CBEB’s

Last week I was giving serious consideration to paying money to seeing Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. However, I recently had one of those “Eureka!” moments that made me ask myself, “What the hell were you thinking?”

Never mind all the publicity the movie has gotten over the past several days; this clip said it all for me.

I guess it’s been awhile since I’ve heard Ben Stein’s voice, because it took a few seconds for his whiny monotone to register. My immediate reaction was, “What on earth were they thinking?” Even if I was the most fervent of cdesign proponentsists, there’s no way I would be willing to sit through 90+ minutes of Ben Stein’s voice.

I realize that to the True Believers, Expelled is going to be the proverbial all that and a bag of chips, but I would think that anyone who is neutral on the issue is going to be turned off by Ben Stein’s voice.

Apparently, professional voice talent like Keith David and Peter Coyote weren’t willing whore themselves out and put on a silly schoolboy outfit.

I’ve read that Ben Stein was chosen because he’s not overtly religious. Whether or not that’s true, I don’t know. Judging by some of the idioitic things he’s said in the past, I tend to think the producers of Expelled saw in Stein the requisite amount of douchitude needed to capture the ridiculousness of the film. Furthermore, Ben Stein’s initials must have come in handy on the set. I can picture the producers hovering over the editor’s shoulder at the editing bay, saying, “I think this scene could use some more BS”.

Since Expelled will probably be nothing more than an hour an a half of “preaching to the choir”, the producers should have gone ahead and hired a Christian to host the film. Kirk Cameron’s schedule must have a few openings, and he’s got plenty of experience making a fool out of himself while cameras are rolling. If Cameron couldn’t be coaxed to remove his lips from Ray Comfort’s ass long enough to narrate a documentary, maybe Willie Aames could have done it. He at least has a great “willing to wearing silly outfits” reference in his resume.

If Cameron and Aames are too cheesy, perhaps the producers could have gotten Stephen Baldwin; he could pull in the dozen or so people who still think he’s cool based solely on his performance in The Usual Suspects.

Bunnell to Myers, Dawkins and Eugenie Scott:
“All three of you are in so much shit, it’s almost unbelievable.”

If I had a hand in the production of Expelled, my choice for narrator would have been Sheriff John Bunnell. He would have kicked ass:

These dizzy Darwinian dogmatists might have thought they were dealing Deistic Design a deathblow by defending their draconian dissertations with deftly-delivered doublespeak, but thanks to this sudden surge of sanctimonious sectarian pseudoscientists selling a sentient Sky-Daddy to susceptible schoolchildren, the only place these evil-utionists will be holding class is… in hell!

Shit, I’d pay money to hear some of that.

The more I think about it, the more I’m down with Cephus’s idea of going all Mystery Science Theater 3000 on Expelled. I’d like to see Expelled re-dubbed a la Shogun Assassin, or better yet, Kung Faux. Or maybe taking dialog and narration from existing movies and splicing it into Expelled would work. I think using some of Ron Howard’s narration from Arrested Development would be perfect.

My family and friends consider me a Movie Nazi; it takes very little for me to get turned off to a movie. For example, while most people would agree with me that Daredevil blew chunks, it was the fact that at the start of the movie, starving attorney Matt Murdock was prosecuting a case that did it for me. I realize that suspension of disbelief is part and parcel of the movie viewing experience, but too many filmmakers use that as an excuse to be lazy. Suspension of disbelief shouldn’t even apply to a documentary, anyway; I bring it up only to say that while I enjoy Droopy cartoons I wouldn’t necessarily want to see a documentary narrated by Droopy Dog. If I did watch a movie narrated by Droopy, I’d expect anvils to start falling out of the sky at some point in the film.

It’s the same thing with Ben Stein. A few seconds after hearing his voice, I’m either looking for the Visine, or changing the channel. It has nothing to do with what an asshole he is; we’ve all heard the expression “he has a face made for radio“… Ben Stein has a voice made for mime.

Several years ago, I watched the documentary, Let the Good Times Roll, a 1973 concert film featuring acts like Little Richard, The Coasters, Chuck Berry and Bo Diddley. It was one of those Rock & Roll revival shows that probably sounds lame to modern audiences, but I was somewhat surprised. In front of an audience consisting of a bunch of long-haired, pot-smokin’ hippie types, Little Richard nearly incited a riot, and Chuck Berry joined Bo Diddley on stage for an extended jam.

What made the film so interesting, however, was the way the editors spliced archival footage into the movie. There were a lot of clips of preachers, politicians, parents and otherwise “concerned citizens” ranting about the evils of rock music; in 1956, it appears there wasn’t an evil under the sun that couldn’t be blamed on Rock & Roll. Chief among the Evils of Rock Music was that it led to *gasp!* integration. According to the authorities back then, black people sharing the same dance floor as white youths would ultimately lead to the downfall of civilization.

A lot has changed since then. Sure, there’s a fringe element who still rails against rock, but the sad fact is, what kids are listening to these days is pretty tame. Face it: since GG Allin and El Duce died, parents can sleep a little safer at night.

The internet can take part of the blame for the decline of Rock & Roll’s influence on today’s youth. What with goatse.cz, Tubgirl, and 2 Girls 1 Cup hiding behind hyperlinks, it seems almost quaint that the anti-rock establishment’s last hurrah placed a Prince song at the top of their “Filthy Fifteen” list.

There is another notorious Minnesotan arousing the ire of concerned parents these days: PZ Myers. If I didn’t know better, I’d think that Professor Myers was some sort of serial killer on the loose, preying on unbaptized children and stealing socks from the dryers of God-fearing Americans.

PZ Myers: Shown in Expelled only from the waist up

The Information Age must be frightening to parents who wish to keep their children insulated from the scary outside world. All a child has to do is type the word “atheism” into a search engine, and they’ll find millions of pages dealing with the subject. For young people who subscribe to the stereotype of the atheist as the unhappy, god-hating local crank who tries to get nativity scenes removed from people’s lawns, the internet probably does a lot to shatter some myths about atheism.

To counteract all this information, some religionists have taken to Defending the Faith by shooting the messenger, so to speak. Why bother refuting atheism or providing evidence for Intelligent Design when it’s so easy to attack a biology professor in Minnesota?

I’ve been a semi-regular reader of Pharyngula for several years. Lately I’ve discovered that the reactions to PZ Myers are just as entertaining as the man himself.

The name “PZ Myers” is to religionists much like Red Kryptonite is to Superman; there’s no telling how they will react upon hearing those words. Even though Myers defended Robert Marks in the Baylor/Evolutionary Informatics Lab flap, according to The Discovery Institute’s Bruce Chapman, Myers “is the most vociferous advocate of expelling Darwin critics from academia.”

This sort of we’ve-always-been-at-war-with-Eastasia rhetoric is common when dealing with PZ’s critics, and often comes up even when Professor Myers isn’t the topic of discussion. On a Christianity Today article about atheist summer camps, a commenter chimes in with:

Preaching is what atheists do - at least many of the louder ones. Have you ever been to pz myers blog? Have you ever read Dennent [sic] or Dawkins? These guys are more evangelistic than the most ardent evangelical.

That’s funny… the last time I checked, PZ works for a living and doesn’t have to solicit donations like other evangelical missions. The day an atheist knocks on my door and tries to convert me using bullshit arguments is the day that I will concede that atheists are “evangelical”.

After having his ears thoroughly boxed by PZ over his “Where are the giant mammaried mosquitos?” article, Timothy Birdnow has since been reduced to a blubbering moron when it comes to dealing with Myers:

Of course, the pious P.Z. is piously atheistic, and has the usual child-like understanding of history that is the hallmark of atheists and liberals in general, so he ends his blogpiece by calling for an end of the “superstition“ of religion.

Someone get that man a thesaurus! Pardon me for using the F-word, but I’m amazed at how often religionist anti-atheist rhetoric is framed in religious terms. “Evangelical”, “pious”… these are words with positive connotations in the world of religion, yet they’re thrown around as epithets by religionists. I honestly don’t get it.

It comes as a shock to Christians that PZ Myers has a daughter, Skatje. Perhaps there’s an old wives’ tale that claims atheism leads to sterility, because some god-botherers just can’t seem to get their heads around the fact that Myers raised a child. Perhaps the last person on earth who should be discussing fatherhood, the disturbingly misogynist Coach Buzzcut lookalike, Vox Day, put Myers’ parenting skills to question because Skatje had written an article advocating the repeal of laws against bestiality. Never mind that she plainly stated in the first two sentences of her article that she was not in any way interested in having sex with animals, the anti-PZ crowd jumped on the post like William Dembski on someone else’s intellectual property. Only a few days into the new year, Salvador Cordova earned the coveted Asshole of the Year award by writing a post so foul and contemptible that it eventually managed to trigger a rare public display of shame by Cordova.

Salvador Cordova removed the offending article after being prodded by the Number One Concerned Parent in the State of Kansas, “For the Kids“. This is surprising, considering it was FtK’s baiting that initially inspired Skatje Myers’ Zoophilia post.

There are very few bloggers who can bring the anti-PZ hysteria like FtK. Virtually any defense of atheism is met with “Oh yeah? Well, PZ Myers…” by the self-proclaimed “Reasonable Kansan”. Her blog is a treasure trove of PZ-on-the-Brain. The mere sight of him renders her speechless (for which we are grateful, even though the effects are only temporary), and when she manages to string together a complete sentence, stand back, people, you might get hurt:

If I had only to go by the attitudes and the hatred displayed by the majority (not all) of the atheists at AtBC and the horrendous tactics and hate filled rants of atheist bloggers like PZ Myers, then yes, I’d believe that atheists are less than honorable and, in fact, quite hateful and despicable individuals.

Keep in mind that FtK’s “atheists are mean” shtick is often contrasted by her cheerleading on behalf of people like Salvador Cordova and Vox Day.

It could be that FtK is nursing a broken heart. In a piece that deserves to be read in its entirety, she writes:

I once tried emailing PZ and reasoning with him, but he said something negative and told me he wouldn’t respond to any further emails from me.

If FtK’s blog isn’t testament enough, here are 200+ pages of evidence that the so-called “Reasonable Kansan” couldn’t reason her way out of wet paper sack. PZ was only saving the both of them a lot of pain and misery by brushing off her clumsy attempt to “reason” with him. This is someone who genuinely thinks that Walt Brown’s hydroplate “theory” is somehow valid. Furthermore, she seriously believes Expelled is going to pose some thorny problems for scientists (a.k.a. “OMG! DARWINISTS!” in the FtK lexicon). Weighing in on the recent controversy, she greets the prospect of DI flacks debating Myers, Dawkins and other “Darwinists” at Expelled screenings with glee:

Oh, Dear God, please let this come to fruition, and let there be plenty of press and cameras surrounding the scene. Amen.

FtK can be forgiven if she’s forgotten how Myers’ last debate with a DI Fellow went; after all, Uncommon Descent shitcanned the discussion of the debate’s aftermath.

Whether or not the recent controversy will translate into free publicity for Expelled remains to be seen. I find it strange that a documentary allegedly promoting academic freedom tried to prevent a real-life academic from seeing the film. The publishers of The Design of Life have gone on record stating that they have no intention of offering review copies of the book to people qualified to give it a negative review, yet William Dembski brags about the positive reviews. And so it goes with Expelled; the film’s boosters seem terrified that someone who can offer a qualified analysis of the movie’s content might - of all things - see the film.

Denyse O’Leary weighs in on the Myers/Expelled scandal with her usual nonsense, claiming Myers should at least be allowed to see half of the movie, because he only read half of her book, The Spiritual Brain.

Anyone who has read more than one of Denyse O’Leary’s blog posts will have to admit that Myers exercised a lot of patience by making it halfway through her book. How much poorly-written nonsense must one read before coming to the conclusion that it’s nothing but poorly-written nonsense? Do you need to actually drink the milk before deciding it’s gone sour?

The religionists’ level of disconnect when dealing with PZ Myers is amazing. Take a peek in his dungeon and see for yourself some of the absolutely nutty behavior of his detractors. He has inspired not one, but two (now-defunct) blogs supposedly dedicated to “exposing” him.

This is something that the Crusaders can’t seem to understand: arguing against PZ Myers is not an argument against atheism. Nor is it an argument for Intelligent Design. If it suddenly turned out that Myers was an alcoholic wife-beater, it would have absolutely zero effect on atheism. Sure, creationists and fundamentalists would revel in schadenfreude and tell their children, “See! That’s what happens when you become an atheist!”, but there would be no discernible negative consequences to the “cause” of atheism.

The internet has made it much more difficult for parents to bring up mindless robots like the infamous VenomFangX. Although most reasonable people would view this as a Good Thing, to the authoritarian mindset, the prospect of a child who might abandon the religion of his or her ancestors is a scary thought. With such an abundance of information so readily available, today’s youth is able to rebel against the Powers That Be with an eloquence far beyond the days of, “Hey! I didn’t ask to be born!”

What parents must realize is that these kids aren’t jumping on some bandwagon, they’re making a choice based on reason (and to a person who thinks people used to live among dinosaurs, making choices based on reason must be a totally foreign concept). None of the adjectives used to describe the atheism of PZ Myers (evangelical, vehement, pious, militant, piously pious, etc) are in any way relevant to atheism in general; atheism is not some sort of collective with leaders and sleeper cells, it’s the absence of a belief in god(s). Nothing more, nothing less.

Attack PZ Myers all you want; I’m well aware that he is perfectly capable of defending himself and in the grand scheme of things, it doesn’t have any bearing on atheism. Like Rock and Roll, atheism is here to stay.

Preemptive strike: No, this doesn’t mean the Richard Dawkins is the Cliff Richard of atheism.

The blogosphere is abuzz with the recent account of PZ Myers’ being expelled from Expelled.

How does Discovery Institute director Bruce Chapman spin the issue? Evidently he’s not happy with Intelligent Design’s failure in trying to redefine science so that “God Did It” becomes a scientific proposition, so he’s moved on to redefining etiquette.

In the mysticism-addled mind of a creationist, signing up for a free screening of Expelled constitutes “gate-crashing”. Not only that, but by following the same procedures as everyone else, Dawkins and Myers stooped to gate-crashing. Oh, the humanity!

This should be a major embarrassment to the producers of Expelled and the Intelligent Design movement in general, but Intelligent Design advocates aren’t bothered by such things as facts; they’re more concerned with spin.

While the Discovery Institute cries about gate-crashers, Jeffery Overstreet prints an alleged eyewitness account from an ID sympathizer:

But enough about the film – the real highlight of the evening occurred after the showing, during the Q&A. Mathis led this discussion, and the second question was asked by a surprise member of the audience: Richard Dawkins, author of “The God Delusion,” and arguably the biggest name in the movie other than Mr. Ben Stein himself. As this screening was by invitation only, Dawkins appearance was quite a surprise to both the audience and Mathis. [emphasis added]

Meanwhile, Mark Mathis is telling the New York Times, “I meant to do that”:

Mark Mathis, a producer of the film who attended the screening, said that “of course” he had recognized Dr. Dawkins, but allowed him to attend because “he has handled himself fairly honorably, he is a guest in our country and I had to presume he had flown a long way to see the film.”

It’s Easter weekend, so Christians all over the world are exercising their brains in an attempt to harmonize the conflicting narratives of Christ’s crucifixion, resurrection and ascension. Come Monday, their minds should be sufficiently nimble enough to explain away the contradictory accounts of what actually happened in Minnesota that night. We can expect to see Myers’ and Dawkins’ version of events to be dismissed outright; they’re atheists, after all, and are not to be trusted. But since ID proponents never lie - they just spin the issue - cdesign proponensists will have multiple versions of the truth from which to choose.

If you haven’t read PZ Myers’ account of getting expelled from Expelled, do so now: it’s a must-read.

I was planning on blogging about this eventually, but PZ’s post lit a fire under my ass. I’m curious: do you plan on seeing Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed? If so, do you plan on seeing it in the theater, waiting for the DVD release, or waiting for it to be broadcast on your local Public Access station?

The more I think about it, the more I want to see the movie at the local Cineplex. I know about all the arguments for not wanting to give these scumbags any money, but the opportunity to “people watch” is getting to be tempting. I’m really interested in what sort of person will be going to see the movie. Will it be people who genuinely think Expelled is going to be some sort of damning indictment, or will it be people going to see it out of morbid curiosity?

We’ve grown accustomed to cdesign proponentsists saying stupid things. Whether it’s DaveScot falling for an Urban Legend, Casey Luskin pretending to be a lawyer, or Denyse O’Leary simply typing anything at all, Intelligent Design has become a perpetual motion machine, producing an endless stream of embarrassing statements.

I was dicking around the web the other day, and found a post about the trailer for Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. Nothing special, really… but in the comments, Kyle Latino (who’s apparently some sort of comic artist) had this to say:

No, I really love the “Mannish Boy” depiction of Ben Stein, for surly [sic] he is the vision of what Muddy Waters had when he wrote that song.

Riiiiiiight. Muddy Waters was thinking about a fucking Nixon speech writer and game show host when he penned his classic, “Mannish Boy“.

Shit, if Ben Stein had walked into the Chess studios in 1955, Muddy Waters would have held him down while Sonny Boy Williamson stabbed him and Howlin’ Wolf planted his size 16 foot in Stein’s ribcage.

If Ben Stein ever inspired a song, it would probably be something like The Monks’ “Shut Up“, or Run-DMC’s “You Talk Too Much“.

“B.O.L.O.” is law enforcement jargon meaning, “Be On the Lookout”. Seeing that Denyse O’Leary just loves to trot out analogies using the field of criminology to prop up the non-starter known as Intelligent Design, she might already know about the B.O.L.O. acronym. Then again, she might not.

Another common law enforcement acronym is “MMO”, which stands for “Means, Motive & Opportunity”. Judging by Granny Spice’s latest episode of CSI: Imaginary Kingdom, it’s pretty obvious that she thinks “MMO” means something entirely different.

In an awkward attempt to show there’s some sound reasoning behind the vacuous enterprise known as “design detection”, O’Leary uses an example of a man stabbing his dinner companion:

Harry and Jack are having a somewhat tense conversation over a beer and steak at the local pub.

Harry seizes a steak knife and tries to plunge it into Jack’s ribs.

Pub regulars overpower him and the police are called. He is charged with assault with a deadly weapon.

That’s intent.

I’m fully aware that saying “Denyse O’Leary is wrong” is entirely redundant, but in this case, she is wrong on so many levels, it hurts to even think about it. Most damaging to her premise, however, is the fact that intent can really only be established once the suspect is identified. In some cases - for example, a body is found with its head blown off by a shotgun blast - the intent is obvious, but it’s useless in determining a suspect. This is where “Means, Motive & Opportunity” come into play. Since Intelligent Design is a science-stopper, Denyse O’Leary is apparently satisfied with the outcome of her little mystery. Being such a super-duper writer and all, maybe she’ll pen an Agatha Christie-style thriller utilizing her amazing crime-fighting know-how.

I can see it now… Private Detective Michael “Bill” Behembski cracks the cases that the materialist cops are afraid to touch. In Chapter One of “Pinched, Purloined and Pilfered”, gumshoe Behembski arrives at the mansion of real estate mogul Arnold Tromp, who has had his collection of rare jewels stolen.

Behembski: It looks to me like the burglar’s intent was to steal your collection of rare jewels.
Tromp: No shit, Sherlock. I’m interested in finding out who stole them.
Behembski: I’m afraid that’s beyond the scope of this investigation. After all, it’s obvious those jewels were designed in a manner that would attract thieves, so it could be anyone. There might even be those who say that aliens stole your gems, but that’s mere speculation. Judging from the way your elaborate alarm system was disarmed, I’m guessing it was someone reasonably intelligent, but that’s the most I can say.
Tromp: You’re fired!
Behembski: Case closed. Another satisfied customer.

Being colossally mistaken has become the norm in Denyse O’Leary’s career as an ID apologist. Her articles touting the truthfulness of Intelligent Design are often nothing more than Mad-Libs, the blanks filled in with the ID talking points du jour: Blah blah blah “materialism”. Yadda yadda “design inference”. Boo hoo hoo “buy my book”, and so on.

Just in case readers are unconvinced of how utterly wrong she is, O’Leary hammers the point home, adding:

No one knows his motive, but no one needs to know his motive. What he intended was obvious. And it is a crime

In O’Leary’s example, the perpetrator’s intent could mean the difference between 15 years in prison and 15 to life. Regardless of motive, was the man’s intent to merely see his victim bleed, or did he want to kill him? What if the heated discussion involved the victim bragging about how he was going to set off a bomb in a densely populated area after he finished his steak? It doesn’t matter to Saint Denyse of Leary; a roomful of witnesses saw a guy stab someone in the ribs with a steak knife. End of story, no further investigation needed. We all know that ID is a science-stopper, but it doesn’t look like “design detection” would ever be of any use as a crime-stopper. Is it any wonder that the field of criminology still relies on good old-fashioned science?

I’m sure Ms. O’Leary doesn’t want anyone to consider the subtleties - or lack thereof - of her analogy. After all, if she doesn’t spend more than two seconds thinking about the validity of her arguments, why should we?

Over at Evolution News & Views, BPSDB poster boy Casey Luskin points readers to Men’s News Daily and this fabulous article spewed forth from the imagination of Mike LaSalle, entitled, “Darwin Ist Tot: Intelligent Design is Not Creationism“.

LaSalle kicks off his argument by linking to an opinion piece in the Daily Observer penned by the Reverend Eric Strachan. A word of advice to Mr. LaSalle: When you’re trying to make the argument that Intelligent Design is NOT repackaged creationism, it helps if you don’t reference articles containing stuff like this:

Who can improve upon the wonder of a sunrise, the majesty of a sunset, the awesomeness of a baby coming forth from the womb, trees clothed in a garment of wintry white glistening in the early morning sunshine, a golden eagle soaring upon the wings of the wind?

Yet, often the moment we add the human touch, creation loses its pristine beauty.

The Good Reverend Strachan might want to look into how the human touch has made babies coming out of wombs a little more awesome; thanks to science, a lot less stillborn babies are springing forth from wombs.

“Intelligent Design is not creationism” has become the bumper-sticker slogan/talking point of the ID crowd as of late. I’ve got to wonder if this is nothing more than a weak attempt at running interference on behalf of the next supposed nail in evolution’s coffin, Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.

With the host of Expelled talking like a creationist,

Stein apparently even went into the project with the idea that it might ultimately be titled “From Darwin to Hitler.”

and the producers of the film using creationist tactics to get interviews with academics, the words “ID is not creationism” ring hollow. As it turns out, the filmmakers had to go with another title because there’s already a book entitled From Darwin to Hitler, which has been promoted by both creationists and ID proponents.

Are you confused yet? Don’t worry, it gets worse. It’s been a few years since ID’s Dover fiasco, so the revisionists at the Discovery Institute are hoping the public has forgotten about the “cdesign proponentsists” transitional that was found in early drafts of Of Pandas and People.

Furthermore, most of us are familiar with William Dembski’s famous quote:

Indeed, intelligent design is just the Logos theology of John’s Gospel restated in the idiom of information theory.

In other words, Intelligent Design is NOT creationism, it’s just a bunch of stuff from the Bible made to sound sciency. I’m glad we could work that one out.

What I find more interesting than the increasing claims of “ID is not creationism” is the dearth of headlines exclaiming “Intelligent Design is Science”. Sure, they wish it was science, but as a wise man once said, “Wish in one hand, shit in the other, and see which hand fills up first”.

I’d like to be Ring Magazine’s Middleweight Champion, but I don’t necessarily want to do things like, oh, I dunno… train or have to step into the ring with someone like Kelly Pavlik. I guess I could redefine the phrase “Ring Magazine’s Middleweight Champion” to mean something entirely different, but there’s a slight drawback to that approach: no one in their right minds would take me seriously.

And so it is with Intelligent Design, with one minor difference. The leading lights of Intelligent Design most certainly wish to redefine science in terms that will allow ID proponents to say that ID is, indeed, science. Like my futile fantasy of becoming middleweight champ, ID proponents want to be scientists without having to do all that messy science. The difference between my dream and theirs is, there are people who earnestly support ID’s effort to turn the word “science” into a meaningless term that would make astrology a legitimate scientific endeavor. As I’ve previously mentioned, there is no idea too ridiculous or offensive that can’t be made respectable by dressing it up with religion.

Let us momentarily put aside all that pesky evidence and pretend that “Intelligent Design is not creationism” is a factual statement. Even if that was true, ID is still pseudoscience. It’s still anti-science. That’s the issue which creationists ID proponents need to be addressing, but instead choose to ignore.

Since I’ve been back online, I haven’t had time to check out all of Denyse O’Leary’s blogs. I’m sure a couple hundred new O’Leary blogs sprouted up in my absence, so I’ve got some catching up to do. I did, however, find the “Darwinian Fundamentalism” blog in one of Denyse’s blogrolls. As one might guess, the blog is rife with Tard.

The most recent article is entitled “The Insular Secular Left”; it’s not much more than an excerpt from and a link to an editorial in the New York Sun, although the author does have this to say:

Why are Darwinian fundamentalists so eager to vilify intelligent design proponents and other macroevolutionary skeptics? Why is Nick Matzke so eager to lump young earth creationists and ID proponents together, and remain passionately ignorant of important distinctions? Why do so many scientists seem so eager intentionally to misrepresent ID and its advocates?

Darwinian Fundamentalism’s blogmeister is obviously unaware of Intelligent Design’s “big tent” policy:

Along with Mike Behe, most advocates of Intelligent Design (ID) think the designer is God. Almost all members of the ID community are mono-theists: mainly Christians, but also Jews and Moslems. As explained earlier, evolutionary creationists are excluded — by their own choice, and by the ID community — from the “big tent” of ID, which includes mainly old-earth progressive creationists (OECs) and young-earth creationists (YECs).

In other words, there are no important distinctions when it comes to Intelligent Design and Young Earth Creationism. They are both religiously-based forms of anti-evolution. Sure, there are some minor distinctions to be made, such as

• Intelligent Design sounds a little more scientific than Young Earth Creationism
• Young Earth Creationism is more blatantly anti-science than ID

Other than that, there’s not much difference. I mean, ID proponent William Dembski is just as much of a fuckhead as YECs Kent Hovind, Ken Ham and Jonathan Sarfati. One of the biggest douchebags on the internet is both an Intelligent Design proponent and a YEC. Intelligent Design and Creationism are both forms of pseudoscience.

Until Intelligent Design comes out and says that there is no longer any room in their big tent for YECs, any conflation between ID and creationism is perfectly acceptable. Better yet, if ID wants to claim an important distinction between Young Earth Creationism, perhaps ID proponents should stop whining about persecution and get off their asses and do some actual science.

The NY Sun editorial has fuck all to do with creationism and/or Intelligent Design, but it does bring up some interesting points that I might address a later date.

(a tip of the headgear to my brother for giving me the heads up on this)

If you’re an atheist who’s spent more than 10 minutes on the internet, you’re probably aware of Ray Comfort’s infamous “The Atheist’s Nightmare: The Banana” video. The classic clip comes from Season One, Episode Seven of Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron’s “Way of the Master” series. If you’re wondering if the entire episode is as stupid as the banana argument, wonder no more: The folks at the Iron Chariots Wiki (a kickass name for a website, by the way) have posted a thoroughly detailed rebuttal of episode seven.

Comfort & Cameron’s “arguments” are so blatantly idiotic that they can be dismissed as bullshit, but if you ever need to point out to someone exactly why their arguments aren’t even worthy of consideration, the Iron Chariots page is your one-stop source. Two stops, actually; the banana argument merits its own page.

I can’t help but be in awe of the patience required to not only sit through an entire episode of that garbage, but to construct a detailed analysis of it, as well.

I’d like to thank a kind reader who shares the same name as a former Governor of California for pointing out that the videos in my OMG! The Collapse of Atheism! post have gone dead. Fortunately - or unfortunately, depending on your outlook - I’ve found replacements. I almost used these videos in the original post, but decided to go with the four-part version instead of the five-part series. The original post now has the links updated and contains working videos.

I realize the videos are pretty much the same thing over and over again, but the first video contains an introduction that wasn’t in the first batch of videos. Check out the first 1:45 of the first clip for a good laugh: Hitler, Mussolini, and… John Lennon?