) and ‘Tis:
I grew up with a steam engine. My family actually owned one. It was slim gauge (2-foot scale) but nevertheless a real, steam-powered 4-4-0 locomotive. We actually converted it from coal to propane. The tanks were on the tender, and fire was “shot” into the firebox.
One of the best days I had in military officer training was the day we got to walk around inside the cut-out of a ship’s boiler. Being able to see that stuff on a considerably larger scale was pretty exciting.
I’ll see if I can find a link to anything resembling our family’s train.
Linky:
http://www.milwaukeezoo.org/visit/map/trainstation.php
Oh, that’s fantastic, Katrina! Please do try to find a pic of what yours looked like. I know little about gauges – is a two foot a real, life-sized loco?
Thanks for the linky, too, Kamaka.
Kamaka, that’s the right scale, but it looks nothing like our engine. Looking back at old photos, I realized that it was an 0-4-0, not a 4-4-0.
Here’s one that is close in size and shape, but ours was red and green.
Josh, yes 2-foot, or slim gauge, was mainly used in areas where a standard sized train wouldn’t fit. I may be getting some details wrong (I was probably about 10 years old the last time I read up on them) but I believe they were used for mining, especially. They were also handy because you could place a third rail in the center of a standard size track and run them, too.
We ran our train on a Christmas tree farm. The engine pulled three passenger cars and two flat cars loaded with trees. My uncle built a diesel “push” engine out of an old Jeep and some plywood. It looked a lot cooler than it sounds. Anyway the two engines were able to haul over 200 passengers and the two flat-cars loaded with trees on each trip.
Lynna,
How truly Orwellian, using children to spy on the parents. That’s truly disturbing.
Here’s a better link:
http://www.milwaukeemomentum.com/21/cheap-flights-to-milwaukee/milwaukee-county-zoo-train/
Katrina, I would have been in hog heaven growing up in your house. I used to take every library book out that had any reference to steam locos and obsess over them (not to mention my model train set).
I’ve always loved mechanical things, especially elegant machines. Trains, cars, whatever. When I had my 1975 Dodge Dart, I used to yearn for tune-up time to come along, so I could get right up under the hood and adjust the valve lash until I got that perfect, clickety-click sewing machine sound of a well-tuned slant 6 engine.
Ahh. . .
/geekgasm
When I had my 1975 Dodge Dart
Oh, that’s cool! Back in the day, I drove a slant six Dodge Dart (’72?) as a taxicab…we got 400,000 miles out of that thing with just one rebuild. We finally had to take it off the road because it had been banged up so many times, we couldn’t keep it in one piece anymore. But that engine was still clickin’!
Did anyone else find it unintentionally funny that SC’s comment
immediately followed one of PZ’s posts?
Josh, we had a ’70 Pontiac LeMans with a 350 big block. That’s what I learned to do tune-ups on.
It’s been too many years since my parents closed the farm and sold the train for me to find any remnant of it on YouTube. I will see if I have any old photos and post links to them, if I can.
Kamaka, you should not have gotten me started! Our family car growing up in the early 80s was a retired town police cruiser, a 1969 four-door white Dart with a slant 6 that still had its spotlight on the driver’s side door. The interior was blue vinyl. It looked like this, except not jacked up. It was a sedate four-door.
That baby had 260,000 miles on her when we sold her to move from CA to NY.
Then, my mom bought a 1977 Aspen wagon, also with a slant 6, that looked like this. Great car. She hauled us to the drive-in theater in 1984 to see Star Trek IV, and us kids though it was so cool to see a movie inside the car, with those tinny speakers hanging on the window.
I was so in love with Chrysler slant sixes, I bought that ’75 Dart in 2000 from an old farmer in rural Virginia when I was working as a newspaper reporter. He had it sitting in his yard with a hand-lettered sign that said: “$500 – AIR-CONDITIONING WORKS!”
It looked like this one, only forest green.
I drove that car everywhere, even to NYC, where I got bus drivers honking their horns and asking me at red lights “What year? Slant six or V-8?”
I literally cried like a baby when I had to finally tow her to the junk yard. The engine still purred at 250,000, but the body was falling apart.
Oh, dear. I better stop before I wear out my welcome. . . .good times.
Yah, Josh, they had a convention of automotive engineers and I was taking one of them to the airport in said cab, he said the slant six was the best engine ever made. That would have been sometime around 1979.
I was a Machinist’s Mate in the Navy. I worked with steam engines (turbines, not reciprocating).
In the US Navy the older submarines were diesel-electric and the newer ones were steam powered (steam generated by nuclear reactors, but still steam). There aren’t any more diesel subs in the US Navy any more. The last three, USS Barbel (SS 580), USS Blueback (SS 581) and USS Bonefish (SS 582), known affectionately as the B-Girls, were decommissioned in the late 1980s after Bonefish suffered a nasty fire which killed three sailors.
thou 386sx @165 said “If Smoggy or one of the sock puppets are reading this, I hope they took no offense from the previous thread. It’s just that the vile jokes are offensive to sensitive people who don’t like the vulgar language. But yes, they are very funny.”
Why would I take offense? I’m about as offensive to people who stray blindly into Pharyngula as it’s possible to be. Poor Christian Mike (and no, he’s not a sock puppet of mine, I’ve never had any sock puppets, there’s just me and that prick Happy Kiwi, who thinks he has proprietorial rights over me)…as I was saying, poor Mike had no idea what hit him. Sure he believes stupid shit, but he’s probably a nice guy, most likely a good father, and he got a hefty verbal assault for his pains.
Anyway, I didn’t come here to bitch. The fact is the homicidal Happy Kiwi is the one who wants a word, so I’m going to leave him to it.
———————-
Hello Pharyngulistas,
Some of you may recall me being around when Smoggy first invaded this blog (for which I take dubious responsibility). I’m amazed he has survived here this long–I thought people would get tired of him much more quickly than this (and that PZ would probably boot him off after while).
But Kel and thou were of a similar mind to me when they suggested on the last thread that Smoggy is getting a little tiresome. I’m finding him less original and more repetitive than when I first started doing Smoggy-riffs. As well, there seem to be less of the really obnoxious religiots around of the sort Smoggy enjoyed savaging. I guess most of them are in the dungeon now, and there’s no satisfaction teasing the Mikes of this virtual world.
To cut a long peroration short, I think the time may have come to send Smoggy back to prison for importing powdered ram semen, and this time with no internet connection. I’m not surprised his humour doesn’t appeal to SOME Nth Americans, with the exception of a late discovery of George Carlin, Smoggy’s humour is purely British and antipodean: The Goons, Monty Python, Not the Nine O’Clock News, Billy Connolly, Rowan Atkinson (Blackadder and Baldric), Billy T. James, Fred Dagg, Kevin Bloody Wilson, Norman Gunston, Little Britain, Kenny Everett etc. etc.
I should also add that although I share Smoggy’s views on the evils of dehumanizing religion, most of his attitudes and behaviours are completely fictional. I’m boringly straight, and many of the things Smoggy comes out with shock me (not least because of what they suggest about the roiling cesspit of my unconscious). The original Smoggy Batzrubble was actually a character in a children’s fantasy novel I never got around to writing. I’ve enjoyed writing Smoggy’s chats with Jesus and quite a bit of his smoggerel, even if it can’t hold a candle to Cuttlefish. The poem I’m most pleased with is the little limerick he wrote on the rock thread about my girlfriend named’Gamina’ who has laminar flows (although Floyd inserts a Shofar always makes me laugh).
I won’t kill off Smoggy, he’s a wonderful safety valve when the respectable everyday world gets too tedious, and I find I’m quite fond of him. But he won’t be showing up that often, unless he has something really worth saying (or a poem worth offering). Thanks for putting up with him. If he’s offended any of you deeply in any way, then although he’s not sorry, I am.
Finally, sincere thanks to PZ for allowing me to indulge my penchant for fiction and satire on his blog.
Happy Kiwi
Considering that arabic numerals didn’t come into use in the Middle East or Europe until after Islam was established, the Number of the Beast in Revelations should correctly be written as DCLXVI
Here’s a picture Josh, it’s the blue 4-door.
http://www.valiant.org/dart/1972.html
The slant six was the best engine ever made in an American car. It was indestructible, dependable, and fuel-efficient for its day. And it had a delightful sound. That Dodge was the last car I owned that I could maintain myself with a modicum of knowledge and some basic tools. There was enough room under the hood to maneuver, and the only electronics were in the ignition system (and you just replaced a coil or a box if it went bad).
Now, I love my four-wheel-drive Subaru, don’t get me wrong. But I don’t love the fact that I can’t repair it, that it has to be “diagnosed” by computer, and it doesn’t have half the charm of my old Dodge.
Oy. If I don’t stop this, I’ll have to forfeit my title as Official SpokesGay. We are, you see, supposed to be so rarefied and refined that we wouldn’t deign to get motor oil on our hands!
And how pretty it is. Is that the model you drove for a cab?
Dear god, Google Buzz is a clusterfuckastrophe.
Anyone with a google account: buzz is on whether you clicked on it or not. If you never made a public profile you’re almost ok, but not quite. Here for more information.
The first car I owned was ’68 Valiant with a slant 6. It got me through grad school and post-doc. The body was falling apart when I replaced it in late ’79, but the engine was still good.
Happy Kiwi, you shouldn’t pay attention to what I say cuz I get in weird paranoid moods sometimes. (I thought you were being mean to me, which makes no sense at all, I know.) Didn’t mean no harm.
‘Tis, I remember the B-Girls. After OCS, I spent two years playing “Hunt for Red October” in Bermuda.
Josh, I’ll keep looking for pictures. I suspect my mom has them all. We had the train from the mid-’70s, to the early ’90s. Bought it from the Nebraska State Fairgrounds, if I recall correctly. There was another one, twin to ours, that ran for a while somewhere in California.
I officially re-christen you Nerd of SpokesGay (deference and apologies to the Redhead).
Is that the model you drove for a cab?
Yes, for sure. I spent much time in that thing…it was close to that color, too.
Happy Kiwi here, can’t seem to sign in as anything but Smoggy:
Seriously ‘thou’ @ 209, I knew you meant no harm and no offense was taken. It’s more that the last thread was the catalyst for something I’ve been considering for a while–that Smoggy should leave the building while the music was playing. The day will inevitably arrive when the majority will have had enough of him. Now seems like a good time.
HK
Brother Smoggy, you stick around. I’m the one retiring, because, frankly I only weird myself out what with trying to interact with people and whatnot. It never works out very well. :D
I’ll be over here trying to be a famous musician, never giving up, and if you ever hear a Smoggy Batzrubble song, well, that’ll be me in my weird apologetic ways.
Smoggy Batzrubble OM4Jesus/Happy Kiwi #202
While I can understand wanting to ease back on Smoggy, he still can be useful in dealing with certain types of godbotters, particularly proselytizers. I got many good laughs due to Smoggy’s irreverence in the name of Jesus.
I won’t tell her, but if she does find out, beware of ladies knitting. She is a Knija Knitter after all.
Thanks ‘Tis @ 215
I wanted to say (since I’m having a cathartic moment) how much I enjoy the other commentators here. Ones like you who really know what they’re talking about. The science discussions in particular when someone shares their expertise (Alan on rocks, Itchy on fish etc.) and the excellence in debate when some particularly obdurate fundie shows up. I’m no scientist (actually an English prof) but science has always been a passion and biology would have been my academic fallback. The fact most of you enjoyed Smoggy when you’re such uncompromising critics was a quiet source of pride to one who aspires to create fictional characters.
HK
Me, too. But there have been posters here who so richly deserve the kind ministrations of Smoggy, he just has to stop in every now and again. (Bwahaha, the guy who called you “just sick”, I still chuckle about that.)
Thanks for the useful link. Their company motto is “Don’t be evil”. Oops, they come close this time.
The door is slammed.
World’s Most Precise Clock Keeps Time to One Second in 3.7 Billion Years
close enough for jazz
Sven wins the whole Internet. All of it.
I didn’t say you were getting tiresome, I said I found you a bit try-hard. Not to my humour, that’s all.
Oh, and also, I just made the most rockin’ macaroni and cheese. Yes, I used Velveeta, which is trashy. But it’s soooo good. You all wish you were at my house right now. Mmm-hmm.
Yes, I used Velveeta, which is trashy. But it’s soooo good.
Velveeta? Yuck, that is soooo gay.
You all wish you were at my house right now. Mmm-hmm.
Oh, so you put bacon in it?
Is that an invitation?
Kamaka, I took the best job I good, so you and your sister could eat, and have a place to sleep, and some clothes on your backs.
Aren’t the tentacles enough? Do you have to degrade me?
Thanks for the Internet, Josh. It’s…it’s just what I’ve always wanted.
You guys can just, I don’t know, put it over there? For now? I guess. Thanks.
I found Smoggy tiresome from day one and said so. I killfiled that motherfucker so fast that the little greasemonkeyface down in the corner was briefly depilitated. But I peeked, as I always do, and I realized that I was right in the first place.
Then I changed my mind.
And then, again with the tiresomeness.
What I’m saying, so long, Smoggy.
So and also, I usually enjoy that 386sx guy’s contributions, personally.
SC, good, tight, straightforward post. What else can you do, really. All the information is out there. Laden’s a buffoon.
Yet I canNOT believe Z. I find her weirdly fascinating, in an odious bizarro/opposite-world sort of way. The two sentences thing, I actually gasped.
Yes, yes it is, my little pikachu. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!
When you say that, I’m reminded of this song and this song at the same time.
hmm
‘depilitated’ or ‘depilated’?
Kamaka (#218)
Careful, I think they stuck tape over the latch bolt.
Josh links @ 226, 228
Gyeong Hwa Pak links @ 229
What is wrong with you people, how would you even know about such crap?
para lang sa iyo
Filipino, too, Pikachu?
Dear sweet (and salty) Smoggy. While you may feel that you should phase out your fictional self, I do hope you are around enough to confound the odd christian troll. I always found you to be funny even though I am an american. Go figure.
Remain strange but do not be a stranger.
I must be the only one, then, who would like Smoggy to get even more deranged, if that is possible. Then again, I found Bob Saget’s telling of the Aristocrats joke…well, tame.
Happy Kiwi, I would like to thank you for Smoggy. I also want you to know that you can expect to hear from my lawyer, on account of you having nearly killed me with laughter a number of times.
yep. So long, Smoggy.
See ya.
I also think that Smoggy should go into semi-retirement only if Smoggy himself tires of the commenting.
As for Google – gah. I’m angry enough that I’m about to switch entirely over to Yahoo. Even if you don’t have a google profile and don’t turn on Buzz, the followers/following are still there until you go in and manually delete them, then you can turn it off. And as Isis pointed out, in a lot of cases that’s revealing real names of pseudonyms for people who comment on blogs under pseuds but using their real google account for the sake of the blogowner only. (Ex. – if I go by the name Smoggy but email PZ using my real name attached to my gmail, knowing that PZ won’t give me away, buzz will put my real name in his list of contacts for everyone else to see if he has a public profile.)
Para lang Kamaka
Oh, that’s a good link, GHP. I’m supposed to be learning to speak Tagalog, but damn, it’s tough.
Lol. I don’t really know Tagalog. I just like foreign music.
and now I’m calling you.
Thank God (or Allah) that someone is making sure that there are no evil red roses around on Valentines Day. Who knows the terror they could inflict on poor, unsuspecting Saudis.
From theage.com.au –
Saudi police launch Valentine’s Day crackdown February 12, 2010 – 8:40AM
The Saudi religious police have launched a nationwide crackdown on shops selling items that are red or in any other way allude to the banned celebrations of Valentine’s Day, a Saudi official says.
Members of the feared religious police have been inspecting shops for red roses, heart-shaped products or gifts wrapped in red, and ordering storeowners to get rid of them, the official says. He spoke on condition of anonymity as he was not authorised to speak to reporters.
Happy Kiwi, I have always appreciated Smoggy and always will. He has brought me to tears several times from laughter. Thank you for taking the conversation to such absurd heights for our amusement and the befuddlement of trolls. Long live Smoggy Batzrubble!
Smoggy, you can always change your name by clicking on your name on the commenting box.
goodbye my Smoggy
Damn, I feel bad now.
So Greg has finally listed all of the comments SC made that he thought could be seen as antisemitic, and… none of them are, and I don’t see how anyone could interpret any of them that way. I guess at least he laid it on the table.
I just like foreign music.
Like this?
A didgeridoo!
Kel @ 243
Damn, I feel bad now.
Why? Smoggy is a fairy tale. Things have changed since required registration, the “best” we’ve seen in trolls lately is the smug and arrogant dendy. And I do believe he got sent away, praise jebus!
Nah, Smoggy is cool laying back. He can always rise from the dead.
Kel wrote:
Kel killed Smoggy!
Nah, I agree that Smoggy has had a good run and should now be used for the occasional impact comment rather than on an everyday basis. But, that being said, the keen insight of his puppeteer, Happy Kiwi, should appear more often!
Happy Kiwi, re: Smoggy’s demise
Personally, I’m really sad to see Smoggy locked back inside your unconscious mind again. He was growing on me, ripening (like a particularly-acrid cheese) and was always good for hilarious shock value when those other, non-OM xtians came marching in, waving their bibles. I’ll miss that.
Mark me down as one of Smoggy’s fans.
There is too much win on this thread . . . I can’t keep up!
C_E, I’m sorry to hear you’re so busted up. Your rib cage must have taken a hell of a lick. May your recovery be swift and your pain meds teh awesome. But I’m very glad you’re here to tell the tale, thanks to those socialist commie nazi EMT’s and firefighters and whatnot.
Happy Kiwi, I for one love Smoggy and hope to hear from him at suitable times in the future. And to see more from you in your own voice, too!
Owlmirror, Lovelace and Babbage are GREAT! I have a kid into steampunk now; can’t wait to show it to her.
And speaking of steam, Josh, this one’s for you; here is a picture of a locomotive used in harvesting Southern pine from East Texas in the thirties, now conserved at the Diboll History Museum (home of Temple-Inland Forest Products).
Josh, Mr. Science also makes incredible mac-n-cheese, also using the white-trash staple Velveeta, plus cream cheese and sour cream too. You can feel your arteries clogging as you eat. Velveeta’s the only way to go, in my opinion (and yes, I’ve made it with white sauce, gruyère, and other fancy stuff — Velveeta’s better).
Walton:
Our young fella is growing up! (surreptitiously wipes a tear from the corner of an eye) It takes me back to this exchange you, JeffreyD, negentropyeater, Bill Dauphin, Etha Williams, Kseniya and I had in 2008; you’ve come a long way, baby!
Lynna, share only as much of your medical progress as you feel comfortable doing. You know we’re all on your team and worrying just a bit.
What a week this has been! I’ve had the flu for over a week, possibly H1N1 (didn’t get to the doc to know for sure); my biggest client shipped out trucks and front-end loaders to haul snow in Maryland — a first for us, and our Texas-bred folks don’t even know how to drive on snow and ice; and we’ve got two young Korean students coming to stay with us starting Saturday in an exchange from our sister school in Seoul. That last necessitates a wild house-cleaning orgy. Should be a ton of fun, though!
Somehow I haven’t settled down to deliver the promised pink fluffy god theology lecture. I’ve done some research, but it’s not coming coherently together right now as I bounce between the bed, the bathroom, the pharmacy, and remote support for my intrepid snow-haulers. Soon now, I hope, though the project has all the charm of an overdue sophomore-level research paper to me right now.
Leigh,
Leigh, please don’t feel under pressure.
I want you at your best. <g>
Lovelace and Babbage Vs The Economy
… !!
For all you train fans in the states: A trip worth taking!
BS
There’s a surprise.
Disagree, and very upset at Smoggy’s demise, agree that his puppetmaster Happy Kiwi should post more and keep Smoggy in reserve at least !
Yeah, in another thread, one he named “private letter to SC”, talk about blog traffic hey !
I stay away from anything “google”, but I read an article about this in german today pointing out why and how they integrated gmail into Buzz by default, how it is not particularly easy to get rid of this default setting, and how your “friends” can via one mouse click easily see who you write emails to.
This has so many security concerns that I will just stay away from google, like I have done in the past.Other people should, too.
Rorschach: “There’s a surprise.”
Hold the snark until after you read it. My brain has been working at half-speed, possibly because I’ve blown it all out my nose. Or maybe it was the massive amounts of decongestants and pain/fever relievers I’ve been ingesting all week. To put it bluntly, I’ve been feeling like warmed-over dog shit and sleeping 12 or more hours a day. Up until today, I’ve had the attention span of a fruit fly and the sunny disposition of a rabid warthog.
Kel, OM | February 12, 2010 1:06 AM:
Good grief.
Shape up and be a proper atheist. Kill without remorse!
Which reminded me (this is cross-threaded from the Video conference? post back in January).
—
To his credit, the Pastor has (sort of) acquiesced to repeated calls for his supporting his contention that “Theology is self-correcting, like science.” here.
Leigh,
Did your co-religionists pray for you to get better? Did you?
Seems to be working…
<ducks>
Your brain caught a much worse virus then the current one in your body long ago, so I’m not holding my breath.
Noone cares about that anymore, we don’t test for it anymore either, unless you’re pregnant, under 6 months old or have cancer or something.
I liked your link to that 2008 thread though, made me send Etha a message tonight, who is one of the people I really miss here, same with Mrs Tilton and Kseniya.
[meta]
Interesting. My comment got through (#259) but I was informed that it had failed, with this message (which I’ve never before encountered):
Leigh, on the ancient thread to which you linked, you said to me:
But perhaps you were too kind. Perhaps I wasn’t a rational conservative voice, since I’ve completely changed my outlook since then. I was younger and more naive in those days; I was making an argument from legal-philosophical principle, without really understanding its social context or its actual consequences in the real world. I have since learnt much more about these issues, and have entirely changed my legal philosophy.
Over the last two years, I’ve changed from a raging right-wing conservative and vague (non-practising) Christian, into an outspoken atheist, secularist, civil libertarian and human rights advocate. This is not a transition I ever intended or expected to make. But, as Thomas Jefferson said, “the opinions and belief of men depend not on their own will, but follow involuntarily the evidence proposed to their minds.”
Just because of general awesomeness( and because I havent linked to them for at least 6 months) :
Paint it Black–Live
Far away Eyes–Live
Shine a Light–Live
@Walton: you could become quite tolerable company one of these days if you’d just ditch the Tories :)
I had a thought which I hoped might illustrate to you why a lot of people are pretty down on Thatcher’s policies. Do you recall the infamous statement that there’s no such thing as society? Thatcher had a chemistry background. If she’d declared that there’s no such thing as water, only molecules, how seriously would you have taken that?
Shit, I forgot one, some might say, the best ever :
Sweet Virginia–Live in Tokyo
Throw one in for good measure because of Keith’s awesomeness :
As Tears go by–Live
And this one just because I can(not thinking of any pharyngulans in particular !) :
Shw was hot–Live
I like both Smoggy and 386sx, I’m never quite sure how to interact with you two though.
Greatest hits of 386sx:
-the “Jesus flying around like a birdie” meme
–Rebuttal of the “Augustine is just so freakin scientifical wonderful” meme
-I’m sure there are lots more but I’m too lazy to look them up
Happy Kiwi:
As a relative newcomer to this blog I will be sad to see less of Smoggy but can understand your reasons. Some of the best laughs I have had recently!
Have you (or anyone else) got links to Smoggy’s best encounters? Trawling the archives is not easy (or I haven’t found an easy way) and doesn’t find the gems.
‘depilitated’ or ‘depilated’? – Sven DiMilo
Well it’s “depilated” usually, but I think “depilitated” is a good word for what happened to Samson.
Despite our still frequent disagreements, I cannot but commend Walton for his demonstrated readiness to change his mind on rational grounds, and admit it.
@269: seconded.
@268: if a pilus is a hair and depilation is loss of hair, isn’t depilitation the act of being deprived of Pilates classes? :)
In Foucault’s Pendulum, Eco’s characters create an imaginary scholastic discipline of tetrapiloctomy; the art of splitting a hair into four.
I think it’s a misunderstanding of what Thatcher meant. Like many famous quotes, the “no such thing as society” remark has been taken entirely out of context. The whole quote is this:
Walton, you might find current discussion on the “You are a religious man and you know this is not acceptable behaviour.” thread interesting.
Thirded, fourthed.
Disgusting as Smoggy (deliberately) is, his humor overcomes all!
Not at all. Just sit back and enjoy. :-)
:-D
Win.
@Happy Kiwi: I, too, will miss Smoggy and hope that he breaks out of prison now and then. (BTW…what is the usual sentance length for his crime?) Not all Americans misunderstand him and Floyd.
@Leigh Williams: I hope you keep feeling better. I haven’t had the flu, just a bad cold for 8 days, and that is draining enough, can’t imagine how you are coping with your job! Hope your Texans are coping with the snow and ice on our East Coast roads.
@Celtic_Evolution: hope you, too, keep improving. Many kudos to the EMS people who got you out. You are in my thoughts.
Fine, but I still prefer the reasoning given in the US Declaration of Independence for why “Governments are instituted among Men”.
OK, the new thread at Greg’s is not quite such a trainwreck. This is progress, I think. And despite what Stephanie thinks.
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2010/02/a_private_letter_to_salty_curr.php
I still don’t see any excuse for the claim that “There is no such thing”. Its context of “if you don’t have a job it’s your own fault, you workshy scum” doesn’t no much to improve it.
Happy Darwin Day, everybody!
Paul W – How is it that Stephanie still doesn’t get it? Even after a dozen comments of people saying that it’s good that he put out all the comments, and them saying that now they get the problem but really don’t see the antisemitism, for her to say that no one wants to talk about the comments? She’s gone entirely off the deep end now.
Again, just because I can :
Donovan–Universal Soldier Live
Barry McGuire–Eve of destruction Live
And again, just for awesomeness :
Pogues–Maggie May
Progress in continuing to “clear” Salty’s name (as if she needed it). Greg’s looking worse than ever, muddled, typo-ridden, nonpologizing, & holding up comments way longer than usual. (I wonder what’s NOT getting through?)
Why does he get away with such groundless speculation and stream-of-consciousness rambling? Just about every (non-GL) comment is better written than his posts are.
The trainwreck of Greg intensifies, and I find I no longer care to even give him the benefit of ‘holdover liking’ for some of his past work.
And a drunken tribute to Mary Travers, why not !
Where have all the flowers gone
The times are a’changing ! ( Given the upcoming anniversary of the Watchmen thread this song is more then appropriate !!)
I’m at work, so i can’t:
But someone find a link to Tom Waits’ ‘The Pontiac’ (Orphans) for JoshOSG.
Post #199 made we wonder if he IS Tom Waits:-}
My last hasn’t appeared yet. It really makes it impossible to have an argument. Of course, this is also complicated by the fact that some of the commenters there are braying jackasses who seem incapable of coherent thought. They keep repeating the same dumb line without ever backing it up with anything.
Ok, I’m drunk, go easy on me please…:-)
Peter Paul and Mary–Puff the magic dragon
Leaving on a Jet plane–PPM
Mary Travers dying is such a loss, it’s not funny,she was just such an awesome person.
I’m so with you in your sorrow, Rorschach.
who is society? There is no such thing! There are individual men and women and there are families… Walton, quoting Thatcher
This is still exactly like saying: “what is a gas? There is no such thing! There are individual atoms and there are molecules…”
The popular version wouldn’t have stuck if it had not summed up her attitude for people – just as with Callaghan’s “Crisis? What crisis?” – which he never said at all, but which captured his apparent failure to appreciate the seriousness of the “winter of discontent”. Most modern politicians rely on soundbites in place of rational argument or even inspiring rhetoric, so they are in a weak position to complain if they sometimes get “soundbitten”!
@284: I think so far Irene[46] has the dumbest possible comment in the “private letter” thread, although StephanieZ’s performance in “Am I wrong?/Yes you are wrong/ Don’t tell me” is a close second. I thought Creationists were unbeatable in Logical Fallacy Bingo, but – wow.
Lovely link, rat….:-)
I better retire for the nite lol
And now #53! I’m almost hoping Irene is some sort of stupidity troll. It’s disturbing that anyone could be that dumb and commenting on Sb.
Scienceblogs doesn’t require an intelligence test before people are allowed to comment. :-)
Yours too. :) Night!
@C-E:
I can sympathise with you – I broke my sternum 2 1/2 weeks ago. Advice – don’t get into a sit-down bath; you’ll never get out without a hoist. Do not cough, and definitely do not sneeze, or you’ll explode.
I survived my first sneeze this morning. Ouch, that hurt! After 2 weeks, I can move around OK. Hope that you will soon, too.
Knockgoats and Stephen Wells: I still think you’re caricaturing Thatcher’s remarks.
No one denies that societies exist, to a given value of “exist”. They exist in the same way that ecosystems exist, or that economies exist. Societies are systems created by the complex web of interactions between individual human beings. Like ecosystems and economies, they display certain features and patterns which it is important to study and understand.
But Thatcher was trying to make the point that societies are not entities in themselves; they consist of individual men and women. In and of themselves, societies don’t produce anything or own anything; and it’s simply nonsense to talk of someone “owing a debt” to society, or, conversely, to talk of society “owing someone” a living. Individuals produce things, and when you rely on society, you really rely on the efforts of other individuals. In short, she was trying to de-anthropomorphise society.
You can agree or disagree with her remarks. I personally think her comments were a little unfair, given that the structural economic changes of the 1980s inevitably created temporary mass unemployment. Those changes may well have been necessary, but it certainly wasn’t legitimate to criticise the unemployed for their own predicament, and remarks of that nature only inflamed the perception of “class war” and the bitter (and largely unnecessary) social conflict that characterised the era. But it’s important not to caricature her comments, or her motivations.
Ok, now this is just awesome :
500 miles–Live
Looks like when I get off work tonight. I’ll have to hoist a libation is memory of Mary Travers, to C-E’s recovery, a salute to Smoggy so that he may reappear to confuse some godbots, and to Happy Kiwi.
Wow – I didn’t think it was possible to Godwin that thread any more thoroughly than it already was, but Saadia did it @#40.
Carlie,
Yeah, she backed the train up, added cattle cars full of Jews, and sent it full steam back into the trainwreck.
:-(
I love Smoggy. I just hope I haven’t loved him to death. Come back whenever you feel like it Smoggy. I’ll be gentle.
Rorschach | February 12, 2010 8:48 AM:
I can’t believe you posted a link to that deplorable song. It advocates drug abuse. IT LURES INNOCENT CHILDREN STRAIGHT INTO OPIUM DENS!!
Leigh as a “rabid warthog” is a very useful images. It sticks in the mind and keeps on giving. My particular Leigh -rabid-warthog also has a runny nose. Amusement, Texas style.
Thanks for all the Rolling Stones links, Rorschach. It’s not the evening of the day here, but the Stones are good with breakfast too.
Gesundheit!
Actually, wow. That’s a tough instrument to make do anything more than one-dimensional. She’s impressive.
This is either one of the all-time great oxymorons or a violation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
I have taken it, and it was indeed well worth it. Except for the horrible air pollution. I felt bad about that. But then, you’re looking down at bright-orange creeks already.
Inevitable and NSFJ:
Happy Monkey to all!
That is the shit right there. I’m tearing up here.
Nostalgia warning: “WHATFG” was at one time one of the 3 or 4 songs I knew on the guitar. I used to sit out in the middle of the Mojave Desert by myself and bang that one out for fucking hours. Reggae versions, strummy pseudoMetheny versions. Four excellent chords right in a row, man.
That’s not what she meant to say!!!
(I think.)
I can’t deal with reading the Sarge yet today.
Bleh. I am making Rev BDC-ish mistakes, as in #301, where “images” should not be plural. I think I’ll go out and shovel snow as penance.
Right, so that was what she meant to say.
My bad.
(I think.)
Celtic_Evolution
I’m way behind on the thread but may I add my best wishes to all the others. The order is:
1) Survive – you seem to have managed that.
2) Get well – sounds like you are doing OK with that.
3) Get back to what you enjoy doing (like commenting on this thread!)
All the best from the English side of the pond.
Walton,
I think you’re mistaken in saying that because societies are composed of individuals and arise from the interactions that they don’t (can’t) create.
Society does not exist independently of its members, but neither do people exist independently of their cells — at least not without bringing in some dodgy propositions. Societies give rise to art, science, law, war, and so on. It was not coincidence that Newton and Liebniz simultaneously and independently invented calculus — European (including British, at the time) society was primed for this discovery; it was perhaps inevitable that it be discovered very close to when it was.
This does not in any way diminish the achievements of individuals. But those achievements arise and are recognized when the conditions for them exist. You do “owe” society for the legal education that you are receiving — it is only now, in the society in which you live, that you can receive that education. It is in the attempt to quantify and collect that debt that mistakes are made.
There are, undoubtedly, some people who choose not to work when they could. But Thatcher in her speech paints all people “on the dole” as malingerers; she does not offer a way to tell the difference. Not only are they stealing from society, they are stealing the bread directly out of your mouth.
Hate them. Scorn them. Drive them out. They are thieves and parasites. We have nothing to do with this. They made their gutter: let them die in it.
That is Thatcher’s “no society” argument.
It’s okay, Sven (@305), when you’re wrong, you’re wrong in an entertaining manner.
Seems the mormons are moaning about their rights to be bigots, racists, and prejudiced far beyond reason. They are maundering on about how these precious rights may be abridged by the Gay Marriage battle. Oh, noes!
I like that bit about “a disturbing slide downward
Arghh….
Matthew Segall*, frankorsaurus and Hyperon all on the same thread.
____
* Well, redliterocket4. Even if they are not the same person they post pretty post the same stuff.
Oh, holy crap! More cut-paste errors. That’s it. I’m fit for shoveling snow and nothing else this morning.
Feynmaniac@309:
Someone posted a link to Matthew Segall’s blog where he posted redliterocket4’s “contributions” here and lists redliterocket4 as himself. I forget who, as is typical for me.
I bet I can beat Rorschach when it comes to posting good music. (And I’m not even drunk.)
Various versions of one of the best TV themes ever:
Oh, I am rubbernecking the circus-trainwreck.
Oh, oh.
OK, but this one is quoted solely for loud LOLz:
The person who linked redliterocket4 to Matthew Segall would have been Rev. BigDumbChimp (link here).
I think it was Rev. BDC.
Lynna,
This sentence here seems to be the crux of it all:
The Mormons, having finally bought some clout, are loathe to do anything which might diminish it. If a new religion started which enshrined marriage equality as the highest good, would the LDS church support their right to religious freedom? I suspect they would claim it wasn’t a “proper” religion.
(If someone who can speak for the Mormon church is here and knows that the LDS church would support religious freedom, please, consider that religion started! It’s name is “Marriage Equalityism”. Get to defending my religious liberties!)
Irene @67 on Laden’s Private Letter thread:
The Kw*k is strong in this one.
But Thatcher was trying to make the point that societies are not entities in themselves; they consist of individual men and women. – Walton
Absolutely, totally, unquestionably, wrong. Consider all the physical infrastructure, domesticated plants and animals, not to mention the natural environment, that are essential to their functioning. Methodological individualism is an egregious blunder, but one that is very useful to propagandists of the right.
remarks of that nature only inflamed the perception of “class war” and the bitter (and largely unnecessary) social conflict that characterised the era. But it’s important not to caricature her comments, or her motivations.
It was perceived as a class war because that is what it was. The rich, led by Thatcher, looted the public coffers, trashed communities, and killed many people. Her motivations were hatred and contempt for everyone not “one of us”.
Shorter Mormon Lawyer argument: If my religion demands that I abridge your civil rights, then you must allow me to do so.
A message for Brother Smoggy Batzrubble, care of Happy Kiwi
Dearest Brother Batzrubble,
Please do not utterly abandon this horde of marauding atheists. Surely, it is Lucifer himself who tempts you to desert your post now, when you are so close to success. Only through great pain, perseverance, and suffering will you ever achieve the salvation of a single atheist soul.
As the daughter of missionaries, I know that the only thing more daunting than witnessing to primitive headhunters and cannibals is testifying the True Word™ to atheists. Let me express my deepest admiration for you and your work here amongst the truly depraved. If you cannot bear to carry out your work in the venomous pit of Pharyngula any longer, I am certain that Wycliffe Bible Translators (also know as the disarming Summer Institute of Linguistics or SIL) could find a harmless group of cannibals for you to minister to. Remember the saga of Operation Auca and the ultimate triumph of the saintly Rachel Saint and Elizabeth Elliot and remain stalwart in The Faith™. (I know, the original missionaries to the Huaorani ended up dead, but sometimes one must make sacrifices in the name of Truth™ and Big Oil…)
If you feel the need to ease back a little, please take the customary missionary furlough (and do remember that you are supposed to spend this furlough fund-raising) so that you can return to us refreshed and renewed in The Spirit™ (and flush with cash). I have always found your humour quite enjoyable and it has even caused me to break my New England reserve and chuckle out loud on occasion (though I admit to being a little intimidated by Floyd).
Yours (but no longer His) Truly,
Vasti
Right. Also: If my religion claims ownership over some public institution, that institution leaves the public sphere and becomes a part of our religion and you can’t touch it by our First Amendment rights.
Depilitating, from a debilitating depilation?
Happy Kiwi, don’t incarcerate Smoggy, just send him on a vacation.
davem, sorry to hear about your sternum, glad it’s recovering.
yeah.
Well teh Google sez I am at least not unique in inserting that ‘it’.
It is my personal opinion this thread is suffering from dangerously low levels of Sparklehorse and Tom Waits collaborations…
(/Fixed now.)
FFS
*snort*
haw
I just left a post on Greg’s latest trainwreck thread. I’ve rarely seen anyone act in such an ethically scummy way, and that’s saying a lot considering some of the crap that’s occurred on Scienceblogs over the years. That it comes from Greg Laden – who I never would have thought capable of it – is genuinely shocking.
Thought that was you, Josh. Nicely put. If I hadn’t ostentatiously flounced Forever, I’d give you the CTS over there, but this will have to do:
*clenched-tentacle salute*
Happy Monkey!
(new! improved! now with better image!)
Guys, you’re just teaching Greg that if he shits on the carpet he gets attention and blog hits. Not a good way to potty train.
*tentacle-bumps Tulse for #102 at GL*
Josh, thank you. (Everyone else, too.)
I know. And this latest comment is exactly where it leads. That he said it, clearly in anger, is forgivable. But that he’s allowed it to keep going and perpetuated people’s ignorance so they wouldn’t know what’s going on is just…
This has been really emotionally trying.
I know, but if everyone ignores him, then the shit just sits there and causes a walking hazard.
If I could change my moniker to SC, OM, Greatest Bitch on the Internet there would be a tiny silver lining.
SC, I’m sorry that you ended up somehow being the whipping post in all of this. I think there are a lot more readers there who do get it than there are the ones agreeing with G/S, and I don’t know that they could reason their way out of a paper bag in the first place.
SC @333: do it. Then we’d have Patricia, Queen of the Sluts, Janine (Foul-mouthed, plus many more descriptors), and SC, OM, Greatest Bitch on the Internet. Let us do battle.
More hugs for Smoggy (assuming Floyd is not standing too closely by, with lash in hand).
Walton (@I_Forgot_the_Number):
One of the problems I always encounter in discussing politics and political philosophy with people who are basically rational and well intentioned is that they habitually underestimate the existence and impact of people who are not rational or are (worse yet) rational but not well intentioned.
As has been noted (and as we’ve just been reminded by Leigh’s invocation of the wayback machine), your thinking has evolved in ways that I consider distinctly positive, but even before most of that evolution, you were clearly an intelligent person trying to deal honestly and rationally with the issues in front of you. This just in: Not everyone is like you!
Some people are stupid, or have been seduced by irrational dogma, or just fucking selfish… and plenty of those people really do deny the very existence of “society,” at least as that term is used to indicate a collective of people with needs, and capabilities to act, that are distinct from those of individuals or individual families. I could name some such people who have been regulars here during your tenure… but I’m afraid naming them “aloud” would summon them from hell.
My wonderful wife is a passionate advocate for the public schools, and hates attempts to cut schools’ funding or otherwise undermine them… but because she herself is a rational being, whose opinions are honestly held with the most generous-spirited of intentions, she finds it impossible to believe me when I tell her that some segments of the political population are deliberately trying to bankrupt the public schools by advocating things like vouchers, charter schools, and homeschooling advocacy, and by attacking teachers and their unions. To her, that seems evil, and because she has a hard time imagining people that evil, she just assumes I’m being hyperbolic.
Sometimes I feel the same way with you: You’re not evil, I’m quite sure, but some of the people who hold views you have in the past at least partially identified with are evil, in ways you apparently have a hard time recognizing.
Miki Z @316
And the answer is … fuck no! Very good point, though — and you should register your new religion right away, preferably on an Indian Reservation in Utah. But the mormons aren’t thinking along those lines, since, as you pointed out, theirs is the only True Religion™.
Basically, we’re just saying that, no, you don’t have a right to abridge the rights of non-members. And as aratina cage pointed out, no, you don’t have the right to claim a secular institution, like marriage, for example, as your very own Religious Ritual™.
I think I’ll go on a little googling spree and see if I can find out how many of The Quorum of the Seventy, and The Quorum of the Twelve, and The First Presidency are lawyers. How many of those damnable lawyers are being paid a “stipend” (fat salary) out of tithing funds to strip their fellow citizens of their civil rights.
I have just been given a bottle of Bruichladdich (along with a very warm letter of recommendation).
Comments? (And how the fsck is it pronounced? I think I know just enough Dutch spelling for it to ruin any idea I might have about Scots.)
Sven, thanks for the CTS!
I only use the “SpokesGay” id here, since it’s a Pharyngula-specific joke and identity. Without that context, people on another blog wouldn’t get it, and there’s always the risk someone would get their knickers in a twist and accuse me of being “insensitive.” I’m definitely not trying to sock-puppet or hide who I am (I know you didn’t think that, just offering clarification generally).
:-D
Reminds me of when a top-level Social Democratic politician in Austria said during a TV debate that she was sure all parents want the best for their children.
PZ and friends,
If I may just briefly direct your attention to a different topic: A dung beetle is fighting for its life against Glenn Beck and needs your help.
http://trueslant.com/daviddisalvo/2010/02/11/glenn-beck-vs-the-dung-beetle/
Please support the little guy – he can’t do it without us.
Best
Mooney’s first PoI guest will be Paul Offit, a doctor who has been demonized by the anti-vax types for writing a book telling the truth about the whole autism/vaccine brouhaha.
I would have expected him to have on Jenny McCarthy or Kim Stagliano. You know, I note a decided lack of bridge building on Mooney’s part.
What’s the joke?
Josh #199
I’m home from another day in the money mines so I can post this
http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/02/moncktons_mcluhan_moment.php
Well, I got bored really quickly while trying to find out how many lawyers currently reign in the LDS Church’s top leadership. But here’s a sampling of Mormon Lawyers:
Elder Lawrence E. Corbridge, Lawyer, shareholder and senior attorney at a Salt Lake City law firm. Married Jacquelyn Gayle Shamo, five children.
Elder James J. Hamula, 50, Employed as an attorney at an Arizona law firm. Married Joyce Anderson, six children.
Elder W. Eugene Hansen, received juris doctorate from the University of Utah; former trial lawyer, president of the Utah State Bar Association. Wife, Jeanine Showell Hansen, parents of six children.
Elder Earl C. Tingey, Formerly corporate attorney for Kennecott Copper Corp. [only 4 children, he must be slacking off]
Elder D. Todd Christofferson, [earned] his law degree from Duke University. He practiced law in Washington, D.C. and has been a senior vice president and associate general counsel for major banking institutions.
Elder L. Whitney Clayton, His professional career was in law where he was a business litigation attorney with a California law firm. [Wife] Kathy Ann Kipp … parents of seven children.
Dallin Harris Oaks is an American attorney, jurist and religious leader. Since 1984, he has been a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church). He is a former professor of law at the University of Chicago Law School, a former president of Brigham Young University, and a former justice of the Utah Supreme Court.
Elder Tad R. Callister, Worked as an attorney with a firm in California. Married Kathryn Louise Saporiti, six children.
And here’s a good example of an old white dude who is not a lawyer:
Elder F. Michael Watson, Temple Sealer. Secretary to the First Presidency of the Church. Married Jolene Mann, 12 children.
@Pikachu
I don’t remember the original thread or comment that inspired the SpokesGay identity, but it was something on Pharyngula. I just think the concept of an “official spokesgay,” making official pronouncements on behalf of Teh Gay, is funny.
Every once in a while, my alter ego appears. Locutus of Gay speaks for The Collective, and everything he says is srs bizness. No sense of humor, that one.
True enough, but we reinforce trolls with attention too. I’ve never noticed anyone refraining from the later, so I hardly would expect folks to avoid the former.
It is my understanding that adblock software blocks blog hits as well.
BS
Nice! Sounds like classic pwnge.
I do hope for Walton’s sake that Lambert has gotten all the peerage protocol correct.
I’m very pleased to report that (some) ‘ordinary’ Americans seem to fully comprehend the issues surrounding climate change. It’s very easy to forget that there might be hope, when the blogs I follow all focus on reporting on the denialist nutcases.
Or the others are all elder than he, and he’ll catch up by the time he reaches their age.
:-) :-) :-)
Oh and btw that was pretty funny.
Confirmation bias. With any given troll, there are quite a few people who decide to ignore them to starve them of attention, at different points in the troll’s “career”. What is interesting occasionally is which people killfile which trolls…people have some oddly different sensibilities, from what I’ve seen.
If that’s the case, I might check out the train wreck. I felt morally obliged not to contribute to his well-being in any manner based on his current asshattery, and even adding to blog hits seemed a bit too much for my taste.
Walton (#262)
Well, isn’t the definition of a rational conservative one who eventually changes into a liberal? Mwahaha!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Paul W. (#276)
The people spewing the “yes, that’s totally anti-Semitism or could be if the person reading was a naive little puppy-wuppy (unlike me!) and how dare you stomp the puppy-wuppies, SC!!!, you would-be maybe-accidental Nazi” bullshit kind of made me rage. Made me rage enough to call them all out. For all the good it will do. *sigh*
On further reflection, I suspect a likelier cause is the rhythm-rhyme with ‘depilatory’, which is the form in which I (and probably many others) first encounter the word, in connection with ‘cream’.
(I was a swimmer, OK? My relay went to the State meet.)
(not that there’s anything wrong with that)
I typically see it represented as “brook-laddie”, although you have to sound like you’re swallowing your tonsils on the first syllable.
That’s what I usually do, but I don’t think that was the kind of interaction that 386sx was talking about.
Back again from Hammond.*
Just curious as to whether anyone has ever encountered ‘Elaine’, ‘Irene’, or ‘Dunnigan’ previous to these thread?
*[look, Sarge, I’m speakin’ metaphor!]
Here are three covers that I like.
Within You Without You-Sonic Youth
Break On Through-Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog
I Put A Spell On You-Diamanda Galás
I will leave it to you to figure out which two of the three originals I like.
On a different note, that is a field that is not only salted but there is broken glass and rusty syringes buried in the dirt. SC, the advise given to trolls here is to stop digging. While I think SC is in the right, it does not seem that any amount of arguing are going to convince some of those people. Shit, Irene seems to be as foolish as any troll who has tripped and fell through this blog.
Isn’t time to just withdraw? It just seems to be a lot of frustration and getting nothing in return.
[Incidentally, in real-live meatspace I have been to Hammond many times in my life, though all before 1985, because my father grew up there. My grandfather was a railroad man on the Nickel Plate line. Yet I never heard the story of that wreck until somebody (Owl? Wow?) linked it here.]
John Morales@261, yeah, I got one of those as well as a few days ago. Like you, my comment was indeed posted, and I also don’t recall ever seeing the message before. It was so weird I saved a copy:
I haven’t bothered trying to report it to the SciBorg’s webmaster since, last I checked (c.2 weeks ago), that e-mail is still b0rked.
by way of mashing up several current Thread themes, uh:
Nickel Plate railroad
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzqVXvwMHCU
Wow…just when I think I’ve seen it all heddle comes to the defense of SC!
I actually looked up “Elaine” earlier. Found a couple of hits, but didn’t bother to click on them. I wouldn’t put it past them at all. (Though I can’t imagine anyone being strange enough to create a clueless buffoon like Irene as a sockpuppet.)
I withdrew a few hours ago. I don’t know if he realizes the damage he’s done, out of vanity it seems more than anything else. I hope he does eventually. Of course it’s already too late to undo a lot of it – the false seed is planted in people’s minds.
I’ve said what I had to say. And when the ones speaking out against what he’s doing are people I respect like you guys and Russell Blackford – whom I very much admire even though I’ve disagreed with him in the past (never did tell him how cute I thought his “Mark my words…I told you so” posts concerning the Yoko Ono lawsuit were…) – and those mindlessly supporting it are people like Irene, Elaine, and Dunnigan, I’m pretty comfortable with the long-term prospects.
Not sure, but drinking it helps. Probably.
Now I really am speechless.
Indeed! We must ever be vigilant to the dangers of allowing the decadent, non-apple-pie-loving European rot to establish itself! In fact I happen to know that many here are already admirers of long ‘pamphlets’ written by a charismatic if socially awkward young man who hails from Austria! WHERE WILL IT END?? Wake up people!!
You mean like the poopyhead himself going to, oh, I dunno, Ireland?
Wow…just when I think I’ve seen it all heddle comes to the defense of SC!
My eyeballs are sitting on my lap.
windy, my stomach tries to rotate and presses most painfully against the liver and the pancreas. :-}
You know who else had stomach problems? ;)
I smell Godwin!
Heddle may be many things, but in his own way he is scrupulously honest and fair.
Kudos to Heddle.
I gotta say, I’m surprised and pleased, and it’s bizarre in a way… but it doesn’t actually seem out of character for Heddle to do that, IMHO.
I find his religious views to be bizarre and… well… wrong, wrong, wrong, but he isn’t just an adversarial troll who wouldn’t stand up for somebody he disagrees with about something else.
(Then again, I’m not a Heddle expert. I generally ignore most conversations he’s in. YMMV)
Ah… I see Tulse just posted a similar sentiment.
Er PZ today is Friday, I have noticed something missing from the main blog (as of 20;20 GMT-which is what I am on) I hope the fact the Friday Cephalopod is absent doesn’t mean there is a problem at PZ towers but it is just late.
If we can help just let us all know someone will have the HTMLfu to post one.
Darwin?
I was starting to think that they were Stephanie’s sock puppets myself. They all have the inability to read a simple sentence and come to the obvious meaning, rather than reading what they desperately want to read – anti-semitism.
Greg has now posted that he doesn’t want any more criticism. He’s completely lost it, as far as I’m concerned, and needs to make a lot of apologies before he gets any credibility back.
Hello! I’m new here (from Europe), just recently interested in this great blog because of a long term debate with a creationist friend, would you someone recommend some other great atheist pages also on the net? You know FAQ-style, like how to argue with creationists, or info about evolutionary origins of religion.. :)
:-D :-D :-D :-D :-D
Only site you’ll ever need: http://talkorigins.org/
I’ll try that at some point. (That’s why I suggest a bottle instead of a gift basket or a new phone – I knew full well that I’d never get myself to actually fork over the money for some good stuff.) It’ll just have to wait for the next time I have guests over.
Also I need tumblers. Does anyone here have the knowhow to cut ‘highball’/’Collins’ glasses down?
Thanks Kel, looks good :)
My latest contra Sgt. Z over at Greg’s:
I fail to see what’s “diminishing the scope of the problem” by pointing out, correctly and relevantly, that it isn’t normal for someone to accuse people in the course of a debate of desiring to torch synagogues and perpetrate a holocaust.
It isn’t. My Jewish friends don’t resort to that, without good reason—which there evidently was not—and would be astonished by any denial that it isn’t normal.
Imagine SC had said, in that context, that it is normal for (Jewish) people to accuse people in the course of a debate of desiring to torch synagogues and perpetrate a holocaust.
Holy crap.
That would be tantamount to saying that Jews cannot and should not be reasoned with, and that would be horrendously antisemitic, as well as being blatantly false.
Some things Stephanie is saying—and the degree to which she strains at such things—seem to indicate that she thinks that Jews cannot and should not be reasoned with.
I don’t think she thinks that, but she’s arguing a very weird position here, which seems to amount to advising people not to get into arguments with Jews—even if they come onto your turf and pick a fight—because if they falsely accuse you of being genocidal, you’re seriously fucked and can do no right. If you argue with a Jew, and they play the Nazi card, you lose.
That can’t be right.
I’m sorry, but I have a considerably more respect for Jews than that, based on long experience. I am quite certain that most are not Henry Gee, or even close.
Does anyone here have the knowhow to cut ‘highball’/’Collins’ glasses down?
Bandsaw.
To think, once you guys get tired of wasting time on Greg/Stephanie he’ll actually have to come up with something interesting to get back on the Top 5 most active.
Taking bets on whether we’ll see “Congo Memoirs” mark 2 or “Glenn Beck someone and call them names when they get mad at being misrepresented” mark 2. Of course, I’ll have to take your word for it, because there’s no way I’m following that blog after the way he’s composed himself this last week.
StephanieZ posted this gem at me: “Stephen, I see no evidence that you’re actually happy that Greg posted the language he was referring to. I do see quite a bit of evidence that you’re invested in me being wrong about…whatever. Given all that, I conclude that you’re less than sincere.”
Blink. Blink.
She said I no happy. I said I happy. She say I lying and I not happy.
Walton
Thatcher had no particular expertise in either anthropology or sociology, both of which study society or culture. Societies are composed of individuals, yes, but they, like humans, are more than the sum of their parts (thanks for the metaphor, Miki Z). You can “owe a debt” to society because you benefit from the privileges of society. Those benefits are more than the benefits of simply living in close proximity to your conspecifics. The society/culture existence is an interesting debate.
Bill Dauphin,
And most people are average. That’s something that’s hard to come to terms with, especially when you’re used to interacting with the intelligent and highly educated (those are two separate, yet overlapping groups). On top of that, many people of all intelligence levels have no intellectual curiosity. In many cases they live lives that provide no challenge to the ideas and beliefs their parents handed down to them, whereas others actively seek lives that insulate them from contrary views so that they are never challenged to think in any significant way. That’s one thing that sets Walton apart from many conservatives e.g. the American Tea Party Movement.
I think you’re absolutely right about how many people just can’t understand that there are evil people out there who want to tear down the institutions that serve society so well. It has only been in the last few years that I’ve come to know a few people who are evil in this manner. They don’t respond to either empathy or rational argument. They truly embody the “I’ve got mine, fuck you.” mentality of fringe libertarianism. It’s difficult to interact with people who understand the rather dramatic consequences of destroying public education, social security, social welfare programs, FEMA, etc. and still support getting rid of these institutions. One thing I’ve noticed, though, is that the evil people never think they will be the ones to suffer the most severe of the consequences of their ideas.
Pygmy Loris (@387):
The sad thing, as I argued way upthread, is that the I’ve got mine; fuck you attitude isn’t limited to the evil people: We’ve been so steeped in the Reagan-era mantra of government sucks, so look out for No. 1 that by now, even people who are well intentioned and think they’re liberals often end up going along with tax-cut/budget-cut ideology that passes for “moderate” here in the U.S., however right-wing it looks from the vantage point of the rest of the developed world.
llewelly linked to an article that discussed the defunding of local government in Colorado Springs, and it included the line “There are two kinds of conservatives: millionaires and suckers.” My response was that the suckers are really just people who think they might be millionaires someday, and are therefore willing to vote against their own current interests in order to preserve their hope of “pie in the sky by and by.”
The thing is, those suckers aren’t necessarily evil; they’re just hopeful… and that makes them easy to seduce into supporting evil policies. Frankly, I’m somewhat stumped as to how to even start changing this situation.
Bill,
I remember that. I don’t understand the internalization among liberals of the government doesn’t work mentality. My grandfather receives his social security check on the same day every month. When my friend’s house caught fire the firefighters were there within minutes to fight the blaze. My friends’ children go to schools everyday that provide and education at no cost to them.
I have a couple of acquaintances who say that Katrina proved the government wasn’t capable of responding to disaster. Why don’t they understand that the problem wasn’t “the government” in a general sense, but rather that those who were supposed to be governing abused their positions to appoint friends to important administration positions rather than people with actual qualifications? Why don’t they understand that the Rethuglicans are serious when they say they want to defund government so that people will think it doesn’t work and will support the dismantling of our most important institutions? I don’t get it. The residents of wingnutistan outright state their intentions, yet people simply don’t believe that anyone could be serious about dismantling the government. It’s so freaking infuriating!
That’s such a true, concise statement, Bill. It’s truly amazing how out of touch most US people are. As you said, they have no idea how extreme and right-wing these ideas are – they actually think they’re “centrist” or “liberal.” The rest of the world scratches its head.
I agree with llewelly, Bill. I personally know conservatives that have absolutely no interest or expectation of being millionaires someday. They align with the government sucks, so look out for No. 1 measures without recognizing that they are not in their own best interests, currently or in the future. And if they recognize that it is not in their own best interest (this is fairly rare), that just means their beliefs are so justified and right that they’re willing to sacrifice to do the right thing. These would be a subset of the suckers, not all of whom fit your characterization. It may be relevant that I work mostly with engineers who are more interested in building interesting gadgets than accumulating wealth, yet are still in a right-wing, religious area and absorb the talking points with little filtering for rationality.
Knockgoats, you’ve posted the same thing on Laden’s blog four times now. Are you not seeing your previous posts?
Laden’s turned on the moderation, because he’s concerned about people not following the rules. Here’s what I posted, which is currently being held in moderation:
Some C of E people, who are also union members, whinge that freezing their pay is not “Christian behaviour”. It’s clear that what they’re demanding there is a pay rise. It doesn’t even seem to occur to them that taking a pay cut would be more consistent with story-book Christianity (though not the real-world, greedy, evil version).
(Either that or they should have taken their religious “talents” and made extra money out of them themselves, eg by inventing their own religion and investing in their own religious scams, in order to qualify for being given more.)
Pharyngulites, mind if I stir the pot even more? The King of Concern himself is warning about how he’s going to prevent anonymous commenting on his blog, because it promotes incivility. Guess that means his average comment count will go from 3 to 0.
And yes, the post carries the obligatory Simpering, Soft-Sounding Title With Au Courant Lingo Playing the Role of Plain Language(TM):
The Right Room for a Dialogue
Ooooo, baby, great hair. . .wanna dialogue with me?
Paul (@391):
First, let me be clear: The quote about millionaires and suckers was from an article llewelly linked to; I didn’t mean to put words in his/her mouth.
Next, it was admittedly careless of me to suggest that my characterizaton was valid for all the “suckers.”
Still further, I didn’t mean to suggest that people consciously make the calculation, “I know this is bad for me, but it’s good for millionaires, and I’m going to be a millionaire someday, so I’ll vote for it anyway.” Rather, I meant to suggest that people internalize the aspirational aspects of the “American dream,” and therefore (mostly unconsciously) vote as if they were already members of the privileged class they aspire to join… without realizing that the policies they’re voting for are not in their best interests in the meantime.
I actually don’t think we’re in much disagreement here.
OK – I’m shocked. Greg Laden actually altered a post of mine by editing it and putting words in my mouth that I didn’t write. Here’s what I actually submitted:
Here’s what he actually posted, with his addition in bold type added by me:
Whoa! Am I off-base in thinking it’s totally, completely uncool and unacceptable to do that?
I wasn’t sure, Bill, but it did seem you were equivocating directly between “suckers” and “people who hope (subconsciously or no) to be millionaires” (which is actually why I didn’t want to say I disagree with you, as I wasn’t sure :-) ). With the addendum, I don’t think there is any disagreement. I’ve had similar thoughts myself in the past.
That’s a pretty big line to cross. Attributing words to someone they didn’t say, in a manner that nobody could tell he had altered them? The guy is unhinged. No idea what his damage is, but he keeps digging and digging.
Paul, I thought so too. I can’t believe it. For clarification, I did write “that’s rich, Laden.” I accidentally deleted that in my post above. The moron portion is entirely Laden’s, though. And no, you can’t tell that he wrote it. . .he left it in the same typeface and line-structure as my original post.
It’s so bizarre that I’m genuinely wondering if something really serious is going on with him. I mean that honestly, without sarcasm, and without ill-will.
*stomps in*
Damn, but I’m mad at NBC. They just showed the luge accident video THREE TIMES. God. And I get CBC but not CTV, so I can’t switch to Canadian coverage of the Olympics this time. NBC, snuff film central.
Oh, and now they’re showing a video helpfully telling us Mericans what Canadians are like. Argh. I need a drink.
*looks around*
Oh, sorry. Let the Laden bashing continue.
Sorry I can’t join in on that, Carlie, as I don’t have TV (so I’m totally out of touch), but I’ll join you on the drinking part!
Josh, WTF?!
<checks> Yup.
Despicable.
Josh,
Oh. My. FSM. That’s just completely unacceptable. How fucking sleazy.
Carlie,
ugh. I had no idea there had been an accident (I don’t watch the news until 9:00 CST). It’s really sad that the man died, but why does NBC have to show the video over and over. That’s just creepy voyeurism.
Also just saw that there was a shooting at the Univ. of Alabama Huntsville – three faculty dead, two in critical condition, at least one more injured but stable. :( It was a biology faculty who had just been denied tenure that day and went into the afternoon faculty meeting.
HOLY SHIT GET OUT OF HERE
Ok, now that’s frightening. Not in any way comparable to all of the tragedies of today frightening, but in a “what on earth is actually happening in his head, because this has gone from hyperbolically unhinged to literally unhinged.”
I don’t have TV either, but since Carlie mentioned it, I checked out the news. He was clocked at 88mph/142kph just before he lost control of his luge and hit that metal support head first.
I don’t miss TV. At all.
If I can’t see it on hulu or netflix, I probably didn’t want to watch it anyway.
Remember, Canadians drink Molson or Lablat beer.
Oh yeah, he’s lost it well and truly: 160-164.
Bill Dauphin, Pygmy Loris, et al.:
I think the problem largely arises when people repeat political slogans as though they were universal laws of nature. In the real world, government intervention is neither uniformly bad nor uniformly good; it’s good in some situations and bad in others, depending on the circumstances and the social goals we’re trying to achieve. Reagan’s statement that “government is the problem” shouldn’t be read as laying down a universal rule that government can never be the right solution to anything. Leaving aside the question of whether Reagan was right, his slogan was a response to a specific set of problems and socio-economic conditions. It doesn’t mean that government action can never be justified in any situation. (Indeed, Reagan himself certainly didn’t follow the same approach in every policy decision; he massively expanded the role of government with regards to defence and foreign intervention, for instance.) Any conservative or libertarian today who simply repeats “government is the problem” as a mantra, as if it were applicable equally to every circumstance, is just an idiot, and has a very shallow understanding of political and economic theory.
There are some things that government should be doing, because they just can’t be done adequately by the private sector: policing, fire services, emergency management, the military, social security, conservation, and so on. These achieve broader social goals which can’t be attained by profit-motivated individual action alone. At the same time, there are other things that government is bad at, and that the private sector, with the laws of supply-and-demand, does much better: the manufacture and supply of consumer goods, for example. And there are still other areas in which a mix of government and private action is appropriate, such as education and health care.
There’s plenty of room for legitimate debate over what belongs in each category. But someone who simply says “government is the problem”, and insists on cutting every government service regardless of any evidence as to its usefulness, is not helping matters. Nor, equally, would it be useful to repeat a mantra like “government is good” or “government saves lives” and to offer legislative action as the right solution to every real or perceived social problem. Rather, the sensible thing is to look at evidence, determine the social and economic objectives we want to attain, and decide which services should be provided by government, which by the private sector, and which by a combination of both.
In other news: A former Blackwater employee claims Blackwater charged the government for prostitutes.
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/02/12/blackwater.suit/index.html
story on alabama.
The shooter was a woman, which is highly unusual (first of its kind, apparently). She was also taken into custody alive, which also doesn’t happen often. The article I just linked to, though, spends a lot of real estate on some student who had a concealed carry petition turned down and says that she’d feel safer if everyone on campus was packing heat. ‘Cause of course in a chaotic situation like someone opening fire in a lecture hall, she would have the presence of mind and accuracy to take out the shooter without hurting anyone else.
Of course. And if you don’t immediately assent to that impervious logic, you hate America. And you’re a feminazi bitch. And a faggot. And stuff.
Totally uncool. Just, wow….
Since Laden is doing that sort of editing, it’ll be a very long time before I go back to his blog.
Hey, I’m on Laden’s list of people whose comments get held for moderation. For calling out Stephanie for false equivalence. Nice.
Watch your posts, Paul. They’re likely to come out with words inserted by Greg, word that look like you wrote them.
In moderation, we’ll see if it goes. I wasn’t exactly measured, but that shit was ridiculous:
No, and don’t put those words in my mouth. You’ve been fucking slandering SC for days with shit like calling her “Salty Cracks” while refusing to actually answer to anything she said. If you said nothing, that is one thing. When you present things in a one sided fashion to make someone look bad, you do not deserve any such assumption of fairness (which is what I was talking about, Stephanie’s assertion that you and her deserve the same assumption of innocence that SC does in this situation).
That’s just, like, the worst blogbehavior I have ever heard of. Beyond buffoon, Laden is a dick, as I previously publicly suspected. *shrug* Lotta guys are.
Who can police the thread-police?
We are lucky that teh CO is not really so E.
I noticed, btw, that dendy received the banhammer. Anybody have a link?
I should add that if he had said nothing, the issue wouldn’t have came up in the first place because he would not have implied SC is an anti-semite. I wasn’t really thinking clearly while typing, because he’s seriously being ridiculous at this point.
Sven, the most frustrating part is that I’m unable to let anyone else there know that I didn’t write that. Laden won’t let any of my comments through now. That’s the most douchebaggy behavior I’ve ever, ever seen.
Walton @ 413
Agreed, but where is your action plan to get it done?
Or as Bill Dauphin, OM said
Josh, Official SpokesGay (and I still love your nick), Laden adding words to your post and not identifying them as his addition is … well, unbelievable. Can you imagine PZ ever doing that? No, you can’t, because to do something like that says, “I have no personal integrity.”
I’ve admired and enjoyed some of Laden’s past posts, so I can only assume that he’s lost perspective through some emotional or even physical problem. I was trying to think up an excuse for his attributing words to you that you didn’t post, and the only thing I can come up with is that he intended to identify the addition as his snide comment, but he messed up the formatting and failed to do so. Seems highly unlikely — he could have posted the snide comment without including it in your post.
Weather: Frozen! :-) There’s still some snow left, even though today was sunny enough for much to sublimate.
Jadehawk has left me alone on the “Religion: adaptation or byproduct?” thread to deal with both Frankosaurus and Hyperon! :-( They’re so clueless! So ignorant! Have they never known any babies personally?!?
And then come the pessimists and say that America was founded on escapism. <way too smug grin>
No, I think education can fix this in the long run. That means funding the public schools properly. And that means… hey, look, a vicious circle. Please stand by while I get my holy wrath.
Oh, while I am at it: China has completely privatized its health insurance market. It’s worse than in the USA: basically, there are hospitals for rich and hospitals for poor people, and the old people just die at home. I can still laugh about China now needs to introduce socialism, but then I can also laugh about the decades-long joke that is North Korea… :-|
No, actually, at half past 2 at night I can’t laugh at those anymore.
Because they don’t know any better.
And that’s because they get all their information, little as it is, from Faux Noise and/or other Reptilian propaganda outlets.
…on their side. On the employers’ side, a pay raise would be more consistent with it.
WTF.
o_O
O_o
0.8 Tc. Needs professional help. Has been needing it for an unclear but long stretch of time, as shown by the fact that he got all the way to 0.8.
What next?!? Will he make sockpuppets?
I think PZ should blog about this whole clusterfuck.
<headshake>
Josh,
He just gets sleazier and sleazier. That’s horribly dishonest behavior.
Why isn’t the whole company simply illegal. What happened to the violence monopoly of the state…
…oh, right, the 2nd Amendment. Carry on. <headdesk>
One reason why I don’t miss Holbach and his violent hero fantasies.
To the comment where it happened? I’ve seen it, but don’t remember exactly which thread it was in and can’t look for it right now…
Sorry, David, but you’re on your own. I killfiled both those cretins some time ago.
One of the best things about the Dungeon is that PZ links to the interns’ blogs.
That’s class, to me.
David,
Yeah, I saw. I couldn’t muster the will to confront them, in particular the egregious Hyperon, but they’re clearly clueless about women.
Sven, I will drop you off at the beginning of the end. PZ finally brings down the banhammer 141 comments later. There are lots of taunts by old fuckface in between. Have fun.
Ronald Reagan said Government was the problem, and he and his successors have spent the last 30 years trying to make it so. I was in college in 1980, and I saw the man speak. He was utterly incoherent.
But there were a lot of boarded up shops all over the US, we had people held hostage in Iran and Jimmy Carter was telling us we had a bad case of malaise.
Ronald Reagan may have been the worst President we ever had–mainly because he systematically dismantled the civil service, which was the mechansim by which we’d survived all the other crappy presidents we’d had. Now government has no autopilot, so when Junior got the keys to the country in 2000, I knew it was going to be bad. Sure enough, Junior crashed the country, just like he crashed Arbusto petroleum and every other thing he’d touched. And damned if in ten years you don’t have Republican Congressmen trying to pull the same crap with Bush they did with Reagan. Mark my words, I expect to see both these bastards up on Mt. Rushmore someday, even if they have to chisel them out of Thomas Jefferson’s forehead.
I’m going to engage in a bit of needless nationalism here.
The Star Spangled Banner is just so much more awesome than O Canada.*
However, the young woman who sang the anthem just now for the Opening Ceremony was phenomenal.
*I do like O Canada and actually know all the words from years of going to baseball games. For some reason we always got tickets for when our team was playing the Expos, so they always played both anthems before the games. This might be where my love for national anthems comes from. I think it’s interesting what different countries choose to represent them. I just wish American TV showed more of the medal ceremonies where other countries win gold. It’s really cool to hear the national anthems and see the athletes mouth along with them.
Carlie, thanks for the update, sad to hear about that.
Concealed carry was recently an issue here at UT Austin. I wonder how many of those who advocate for concealed carry, or even open carry for that matter, would actually prove to be cool heads in a firefight. I know there are numerous people who handle firearms with the caution, expertise, and proficiency that makes for safe ownership. I’m personally conflicted over the firearms issues that we have in the states, as I own one and come from a family that has long owned them and used them safely.
Ggranted, the rifle I own is a muzzle loader, so it’s not likely to do me much good in a surprise personal defense situation as anything other than a club: “Pardon me, intruder in my domicile, will you allow me the 30-seconds-to-1-minute I require to pour powder, seat and ram patch and ball [IYKWIMAITYD], pull the cocking trigger, set the hammer on half-cock, fish out and afix a percussion cap, pull the hammer to full-cock, raise, aim, and fire, in my defense? Perhaps we could adjourn outside and settle this at 10 paces?” To say nothing of whether I’d have the psychological fortitude to actually use a firearm to shoot at someone, and here’s hoping I never have to find out.
But I worry that for everyone who took firearm safety seriously, and diligently attended to it, there’d be one or more who were just looking to “get strapped,” and in the event of some disgruntled lunatic bent on solving a job/relationship/philosophical issue with gunplay, would do far more harm than good. Firefights are crazy, with noise, confusion, adrenaline, and panic. Every year there are hunters who fail to adequately assess what’s behind the animal they’re stalking, and someone gets hurt. Suddenly that situation is transported into a busy classroom, and with the potential for numerous firearms available? It’s sobering to say the least.
I don’t have an answer on this. But I worry that many people imagine that in a desperate situation they’d be Wyatt Earp at the O.K. Corral, when the reality is it takes a lot of time, practice, and careful attention to get there (to say nothing of the role pure chance plays in those circumstances.
Total information overload aside, but I’m also sad to hear about the luge accident. Need to get some dinner, and probably sign off. Long day, long week, I’m tired. Anyway, thanks for the updates, y’all.
Still learning,
Robert
Normally I wouldn’t bother with them, but for some reason my SIWOTI syndrome is strong tonight.
Pygmy Loris @ 435
What, because there are no bombs bursting instead of just standing on guard?
Fuck. Did Laden really do that? I was actually having a polite exchange with him at the Great Moments in Evolution thread. I just asked him if he is adding words to peoples posts without attribution. We will see if the comment goes through.
Bs
Carlie:
I dunno…. Maybe showing it three times was a bit much, but I thought generally they handled it like a straight-ahead news story, with reasonable dignity. And they did warn viewers before showing the video. I don’t really have much of a beef with them.
Yes, it went through. Now do I get an answer?
Personal note: I don’t have a TV either. I’m rather pleased to learn I am not alone in this matter. Also Hulu doesn’t work because of the slow connection.
Saw my first human face today after 5 days of isolation due to snowfall and other unrelated factors.
BS
He deleted my post. He’s lost it completely.
BS
Bill – I could have handled a picture of it, but to show the video crosses a line for me personally. Watching a person actually die is just too voyeuristic for me.
RMM Barrie,
Actually it’s the last two lines of the first verse “Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?”
It actually brings tears every time I sing it. Maybe I should specify that I like the first two verses of my national anthem. The third is just gross and the final has that god crap in it. This is why I oppose changing the national anthem to God Bless America or America the Beautiful. We don’t need god in our anthem.
PL (@435):
I actually feel just the opposite: Despite being a loyal American, I think the Canadian flag and O Canada totally pwn the SSB and our flag. That said, while I agree the young woman who sang O Canada tonight was very good, I hated that draggy arrangement.
The Georgian delegation was so sad. I read a news report about the accident and they said the track in Vancouver is one of the most dangerous in the world. Athletes are calling it the 50-50. It must be terribly frightening to be competing on that thing.
Ha!
Thanks, Janine. I see that I missed the ban by 5 comments and 9 minutes.
Bill,
TRAITOR!!! Liberal, commie bastard!!!! If you love Canada so much why don’t you go there!!1!!!!
Okay, that actually hurt to write. :)
The SSB pwns everyone on difficulty to sing. That’s why no one ever sings it properly. I’ve got news for all these pop stars they hire to do it at sporting events and such: the song has actual notes in it. I know when you’re hitting the wrong ones or making it up as you go along.
Yikes. This is so vexing. I administer the comments section for the organization I actually work for, and I would never, ever, consider altering a commenter’s words that way. If I have a problem with something a commenter says – for example, if they give out misleading information – I insert a comment [in brackets] and identify my comment as coming from the editor of the site. Or, I counter it with a post of my own.
The only comments I delete are complete spam, or that are so off-topic and feckless they’d derail the thread. And in those rare cases, I write directly to the commenter to let them know (when time permits).
Inserting words in a commenter’s mouth is (if I believed in it) a cardinal sin as far as I’m concerned. Deleting follow-up comments that question this action is a close second.
I’ve tried to give Laden the benefit of the doubt, but I’m at teh Fuck Right Off Douchebag point.
a_ray_in_dilbert_space #434
Working for the Treasury Department under Reagan was strange. Before him, while the appointed political leadership might posture and spin facts to meet ideology, the civil service wonks would just keep working, giving our political masters factual data for them to fold, spindle and mutilate. But when Reagan became Maximum Leader and Don Regan became Secretary of the Treasury, that changed.
Regan was a strong proponent of “Reagonomics” and wanted everyone to support it. He would get position papers from underlings and, if they weren’t ideologically pure, would write “unsatisfactory” in red marker across the title page and kick them back to the originator. Often he wouldn’t tell us the unsatisfactory particulars. He was not liked nor highly regarded by the civil service or even the other Treasury political appointees.
Regan’s replacement, James Baker, suffered from the same problem. Political purity was more important to him than reality. Fortunately he would listen to his Deputy Secretary, Dick Darman, who was a genuine economist and who would listen to us staff economists. Baker was a much more effective SecTreas than Regan, as shown by the Plaza Accord and the basic idea for the Baker Plan which was implemented in his successor’s Brady Plan
Blind Squirrel, yeah, I saw that. First it was there, then it wasn’t.
As good as a confession; and in such a classy way.
(He’s getting page hits from me, for now, because I find the debacle fascinating — but once this is over, nevermore.)
@ Blind Squirrel:
I haven’t had TV since I could no longer steal (with her permission) my neighbors’ cable and split the bill with her. I quickly found I didn’t miss it. And, when I’m subjected to it now in bars and airports, I actively resent being yelled at and condescended to by the idiots on “news” shows and by the fucking commercials. Once you’re weaned off it, you literally can’t stand watching it.
This isn’t some smug “I don’t watch TV, and I look down on those who do” thing. Not at all. There’s nothing wrong with enjoying it. But I doubt I could ever go back to it. in my own house.
‘nother TV-free domicile
My comment was: “Greg, are you really adding words to peoples posts with out attribution?” I think he has closed the thread. There has been no new posts for 20 minutes. I picture him trembling, cowering behind his sofa.
BS
needless to say, I am a White Person
One good Clenched Tentacle Salute deserves another!
OMG, Sven, please don’t send me to Stuff White People Like. I’ll never, ever get to bed because I’ll be puking my guts out from laughter.
If I may lower the discourse a notch or two, let me introduce you to People of Walmart. Yes, it’s classist. It’s not at all nice. It’s probably most unseemly, and ethically questionable. But I like it.
I’m going to go against the grain and say I love TV! The bf has the fancy TV (i.e. cable) and I watch it all the time. My house is essentially TVless ever since the digital transition. I don’t pick up enough signal to even watch broadcast TV anymore and I refuse to pay for it.
Trainwreck :
Damn, I knew it !!!
:P
I had the same thought, Elaine maybe, it’s a common name, the 2 others pretty sure I hadn’t seen before.
I agree with David M, I think PZ should blog about this, because the damage is not only to Greg’s and his blogs reputation, but also to the reputation of Pharyngula readers and commenters, and of how people perceive the level and quality of discourse here.
If this indeed occurred while your post was held in moderation, it would utterly ruin his credibility, or what’s left of it.
Pygmy Loris @ 444
Agreed is the best two lines. The problem is the violence in the rest of it, and can get somewhat reflected with news events of this evening in the U.S.
The Canadian anthem is boring, just like us in many ways, but is reflective of the country after we got away from singing God Save the Queen (King). Sorry Walton et al., but when we phoned and said we were leaving, that was it, no revolution to lose again.
For those not familiar, since it is short, am pasting the English version:
O Canada!
Our home and native land!
True patriot love in all thy sons command.
With glowing hearts we see thee rise,
The True North strong and free!
From far and wide,
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
God keep our land glorious and free!
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
O Canada, we stand on guard for thee.
As can be seen, the god parts are a mutual problem. At least our appeal is to a non existent entity, instead of war.
Pygmy, girl, then leech off that boyfriend’s cable, absolutely! I’m too damned cheap to pay for it too, but I have no compunctions about soakin’ up other peoples’ TV shows if they invite me over. I pay for my high speed intertubes because I cannot go without my Pharyngulas, and other tube-based entertainments.
I think that inserting language into a comment without self-attribution, and then deleting comments that ask about it, should be grounds for getting kicked out of ScienceBlogs altogether.
I’d go over and ask about it, but at this point I’m skeeved out just thinking of him having my email address as filled out on the comment form.
Post are getting through on Laden’s blog and are being deleted by the minute. Why doesn’t he just hold them all in moderation?
BS
@Rorschach:
Laden did, indeed, insert words into my post so as to make it seem I said things that I didn’t. I know, it’s really unbelievable. Read up in this thread for the details.
#12. And a no-holds-barred Bora Z. (who likely isn’t fond of me after this Gee thing):
and
That’s exactly what I argued to Mooney a while back.
***
Josh and others:
Maybe I shouldn’t be, but I’m shocked.
I am, too.
449 Josh, Official SpokesGay
What is the URL for your blog. I want access, and I want to say whatever comes to mind in the comments on your blog and I want you to like it. Would that be fair?
Oh,wait, you don’t have a blog. You’re just some asshole who likes to temporarily own other people’s blogs.
Do correct me if I’m wrong. But here, not on my blog. I just threw out the trash and I don’t like to do that too often.
Any further comments on this issue that show up on my site will result in … me having my way with you.
I think he just changed another post and substituted the person’s nym for his e mail address. I’m not completely sure. Did anyone get a screen capture?
BS
Greg Laden:
You put words in my mouth, and you made it seem as if I’d said them. That’s not fair play. You don’t have to allow me to comment on your blog. You have every right to ban me if you want, and you have every right to mock me or any comment I make on your blog.
But you don’t have the ethical right to edit my comments to make it seem like I said things I didn’t say. That’s dirty pool. I wouldn’t do that to anyone, no matter how much I disagreed with what they said.
Is that you, Greg? Do you honestly not understand the difference between doing your own moderation, sometimes deleting comments you don’t like, and making up shit and writing it in a comment so that it appears to have come from another actual person?
BS,
How do I do that?
Bill Dauphin, OM @445
And could I interest you in a little universal health care plan?
RMM Barrie,
It’s violent, but it’s about our first victory after the Revolutionary War. The British may have burned Washington, but we beat ’em and our anthem exists just to rub it in.
Some things bring out irrational patriotism in me, reading the Constitution and Declaration of Independence, watching the Olympics, singing the national anthem.
Of course I’m normally a “blame America first” liberal ;)
BS – the last comment there a few minutes ago was by CCP (with active link), without the “me” comment at the bottom. That one’s gone, with it quoted and the “me” bit after, by another name altogether.
Cute.
Laden’s ethical breaches multiply. He just published my private e-mail address here. I had entered my real initials in the ‘Name’ slot and he put up the e-mail instead.
He also added the words “Me. And you are next.” to my comment, without attribution, for the record. Is there a record?
I’m actually starting to feel bad for the guy, though also royally pissed off.
There is a Firefox add-on for that. I don’t have it. I don’t know about Windoze except that there are free stand alone programs you can download. Anyone?
BS
There is no limit to what I will do to abusive commenters. None. You can imagine whatever rules you like. You can imagine that you have some sort of right to tell me what the rules are. But that is no more real than unicorns and leprechauns.
If you are unsure of my policies, read my about page. But do be aware that I have the right to arbitrarily change them if it amuses me to do so.
Oh. My. God. Sven.
I hesitated to even mention this, but I’m hoping PZ can have a private talk with Greg. I can understand why he doesn’t want to get involved with this, but Greg has gone way, way too far.
Laden,
You’re being a dishonorable person and you’re acting in bad faith. Your sycophants may not mind, but the rest of us are watching.
I have IE.
Carlie: That jibes with my impression.
BS
Reminds me :
Show must go on
Curious, it now shows up as the commenters email address in the name field, I wonder if he has decided to publish email addresses ?
delusional
Do we need to start writing directly to the Scienceblogs administration, Greg? You’re way out of line.
OMG THE PYGMY LORIS IS WATCHING ME.
Oh, were you aware of the fact that we are trying to avoid using the word “pygmy” even when it fits into an existing animal name because it is considered insensitive and inappropriate?
It’s a little tricky when it comes to animal names because they are somewhat standardized. But certainly, to use such a term as your handle is unnecessary. You really should be fucking ashamed of yourself, either for your racism or your abject ignorance.
Sven,
This is why I have a separate e-mail address just for commenting on blogs and registering for various sites.
Holy crap. Does he somehow think that he is tagging them as blogowner comments? Because that’s the only thing that even makes the remotest bit of sense, that he’s replying to you by saying “me” as the author. But then the threat of “you’re next”, and publishing your email address with an obvious name on it – that’s even a worse ethical breach in my mind than adding comments, because exposing someone’s nym and real name and address is violating an expectation of privacy that everyone on ScienceBlogs has adhered to up until this point.
Fuck, people have reasons for using pseudonyms. And it’s none of anyone else’s fucking business to judge why they use them. Some people might do it just for fun, others might have serious repercussions to worry about from their job, their family, scary stalker exes, etc. It isn’t anyone’s business to question them, and it sure as hell isn’t ever anyone’s prerogative to decide to expose them.
That makes me entirely speechless with rage. There is really no lower place to sink from here, in my opinion.
OK, backing up a bit. Do we know if the recent commenter is actually Greg Laden? Perhaps not, and I shouldn’t jump to that conclusion without evidence.
SC:
1. Press the Print Screen key on your keyboard. It may be labeled [PrtScn].
2. Open an image editing program, such as Microsoft Paint.
3. Go to the Edit menu and choose Paste.
4. If prompted to enlarge the image, choose Yes.
5. Optional: Use your image editor’s crop tool to crop out unnecessary portions of the screen shot.
6. Go to the File Menu and choose Save As.
7. Navigate to the folder where you want to save the image.
8. Type a file name for the image.
9. Select a file type.
10. Click the Save button.
Tips:
1. Hold the Alt key down while pressing Print Screen to capture only the active window.
2. Generally the GIF format works best when saving screen shots of application windows. The JPEG format usually makes screen shots (especially those with text) blurry, blotchy and discolored.
3. See related resources below for more screen shot tips and listings of screen capture software that offers many more options for capturing screens and portions of screens on Windows and Macintosh computers.
4. The Windows “clipboard” is a term used to describe the temporary storage space in memory where an item is placed when you copy or cut. When you paste, the item is transferred to the program you’re working in. If you copy something else, the old item is replaced with the new. You can’t manipulate the clipboard directly; it’s only used for copy and paste operations.
5. If you have windows Vista, you can capture screen shots much more easily using the Snipping Tool included with Vista.
or install this: http://www.etrusoft.com/
BS
I have it. Thank you, snip tool.
Josh,
Do you think it’s not Laden? This person just outright called me a racist. I’m literally shaking with rage right now.
Greg Laden @ 466:
You’re wrong. On more than one front. Moderating does not include editing other people’s posts in such a manner. I’m a moderator (not on sciblogs), and I wouldn’t dream of doing what you’ve done. You have seriously fucked up and you keep making it worse. You’ve lost all credibility with me and I won’t be visiting your “blog” anymore.
No, we don’t.We also don’t know if he is indeed editing comments, because no screen dump pre and posts of this have been shown.
At this point, all I would like to say if Greg is reading this is, please step away from the computer and from blogging for 48 hours, because nothing good can come out of this mess at this point.I’ll glady do my part and not comment about it in here anymore.
This is getting very weird, and it was already pretty weird.
Pygmy Loris @ 472
There is indeed a lot to be proud of, so understand your sentiments.
Actually it was us who came to Washington and burned (a little bit)the house of the President. At the time it was blue, so you guys overnight whitewashed it, and in the morning nothing was said about any fire. The origins of The White House.
I don’t think it would do much good for bystanders to do so, but I would strongly urge Josh and Sven to contact SciBlog administration about the breaches they’ve just experienced. Those are both seriously out of line things to do, and SciBlogs should be aware that one of their bloggers is doing it.
Josh: good point.
I too use a garbage email address. Everyone should since it seems like we can’t trust the people we thought we could trust. I don’t believe I have ever seen someone who styles them self a professional melt down so completely. It’s actually creepy.
BS
Holy shit. Sven, I’m sorry you’ve been subjected to such despicable treatment. This is waaaay over the line.
Shouldn’t the SciBorg overlords be able to tell, though? I would imagine that there are digital records of all submissions/comments/edits/and such on backup.
Person posting as Greg Laden,
Could you please point me to some references as to the inappropriateness of using the term pygmy in relation to animal names? I actually love the pygmy loris and that is why I chose it as my pseudonym. I have never heard anything about there being any controversy surrounding the term pygmy in animal names.
1. I don’t know definitively if the person posting here on Pharyngula is, in fact, Greg Laden.
2. I do know definitively that whoever moderates comments on Greg Laden’s blog did alter my post by adding words I didn’t say
I’m fed the fuck up with this shit. No one wants to be the tattle who goes to the principal, but Laden’s behavior is way, way beyond the pale.
Cut the shit Greg, or I’ll play dirty too.