Would you believe the Urban Dictionary has an entry for PZ? It’s lousy—I can’t believe anyone uses the term that way, and I can’t imagine how they pronounce it. And pzizzle isn’t any better.
Myers, at least, has some punch to it: “Last name of any various white masked knife weilding bad muther *uckers.” I still think most of these entries are jokes sent in by people, especially when the spelling and grammar are atrocious, and that they don’t really have any common usage.
She really hasn’t changed a bit.
Well, maybe a little. Skatje (since everyone asks how it’s pronounced, I’ll spell it out: scot-ya) is turning 17 today, and guess how she’s going to celebrate?
She’s hosting the first ever meeting of the UMM Campus Atheists, Skeptics, and Humanists, with free pizza, free discussion, and free thought at the Morris Pizza Hut, at 7:00. She’s a regular little godless debutante, I guess.
This is so sad. There is now a Richard Dawkins social networking site, and I have no friends. Not even among those dour, hateful, amoral atheists. You’d think we’d be so perfect together!
There is going to be a melee in Minneapolis, a testicle-twister in the Twin Cities, a bloody battle at the Bell — the framing debate is going LIVE, in an event sponsored by the Bell Museum in Minneapolis at the end of September. On one side, Mooney and Nisbet; on the other, Greg Laden and … uh, me, I’m pretty sure. I’m still juggling some travel dates, but I think I should be able to make it.
I think the plan, though, is to pretend I can’t, so Mooney and Nisbet get all cocky. Then, just when Greg is down, trapped in a headlock by one and the other is doing the dreaded pinky toe pincer, I come parachuting down off my Northwest Airlines passenger flight, carom off the ropes, launch into a flying tackle on both, and Greg and I then spend the next hour kicking and punching two cripples. And then we buy them both a Bud Light.
That’s the plan, anyway. It should be great fun.
Don’t worry, Greg. I’m not chickening out. It’s part of the dramatic narrative, where putting you in the role of the underdog is part of the frame to get the crowd supporting you.
Hey, you know that $15 million lawsuit that was filed against me by Stuart Pivar? He’s been getting hammered on the weblogs, the City Pages was preparing a story on it, the Seed lawyers were unflappable, and Peter Irons was constantly sending Pivar and his lawyer cutting dissections of their poor case. Peter was in contact with the City Pages reporter, who received a brief comment from Pivar earlier this evening.
“My attorney withdrew the suit today.”
I wonder if the article is still going to be published…?
I can’t say that I was ever really worried — the man had no case — but it’s nice to see that silly potential time-suck gone.
No good deed goes unpunished, as they say. Peter Irons, who did such good work on my behalf, is now being threatened with legal action by Stuart Pivar’s lawyer, Michael Little. The mouse squeaks at the lion; we should all close our eyes and turn our heads aside to avoid the inescapable carnage to follow. Either that, or open up a popcorn and cotton candy stand.
How come you people never come visit? I’m only an hour from the freeway by way of a two-lane county road, roughly equidistant from Fargo, Sioux Falls, and Minneapolis, yet somehow no one ever happens to be passing through this remote rural town … until today. Jim Moore took a little detour from his road trip from Victoria, BC to Oklahoma to pop by lovely Morris, Minnesota and say hello. Now we expect the rest of you to come on by.
In case you don’t know who Jim Moor is, he maintains this web page, a critique of the Aquatic Ape “Theory”. This “theory” (really, it doesn’t deserve the promotion) is often taken as quite reasonable at first glance — hey, whales have reduced body hair and are aquatic, humans have reduced body hair so maybe they also went through an aquatic stage in their evolution — but once you dig just a tiny bit deeper, the inconsistencies within the hypothesis and the contradictions with reality loom larger and larger, and you really should realize that it’s utter nonsense. But weirdly, there are a number of people who have gotten quite obsessed with the idea and who have written reams of papers to rationalize the baloney. Back in the 20th century wrangles over the Aquatic Ape nonsense would spontaneously emerge on usenet all the time (here’s one example) because its proponents had to be completely refractory to contradicting evidence. Good times.
One interesting twist to it all is that it’s an odd variant of denialism. These people aren’t rejecting an established scientific conclusion, such as that HIV causes AIDS or that human activities contribute to global warming — they are pushing beyond reason for a conclusion that science denies. I suppose you could say they’re denying the evidence that shoots down their favored beliefs, but at least they actually have a positive (but bogus!) hypothesis that they aren’t afraid to recite at you, which puts them several notches above the Intelligent Design creationists.
Anyway, Moore has a tremendous amount of useful information rebutting the Aquatic Ape Speculation — it’s well worth a browse, and also amusing to read some of the crackpot defenses (one of my favorites is the claim that Neandertals had large noses that they used as snorkels). And I’m not just saying that because he was nice enough to stop by Morris!
Not for me, for someone else. I just sit quietly and listen, but I must say this “Rule 11 of the FRCP” sounds awfully interesting. I’m not sure exactly what it means, but there sure are a lot of smart lawyers lining up on my side; they probably know, don’t you think?
Last chance at escapism before the school year starts: Skatje, her friend Nathan, and I are heading off to the Minnesota Renaissance festival today. I don’t know about this; hanging out with a gang of people pretending it’s the 13th century is a bit too much like meeting up with creationists.
On the advice of counsel, I’m not going to say a word, yet.
However, I’ve been getting lots of email and seeing lots of articles on the web; I’ve been getting offers of pro bono lawyering and to set up donations for a defense fund. Thanks to everyone! I haven’t been replying to most of those offers because, on the advice of counsel, yadda yadda, but I appreciate them all. If the need develops I may take advantage of them, but until then, I just crouch, gnawing on the muzzle, mad eyes rolling, doing my best to be a good little doggie.
But really, thanks, thanks, thanks — and now we just sit back and wait. Let the pros do their job.
