Wednesday, January 31, 2007

Funny Searches: January 2007

Well, last year I didn't get many of these, but they've built up pretty quickly:

can a woman give birth to a dog: Turn her around, Dad, I want a puppy!

fetish of divine bronze: In another time and place, I might be flattered.

why astrology: Why not? Because it's a load of bullcarp. That's why not.

blood virgin picture: I'm not really into that BDSM stuff.

positive things about sylvia browne: And he got me instead of a 404?

people who hAVE SUPERNATURAL ABILITIES: You can find them in the Monster Manual. Not sure how many can be safely called "people." Oh, and someone bumped your volume control, there.

measurements of gameboys: Make sure they include the DS on there. Nintendo can deny it all they want, but it's the Gameboy DS, not Nintendo DS.

danger of dowsing crystals: May cause unsafe levels of credulity, closed-mindedness, and if it's sharp enough, you could put an eye out.

ninjas are god: You've got it backwards.

james randi arrogant: It's not arrogance if you deserve it.

"The Biggest Douche in the Universe": John Edward.

"greek myth blind spot": It was inflicted upon us by Squidipus, born of Poseidon and well, he'd rather not talk about that.

lincoln nebraska sluts: Hey, this is a family blog! Well, kinda...

sylvia browne charities: She gives money until it eases her conscience just enough for her to sleep at night.

sylvia browne psychic reading on president for 2008: Someone better than Bush. I hope.

decemberween: You're fifty-five days after Halloween.

sylvia browne cancer cures: If I were a nastier person, I'd rephrase that as "Cancer cures [world of] Sylvia Browne," but I'm not quite that mean. Most I'd wish for is probably something like that charities link above.

do sylvia browne really knows about everyone life: 1. No. 2. Stop contributing to the perception that all southerners (this came from Mississippi) are illiterate morons.

I am a Virgo , Psychic will I win , tell me for free: All the signs are a month off, Woo are you, insult free of charge.

what words to use on people who want to change there life from smokin weed: 1. I would name some brand of patch or gum or something, except I don't know any for marijuana. 2. Try at least using the right words for properly constructing a sentence before you try provoking life-altering epiphanies: It's "their" as a possessive, and though I'm guilty of it, it's not a substitute for our language's lack of a singular neuter possessive pronoun for living things.

sylvia browne and coins: She likes collecting the ones people send to her. Not for their historical value, though.

can sylvia browne tell a person when they are going to die: She needs to work on being able to tell if they're dead or alive before she works on making predictions.

zelda wii sucks: DO NOT BLASPHEME! EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!

evidence proving fairies do not exist: You know you've hit rock bottom when you're the archetypal analogy for shifting the burden of proof.

blowjob quiet: I'm not going to fall for that like Clinton did.

sylvia browne "black people": I think I'll avoid touching this one. I'm morbidly curious what else showed up on that search, though. I'm also scared to look, lest my disgust for Sylvia reach unprecedented levels.

positive sylvia browne experiences: I'm sorry, Mario, but our hag is in another castle.

sylvia browne appearance in austin: If you find one, be sure to tell my brother. He could probably stand to branch out a little.

jack chick idiot: You said it!

fucking sylvia vs other psychic: I CAN'T BURN THE IMAGE OUT OF MY MIND!!!111!

psychic powers testing, coin stuck on wall: Turns out it was just chewing gum. They had a hidden camera to see how long people would try to pick it off.

hand waving fallacy: The propulsion system proposed for the new Intelligently Designed airplane.

lion serpent sylvia brown: Try "lying serpent" or "forked tongue." That should provide more results.

nikken dog pills: Take with large grains of salt.

manipulating the munchies when your high: When my high what does what? People need to learn to at least complete thoughts, if not sentences.

sylvia brown follow ups: Performed only by skeptics.

lunatic fundies: Search performed by the department of redundancy department.

how to draw ass: My art days focused mostly on abstract art. I'm sure there's at least one website you could use for reference out there.

Podcast?

I gave a little thought of doing a one-time podcast with my brother during the Decemberween break, but nothing came out of it. Got a tiny cheap little microphone that's been largely unused, but I don't have any editing software (mostly needed because my speaking ability isn't on par with my typing ability). Got some sound clips I could use, or probably download as necessary.

Kind of a blank slate on how I'd do the thing if I get around to it, so the floor's open if anyone wants to make suggestions.

Monday, January 29, 2007

Skeptiplomacy Update

Been a while since I mentioned the game, so here's an update:

For the wager idea, I think I'll borrow a bit from the Reverend: The losing players have to get some item of their local areas and mail them to the winner, and I'm interpreting "areas" to be fairly broad, just in case you live in some boring little town, but some nearby place has something of interest. How does that idea sound?

Other than that, not a lot happened since the last post, but here's the player list thus far:

1. Bronze Dog (duh)
2. Austin Atheist
3. Rev. BigDumbChimp
4. JackalMage
5. xiangtao
6. Infophile
7. baldywilson
8. Brendan
9. Bourgeois_Rage
10. Akusai
11. Greedy Algorithm
12. Nes
13.
14.

We still need the last two players. I'm thinking of just going around doing some inviting on my own. Don't hesitate to do the same. If there's more than two new players showing up, they'll get the slots in the order they appear in the comments for signing up.

Random Fun Stuff

My brother and I ended up exchanging some entertaining videos. Kind of surprised me that he sent me a Star Trek music video, since he's not a big fan (though I think he's seen some of the appeal now and again):



I spotted this in the 'related videos' and thought it was funny. Hope there's a sequel. I can see the Defiant fitting in, since it's a little smaller than a Corellian cruiser.



It may also interest you to know that fandom doesn't know international boundaries. Hands from Japan (via VG Cats):

Doggerel #57: "You Use Bad Words!"


Welcome back to "Doggerel," where I ramble on about words and phrases that are misused, abused, or just plain meaningless.

As has been mentioned before, it's not at all uncommon for skeptics to become extremely annoyed as an argument carries on, especially if it involves a woo repeatedly ignoring arguments, spouting doggerel, changing the subject, or making specious accusations. Naturally, some start using a chunk of language that has been arbitrarily declared taboo in an effort to get a point across.

One way to get skeptics to use even more nasty language is to complain about their language while ignoring the arguments containing the objectionable words: Like many entries in the Doggerel series, it is, as you probably guessed, another subject change, specifically in the vein of the "style over substance" fallacy. Whether or not a skeptic uses taboo words has nothing to do with the validity of his arguments. If a drunken sailor makes a valid point, it's still a valid point, even if he's suddenly mobbed by the FCC.

Personal note: I've got nothing against the forbidden words, but I like to carefully choose when to use them. It helps to add emphasis.

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Doggerel Index

Friday, January 26, 2007

Open the Floodgates!

The 2% Company had a long comment thread filled with trolls who cast skeptics as inhuman monsters incapable of feeling love, joy, and so forth. These people inspired a Doggerel entry, which in turn, inspired some fellow skeptics to mention a number of things that have moved our very human hearts to tears.

Doggerel #56: "You Want to Disprove Love!"

Welcome back to "Doggerel," where I ramble on about words and phrases that are misused, abused, or just plain meaningless. Forgive me if this entry is extra-rambly.

One of the most bizarre, yet still strangely common, accusations against skeptics is that we're trying to disprove love, joy, art, or some similar good thing completely unrelated to whatever we're arguing about.

First, skepticism is one of the cardinal virtues of science. Without it, we'd only be milling over possibilities, rather than solving mysteries and using that newfound knowledge to discover and unravel new mysteries. Without skepticism, life would be full of stale, meaningless sophistry. It'd also be much shorter.

Second, woos who use this doggerel implicitly or explicitly claim that skeptics can't experience the abstract item in question. This is nothing more than a base attempt to dehumanize skeptics.

One of the recent videogames I've played was Okami for the PS2. It is a truly rare experience to see a game that has such beautiful imagery, stirring music, creative spirit, driving story, and innovative play style. Another experience of mine is with the last episode of Futurama before its cancellation: The last line of dialog simply makes my heart ache from the beauty and sorrow (soon to be turned to joy) of it: "Don't stop playing, Fry... I want to hear how it ends."

I'm on the verge of tears just thinking about some of this stuff. The fact that countless woo trolls would deny my capacity for such things is appalling, and leaves me wondering if they're at all capable of the things they pretend to revere. After all, I've noticed a tendency for the people who talk about art while bashing science to come across as hacks with no creative impulse.

Among the skeptical community, I've noticed it's exceedingly common for us to be fans of science fiction. Science fiction is a truly special genre, since it allows us to think about the implications of our hopes, dreams, and even fears coming true. Star Trek, even though it features a lot of dodgy "science," is built on a sentiment that many skeptics share: With the knowledge and wisdom that comes from science, we can solve many of the problems that plague us and rise above many of the petty disputes that divide us. I doubt it'll be nearly as easy in the real world as it was in Star Trek, but I think mankind can achieve something roughly like that.

Woos, however, seem to go by the motto of "ignorance is bliss," are content to live in a stale world, and vehemently attack anyone who seeks to expand their horizons.

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Doggerel Index

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Doggerel #55: "You Haven't Walked in My Shoes!"

I've been tackling this doggerel in some comments on other blogs, but for some reason it never occurred to me to add it to the series. Thankfully, I don't have to: Orac writes about it in detail.

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Doggerel Index

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

I Wish...


Found this when I was doing a search for images for the latest Doggerel entry. Would like to see the Christian equivalent of the cartoon's events happen in the US, too.

Note: Not going to comment on the Israel remark in the streamer. That's a whole different can of worms.

'Nother Temporary Template Change

Sorry about the inconvenience: Some of my posts just wouldn't work with half of a large image being chopped off, and this one stretches. I couldn't figure out how to stretch the Thisaway template in the html, so we're stuck with this until I can get the time to figure things out.

Thankfully, it seems it's much easier to adjust the colors, so I can get an idea of what color scheme you'll take.

Doggerel #54: "I Demand Respect!"

Welcome back to "Doggerel," where I ramble on about words and phrases that are misused, abused, or just plain meaningless.

Often, trolls like to claim that they are innately deserving of respect in a debate. Like many other entries in the Doggerel series, this particular "point" is often intended to distract from the actual arguments being raised. Like cries of "ad hominem," this complaint essentially cherrypicks the skeptics' arguments in an attempt to cover up their meaningful content.

First, respect is something that is supposed to be earned. If you conduct yourself poorly, spout old canards after claiming to have researched the issue, and get pedantic about completely irrelevant details, you're not entitled. In fact, if you do that, you're earning major brownie points towards great disrespect.

Second, whatever you're defending is not automatically equal with modern science. If you've got some crazy idea that goes against mainstream theories, don't spend your time whining about how you're treated. Knuckle under, get actual evidence, and *gasp* rebut your opponent's actual arguments instead of ignoring them. That's what Galileo did.

(This particular Doggerel entry is subject to added nuance.)

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Doggerel Index

Friday, January 19, 2007

Shall We Make a Wager?

Well, we're up to 11 12 players out of 14 for the Skeptiplomacy game. One thing I was thinking about to spice things up and possibly attract the last 3 2 players: A wager of some sort, where the losers (that'll be the rest of you) do something for the winner (that'll be me) at the end of the game. I was also thinking of having it at multiple levels: The people who get utterly wiped off the map are bigger losers than the people who manage to survive until the end, when I claim over half the supply centers.

Beyond something simple like everyone making a post about a topic of the winner's choosing, I don't have many ideas, so get to brainstorming.

Quote of the Time Being #7

At Respectful Insolence:

David Cooke said

You have to list, in order, the stepwise mutations, deletions, transpositions, duplications, or whatever other currently known mechanisms of DNA change have actually occured to produce the information necessary to code for a human limb.

To prove you can drive from New York to San Francisco, you have to list in order all the movements of the accelerator and brake pedals, the precise amount that the steering has to be turned at any time and the duration of these activities, all the roadside signs and any stops that are made. If you can't do this, it clearly demonstrates that the only way to get from New York to San Francisco is by taking the train.


-Richard Simons

52nd Skeptics' Circle

It's up at Frank the Financially Savvy Atheist's place.

Open thread as usual, but there are a couple things to observe.

1. Basic netiquette. For some reason (I think you can guess), I feel compelled to remind some people.

2. Failure to poke fun at Sylvia Browne is FORBIDDEN!

Thursday, January 18, 2007

*Ksssssh Booooop!*

I'm going to have to make a note to watch this all the way through when I have 2 1/2 hours. It's a video debunking one of the 9/11 Troof movement videos, via JREF forums, again. When the video makes the noise from this post title, you know The Doc is going to whack 'em really hard.

Coming soon, hopefully: 911mysteriesguide.com

Wednesday, January 17, 2007

The 9/11 Twoofer Credo

Brought to you by Orphia Nay of the JREF forums. You may recall the Woo-Woo Credo.

Some favorites:

Fight strawmen valiantly. Repeatedly state that 9/11 was not caused by “Arabs in caves”, and that burning jet fuel alone did not bring down the buildings. Accuse your opponents of being George Bush-lovers, and dismiss their evidence accordingly.

Use one myth to support another myth.
“They were going to create a false-flag operation (Northwoods) in the Sixties therefore 9/11 was an inside job”.
“Oswald didn’t kill Kennedy therefore 9/11 was an inside job”.
“9/11 was an inside job therefore anyone who disagrees with me is a disinformation agent”.
“The “New World Order” is a group of shadowy masterminds who control every government and fake every world event, therefore 9/11 was a false-flag psy-op.”
"The Holocaust did not happen so 9/11 was an inside job." "The hijackers were cokeheads and Osama was mortally ill therefore the US gubmint orchestrated 9/11".

Monday, January 15, 2007

Well, That Was Annoying

My room's just about done with some renovations, and while the TV was down, and all my other stuff was still running, I decided to try out the TV tuner I got with my laptop. Setup was incredibly annoying, since Toshiba made an effort to hide everything from me: The tuner didn't come with a manual, the CD its driver came on was of no help, and I had to go through this horrible meandering path through a "Media Center" program to even realize I was in the right place to go through set up.

And once I was there, I found out I was being forced to use the remote control attachments: The laptop couldn't simply accept a signal: It had to be in communication with my box. I couldn't just use Patina as a monitor.

I hope you appreciate what I'm going through to bring you a few YouTube clips in the future. Think I'm going to have to find a way to rearrange all my systems and so forth, though: Right now, all the sound goes through my system switcher into my surround sound amplifier. Need to change the setup so that I can switch between TV/amp and laptop easily. I'm not looking forward to it.

Think I may get a new amp system while I'm at it.

Might as Well Post Something for MLK's Sake

"The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool. If the church does not recapture its prophetic zeal, it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority. If the church does not participate actively in the struggle for peace and for economic and racial justice, it will forfeit the loyalty of millions and cause men everywhere to say that it has atrophied its will. But if the church will free itself from the shackles of a deadening status quo, and, recovering its great historic mission, will speak and act fearlessly and insistently in terms of justice and peace, it will enkindle the imagination of mankind and fire the souls of men, imbuing them with a glowing and ardent love for truth, justice, and peace. Men far and near will know the church as a great fellowship of love that provides light and bread for lonely travellers at midnight."

I may not agree with Martin Luther King's religious views, but we share common ground in moral issues. When he was standing up for justice, equality, and all those things America is supposed to be a shining beacon of, one of the greatest problems he faced aside from overt racism was the sloth of the "moderate" churches. I think we're still facing the same problem. While we've still got serious issues to deal with, the fundies are maintaining the status quo by distracting us with the fictional "War on Christmas," while a real war is going on in Iraq, paranoia about reading harmless fantasy novels like Harry Potter while woos and fundies try to make people act on fantasy, and claim religion to be a great unifier while acting horrified at the prospect of a Congressman swearing on a different book, calling atheists "militant" for writing books, and endorsing a videogame that uniformly treats non-Christians as enemies.

So, if you consider yourself a "moderate" religious person, and want to take a stand against fundies of all sorts, it'd really raise my spirits (or at least endorphin levels) to hear it again. With the media's lack of coverage, sometimes I need a reminder that there are moderates out there who aren't idle, and that the church can at least take some sort of action against its members who go far astray.

Saturday, January 13, 2007

Sit! Stay! Good Blog. #4


Not only does he code Diplomacy games for us, baldywilson blogs, too! So far, he's still new, but off to a good start. One of the entries I enjoyed detailed an... "interesting" bit of junk mail.

He also covers a bit about that Left Behind videogame, including one Cretinist canard included in it.

Friday, January 12, 2007

Game Year Update

Well, Brendan's working on the map for our big Diplomacy game, and has set the number of players to 18 14, so now we have a particular number of slots. One thing Brendan requested to help inspire ideas for the map: Some history of the fictional world soon to be ruled under my not-quite-iron fist we'll be playing in. Remember that the genre and such aren't being restricted, so go wild with your imagination. One idea I'm fond of for the moment is floating islands with an airforce substituting for fleets.

baldywilson has offered his 133t code monkey skills for programming a server to handle the board, and Rev. BigDumbChimp has offered a machine to act as said server.

The player list:

1. Bronze Dog (duh)
2. Austin Atheist
3. Rev. BigDumbChimp
4. JackalMage
5. xiangtao
6. Infophile
7. baldywilson
8. Brendan
9. Bourgeois_Rage
10. Akusai
11. Greedy Algorithm
12. Nes
13.
14.

If you'd like to join, say so in the comments (unambiguously, please), and I'll add you to the list. Here's a tutorial for the new players.

While you're here, I'd also like ideas for what to call the big game. Would help it become a regular event or something if we enjoy it enough.

Thursday, January 11, 2007

Doggerel #53: "We Need More Time to Research!"

Welcome back to "Doggerel," where I ramble on about words and phrases that are misused, abused, or just plain meaningless.

In fields like parapsychology, woos often try to render themselves immune to criticism by claiming that they need more time to build up the evidence. Granted, new fields of science can always use more research time, but that's seldom relevant to the conversations where this doggerel shows up:

First, it usually involves a fallacy known as "argument to the future": basing your position on evidence that will allegedly show up. Usually woo fields are criticized for having no evidence at all. The far more reasonable response is skepticism and maybe a few discussions on what kind of experiments to do.

Second, it often ignores the fact that very little legitimate research being done in woo fields. Parapsychology did have some legitimate aspects once, such as Zener cards, with 5 distinct, objective outcomes to be measured. They have been largely abandoned, however, for experiments that often rely on subjective interpretations of the results when the cards didn't produce any positive outcomes.

Third, woo fields seldom define terms in a meaningful fashion. How do you measure the strength of an aura, the CSI of an object, or the wavelength of a healthy chi? You also have to have make the demarcation between success and failure before you get the result of an experiment. As long as a field can maintain its ambiguity, it can disguise failures.

An additional abuse that often crops up on forums and the like: A woo promises to get to work on research, claiming limited time to deal with that sort of thing, and yet keeps posting contentless entries.

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Doggerel Index

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

A Little Fun

Emailed from my brother:



Well, it's better than allegedly real levitation videos out there.

Please Disengage Your Lurking Device

Seems there's a "Delurking Week" thing going on. This post has been treated with a tachyon net that will automatically detect any lurkers attempting to read it.

Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Since I'm Behind the Times

I'm not all that heavy on mp3 players: I just download free bits onto my PSP on occasion from a handful of narrow sites. I am, however, thinking of expanding my variety a bit, and potentially looking for the kind of music that I might have to pay actual money for. Anyone got recommended sites for sheer variety and ease of use?

Specific craving at the moment: I'd like to listen to a bit of techno, and I don't know much about the subgenres or the people behind the music. Leaning towards the kind that'd go well with a fast-paced space shooter.

Oh, and I like Blue Man Group when they don't have lyrics: Just the makeshift instruments.

And Now For Something Completely Different

Not quite the usual skeptical blogging subject, but the 2% Company has a post that pretty much nails a defender of an archetypal frivolous lawsuit dead on.

In addition, the article mentions that McDonald's didn't warn consumers that the coffee could cause burns. To us, this is the most maddening statement in the entire summary, and it's the usual rationale behind lawsuits that we see as frivolous. It's coffee. Coffee is served hot. Really hot. Of course spilling really hot things on yourself can cause injuries. The implication that this woman somehow wasn't aware of these obvious facts is ridiculous, and it's the primary reason that we will continue to refer to this as a frivolous lawsuit.

Monday, January 08, 2007

Doggerel #52: "Why Isn't Your Site More Popular?"


Weclome back to "Doggerel," where I ramble on about words and phrases that are misused, abused, or just plain meaningless.

You probably know where this entry is going: An arguer's popularity has nothing to do with the validity of his arguments, hence it is a subject change. It's becoming a cliché in a number of media that the average person doesn't care about the truth if he can be comforted by lies.

Even if people did have an innate attraction to the truth, there are other reasons a website could be lacking in popularity: Lack of promotion, bad format, inclusion of uninteresting material, etcetera.

What makes this fallacy worse is that more popular science websites such as Pharyngula often get comments accusing the visitors of being "sycophants" and "yes men" and sometimes claim that the site's popularity is being used as the basis for its validity, rather than the arguments presented. Such posts, however, seldom refer to any of the actual content.

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Doggerel Index

Friday, January 05, 2007

Temporary Template

I've decided to update my template to try to convince myself to get to work on the real end result. Currently dinking around with the basic tools they provide with the updated formats. Will come in handy on some things, but I need to think about how to work around some of the built-in stuff. Would like to have a sidebar on each end, and figure out how to change the background color: You'd think they'd make that a one-click thing.

Anyway, I'm working so don't be surprised if things switch around in the middle of your surfing.

Suggestions are appreciated, and I'm trying to remember all the people I'd like to add to the blog roll. Going to stick with the updated name and try to use a lot of browns and orange colors. I'm also looking for a reason to use a blue-green patina color.

UPDATE: Currently working on the icons for the blogroll. If you can, it'd be convenient for me if some of you would send images you'd like to use for your icons to my gmail account. The general theme I'm going on is that it'll be a dark monochromatic icon on a metallic, polished bronze button. I'm going to be using a lot of hexagons, so try to keep that in mind: Examples thus far: I've turned my brother's "empty set" symbol from a circle with a line through it to a hexagon with a line through it. For Pharyngula, I made a squid out of joined hexagons.

UPDATE #2: Couldn't pull myself away from Zelda this weekend. At least I saved Hyrule from Ganon for the illionth time. Anyway, stuff I'm trying to do for the moment, since I'm having trouble trying to mix my limited html / Adobe GoLive knowledge with all the code they've got for blogger:

1. Kill or greatly reduce the tan spots to the sides. They're doing nothing but taking up space that could be better devoted to sidebar stuff. (It seems everything except those bars is stuck at a specific pixel width, and I can't alter them all and keep the place working)

2. Make a second sidebar to the left with a "recent comments" thing. (Preferably latest 10 comments, just the name and location)

3. Change the backgrounds for the post area and existing sidebar.

Thursday, January 04, 2007

51st Skeptics' Circle

It's up. See it at See You at Enceladus.

Glad I got a little plug for the Diplomacy game... Need to see if I can contact Brendan to see how the map's coming.

Withdrawing from the game is FORBIDDEN! Otherwise, the thread's fairly open.

My Brain's Upside-Down, Now

Sometimes, when I try to make sense of a crazy conspiracy theory, a narrative of this sort pops into my mind, only less funny and more painful.

Speaking of that painful link, I'm thinking I might do an Agony Booth-style review of The Celestine Prophecy: Saw a DVD version when I was Decemberween shopping. Should probably see about finding a rental place that doesn't do late fees, since I'll probably just do 15 minute spurts.

Be careful when driving home. We're expecting a disco thunderstorm tonight.

Tuesday, January 02, 2007

2# !fooW

I once again feel the need to bring some humor into people's lives. Ask me a question. Chances are, you'll get a silly answer.

Doggerel #51: "Threatened"

Welcome to the first Doggerel of 2007, where I ramble on about words and phrases that are misused, abused, or just plain meaningless.

Often, woo trolls like to think that when we get riled up, it's because they're threatening our worldview or something. Usually, nothing could be further from the truth, since there are plenty of other reasons to get seriously annoyed with them:

First, we are not required to suffer fools lightly. If someone repeatedly spews out logical fallacies while demonstrating zero effort to actually comprehend a skeptic's stance on an issue, it's only natural to get angry. In this instance, it's kind of hard for them to be threatening to your stance if they don't bother learning what it is. You can't really threaten an idea if you don't know anything about it.

Second, a lot of the people who use this are shameless trolls, and often employ other troll techniques that get under our skin without contributing anything to the discussion: Copy-paste floods, "UR GAY"-type insults, all-caps, red herrings, etcetera. Sometimes rudeness is necessary to get a point across, but all of the above are unnecessary.

Third, if they want to threaten our worldview, it should be fairly easy: If we're defending a scientific theory, there are ways to falsify them. We know what it'd take to prove us wrong. If we don't accept their claim, they should probably see about applying for the Randi Challenge or conducting a similar experiment.

Of course, as I feel oddly compelled to point out all the time, this is another example of a subject change. Even if we do feel threatened, that doesn't change the soundness of our arguments.

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Doggerel Index