People, I’m out of town! I’m taking a break! How about if the loons also take a little time off and stop pestering me with silly complaints?
No, they won’t. This guy is irate about an ancient quote from me — something I said and still stand by about how we shouldn’t be nice to the frauds of creationism. I get sent this quote fairly regularly.
In his book on Intelligent Design, Dr. Jonathan Wells gives the following quote from a University of Minnesota professor named Paul Z. Myers:
“The only appropriate response should involve some form of righteous fury, much butt-kicking, and the public firing of some teachers, many schoolboard members, and vast numbers of sleazy far-right politicians…It’s time for scientists to break out the steel-toed boots and brass knuckles, and get out there and hammer on the lunatics and idiots.”
This was in the chapter on Darwinists, their strident nature and willingness to employ machiavellian tactics to achieve their war on traditional and orthodox Christians.
“Machiavellian”? Saying that we ought to be blunt and undiplomatic and angry about the lies of creationists is kind of the opposite of Machiavellian. But this fellow goes on to really teach me a lesson.
Notice Myers uses the term “righteous fury”. How ironic. There is nothing righteous about him. I recall Professor Johanneson in my college days in Los Angeles who also was from the University of Minnesota, and who even way back in the 60’s was wildly and radically liberal. I was given a C in his class after getting all As on his tests. His explanation was “I must insure that people like you do not succeed”). I appreciated his honesty if not his world view!
Uh, what? I do not know this Johanneson fellow. He’s complaining about his grade in a class in the 1960s? I was at best 12 years old; I rather doubt that I had much to do with his grade. I also rather doubt the truth of his story; there are rather strong requirements about openness and documenting grades, and if a professor downgraded him with the intent of doing him harm there are all kinds of avenues for getting redress. More likely he did well on exams (but maybe not as well as he remembers) and that there were other components that were part of his grade.
But OK, if we accept his unlikely story as true, I will condemn the actions of Dr Johanneson. It hardly has anything to do with me, though. I guess this gomer just assumes Minnesota professors are all alike.
But the same sort of arrogant (and sometimes violent) dismissal of any views that are Biblically based, are imposed on our kids by University professors all over (yes even Texas) and they appear to be cut from the same cloth, a robe of virulent, ungodly and egotistical humanism.
They can not totally suppress the truth, and I think God for Scientists like Jonathan Sarfati, Henry Morris, Jonathan Wells and oh, don’t forget the founder of modern science, Sir Issac Newton who wrote more on religion than he did science!!
Piperwill
Creationists don’t get to call others egotistical. Sorry, guy, but you’re engaged in wholesale denial of physics, chemistry, geology, and biology, which takes an amazing lack of humility. Your short list of creationists is mostly loons — and Newton is not remembered for his writings on religion.
It is nice to see that I could write something in 2005 that still irritates creationists.
Creationists seem so quaint nowadays what with the likes of the alt-right and other deplorable characters about.
@1: “Creationists seem so quaint nowadays what with the likes of the alt-right and other deplorable characters about.”
I think many if not most of these “alt right” folks are creationists too. All part of the prion disease that seems to be melting the brains of America. And when I say America I include Canada where I live because the “right” up here is going for the same craziness that the USA has contracted – just look at the election in Ontario where Drumpf light is still the leading candidate, alas.
Sure he didn’t crib this story from an Ayn Rand novel? Jack Chick tract?
I notice he doesn’t say what the course was. Did it have problem sets to turn in? Was there lab work to do?
He got a mediocre grade for disagreeing with the instructor…perhaps. Of course, Christians are the pinnacle of fairness and forgiveness, and never, ever punish students who disagree with them. The Southern Baptist college I attended expelled two men for getting caught in each others arms. Another student was expelled for just being seen walking out of a bar in Knoxville. Women students were sent home for entering their dorm a few minutes past curfew. Taking a male student up to their room…you can imagine. In 1968 after King’s murder and the US flag was flying at half-mast in his honor, one male student took it upon himself to raise the flag back to the top. Of course, he wasn’t expelled.
Rather convenient the letter writer doesn’t give the name of this supposed professor, or of what school he supposedly took classes at.
Oops, that should be “first name of this supposed professor….”
Why didn’t he just fail him? That would have stopped him.
“virulent, ungodly and egotistical humanism”
Not seeing the downside here.
I think what they’re trying to say, PZ, is that they are interpreting “righteous fury” to mean or include actions like that of Johanneson’s (assuming this really happened). Yes, I suspect this despite your quote saying nothing about punishing students by faking their grades. I don’t expect their argument to be coherent or logical. :)
That’s his own fault for not buying grade ensurance.
He’s got Irritable Creationist Syndrome, poor sod.
Professor Johanneson was “wildly and radically liberal”! He said “Happy Holidays” all OVER the place!
PZ
Is the babby still cnute?
Wait, did you get sent e-mail that refers to you in the 3rd person?
Creationists always lie.
The whole idea is a lie from start to finish anyway.
His story about a professor in LA in the 1960’s isn’t really believable.
I seriously doubt he was ever at a college or university ever.
That they are overrun by radical leftists is a myth.
Jordan PeaBrain Peterson is a university professor for Cthulhu’s sake.
Yes, Newton wrote a lot about religion. But he would have considered most Americans and evangelicals to be heretics. You can’t claim support from someone who thinks you’re a heretic. Especially when nobody cares about his religion writings.
Proof! Proof!! Proof he is a modern-day Cnute the Great, planning to invade, as speculated in another thread.
The original Cnuate, according to the cited link, gave generously to the church of the time. Albeit like Newton, he’s also perhaps better remembered for other things.
“virulent, ungodly and egotistical”
I’m not sure why, but that word always makes me think of John Betjeman’s poem An Incident in the Early Life of Ebenezer Jones, Poet, 1828 and the lines:
“The godly usher left his godly seat,
“His skin was prickly in the ungodly heat,
“The dog lay panting at his godly feet.”
whereupon the usher kills the poor thing, Ebenezer shouts “YOU SHALL NOT!”, and
“Blind desolation! bleeding, burning rod!
“Big, bull-necked Minister of Calvin’s God!”
Ah! Those wacky Christians!
To the idiot who sent this email:
Your “truth” is a pack of ridiculous ad hoc distortions of science, and the “scientists” you mentioned (other than Newton) are a pack of frauds and hacks who’ve contributed nothing to science and mostly just appropriate and cannibalize the work of the real scientists that they hate.
You don’t get to call us arrogant when you think you speak for the infallible creator of the universe.
Also, nice job taking a metaphor about brass knuckles literally. No one on our side has ever physically assaulted anyone on yours.
Keep yer eyes on them, they are still up to truly Machiavellian trickery. For instance, Can You Teach Evolution Without Saying the Word? Arizona Is About to Find Out (24 May):
Public comments on this nonsense have now apparently closed.
The Governor, Doug Ducey, is quoted as firmly opposed to this nonsense, Arizona’s governor supports evolution in the state science standards:
† Set in as the intention seems to be the colloquial meaning, not the technical (scientific) meaning — that is, obfuscation. This far more detailed report, Evolution comes under fire in Arizona (23 May), makes clear Superintendent Douglas is trotting out multiple cretinist nonsenses, e.g., , , and so on, and also believes cretinism should be taught as science (but is apparently smart enough to realise she cannot mandate that, hence all the obfuscation).
Also note that Newton did not confuse science and religion. He never used “God did it” to explain the phenomenons he was studying. Bruce is right; Newton would have kicked some creationists’ butt if he had lived today.
Apropos of nothing much, he may have been a bit confused between legend and actuality when he write to write a (eurocentric) history of the world using plausible techniques — relative dating, multiple sources, astronomy, and so on — at least when he tried to pin down the dates by using the voyage of Jason and the Argonauts as a fixed point (The Chronology of the Ancient Kingdoms Amended), dating it as 937 BCE. He also dabbled in alchemy.
Much of that was presumably common belief at the time, with perhaps Newton’s contribution trying to be far more precise about it all. But the main point remains, whilst including improbable religious figures and events in his Chronology, he didn’t confuse them or religion with science.
How is it that PZ can recommend Nazi-style violence–“steel-toed boots and brass knuckles”–and no one here sees this as dubious? Has anyone here ever considered the thought that such language helps the creationists, which is why they love to use quotations from him?
Oh no arnhart we’ve neeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeever thought of that.
me@23: he write to write a… → he tried to write a… or he wrote a…
(In my defence, I think was writing to write that when the timer dinged for dinged lunch…)
arnhart@24,
Thanks for demonstrating once again what utter fuckwits Peterson’s fanboys are – in your case, unable to recognise even the most obvious metaphorical speech.
KG at 27-
We all know that PZ’s quoted statement was metaphorical, but someone who accepts that dragons and witches are real will find that hard to understand.
Only metaphorical? Isn’t that what Sara Huckabee Sanders has said in defending some of Trump’s comments?
I’d be a little bit more impressed if you were capable of putting this in context. You know, that context you Peterson cult trolls always whine about when we quote Peterson’s long list of hates and hate speech.
Creationists and fundie xians love to send out death threats.
Many scientists have gotten them, including myself.
PZ Myers has gotten death threats and hate emails numbering in the thousands at the least over decades.
In one day, he once got over a hundred death threats.
And there is some serious backing to these death threats.
Xian terrorism has been a problem in the USA for decades.
They have murdered 7 of my colleagues and wounded dozens more.
One of PZ’s attackers was arrested by the Canadian police.
Two of the people who threatened me were arrested by the FBI.
Death threats are a felony.
rietpluim @22:
Not quite. He reckoned that God would have to step in to stop orbits becoming unstable due to gravitational perturbations.
Where can I get a robe like that? Sounds comfy.
I don’t get the connection between “steel-toed boots and brass knuckles” and Nazis.
What a Maroon,… @32
Try her:
https://www.arcamax.com/thefunnies/speedbump/s-2080923
fusilier
James 2:24
His story of getting a C after testing with all As is bullshit. I’m calling bullshit. Take it from someone who was fucked over by a professor with a grade – they don’t explain themselves. They enjoy gaslighting you.
At risk of furthering arnhart’s derail of the thread, his hero Jordan Peterson himself is entranced with violence and uses violent rhetoric often.
It’s disturbing. It doesn’t make me want to follow him. It does make me want to take out a restraining order.
A few quotes below. My comments are in bold.
1. And you call me a fascist? You sanctimonious prick. If you were in my room at the moment, I’d slap you happily. Jordan Peterson on twitter
2. .that it’s unfortunate that men can’t control women who say crazy things because they aren’t allowed to hit them
How about crazy men like Peterson. We aren’t allowed to hit them either.
Peterson admires violence and is frustrated that he can’t be violent towards women.
Guy is a sick puppy.
3. ..says stuff like “Men cannot oppose pathological women because chivalry demands they keep their most potent weapons sheathed” on twitter
That violence thing again. I would be very surprised if Peterson doesn’t have a history of violence against women, children, and pets. Anything smaller and weaker than himself.
There is lots more. Pages and pages of sick garbage like this.
People, let’s not let the pea-brained troll derail the thread.
So what? The fact that PZ’s language was clearly metaphorical does not mean Sanders wasn’t lying – as she does in practically every statement she gives – when she claimed Trump’s comments were. Really, can’t you do better than that?
re OP letter:
In college, getting series of A’s on quizzes, does not guarantee a passing grade on final exam, which may have 50% weight of final grade. I know from experience. *sigh*
and
could easily have left out the preceding statement of “I saw you cheating on all those quizzes and let each pass, so…”
–
re Newton:
Newton was hardly religious, in the modern sense, he did explore alchemy as a valid science, while remaining firmly rooted in the development of hard science and mathematics. To idolize him for being “religious” is missing 98% of him.
slithey tove@39,
I’m afraid that’s simply wrong. Newton spent a lot of time and effort working out (from the Bible) when the world would end. He was not, however, the kind of Christian PZ’s correspondent would recognise. Specifically, he was a Unitarian, who denied the divinity of Jesus. He kept fairly quiet about this publicly, as it could have ended his career and maybe worse.
@raven:
may I make a mild correction? You may know more than I and thus I may be the one who is wrong, but I think
might be a slip of the brain and that
might be more accurate.
We are talking about Markuze, right? The guy who was arrested for harassment including many, many death threats? I don’t think he ever made a physical attack on PZ…
…but then, I just realized that you might be speaking about “attackers” in a sense that is not necessarily limited to the physical. In that case, you are right again. At this point, I wouldn’t even post this comment, but since I first thought you meant a physical attacker, I think I’ll post it anyway just for clarification, not correction.
expanding on slithey tove‘s #39
Subjecting the claims of alchemy, astrology or homeopathy to empirical testing isn’t anti-science. Nor is writing a treatise that gathers together things other people have claimed, true or false, so long as it’s clear you’re anthologizing and not making claims for yourself without evidence. Heck, you can even make those claims without evidence as long as it’s framed a certain way. In fact, this:
is probably exactly the statement you would want a good scientist to make if she were brought up in the 1500s and educated in the best schools of the western European tradition.
I haven’t read any Galileo, so I’m not commenting one way or another on his writing except to make the point that not only is merely mentioning a pseudoscience far less evidence than one would need to prove a writer unscientific, but one can even support pseudoscience if the information in one’s cultural milieu makes that credible and if one withholds the amount of certainty appropriate to any claim not yet rigorously and empirically tested.
Based on what little I know, I’d be strongly loathe to dismiss Galileo’s scientific rigor based on mentions of hypotheses common in his day.
@slithey tove:
Nope.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton%27s_occult_studies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_views_of_Isaac_Newton
You might be thinking of the physicists who built on Newton’s work, especially Pierre Laplace, but Newton was as theololgical as they get.
@KG:
“Arian” is the more commonly-used term (see the WikiP page above), but the meanings of that and “Unitarian” do seem to have some overlap. Newton was very cagey about his exact beliefs (and they may well have changed over time).
@Crip Dyke:
How about calculating the approximate date of the apocalypse based on the books of Daniel and Revelation?
@Owlmirror:
Not inherently, though it could be.
If you’re calculating it and saying, “The is the date predicted in the bible, we can make new statements about the bible’s accuracy by waiting until that date and then observing whether or not any apocalypse happens,” then you’re doing something scientific, if not precisely doing science.
If you’re calculating it and saying, “Haha – the christians think the world will end on this date, the morons!” then you’re engaging in mockery, which is definitely not scientific, but isn’t necessarily anti-scientific.
If you’re calculating it and saying, “The bible asserts this to be so, as best as I can figure,” then you’re engaging in nothing more than textual analysis of the type that any modern critical reader of the Epic of Gilgamesh might perform. It’s not precisely scientific, but it’s related (and certainly not opposed) because you are engaged in straightforward observation followed by critical thinking about the information you’ve observered.
If you’re calculating it and saying, “The bible asserts this to be so, and therefore it is so,” then you’re engaging in religion and you’re definitely being anti-scientific.
I simply have no idea of what Galileo might have said, and have no way of judging the context (especially in the original language, but even in translation). I have no reason not to take whatever you say to be provisionally true, but if **all** you say is that he wrote about astrology or extrapolations of biblical dates (without telling me what he wrote) that doesn’t really tell me anything about his religiosity.
Newton did make an apocalyptic prediction — for 2060 CE. Nonetheless, he did not confuse science with religion, despite his inability to account for orbital instability.
@ 45 Crip Dyke
Where does Galileo come in? I thought this thread had drifted into Newton.
Machiavellian is used so many ways as to be almost meaningless, but if brass knuckles brutality is meant one can do no better than Nicolo’s notoriously ruthless acquaintance Cesare Borgia and sidekick Micheletto (the cheese wire guy). A Borgian approach to diplomacy, quoting Machiavelli (in Miles Unger’s Machiavelli: a Biography ) : “Messer Remirro this morning has been found cut in two in the piazza, where he remains and
where all the people may still see him. The reason for his death is not well known,
except that it was pleasing to the Prince, who wishes to show that he can make or
unmake men at will, according to their just deserts.”
And more Borgian just deserts:
“Machiavelli describes a conversation Corella had with Oliverotto da Fermo on 31 December 1502: “Therefore Don Michele rode off and joined Oliverotto, telling him that it was not right to keep his men out of their quarters, because these might be taken up by the men of the duke; and he advised him to send them at once to their quarters and to come himself to meet the duke.”[5]
On the night of 31 December 1502, Vitellozzo Vitelli and Oliverotto da Fermo, who had been arrested under Cesare’s command, were strangled to death, supposedly by Corella (hinted in Machiavelli’s letter of 31 December).”
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micheletto_Corella
Not a gamer but I hear this guy was on Assassin’s Creed.
jrkrideau, Galileo, Newton, Nostradamus, Padre Pio, Mr Carpenterson of Nazareth, Itzamna, Распу́тин, and on and on and on (and on) …— what’s the difference, eh ?
</snark>(Yes, I also find the sudden mention of Galileo without any explanatory context confusing…)
@jrkrideau
My bad. Please accept my apologies for the error.
Is it permissible for any of you to ever disagree with PZ? I have noticed that he ridicules Peterson’s “fanboys.” But I have also noticed that you all seem to be boys who compete in showing your agreement with PZ.. Am I wrong about this? Are there any women here? Or is it all young men?
Can the troll be banned already?
Why not ask PZ, whose permission we would need? Whatever he says, I’ll tell you the opposite.
I’ve got a more ambitious question for you: are you right about anything?
arnhart #51
What criteria are you using to determine the age and gender of people who you “know” based on text on a screen?
How stupid are you?
arnhart posts immediately after a comment by Crip DYKE.
fFs, arnhart: are you trying to be as sexist as possible, or do you get it from your lobster genes?
also:
Is anyone allowed to disagree with PZ? Hmmm. I don’t know.
Probably thinks that means something like “person who cripples dykes” although he may have Dutch water barriers in mind.
Of course. But it requires YOU to provide third party evidence with links. Your word alone is insufficient. As with any asshole troll. We are still waiting….
Define “young”. And “man”. I mean, I’m pretty sure that everyone here is a member of the species Homo sapiens, and is well short of the age of the universe….
But honestly, I think you’ve got the early lead for most clueless post of the year.
Someone seeing “Dyke” might well think it a variant of the name “van Dyke”. Indeed, I see that “Dyke” is a surname on its own, as is “Dykes“.
/just sayin’
I may have disagreed with our leader on this very thread. Not sure. Did point to the brass knuckles ruthlessness of some of Machiavelli’s model actors. Yet the notorious Giuliano della Rovere hadn’t yet ascended to the Papacy displacing Cesare’s power base thanks mostly to the death of his machinating dad (???) Pope Alexander VI.
Oh yeah didn’t Nicolo suffer the strappado upon return of the Medici to Florence? His was no abstract political musing about chimpanzee power politics or some silly EP mind module. He lived it literally down to his bones.
@58 ‘”Or is it all young men?”
Define “young”’
Well, I’m only 74, so I guess I’m evidence to support his beliefs.
At least arnhart has stopped trying to get us to read stupid shit on their blog, and has simply begun to post their stupid shit in the comment section. For the record, arnhart, your comments here are doing nothing to make people here think your blog is worth reading. You really need to up your game.
@Owlmirror:
I think you’re missing the point. With
that one can never really tell for sure what gender or race or sexual orientation or whatever belongs to the person behind an internet nym.
But that’s not actually a defense of arnhart. Look at what was written, and you see that arnhart is quite clearly assuming that arnhart can tell; arnhart fully and directly rejects your argument. My point is that if you think you can tell gender or sex (or whatever) just from what is written on a comment page, then you for damn sure better pay attention to what’s actually written on that comment page. My point is that even if you go with arnhart’s stupid thesis, arnhart is acting stupidly because that stupid thesis demands that you read for content.
arnhart doesn’t. Instead, arnhart clearly assumes gender, often quite wrongly. Critiquing those who point out that the clues are right there in front of arnhart’s nose that gender isn’t a unity is taking a stand against those who are insisting arnhart is stupid for making assumptions. But in reality, the On the internet, no one knows you’re a dog argument is yet another reason to think arnhart is acting stupidly, not a hedge on the truth of my argument that arnhart’s acting stupidly. If arnhart was acting consistently with the lesson of On the internet, no one knows you’re a dog, the original wrong-headed assumption would never have been made.
But the truth is, arnhart isn’t thinking at all.
To sum up, I agree with you Owlmirror, but that does nothing to blunt my critique. That’s just another layer of the stupidity which is arnhart’s contributions to this thread.
@51
Sure. I think PZ’s a little milquetoast about economic leftism, I think crackergate was kind of silly double-ought NuAtheist attention grabbing nonsense, and I think that he’s kind of a spoilsport when he sees a Sci-Fi/Fantasy movie and complains that they’re not suitably realistic.
Unlike Peterson, PZ doesn’t peddle some kind of culty self-help bullshit founded on a nazi-sympathizers long-since-discarded psychological theories. He’s just a somewhat liberal internet atheist and biologist.
I’m none of the above, nor am I particularly young.
You’ve made it official now.
You aren’t very bright.
Quite a few people on this blog have advanced degrees of one sort or another.
Ph.D., MD, JD, etc.. It’s on average a highly educated, accomplished crowd.
Myers is a scientist, biologist, and many have followed him from his science blogging days. He still occasionally posts on evolutionary biology.
My impression is that there is a spread of ages but it skews older, Boomer age, like our society does.
And many are what Jordan Peterson hates and has contempt for. Women.
Speaking of which, you ignored my point that Jordan Peterson himself frequently uses violent language and has implied very publicly that violence is sometimes necessary.
If you read Peterson, it all becomes clear. He is a mentally sick puppy.
Unlike PZ Myers, Jordan Peterson makes a point of often using violent language and comes close to flat out calling for violence.
He is just another in a long line of hack right wingnut hate merchants like Alex Jones, Ann Coulter, or Rush Limbaugh so this is no surprise whatsoever.
Peterson comes close to flat out calling for violence.
He is also a merchant of hate, hate for women, atheists, Muslims, trans, nonwhites, the educated, Progressives.
Add them up.
This is most of our society.
This is why Peterson and his fanboy trolls are getting a huge amount of push back.
They are all haters and violence is a real possibility here.
Wherever you have hate speech, you will have hate violence.
We have the right and responsibility to defend ourselves and that is what we are doing.
Disagreement is a spice of life. POVs vary. One can disagree without being disagreeable. I’d put it on the Scoville scale. Critical discourse in the Popperian sense should hover at about the level of a mild banana pepper. Mild dissonance perhaps though people vary in their tolerance for spicy things.
I ate a raw habanero twice in my life. The 2nd time just because I wasn’t entirely sure. Scorpion or ghost peppers are off limits for me. YMMV. But these are analogous to flame wars and bar room brawls.
raven:
It’s also the case that, as can be seen in this very thread, as soon as we do advocate defending ourselves and what we do, even metaphorically, someone pops up and says that we’re advocating ‘Nazi-style violence’, or some such – despite the likes of Peterson clearly advocating actual, non metaphorical violence. So does this not logically mean that Peterson is actually WORSE than the Nazis?
Jonathan Wells!? Is he still being dredged up? I remember writing a rebuttal of his chapter on fossil horses in “Icons of Evolution” like 15-20 years ago. I was with a bunch of scientists wanting to compile criticisms of each chapter it into a book or something, but it never got off the ground, because… reasons. I think PZ Myers also was part of the club too! And Wayne Ussery, whom I met in Copenhagen. Very nice fellow!
As the worth arnhart trusts his guests.
*David Ussery
arnhart wrote:
Did you ever stop to consider how much work the ellipsis in that supposed quote were doing? The first half of the supposed quote was from a comment PZ made on June 14, 2005, while the rest is from a blog post on August 04, 2005. That is one hell of a way to strip something of its context.
Here’s the first half:
This was in regards to people who insisted that we must be concillary in our tone in response to creationism in schools. And if a teacher, or school board member refuses to correctly do their job, is a firing not appropriate?
And here’s the second part:
Again, this is part of the “tone wars” and is in response to those who claimed the opposition to intelligent design creationism was . I’m not terribly fond of the implication of violence (even metaphorically), but it does seem fair to answer one hyperbole with another.
Yes, I’m using the “out of context” excuse, but months of context were snipped to make a frankenquote like that, so it’s entirely valid.
OMG! The website is still up! Icons of Anti-Evolution
ck,
Thanks for clarifying the context of the PZ quotations. This makes it clear that the intelligent design folks have taken the words out of context to make them sound more violent than they really are.
In a previous version of this frankenquote promoted by Bryan Fischer and Casey Luskin, PZ produced this quote in front of a “Pro-ACLU crowd” (which is purposely vague and open to misinterpretation) and got rapturous applause in response. PZ covered it back then, too. These kinds of self-serving quotes get passed around so frequently around the creationist community, the prevelence of them within that community becomes proof they must be true. Virtually no one cares enough to fact check, and publishing corrections is practically unheard of (neither Fischer or Luskin bothered with either).
This lie has been passed around for a decade now, despite being disproven shortly after it surfaced. I imagine it’ll be passed around for another decade.
hemidactylus @48:
Assassin’s Creed 2 (& related games in the franchise) was set in that period and roped in all sorts of historical figures.
That game holds a special place in my heart; mainly because for the final boss fight you get to beat up the pope!
blf:
Point taken.