Here’s a new tradition I have to encourage: I was brought a cheesecake at last night’s talk at Stanford. It was fabulous: white chocolate raspberry chocolate chip. The fellow who sent it along was Victor Harris of Reuschelle’s Cheesecakes. He has a huge variety of different kinds of cheesecakes, and he ships…so if you’re sitting around somewhere far away from California, and you’ve got a craving, you can just email for a menu or to order, and the next day a lethally delicious cheesecake will magically appear at your door.

Maybe I shouldn’t encourage these kinds of gifts at my talks, though. I don’t really need more sweet rich goodies in my belly. But hey, you’re all hedonistic godless people, dig in.

Just about everyone is following the horrible news from Haiti, where they’ve been struck with a major earthquake causing great loss of life. I’ve been informed by multiple people now that Pat Robertson has announced the reason for this disaster: the Haitian people made a deal with the devil to free themselves from the French.

Let that sink in for a minute.

Rather than seeking to place the blame on divine retribution, I suggest that we secular people donate now to relief organizations. I’ll recommend two: The Red Cross is an obvious choice; it’s a secular organization that is dedicated to providing effective aid. I’ll also recommend Partners in Health, which is on the ground right now and has been providing health care to the poor in Haiti for years.

I know this is redundant because many of you have already made donations somewhere…but just in case you haven’t, get off your butt now and help.

---

You can watch a video of Pat Robertson blaming the earthquake on Haitians and their deal with the devil; it’s about 6 minutes in, so you can skip most of the wretched CBN noise.

If it makes you angry, turn your outrage into something constructive and use it to motivate you to donate to Haitian relief first. Deal with the evil scumbag Robertson later.

Just in case there is more than one of you, I’ll mention that a Pharyngula fan group has been formed to coordinate social activities in Baltimore. Surely this will not involve alcohol or blasphemy, will it? Nor will there be rudeness and vociferous argument? Perhaps there will be squid.

Won Chong Boyd, the wife of Mark Boyd, president of the Central Valley Alliance of Atheists and Skeptics, has died suddenly while on a trip to Korea. This is a deep personal shock for him, of course, but it’s also a serious financial hardship. If any of you can help out, go to the link.

I thought I’d stumbled onto FSTDT, but no…it’s a collection of quotes from the Texas board of education collected over the last year. At least I learned that Don McLeroy is an honest man.

Am I a religious fanatic? Absolutely. You’d have to be to do what I do.

A while back, I asked you all to vote in the L’Oréal Women of Worth contest, which gives awards to notable women who have provided good service to their communities. I was a bit self-interested, because one of the nominees was an alumnus of my university: Shannon Lambert runs support services for victims of rape at Pandora’s Project.

This is an update: she won!

I wonder where one gets mollusc flavoring?

It was the classic scam. An elderly couple are told they’ve won the lottery, and millions of dollars are theirs…they just have to pay a few taxes and fees first in order to free up the cash. First it was a few thousand dollars, than a few thousand more, than a few tens of thousands, and finally, their savings account stripped dry of about $78,000, they catch on: they’re being conned. It’s a monumental personal tragedy that has impoverished them, and there’s nothing that can be done—the scammers are gone.

There is a lesson to be learned, although these victims haven’t learned it.

“We were going to move into (a) retirement home, but now we don’t have the money. I just want to help other people who are in the same predicament.”

She can’t believe she was fooled for so long.

“We’re honest,” she said. “We were raised Catholic, and we just believe everybody. It’s just torn up our whole life.”

She was raised a victim.

I’m an atheist and scientist. I don’t believe anybody without good evidence.

Back in October, I sent you off to vote in an online poll that pitted real social workers, SozialHelden, against homeopaths, in a contest that actually had consequences: the winner would get a “Dedication Award” for their work.

We just got word from SozialHelden on the outcome of the poll:

haben gerade den Deutschen Engagementpreis 2009 gewonnen. Danke für Eure Stimmen!

They’ve won the German Engagement Prize for 2009. Thank you for your votes!

They have successfully spawned. Say hello to Huxley Laden!