Crazy Creationist Offers Paltry $10,000 Prize

Dr Joseph Mastropaolo who has a PhD in kinesiology, is offering $10,000 to anyone “who can prove in front of a judge that science contradicts the literal interpretation of the book of Genesis.”

The challenge has been designed to be played out in the form of a mini-trial, before a judge. One of the rules of the mini-trial is that the evolutionist challenger must also put up $10,000 to match the pocket change being offered by Mastropaolo and the Creation Science Hall of Shame Fame, a website to which he contributes articles. [You can check out the other rules including some preposterous claims for creation which compete for space on this page]

I fail to see how he’s going to win this challenge, let alone attract anyone of integrity to participate. Firstly the $10,000 reward is paltry; in fact it’s an insult. Any number of high school biology students could present the evidence (which is overwhelming) for evolution, but I doubt $10,000 would cover their travel and other costs to attend this proposed circus. Compared to the $1,000,000 being offered by the James Randi Foundation to proponents of the paranormal and supernatural, this prize is laughable.

Secondly scientific evidence is not adjudicated by a judge, no matter how esteemed. Scientific evidence is peer-reviewed. The evidence for creation (sic) is only supported by quacks, pseudoscientists and the religious faithful and nuts alike.

Mastropaolo maintains the absurd belief that evolution “is devoid of scientific evidence.” He further contends that since none of the esteemed list of scientists and institutions he lists on his challenge page have taken up the challenge, he can claim default judgement against the Debate Dodgers as he calls them. He then goes on to proclaim, quite ludicrously that “This is proof positive that evolution is an inverted-fantasy religion taught in the public schools in violation of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America,” and “These data confirm the scientific peer-reviewed articles of objective, valid, reliable, and calibrated evidence that evolution exists nowhere in the universe, never has, never will, except as an inverted fantasy based on vitalism superstitions 2,500 years old.”

Wow! I for one am left in no doubt that Mastropaolo is just another Creationist blowhard, hoping to create a circus show that will likely spin some money for him and his cronies. Either that or he’s bat-shit crazy.

The Venn Diagram of Absolute Bollocks

Just lifted another brilliant infographic from Facebook again…

The Creation scientists may be trying harder, but my pro-creationist readers are not…

Recently there has been a flurry of comments posted to a blog I wrote in February last year, I’ll give the Creationist’s this much: they’re certainly trying harder.

These comments are remarkable for one thing only: the utter deficiency of the basics of science. On the contrary, they’re crammed with non-facts, regurgitated from notorious Creation scientists… nearly all of which have been debunked at one time or other.

It is utterly astonishing that with the wealth of information at our disposal which demonstrate conclusively the authenticity of evolutionary science, these readers allow themselves to be drawn like zombies, to sources disseminating pure garbage. Attempts to point them to genuine sources of information such as TalkOrigins, are met with loathing and outright dismissal.

The distinct impression I get is that they don’t want to learn anything new, but rather seek the comfort of confirmation for their predisposed beliefs.

Anyway, I found this on my Facebook page today and leave it here for them to mull over… if that’s not asking too much.

 

Rationalizing prayer

Hehehe! Saw this on my Facebook page and had to share…

So this is what the belief mongers have surrendered to? Rationalizing a totally ineffectual pursuit. It must be comforting playing heads I win, tails you lose.

17 Shopping Days Until the End of the World… Again!

It’s silly season again! No really, this time it most certainly is…

I wrote last year in October about the religious nut, Harold Camping who predicted the end of the world on 21 October. This time around its various New Ageists and other assorted crackpots. Most of these wacko’s base their beliefs on the Mayan calendar. Others think that Earth is going to collide with a Black Hole, or the imaginary planet Nibiru. Some even suggest we’re going to be invaded by Aliens.

I know the world is still as crazy as ever; probably even more so than last year. There are all the usual signs. We’ve had them here in South Africa too. Religious nut jobs are still butchering anyone who they deem to be in opposition to their primitive belief systems. Politicians are still defrauding their constituencies with gay abandon. And every freak, thief, rapist and murderer continues to treat the world as their personal property.

And global temperatures are rising.

But I can assure you that I will stop the world from ending on 21 December 2012. The question is, will you worship me thereafter?

Climate Change denialists take the cake…

…but not the pie.

The pie belongs to peer-reviewed acceptance of climate change.

 

The journey to unbelief, revisited

I spent some time last night going through a manuscript on atheism and unbelief, sent to me by a work colleague. Reading through it reminded me of my own personal journey from credulity to skepticism.

I could see the same mistakes in the manuscript that I had made when I first ventured out into the world of unbelief, trying to make sense of this bewildering, yet deliciously liberated frame of mind… no being. It was like deja vu.

I remember grabbing eagerly at any book I could find, any resource that would explain this new world to me. And most of the time I was led astray by utter nonsense. Believe me, there is a lot of it out there. From the cunningly sublime, to the outrageously ridiculous. There’s all kinds – from conspiracy theorists to pushers of woo of every hue.

It is amazingly easy to be lulled into accepting bullshit, because it is comforting. Yes, bullshit is comforting. Which is probably why the world is full of it. Generally people want to be comforted. Who can blame them? Being or feeling challenged is not a natural desire.

This is for my colleague. I hope you are reading this. DO NOT ACCEPT ANYTHING YOU READ OR HEAR. EVEN YOUR EYES MAY DECEIVE YOU. DOUBT IS YOUR BEST FRIEND…

Reality simplified

Sean Carroll, a theoretical cosmologist from the Department of Physics at the California Institute of Technology, explains reality and renders the supernatural, superfluous.

The end bits are quite humbling.

Misconceptions About Science

Based on the many comments received on my blog posts, I gather that there are many misconceptions about science – how it works and what it can and can’t do.

I am therefore quite chuffed at having this valuable resource pointed out to me by Facebook friends at the link below, and hope you will find it as useful as I have:

Misconceptions About Science. 2012. University of California Museum of Paleontology. 25 September 2012. http://undsci.berkeley.edu/teaching/misconceptions.php

It is part of a larger resource by the same authors known as Understanding Science. How science really works, of which I have posted a permanent link in the sidebar of my homepage.

Here’s a small sampling:

• MISCONCEPTION: Science is a collection of facts.

CORRECTION: Because science classes sometimes revolve around dense textbooks, it’s easy to think that’s all there is to science: facts in a textbook. But that’s only part of the picture. Science is a body of knowledge that one can learn about in textbooks, but it is also a process. Science is an exciting and dynamic process for discovering how the world works and building that knowledge into powerful and coherent frameworks.

• MISCONCEPTION: Science is complete.

CORRECTION: Since much of what is taught in introductory science courses is knowledge that was constructed in the 19th and 20th centuries, it’s easy to think that science is finished — that we’ve already discovered most of what there is to know about the natural world. This is far from accurate. Science is an ongoing process, and there is much more yet to learn about the world. In fact, in science, making a key discovery often leads to many new questions ripe for investigation. Furthermore, scientists are constantly elaborating, refining, and revising established scientific ideas based on new evidence and perspectives.

• MISCONCEPTION: Science contradicts the existence of God.

CORRECTION: Because of some vocal individuals (both inside and outside of science) stridently declaring their beliefs, it’s easy to get the impression that science and religion are at war. In fact, people of many different faiths and levels of scientific expertise see no contradiction at all between science and religion. Because science deals only with natural phenomena and explanations, it cannot support or contradict the existence of supernatural entities — like God.

Have fun exploring the rest…

Is God talking to you too?

“I came into this project wanting to understand the question: How are rational, sensible, educated people able to sustain faith in an invisible being in an environment of skepticism?”

Tanya Luhrmann, an anthropologist spent about four years studying the rituals of evangelicals and came to the conclusion that prayer teaches them to hear the voice of God, presumably the Christian version of the supreme being. Luhrmann went on to write a book about it – When God Talks Back: Understanding the American Evangelical Relationship With God.

The obvious but crass reaction of many cynics and non-believers would be to retort that those who hear voices in their head are crazy or schizophrenic. Indeed in an essay on this story in The Week, one commenter observed “When you talk to your deity, you’re religious. When it talks to you, you’re a crazy sumbitch.”

Luhrmann on the other hand contends there’s more going on with evangelicals than we care to acknowledge. She believes they hear voices which they conclude is that of God for good reasons; the presumption yet again is that there is only one such being. However, while she went to great lengths to observe the evangelical behaviour and explain HOW these adherents come to believe that they’re talking to God, she does not attempt to explain WHY it happens. To be fair, as an anthropologist, perhaps it’s beyond her level of understanding; rationalizing an observation was all she was left with.

I would therefore like to indulge Luhrmann and other believers for a bit. Let’s suspend all credulity, and accept that a God does indeed talk to evangelicals, or anyone else for that matter, who from her observations at least, satisfy the following criteria:

1. God only talks to those who believe and accept without question that a God exists,
2. Adherents willingly want to “have a relationship” with said God, and
3. Adherents are both willing and able to participate in a ritual such as prayer, which presumably makes it possible for them to “open a communication channel” with said God.

Having satisfied the criteria, what does an adherent talk to God about, and exactly what does God reveal? According to Luhrmann:

Members told her about having coffee with God, seeing angel wings, and getting God’s advice on everything from job choice to what shampoo to buy.

Nothing of major significance or importance it seems; nothing world-changing. But that’s quite revealing actually. It seems that ordinary people talk to God about mundane things; things that don’t contribute a whole deal to the future of the planet, indeed the world.

If a supernatural entity does exist, and is talking to people, it would imply that other things we’re normally skeptical about, should also be possible. [Lest you've forgotten, we've suspended credulity].

Wouldn’t the secrets to solve both our constantly increasing energy requirements and global warming, be the most fundamentally essential revelation to mankind? Wouldn’t the solution of these issues lead to resolving poverty and other social problems? Off course there may be more pressing needs of which I am not thinking about right now.

So, in a world with a God, without doubt perpetual motion should also be possible. And a substance should exist which when diluted in water, be able to cure all diseases and render homeopathy all-powerful, right? So why hasn’t God revealed how to build that perpetual-motion machine and create the wonder homeopathic cure?

Either God doesn’t know, or the people he’s revealed such important information to, are keeping mum. Or, we need the people who can make the greatest impact to saving the world, such as scientists, to learn how to talk to God. Because they’re indubitably wasting valuable resources and money carrying out useless experiments in underground particle colliders and outer space.

Clearly then, the wrong people are talking to God. The planet’s going to hell in a handbasket at a dizzying pace. Surely those capable of talking to God should be asking Him how to sort out the mess we’re in. You have to question why we’re being made to suffer if divine information can make a difference to the way the world is unraveling.

But nada! Does God talk to us just so that we can feed his vanity? Is God then just “jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully,” as Dawkins so eloquently pointed out in The God Delusion?

Isn’t it a much simpler and more reasonable explanation that any conversation with a God is one-way traffic…