A stupid argument for God

There’s this guy, see, and he was talking to his friend who was a physicist, and he got A decent argument for God, so he published it in a newspaper. Where I read it. I hope he’s misrepresenting his physicist friend, because it turned out to be so stupid that he ought to be booted out of the science club if he actually made it.

It started out badly enough.

After reading that astronomers had updated the estimated number of stars in our galaxy, the Milky Way, to around 400 billion, Matt started thinking about the total number of stars in the known universe. The estimate now is about 70 sextillion stars. That’s 7 with 22 zeroes after it.

This is the boring old argument from complexity. It doesn’t work. Natural processes are really, really good at generating complexity: intelligence is good at honing and refining. We generally don’t regard piling up excess and superfluous complexity as a hallmark of intelligence in a design process.

But no, his argument is even worse. He babbles about the Drake equation and the Fermi paradox, and then makes his ultimate argument, which is what makes me hope this gomer isn’t actually a scientist.

He smiled and said that was why he had started to doubt his atheism.

“Either scenario,” he said, “leads me to believe that this isn’t all random. In the first case, you have a universe filled with amazing, varied species that all have somehow evolved to the common point where they can speculate, wonder and create. That is really a pretty decent argument for God.

“But in the second case, you have an even stronger case for God. If we are alone in the universe, then our solitude has so overwhelmingly defied statistics that you almost have to believe something supernatural has occurred to bring our very existence about.”

So if there are more than one intelligent species in the universe, god exists; if there is only one species, god exists. I think any semi-competent scientist or philosopher should be able to tell you that he has just shown that counting the number of intelligent species in the universe offers no power to distinguish between the the two alternative hypotheses presented, not that it demonstrates the truth of one hypothesis.

Maybe he meant that a “decent argument for god” is any argument that supports his prior belief, no matter what the observations.

Some students should not go into a health profession

I’m afraid Ben Cochran is one of them. He’s a nursing student who wrote a column in a newspaper because he was upset at the time it took for the emergency medical services at his local clinic to help him with his sneezy, phlegmy cold (which, I would have told him, is going to put a low priority on something they can’t really treat anyway). He places the blame: the clinic offers women’s reproductive services, and they were busy helping a “gaggle of preemie sluts [] get a free pass on harlotry” and treating their “cunt problems”.

But he really doesn’t have a problem with these women, he says. He just wants to end women’s medical services and the distribution of condoms on campus.

I don’t take issue with sex mongers. They serve their place. Hell, according to the bible, it’s the oldest known profession on earth. So you sultry sex fiends are clearly established, but this is a place of higher being. Please take your gaping holes elsewhere for medical services, and leave the real health issues to those that actually belong on a college campus

Yeah, he’s going to make a greeeeeat nurse. He’s already an expert on triage: men with runny noses must be treated before sluts with gynecological issues.

He’s going to have a tough time doing the work, though, with all the holes Ema ripped into him.

(Also on Sb)

Some students should not go into a health profession

I’m afraid Ben Cochran is one of them. He’s a nursing student who wrote a column in a newspaper because he was upset at the time it took for the emergency medical services at his local clinic to help him with his sneezy, phlegmy cold (which, I would have told him, is going to put a low priority on something they can’t really treat anyway). He places the blame: the clinic offers women’s reproductive services, and they were busy helping a “gaggle of preemie sluts [] get a free pass on harlotry” and treating their “cunt problems”.

But he really doesn’t have a problem with these women, he says. He just wants to end women’s medical services and the distribution of condoms on campus.

I don’t take issue with sex mongers. They serve their place. Hell, according to the bible, it’s
the oldest known profession on earth. So you sultry sex fiends are clearly established, but
this is a place of higher being. Please take your gaping holes elsewhere for medical services,
and leave the real health issues to those that actually belong on a college campus.

Yeah, he’s going to make a greeeeeat nurse. He’s already an expert on triage: men with runny noses must be treated before sluts with gynecological issues.

He’s going to have a tough time doing the work, though, with all the holes Ema ripped into him.

(Also on FtB)

Aim for the stars, creepy guy!

Wow. It’s just like science.

I wouldn’t say I know all that much about porn. More than the average guy for sure but there is a whole other level of porn aficianado out there that dwarfs mine. It’s the guys who have been following porn for 20+ years and have tens of thousands of posts on sites like Adultdvdtalk and planetsuzy.com and run blogs about porn who are the real experts who have helped educate me. It’s kind of like what Newton said about standing on the shoulders of giants.

I’ve completely missed out on that kind of education — I’ve wasted all those years studying mere biology.

The weird cluelessness is compounded when you consider that Newton died a virgin, and proud of it.

Anthony Navarro is an evil scumbag

Be warned. This is a horrific story.

Anthony Navarro Jr. is a righteous fundamentalist who is opposed without reservation to divorce. His brother, Dave Navarro, decided to leave his marriage — so Anthony Jr. stalks and harasses his own brother, threatening him, harasses people associated with him, lies about him, contacts his clients and basically destroys his business, all because he will not tolerate the fact that a man and a woman can decide to dissolve the bonds of matrimony. He has a religious belief in an absolutely insoluble form of marriage, which he insists on imposing on others (Anthony Jr.’s wife is apparently trapped for life).

Anthony Jr. writes a letter to Dave.

Psalms 69:5
O God, you know my folly;
the wrongs I have done are not hidden from you.

Jeremiah 3:25
Let us lie down in our shame, and let our dishonor cover us. For we have sinned against the Lord our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even to this day, and we have not obeyed the voice of the Lord our God.”

Brother, no matter how fast you run, you cannot run from your sin, nor its penalty. Come back to the light, come back into the circle of blessing. You need not continue to live like a fugitive… Like a coward.

Adultery is the greatest sin addressed in the bible. Realize, Dave, that you are committing adultery… Against your wife, Alison; against your children, and against God. You are guilty of the same sin as our mother and it cost her her life in the end… It cost her her soul. Her selfishness was her downfall. Do not fall into the same trap… The same spiral… The same death… The same eternity.

Why do you not even talk? Are you so ashamed? You can turn back to the right path, and you can be forgiven.

It’s not too late. Yet.

-Anthony

That’s a scary letter. That’s a letter written by a demented fuckwit. But you haven’t heard the worst of it yet.

What happened to Dave and Anthony Jr.’s mother?

Their mother left their father when they were children. Anthony Navarro Sr. hired a hit man to murder her in front of her daughter and mother. Anthony Navarro Sr. was convicted of this crime and is currently serving life in prison.

So Anthony Navarro Jr. is now blaming his mother for her murder by his father, and is now perpetuating the same warped, sanctimonious idea that divorce justifies murder.

So that’s what the Bible means by “sins of the father”.

Haters gotta hate

Rebecca Watson takes a moment to vent about the internet bile aimed at her, and it’s a depressing read. Who would have imagined a mild admonition to “guys, don’t do that” would turn into months of seething hatred and demonization? As she documents, there are whole sites and ongoing threads dedicated to trashing her and anyone associated with her. I took a quick look at some of her links, and found this treasure on one thread committed to hatin’ everything Watson:

“freethoughtblogs” has become a spiteful ghetto built on a river of bile for insecure gutter-fascists.

That is supernova-grade irony.

Rebecca Watson has my support as an appreciated and valuable member of the skeptical community, who has made many contributions and has also been an entertaining and informative face for skepticism.

The saddest part of this whole contemptible witch-hunt, though, is that several of the people who are still spittle-spewing ranters against the Skepchicks were also appreciated members of the skeptical community, who have unfortunately done a fine job of isolating themselves with their obsessive hate-mongering and slander. Let it go, people. Grow up, move on, shed the misogyny. And make no mistake, you have exposed yourselves as irrational misogynists.

Bob Enyart and Will Duffy, partners in idiocy

We’ve got another chittering weasel of a creationist raving in the comments, a fellow going by the name YesYouNeedJesus. He’s also sending me email.

PZ, I first heard about you on Bob Enyart’s radio show about the fact that you turned down an offer to debate Bob. I must say that my first impression of you is that you are smarter than most evolutionists. Smarter because the evolutionists that debate Bob get absolutely destroyed every time. Every evolutionist that I spoke to who was at the debate between Bob Enyart and Reasons to Believe willfully admitted that their side (evolution) lost. Bob’s debate with Eugenie Scott was just flat-out epic and is still my all-time favorite science debate. Of course they all made the mistake of debating Bob and you did not. You are smart, I’ll give you that. I think they made the mistake of underestimating Bob because he’s just a radio talk show host. Personally I think that Walt Brown is the greatest scientist of our day, but after Walt Brown, Bob is one of the most brilliant scientific minds I’ve ever listened to. I believe that the evolutionist’s new tactic is to avoid debating creationists because the arguments are just becoming impossible to refute. While that’s quite the tactical strategy and may work for a short time, it is encouraging to see the creation movement grow like a wildfire. And I do believe it’s just a short amount of time before we see evolution become the next ‘spontaneous generation’ and become obsolete. Don’t forget that if you dared question spontaneous generation, you were labeled as anti-science. Good luck to you. -Will

You read that, and apart from the creationist crazy, you get the impression that this guy is just someone with no ties to Enyart (other than his deep and abiding passionate love for him) who listened to the radio show, found out about these evilutionists, and ran over here to see what was up.

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I get email

I’m not going to post this email I received, simply because it is insanely long, 15,000 words of random caps and peculiar color changes. Just to give you a taste, this is the subject line:

Subject: SCIENCE, AND THEOLOGY {{ Cogent Word for the 100’s of new ears in Science and theology we contacted/called last week around earth }} CHIMERISM, deaths/Wolbachias/satans attack upon Adams Society, ULtra Microbic Life Force/death Force — How does the Harlot called death ride Adams children and cause death and aging??? Listing below — {{ A Brief Word on obamas Buffet taxes, and Word that all most pay their share, Very well stated }} The Holyone has been Shaking Greece trying to tell Germany and all do not feed them any more — Eleanor Mondale and Kara Kennedy Esq; Die at Fifty one, but hours from each other — His Quakes now become stronger to Oklahoma and Canada —- SCIENCE allowed Gamers to finish their Research — “i” gather those of increased knowledge and wisdom…Death and aging now end…..It has begun…Bring home your Missions…Dubai city is soon no longer…..

What I did want to share, though, is that this one is illustrated. Along with the author’s claim that he’s the prophet specifically sent to gather the 144,000 people who get to go to heaven, he included a lovely illustration of his lord and master, Jesus, who just happens to look rather European.

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