Category Religion

Ray Comfort, Plagiarist?

Looks like Ray Comfort found it too hard to write a 50-page introduction to Origin on his own: Metropulse.com, a Knoxville, TN local paper, has a story about Stan Guffey, a University of Tennessee lecturer who wrote a brief bio of Charles Darwin. Turns out that bio bears a striking resemblance to the first few pages of Comfort’s introduction (you know, the part that isn’t batshit crazy).

(HT Unreasonable Faith and AIG Busted.)

I find it ironic that the approach investigators use to detect plagiarism are similar to that taken by biologists to find homologies, which are one of the bits of evidence pointing to common descent.

So maybe Ray can use creationist arguments in his defense: “You cherry-picked your examples to make your case. If you look at the other 47 pages of the introduction, you’ll see that it’s nothing like anything Dr. Guffey has written”, or “Similarities do not mean that I copied from Guffey. It’s more likely that both texts were written by God.” Or the ever-popular “Did anyone see copying take place? Then how do you know it happened?”

(Cross-posted at UMD Society of Inquiry.)

Kent Hovind’s Dissertation

I think I just came a little in my mouth. But then again, I’m a glutton for punishment.

Kent Hovind’s “doctoral dissertation” at Patriot “University” has been released on Wikileaks. Grab it while it’s hot!

Those who lack the patience to read the whole thing may wish to read Karen Bartelt’s analysis.

(HT PZ.)

Luke 6:30

Luke 6:27-31 (NIV):

27“But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. 29If someone strikes you on one cheek, turn to him the other also. If someone takes your cloak, do not stop him from taking your tunic. 30Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. 31Do to others as you would have them do to you.

This has long been one of my favorite Bible verses, especially with biblical literalists, because so few of them actually obey it.

Over in the comments on the Jo Hovind Update post, I asked Flabberghasted whether he obeys that injunction. He said yes. I asked him for a thousand smackers.

To my surprise, he came through. Oh, not the full kilobuck. But he did send me a $50 Amazon gift card. After I pointed out that this was an object lesson to illustrate that the passage above was not one of Jesus’ better-thought-out ideas. And in the credit-where-credit-is-due department, he didn’t drag his feet. The main delay was that I didn’t give him my email address as quickly as he wanted it.

So first of all, to Flabberghasted: thank you.

Secondly, while he gets points for consistency and obedience to Jesus. Unfortunately, I maintain that my point still stands, and being a doormat is still not a good long-term strategy for Christians. So minus a bunch of points for that.

I haven’t decided yet what to do with the card. As I said, I just got it, and am considering my options.

ID at 25

ID the Future has a new episode entitled Intelligent Design Turns 25. I haven’t listened to it, but the title alone is cause for contemplation.

25 years of “Darwinism will be dead within 5 years”.

25 years since the phrase “scientific creationism” was deemed too obviously religious to pass legal muster, and therefore in need of a pair of Groucho glasses.

25 years without a single experiment, testable theory, or, indeed novel argument.

25 years of whining about how the mean old scientific establishment doesn’t take ID seriously.

22 years since the phrase “cdesign proponentsists” came into existence.

20 years of evolutionary theory somehow still lurching forward, zombie-like, propped up by academic tradition, Vested Interests(TM), and of course, its enormous predictive power and ever-plentiful practical applications.

How time flies.

Disco Tute Sues

Oh, lovely. The Disco ‘Tute is suing the California Science Center. Technically, the suit is about the California Science Center (I was going to say “CSC”, but that’d be confusing) not releasing certain documents that Disco asked for under FOIA. But what really chaps their hide is that scientists have a bias against bullshit pseudoscience:

“We believe the reason the California Science Center withheld these public documents is simple: the e-mails show evidence of discrimination against the pro-intelligent design viewpoint.”

Yeah, I bet those mean mainstream scientists also have a bias against dowsing, astrology, and Bigfoot sightings, too. Mean ol’ poopy heads! Why can’t they consider all opinions to be equally valid, regardless of evidence or lack thereof?

To quote David St. Hubbins of Spın̈al Tap,

I believe virtually everything I read, and I think that is what makes me more of a selective human than someone who doesn’t believe anything.

Colbert Endorses BillDo?

Secular Sabotage
This will not come as news to some of you, but ε-Clueful Reader Fez pointed out the blurbs on Bill Donohue’s new book, Secular Sabotage.

The most surprising one is the last one, by none other than über-pundit Stephen Colbert:

“Wake up, America! The secular minority has cut the brake cables on America’s In-God-We-Trust-Mobile™! Not even all 43 of our Christian presidents can save us now.”

Which raises a question: does BillDo not realize that Colbert’s act is just a act, or whether he’s catering to those of his readers who don’t realize that it’s just an act?

At any rate, BillDo hasn’t always been so friendly with Colbert: his 2005 Annual Report of Shit He Got Upset About includes:

February 17
New York, NY—The Comedy Central program, "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart," ran a segment entitled "This Week in God" that mocked the Catholic Church and its teachings, while poking gentle fun at Muslims and Orthodox Jews. For example, Stephen Colbert, the segment host, after reporting that the Vatican teaches that condom use is immoral, exclaimed, "What would high Catholic Church officials know about immoral sexual conduct?" The segment also featured a wheel with religious symbols on it, one of which was labeled "the Immaculate Contraption known as the God Machine."

(Actually, the segment aired Feb. 15, but who’s counting?)

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
This Week in God – The Pope
www.thedailyshow.com
http://media.mtvnservices.com/mgid:cms:item:comedycentral.com:120257
Daily Show
Full Episodes		 Political Humor Health Care Crisis

and

June 6
On "This Week in God," a recurring segment on the Comedy Central program "The Daily Show," Stephen Colbert commented that the Vatican traditionally waits five years after someone dies before the cause of sainthood commences. He noted, however, that Pope Benedict XVI waved it for Pope John Paul II, adding, "what are you going to do about that, bitch?" Colbert then said that the reason why Mother Teresa’s canonization has been held up was due to a film, "Mama T Goes Wild 6: Calcutta Nights." When he said this the program showed a picture of Mother Teresa made to look like she was flashing onlookers.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c
This Week in God – The God Trough is Empty
www.thedailyshow.com
http://media.mtvnservices.com/mgid:cms:item:comedycentral.com:120703
Daily Show
Full Episodes		 Political Humor Health Care Crisis
Mockery Works, Apparently

According to several sources, Kimberly Daniels wrote an article for Pat Robertson’s site entitled The Danger of Celebrating Halloween, with such tidbits as:

The danger of Halloween is not in the scary things we see but in the secret, wicked, cruel activities that go on behind the scenes. These activities include:

  • Sex with demons
  • Orgies between animals and humans
  • Animal and human sacrifices
  • Sacrificing babies to shed innocent blood
  • Rape and molestation of adults, children and babies
  • Revel nights
  • Conjuring of demons and casting of spells
  • Release of “time-released” curses against the innocent and the ignorant.

To quote Mike Argento, “Man, we never get invited to the good Halloween parties.” And a friend of mine added, “How come we never see those jobs advertised? I could do that. I even got a new costume and hat this year”.

And now it appears that the article has been pulled. If you want to read it, you’ll have to retrieve it from Google’s cache while you can.

So does this mean that CBN sought divine guidance from Pat and determined that Daniels’s views were not factually true? Perhaps. But I prefer to think that the article was originally put up because Pat & Pals agree with Daniels, but once everyone started pointing at them and laughing, they were embarrassed; and rather than defend their views, CBN preferred to just yank the article and pretend it never happened.

In short, mockery works.

People like Dawkins, Dennett, Hitchens, and countless others have done a sterling job presenting the intellectual arguments against religion. But the fact is that people aren’t religious for rational reasons; they’re not convinced by rational arguments, any more than people are convinced of Santa Claus’s existence by rational arguments. But a lot of people stay religious because it’s comfortable.

And just as a lot of kids start doubting Santa Claus when the older kids make fun of their beliefs, it’s likely that a lot of people would doubt their god-beliefs if they were widely perceived as uncool or ridiculous. That’s what people like George Carlin and Tim Minchin are good at. But every little bit helps.

BillDo on Sex Ed

Yesterday, BillDo blew a gasket over the use of the phrase “opposite-sex marriage” in the New York Times. Which is, I suppose, his function in the great circle of life.

But then he went on to say:

Here’s how it will play out in the classroom: kindergartners will be told that some adults choose same-sex marriage and some choose opposite-sex marriage. There is no moral difference—it’s just a matter of different strokes for different folks. Not mentioned, of course, will be that some male-on-male sex practices are dangerous.

This brings up some questions: how should one talk about dangerous “male-on-male sex practices” (by which I assume he means anal sex) in a manner that’ll make sense to 2- to 7-year-old children? Should teachers tell them about hetero anal sex at the same time, or wait until after nap time?

In Donohue’s mind, should children also be taught about other potentially dangerous sexual practices, such as autoerotic asphyxiation or BDSM?

Is there any conflict between this and his earlier advocacy of abstinence-only sex ed? Religious conservatives like Bill don’t generally strike me as the type of person who’d want to discuss hot man-on-man action in graphic detail with small children.

Is David Berlinski Redecorating His Home?

For those who don’t know, David Berlinski is one of the Disco Tute’s pet “scientists”. If you’ve seen the movie Expelled, he’s the one who spent his entire interview practically lying on his couch, spouting airy nonsense filled with sesquipedalian words.

The IDists love him because in addition to being an evolution denialist, he’s also a secular Jew (or so he claims), which means they can use him to prop up the idea that ID isn’t religious dogma.

He’s also appeared on the Intelligent Design the Future podcast six times in the past month, and there are thirteen posts about him at Evolution News and Views.

When an actor appears in a movie that’s far beneath them, say, if Morgan Freeman were to make a cameo in Zack and Miri Make A Straight-to-DVD Romantic Comedy, I tend to assume that said actor wants to pick up a few bucks on the side because they’re redecorating the living room.

Berlinski isn’t an actor (and I certainly don’t want to insult Morgan Freeman by comparing him to Berlinski), but he seems willing to say anything as long as the DI’s checks keep clearing. So it looks to me as though he’s trying to redecorate his living room either through speaking commissions, or through book sales. (His 2008 book is out in paperback, and he’s just published another one through Discovery Institute Press.

At any rate, I’ve listened to several of his interviews, and he doesn’t seem to have anything to say. So meh.

Happy Birthday, World!

According to James Ussher, the world was created on October 23, 4004 BC.

So happy 6012th birthday, world!