Home Made Candles

What do I do when home during a power outage, using candles for light? Make more candles of course. I used to make candles when I was younger so this was familiar territory. I used some paraffin lying around in the basement, a lump of beeswax and the melted bits form the candles I'd been burning. You can also use crayon fragments for color, but I didn't do that this time around.

Merry Christmas!

The audience loves this so much, there's a 15 to 20 second interruption for applause in the middle of the song. This is NOT your average "12 Days of Christmas"

Writing a Poison Pen Letter to CNN

Dr. Sanjay Gupta was once tapped as a potential Surgeon General. Today I learned it would have been somewhat catastrophic if he'd gotten the job, as he's easily swayed by con men, psychic surgeons and faith healers. On December 22, 2010 this idiot used CNN's AC360 as a forum for promoting the faith healer and psychic surgeon "John of God."



I sent CNN the following comment to express my disgust at their promotion of a faith healer and their inability to do even rudimentary reporting. Apparently CNN, like Oprah, feels its more important to produce a "feel good" story that gives false hope than to find and report the truth.

I'm writing to express my disgust over Dr Gupta promoting the con artist "John of God" on a December 22, 2010 episode of AC360. I found the alleged investigation to be shallow and pathetic. Is this really what journalism has come to at CNN, the uncritical promotion of a known con artist with nothing more than a few vague bits of hand waving and pretense at MAYBE having some doubts?

"John of God" is a faith healer, a con man whose antics have been vivisected by people who actually investigated the man. The only positive to come out of that promotion piece is knowing it's a damn good thing Gupta didn't get the Surgeon General job and anything he has to say about medicine or science in the future can be dismissed as the babbling of an ignorant and easily fooled kook.

CNN has a web form for sending them letters.

You can learn more about Sanjay Gupta and his promotion of quackery at the links below:

Faith-Healer 'John of God' featured on CNN's AC360

John of God on CNN with Dr Gupta

You can learn more about Oprah's promotion of "Psychic Surgeon" John of God on the December 01, 2010 episode of the The Skeptics' Guide To The Universe Podcast.

Racists Angry Over Thor's Black Sidekick.

One of my favorite things about new movies are the flame wars over casting. People grouse about the race of the actors, the fact that the actors portraying parent / child relationships don't have a large enough age gap to make it plausible, drug problems the actors have had in the past and just about everything else you can think of. For some reason people seem to forget that Hollywood routinely does things like cast Charleston Heston as a Jew and still produce a few really good movies.

Despite all the grousing, the nit-picking idiocy is generally unfounded. Yes, white supremacists and racist assholes got bent out of shape at the addition of a black character to "Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves", but let's be honest here, Morgan Freeman pretty much carried the non-villain scenes. Without Freeman and Alan Rickman the film would have been virtually unwatchable, even if some racist idiot in congress groused about having to "explain why Sherwood forest was integrated" to his 9 year old daughter.

Enter Thor and the news that a black man will play a Norse God in a supporting role. Thor himself isn't being played by a black man, but Heimdall is going to be far darker than most the people who ever worshiped him. Theologically, there is a vague rationalization. If these were in fact Gods, instead of imaginary friends created by Norse people to get them through cold winter nights, then it makes sense for the races of the Gods to reflect to a certain extent the races of the people of Earth. More to the point, the Marvel character of Thor is already pretty well divorced from Norse mythology.

Regardless, people are outraged. Neo-Pagans who claim to worship Thor aren't the ones who are outraged. Minority rights activists aren't outraged that the main black character to be announced is only a glorified bouncer. No, outrage from those groups would at least make some vague sort of sense. Conservative Christians are the ones who are outraged a Norse God is being played by a black man.

Take a moment to wrap your head around that. Christians are upset over the race of an actor in a movie about Norse Mythology. At first glance that makes about as much sense as Ted Haggard getting bent out of shape over the a Bollywood movie where Shiva is being played by an Indian actor who isn't from the Brahmin caste.

The Council of Conservative Citizens web site has the following article:

Marvel Studios declares war on Norse mythology

Norse mythology gets a multi-cultural remake in the upcoming movie titled “Thor,” by Marvel studios. It’s not enough that Marvel attacks conservative values and promotes the left-wing, now mythological Gods must be re-invented with black skin.

It seems that Marvel Studios believes that white people should have nothing that is unique to themselves. An upcoming movie, based on the comic book Thor, will give Norse mythology an insulting multi-cultural make-over. One of the Gods will be played by Hip Hop DJ Idris Elba.

The online campaign to boycott Thor by Marvel Studios has begun. Visit Boycott-Thor.com

Keep in mind, this outrage is coming from people who, due to their religious views, are unlikely to see the movie anyway. People who were not going to see the movie because it depicts a pagan religion are calling for a boycott because one of the actors is black. As you can see in the quote above, they try to write this off as outrage at multiculturalism, but there's no good way to whitewash it any anything other than plain old racism. A "white" character will be played by a black man and these jackasses have gotten their panties in a knot over it.

At least the overt and admitted racists over at the stormfront forums have the intellectual integrity to admit they're pissed off for racist reasons. The fact that white supremacists are displaying more honesty and integrity than the Council of Conservative Citizens (CofCC) doesn't bode well for the CofCC.

My Oddest Beer Yet

Last year I made a pale IPA with artificial spruce flavoring. The bottling date was August 1, 2009. Most of it was consumed within the first few months. It was novel, tasty and well worth repeating. I saved a few bottles to see how the brew aged. Last night, December 15, 2010, I opened one.

A year ago the spruce and the hops balanced nicely. As experienced brewers are likely suspecting as they read this, the hop aroma and flavor had faded over the past year, leaving the spruce VERY prominent. The tasting notes I wrote included the text "Strong spruce flavor and nose with aspects of pine pitch. This is NOT a beer for aging."

Fearing the remaining two or three bottles in the basement would end up down the drain instead of in my belly, I sprinkled some cinnamon over the beer to see if that helped. The dash of spice took a virtually undrinkable beer reminiscent of sucking a hunk of conifer into a pleasant, light Winter beer. It was more like drinking a frothy cinnamon beverage next to the Christmas tree, as opposed to chewing on said tree.

I offered some to my lovely wife, but she declined. We did however discuss the beer before going to bed.

"Honey, you're weird," she said.

"How so?" I asked.

"Spruce and cinnamon beer. Face it, you're weird."

"No argument there."

What is Anonymous?

"Anonymous" consists of a collection of people who act based upon conversations on the marginally moderated 4chan.org /b/ forum. /b/ is the site's "Random" board. It usually features pornography and efforts to get 4chan readers to harass a particular individual. Most of the time these efforts consist of "I hate this bitch, here's her facebook / home number, make her suffer!" These are usually met with the reply of "Anonymous is not your personal army" and a collective "meh."

If, however, kittens are being tortured, rabbits crushed, puppies thrown into rivers or the Internet censored, 4chan declares war.

A few key hackers will post download links to botnet clients to turn your PC into a zombie for a DDoS attack on targeted web sites. At various points over the last few days, Mastercard, Paypal and Visa have all been unable to process any transactions due to these attacks.

The better researchers will dig up loads of information to be used in tracking down the offenders. This, for example, is how the woman who tossed a cat in a trash can in the UK was tracked down.

The war will escalate until, I kid you not, the warriors grow bored or move onto something else. Frequently this happens after a sufficiently large laugh comes out of the exchange. For example, an 11 year old girl was posting topless photos of herself to /b/ and links to videos where she talked about using a gun to make a "Brain Slushie" out of anyone who gave her grief. Anonymous tracked down her home phone and made it very clear to her parents what kind of person she was being. They were not kind. They were raging assholes. The issue died when her father, displaying a complete disregard for the fact that his 11 year old started this by posting nudie photos of herself online, posted a video where he threatened 4chan. Normally this would only escalate things, but he made such an idiot of himself Anonymous just laughed at him, treating his "Consequences will never be the same (NSFW!)" video as the best possible punch line to the entire affair.

If you had to translate Anonymous into D&D terms, the best match for their alignment would be "Chaotic asshole."

Side note, most of the porn on /b/ falls into one of the following categories:

1. Chubby porn.
2. Female 4chan readers posting their own topless photos.
3. Shemale porn.
4. "Trap" porn, referring to young effeminate men who can pass for women when properly tarted up.
5. "Dumps" where someone starts dumping their favorite porn photos, most of which were found on 4han to begin with.

Every few hours some idiot tries to start a child pornography thread. The moderators step in quickly, lock the thread, delete it and allegedly turn the IP addresses of the idiots who posted the garbage over to the FBI.

4chan is hosted on the USA. Its founder, Moot, is a US citizen. No one really knows HOW the site has avoided being taken down by the US government. The best guess is that that FBI finds it too rich a source of information on child porn producers and traders.

It's safe to say that none of the conservative pundits have ever looked at 4chan themselves. If they had, they'd be decrying /b/ as part of the gay agenda. You can't go more than a few pages on /b/ before hitting a tranny thread. It can be quite jarring until you become desensitized to the sight of a 6 foot tall ebony black transsexual with implants felating herself.

Then again, given the Republican track record of the last few years, they may know EXACTLY what's on /b/ and are keeping it quiet so as to not dry up one of their favorite sources of spank bank imagery.
Reply

Salt Water Quackery

*sigh*

ASEA Scam?

$40 for a bottle of salt water and a long list of mumbo-jumbo claiming it's more than just salt water. Oh, and trying to hide the fact that it's table salt by calling it by the chemical name sodium chloride.

I'd start bottling filtered tap water with a few teaspoons of salt and claiming it's a less expensive, but equally effective version of the quackery, but I have morals, something the folks at ASEA appear to lack.

As temping as it is to call it a sodium chloride water scam, but it's not quite accurate to call it a "scam." Calling it a scam implies the people selling or manufacturing it KNOW the health claims are a pile of nonsense. I have no evidence, other than the evasive nature of the swill on their web site, to demonstrate they KNOW they're selling quackery.

The lack of peer-reviewed, placebo controlled, clinical trials with a non-trivial sample size, combined with the complete lack of feasibility for their claims makes a label of "Quackery" quite accurate.

If it walks like a duck...

Christopher Maloney is a quack

Just to make sure there's no ambiguity about it, Christopher Maloney is a licensed, board certified quack, but a quack regardless.

Socialist Catalonian Party Vote - Woman Has Orgasm (OFFICIAL VIDEO)

Some people take their civic duties quite seriously. I think this woman goes a bit overboard.

Adam Deen, Evolution and Censorship

What do you do when the opposition has completely destroyed your arguments? How do you respond when they reveal your sources to actually be saying the opposite of what you claim?

Censorship of course!

The Sound of Science

I'm attaching this to every youtube PM I exchange I have with a quack or pseudoscience nutjob for the foreseeable future.

GOP Candidate: Church-State Separation Came From Hitler?

The separation of church and state has been a political idea for a LONG time. In the west the idea got started among the masses when the British tired of the wars over Catholicism vs Protestantism. It wasn't even an original idea for the founding fathers of the USA when the Constitution was written. Claiming Hitler had anything to do with originating the idea is comically ignorant.



Update:

In the comment below, the eternally ignorant "DM" claims:

And the Pope is 100% correct: The Nazis and the atheists both wish to ABOLISH FAITH....

Reality however conspires to prove both him and the Pop wrong. You see, Hitler was NOT an atheist.

"Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord."
- Adolf Hitler, 1943

"The task of preserving and advancing the highest humanity, given to this earth by the benvolence of the Almighty, seems a truly high mission"
- Adolf Hitler, 1943

"A campaign against the "godless movement" and an appeal for Catholic support were launched Wednesday by Chancellor Adolf Hitler's forces."
- Associated Press, 1933

In a speech delivered in Berlin, October 24, 1933, Hitler stated: "We were convinced that the people needs and requires this faith. We have therefore undertaken the fight against the atheistic movement, and that not merely with a few theoretical declarations: we have stamped it out."

Let's be blunt here. Hitler hated atheists and considered them enemies of the state.

Note that the "National Socialism" in this next quote refers to the NAZI party, not Communism as practiced in the USSR.

In a speech delivered at Koblenz, August 26, 1934 Hitler states: "There may have been a time when even parties founded on the ecclesiastical basis were a necessity. At that time Liberalism was opposed to the Church, while Marxism was anti-religious. But that time is past. National Socialism neither opposes the Church nor is it anti-religious, but on the contrary, it stands on the ground of a real Christianity. The Church's interests cannot fail to coincide with ours alike in our fight against the symptoms of degeneracy in the world of to-day, in our fight against the Bolshevist culture, against an atheistic movement, against criminality, and in our struggle for the consciousness of a community in our national life, for the conquest of hatred and disunion between the classes, for the conquest of civil war and unrest, of strife and discord. These are not anti-Christian, these are Christian principles."

Anyone claiming Hitler was an atheist or was motivated by atheism is, in making that claim, revealing that they are either painfully and pathetically ignorant of the topic upon which they speak, or are perfectly happy to deliberately lie to advance their agenda. Given the current Pope's past of deliberately hiding pedophiles to shield them from the legal consequences of raping children, my guess is that he's intentionally lying. I don't know about DM. My suspicion is that he's just an ignorant idiot, as that theory is more consistent with his other comments.

Is fixedearth.com the new Timecube?

fixedearth.com is full of some really idiotic claims. For example:

"I) Instead of granting the Copernican assumptions of a rotating earth & a stationary sun, one can keep a rotating earth & assume that the sun orbits the earth annually.  "

One big problem with such an assertion is that it doesn't explain night and day. If the Earth is stationary and the sun orbits the Earth once a year, then a single night /  day cycle would take not 24 hours, but 365.4 of what we now call "days." We'd have 6 months of darkness and 6 months of light. In order for the day / night cycle we have now to be maintained, the Sun would have to orbit the Earth once every 24 hours, or be in a fixed position while the Earth rotated beneath it.

Most of the content of fixedearth.com is little more than incoherent rants. For example:

There is a third fact which reveals a striking contrast to these assumption-based Models falsely claiming to be "Science".  ("Science: TO KNOW". "Assumed: ADOPTED TO DECEIVE").  This third fact relates solely to the Biblical Model of the Earth and the Sun.  In this Model no assumptions and theories are required at all! Worldwide, all of us can see and photograph the sun, moon, and stars going around the earth daily.[1] This is KNOWN SCIENCE with real math behind all eclipses, space shots, etc.  

Really now, if this kind of drivel represents the height of Geocentric thought then it's no wonder that among scientists the theory died out a few hundred years ago.

 The Biblical Model is the only truly scientific Model. It is time for every truth seeker to ignore the scoffers and insist on the facts. The facts are that the Biblical Model of a completely motionless Earth with the Sun, Moon, and Stars going around daily is true science requiring no assumptions. All else is from Satan, the father of lies.

The rant above ignores the fact that an Earth centered solar system does not comply with any observable facts about the motions of the planets or the observations and achievements of the space program.

Why Geocentrism is Wrong

There's a Geocentrists convention being held to try and claim the sun orbits the Earth.

This depresses me greatly. as it's an indication of yet ANOTHER way the American education system has failed catastrophically. One could ask "Well, how would an Earth centered solar system even look different?" Here's a few examples of how:

Starting Points

None of the probes we've sent into space would have reached another planet, as all the navigation calculations done assume a massive sun in the center of the solar system and planets that orbit it. The current calculations of satellite orbits would simply not work. Instead of the Moon as our main satellite, we'd also have the Sun and all the planets to contend with.

The orbits of the planets would look more like that of the moon and would be far easier to predict. The machinations needed to predict the positions of the planets with an Earth centered solar system are maddening.

We'd see no parallax when observing stars during different seasons. While the parallax is small and requires sensitive instruments to detect, it is very, very consistent.

The Sun, the Moon and Solar Eclipses

The sun would have to be much, much smaller for the Earth to keep it in orbit, well below the lower threshold for it to contain enough gas to ignite into an active star. As a result it would need a very different fuel source than what we believe it has now.

Solar eclipses would be a different beast. We have a near perfect fit now because of how the size and distance of the sun gives it the appearance of being the same size as the moon. The moon is already about 1/4 the Earth's diameter. Unless the sun were in the same orbit as the moon it would have to be either further away and larger, or closer and smaller. Being the same distance would mean there were no solar eclipses. The further away it gets the larger it has to be to maintain the illusion of identical sizing so vital to a solar eclipse.

Either way, the sun would have to stay pretty close to lunar size to not escape Earth orbit. This would put it close enough to the moon to keep it pretty much molten, at least during close passes. The moon would not be the unchanging venue we see today but a, active, volcanic place constantly heated by close proximity to the sun.

The sun would cause tides as well. In a sun centered solar system, the Sun is so far away that it's gravitational pull doesn't cause localized tides the way the moon does. A sun small enough to stay in Earth orbit and yet appear the same form Earth's surface would cause tides. This would mean tidal forces would not be determined by the moon's orbit alone, but by a combination of lunar and solar orbits. Daytime would ALWAYS be high tide and days when you could see the moon and the sun would have particularly high tides. Tidal pool ecosystems would either not exist or be adapted to a highly irregular high / low tide pattern.

We'd See Differently, if we Were Here at all

None of that really matters as we'd probably be bathed in lethal radiation. A sun small enough to be kept in Earth orbit yet bright enough to produce as much light as the one we see would probably need a nuclear power source involving metal, not a plasma miasma. This means the Earth would probably be a sterile wasteland devoid of life, as it would be bathed in enough nuclear radiation to rip apart most life forms.

The visible spectrum of light would be different. A plutonium reactor for example emits a pale blue light, not the white light we see from our sun. The sun has the wrong color spectrum for self sustaining nuclear reactions in a body small enough to be kept in Earth orbit.

The Outer Solar System

Jupiter would not exist as we've seen it. The super-massive gas giants we've seen with our telescopes and probes would have too much gravity to be kept in orbit by tiny little Earth. They'd have to be much, much smaller, which means our calculations on how to get probes to them would have been so massively incorrect as to prevent the probes from getting there.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. One could easily spend months or years compiling a list of ways an Earth centered solar system would be different from the one we have now. It takes quite a bit of ignorance to try and assert that the Earth is the center of the solar system.

Update: Venus

If the Earth was the center of the solar system the current calculations for predicting a Transit of Venus simply wouldn't work, if transits still happened at all. Remember we're dealing with a sun slightly larger than the moon, orbiting a distance not that far beyond it. Venus would either be a large planet far beyond the sun's orbit, or a much smaller satellite inside that orbit. If Venus were further away then a Transit of Venus would NEVER HAPPEN. If it were inside the orbit of the sun then Transits would happen with far greater frequency than they do now. If the orbit of Venus were irregular enough to account for the rarity of a Transit of Venus then we would be seeing it as frequently as we see a comet, not regularly enough for ancient cultures to have dubbed it the "Morning Star."

Indeed, explaining a Transit of Venus AND the frequency with which we see Venus now would require one to conclude that there are actually multiple objects in the solar system that just HAPPEN to have appearances and orbits aligned in JUST the right way as to make them LOOK like they're all the same planet.

Update: Planetary Orbits

The web site jgiesen.de has a model showing side by side comparisons the Heliocentric and geocentric motion of the bright planets. It illustrates how absurdly convoluted the orbits of the planets would be in a geocentric model, if they were to fit the positions of the planets as observed from Earth. As you can see from the animation the geocentric model necessitates the planets not only revolve around the Earth, but move in an additional circle as well. Geocentrism requires additional orbits around unseen objects. Venus, for example, simply can't orbit the Earth directly, but would have to be orbiting something invisible and transparent which was in turn orbiting the Earth. A sun centered solar system actually FITS the observed data using the known laws of physics. Geocentrism on the other hand requires an invisible gravity well for each planet that we can neither see nor detect.

Strange Words: Stopa

Stopa:
Definition:
Politically correct yet still insulting version of "Retarded". Refers to people who are not mentally challenged but act like they are.

A person with Down's Syndrome is not Stopa but most political extremists are.

History:
Created by online malcontents as a response to mental health groups requesting the word "retarded" no longer be used. Stopa replaces the word "Retarded" in insults. Because "Stopa" is so short, it also works as a replacement for "re-re" as a shortened version of "Retarded."

Examples:
Jesus Christ that politician is such a Stopa!"

"That's Stopa grade stupid."

"You are Sooo f***ing Stopa."

"What are you, Stopa??"

WTF Nuke Mecca?

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Liars, scum and Halloween

I just finished reading "The Danger of Celebrating Halloween" by blogger Kimberly Daniels. Fark.com also covered this deceitful individual.

She appears to have forgotten the commandment to not bear false witness against your neighbor. She certainly enjoys regurgitating a long list of nonsense about witches. There probably aren't enough pagans in the country for her claim that "most of the candy sold during this season has been dedicated and prayed over by witches" to be even remotely true.

It says a lot about the "faith" of Kimberly Daniels that she has to flat out lie about others to try and make a point.

Here are some choice quotes form this jackass:

"During this period demons are assigned against those who participate in the rituals and festivities. These demons are automatically drawn to the fetishes that open doors for them to come into the lives of human beings. For example, most of the candy sold during this season has been dedicated and prayed over by witches."

Gee, Nestle must employ just about every witch in the country to curse all that candy!

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.

Citation needed. Where, for example, are the police reports of all these Satanic human sacrifices?

Jennifer Lopez Public Service Announcement for Pertussis (Whooping Cough)

A wise quote

"Being yelled at by a furious woman should be treated as a semi-formal occasion" -Dexter (The serial killer)

Update:

I find it hilarious that Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus felt compelled to post a comment, adding his usual incoherent ranting and drivel to a quote about furious women. Perhaps David is trying to tell us he's working on becoming Danielle.

I'm also amused by his reference to skeptic and magician James Randi coming out of the closet. It's ooooold news, but then no one could accuse Danielle / David Mabus of being timely or well informed. If Danielle is true to form, the videos probably won't even be related to the point this poor unmedicated schizophrenic is trying to make. IF the videos are related, they'll probably contradict Mr/Ms Mabus.

About the UN

To everyone who is afraid that UN shock troops are going to invade the USA and enslave the people they don't kill:

The UN has no standing army. "UN Troops" are frequently forces borrowed from the US.

Fearing a UN invasion is like being afraid you're going to be violently raped by your paraplegic uncle who is chemically castrated, has no arms and was impotent before the accident that paralyzed him.

Anger and Trolls

Anger at a troll is nothing more than high grade troll chow. They eat it up and feed upon it.

Amber Benson and Anthony Stewart Head singing

I have no words. Go in to about 3:45 to see something that can never be unseen.

A word to the wise

Do not argue with a troll, for he will drag you down to his level and defeat you, because ultimately he will say whatever he wants to say and is not confined by mundane considerations like accuracy, consistency, manners or intellectual integrity. They're kind of like the Religious Right or the far flung left that way

Blimps are scary

Like it or not, blimps can be terrifying things, even the toy ones!

Robert Lanza threatens his critics

Robert Lanza likes to make some outrageous claims. People who have criticized things like Robert Lanza's view of the afterlife or the claims that we don't die, but time simply reboots have received an ultimatum. Robert Lanza has demanded critical blog posts about him be taken down. His response to being criticized appears to be not an effort to address the concerns raised, but to threaten and intimidate the people who raised them.

Doug Humphrey may want your child dead

Doug Humphrey advocates the death of non-Christian Children.

I can't help but wonder if Doug Humphrey ALWAYS advocated the genocide of non-Christian children, or if this is a new development. Notice that the tweet was directed at an atheist. That's right, Doug Humphrey was telling this GodlessAtheist bloke that it would have been more merciful if God had Killed him as a child.

PZ Myers is a bit more gentle to this jackass.

Robert Lanza spews more nonsense

What is this guy smoking anyway?

I'd love to have his job. Toke up, spew a bunch of philosophical and pseudoscience BS, label it an "experiment" or "science" and send it off for publication. Sadly I have to work for a living and produce intelligible content and not transcribed drug trips.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Liar or Moron?

I posted the following reply to a woman who made some rather absurd claims about atheists:

http://answersto.wordpress.com/2010/05/05/the-silliest-atheist-say-or-do

I'm a Christian and I found your flat out lies about atheists to be disgusting and an embarrassment to Christendom.

"Please don’t stand for the all atheist in the world, you don’t know every nature they have. Luckily I had a bump in roads with those silliest atheist that’s why I’m stating this fact in my article and in my vid."

So, you're making fun of one specific person and extrapolating their beliefs to ALL theists?

That's no different than claiming Fred Phelps is representative of all Christians or the 9/11 bombers are representative of all Muslims. You're cherry picking a specific individual who doesn't even represent the mainstream of atheist thought.

"Sadly but most of them are rly practicing this silliness."

That's a flat out lie. Did you not read the passage that tells us not to bear false witness against our neighbors?

"I’m pretty sure that you also had an encounter with this kind as well. but you just disregard that without paying any attention into it."

I've never met an atheist who believed in Satan.

The more I read of your comments the more I suspect you're NOT a Christian, but someone who is out to make Christians look ignorant and stupid. The flat out lies you're telling are too absurd to be written off as mere ignorance on your part.

Terrariums for Kids

I need to file this idea away for when my son is a little older.

Mercola should learn to fact check

Fruit Juice and Honey both get a lot of their sweetening power from fructose. Mercola must be some kind of idiot to recommend fructose heavy products on one hand but advise against consuming it on the other.
About Health
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

The Muppets: Pöpcørn

My neighbor Totoro becomes a commuter. on Twitpic

My neighbor Totoro becomes a commuter. on Twitpic

The Evolution of Creationism: Part I

Malena Ernman & Martin Fröst in Flight of the Bumblebee

Cycles

What Happens When You Die? Babbling Idiot Suggests Time Simply Reboots

I think this article was GREAT! I printed it up and now I'll have all the manure I need to fertilize my garden this weekend. I think it's hilarious how the author engages in some scientifically illiterate naval gazing and calls it "evidence." Is ALL the "news" on the Huffington Post this shoddy and incompetent or is Robert Lanza an aberration?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

AOL News gives mentally challenged man reporting gig!

The article Stanton Friedman: A Scientist Searches for the Truth of UFOs - AOL News was written by Lee Speigel The article itself is a testament to shoddy, incompetent reporting. Instead of actually asking any challenging questions, Lee Speigel bends over backwards to lend creditability to the wild, unsupported claims of a well known UFO crank. Instead of actually asking for evidence, Lee Speigel bends over backwards to make his subject seem more reliable. This is known as an "Argument for Authority" and its a common, and shoddy form of argument used primarily by people who have no actual evidence to back up their assertions.

Fascinated by the extreme incompetence of Lee Speigel's "reporting" I decided to see what else he had written for AOL News. His bio says:

Lee Speigel
Contributor

Writer, reporter, and paranormal expert Lee Speigel is the former host of NBC Radio's "The Edge of Reality." He's hosted nearly 1,500 programs on unexplained phenomena, and previously worked at Westwood One Radio and ABCNews.com. He is the only person to produce a presentation at the United Nations on the subject of UFOs.

This explains a lot. Lee Speigel is happy to ignore the lack of evidence not for a single interview, but as a fundamental, core facet of his very existence. Let's look at some of his other stories:


Netherlands Town Claims Tallest Lego Tower
Nuclear Physicist Describes Vast UFO Cover-Up
Octopus Tree: Ancient Indian Burial Ground or ... Just a Tree?
No Sea Serpents Here, Says UK's Royal Navy
Russian Governor Says He Made Friends With ETs
Science Embraces Time Travel, Once Stuff of Sci-Fi
Jersey Devil: Horrific Fantasy or Genetic Mutant?
Police Tried to Protect 'Nessie' From Hunters
ET Debate: To Speak or Not to Speak?
Mr. Spock Beams Into Retirement


Lee Speigel's publication history seems to contain mostly nonsense like this. The most hard-hitting, fact based articles I saw was the one about the Leggo tower and Leonard Nimoy's retirement. Most of his writing deals with fringe nonsense with no real evidence to support it.

Lee Speigel would benefit from an introduction to the Skeptoid Podcast. Perhaps he'll learn a thing or two about critical thinking skills.

Eivind Berge's Blog: Fighting with monsters

Eivind Berge's Blog: Fighting with monsters

The nutbar who claimed that rape was a rational response to feminism has asked "Have I become a monster?"

Personally I suspect he's really a deep-cover feminist out to make anyone who opposes feminism look a psychotic, sociopathic, amoral sub-human. Let's be honest here, no sane mind capable of empathizing with other people would honestly think rape could be a rational reaction to difficulty getting a date.

The kind of outright hostility to his fellow human beings portrayed in Eivind's posts depicts not a rational human mind, but a marginally controlled predator. If the posts on his blog honesty reflected his real views, then the question readers should ask is not "if" Eivind has a collection of trophies from animals he's tortured and murdered, but how large that collection is. If this blog reflected Eivind's true beliefs then it would only be a matter of time before he went out to rape a woman, possibly torturing and murdering his victim, if he hasn't done so already.

Eivind is either an uber-feminist troll or a serial killer in training. I think all of us would rather Eivind be a deep cover feminist than the next BTK.

Responding to the "Rape is equality" moron

This was also written about by PZ Myersin the entry You can tell where this is going, but you can hardly believe it when it gets there

Below is my open letter response to the nit-wit who tried to claim that rape was a man's "right."

Eivind,

Women aren't refusing to sleep with you because you don't have enough money.

They're refusing to sleep with you because you're a loser. I'm not saying that as a joke or an insult, but as a simple statement of fact. Feminist bashing, like racism, is a refuge for sad, pathetic people who perceive themselves as failures and need to blame someone. People like Rush Limbaugh hop on the anti-feminist bandwagon because they know banging that drum will draw in the sad, pathetic losers desperate to blame someone other than themselves for their shortcomings.

I don't know what personal truncations drove you to the point where you actually considered rape to be "OK" but feminists have nothing to do with it. You're just using them as a scapegoat to defer responsibility for your own condition.

Man up and grow a pair. Take some personal responsibility for your condition instead of blaming a straw man vision of feminism.

Baby buns rescued from cruelty by Little Furries Rescue

Karen's Spiritual Journey

Preaching to the Liar (Prank Call to a Televangelist)

Crap Hardware

I just sent the following to the tech support for the Flip Ultra:

My Flip refuses to turn on. Changing the batteries had no effect. Pushing or pushing and holding the power button does nothing. Plugging the Flip into the USB port on my or my wife's Mac does nothing. The device is not recognized or detected by either computer even though it has worked fine on both in the past.

As far as I can tell the unit appears to be completely dead despite being only a couple months old and having been subjected to no abuse.

The only response so far:

The reference number for your question is '100514-000574'.

Bee Sting Therapy Returns

The Cultural revolution really trashed Chinese medicine. Most of the doctors were executed or deported along with all the other "intellectuals." When the violence died down the Chinese government started pimping all the folk remedies that had been abandoned when western medicine that actually WORKED had been introduced. It's a shame long discredited nonsense like this is still circulating.



I wonder how many of the people going in for bee sting therapy avoid vaccines.

The gayest video on youtube

This gentleman addresses the nutjobs at the Westboro Baptist Church with "Why God Hates Fags or 'Bitch I get more dick then you'"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dm9nw5GdlzQ

Next, a video that has been described to me as "The gayest video on youtube." I'm not sure I agree that it's THE gayest, but I'd like to submit it for your consideration:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q842E-a-dEw

His other videos are also hilarious.

Children in LDS Mormon community chant "Assassinate Obama"

In all fairness to the racist, hate fueled psychopaths chanting below, Bush didn't get much of this because his critics were largely more terrified of the specter of "President Cheney" than they were of Bush.

Florida tries to ban sex with animals. Again.

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Tax Code Allows Rappers To Write Off Bling

You've GOT to be kidding me.


http://www.prefixmag.com/news/tax-code-allows-rappers-to-write-off-bling/39674/

April 16, 2010 11:31 a.m. by Andrew Winistorfer

I always wondered how even the lowest tier rappers could afford chains that are worth more than my car. Apparently, thanks to their CPAs, they can write off bling purchases because, according to this article over at Plentii, it's part of maintaining their "brand." The article is pretty interesting in its depth of how basically rappers can write off anything they buy with a little creativity. Here's a little excerpt:

Rappers can deduct the cost of touring. They can deduct touring costumes, extravagant music videos, and insane home studio equipment. They can amortize the home studio itself. Moreover, Catalano says they should deduct their expenses or they have to give that money to the tax man. 

It's a pretty simple scenario: say, you're an underground rapper who suddenly hits big. You get a $50,000 royalty check one week and now you're looking at perhaps $20,000 in tax liability to Uncle Sam. 

“I never recommend a client spend money just to get rid of taxes. You want to reduce taxes with expenditures that''ll expand your business,” says Catalano. “Buy the future, if you can. Ask yourself, 'Is there something I can do for the next record or promotion, the next video, to help me make more money next year or the ensuing years?'”

I suppose it makes sense to an extent. If the bling is part of a costume to maintain an image than there's a rationale for claiming it's just as valid a business deduction as a new head for the the Boston Ballet's Rat King costume. The problem is, no one is wearing the Rat King's head to a club Saturday night. It really IS a costume and not part of daily attire. If worn outside of performances bling becomes more of a home office style expense, where I can see the IRS deciding only a percentage of the bling's purchase could be deducted.

Nuke the Spill!

http://trueslant.com/juliaioffe/2010/05/04/nuke-that-slick/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ojCbqfRRr8

I'd love to see the political battle that would ensue if Obama started advocating the use of nuclear weapons to stop the Gulf oil leak. I'd also love to see Greenpeace's reaction if it turned out that a deep sea nuke was the best bet for stopping the leak. Cognitive dissidence at that level may very well be lethal.

That said, I doubt BP would be able to tap that spot anytime soon if it was sealed with a nuke.

An observation about God

"The difference between an Atheist and a Christian is actually quite small. Both of them disbelieve in thousands of Gods. The real difference is that Atheists reject one more god than Christians.

What many Christians fail to understand is that an atheist's reasons for not believing in the Christian God are not that different from a Christian's reasons for not worshiping Thor, Apollo or Shiva."

Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus Babbles Again

I've asked Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus to restrict his incoherent diatribes to threads that are actually about him. Instead he chooses to comment on almost every post I make. This wouldn't be a problem if he were actually responding to the content of my posts. Instead he spews the same kind of irrational nonsense that gets him banned from just about every online forum he touches. Since I don't want every post in my blog to become a long list of his bigoted copypasta I've been forced to delete his comments when made outside of the threads dedicated to his special, unhinged brand of insanity.

His latest spew however includes some new material. He's changed things up a bit and I thought I'd give him some recognition for the 15 minutes or so of work he must have put into it.

DM has left a new comment on your post "Speaking in Tongues":

they thought BOOBIES had no effect... WRONG!


see, I just want to make it clear to the rest of you:




jen is unable to see that there is a CONFLICT BETWEEN EROS & SCIENCE....


________________


http://www.blaghag.com/2010/04/in-name-of-science-i-offer-my-boobs.html


ETA: follow-up


http://www.blaghag.com/2010/04/quick-clarification-about-boobquake.html


see how we take a term and convert it into its AUTHENTIC POLITICAL DIMENSION - THAT
OF LIBERATION - not just merely harmless expression...


they thought BOOBIES had no effect... WRONG!
____________

Here DM again fails to make any kind of point. I recommend checking out the links above, as they're a humorous response to a misogynistic Iranian cleric who claimed that indecently dressed women caused Earthquakes. DM appears to agree with the cleric, but fails to articulate any kind of a defense of his position. He also completely fails to make any kind of counter-argument against the female blogger above. He links to two posts that ridicule the woman hating cleric and then gives a grade school "nuh-uh!" style response.

It's tempting to suspect that DM is in fact a deep cover atheist and that his posts are meant not to attack atheism but to ridicule religious beliefs. He comes across as a ham fisted, inarticulate attempt at a religion focused Stephen Colbert impression.

FOR THE *HEADLESS IDIOT* called m.shermer

http://www.skeptic.com/Merchant2/graphics/audio_video/av558_lg.jpg

Again, we have a poorly thought out insult coupled with a link to someone who disagrees with DM's alleged religious beliefs. No attempt is made and saying WHY DM disagrees with this new target. DM merely asserts his disdain for Dr. Shermer and acts as if his disdain were in and of itself relevant and sufficient.

his is your *FINAL WARNING*
____________________________________
the really SHARP END OF OCCAM’S RAZOR…


they mix SKEPTICISM with ATHEISM…


KABOOM…

DM has used this text before. It's just recycled DM copypasta.

Now I want you to listen to this little f*cker...


http://www.ted.com/talks/james_randi.html

This too makes me suspect DM is really a deep cover atheist trying to ridicule religion. He tosses a profanity at James Randi but then cedes the rest of the discussion to James Randi.  If he actually disagreed with what Randi had to say, he's try to construct some kind of a response to the linked video. If the two of them were having a formal debate this would amount to DM's entire response consisting of "My opponent is a f**er, I will now allow him to use both his allotted time and mine to make whatever points he wants." Can you imagine a political candidates' debate running in such a manner?

Randi:



When I see your UGLY FACE I understand why you are an atheist
_________________________________

Even though DM has used this text before, I still don't know what he's trying to claim. My best guess is that he finds James Randi unattractive and thinks that's why Randi is an atheist.

now I want you to watch this video of DELUSION...


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SW2zsobxJDU

Again, DM lobs and insult and then cedes the rest of the discussion to the opposition. The linked video features a commercial pointing out that most people are responsible, honest members of society not because they fear a cosmic daddy will spank them if they misbehave, but because it's the right thing to do. The video itself makes the point much better than I do and I recommend watching it.

with the atheists:


they start begging when they start dying...

More of the same old same old from DM. He seems to have a fevered vision in his mind of atheists fervently praying to God and begging forgiveness when death approaches. This is part of the same mentality that leads some people to claim that atheists don't actually lack belief in a deity, but are merely angry at God and are denying him out of spite. It's as insulting and dismissive an attitude as using Fred Phelps as an example of the average Christian or judging all Muslims by the 9/11 suicide bombers. It's replacing any attempt at or desire for understanding with a convenient stereotype.

_____________________


Atheists,


but you have NO ANSWER TO DEATH... therefore you FAIL...


the Death of Ath*ism


*********************************

What does DM mean by an "answer" to death? Most the atheists I've spoken to about death seem to agree that a cessation of consciousness accompanies physical death and that oblivion follows. That hardly amounts to "NO ANSWER TO DEATH."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-8-Yxdphsg


DEATH TRAP


**********************************

Again, DM is acting more like a deep cover atheist than someone with actual religious convictions. The linked video above features psychic Deepak Chopra as one of the defenders of religion. Deepak Chopra was the new age twit who "jokingly" blamed his own meditation for a 2010 earthquake in Baja. Now, if I were trying to mock and ridicule religion, I'd probably want people to equate a belief in God with a blithering idiot like Deepak Chopra.

THE REAL QUESTION:


DOES ATHEISM HAVE A FUTURE?


AND THE ANSWER - NO!


Atheists,


GET OUT OF MY UNIVERSE

If DM actually believed in God, he;s know it's God's universe, not his.

you little liars do nothing but antagonize…

The phrase "pot calling the kettle black" comes to mind. Keep in mind, DM posted this in response to a post I made about speaking in tongues. In that post I threat the "Acts of the Apostles" as accurate and the description of the Pentecost miracle of "Speaking in Tongues" as authentic. This was the context that DM felt appropriate for a hate filled rant against atheism. He was the one who introduced atheism to the thread and yet here we see they hypocrite yammering on about atheists antagonizing other people.

What, exactly, does DM think HIS posts are? They're certainly not reasoned debate.

and you try to eliminate all the dreams and hopes of humanity…

Clearly DM has not watched Carl Sagan's "Cosmos." Some of the most hopeful writing I've encountered about human destiny came from atheists. For some reason believing we have to do things for ourselves motivates some people. Instead of relying upon God to do everything for us, they go out and pursue the advancement of humanity with their own actions. I want DM to elaborate on what "dreams" he feels atheists have attacked and what they said or did to attack them.

but you LOST…


THE DEATH OF ATH*ISM - SCIENTIFIC PROOF OF GOD


Crystal Night, Atheists!

Here DM is evoking Kristallnacht, the night NAZI agitators destroyed the businesses and properties of Austrian Jews as a preface to moving them into ghettos and then concentration camps. That's right folks, DM appears to be advocating Christians round up and execute atheists. I'm sure he'd have been right at home during the Spanish inquisition.

Oh, wait, DM claims to believe in the prophesies of Nostradamus. That would have gotten him tortured to death during the Spanish Inquisition.

FINALE:



Have I said this before?

Oh yes, may times. Originality is not DM's forte.

***********************************


http://theatheistwars.free0host.com/


***********************************
PULLING THE PLUG on atheism


http://www.firstscience.com/site/articles/coles.asp

Predictably, the link doesn't actually say anything that supports DM's claims.

bye

Yeah, right.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20090126/as-indonesia-solar-eclipse/images/c52d9d50-7ca2-4c3a-b13c-c866836298c8.jpg




Einstein puts the final nail in the coffin of atheism…


*************************************
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7vpw4AH8QQ
*************************************

Here we get into familiar territory. DM links to a video that does NOTHING to support any of the nebulous claims he's made. Either he lacks the mental capacity to understand this, or he's continuing his program of mocking religion.

atheists deny their own life element…
LIGHT OR DEATH, ATHEISTS?
********************************
***************************LIGHT*********
************************************

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CC7Sg41Bp-U
E=MC2

Again, DM links to another video that has nothing to do with his claims.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmtK-X_MV0k&feature=fvw
DOWN THE TOILET!!!

Here we have DM linking to a video by Ray Comfort, a man so incapable of honesty and integrity that Comfort claims food plants that have been heavily bred by humans are "proof" of Creationism because they're so well suited to human use. So far, this video of Ray Comfort's claims about the religious beliefs of Albert Einstein is the closest DM has come to actually supporting any of the anti-atheist rants he's posted.

http://open.salon.com/blog/sandra_no_longer_miller/2009/02/13/files/lamb1234553042.jpg

LAMB POWER!

You know, wool undergarments would explain a good deal about DM's sour, cranky disposition.

_____________________


UNDERSTAND!!!?

What I understand is that Dennis Markuze aka David Mabusis either incapable of rational thought and in desperate need of psychiatric care, or is in fact a deep cover atheist out to mock Christians and drive people away from religion by slandering it with his rants.

Shermer - Randi - Myers - Harris - Dawkins VS. NOSTRADAMUS - EINSTEIN - MARKUZE
you are ANNIHILATED!!!
crystal night is a reference to when the SUN IS ECLIPSED... --------------------------------------
Repent and turn to God or be destroyed...
LIGHT OR DEATH, ATHEISTS?




********************************
***************************LIGHT*********
************************************ or death...


LIGHT!

As you can see the rest of his post dissolves into the same kind of disconnected ranting he normally engages in. This latest MD post has convinced me that DM is not the psychologically damaged, mentally challenged psychopath he pretends to be, but is expressing an actual hatred of religion by actively mocking it. Not even a psychologically crazed moron could think any of his posts are actually convincing people or even defending his positions. What they are doing however is making people with religious beliefs look like clinically retarded idiots incapable of coherent thought. DM's rants embody everything the most hostile atheists decry about religion. He embodies the anger, resentment and violent undercurrent that lead to atrocities like the Crusades and the Spanish Inquisition.

In my opinion, Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus is too perfect a parody of religion to be anything but an act.

Speaking in Tongues

I've been having an online discussion with a man who claims that "Speaking in Tongues" involves speaking in an angelic, divine or invented language without understanding anything you're saying. I've countered that the Biblical examples of Speaking in Tongues, such as when the apostles spoke in tongues on Pentecost, involved speaking a language despite having never been taught it, but understanding what was being said. He countered by asking, "why bother to mentioned if it is just understandable language?"

I responded by pointing out they were speaking in a language they had not learned, but was a real language. one has to remember that 1st century Palestine was a melting pot of cultures, but not everyone understood each other. Traveling more than a few days or weeks away would require you to find a translator. Traveling more than a few months would mean it would be nearly miraculous to even FIND someone who spoke both your language and the native language. Even traveling within the Roman Empire and knowing Latin would only let you speak to the educated, not the masses.

Remember the Tower of Babel? When the apostles spoke in tongues on Pentecost they were undoing that curse.

The ease with which one can find a translator these days and the mind boggling scope of a few spoken languages makes it easy to discount the amazing power of the Pentecost miracle of speaking in tongues. I can understand why false prophets try and claim the gift involves speaking in an angelic language despite the complete lack of Biblical support for the claim. When you can enroll at the local university and learn just about any language you want it's easy to forget just how incredible the gift of tongues, speaking to people in their own language despite having never been taught it, really is.

They didn't HAVE university courses in other languages back then. You couldn't go to Borders, pick up a "Spanish 101" DVD series and have a rudimentary understanding of the language in a few months. You needed to either travel to a place and immerse yourself for months to years, or hire one or more tutors. Most people only spoke the languages of their immediate neighbors. Only the wealthy and traders could afford to learn more languages than they grew up with.

And here were these fishermen, these uneducated working class stiffs running around speaking the language of the people who had traveled for weeks or months to be in Jerusalem for passover. The travelers would have been blown away by this. Here they were, needing translators or speaking a pidgin Latin or Hebrew, desperately trying to communicate even the most rudimentary ideas, suddenly being approached by a fisherman who spoke their language with the fluency of a native speaker yet were obviously working class men from the immediate area.

The miracle looses all substance if the Apostles didn't understand what they were saying. Instead of being miraculously connected to visiting foreigners they'd be nothing but a marionette. The visitors would have seen uneducated nobodies reciting a memorized speech. That's not a miracle. That's no better than rote memorization.

How crazy is he?

David Mabus was banned by the David Icke forums.

That's right, his rantings were so repetitive and unsupported that he was banned from a forum dedicated to a man who believes alien reptilian monsters are secretly ruling the Earth. Considering the "V" miniseries to be a public service announcement is less crazy than David Mabus.

MSNBC's Rachel Maddow - Gov. Huckabee's foot-in-mouth on Gay issues - ex...

I've gotta say, Mike here is looking more and more like a closet case to me. The fact that he's compared homosexuality to drug use makes me suspect he's suppressing some "jonesing" of his own.

It's only a matter of time before he's outed. You don't equate homosexuality with drug addition unless you yourself are fighting some serious man-love urges. The quivering, butterfly-stomached way he touches the issue of homosexuality screams "denial" with a salivating, unctuous urgency of the kind only heard from within the confines of a Caligula themed, San Francisco bath house.

That's my suspicion anyway.

Caturday

Inhibition of human basophil degranulation by successive histamine dilutions:

I recently finished reading a homeopathy study titled "Inhibition of human basophil degranulation by successive histamine dilutions"

While superficially interesting, the human basophil degranulation test used in that study is a test tube test. It's not a human or even animal trail. Homeopaths can use special pleading all they want but a test tube trial is not how real pharmaceuticals get approved for sale.

I'm STILL looking for homeopathy related, double blind, placebo controlled human trials with a non-trivial sample size that demonstrate a statistically significant effect. Is EVERYTHING homeopaths have really just test tube studies that haven't been replicated?

Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus found my blog

I was never really into the whole "Ego surfing" thing. I'm not going to claim humility or a lack of narcissism has anything to do with it. The simple fact is there are plenty of men named "Matthew Miller" who are more famous than I am, so I'd have to slog though a lot of data about other people before I found much about me.

Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus on the other hand has no such problem. His name is rather distinct so it's not hard to track down references to the name online. It also looks like Dennis / David found my recent blog post about him. He posted a response, which I'll discuss below. Oddly he also posted similar replies to three other posts of the last few weeks, none of which had anything to do with him. I guess he wanted to make sure I noticed him.

Anyway, on to amateur the analysis of the crazy:

THE DEATH OF ATH*ISM - SCIENTIFIC PROOF OF GOD

David is off to a bad start. The all caps typing is generally considered poor form online. It implies the writer is shouting. The inexplicable * in "atheism" is a clear indication that DM thinks it's a naughty word deserving of censorship, which is just plan silly.

http://engforum.pravda.ru/showthread.php?t=280780

This is a link to a discussion forum where Dennis Markuze aka David Mabus posted a few bits of flotsam, but never made any actual statements or arguments. It's sadly typical of the Markuze posts I've seen online. He seems to think making unsupported statements and linking to unrelated videos constitutes evidence of some kind.

Einstein puts the final nail in the coffin of atheism...

*************************************

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7vpw4AH8QQ

*************************************

The youtube video talks about Einstein's theory of relativity in relation to theoretical time travel. It doesn't offer any evidence or claims about the existence or non-existence of God. Aside from mentioning Einstein it is wholly and completely unrelated to his claim of Einstein putting "the final nail in the coffin of atheism". Markuze's "logic" if I can use the word, seems to be to make a wild claim about Einstein and then support his claim by screaming "See! This video mentions Einstein so that PROVES I'm right!" It would be a bit like claiming Glenn Beck raped and murdered a girl in 1990 and then linking to a video of Beck talking about the health care bill as "evidence" to support the claim.

atheists deny their own life element...

Again, Markuze makes a statement but does nothing to support it. WHAT life element are atheists supposedly denying? What does Markuze even mean by "element"?

LIGHT OR DEATH, ATHEISTS?

********************************
***************************LIGHT*********
************************************

___________

Demonstrating he's at least consistent, Markuze makes no sense here. I see no indication of any kind of an attempt to prove a point or argue a particular viewpoint. All Markuze has offered in the above is a string of inarticulate ranting. There's no cohesion, no attempt to state a point and then defend it, nothing. If posts like the ones he made to this blog are a window into his actual thought processes, then it looks like there isn't much there except irrational, broiling antagonism.

add comment moderation to your blasphemy blog, you fool...

Why bother? This is a low traffic blog and most of the people who have posted comments here made actual contributions to the discussions or were at least relevant. There's already a spam filter. Markuze posting his rant in three unrelated posts is the worst I've had in well over a year.

Now, Markuze might very well decide to start spamming this blog with his nonsense. If he restricts his posts to the threads about him and tries to rationally and calmly defend his position, then I welcome his input. If all he does is post the same copypasta to one thread after another then I'll have to turn on comment moderation until he grows bored with me and moves on to the next person who dares mention him online.

And what, pray tell, is so blasphemous about my blog anyway?

Mr Markuze, you have a very poor reputation online. I want to give you the chance to demonstrate a level of rational thought and coherent discussion your critics seem to think beyond your capabilities.

Wait, it's news that Ricky Martin is gay?

Ricky Martin reveals he's a strong, proud gay Latino

Why is this considered news?

Is EVERYONE'S gaydar REALLY that broken?!?

Jesus H Christ. I'm a corn-fed Midwesterner who was raised in a conservative, fundamentalist home and I could tell Ricky Martin was gay back when he was at his peak.

What next, a front page story revealing that Liberace was bisexual??? Should I write a shocking biography revealing the deep, dark secret that Christine Jorgenson used to be a man? Oh! I know! I'll revel in the rumors of a secret gay past in the life of Ted Haggard.

I swear this sort of thing is only news because people are in such deep denial that they fail to notice such things when it first comes to light. They're so terrified of gays that they refuse to pay attention to even obvious clues to someone's sexual orientation. It's downright hilarious that the people who are most likely to care if a person is gay are also the ones least likely to realize it.

How I caused a panic 6 months after April 1

Back when I was working at FinancialCampus, I circulated a memo on
April Fool's Day, 2002. The memo got a few giggles but was largely
ignored, as most my coworkers didn't get the joke.

In the next five months the company had a major growth spurt. An
entire department sprung into existence with close to a dozen people.

One day I returned to the office after giving a deposition. (The
company was being sued, again) and I was approached by an
exceptionally foolish woman who had, for reasons known only to her,
been going though my home directory on the server. Why she even had
access to my home directory the Network Admin refused to tell me, but
the damage was done. She'd found my memo and printed it up,
circulating it among her coworkers. The entire department was in a
panic, as the only person in that department who'd been with the company when I'd first
circulated the memo had clearly forgotten all about it.

She ran up to me and demanded to know why I hadn't told anyone about
the "poison in the water." I was confused until she showed me a printout
of the memo. I read it and started laughing. This upset her and some
of the people behind her. "This could be killing our kids" one of them
said.

I asked her where she'd gotten the memo and she admitted to having
spent the day poking around peoples' home directories on the server. I
pointed out the date.

"So?" she demanded.

"I sent it around on April 1."

One of her coworkers swore quietly and returned to her desk. A few
others groaned and did the same.

"So we've been drinking this s**t for months?"

It took an additional 20 minutes to get her to understand it was an
April Fool's joke and that dihydrogen monoxide was water.

Below is the text of the memo:

The Massachusetts Water supply has been found to contain dihydrogen monoxide.

This acid can cause corrosion in a variety of substances, irreversibly
damaging wood, paint, metal and most structural components.

Prolonged human exposure can cause loss of skin oils, discomfort,
encourage bacterial infection and in some extreme cases, death.

In pure form, it is clear, odorless and tasteless.

Numerous organisms, many harmful to humans, thrive on this chemical.

This chemical also damages electrical components and destroys paper products.

Thousands of deaths a year can be attributed both directly and
indirectly to dihydrogen monoxide. One recent, and spectacular death,
involved an unfortunate man who handled electrical components that had
come into contact with dihydrogen monoxide. While electrocution was
the direct cause of death, the electrical device would have posed no
threat if the dihydrogen monoxide had not destroyed the device's
insulation.

Presence of dihydrogen monoxide in the lungs prevents the absorption
of Oxygen, and results in death.

There has even been one case reported where excessive quantities of
dihydrogen monoxide caused electrolytes to be flushed from the body,
resulting in death. This however, appears to be a suicide.

Dihydrogen monoxide intake can be correlated with an increased need to
urinate as the chemical is flushed from the body.

Recent studies have revealed that most Americans have large deposits
of dihydrogen monoxide in their bodies.

Withdrawal from dihydrogen monoxide intake is generally fatal.

It's production and distribution is legal and unregulated aside from
rudimentary purity laws.

Please take the appropriate precautions.

When will Erick Erickson be outed?

I've long suspected that the most outspoken, angry and paranoid anti-gay activists are closeted homosexuals. In my estimation their hate fueled diatribes are not expressions of moral certainly or religious zeal, but the burbling emissions of a deep seated self loathing. There's research linking homophobia to homosexual arousal. The cases of men like Ted Haggard only add real life examples to fuel the theory.

Based on this information, I'd like to suggest that Erick Erickson might be gay. Erick Erickson's anti-gay vitriol leaves little doubt about his homophobia. For example, Erickson compared hiring a homosexual to supporting NAMBLA in one essay. In that essay he gave the impression that he sees no difference between homosexuality and pedophilia. Kevin Jennings was not the only person to face the business end of Erickson's rhetoric . Obama and Ted Kennedy are among the folks who have been on the business end of his ire.

It's his anti-gay statements that interest me most. His inability distinguish between homosexuality and pedophilia for example is the sort of thing I've come to expect from political nutjobs being eaten alive by their own desire for a wild night with Ricky Martin.

The question then becomes, how long will it be before someone outs him? How long before a past lover comes forward to reveal steamy, seedy secrets about late night bath house encounters? Will some staffer at CNN discover a gay porn stash on Erickson's PC? More importantly, are there any offshore gambling sites that will let me set up a pool on when Erickson will be outed?

Are ALL Homophobes this gay?

I'm tempted to start a web site where people can bet on when a given homophobic politician or activist will be outed by a gay sex scandal. Ted Haggard set off the gaydar of so many people BEFORE he was outed by his gay lover that it's hard to believe ANYONE actually thought he was straight in the first place. I mean, seriously, take a look at the guy. I know I'm not the only one who was unsurprised by his outing.

Dr Aubrey Levin has proven that this phenomena is not unique to the USA. Levin is a South African nutjob known for doing things like using electro-shock to "treat" gay soldiers,a and giving IV barbiturates to soldiers who objected to serving int eh apartheid era military. Now Dr Aubrey Levin, known as "Dr Shock" for his love of running current through patients' brains, has been secretly videotaped making sexual advances on a make patient.

That's right, the "dr" who used electro-shock treatment to "cure" gay soldiers is himself not just a homosexual, but a predator trying to abuse at least one male patient.

It's a shame online gambling laws are so strict in the USA. I could really clean up running a betting pool on these sorts of things.

Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!

Woman claims she's being oppressed because she's being treated the same as everyone else.

Shirley Chaplin doesn't look like a religious nutjob. She's a nurse who worked at a hospital that banned all necklaces for safety reasons. The elderly patients she cared for have a tendency to grab things when being moved or treated and a necklace is a nice shiny object that poses the exact kind of safety hazard the hospital wants to minimize.

Ms. Chaplin however, disagrees. You see, her necklace has a gold cross. Even though someone wearing an Islamic Crescent, a Star of David, a Wicca Pentagram or a Flying Spaghetti Monster would all be asked to remove their necklaces in the workplace, Shirley Chaplin's cross is special. She considers it persecution that she's being held to the exact same standards as everyone else.

The hospital makes concessions for religious clothing, like head scarves, but not for jewelry. Being the whiny, self centered twit that she is, Ms Chaplin has gotten her clergy involved. The clergy in turn has decided to claim that this safety rule is an example of religious persecution.

Who is it asking for special rights again?