The Potterverse needs this retcon

I am not a fan of the Harry Potter books (what was that noise? So that’s what a million people simultaneously unsubscribing sounds like!) — my kids enjoyed them, we’ve got all of them around here somewhere, and I read the first couple of them, but they were just a bit too repetitive for my taste, and also too familiar. But don’t worry, I can understand how a lot of people liked them.

But now I’ve read a rewrite of the main story line, with Hermione as the main character. Much better! That’s a story I’d read to the end!

A papal conundrum

Uh-oh. The Pope has just grossly insulted my beliefs.

I believe you have a right to criticize anything — I go further and think you have an obligation to criticize.

I also believe that violence is never the answer, and that the proper response to words is more words, not flinging punches.

But look at what this pope is saying, violating what I hold dear.

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Apparently, scientists need to work on educating themselves

The results of a survey of university scientists are surprising and odd.

Surprisingly, 87% of scientists think there is a scientific method that describes the way scientists do their work. Most of them believe in the old hypothesis → testing –→ theory view that hasn’t been popular among experts for many decades.

Almost half (49%) of natural scientists and 29% of social scientists thought that science was independent of social and cultural biases.

Almost half (48%) of all scientists believed that a theory becomes a law when it is proven.

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We got mentioned on Boing Boing!

That’s the good news. The bad news it’s in an article about rage-blogging, click-baiting, witch-hunting professional victimizers who profit greatly from online hate.

Oh, not us. I know those are accusations frequently leveled against freethoughtblogs, but the irony is that it’s the other side that has been doing a really good job of monetizing obsessive hatred. While we struggle with really ugly ads (we hate them too) just to keep a maintenance level of support for our small community of writers, the gamergate goons and people like Phil Mason have tapped into a much more lucrative income stream: misogyny pays.

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I get email

Did you know there are actually a bunch of low traffic, negligibly interesting, obsessive web sites out there dedicated to hating me? I know. Weird. I can understand disliking me, that’s not at all surprising…but to really, really detest me, and then spend hours scrutinizing every post and every comment on Pharyngula to find things you don’t like, and then to spend more time scribbling up poorly written rebuttals on the most obscure website you can create, well, that’s what I find incomprehensible.

What I do sort of understand, though, is the desire to be noticed. Invariably, these same sad obsessives who have been toiling away at an utterly neglected blog will write to me, demanding that I notice them.

I do.

Imagine how you would feel if someone spent months gathering shit and then sculpting it into a crude bust of yourself (well, they say it’s you…but it’s more like a lump of sagging sludge), and then unveiled it to you and declared their intent to expand it into a monumental equestrian statue, because they hate you so much. “Look at me, look at me!” they scream.

OK, look at “Bob Jones”.

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