Dang it, life, stop finding a way

Last year, in hopeful anticipation of a contractor finally getting around to giving us new siding, we hacked away all the brush and shrubbery and saplings sprouting all around our house. We were disappointed: he didn’t get around to us that summer (life in a small town: limited supply of available contractors, high demand).

So this year, he has promised! We gave him a giant bucket of money! He ordered all the supplies! So we took another look at the vegetation around our house.

It had all grown back.

So this morning we’ve been out with pruning shears and weed-eater, trying to destroy the jungle. I think I need a machete and a chainsaw. Or a flamethrower. Or to call in an airstrike. Thinking about exotic plant poisons, or hiring a herd of elephants.

See, this is why I was trained as a zoologist. Plants are apparently my nemesis.

Mouth-watering buffets and rich Biblical teachings

My personal vision of hell launches in March: a Caribbean cruise with Ray Comfort and Ken Ham.

If you thought that cruise with fires and sewage leaks, or the cruise with puking passengers with norovirus were nightmarish, imagine one with Comfort and Ham stalking the halls like angels of banality, haranguing you about sin and Jesus, and the fun part of the trip is handing out gospel tracts in port. It looks like a freakish combination of gluttony and sanctimony.

Fortunately, at $1500 for the cheap rooms, and $5800 for the luxury suites, it is economically impossible for me to end up on the hellboat, if I were tempted in the first place. I also would rather not be chucked over the side by my fellow passengers, as would inevitably happen.

Although…imagine Comfort+Ham+Norovirus+ruptured sewage lines. We could pray for it.

The Unraveling continues

Reince Priebus has been fired. How do I know? Trump announced his replacement in a tweet, of course.

Isn’t this administration professional?

In other fun news, Anthony Scaramucci’s wife, Deidre Ball, has filed for divorce, citing his excessive ambition and connection to Donald Trump.

It’s like everything The Donald touches turns to ashes and slime. Or is it just that ashes and slime are attracted to The Donald?

There is good skepticism, and bad skepticism

I’m down on the organized skeptical community, because I think they practice skepticism selectively. But here’s a good example of healthy skepticism on nutrition science, prompted by this ‘documentary’, What the Health. I like that the position is put right up front.

As a vegan health professional, I am sometimes mortified to be associated with the junk science that permeates our community. And as an animal rights activist, I’m disheartened by advocacy efforts that can make us look scientifically illiterate, dishonest, and occasionally like a cult of conspiracy theorists.

I’m not a vegan, but I sympathize with the movement; I’m not an animal rights activist, because I agree that there is way too much scientific illiteracy in that movement…but I do support improving care and minimizing suffering in animals. I can never support the kind of dishonesty rampant in these quack nutrition stories, like those credulously promoted in What the Health.

The exaggerated and misleading statements about animal foods and health are meant to build the case that you must be vegan if you want to be healthy. We hear, for example, that there is no evidence that consuming animal foods in moderation can turn heart disease around. Yes, there is. There is at least as much evidence that plant-based (but not vegan) diets can reverse heart disease as there is evidence indicating vegan diets can reverse heart disease.

And finally, there are the miraculous healings. The film tells us that a plant-based diet can treat lupus, multiple sclerosis and osteoporosis. (I’d love to see actual evidence for any of this.) Then we’re shown real-life examples of astonishing recoveries from illness. One woman has been diagnosed with bilateral osteoarthritis and is scheduled for two hip replacements because, as she describes it, bone is rubbing on bone. This means that the cartilage that cushions the hip joints has worn away. You can’t just grow back a bunch of cartilage in two weeks by changing your diet. Nor is there evidence that a healthy vegan diet will reverse thyroid cancer as is claimed in the film. And I hope that the woman who stopped taking antidepressants in just two weeks did so under strict medical supervision. That is not enough time to taper off of these drugs (which kind of makes me doubt her story). And to imply that people can abruptly stop taking their antidepressants when they go vegan is irresponsible and dangerous.

Kip himself says that after he changed his diet, “within a few days I could feel my blood running through my veins with a new vitality.” It immediately brought to mind Lierre Keith, ex-vegan and author of The Vegetarian Myth. She says this when she eats a bite of tuna fish after many years of veganism: “I could feel every cell in my body—literally every cell—pulsing. And finally, finally being fed.”

I’ve personally made changes in my diet to reduce animal protein, because the arguments make sense: it’s generally good to exercise moderation in your diet. I’ve been exercising more. But I don’t believe in magical rejuvenations or that I can feel my veins or cells or that eating more carrots will prevent cancer.

I think I’ll skip the movie. But I’m willing to listen to what Virginia Messina has to say about vegan diets.

Why are you still reading Skeptic magazine?

It’s trash. There’s no clearer indicator of where Shermer’s vanity magazine’s focus lies than this, A Review of Milo Yiannopoulos’s new book Dangerous by George Michael, which manages to go on and on and tell us very little about the book, but does regurgitate a massive bolus of alt-right talking points. The author seems to have very little interest in what Yiannopoulos actually says, or how he says it, but mainly wants to repeat every tired cliche of the alt-right/mens rights movement.

Like this:

It is Milo’s strident critique of this form of feminism that has gained him the most opprobrium. Although Milo does not characterize himself as part of men’s rights activism, arguably, he has emerged as the movement’s most noted spokesman. His track record displays a clear affinity for the movement. For example, he played a leading role in the 2014 “gamergate” controversy when he supported the online harassment campaign against women who decried the violence and misogyny in video games. Reminiscent of Warren Farrell’s The Myth of Male Power, Milo cites numerous indices—including disparities in life expectancy, sentencing, education, and health care—to illustrate that women have made substantial gains over the past several decades. In fact, according to these measures, women are arguably more privileged than men in America today. As Milo demonstrates, studies have found that the wage gap shrinks to nonexistence when relevant, non-sexist factors are taken into account, such as chosen career paths, chosen work hours, and chosen career discontinuity. As a group, women prefer to study people-oriented disciplines like psychology, sociology, and social work, which on average are less remuneratively rewarding than STEM fields. In medicine, females physicians are more likely to specialize in fields like pediatrics, which pay less than some other fields that male doctors gravitate toward, such as elective surgery.

Oh jebus. Not this crap again.

You cannot ignore the fact that the remuneration given for ‘women’s work’ is entirely socially constructed as well — why should sociology pay less than, say, biology? I can tell you which has more immediate impact on people’s lives, and sorry to say, it isn’t the field I’ve chosen for myself. Why should pediatrics pay less than working as a surgeon? Does one require that much more training? Is taking care of children’s health less important than cosmetic surgery? As usual, these bozos ignore the value-dependencies of the options.

I’ll also point out that one of the tactics I’ve often seen used to disparage my chosen field is that the percentage of women seeking occupations in biology is rising…therefore, biology must be less rigorous and scientific than fields that exclude women. It’s a wonderfully circular argument.

Of course, this ‘review’ cites all the usual crap: Christina Hoff Sommers, there is no such thing as rape culture, except that when there is it comes from Islam, the police are the greatest defenders of the black community, and of course, political correctness, identity politics, and cultural Marxism. It’s a totally mindless recitation of the nonsense you get on Reddit and in YouTube comments. Yes, “women have made substantial gains” — there is a steady improvement in equality since the days they were not allowed to own property or vote. It does not mean that there aren’t still serious inequalities left, and it doesn’t help that people like Yiannopoulos and Michael are desperate to end progress, all while labeling it “regressive”.

Just unsubscribe already.

I still detest him, but McCain did one good thing

The latest iteration of the health care repeal bill was presented to the senate in the dead of night, while most of us were sleeping, and put to a vote. Three Republicans — Murkowski, Collins, and McCain — voted with the Democrats to kill it. The maverick was mavericky one more time.

But still…there were 49 Republicans, and Mike Pence waiting in the wings, willing to wreck the hobbling compromise that they call Obamacare. Remember that. All those other Republican senators who have been occasionally willing to complain about the fool running the country caved and were willing to go along with this abomination: Ryan and Graham voted for it. And remember most of all that McConnell is the arch-villain who has been orchestrating it.

Remember all of them. And remind everyone else when the next election rolls around.

Voted most likely to be a recurring character on SNL

The Mooch.

“They’ll all be fired by me,” he said. “I fired one guy the other day. I have three to four people I’ll fire tomorrow. I’ll get to the person who leaked that to you. Reince Priebus—if you want to leak something—he’ll be asked to resign very shortly.” The issue, he said, was that he believed Priebus had been worried about the dinner because he hadn’t been invited. “Reince is a fucking paranoid schizophrenic, a paranoiac,” Scaramucci said. He channelled Priebus as he spoke: “ ‘Oh, Bill Shine is coming in. Let me leak the fucking thing and see if I can cock-block these people the way I cock-blocked Scaramucci for six months.’ ” (Priebus did not respond to a request for comment.)

It’s nonstop hilarity!

Scaramucci also told me that, unlike other senior officials, he had no interest in media attention. “I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not trying to suck my own cock,” he said, speaking of Trump’s chief strategist. “I’m not trying to build my own brand off the fucking strength of the President. I’m here to serve the country.” (Bannon declined to comment.)

Bannon hasn’t been making as much of a spectacle of himself lately — I now realize it’s because he’s working through an intense list of flexibility exercises.

Ken Ham buckles beneath the hob-nailed boot of Caesar!

Yep, Answers in Genesis has folded, but not without whining.

The Ark Encounter has agreed to pay the 50-cent per ticket Williamstown safety assessment fee after a lengthy debate with the city council that has spanned weeks.

Answers in Genesis Co-Founder Ken Ham offered a statement to the Grant County News, in which he explained that Ark Encounter officials never said they would not pay into the fee. He added that the Ark Encounter has been paying into the fee since the city began collecting from businesses on July 1, and offered to pay the city a capped amount of $350,000, later increasing the offer to $500,000.

“Now, we do believe there were, and still are, some issues with the way the ordinance is worded, and we do have concerns about the fairness of such a tax,” Ham said. “The city ordinance makes the Ark Encounter bear almost the entire load for the increased funding for Williamstown’s police, fire and EMS budget.”

Ham said that the organization is still concerned over the fact that there is no cap, and what that might mean for the Ark Encounter’s future.

Ham also notes that despite the large numbers of guests the Ark Encounter serves on a regular basis, calls for emergency services have been relatively small. On average for the year, it’s been about two calls per week, with the majority being in the busiest six months of operation, according to Ham.

Aww, they never said they wouldn’t pay it, they just wanted to control how much they paid. I’m going to try this with the IRS: sure, you guys can tax me at the same rate as anyone else in my bracket, but I’m unilaterally putting a cap of $500 on how much I’ll pay. See, I’m not saying I won’t pay my taxes. I’m also worried that if I make a few million dollars this year, you might demand that I pay more than I do with my middling 5 figure income.

As for his argument than there haven’t been very many calls on emergency services yet, does he even understand what “emergency” means? Why should I pay for homeowner’s insurance, for example? It costs me more than I get back each year! Usually. Except for that time the water main broke and turned my basement into a nicely carpeted lake with floating furniture. But that’ll never happen again!