#slimedidnocrime

YouTube/Google stuck their ugly racist necks out to ban this video, apparently because it pointed out the sleazy hypocrisy of the right wing nutsacks and Big Media.

Youtube have YET AGAIN caved in to a right-wing false flagging campaign. This time they have allowed Steven Crowder fanbois to flag down Thought Slime’s great video. However, on this occasion it is even more egregious than usual, considering the topic of the video is how youtube allows Steven Crowder and other rightist bullies to silence opponents.
This is obviously unjust and so I’ve mirrored the video, and encourage others to do the same.
You can also go give Thought Slime support on the links here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCrr7y8rEXb7_RiVniwvzk9w

https://www.twitch.tv/thoughtslime
https://twitter.com/ThoughtSlime

Surprising spider industry

I have an office spider, Diana, who lives in a display case with a wooden climbing frame and a floor made of left over calcareous sand and shells from my aquarist days. Today I found that she’d seized stuff from the ground, like this:

…lifted them up to her web up high, and build a hemispherical nest, which she was snuggled down inside of. Clever girl.

If you want to see the nest, I put a photo on Patreon (reminder: I have a patreon account I use to try to pay off our legal debt) and also on Instagram.

We’ve got to break out of the binary

I’m not enthusiastic about getting a slap in the face in November, but it beats getting a chainsaw to the crotch, for sure.

Now waiting for all of us to realize that we’re being herded into this duality to accept our punishment when maybe there’s a third way that doesn’t involve either slapping or chainsaws. We just have to figure out how to get there.

The sad thing is that faced with what should be an obvious choice, there are lots of people who will welcome the chainsaw.

Mark Siddall becomes famous for something! Not for what he would have intended

The AMNH cracks down on a harasser.

I don’t know the guy, and hadn’t heard anything about his behavior until now — the whisper networks are pretty good at the ‘whisper’ part and focus their messages on the people who need to hear them for their own defense, which is not me. I’m not at all privy to the man’s actions, but for an institution as staid and conservative as the AMNH to fire someone they once featured in a children’s video says something awful was going on. They have typically been thorough in covering up problems (not a good look), but we are starting to hear from the people he harassed.

There are big questions here, though. He’s been a problem for many, many years, and nothing was done — he was allowed to take on women as students. I don’t know whether to be surprised or groan at the familiarity of it all. The larger and more prestigious the institution, the more likely there will be some people in the upper ranks who practice denial. What that means then is that the problem festers, and eventually there has to be a big ugly break after years of peoples’ lives and careers are ruined.

You can learn more about this mess at Balter’s Blog.

Over the last 24 hours, a number of Siddall’s victims and their allies (including people the victims have told) have taken to social media to briefly describe their experiences with him. A key, widely shared demand is that the museum engage in full disclosure of how and why Siddall was allowed to traumatize colleagues for so many years. That means disclosing who knew, when and what they knew, and what they did or did not do about it. Perhaps will take some lawsuits from survivors to pry that information loose, but the museum would be better off doing its own, fully transparent, inquiry now, and let the chips fall where they may. Perhaps even a fully independent inquiry would be necessary to get at the truth.

The AMNH is evidently hoping that getting rid of Siddall after all these years, with a minimal internal announcement to museum staff, is enough to show that they take harassment seriously. Bullshit. My sources say that the museum administration was fully aware–right up to the top ranks–of Siddall’s behavior all this time, but that the HR department was used as a shield to deflect all complaints. They got away with this for years. We still don’t know what the actual findings were in the investigation of Neil deGrasse Tyson, for example; and the only time that the museum has shown any transparency was in the case of disgraced human origins curator and sexual predator Brian Richmond. Why? Because Science magazine already had the whole story.

This is what happens if you’re not swift to respond and transparent about how you handle the accusations — someone is going to sink their teeth into the story and guilt will shift from the bad guy who was abusing people to all of the bad guys who are sheltering the culprit. Perhaps you too are an amoral exploiter who has risen in the ranks of the administration, and I can’t possibly reach you with appeals to morality and goodness; but can I appeal to your selfishness? The bad guys will eventually be exposed, and then you are going to be in the crosshairs…and you’re going to deserve it.

Maybe the botox has leaked into his brain?

I really can’t stand listening to Sam Harris — he is a dreadfully boring speaker whose schtick is to reduce racism to a bland, boring mediocrity that we’re supposed to just accept. I managed to get all the way through this interview on BBC Hardtalk because the interviewer actually pushes back on him. I almost bailed, though, at seeing Harris, who looks chillingly botoxed or processed by some video filter, matching the plastic quality of his arguments.

For instance, he goes off on the Black Lives Matter movement, accusing it of “identity politics” and seeing racism everywhere, even where it’s not. To back up his claim that concerns about racism are overblown, Harris says out of his emotionless white face that Black Americans are roughed up by the police far more often than white people, but on a per incident basis, black people are less likely to be murdered.

No, really, he says that.

That’s right. If cops beat up white people robbing gas stations, and they also beat up black people robbing gas stations and jaywalking, then black people are less likely to get shot in any particular encounter with the police. Gosh. What a triumph of statistical bullshit.

If you want an example of a calm, polite racist holding odious views while denying that he’s a racist, just tune in to Harris. Or don’t. You’ll be less angry if you don’t.

He is truly a worthy successor to Kent Hovind

I made another Bad Science Sunday video, this one about Matt Powell. He claims to have debunked evolution in 50 seconds, and in that short claim he makes one of the dumbest creationist arguments ever…and he presents it in total seriousness in the style of a high school debate team point. The smug ignorance has to be something he got by aping Hovind.

At the end he claims to have refuted evolution using science and logic, neither of which are on display in his argument.

The sleep of the innocent

I sleep fairly well — as I’ve gotten older, I sleep less, but most nights I go to bed, read quietly for an hour or so, and within minutes of turning out the lights, I’m out. Then I’ll typically wake up around 5:30am. I get between 6 and 7 hours of solid sleep most nights, which is about what I need. That’s my pattern, I’m sticking with it.

Clearly, the reason I sleep well is because I’m an atheist — you know, unconflicted by storms of Catholic guilt or Protestant sanctimony. At least, that’s the implication of a study. After all, when it’s called a “study”, you know it’s serious business.

A new study out of Baylor University finds that 73% of atheists and agnostics sleep at least seven hours a night, compared to only 55% of Baptists and 63% of Catholics. Atheists and agnostics also reported fewer difficulties falling asleep at night. The findings held even after controlling for details like age and socioeconomic status.

Gosh, it fits my personal experience as an atheist, so I get that little buzz of confirmation. I don’t have any personal experience sleeping as a Baptist or Catholic, but I still get a little buzz at the idea that the Others are tossing and turning at night. And now, when my religious friends (if I had any!) show up at work tired and red-eyed, I get the smug satisfaction of being able to tell them they ought to become an atheist so they can get a good night’s rest for a change.

If I were an idiot.

I took a look at the study. They’re just mining a bigger data set for correlations, which is not a kind of science I care much for. In other words, there was a survey that asked a large collection of semi-random questions of religious and non-religious people, and then afterwards they fished for anything that might show a difference. It could maybe be useful if they followed through and figured out what caused the difference. But they don’t; this is just a cold wet plop of an observation from a data set.

Another thing that always bugs me is that when a study is reported in the popular press they always strip out important qualifiers that at least the original work includes.

Religious affiliation was associated with sleep duration, but not in the predicted direction. Atheists/Agnostics (73%) were significantly more likely to report meeting consensus sleep duration guidelines than religiously-affiliated individuals (65%), p< .05. For example, Atheists/Agnostics reported better sleep duration than Catholics (63%, p< .01) and Baptists (55%, p<.001). Atheists/Agnostics also reported less difficulty falling asleep at night than Catholics (p=.02) and Baptists (p< .001).

Notice the word I highlighted: these are the results of a self-reported survey. They don’t necessarily mean what you think they mean. It could mean that atheists are very insecure and like to lie positively about their health and confidence. Go ahead, Baptists! You can read it that way! Even if I know in my heart that you are tormented by your god-belief.

That’s the only thing that jumped out at me about this trivial and mundane study. It’s a great example of how the press likes to file the serial numbers off a paper: they report “atheists sleep better” when the actual paper says “atheists report that they sleep better”. In this case, they’re making a change that’s favorable to the godless, but it’s also what they do with studies that go the other way. This paper even begins with a statement of the common presupposition!

The psychology of religion literature indicates that religious engagement is beneficial to physical and mental health.

I don’t trust that interpretation any more than I do the suggestion that atheism is beneficial to your sleep.

Also, it’s a Templeton funded study.

Speaking of bugnuts…

Scott Adams has completely lost the plot.

Bet you didn’t know antifa was allied with fascists, didja?

In case you were wondering where he came up with this bizarre idea, he was asked, and his answer was “Wikipedia.” Just “Wikipedia.”

Good people don’t read Dilbert. We’ve got to stop encouraging these clowns.

The people with bugs in their brains are a vital segment of American culture, after all

I’m usually on the progressive side of current affairs, but I don’t know. Maybe Black Lives Matter is going too far — after all, Pat Robertson tells me so.

Robertson said he agreed with the general premise behind BLM, but “that legitimate thing has been hijacked by these radicals and they’re using that label to put forth an agenda and people need to be aware of it.”

“They’re talking about Marxist communism,” Robertson said. “They’re talking about destroying the nuclear family. They’re talking about destroying essentially Christianity as being racist. And all the way through, they want to upend the capitalist structure and destroy America.”

“People should be aware that they’re not just standing with the poor oppressed Black people,” Robertson added. “Of course we want to stand with people against police brutality. Of course we do. But we don’t want to go along with a lesbian, anti-family, anti-capitalist Marxist revolution. We don’t want that for America.”

I had no idea those poor oppressed Black people were a gang of lesbian anti-capitalist Marxists who…wait a minute. If that were true, I’d support them even more! Although it’s not true. Most of the people participating in BLM protests are heterosexuals with families who would be happy if the structure of American society gave them justice and security. At its core, this is not a radical movement unless you think treating black people with dignity and respect and equality is radical — which is probably Robertson’s position anyway.

I think we need a second opinion here, so let’s ask Michele Bachmann? Wait, what year is this? Why does anyone give a flying fuck what Robertson and Bachmann think?

Oh, right, because they are entertainingly bugnuts, as long as you’re not one of the people they hate.

“Antifa is, if you go to their website, their materials, they are directly traceable to the Communist Party because their goal is the overthrow of the United States government and to bring communism into America,” Bachmann said. “Just like Black Lives Matter, this is not a new movement either. On their website, these are transgender Marxists, transgender Black Marxists who are seeking the overthrow the United States and the dissolution of the traditional family.”

“What people need to understand is that 103 years ago, there were no communist countries in this world,” she said. “But this same idea where you have a pretext, you create something—like right now the pretext in America is race wars, that we’re seeing race wars on America’s streets—what this is is a cover to bring about communism and a communist takeover. It happened in communist China. It happened in Venezuela, many countries. What people need to understand, the viewers, is that we currently right now are in a situation where communists are trying to come in and take over America.”

“You say, ‘Aren’t you a little overheated? Isn’t this melodramatic?’” [OMG, Bachmann read my mind! At least, the restrained, polite part of my mind. If she’d gone deeper, she would have used stronger words] Bachmann continued. “This is exactly what a communist revolution looks like. They think they’re going to do it by electing Joe Biden and then once Joe Biden is elected, they think that these Davos, Switzerland, meetings that go on, they think that what they’re going to do is have the United States’ economy collapse, move to a digital currency globally, and then we move into a global-type government. I mean, it’s bizarre, but this is their goal.”

“For people who know their Bible, this is exactly what the prophets told us,” she added. “So, we stand on the word of God, the Bible, and we say, ‘Satan, flee, we’re going to stand on the truth of God.’ And so that’s why now more than ever, between now and the election, what we need to do is pray and cry out to Almighty God and ask for his protection over America and to speak in this election.”

Jeez, but the Cold War really wrecked people psychologically. It’s not the 1950s anymore, the Commies are not and never were hiding under your bed, and it is not anti-American to be smart enough to realize that capitalism is broken and needs, at the very least, a major overhaul. Biden is a political centrist beholden to all the moneyed lobbyists, not a transgender lesbian Black Marxist. You are not a little overheated, Michele. You and Pat Robertson are malignant freaks with bugs in your brain that you call “god” and a terrifying authoritarian streak.

Building up to a fundraiser

Remember FtBCon, the online conference we did before virtual conferencing was the only way to hold a conference? We’re going to be doing something similar, but different, at the end of this month — we are plotting some video events, some twitch streams, some auctions, some targeted blogging, all that sort of thing, all geared to provide content while we ask you all for donations to our legal fund. If you look at the top left of the window here, you’ll see some text saying “COMING SOON: FTB’S SEPTEMBER FUNDRAISER”, and if you click on that, it will take you to a page listing a schedule of events. Well, it will…it doesn’t yet. We’re working on it. We aim to have that list up next week, and then we’ll start spamming you with mentions of the fundraiser itself, which will be over the weekend of 26 September. We’ve got some ideas ready right now, but the purpose of this post is to ask you for suggestions. What would you like to see?

For example, for me we’re considering forcing me to watch some ghastly video, while you chortle at my reactions. Maybe we could let people bid for a seat at the viewing so you can react too? I’m thinking of some niche science blogging (that is, spiders) with donation requests in the post. I may also do a live video/Q&A of my macrophotography and photomicroscopy toys, with real time video from my cameras/microscopes — would you chip in a bit to watch that? There are some other ideas floating around here that we’re whipping into shape, but please, do make suggestions for what you’d like to see and do.

It’s not just me, either. We’re going to ask lots of other FtB bloggers to join in. Who’s your favorite blogger, and what would you like them to do for a few extra dollars?

All donations will end up in our GoFundMe or our new PayPal donation site, paypal.me/freethoughtblogs. Look for more information next week!