Be Excellent To Each Other

Happy Birthday Mimi!

I'm not hugely keen on him, mainly due to his high pitched weirdy voice, but he makes very many very good points, e.g. around faith schools.



And, given the militant christian movement we have (e.g. Christian Legal Centre challenging any application of the Equalities Act that pervents them discriminating against people), what's wrong with a voice for another point of view?


Get to fuck, chap. He's brilliant, up there with MD in the Eye.

Doogie Howser?

Heh, no. The irrepressibly ginger Phillip Hammond.

"Sing 'Soft Kitty'"
"Stroke my hair"
"I want tea"

Etc.

She's getting sick of that, then?

Sounds familiar.

Whereas I, like all men who have gone before me, just want to be left the fuck alone when i'm ill.

He began to irritate me on Twitter, so I sort of switched off. And he never thanked me. The AntiGod movement comes across to me as needlessly confrontational, as I'm primarily a laissez faire person ( dual classing as a mighty pirate) and runs the risk of being like those Westboro chaps.

The cool kids are starting to be anti the anti-anti-god people now though. That's where the zeitgeist is now.

Everyone will be anti-zeitgeist soon.

Already there. (Indeed, since the 12th, pretty much)

Admittedly, living in a provincial backwater relatively unaffected by the eddies of the political currents, I'm somewhat behind the curve. The hyper rationality of some does seem to subtract from the wonder of this world, like a joy vampire leeching on the slumbering giant that is creation.

It's not "anti-God", of course.

And confrontational in what way? They're not picketing convent schools.

".. if you know what I mean."

Primarily, the bus advert, I suppose. And Dawkin's book titles. I'll write more extensively on this later, once I'm a computer, as it ties in with another bugbear of mine.

"at a computer". I haven't been cyborging myself.

Given that they were take offs of the Alpha Course ones, it's hard to see how they're any worse than those.


I look forward to some quality contrarianism.

What's the "soft kitty" song?

It's from The Big Bang Theory.

You'd hate it.

I think the 'New Atheism' can be some strident bullshit, but it's not as though it advocates Stalinist persecution of God-botherers, or anything. Separation of church and state and individual religious freedom seems to be what most people are after. Unless they're "ban the burqa" twats.

High rationality and the pursuit of truth through science IS the most wondrous thing though. I don't understand how the continual discovery of facts and theories (in the scientific definition of theory) about the creation of the universe and live can be thought of as any less wondrous and joyous than any of the creation myths.

I think the whole "New Atheism" epithet is bollocks anyway - it's a label put on it by the more strident on the religious side, in order to paint it as some sort of coherent, pernicious ideology - which, of course, atheism is anything but.

.

I don't think it's particularly outrageous for people to want to articulate their displeasure at having other people's stupid, non-debatable word of god mumbo jumbo foisted upon them by government policy. To compare the phenomenon of people doing so to a religious movement is just lazy, specious bullshit.

Heh -

Agreed on both counts!

After cheese.

Yeah, cheese is pretty amazing.

Why don't you worship cheese then?!

more so, in fact - "ZOMG this whole amazing thing happened ON ITS OWN!" is far more wondrous than "omnipotent evil fucker did it"

I do.

*Bestows offering*

I reject all counter-arguments after this post and wholeheartedly agree with this. Counter-movement my arse Mr Kissyfur! This is just smug cunts flexing their 'intellect' and trying to make people feel stupid. Yes, you don't believe in god. Stop fucking shoving it down my throat. I don't either. Please, shut up. Yes, the Christians done a funny. Shut up.

Goldacre is just a mirthless cunt who takes a little too much pleasure in pointing out scientific inaccuracies as though he's the only scientist with a twitter account. I genuinely have to stop myself from unfollowing people who retweet his tedious brand of 'well, actually...!'. Urgh. For the record, I'm generally in support of the people who think he's great, I just hate him.

I do. And I celebrate every 25th December: Cheesus's birthday.

If you want to be hilariously simplistic and wrong about it, yes, you're absolutely right there.

"I'm so clever! I've rejected the notion of a supreme being! How can other people be so stupid? I must tell everyone I know immediately and bang on about it for fucking ages in a massive circle jerk!"

Smart people simply acknowledge this realisation in their heads and only bring it up when provoked.

Ricky Gervais is a classic example at the moment. Banging on about atheism on Twitter day in day out as if he's literally just had the epiphany and he's so fucking blown away by his own smarts for working it all out he has to drum it into anyone who will listen as if he's the first person ever to realise that religion might just be a crock of shit.

Again, if you want to be completely simplistic and wrong then yes, you've made a wonderfully cutting point, WTB.

It is, as you'd know if you'd paid any attention to anything written or said by any of the "New Atheists", absolutely nothing to do with "ooh, aren't I clever", and all about "hang on, why do these people who believe in various sky pixies get special treatment and/or to dictate X Y and Z? Why is this taken as the norm when it comes to e.g. abortion debates? Why do they get their own schools, which we have to pay for but can't attend?" etc



Using Gervais as an example is where you went wrong there.

There is provocation though. Look at Cameron's "This is a Christian nation" speech the other day. It's pretty damned important to get it through the institution's head that just because they should loudest, that doesn't mean that outspoken religious folks should have the greatest voice in the country. Keeping legislation secular is fucking important, and if you have to shout your head off to make sure people realise it, then that's what you do.

It is? I think it's a perfect example. Seeing as I was explaining what annoys me, then I gave a specific example of someone recently annoying me.

You can't on the one hand talk about intellectuals and then use Ricky "mong isn't an insult to people with Down's" Gervais as an example.

Goldacre is a phenomenal thundercunt on twitter. I enjoyed bad science, but his inability to take the lessons he gives on research and reliable sources of information before he parades Rumour and speculation as demonstrable facts in the non science arena gets right on my fucking tits.

Well I did, until I stopped following him on twitter and everyone who retweets him.

Which is what I meant by provocation. This stuff hasn't just started annoying me today. It has always annoyed me. Recent news events aside, these people are annoying.

Your position seems slightly muddled, if I may say so.

APOD - like what, man? I like the guy, but haven't noticed him going off on any weirdo hypocritical jollies. Then again I don't read him much these days.

I don't remember ever lumping any of these people under the intellectuals umbrella. I did say 'intellect', i.e. people who think they're smart, i.e. Ricky Gervais.

Ah, that was Mali.

Anyway, you're still wrong, as the conversation was about the new atheist movement - gervais isn't part of that, he just repeats whatever he heard most recently, but with a silly face and showing his tongue.

Ah, well that'll teach me for not reading. I basically hate Ben Goldacre and wanted a whinge. I'm also growing increasingly frustrated with Gervais, having followed him on Twitter. Also, his new show is shit.

Why can't we just love each other? It's the last week of Beex before Christmas!

Dropping back in time 85 years, the Butler Act was passed, making it illegal to teach evolution in schools. America in the 1920s was batshit mental anyway, and still is today, going through a very long adoescence,a country brought up on staid puritanical values which still struggles to cope with the fast paced change in the world that they found themselves living in. My brief history of America aside, this law clearly wasn't a good idea, as we know that post industrial revolution there were more black peppered moths than white ones, something about finches and bacterial flagellum are quite important in saying "No, really, check it, bitches". This was the first highly visible 'Science vs Religion' fight. After the Butler Act came into power, the ACLU were actively seeking, by advertising in papers, a fight over this, and needed someone to step up and take one for the team. Lining up on either side were really quite famous people of the time. They all wanted a piece of this action, and they wanted it bad. The town, Dayton, actually had a meeting and sent Scopes up to the plate with instructions to "Darwin it up something good" with the intention of getting the place known on the map. Scopes lost, by the way, and had to pay $100, and the children of Tennesse were not allowed to learn about evolution until 1967, which was the last year that the Nashville Dixie Flyers won the Eastern Hockey League before God, clearly pissed over the new curriculum prevented them from winning in the final the following year and then smited them until their franchise folded in 1971. Dignified.

Having nothing to do from that point on, until 1989, they hit the books, and "Of Pandas and People" was written. This was a new avenue of attack. Rather than saying "KAZAM! There was light, and dark, and the earth and flowers and stuff", the idea of "Intelligent Design" was brought into being. It's a slight climbdown from the "And it was done" idea, with an unseen force guiding change. Sadly, it seems God wasn't onside with this rebranding, and condemmed the Nashvill Predators to finishing no higher than third, and not qualifying for the playoffs that year. With the 2004-2005 season locked out due to agreements not being reached between the League and the Players Association, something had to be done. Over in Dover County, pleased by the success (losing in the conference finals to Tampa Bay Lightening) the Philly Flyers found a new team to cheer. Team Dover Area School District were facing off against lil' Tammy Kitzmiller and her chums. Their beef as with the fact that the intelligent life stuff was going to be read in parralell with Evolution. natuarlly, this caused eyebrows to be raised and the wagons were loaded and headed off to Dover. There was, once again, the usual guest list of people with books to sell were up on the front pages and it turned out that they couldn't teach that stuff and so they weren't allowed to anymore.

These two examples both display the absolute circus that follows any event that puts religion into the ring with the drunken bear that is science. Even though the two cases were, in my opinion, decided correctly, it was something of madness to have gotten to that point in the first place. In the latter it is clear that an agenda was being pushed, and was rightly stopped, the former is held up to be the "Heh, Scopes, those lunatics". however, in both these examples, I don't think either side came out looking anthing other than a scraeming toddler having a tantrum over a train set. This could be because I've viewed it thhrough the lens of the media, but the way in which it was all handled, was excruciating and embaressing to watch. Few people behaved with much sense of decorum from my recollections. Which leads me to the buses.

Way back in 2008, a comedy writer saw a bus which had a quote from the bible and then a website address. The lady took exception to it, as on the website, buried away was a further quote from the Bible about God getting pissy with the non believers (curiously, the Dixie Flyers, Nashville Predators and the Philly Flyers didn't get a mention. She wrote an article about this, and suggested getting "4,680 atheists reading this and we all contribute £5, it's possible that we can fund a much-needed atheist London bus ad with the slogan: "There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and get on with your life.". And then the lunacy began. A blogger (Jon Worth. Who? Exactly) set up something to make it ahppen, and the British Humanist Association and Richard Dawkins jumped on the chance to get some free publicity with all the dignity of a pissed elphant on an ice rink (the Dixie flyers 63-64 season proabbly did field a cople of these. A bunch of people saw this as a really jolly jape and decideing that one very small religious groupclearly speaks for them all because "it's all the same god, isn't it?" and sent money in and cackled gleefully when their adverts were on the buses. It was set up and run from the internet and it happened. religion got apoke in the eye and everybody felt a part of it. Way to go dignfied arguments! Which segues nicely into Twitter...

Twitter is a great thing and we all know that and use it. However, the problem is the speed and ease it is to spread the message. Generally, people believe things that sit comfortably with their worldview and that's all well and good. With twitter, one can get lots of word views and then one person can do something which zooms around and divides opinion. There was a story in the news (or somewhere) about a girl who is/was very, very poorly. Life threateningly ill, in fact. Lots of stuff had been tried to help her and lots of stuff had not. With options running out, and hopes fading fast, her parents heard of a treatment that could help, somewhere in America and it'd cost $200,000. Peter Kay pciked up on this and apaprently did a benefit gig to raise money, and some band did, too. Then Goldacre heard about ti, did some research and launched into what is possibly some of the most toe curlingly embaressing rants about Kay and the band for doing the fundraising and the research behind this treatment. lots of people retweeted abot it and there were cease and desist letters and stuff like that and we all had a jolly good time at laughing at Kay and the Band for trying to do something good for a dying child and no we didn't want any dignity in that, either. Well done twitter. You've got the family of a girl clinging on to their last hope to dave their daughter and you're calling people trying to help her idiots. Once again, "science" tries to claim the high ground and looks like a dick. There's lots of other reasons I dislike twitter, but the principle one is te mob like mentality that goes on with it, and the ease in which celelbrities cana pear to endorse a cause, however stupid it is. This ease could lead to unpleasent things becoming apaprently acceptable to many, so we should be careful of that.

tldr: Scientists rarely act in a dignified fashion and twitter is a force for evil.

not enough paragraphs.

I will however pick you up on the Goldacre thing. Whilst Twitter may be rubbish for getting people to raise money for sending some kid off to have a $200,000, completely unproven, untested bunkum treatment which cures your cancer by geting you to drink your own piss, I think Goldacre was 100% right to lay into them, and the Guardian, for promoting it, as was the resulting shitstorm on Twitter. This sort of charlatanism and snake oil salesmanship should be shouted at as much as possible, as it’s fucking dangerous. Science did have the highground with this response. And you a scientist, eh?