A creationist’s very silly laundry list

my-god-its-full-of-stupid

I was reading the comments on Moran’s post, and there’s a creationist there challenging people to come to his youtube channel, where he has apparently refuted all of evolution. So I did. It was…pathetic. You can suffer through it if you want, but let me spare you some time with a summary of the entirety of the content.

This ignorant fellow, Tommy Hall, declares that he’s going to present a list of the failed predictions of evolution. Right away, there’s a conceptual problem: science makes failed predictions all the time. It’s how it works. We’re supposed to make predictions, and test them, and if none of them were to fail, what would be the point of testing them? So sure, I could put together a long and accurate list of failed predictions, and how we progressed from testing them.

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A suggestion for debaters

Science is big. Really big. Most of us who are trained in science are actually trained in a relatively narrow discipline — and as we progress through our training, our scope gets narrower and narrower. What that means is that there are a lot of questions about science that any one scientist doesn’t know the answer to, so the phrase “I don’t know” really ought to be a common part of our lexicon.

Lawrence Krauss, a physicist, got into a debate with Stephen Meyer, a creationist, as Larry Moran describes. Meyer cunningly got the debate unto the track of molecular biology and the human genome — a subject in which Krauss is far from familiar, and which Meyer doesn’t understand either (either that, or he maliciously misprepresents it). Krauss got stuff wrong and conceded some major points to Meyer.

I’ve been in these situations. I’ve mentioned before that when I get into arguments with creationists, when they discover that I’m a biologist, suddenly they switch gears and start confronting me with all this stuff about physics, or geology, or astronomy — the last thing they want to do is talk to me about stuff I know inside and out. And here’s what I do.

“I don’t know,” I’ll say. I might have some general knowledge and know a source, so if they’re asking me about, say, cosmology, I’ll add, “but I’ve read this book by Lawrence Krauss or Sean Carroll or Vic Stenger, maybe you should go read it, too.”

And then I’ll suggest that, since I know a fair bit about evolutionary biology or development or neurobiology, maybe we should focus on those areas…unless, of course, they’re conceding that they have no disagreement with the consensus in those fields.

I have my debate requirements, and I’ll refer you to point number 3:

The question to be debated must be specific: none of this “Does god exist?” crap. Come up with an addressable topic that can be adequately covered in an hour of back-and-forth.

And point number 4:

The question ought to be one I’m competent to answer: I’m a biologist, not a physicist, so don’t bother asking me to debate the implications of dark matter or the age of the earth (actually, that last one would be stupid no matter who you ask: it’s a settled issue.) Get someone else in the appropriate field.

Krauss apparently walked into a debate titled “What’s Behind It All: God, Science, and the Universe”*, which was stupid to begin with — and then he let Meyer steer it into subjects that Krauss knew little about, but which Meyer was an expert in pretending that he did.

Don’t do that.

Krauss is a good, enthusiastic speaker and I’ve found him informative and entertaining when he’s talking about his area of expertise — cosmology. He should stick to that. I have approximately zero interest in hearing him lecture about biology, or philosophy, or Russian literature, and I think any of those would be a painful experience. Unless he’s got some secret passion for Dostoevsky, maybe.

*Actually, I’d also like to know how Meyer got away with focusing on the human genome, which really isn’t exactly “the Universe”, and why he would be talking about an object, “God”, which the Discovery Institute claims to have no opinion on.

Slimy balls rolling around in my skull!

eyeballs

Peter Watts has this short short story about a brain interface technology that allows people to merge their consciousness with other organisms — and in this one, “Colony Creature”, someone experiences what it is like to be an octopus, and is horrified by it.

“Those arms.” His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat. “Those fucking crawly arms. You know, that thing they call the brain— it’s nothing, really. Ring of neurons around the esophagus, basically just a router. Most of the nervous system’s in the arms, and those arms… every one of them is awake…”

It’s a good story, and I’m not knocking it. I think it’s also important to recognize that the experience of being a non-human organism is probably fundamentally different than being a human.

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The delusion of immortality

steampunkbattleship

Imagine all the poor transhumanists who were born in the 19th century. They would have been fantasizing about all the rapid transformations in their society, and blithely extrapolating forward. Why, in a few years, we’ll all have steam boilers surgically implanted in our bellies, and our diet will include a daily lump of coal! Canals will be dug everywhere, and you’ll be able to commute to work in your very own personal battleship! There will be ubiquitous telegraphy, and we’ll have tin hats that you can plug into cords hanging from the ceiling in your local coffeeshop, and get Morse code tapped directly onto your skull!

Alas, they didn’t have a Ray Kurzweil or Aubrey deGray to con them with absurd exaggerations.

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I get email

zygote

There deserves to be a special place in hell for smug, smarmy “pro-lifers”.

Dear @pzmyers I’ve read some of your reactions to pro-life claims on embryology. You seem to confuse biological claims with philosophical ones sir.

Oh, please, don’t “dear” and “sir” me. Have you ever noticed how some people like to paper over their stupidity with the most superficial expressions of politeness, as if it makes their argument respectable? Give me blunt honesty any day.

I also don’t need random goons on the internet telling me I have to make some distinction between science (usually, in this context, preceded by an unvoiced “mere”) and philosophy. Biology is a subset of philosophy. I get enough of that crap from real scientists.

Also, you don’t get to dignify your religious prejudices with the label “philosophy”.

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Sometimes, the hard part of being a humanist is all the goddamn humans.

At the cell and tissue level, they’re pretty nifty, but once they start perambulating around they’re mostly all about stomping on you.

I’d probably be happier if all my interactions with the world were with computers and embryos. OK, and libraries. Libraries are cool. Especially computer-accessible libraries with books about embryos.

I can cope when you’re reduced to electrons and photons.

“Hello, stream of bits,” I’d say with my own spray of bits.

“You’re looking lovely, ray of light!” I’d radiate.

I’d happily arrange pixels to say, “You can’t screw me over now, abstract pattern of simplified information!”

But people…people mostly suck.

Sorry, people.

If it helps, just remember that you’re looking at a stream of electrons rendered into an array of photons. It’s how I’m trying to see you, after all.

#UMMorris: A hotbed of Satanism!

baphomet

We’re in trouble now: one of those conservative campus watchdog groups has discovered that the University of Minnesota Morris has Satanist students. And not just ordinary, run-of-the-mill Satanists — these are gay devil-worshippers!

Actually, it looks more like a recruiting newsletter was sent out, but I’m sure our evil student body will leap on it.

“I’m looking to start a Satanist group at Morris to address the budding conservatism on this campus—which I find abhorrent,” student Reed Larsen wrote to his fellow classmates. “I’m thinking of calling the group either Gay Devil Worshippers for a Better Future OR Queer Satanists for Change.” The group has since elected to go by the moniker “Gay Devil Worshippers for a Better Future.”

Rather than merely performing its standard Satanic rituals, the group hopes to make social activism its primary purpose.

“I’m hoping the group will have a social justice platform and further such a platform through good ol’ devilish revelry,” Larsen wrote.

Lawks, I’m fain to swoon…not just gay devil worshippers, but social justice gay devil worshippers. I’m pretty sure those are the worst kind.

The City Pages, the Twin Cities alternative weekly, has now reported on it, so now the news of our university’s sinful student body has been broadcast state-wide. I expect enrollments to surge next year.

Except among the Republicans. The article also spilled the beans on another of our secrets.

According to a student at UMM who wished to remain anonymous, the “budding” conservative groups on campus are not actually budding at all. The few conservative groups on campus, including the school’s gun club, pro-life club, and College Republicans, have around 20 combined members, according to the source.

Yeah, that sounds about right. It might even be a bit high. I don’t expect our Satanist group to be that numerous either, but I wouldn’t be surprised if UMM Gay Devil Worshippers for a Better Future would outnumber our campus Republicans for Trump.

P.S. Hey, gang, if you don’t already have a faculty sponsor for your group, I’m available.

In the news

The creation of The Orbit blog network got mentioned on Religion News today. They got quotes from me and Ed, too.

Many Orbit bloggers migrated from other atheist platforms, including Skepchick and Patheos, but the bulk came from Freethought Blogs. Rumors of discord at these platforms spread throughout 2015, but writers say they are focused on the future.

“This group decided it wanted to go off and do its own thing and more power to them,” said P.Z. Myers, whose Pharyngula blog is among the most popular at Freethought Blogs, which he now manages. He has already replaced The Orbit’s bloggers with new ones.

Ed Brayton, founder of Freethought Blogs who now writes at Patheos, said, “The Orbit is being launched by people I think very highly of and consider friends . . . I see no point in building up some sort of rivalry between blog networks. There’s room for everyone.”

I have to make some additions and corrections. Note that link about “rumors of discord” up there? That was from me. The “discord” came not so much from internal problems, but as I say there, from trolling assholes who harass just about everyone here. So if you’re looking for confirmation of Hemant Mehta’s bloviating, it ain’t there.

The other thing is that our new bloggers are not “replacements”. I’ve been nagging everyone in the back channel for years that we have to bring in fresh blood regularly*, and that our old method of delegating recruitment to a committee — when people are here to write, not serve on committees — was not working. We’ve got this nice flush of new voices here because we’d put together an alternative mechanism that is actually working.

*My secret is out, that I’ve been straining to draw in new people simply to sate my vampiric hunger.

Some days, it’s very hard to defend Neil deGrasse Tyson

This morning, I read a pile of bullshit about Tyson written by an anti-intellectual reverse-snob — he thinks he should be proud of being so blatantly pro-mystery and anti-science.

Neil deGrasse Tyson is, supposedly, an educator and a populariser of science; it’s his job to excite people about the mysteries of the universe, communicate information, and correct popular misconceptions. This is a noble, arduous, and thankless job, which might be why he doesn’t do it. What he actually does is make the universe boring, tell people things that they already know, and dispel misconceptions that nobody actually holds. In his TV appearances, puppeted by an invisible army of scriptwriters, this tendency is barely held in check, but in his lectures or on the internet it’s torrential; a seeping flood of grey goo, paring down the world to its driest, dullest, most colourless essentials. He likes to watch scifi films, and point out all the inaccuracies. Actually, lasers wouldn’t make any sound in space; actually a light year is a unit of space rather than time; actually, none of this is real, it’s just a collection of still images projected at speed to present the illusion of movement, and all the characters are just actors who have never really been into outer space.

There’s a hint of a point to his long-winded diatribe; scientists who simply drily list the facts or point to a pretty picture from the Hubble telescope aren’t really promoting understanding. But we also need to dispel the nonsense that that writer seems to think are essential, like clouds inhabited by angels or his Lord Jesus Christ. It’s disgraceful when a scientist dismisses poetry or philosophy, but you can also go too far in the other direction, and dismiss reality. Both are deplorable.

I was ready to go off on a rant about that this morning, and then Tyson had to open his mouth and leave me completely deflated. An interview was published that just left me muttering, “Why, Neil, why?”.

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