This Sunday, it's not just me!

A long time ago, well like 12 years or so. I decided one night to start reading the Bible just because I hadn't at that point. Jess had an old one so instead of reading a science book or something science fictiony I picked up the 'good book.' I think I got through 2 pages, maybe a bit more. It was just bad to me.

So a few years ago I found this site, actually run by atheists, where they were trying to read the Bible one page at a time everyday or every other day. I got to Genesis 21 or something before I stopped. It was just not my cup of tea, It was bad, completely wrong about anything close to the origin of life on the planet or indeed the universe itself. And it was BORING. So very BORING. I usually give books 50 pages or so to keep me interested, I rarely put a book down or stop watching a movie because it's bad. But I did with this, just like I did with the Flintstones movie (that got 10 minutes.)

This is stuff I've gone over before, but it turns out I'm not the only one who thinks the Bible is drek. Jerry Coyne over at Why Evolution is True has come to the same conclusion.  The funny thing is I love all those old crazy creation myths, they are kooky fun, but the Bible is just so blah, there is no style, no flare and it's main character? Wow, talk about weak and uninteresting. He doesn't do anything but kill people, where is the intrigue? The gripping back story? All the stuff about Lucifer and the war with god aren't even in the damn thing and they are by far WAY more interesting. Nope we get a co-dependent god who simply must have people worship him or he kills them, but they have 'free will'. Boy this sounds like the worst cobbled together image comic ever!

Anywho, there is also this amazingly stupid thing that the state of Louisiana has done. Oh The South, when will you come into the 20th century with the rest of the world..? Except South Korea, because the Christians got a hold of them as well and took out evolution in their schools too. Those Christians really do love forcing their views on anybody. Man, I'm really starting to not like them. Its like they want me to hate them because they 'love me'. I try to fight my xenophobic urges but they make it soooo easy to fall back on their bad habbits....

Best,

Brett

This Sunday, 46% is the new minority!

 So a new poll (a scientific one, not the usual internet ones that people crash;)) And it looks like all the people who keep telling me that Creationists are really just a SMALL fraction of the Christian population in the US are WRONG. It looks like 46% of AMERICANS are YEC. That's not a small part, OR a minority, that's almost HALF of the population. Scary indeed.

The other stats are, 32% believe in god guided evolution and then there are the people like me, who believe it was all random chance coming in at 15%.

Can you see now, why I do these Sunday Blasphemy posts? The god guided stuff isn't actually supported by evidence, that's more seeing that there is something to evolution but refusing to give up the good feeling of your religion. It's incredibly frustrating and a bit scary. Because that 46% can make way more religious people faster than the non religious people, we tend to have small families or none at all. Luckily there is that 3rd part of government that will protect the rights of the minority group.

There is a glimmer of hope, the 15% group seems to be on an upward trend... albeit a very SLOW one. In 300 years we might be 80%! Then you Christians better watch out cause we'll simply ignore you and make fun of you. You can keep your religion, we won't try to take it from you by making it illegal. It will still be a secular society.

 On another note;

 I'm still waiting for Steve to post about why it's OK for people to be adhere to certain parts of the Bible yet completely ignore others... So Far I've been told my 'tone' isn't good and that I'm not up for a discussion on the matter. I've of course deleted those comments, just more dodging the question nonsense. He's not allowed to comment until he answers the questions. I wonder how it feels to have deity who doesn't agree with all your ideas as we all know I'm god here.

So in honor of Steve I have a video for you;)

Brett

This Sunday a few quotes and something about Theistic Evolution..

A few quotes from a old school Atheist.

Quote 1


Quote 2

And then a blog post about the difference between Theistic Evolution (Catholic Church style) and ID... Disco Institute style.

All I got this week, I had an idea for another post, but I completely forgot the topic! Gah!

Best,

Brett

 Funny as hell! Found via here!

 Also, Muslims have declared a Jihad on dogs.... this is the kind of thinking religion leads to. So why would I sign up for that?!?!?!

I missed last week so 2 this week!

Best,

Brett

Intelligent Design is dead...

It looks like Science has officially declared this pseudo science up and gone with the wind. I almost feel bad... almost;P

Sorry, I know it's not Sunday but since the IDer's insist it was I think I can get away with it;)

Best!

Brett

This Sunday, why don't I just shut up?

So I will, al least this week. Head's hurting, need to get some more work done so I'll send you somewhere else. Somewhere that explains why I do this far better than I can. This Sunday, ask yourselves Why don't Atheists just shut up and stay home?

Read the comments!

Best,

Brett

This Sunday: Dinosaur Fun!

Pharyngula posted this amusing illustration this week, very funny! But what's really cool is the arrival of a new feathered dinosaur called Xiaotingia. 

Now what's cool about Xiaotingia is that when placed into a cladistic matrix it groups together with Archeopteryx, what was considered the first bird awhile ago (and for awhile the only bird before the end of the Cretaceous.) BUT grouping them together pushes both of them OUT of the bird group and into the 'raptor' group of dinosaurs. So it turns out the great conundrum of paleontology has been solved! We now know Archeopteryx is a dinosaur, not a bird, something that was predicted in the early 80's by the great Gregory S. Paul. Paul, using our knowledge of evolution, made a prediction that later turned out to be true, SCIENCE WIN!

So are you asking yourself why is this in a Sunday Blasphemy post and NOT you dinosaur blog? Well, it turns out that the Creationists seem to think that this invalidates evolution! Ignore the fact that Archeopteryx has been considered a sister taxon to birds for quite a number of years, because science changed to fit the evidence that makes it false to the Creationists... My head it hurting just trying to attempt the mental gymnastics... Science is self correcting, when new evidence turns up and is proven to be true, we have to re-evaluate and incorporate that new knowledge into current thinking, something creationists refuse to do. We know the earth isn't 6,000 years old, we have trees older than that. We have evidence that Egypt was already a great city WITH writing about 100-180 years AFTER creation... I'm not sure if that would be possible to go from basically nothing to a fully civilized nation that fast...  Adam and Eve would still be alive if you go by Creation science! Some other new thinking, is that the Big Bang wasn't the 'beginning' of the universe, it's just the last point we can go back to because the explosion obscures everything before it! Science Channel has some good shows on Wednesday!

And finally, we have this great webpage about God destroying the dinosaurs! It's a bit old, 1995, but since Creation science hasn't actually done anything except repeat verses from a 2,000 year old book this would be very modern thinking indeed! Enjoy as I did!


A few more tidbits to look over:


Taking down some IDiocy!

Why a crazy sect of Jews thinks it's OK to kill babies. Relax they used to do it all the time, Old Testament style! 

And you may have noticed I haven't commented on the Norwegian  Nut, I'm still not really sure if that was religiously motivated or rightwingish, or just plain crazy. It seems xenophobic so since I can't make up my mind I'm not going to play the blame game, Fox News can do that;) (Sarcastic yes?!)

Best!

Brett

Real Life Destination Truth!

What a wonderful world, or at least inter-webs!

Over on this blog Frontiers of Zoology the author has posted this image.

It's Aztec (I'm not 100% sure about that, but it's from that area and region) and looks to show a monkey (or ape, I can't see the rear but since there are no known apes in the Americas I'll go with monkey) covering his ears. That's not why I posted a comment there. I commented because the author has decided that this is an OLD WORLD monkey from Japan, and not a native NEW WORLD monkey. He's using this statue to claim that China and the peoples of S. America were exchanging animals and culture. Now this is ENTIRELY possible…. well sort of possible, there is other evidence that sort of supports this but it's nowhere near 100% fact. Now on to the sculpture!

As you can see it's stylized, it appears to be bald, the head doesn't have the same texture as the body, the face looks like it MIGHT also have some sort of hair, but that might just be weathering. It also appears to be smiling. It also appears to have a ruff of hair along the sides of it's face. It's hard to actually tell one way or the other. Also of note, the feet are wrong for any monkey or ape save man... or bigfoot;)

So what kind of monkey is it? Well the author would have us believe it's from Japan, you know those macaques that use the hot springs to stay worm in the winter. But Retrieverman, one of the commenters (who I agree with) said it appears to actually be a Bald SOUTH AMERICAN Uakarki . That's what got this whole thing started, the author decided that is was a macaque and that any other opinions on it are simply wrong because he believes he knows more about monkeys then the commenters. This is quite possibly true in this case I know some monkeys on sight but not all of them, BUT I do know how to tell the difference between animals.

So what is the linchpin of the authors argument? The nose. On a very stylized image the nose is narrow. Narrower than the bald uakari monkey's usually are. BUT the uakari monkey is from Brazil and not native to Mexico so it's entirely possible the STYLIZED image isn't 100% accurate to begin with (hell, I could argue the head is far to large for ANY monkey or ape and it's all made up!) and so to assume it's an old world monkey based on the nose alone alone is jumping the gun to say the least.

Normally I'd have left my comment and that would be it. But the author chimed back in and told me and Retrieverman that we didn't know anything about monkeys. I then went back and told him it was to stylized to make those assumptions. Some good back and forth always livens up the debate, I'm used to 'debating' people who have preconceived ideas so repeating things sometimes helps;)

That brings me to this morning. Retrieverman sent me an email about it so I checked back. It looks like my second comment was deleted. WHY? Because I repeated some of the stuff from my first comments and the author had this to say…

"I am calling a halt to repeated reiterations of the same point of view being posted by persons who refuse to recognise a basic Zoological principle: in this case, the shape of the nose. You simply cannot make a Cattarhinne into a Platyrhinne by rhetoric, and no amount of arguing will change the point. Next time, Brett, I would advise you against making a power play out of one of these discussions when your remarks betray an underlying ignorance of the subject. NO, you cannot have it your way just because you WANT to have it that way."

I might be ignorant of some monkey species, I don't specialize in that type of thing. BUT I do know HOW science works and the BASIC principle of Occam's razor can easily be used to negate your entire idea. I'm not interested in a power play, I'm interested in facts. What the author has provided are not facts, it's an idea, and not a very good one. His whole idea hangs of a stylized nose done by someone who most likely is simply sculpting something he's seen on another sculpture. I do art for a living, I also study animals for drawing, and for fun. I can tell you for a FACT that most artists simply don't draw animals well. Look at ANY old drawings, they are usually REALLY badly done because the artists simply aren't that good OR they don't have access to the animal. The sculpture in question isn't a good representation of ANY monkey OR ape and to make a grandiose proclamation that it is and call that science is an insult to the people who actually are scientists and study animals.

Go ahead make your claims against reason and logic and call it science, it will not make what you say true no matter how much you try to silence the descension, that ISN'T science either. It won't make the scientific community take cryptozoology seriously. What you are actually practicing good sir, is religion. So you can silence me on your blog, but I have my own blogs and a will to use them. Have at thee!

Best!

Brett

Sun... er MONDAY blasphemy

There you have it, all the answers you'll ever need from the Bible! It all makes perfect sense now!

Found via Pharyngula.

And a few more things I happened upon.

This is a great example of why you cant actually get through to creationists with actual logic.

A perfect inspirational message!

And of course the 'loving' church, who will sic Satan upon you if you don't obey.

Enjoy!

Best,

Brett

Blame Jess for this not being on a Sunday, she wouldn't get off the computer;)

This Sunday: Attack!

Well, it's the 26th and I can stop being nice;) Let's see, so much good stuff this week. We have Hitler and the Nazi's celebrating Christmas. How festive! But I guess it means nothing as they aren't True Christians.

We have those funny old Muslims trying to outdo the Christians in their hypocrisy! Of course you'd never see Muhammad molesting a child... oh wait..

And to liven things up, some funny cartoons... Well, I thought they were funny.

And then a few other things. Josh Brecheen a newly elected creationist from Oklahoma want's the schools to teach creationism again. It's an interesting post because the comments in red are from an actual biology professor. Shows that you really shouldn't argue against something if you don't know anything about it.

And then this news that Christians are now the minority in Britain (at least in that pole.) Exciting!

But what really blew me away this week. A new hominids called Denisovans! Do you remember that single finger bone they found in Siberia? Well they managed to sequence it and low and behold it's a new species, related to Neanderthals! It even interbred with humans in the area! How cool is that, we have a DNA sequence BEFORE we even have an idea what the hominid looks like! To fricken cool! SCIENCE!

I am curious, how the creationists will explain this away? Since the DNA says there are other species that look like homo sapiens but aren't doesn't that mean they were in the Garden of Eden as well? Funny that they aren't mentioned, or is this were Cain and Able got their brides? Then I guess that would mean that humans as a species were never perfect.

Best,

Brett

This Sunday, I want answers!

Via Pharyngula. Nice to see that turn the other cheek saying doesn't actually apply to these Christians. This is Hate Mail sent to Richard Dawkins, which he read an posted.

What is the one thing that Religion promises but never actually delivers?

Answers.

Oh they think they are giving you answers when you ask them questions, but they aren't. And of course if they can't answer it they pull out their trump card…. drum roll please….. "God works in mysterious ways." Or, their new favorite "we can't know the mind of God."

For me, the whole point of religion is to explain were we came from, to provide answers to all those why's floating in my head. Yet it never does. Why is the sky blue? God made it that way is NOT an answer (Light reflecting off the water in the atmosphere is;).) Why is the grass green? (Chlorophyll in the grass.)

Of course when this is told to a true believer (I may owe Stan Lee money now) they tell you that you simply don't understand Gods plan or how he works. AGH! Those aren't answers either! OK, explain it to me. Oh, you can't explain that either? Well where the hell do I get my fricken answers then?

This is my favorite 'answer' to that question. "One you join God in heaven, all will be explained!"…. WTF?!? How is that going to help me when I need help now? Who provided answers to the other questions I asked? (And answered.) What can tell me what I need to know?

Science.

Sure they don't have all the answers yet. But for the small amount of time science has been used, we've learned a lot. Were humans come from, how old our planet is, our universe.  Why this and why that. We can even use science to show how those pesky religions with their non answers are wrong! Of course the true believers ($$$here ya' go Stan!) refuse to except this, they'll use all the medications and happily play with all the benefits that science provides, but if it dips into their closely held beliefs then it's wrong!  It sounds something like this:

"Why is science wrong?"

"Because! "

'Because Why?"

"Because the eye is so complicated! it's perfect! It could only be designed!"

"Really? Then why do I have to were glasses? Why is there this huge blind spot? Why is the image upside down and my brain has to flip it over?"

"God works in mysterious ways."

Thank you! I'll be here all week!

Best,

Brett

Science and Religion compatible? Not this Sunday.

Here's an opinion piece written by Jerry A. Coyne. It's quite interesting, lays out why religion and science don't work and it also has a great article on how morals originated (Psssst... no god needed, surprise surprise.)

And I'm still waiting for that evidence of Gods existence. You've only had four thousand (+ or -) years. I figure you'd have to have something testable by now (feeling it in your soul doesn't count as souls don't exist. And if you're going to claim they do, you'll need to show your work for that as well... ie; evidence please.)

Best,

Brett

See, EVILution is true!

I happened upon this site a few weeks ago, Stupid Dinosaur Lies. I saw this today:

"The Bible is clear. The ancestors of every animal that ever lived were created during Creation Week. Each basic animal type was created "after his kind" and all subsequent individual animals, including dinosaurs, descended from these created categories."

Here, according to the beliefs of the creationists, all varieties of animal life were descendants of the basic animal types that were created on Days 5 and 6 of creation week. There's no "Bible is clear" to it. It's all made up and shoehorned into the Bible which speaks nothing about such things.

It looks like what Morris is really teaching here is the very same thing they continuously claim to be all a lie – evolution. Creationists teach evolution! No ifs, ands, or buts about it. They do teach evolution whether they want to admit it or not. The very same thing they regard as a lie is the very same thing they preached about in their dogma. The difference is evolution according to creationists happened at a rapid pace in a short time just like Poke'mon"

It thought that was rather funny. The person who runs the site is a Christian who actually knows that evolution is a fact. I guess there are some who didn't swallow the Kool-Aid (just a joke people.)

Best,

Brett

Insane religious nuts making everyone think like them..

Or at least trying to, go here for the story American Taliban , it has links to these 'peoples' website. These people are one step away from the Taliban or the Nazis and they're on US soil. It's repugnant. I can't even go into depth because I'd never stop typing. Basically 'Repent Amarillo' is a religious group that goes around an forces their opinion on others, stalking and harassing them. This was supposed to be a free country but I guess it's only a 'free to believe what I tell you to country'. AGH!

Brett

Truth in Polling...

Found via Pharyngula, original website here. I feel like this cartoon is speaking only to me;)

Best,

Brett

Funny ID Takedown and a Quicky Sketch

Done on the computer, I don't have any new stuff to post, just pages waiting for approval and covers that I'm not allowed to show yet:( But once I get the OK, up they'll go.) For some reason I felt like drawing Taboo this morning.

I read this on a blog, it's a comment that I found really funny. I'm going to say this now, NO comments on it, you can talk about Taboo all you want but any ID/religious crap will be deleted. My head hurts too much for anymore shenanigans;)

DEEN said...

"There is no proof one way or the other for or against design intervention."
1. There is no scientific evidence of design intervention (but quite a bit of evidence of sub-optimal or even outright crappy design).
2. There is no known mechanism for design intervention.
3. Design intervention is not necessary for speciation and adaptation by natural selection to occur (both mechanism and evidence are available).
4. Therefore, science gives us good reasons to reject design intervention, and none to accept it.

"Both evolution (sans adaptation), and ID are not verifiable, since both are forensic investigations."
Except that the forensic detective of evolution has the DNA that shows that the butler did it, as well as the bullet traces that suggest what gun you may expect to find in his bedroom. Meanwhile, ID can only whine that there is no video of the act, so maybe the maid did it, even though there's no evidence she was even in the building that night.

Found over at: Zenoferox.

Best,

Brett

Fair and Balanced

See I'm fair and balanced... like Fox News. Edward Current and his one man War on Atheists. This one's about why Atheists are stupid, or at least not as smart as Christians.

Enjoy as I did! He almost had me convinced;)!

Brett

My ongoing effort to give Steve an aneurysm

Been busy today, I'll have to look over the comments on the other posts and cringe before answering.

Best,

Brett

New Agers and Creationists should not be President

An EXCELLENT article by Roger Ebert:

New Agers and Creationists
should not be President

Enjoy as I did;)

Brett

Funny Atheist Humor!

I'm actually a fan of this show, I watch it on BBC America along with Primeval and The Catherine Tate Show to name but a few programs. I haven't seen this skit (it might have been removed for time) so I had to watch it!

Very funny!

Brett