Weirdly, in the first bit of the video clip, Stein says “life did not originate randomly….[slight pause]…not by random mutation and natural selection” but, in the second bit of the video clip, he just says “randomness” and leaves off “and natural selection”. He doesn’t seem to realise that he has the answer to his misunderstanding of evolution in the very first words he spoke. Or am I missing something?
robrosays
Good lord, I hope it’s not all scientific here! I appreciate the scientific parts, of course, as well as the atheist parts. But I also like the social justice messages, and the pissed off at the messed up world rants. The animal pictures. The cat. And the new baby.
This was a pretty good one, PZ, although I think seeing you talk on camera is fine. Thanks particularly for the Shelley quote. It’s already posted on my FaceBook page for all my creationist friends to ignore.
suttkussays
Okay, that comic book at the end of the video, what’s that from?
That’s the Big Stone River in Russia. Little known fact: every rock was hand-carved by Communist artisans, and then carefully placed in intricate and meaningful patterns by expert symbologists.
wcaryksays
Heh!
That’s very impressive though.
jrkrideausays
You are denying randomness!
What did you say your chair’s phone number was, again?
Nice piece of work but the vocabulary is assuming a university level education or equivalent.
Even without going into genetics, I am left wondering – if you somehow scanned a beach, counting all grains of sand, and where they are in relation to each other, would that “information” only exist after you collect it, or does it exist, inherent in the bloody sand? Stupid question, I know, but allowing for a moment that the people pondering this are creationists, if the answer is no, they would be right, but it begs the question of how that information references anything at all in the real world, if not derived from it (whcih it can’t be, if the information didn’t already exist, to be collected). If the answer is yes, it did exist, then what.. their “god” fiddled every bloody grain of sand into place, knowing some joker would want to know how many there are, at some point, and how they relate to each other?
This, to me, is the true absurdity. They keep coming up with bloody complicated things, like genes, and saying, “That’s designed, because *information*!”, but its a BS argument when *everything* contains information, even if they find it trivial or useless information.
David Marjanovićsays
He doesn’t seem to realise that he has the answer to his misunderstanding of evolution in the very first words he spoke. Or am I missing something?
Weirdly, in the first bit of the video clip, Stein says “life did not originate randomly….[slight pause]…not by random mutation and natural selection” but, in the second bit of the video clip, he just says “randomness” and leaves off “and natural selection”. He doesn’t seem to realise that he has the answer to his misunderstanding of evolution in the very first words he spoke. Or am I missing something?
Good lord, I hope it’s not all scientific here! I appreciate the scientific parts, of course, as well as the atheist parts. But I also like the social justice messages, and the pissed off at the messed up world rants. The animal pictures. The cat. And the new baby.
This was a pretty good one, PZ, although I think seeing you talk on camera is fine. Thanks particularly for the Shelley quote. It’s already posted on my FaceBook page for all my creationist friends to ignore.
Okay, that comic book at the end of the video, what’s that from?
“Fall of Cthulhu”
Where is that vast field of boulders? Very striking.
— cary
That’s the Big Stone River in Russia. Little known fact: every rock was hand-carved by Communist artisans, and then carefully placed in intricate and meaningful patterns by expert symbologists.
Heh!
That’s very impressive though.
You are denying randomness!
What did you say your chair’s phone number was, again?
Nice piece of work but the vocabulary is assuming a university level education or equivalent.
Even without going into genetics, I am left wondering – if you somehow scanned a beach, counting all grains of sand, and where they are in relation to each other, would that “information” only exist after you collect it, or does it exist, inherent in the bloody sand? Stupid question, I know, but allowing for a moment that the people pondering this are creationists, if the answer is no, they would be right, but it begs the question of how that information references anything at all in the real world, if not derived from it (whcih it can’t be, if the information didn’t already exist, to be collected). If the answer is yes, it did exist, then what.. their “god” fiddled every bloody grain of sand into place, knowing some joker would want to know how many there are, at some point, and how they relate to each other?
This, to me, is the true absurdity. They keep coming up with bloody complicated things, like genes, and saying, “That’s designed, because *information*!”, but its a BS argument when *everything* contains information, even if they find it trivial or useless information.
Nope.