The Bronze Blog

Funny Thought

2011-11-20T12:29:00.000-06:00

1. According to the Justice League cartoon, Nth metal is an isotope of iron with an atomic weight of 676.

2. According to the Bible, god can be fought off by iron chariots.

So, just how badly would an Nth metal chariot mess up god?

Another Cynicism Dump

2011-11-14T11:36:00.000-06:00

I'm all in favor non-USA countries having their own space programs, but this just feels awkward. On other blogs, I've often commented on how we're falling behind in the world. I originally put the phrase "feels like" in the previous sentence while I was typing it.

I'm really losing confidence in the US these days, and I think I'm likely in partial denial about it by saying we're at the beginning of various downfalls. I used to say that we were at the early stages of a breakdown into a police state with the war on drugs getting more insane each year, the continuing destruction of our freedoms, and the ongoing consolidation of executive power in the wake of 9/11. I think it's time I moved onto assuming we're at least in the middle of the breakdown.

Politics is not one of my strengths, but it's hard for me to imagine that past Republicans were as insane as the current crop of them. Before 9/11, I was able to imagine a Republican being voted into the presidency without it being an outright disaster for the nation. It doesn't help that our current Democrat president is doing many of the same things Bush did. He's essentially doing the opposite of what I voted for him to do: Crack down on US war crimes and civil rights abuses. I will not be voting for him ever again.

Quote ot the Time Being: The Spoils of War

2011-11-11T12:23:00.000-06:00

Today's quote comes from Ed Brayton of Dispatches from the Culture Wars, on a topic I recently thought about, again:

Probably the single biggest passage that did it for me was Numbers 31. This is the attack on the Midianites. The Israelites believed that two Midianite women had “tempted” two men to worship their god instead of Jehovah. As a result, Moses commanded — supposedly because God told him to do so — that all Midianites be slaughtered. Except for the virgin females, who were divided up among the soldiers as the spoils of war. And it occurred to me that this is something that even Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin didn’t do. Even Nazi Germany didn’t force the women they’d conquered to marry the men who had slaughtered their fathers and brothers. That’s how barbaric it was, it went beyond anything even the worst human beings would do. And this is the same being that supposedly commands us to love one another and to do unto others as we would have them do unto us? It just didn’t add up for me.

To make things worse, a lot of fundamentalists believe Moses is being rewarded with eternal bliss for leading a "holy" life.

As for the evils of Adolph Hitler and Joseph Stalin, the fact that they didn't order anything like this suggests that even our archetypes for complete monsters are still less evil than the god of the Old Testament. Even if you try to detach the god from the barbarism, it still makes a far more horrifying vision for humanity than anything modern fundies can confabulate for the "degradation" of our civilization. How exactly are rock and roll, Harry Potter, and equal marriage rights going to produce anything even remotely as bad?

Andy Hamilton's Search for Satan

2011-11-04T10:28:00.000-05:00

I thought I'd go ahead and point this out. Andy Hamilton does a humorous documentary about Satan and how the idea has changed over time. The link has an embedded YouTube video that will probably end up being taken down sooner or later, so if you don't have access to BBC Four, you should probably watch while you can.

I'm only partway through as I type this, but it's looking fun so far. I'm curious just how much (or rather, how little) information about Satan is actually in the Bible. I pretty sure a huge bulk of the common perception will be linked to Dante's Inferno.

Quote of the Time Being: Being Right

2011-10-20T17:27:00.000-05:00

Thanks go to The Christian Cynic for providing it:

The desire to be right and the desire to have been right are two desires, and the sooner we separate them the better off we are. The desire to be right is the thirst for truth. On all counts, both practical and theoretical, there is nothing but good to be said for it. The desire to have been right, on the other hand, is the pride that goeth before a fall. It stands in the way of our seeing we were wrong, and thus blocks the progress of our knowledge.

---W.V.O. Quine and J.S. Ullian, The Web of Belief

Fundamentalism Corrupts

2011-10-20T11:34:00.000-05:00

Unsurprising news: Obama sides against a terrorist group. Rush Limbaugh sides with those terrorists because they identify themselves as "Christian." It turns out those Christian terrorists are very, very depraved.

One point I'll make sure to bring up if someone defends Limbaugh by saying he 'just' didn't research the group:

Why not? You think it's excusable that he just automatically assumes a Christian group MUST be doing good? That's a depraved form of moral subjectivism at work: It doesn't matter what actions you take, but which team you're on. That is exactly how religious fundamentalism has been corrupting the concept of morality for thousands of years. That's how fundamentalists justify atrocities. To them, the affiliation of an action is more important than its morality. That tribal subjectivism is the nihilistic foundation of fundamentalist Christianity AND religious fundamentalism in general. By choosing to judge them based on their professed allegiance to a deity instead of researching the morality of their actions, Limbaugh has demonstrated a belief in tribal subjectivism.

Civilized human beings don't think that way. Rape is immoral. Period. Slavery is immoral. Period. Civilized morality is not absolutely, perfectly objective, but it at least strives for something resembling objectivity, fairness, and impartiality. Actions matter more than arbitrary allegiances. I'll take an honest and imperfect effort over the nihilism and depravity that consistently results from fundamentalism.

Graphic of the Time Being

2011-10-12T14:01:00.000-05:00

jamesmc, in a comment over at Dispatches From the Culture Wars posted a link to this image. Guess what countries the fundamentalist Christians admire.

You may need to click to enlarge.

Blasphemy Day

2011-09-30T15:19:00.000-05:00

There most likely is no god.

Evolution is demonstrably true.

Priests, ministers, and people of faith are mere mortals like the rest of us.

The god of the Bible is a cruel, psychotic egomaniac. Thankfully, he doesn't exist, and even if he did, it's good to know he can be defeated by iron chariots.

The god of the Bible lacks the ability to feel love on par with the average human being.

Faith is an act of deceitful arrogance and hubris. Saying "I don't know" is an act of honest humility.

The universe has no inherent purpose or meaning. We create meaning and purpose.

Marriage is about love. It is not about procreation, religion, tradition, or greed.

An attack on same sex marriage is an attack on all marriage.

Religion has been used to justify countless evils, and the good attributed to it can and should be replaced with secular pursuits and institutions.

Quote of the Time Being: Supernaturalism

2011-09-24T10:50:00.000-05:00

From Sastra: "Supernaturalists seem to have a lot of trouble trying to make sense of abstractions and levels of experience: they want to take everything literally, as irreducible substances. Love is only real to them if it’s a thing, a sort of spiritual-substance which is made of neither matter nor energy because it is the immaterial essence of love. Ironically, that makes them super-materialists — spinning material into finer and finer substances until like only comes from like. Love is derived from love. Otherwise, it can only have the same properties that were there in its origin.

Despite their claims to be so comfortable with “higher levels” of reality, supernaturalists are concrete thinkers. They can only make sense of immaterial abstractions by turning them into spirit-things in a spirit-world. It’s the same sort of composition fallacy that causes people to have a serious problem with understanding how life can come from non-life. Things are supposed to be stable, discontinuous units of essential natures which are forever separated by what they ARE. If inert matter can live, it must be because a vital force made of life gets into the matter to somehow to make it live."

In Lighter News: Zombies

2011-09-22T12:50:00.000-05:00

I stumbled on Project Zomboid one day, and something about it caught my interest. It's still early in development, and they have a deal like Minecraft where people who sign up in Alpha will continue to get updates and help contribute to the creative process. What makes this different from other zombie games I've played (Most often with my brother who's a fan of zombies. A very big fan.) is part of the premise: "This is how you died."

It reminded me of an article I read a long time ago about some old school games, especially shooters, "It's man versus machine. You know the machine's going to win, but the question is how long can you last?" Project Zomboid has no win conditions, and fittingly, it has a "sandbox mode" right now.

For the zombies themselves, the creators look towards Romero for inspiration. An individual zombie slow, stupid, and easy to splatter with a baseball bat, but you can't last forever against a horde. They're attracted to light and noise, so carrying a flashlight and firing your shotgun are generally unsafe actions. Once, while I was hiding in my safehouse, I ran instead of walked and ended up making a small thump which attracted a zombie to bang on my door, which subsequently attracted the nearby mob. I had to abandon that safehouse and run for another shelter.

Right now, the game is very solitary, but the creators plan to create more interactive NPCs. Once they have that going, the real danger may very well be your fellow humans. Got scratched by a zombie? The gun nut might prefer to shoot you now, rather than waste food on a potential zombie in the making. Hyperactive kid making lots of noise? You've got a decision to make about whether or not he lives.

Aside from keeping your belly full in the current version, there are psychological mechanics in the works. Staying indoors for days at a time causes boredom, making it worthwhile to grab newspapers and magazines along with other supplies. Psychological effects will build up into dangerous things like hallucinations and other insanity.

As I was typing this post, news on a big update comes through my brother. Things are going to get a bit more interesting. I should probably keep my food closer to my bedroom if NPCs are going to actually going to 'play the game' now.

...I hope they fix it so that I can get wood from barricades back when I take them down.

A Real Patriot

2011-09-11T13:58:00.000-05:00

The big man PZ posted about her. Ms. McKinsey is an example of what I think of as a real patriot. She used a powerful example to show one of the core values that once made America great: Freedom of expression. She stepped on an American flag to demonstrate that we have the freedom to express our feelings without fear of government reprisal. That includes criticism against the government or the nation as a whole.

For her valor, she gets rewarded with an insane mob of idolators who worship the flag but hate America and everything that flag represents to us. If these people had their way, the flag would become an icon of nihilism, tyranny, stagnation, and ignorance. I stand by Ms. McKinsey. I hope that the children took her lesson to heart, even when so many adults have failed to do so.

Quote of the Time Being: Vitalism

2011-09-09T08:09:00.001-05:00

From puppygod: "The problem with vitalistic theories is that they are wrong. Demonstrably wrong. Thanks to modern biochemistry and physics we understand in quite fine details where the "life force" come from, how it is transformed and distributed. It comes from hydrogen fusion in the sun, plants capture photons energy in chemical bonds of hydrocarbons, we can move thanks to energy released from ATP hydrolysis etc. etc. Postulating some kind of metaphysical "life force" different from well-known biochemical reactions is ridiculously superfluous. It's as ridiculous as claiming that cars move thanks to motion spirits that dwell in the oil fields and are transferred via gasoline and willpower of the driver into cars and make the cars go. And adding half teaspoon of powdered cheetah bones to brakes fluid will repair windshield wipers of your car and make it go faster by making motion spirits happy. "

Random Recall: Poison!

2011-08-15T11:14:00.000-05:00

When I was thinking about the saying, 'the dose makes the poison,' I ended up remembering a show I didn't pay close attention to, but I was around for the Twilight Zone Twist at the end. I was pretty sure it was a more mundane episode of The Twilight Zone, but I couldn't find it on a list of episode summaries.

A married couple are taking care of an elderly mother (I think it might have been the wife's mother, but I'm not sure), but for money-related reasons like life insurance or expensive medical bills, they decide to kill her, and settle on poisoning her tea for the method. It takes far longer than they expected for her to die, so they increase the dose. After she does finally die, the family doctor makes a comment about her heart condition, and how she needed treatment by a certain drug, commenting on its reputation as a deadly poison, yet for someone with her condition, it's life-saving medicine at the right dose. Naturally, the drug in question was what they were giving her, unintentionally medicating her and extending her life instead of shortening it.

Americans Elect

2011-08-11T13:47:00.000-05:00

The Colbert Bump got me to visit Americans Elect, a site that's trying to get an idea of voter priorities so we can allegedly influence the two parties by telling them what we really care about, as well as direct people like me to candidates who agree on the issues.

I doubt it'll make much of a dent, but I figure it's better than just grumbling to myself. At least on the questions I've answered so far, I've been at or adjacent to the majority. Of course, the Colbert Bump might be biasing the results for today.

Quote of the Time Being: Secession

2011-08-10T13:30:00.000-05:00

Normally, when someone makes a joke about letting Texas secede from the US, I tend to make a comment along the lines of, "Okay, but give me some warning so I can move out, first." But Vicki provides a good reason to never seriously consider allowing any nutty state to secede:

When you say “let them secede” you’re also saying “let them beat gay people to death, let them imprison women for having miscarriages, let them imprison poor blacks on dubious charges and then use them as slave labor.” They’re doing too much of that already: do you really think an independent, right-wing south wouldn’t be worse? Think about that runaway gay sixteen-year-old: they might manage to hitchhike or pay for a bus ticket to someone whetter, but they’re not going to have a passport to get them to what’s left of the United States.

Cynicism Dump

2011-08-10T11:03:00.000-05:00

Politics was never one of my strong suits. There are plenty of areas of nuance and history that I haven't had the time or energy to wrap my head around. There are, however, some topics that seem pretty black and white to me. Take torture for example.

Torturing prisoners for any reason, including interrogation, should be self-evidently wrong, exposed whenever it's suspected, and it should constitute political suicide to be caught associating with, much less condoning, people who engage in torture. Even if something stops torturers from being put on trial, there should be a strong cultural pressure to shun those people and deny them any sort of aid or comfort. They should feel isolated from civilized society because they violated basic principles of conduct and embraced barbarism.

So, why do I feel like I'm in the minority in that attitude? It probably doesn't help that I live in Texas, where nearly anyone I meet could be a landmine of right-wing and/or theocratic insanity. My dad has to tiptoe a lot around work. Thankfully, he found out one of the newer employees is of like mind, so they can talk freely together.

I don't watch the news nearly as much as I probably should, and I keep lapsing on the Daily Show and Colbert report. I hope this is just a perception I inadvertently developed from leaving television behind for so long. If someone in the mainstream media's been trying to drill the administration for its abuses, let me know.

A Short Rant: Diet Woo

2011-08-03T13:45:00.000-05:00

Why is it that diet woos just automatically assume we're in favor of, or in league with the fast food industry?

Oh, wait, that's right: They're too scared and immature to deal with a complex, nuanced, and uncertain world, thus they make up a black-and-white fantasy world where anyone who isn't for them is against them. "Natural" versus "artificial", "poison" versus "panacea", "Mom & Pop (Inc.)" versus "The corporations", "alternative" versus "conventional", "Republicans" versus "Democrats", and so on.

They're so used to living in that false dichotomy fantasy that they can't grasp that there are often more than two sides to anything. They can't grasp the idea that someone could be in favor of broccoli and other healthful foods and NOT support their quack's crazy diet that just coincidentally happens to include broccoli for mystical, magical reasons.

If you reject vitalistic, naturalistic (fallacy), or astrological reasons to eat broccoli, that means you reject broccoli outright. It never occurs to them that there would be scientific reasons for it being healthful, as well as scientific reasons for avoiding an excess of fast food.

Hell, most of the ones I've met treat the act of splurging on one order of batter-fried food as if it would undo a lifetime of healthy living: Black or white, no grays, no colors, no moderation.

Unsurprised

2011-07-23T12:13:00.000-05:00

Just thought I'd bring a tiny bit more attention to this: The US is still torturing.

A while back, I was looking at the stuff about warrantless wiretaps, abuse of state secrets privilege, and so on. I thought, "At least it's been a while since I heard something about torture still going on." So much for that. If anyone knows of politicians who are doing something to stop the torture and other abuses involved with the so-called "war on terror," let me know, so that I can vote for them. Lip service alone won't do.

Lunch Break Rage

2011-07-20T12:11:00.000-05:00

I'm worried my work plans are going to be ruined today by my current bad mood. I was eating at a restaurant with CSPAN on their TVs, which I was initially relieved, since one other member of the chain usually leaves Faux News on. Of course, that relief was shortly canceled out: The topic was a repeal of a ban on same sex marriage. I don't talk about it nearly as much as I should, but I'm one of those people who sees attacks on same sex marriage as an attack on all marriage.

The part where I came in had one person defending same sex marriage, calmly but firmly listing all the benefits that are denied to same sex spouses because of such bans. I quietly stated my agreement with him. That bit of warm fuzzy didn't last, as another person favoring the Destruction of Marriage Act (DOMA) started his spiel. Some of his points in short:

1. Tradition: He listed all sorts of "support" in the form of what nations supported as marriage in the past, neglecting to mention that for just as long, people of those traditions treated marriage as a cynical financial or political transaction. Naturally, one of the common tropes that leaps to mind is that the same argument could be used to support bans on interracial marriages.

2. Appeal to Popularity: He referred to some polls I hadn't heard of (and can't look up without more information) where the poll subjects favored "a man and a woman" as the definition of marriage. Sorry, but minority rights trump majority rule. You can't deny someone a right just because he or she wants to exercise that right in an unpopular fashion. Of course, those who are quick with search tools can probably find polls that contradict the ones he cited.

3. The Baby Factory argument: The idea that marriage exists solely for biological reproduction is one that hits close to home. There's one married couple I know where one member had to have a life-saving operation that removed her reproductive abilities. This couple already had children, but imagine if the surgery happened before they had children: If you're going to use The Baby Factory argument, you have to enforce it equally. The Baby Factory argument would require that the government annul their marriage. Combine this with the mob rule argument above, and just try to imagine what it'd be like if people voted for those two to get a divorce, and had that decision enforced by the state. The Baby Factory argument is a rejection of individual autonomy and of the modern marriage based on people wanting to share their lives with someone.

4. "Sexism says so!": He described gender roles as 'non-fungible' to claim that a child absolutely requires one man and one woman to fill the role model slots. On one level, this is a form of the tradition argument, where culture has dictated gender roles. I'd consider it foolish to think that modern culture has found the absolute limits to what the different genders are capable of. Humans are versatile beings. Some women are very good at embodying "male" roles and some men are very good at representing "female" roles. I don't think it's the state's role to dictate who can or cannot fulfill that role. What's next? If I find a woman I love, could the state force me to attend more football games and monster truck rallies to prove my "manliness" is high enough to get married?

On another level, it seems to assume that the child will be sheltered by the parents from the outside world, never meeting other adults worthy of being role models. There are other family members, friends of the family, teachers, mentors and so on who could act as role models. It takes a village to raise a child. And what are they going to do with single parents? Force them to marry a state-sanctioned spouse against their will? Funny how these people who want to regulate marriage tend to pay lip service to "smaller government."

I don't think they buy that idea themselves. Even they must realize how ridiculous it would be to enforce those stereotypes. Scratch that, I'm underestimating the capacity for stupidity in humanity, again. All these excuses reek of an attempt to rationalize an irrational bigotry after they've committed themselves to the position.

Every excuse I've ever heard for banning same-sex marriage is like this: Make up marriage rules for one type of case, and then don't enforce those same rules to heterosexual marriages when they fall short of the so-called ideal. They also roundly reject love and the individual's self-determination as the basis of a marriage in favor of the shackles of sexist traditions, the dictates of a mob, the success of insectine reproductive strategy, or the insanity of ancient religions.

That is why an attack on same-sex marriage is an attack on all marriage.

Alties and Fairness

2011-07-18T14:35:00.000-05:00

It's become something of a trope I've used on a number of hit-and-run altie trolls: When they whine about Big Pharma being in control, I bring up my experiences with a subtype of alties: They want the non-zero amount of trust I put into the big pharmaceutical company's products, but they aren't willing to jump through the various hoops my fellow skeptics and I want enforced on all medical claims.

Some alties claim that proper clinical trials are too expensive for the Yoder's Good Health Recipe Ma & Pa business, therefore they should be exempt from those standards. The problem is that a lack of capital doesn't insulate one from self-deception, confounding factors, bias, and all the other cognitive failings we're subject to as mere mortals. An emotional appeal to poverty isn't going to prove your product works. Either you have it tested and know, or you haven't tested, and therefore, don't know if it works. If I had a health product I wanted to sell, I would have it tested well before applying the first price tag. If I don't test my product under rigorous conditions, that means I don't know whether or not it really works.

The first big question in this post: Why should I buy a product if the manufacturers don't know if it works?

The big pharmaceutical companies usually, but not always, go through the hoops of clinical trials, carefully documenting the tests. Yes, there have been instances of results being manipulated or outright falsified, but at least with a paper trail and post-market testing, there's a way to find out if fraud occurred. From what I've seen, no altie has ever operated under a system like that: They've only made excuses as to why they shouldn't go through the testing process.

Here's another big, important question: Why should I judge the pharmaceutical companies under one set of standards, and so-called "alternative medicine" under an entirely different set of standards?

It doesn't make sense to me to draw a line between medical claims of "mainstream" pharmaceuticals and the medical claims of things like herbs and supplements. Medical claims are medical claims. I don't even accept that there is such a thing as "alternative medicine": It's a false distinction created by a subculture to make excuses for not being treated like other medical claims. For the average altie I encounter, it's not about truth, it's about "Us versus The Other" with successful pharmaceutical companies as The Other.

Of course, people like me get lumped in with The Other because I don't accept the false dichotomy. Instead of arbitrary labels of "mainstream" and "alternative," I base my acceptance of a treatment on its ability to pass scientific trials: Some treatments have been shown to work. Some have been shown not to work. Some have not been properly tested, but look promising. Some have not been properly tested, but do not have any reasonable expectation to work.

The easiest way to market a failed treatment, as well as treatments expected to fail tests, is to label it "alternative." Those who buy into the false dichotomy between "mainstream" and "alternative" will likely give that treatment special consideration, instead of caring about what the clinical tests say.

Of course, one of arguments they bring up is for us to "try it ourselves." If we could determine causation based off of one observation, we wouldn't need the scientific method. If we weren't capable of self-deception, we wouldn't need double-blinding. We are flawed beings, and we have to work hard to counteract those flaws with good experimental design. Anecdotes may be good for generating hypotheses, but all the flaws we have, alongside the complexity of our bodies and the surrounding universe makes them worthless for testing those hypotheses. I know that if I get sloppy, I'm perfectly capable of fooling myself. We've all done it before. Why should I expect that to change when performing an inherently sloppy piece of self-experimentation?

In short, the big problem I have with alties is that they're asking me to be unfairly biased in their favor by demanding that I make special exceptions for them, and yet they so easily accuse me of being unfairly biased towards certain people who can demonstrate and document their competence. They're like children who say the teacher's out to get them, and yet it was their choice not to do their homework.

Zoomy Physics

2011-07-15T09:56:00.000-05:00

I've been way too quiet on my blog, but I came across an interesting term, which might be meme-worthy: Zoomies. Sin particles that contaminate a location. I imagine most of you have encountered the idea before. I really wonder what sort of strange mindset causes people to think like that.

My first real encounter with zoomies, barring sci-fi and fantasy works, was shortly before I gave up going to church. I had just done something that helped eventually lead me to atheism: I read the Bible. In this particular case, the offending parts were in Numbers, when Moses was commanding all that genocide. Inevitably, I confronted someone who claimed to believe the whole Bible with those crimes, expecting him to do as I had done at the time: Label that part as something corrupt people added afterward.

That's when it got surreal: He said that the victims of those Biblical genocides deserved what they god because they had filled up the land with so much sin, it expelled them, almost like he was talking about an ecological disaster, rather than human beings engaging in religiously inspired plunder, mass murder, and rapine against another group for suspiciously unspecific sins. It didn't help that he talked as if every person in those victim nations were interchangeable, like sin was impersonal, rather than something you associate with a particular individual's crime. In the real world, we don't blindly punish everyone from the murder's neighborhood, we seek to punish the murderer.

I felt like I had stared madness in the face: Apparently, committing a crime wasn't what his version of god was angered by: It was these magical zoomy particles that offended him. In other words, god didn't care about helping or hurting other people. He didn't care about happiness or suffering. The illusion of god's love was just a Type 1 error caused by an arbitrary coincidence between zoomy particle production and harmful behavior. Being sinful and being evil were, under zoomy physics, independent of each other.

And the contamination factor just makes it worse: Under zoomy physics, a person could give to charity, save lives, and generally work hard to make the world a better place. But it was all for naught if his neighbors produced enough zoomies to cover that up. A kind person could therefore be treated as anathema for reasons outside his control. An innocent child could be treated the same as a murderer just for being born in the vicinity of one.

It strikes me as an abdication of individual responsibility and accountability. Can you imagine if it were applied in the real world? Sadly, I think I can: A murder has taken place in a slum. Rather than do a real investigation to figure out who performed the murder, the cops just take in the first person who looks "slum" or "ghetto" or "gang" enough to have done the crime, and assume that even if good evidence against the accusation comes up, he "obviously" deserves punishment for something because living in the slum means he's contaminated with zoomies.

Now there's the reverse: Preachers of allegedly high morals get caught performing devious con jobs and/or twisted acts sexual manipulation leading to some flavor of rape. What's one of the standard excuses? "The zoomies made me do it!" Okay, they typically say "devil" instead of "zoomies," but it's essentially the same thing: Blaming something else for their crimes. I'm reminded of instances of the Catholic Church blaming hippies and such for allegedly loosening moral taboos against child molestation as a cause for priestly abuse.

Normally, I'd be eager to write off zoomy physics as an invention of people who just want to have a ready excuse for doing evil, but if everyone thought of it as a transparent excuse, it wouldn't work. I can't imagine what must be going on in the heads of sincere believers in zoomies.

Template Reformat

2011-06-08T11:15:00.001-05:00

Sorry if the colors offend your eyes. I ended up messing up my template while trying to figure out why my navbar wasn't showing up. I'm going to be experimenting with the colors and templates a little bit. It may be time to update my 'gadgets' and consider other changes, so drop suggestions.

While I'm here, I might as well mention some post ideas:

1. A Doggerel entry, "Mind your own business!" for various woos who didn't appreciate me sticking my nose into topics they didn't want open for discussion.

2. A part 2 to "Christianity: The Apocalypse Cult That Survived." I think I'll avoid sticking to a book at a time, since a lot of the cult-like behaviors get replicated between the gospels. Any suggestions for a good list of cult identifiers out there?

Meme Concept: Homophobia = Crypto-Islamic Fundamentalism

2011-05-30T08:47:00.000-05:00

A random idea I came up with: Accuse homophobes of being Crypto-Islamic fundamentalists wanting to impose Sharia law on the free world.

It's not true, but it's plausible enough for a joke:

Islamic fundamentalist theocracies commonly have anti-homosexual laws on a religious basis, and our "crypto" friends also want anti-homosexual laws on a religious basis.

Islamic theocracies also commonly require women by law to wear highly concealing clothing on the premise that all men are sexual predators with no willpower to resist a revealed ankle. In my experience, homophobes have heavy, heavy overlap with people who issue apologia for man-on-woman rape by claiming the woman was dressing provocatively, thus, in effect, claiming that men should not be expected to have the willpower to control themselves.

I think this meme has shock value since it draws attention to the worst similarities between the allegedly "good" Christian fundamentalists and the obviously evil Islamic fundamentalists.

Of course, I expect that a typical response will be a temporary alliance of convenience with radical Islam to fight the evil of our consistent morality. In such a case, it'd be interesting to see what happens if one of us were to quote the "crypto" in a separate thread where he denounces Islam.

A Little Meme

2011-04-28T13:28:00.000-05:00

FUCK YOU, REPUBLICANS!

Yeah, it's short and vague, but that's pretty much getting to be the best response to the crazies of the party now that they've mainstreamed insanity. There's no shortage of reasons to be angry with the party, and I imagine it's worse for the more sensible (and hopefully ex-) members of the party to see the fringe lunatics running the asylum.

Not sure where to try to direct Ellen Lewin's simple statement of rage as a meme, but there is something primal about it that makes it more interesting to me than standard curses.

Still Alive

2011-04-22T16:41:00.000-05:00

I've just been dealing with a fair bit of stuff. In gaming news, I just beat the single player mode of Portal 2 a couple hours ago. I'm looking forward to co-op mode with my brother after PSN finishes maintenance.

Oh, one minor achievement I'm glad about: I got the "Preservation of Mass" trophy. I won't spoil it by telling you what it is.

Super Ultra Mega

2011-04-03T19:36:00.000-05:00

My brother's been tinkering with Game Maker, recently and posted his first simple game for download. Check it out and maybe give him some ideas for his next game. Or suggest improvements for the sequel, Super Ultra Mega Deluxe. :)

Marijuana

2011-03-21T13:04:00.000-05:00

C0nc0rdance recently posted a video about the negative effects of marijuana. I'm as square as he is, but I did have a general leaning towards legalization, mostly due to the negative effects prohibition had on society, but partially due to some misconceptions I had about marijuana being relatively safe. I wonder if he might do later videos about tobacco and alcohol so that he can give us some comparison. Either way, I'm currently moving back towards neutral on the issue of marijuana legalization, based on what I know at this particular moment.

The video:

Of course, one of the stupid 'positive' myths uses the stereotypical altie argument that marijuana is herbal, therefore it's okay. Tobacco's pretty much herbal, and you don't see many people saying it's safe because of that. Or at least I don't, aside from one troll who stopped by Orac's a while back.

Science Works

2011-03-08T17:21:00.000-06:00

There's one argument denialists have trouble facing when it comes to science: Science works. Pragmatism is one of the key virtues of science: Either your theories make accurate predictions or they don't. Good science is about getting down to that issue. Many denialists, however, won't let reliable, repeatable, independently verifiable data get in their way. In this post, I'll explore some of the tactics they use to ignore the robustness of science.

Let us imagine we have encountered someone who denies the accuracy of quantum mechanics. Any informed layman should know that QM plays an extremely vital role in our current civilization. Transistors, for example, are ubiquitous in our computer-driven infrastructure. If QM wasn't reasonably accurate, you wouldn't be able to read this blog post.

Given my experience with other forms of denialism, there are a number of standard arguments presented at this point:

First comes the argument that all the experts are in on some kind of sinister plot, knowingly lying about QM to students, and only allow the top students to be in on the "real" theory that actually drives our technology.

How would this conspiracy maintain itself? If they distributed information that they know is false, how would they maintain the illusion of its accuracy? How would they prevent any curious person from experimenting and finding the "real" answer? How could they silence him? And how would they pay for all this beating around the bush? WHY would they set up such a conspiracy? What would they have to gain?

Next, there's the idea that mankind just stumbled on the technology without any understanding of the underlying mechanics. While there are some examples of such luck, it wouldn't last long. The false theory would stumble on more and more wrong predictions as time went on, and solving an unexplained anomaly is how scientists gain prestige. You don't get research grants for maintaining the status quo.

And finally, one of the most common responses is to remain ignorant of the theory's successful predictions, no matter how many times they are asked to account for it.

This story is the same for just about any major scientific theory. Evolution was how we breed animals and plants according to our desires. Evolution also gives us an understanding of medicine. Heliocentrism and gravitation give us the ability to send probes into deep space. Relativity gives us the Global Positioning System. If science didn't produce reliable results, we wouldn't have these things.

Science. It works, bitches.

Needle in a Haystack

2011-02-28T13:30:00.001-06:00

If any theists who claim their god(s) speak to them stumble on this post, let's play a little role reversal. You'll be playing the atheist in this game. Here's the setup:

The gods:
God Premise 1: Let us assume there are 26 possible god beliefs out there, labeled A through Z.
God Premise 2: Let us assume that you currently do not know which, if any, of these gods are real or false.
God Premise 3: Let us assume that each god is described as powerful.
God Premise 4: Let us assume that if any of these gods are real, that they wish to convince us of their existence.

The Priests:
Priest Premise 1: Let us assume we have 26 priests, one of each god belief who wish to prove that they are correct in their god belief.
Priest Premise 2: Let us assume each priest claims that their god, gods, or spirits speak to them.
Priest Premise 3: Let us assume that, to date, all priests have alleged records of ancient miracles.
Priest Premise 4: Let us assume that all priests are humans.

Humans:
Human Premise 1: Let us assume that all humans are capable of making mistakes.
Human Premise 2: Let us assume that some humans are subject to mental disorders that lead to hearing voices, often with commands.
Human Premise 3: Let us assume that some humans are willing to lie about their god belief for various reasons.
Human Premise 4: Let us assume that human memory is subject to alteration based on personal biases.
Human Premise 5: Let us assume that humans recently developed methods of recording and measuring information that is more reliable than their memory and subjective perception.

Are there any objections to these premises?

If not, what will you ask of the priests to determine which, if any of the gods are real?

The Basis of Morality

2011-02-22T10:50:00.000-06:00

It's a subject that's been gone over many times, but I think Steven Novella put up a good post.

I especially like the part where he points out something that I should have realized myself: Non-theistic morality is inherently more objective than divine command theory. Why?

First, moral philosophy is a transparent process where anyone can find out why some things are considered good or evil. There are first principles and rules that are derived from those principles. By having everyone asking questions about the process, you tend to reduce individual biases.

Second, because of all the conflicts between religions and even priests within a religion. There are countless interpretations of holy books. Even if there were some magic man giving out an objective morality, what would the basis of those decisions be? Divine command theory just strikes me as a morality without any basis whatsoever. As far as I'm concerned, it's objectively random morality before you add any subjective interpretation by humans.

Random Recall: The Magician

2011-02-05T17:14:00.000-06:00

Just had this pop into my head today: When I was a kid, there was a Saturday morning cartoon I got interested in from the previews called The Magician. That interest quickly waned after watching the first episode.

Premise: It's Twenty Minutes Into the Future. The hero is a stage magician who ends up using his trade to fight crime.

Sounds like an awesome idea to me. I was expecting the formula to be something along the lines of him performing some elaborate trick to catch the criminals, and at the end, he would explain how he MacGuyvered it together. I love magic tricks and explanations of how they're done, both from the deception angle as well as some of the technical ones. Even more now that I'm a full-on skeptic.

But it was not to be: He used a collection of standard gadgets and a lot of unexplained stuff. For example, in one scene he just vanished from one location and reappeared closer to the crime in progress, with no preparation. How? Did he simply decide to show off some optical camo by vanishing and running? Did he have some trick set up beforehand to zip over on some mechanical apparatus?

If you wanted him to do stuff like that, just go ahead and call him Dr. Strange and drop the whole stage magic angle. Say it's real magic. Then I would know up front what level of suspension of disbelief you want.

Christianity: The Apocalypse Cult That Survived, Part 1

2011-02-05T11:05:00.000-06:00

One of the things that struck me when reading the Bible was how much Jesus started to look less like the peaceful, loving guy, and more like the stereotypical cult leader. Naturally, the religion has the usual promise of nasty things for unbelievers, tales of miracles and divine origins, and so on and so forth. Instead of that typical stuff, I thought I'd deal with some parts that seem to be ignored in my dealings with fundies.

Let's take a look at some samples:

One of the trademarks of a cult is that they divide families. The family is an important source of support for most people. A cult wants its members to be vulnerable and dependent on the cult, so other means of support need to be cut off.

Matthew 8:21 And another of his disciples said unto him, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. 8:22 But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead.

Jesus tells the disciple to value the religion more than closure with his father. I'm of the opinion that funerals are for the living so that they can come to terms with the loss and remember the good times with the dearly departed.

Matthew 10:20 For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you. 10:21 And the brother shall deliver up the brother to death, and the father the child: and the children shall rise up against their parents, and cause them to be put to death.

Granted, cultural change tends to cause a lot of friction, but this passage just seems to relish in the idea of families tearing themselves limb from limb.

Matthew 10:34 Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword. 10:35 For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. 10:36 And a man's foes shall be they of his own household. 10:37 He that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.

The message is clear: God is possessive and needy. The cult is more important than your loved ones.

Matthew 12:46 While he yet talked to the people, behold, his mother and his brethren stood without, desiring to speak with him. 12:47 Then one said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee. 12:48 But he answered and said unto him that told him, Who is my mother? and who are my brethren?

Jesus wouldn't even acknowledge his family when they wanted to talk to him.

Matthew 15:4 For God commanded, saying, Honour thy father and mother: and, He that curseth father or mother, let him die the death.

It's rather strange to hear him defend parents, but it looks like he's still supporting bloodlust as a means to resolve family conflict.

Matthew 19:12 For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.

There are a lot of cults that stress virginity and asexuality to the point of castration. I'm not sure, but I think this is often meant to target people with longstanding romantic troubles, to free them from the desires that cause them trouble.

Matthew 19:29 And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.

Abandon your family and your country for the cult, and the big man'll make it worth your while.

23:9 And call no man your father upon the earth: for one is your Father, which is in heaven.

Yeah, don't honor the guy who (I hope) raised you with love and care, honor the cult's idol instead.

And that's just the book of Matthew, only about warped family values. This was some of the early stuff that got me started on the road to atheism. Reading the Bible is usually one of the first steps towards deconversion.

Under the Microscope: "In the Beginning was Information": Chapter 6 Sample

2011-02-04T13:59:00.001-06:00

It's a nice cold day, so I thought I'd have a little fun with one of the sources Gabriel considers authoritative: Answers in Genesis. I decided to type "genetic algorithms" into their search bar, and I clicked on the first result.

Unsurprisingly, it doesn't take long before the fallacies show up:

There is an extreme multiplicity of life-forms around us, and even a simple unicellular organism is much more complex and purposefully designed than anything that human inventiveness can produce.

Already, we have an implied argument from personal incredulity. Complexity is not a sign of design: Simplicity is usually a better indicator. One of the principles of engineering I often hear is that you're not done when there's nothing left to add, but when there's nothing left to take away.

Matter and energy are basic prerequisites for life, but they cannot be used to distinguish between living and inanimate systems.

There's a bit of implied vitalism right there. Life can be difficult to define precisely, but that doesn't mean anything for the argument.

The central characteristic of all living beings is the “information” they contain, and this information regulates all life processes and procreative functions. Transfer of information plays a fundamental role in all living organisms. When, for example, insects carry pollen from one flower to another, this is in the first place an information-carrying process (genetic information is transferred); the actual material employed is of no concern. Although information is essential for life, information alone does not at all comprise a complete description of life.

So, how do you define and measure this information? This is a classic problem many Creationists avoid. Of course, skeptics have had a lot to say about IT as it relates to Creationist claims.

Man is undoubtedly the most complex information-processing system existing on earth. The total number of bits handled daily in all information-processing events occurring in the human body is 3 x 10²⁴. This includes all deliberate as well as all involuntary activities, the former comprising the use of language and the information required for controlling voluntary movements, while the latter includes the control of the internal organs and the hormonal systems. The number of bits being processed daily in the human body is more than a million times the total amount of human knowledge stored in all the libraries of the world, which is about 10¹⁸ bits.

I smell a standard Texas Sharpshooter Fallacy in progress. After this, they get into a lot of nitty-gritty details which seem uncontroversial, based on my knowledge. It doesn't last, though:

Figure 20: A simplified representation of the cyclic information controlled process occurring in living cells. The translation is based on pragmatics, but it is involved in the cyclic process of semantic information, since the DNA synthesis can only take place under enzymatic catalysis. This sketch clearly illustrates that such a cyclic process must have been complete right from the start, and could not have originated in a continuous process. The structure of this example of a complex information transfer system also corresponds to Figure 24.

I was pretty sure this was on Talk Origin's Index of Common Creationist Claims, but I must have missed it. Naturally, though, I found they had a different page that covers it.

Perhaps lipid synthesis, in a precursor form of modern synthesis, could have made the system more independent. The RNA system could have, bit by bit, ‘invented’ protein synthesis – as mentioned, the modern ribosomes still contain ribozymes (catalytic RNA) that catalyze the formation of peptide bonds which eventually result in proteins. In a compelling study (Wolf and Koonin 2007) the authors propose a stepwise model for the origin of the protein translation system, in which each step confers a distinct advantage onto an ensemble of co-evolving genetic elements. The goal of development of translation would not have been required, a foresight which evolution does not have. The initial cause for the emergence of translation would have been the ability of amino acids and peptides to stimulate reactions catalyzed by ribozymes (for peptides experimentally shown, see Robertson et al. 2004). Even if it will turn out that several steps in the evolution of translation probably have been different from the proposed model, the study clearly demonstrates that there is nothing in the emergence of the translation system that would represent a case of ‘irreducible complexity’, incapable of being subject to stepwise Darwinian evolution.

Granted, this looks like a fair bit of hypothetical stuff, but the fact that scientists can devise hypotheses is a blow against the IC argument of incredulity. Alleged weaknesses and unknowns in abiogenesis or evolution do not constitute evidence for Creationism.

Back to the AiG page:

In accordance with the theorems formulated in chapters 3 to 5, in particular the impossibility theorems at the end of chapter 4, it is clear that the information present in living organisms requires an intelligent source. Man could not have been this source; so, the only remaining possibility is that there must have been a Creator. We can now formulate the following theorems:

Theorem 26: The information present in living beings must have had a mental source.

A corollary of Theorem 26 is:

Theorem 27: Any model for the origin of life (and of information) based solely on physical and/or chemical processes, is inherently false.

Guess I'll have to check back on those theorems... Huh. Looks like this is just a sample from a book, and those other chapters aren't available.

Oh well, I can already see fallacies: Argument from incredulity, false dichotomy. You can't put "I don't know" in an evidence locker for a positive hypothesis like "Magic man done it." Knowing what I know of Creationist, the "theorems" described are probably also arguments from incredulity.

Anyway, let's move on ahead to the bit about genetic algorithms, since that's what I searched for:

Genetic algorithms: The so-called “genetic algorithms” are yet another way of trying to explain how information could originate in matter [F5, M4]. The combination of words is deliberately chosen from biology and numerical mathematics to suggest that evolutionary events are described mathematically.

This is rather stupid to say.

1. They're called genetic algorithms because they simulate genes. Random number generators simulate mutations of the genes, and if sex is programmed in, recombination of the parents' chromosomes. The selection criteria, fitness landscapes, etcetera act like natural selection. What else would you call it?

2. Of course evolutionary events are described mathematically! Mathematics is what we use to describe the universe when we get precise. What made the modern synthesis of evolution the modern synthesis was the inclusion of population statistics. Statistics is a branch of mathematics.

What is actually involved is a purely numerical method used for the optimization of dynamic processes. This method can be used to find, by repeated approximations, the maximum value of an analytic function numerically (e.g., f(x,y) = yx - x4), or the optimal route of a commercial traveler. The effects of mutation and selection can thus be simulated by computer. Using predetermined samples of bits (sequences of noughts and ones), each position is regarded as a gene. The sample is then modified (mutated) by allowing various genetic operators to influence the bit string (e.g., crossover). A “fitness function,” assumed for the process of evolution, is then applied to each result. It should be pointed out that this genetic algorithm is purely a numerical calculation method, and definitely not an algorithm which describes real processes in cells. Numerical methods cannot describe the origin of information.

They're not being used to describe the origin of information as a whole, but they do produce new information, novel features, and such when executed, which many Creationists say is impossible. Genetic algorithms simulate evolution once you've got reproduction. What you're asking for is abiogenesis, and even if you reject all abiogenesis theories, you still don't have a good argument for Creationism.

Evolutionary models for the origin of the genetic code: We find proposals for the way the genetic code could have originated in very many publications [e.g., O2, E2, K1], but up to the present time, nobody has been able to propose anything better than purely imaginary models. It has not yet been shown empirically how information can arise in matter, and, according to Theorem 11, this will never happen.

Again, argument from incredulity and ignorance. Just because scientists don't know the answer with great confidence at this time is not a good reason to believe a magic man did it.

So, I looked over a decent chunk of a "semi-technical" article hosted by AiG, and it still looks like standard fallacious Creationism. I skipped over a lot, but if any Creationists would like to bring up specific parts, feel free.

Doghouse Science #1: Hypotheses and Alternate Explanations

2011-01-30T12:31:00.002-06:00

"Common sense is genius dressed in its working clothes." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

With all due respect to Emerson, I prefer to say something different: "Common sense is science in its working clothes." All too many woos think that science is something that people do in sterile white rooms with funny-shaped glasses full of bubbling, colorful liquids while wearing a long white coat and pocket protector. You know, just like they do in Hollywood movies.

Those may be common trappings of science, but that is the shadow, not the substance. Wearing a long white coat with an ID tag ending in "PhD." is not a sign of authority in itself. The authority is in the diligence in conducting experiments and recording observations. Today, I'll be writing a post about how I used science to solve a mundane problem.

This story takes place about a year and a half ago when I moved into my apartment and started turning it into a swinging bachelor pad. Which is to say, after getting all the matching furniture I bought in place, I needed to get all my electronics fitted into a rather large entertainment stand. I'm a geek, after all. I decided to get my local cable company's TV and Internet bundle.

There were a few problems with the installation, but that wasn't entirely unexpected. The new guy on the installation team messed up some connection out there in the apartment complex, so I was without television for a few hours, but that got sorted out.

Over time, I started getting internet outages where I would either nothing would come through or the connection would be as slow as molasses. They gradually grew worse. They mentioned going through maintenance and expansion here and there so I accepted the first of it as transitory. Eventually I had an outage that lasted over 24 hours and showed no sign of being fixed. I was going to call tech support and give them a piece of my mind.

But first, I had to get down to work. One common joke among tech support groups is "Problem exists between keyboard and chair." The vast majority of technical difficulties are the result of user error, and if I didn't do everything I could to prove it wasn't my fault, they would have no reason to suspect the problem was on their end. If I didn't go through all the common mistakes I could think of, I would look like a lazy fool to the customer service representative. This is what I thought up:

Hypothesis₀ (Null hypothesis): It is not the cable company's fault.
---Hypothesis_0A: My laptop has a problem.
---Hypothesis_0B: My wireless network has a problem.
---Hypothesis_0C: My router has a problem.
---Hypothesis_0D: My router is not hooked into the cable modem.
---Hypothesis_0E: The cable modem is unplugged.
---Hypothesis_0F: The cable modem is not connected to the splitter.
---Hypothesis_0G: The splitter's input is not hooked up to the cable output.

Hypothesis₁: It's the cable company's fault.
---Hypothesis_1A: The apartment connection was set up improperly.
---Hypothesis_1B: The company's internet service was down for my region.
---Hypothesis_1C: They provided me with faulty equipment.

Notice all the parts of the null hypothesis: If it was my fault for any of those reasons, they would be justified in forcing me to go through a script, and I'd have to go through the tangle of wires AND be on the phone, wasting the support person's time.

So I got to work. I checked my laptop's connection. It reported being connected to the router, but with no internet connection. I turned on my Playstation Portable and attempted to connect to the wireless router. It succeeded, but still failed when I tried to browse the web on it. 0A down: My Windows Laptop and PSP work on very different systems. It is highly unlikely they would both share the error if something was wrong with my laptop.

This also provided evidence against 0B, the wireless connections being the problem, since they both recognized the connection. I went one step further, turning on my PS3 and attempting to sign onto the PSN. I also turned on my old desktop and attempted to browse the web. Both of them had a physical connection to the router instead of a wireless connection. Both failed. The problem was unlikely to be in the wireless connection. 0B down.

I reset my router and watch it when I send an internet request. The lights blink at the same time. The router appears to be working. 0C appears unlikely, so I dismiss it until given evidence to the contrary.

I follow the cables. The router is connected to the modem. 0D down. The modem is plugged in, and its LEDs are blinking. 0E down. The modem is hooked into the splitter's output. 0F down. The splitter is hooked up to the cable in the wall. If it weren't, I wouldn't be receiving my cable TV, and I was. 0G down.

Hypothesis₀ (Null hypothesis): It is not the cable company's fault.
---Hypothesis_0A: My laptop has a problem.
---Hypothesis_0B: My wireless network has a problem.
---Hypothesis_0C: My router has a problem.
---Hypothesis_0D: My router is not hooked into the cable modem.
---Hypothesis_0E: The cable modem is unplugged.
---Hypothesis_0F: The cable modem is not connected to the splitter.
---Hypothesis_0G: The splitter's input is not hooked up to the cable output.

Hypothesis₁: It's the cable company's fault.
---Hypothesis_1A: The apartment connection was set up improperly.
---Hypothesis_1B: The company's internet service was down for my region.
---Hypothesis_1C: They provided me with faulty equipment.

Now that I did a thorough check, it's now much more reasonable to entertain the hypothesis that the cable company is at fault. Only after I addressed those known concerns do I call customer support. Thankfully, I got one who didn't blindly follow a script and listened to my description of the problem, and my troubleshooting efforts. He noted that no one else in the area complained about outages, so hypotheses 1A and 1B are down. He asks me for more information about how I have my television and modem set up: Wall cable -> Splitter -> Modem on the left, TV on the right. He proposes an experiment that will test two hypotheses, one of which I had not considered:

Hypothesis_0H: The cable connection to the splitter's left output was loose, but not visibly so.
Hypothesis_1C: The cable company provided me with faulty equipment. (Specifically, a splitter with a failing left output).

The experiment is simple: Unscrew both the TV and modem cables and switch their places, making sure they're tightly screwed on. If hypothesis 1C was correct, it predicted I would regain my internet connection but lose my good television signal. If hypothesis 0H was correct, it predicts I would have both working television and internet signals.

The result: I turn the TV on and get a clear signal. I refresh my laptop's browser and get my pages to load properly at a good speed. Hypothesis_0H alone predicted this outcome. I was justified to suspect, but ultimately wrong to think the cable company was at fault. But I'm happy with the result. The problem was solved, and I learned that a loose cable connection can provide a poor internet signal instead of no signal at all. It's possible I ended up shifting or loosening the connection while sorting through all my game systems.

Conclusion: My internet outage was most likely due to a loose connection.

That's how science works. It doesn't matter if you started out right. You use science to become right. Because I went through all the trouble of eliminating the other problems, someone who knew more possibilities was able to arrive to the real answer much more quickly. I didn't waste his time, and thus I didn't waste any of mine.

Update: Texas: Still DOOMED

2011-01-27T12:59:00.002-06:00

Here's part of the story. Hat Tip to PZ.

It's bad enough that we've got psuedoscientists and revisionist spin working their way into the textbooks. Texas has enough last place awards as it is.

~~ADDENDUM: Super-DOOMED.~~
ADDENDUM to the ADDENDUM: Poe's Law strikes. Of course, it wouldn't be subject to Poe's law if it didn't sound like a plausible quote. Texas is, after all, near the bottom in education.

Barking Up the Right Tree: No Sale

2011-01-18T14:29:00.000-06:00

There's one thing that needs repeating for the sake of theists who ask why we're atheists, what proof do we have that their god doesn't exists, etcetera: Atheism isn't a belief in itself, it's a lack of belief. It is a negative belief.

Theism is a positive claim, the idea that something called a "god" has some form of existence and an effect on the world. The burden of proof lies on the person making the positive claim. It's the theist's job to sell their idea of god. We're atheists because we simply aren't buying it right now.

Imagine you answer the door, and find it's a salesman with a box covered in question marks. The first thing he does is ask you is for a good reason to not buy his product. That's what it's like to be an atheist.

1. Every theist has their own definition of "god." I don't keep a list of all of them. To put the exchange in other terms:

Theist: "What proof do you have that god doesn't exist?"
Atheist: "Which god?"

And even then, the answer isn't clear: Some Christians, for example, believe in a fire and brimstone god while other Christians believe in a peaceful, merciful god.

2. The burden of proof is on the 'salesman' to convince me his product is worthwhile, and to do that, he has to be able to define and demonstrate it to someone. I don't need to have a disproof. He needs to provide proof that his product works. Until I find a god who has predictable, repeatable effects on the universe, I'll simply file them all into the same drawer as other unproven entities like unicorns and psychic powers and do something more productive or entertaining with my life.

3. A lack of belief in something is supposed to be the default position in logic before evidence is presented. Theism has not earned this position due to its merits: From where I'm standing, theism is falsely elevated to the default assumption because of peer pressure, fashion, tradition, and other social pressures. I don't assume that those things automatically follow logic because I know human beings can rationalize just about any mistake they make with logical fallacies.

A Very Silly Show

2011-01-14T13:33:00.005-06:00

During a recent visit with my folks, my mother was watching a series called NCIS, which apparently was playing "follow the leader" with all the CSI series. I don't know how good the series as a whole is, since I only have a sample of two episodes to go by, and boy was this one a stinker. Funnily enough, it falls into a subject I have taken classes for: Remote Sensing.

So, story involves a guy who worked at radiology at the local hospital, and has security clearance for the radioactive materials involved. He gets shot, and the investigation team finds this odd residue on him. They dig in, and meet up with a US intelligence officer who tells them it's a chemical marker they use to track terrorists by satellite.

Really?

Somehow, these spy satellites can even identify which individual is being tracked.

Seriously?

And tracking is "spotty" indoors.

Only spotty?

And the satellites can track in real time on their monitors, which is how they track the guy (it turns out he wasn't a marked terrorist, just that a paranoid guy who designed the system was marking Americans he considered suspicious with a spray bottle.) when the terrorists who originally shot him steal his head to get past the retinal scanner to pick up the radioactive material.

Anyone who's paid the slightest bit of attention to middle school science should have some decent guesses with what's nonsense about this system.

1. The obvious one: Only geosynchronous satellites can "hover" over an area to monitor it, and outside of a certain zone, the view gets too tilted to be all that useful. Thus, you can't track something in real time by satellite unless you specifically put it in orbit in the general area ahead of time. That lack of mobility would severely limit the utility of a spy satellite.

2. How does the satellite sense the chemical? The chemical would need to generate or reflect some form of electromagnetic radiation. If it generated enough energy to be seen by satellite, it would eventually run out of chemical energy for doing so. And for a small spray of the stuff to be seen from orbit, it would need to generate a LOT of EMR. Additionally, it would have to emit this EMR at some frequency that stands out against all the background noise. Gamma/X-ray radiation? Would poison the terrorist and the people around him, and raise the chemical energy demands straight into nuclear reactions like radioactive decay. Ultraviolet? Would have trouble getting a clear signal out of the atmosphere, much less through the roof of a building. Visible light? Yeah, a glowing spot is going to be unnoticed. Near Infrared? How does the satellite tell the difference between that and plant life?
Middle infrared? Moisture. Far infrared? Would get lost in any heat source, not to mention it'd be a warm spot on the body. Microwaves or Radio waves? It would generate interference with other devices and be lost in the noise of those devices. You might as well start inventing Minovsky particles to explain it.

3. How does it tell one marked target from another, assuming you could get some magical signal? If it's just a chemical, I don't see how you could get it to emit a unique signature unless you tailor made each mixture for each target. Supposedly, you could get around that by telling the system "this spot is terrorist X, and this spot is terrorist Y." and it could track the spots as they change positions over time. But what if X and Y get close to each other? Then their "spots" would blend into one.

This nonsense goes off the deep end of "Big Brother" scenarios. They put a little token objection to the use of this sort of monitoring ability, but it comes across as half-hearted, even with the paranoid control freak, who decides to help them gain access to it to solve the case. This episode was just a wish fulfillment exercise, treating technology as if it were a magic tool that solves problems without any mental effort on the part of the humans. The computers do it all. The computers and satellites will catch the terrorists for us, and the only work we have to do is punch a few buttons instead of, you know, outsmart the people who avoid security for a living.

I'm glad my mother knew enough about science to be embarrassed by the show.

You Know What's Bullshit?

2011-01-12T20:21:00.003-06:00

I think to spite Gabriel, I'll try once again to get back to regular blogging. Since it broke his brain to find out that I don't fit any of the stereotypes seen on his sitcoms, I'm going to list a lot of stuff that I consider nonsense, and thought so for most of my adult life. He'll probably return to whine about my disbelief in some other sacred cow of his. So anyway, here goes the list, subject to updates...

Oh, wait. Fair warning: There's a little bit of mild language below the fold. Not a whole lot.

Acupuncture: Bullshit, but not just any bullshit. It's Maoist bullshit, for that double bullshitty taste.

Alien Spacecraft and Abductions: Why would some shitheads from another planet build causality-defying FTL engines and fly a ship all the way over here to investigate our shitholes?

Area 51: The alien story is bullshit. Probably an old air force testing base that may have turned into an illegal waste dump for the government to throw away its really nasty shit. After some officer goofed by denying the place existed, they used the bullshit alien story to bullshit the Communists into wasting intelligence resources investigating the shithouse. And some of their gullible shitheads probably fell for it.

Atlantis: Bullshit that got flushed down the toilet when no one was looking. In fact, they want you to take their word for it that it was ever there.

The Aurora Stealth Aircraft: Possibly bullshit, possibly a development code name for an existing, publicly known aircraft, or possibly a project that got canceled for being shittier than the other stealth aircraft.

Ayurveda: Bullshit, with a hint of arsenic and mercury.

Bigfoot: Bullshit so steamy, all attempts to photograph it end up coming out fuzzy and indistinct.

Communism: Bullshit that stinks so bad, you'll be made into an unperson by The Party if you point it out.

Creationism: The bullshit belief that nothingness randomly shitted out a perfect, complex, sentient god, who made the universe and somehow did a shitty job on designing our eyes, despite allegedly being perfect.

The Crocoduck: Textbook example of bullshit the Creationists should be looking for if they want to be taken seriously. I'm not holding my breath.

Distant Healing: Bullshit you can smell from miles away.

Dragons: Cool bullshit that's fun to pretend to slay with polyhedral dice, but despite Creationists attempts to argue otherwise, are completely bullshit in reality. Besides, dinosaurs are cooler because they were real. Even without the fire breath. We have the fossils. We win.

Fairies: Bullshit that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle believed in because he didn't think it was possible that some girls could cut out pictures and pose for photographs. Therefore, he bullshitted, the fairies, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.

Faith: The bullshit belief that you're an infallible god, thus you can't bullshit yourself, therefore you are right. Period.

The Flood: Bullshit story about a family who somehow rounded up all the animals of the world in a boat. When Flood believers were faced with the logistics of handing all the food and shit for so many animals on such a tiny boat, they made up a bullshit Super-Duper Evolution theory (but decided not to call it that because someone might call them on being inconsistent with their other bullshit) where the animals could super-mutate into multiple species overnight and somehow gain enough genetic diversity to make it look like nothing happened at all. Oh, and some bullshit about land plants being able to live underwater, and salt water magically knowing not to mix with fresh water so as to not kill all the fish.

Hitler, Adolph: Anti-Semite bullshitter Creationist who believed God commanded him to perform eugenics and burn books like The Origin of Species for not buying into his bullshit. Had a line about bullshitting so big, no one would believe someone could bullshit so big without evidence... Which turned out to be bullshit. Inspired by Martin Luther, a guy believed reason was evil because it gave people bullshit detectors, and you can't have that. Adolph entertained bullshit fantasies about joining the Catholic and Protestant churches together, trying to put his religious bullshit into school curricula and mandate state-led prayers in class.

Homeopathy: Bullshit that isn't watered down.

Iridology: You won't believe your eyes when you see this bullshit.

The Loch Ness monster: Bullshit that stinks so bad, you could make a profit from building a tourist trap around the spot where someone allegedly smelled it.

Lysenkoism: Bullshit with Joseph Stalin and Sarah Palin's seals of approval, so you know it's quality bullshit.

McCarthy, Joseph: Bullshitting witch hunter who was inspired by Stalin to save America from Stalin by trying and failing to turn America into an authoritarian Christian Communist State. Got publicly called out on his incompetent, illegal authoritarian bullshit and lost all support. Now, Texas is trying to bullshit us into thinking he's a hero.

Nationalism: Bullshit pretending to be patriotism. Nationalists are happy to let their country go down the toilet and still call it the greatest on Earth and throw feces at anyone who dares to suggest the country isn't as great as it used to be. Patriots actually care enough about their country to get their shit together and work to make their country great.

O'Reilly, Bill: Bullshitter who doesn't know what causes the tides. No, I'm not shitting you. He really doesn't.

Psychics: Bullshitters who often don't realize they're bullshitting you with cold reading and similar shit like that. A bunch of real gullible shitheads in America tried training soldiers in their techniques because the Communists fell for this bullshit, and you just know Communist science can't be bullshit.

Race: Quite often a bullshit excuse self-entitled lazy high school dropouts (it doesn't matter what race they are) use to feel better about themselves for not doing anything and blame The Other for their inability to get a job or an education. Also, with hopefully increasing rarity, a bullshit excuse an employer uses to give special privileges to a high school dropout who looks like his phenotype instead of hiring the guy who can actually do a full day's work to actually earn a full day's pay. Doubly bullshit since blood groups are probably a much better indicator of race than skin color.

Reflexology: Bullshit, freshly stepped in.

Reiki: Bullshit that's not touching you! It's not touching you!

Theraputic Touch: Bullshit that rubs on smooth.

---

This is easily the most profane post I have ever written. Want to add your own?

Font of (Character) Knowledge

2010-12-23T12:09:00.003-06:00

I hope you're enjoying yourselves for the holidays, whichever ones you might celebrate. I've been relaxing since I got my shopping done, and while tweaking some (donning my cloak of defying flames) 4E D&D characters, I thought I'd design my own character sheets that appeal to my organizational and note-taking preferences.

So, in comes a request for suggestions, just in case anyone might like their own copy of the final PDFs: What are some good fonts to use, or to avoid? I'm thinking about going for some fancier fonts for the bigger bits of text and an "ordinary" san serif font for smaller things for the sake of readability.

Of course, I suspect the thread may very well turn into a display of horrible fonts as others groan and beat the dead horse of comic sans.

The Cult of Permissiveness

2010-12-09T11:50:00.003-06:00

I had a flashback to a fundie troll I once dueled with named Annie. She was a crazy mom who repeatedly argued that the atheist readers of the blog chose to become atheists because we wanted to lead a sinful life. That's what she told her children, and we called her a liar for it. I wish I thought to phrase my rebuttals the way I'm going to write this post:

Fundamentalists live in a culture of permissiveness that disgusts us. That disgust is what motivated me to stop attending church. There were a number of moral boundaries I refused to cross, and I refused to associate with anyone who took such a flippant, frivolous attitude towards those boundaries.

The doctrine of Hell requires a permissive attitude towards torture.

Annie's atheist concentration camps (I believe she actually used the phrase "concentration camps"!) require a permissive attitude towards killing and religious persecution.

Creationism requires a permissive attitude towards deception.

Belief that god ordered the wars described in the Old Testament requires a permissive attitude towards genocide.

Belief that god's will is our purpose for living requires a permissive attitude towards slavery.

Belief that our humanity is defined at the moment of conception, in my experience with pro-lifers, appears to require a permissive attitude towards eugenics: The ones I've dealt with essentially were arguing that our DNA defines whether or not we're a person, not our thoughts, emotions, and consciousness.

Belief in the fables about people "cursed" or "chosen" by god was used to establish and maintain a culture of permissiveness towards slavery, murder, and racism.

Belief in the dominance of one sex over another was, and is currently being used to maintain a culture of permissiveness towards rape.

Belief in the value of faith requires a permissive attitude towards hubris and the idea that a person can be infallible and beyond question. In other words, faith is the act of believing oneself to be the supreme being. All the other vices owe a lot towards this attitude.

Minecraft!

2010-10-27T21:26:00.004-05:00

It's getting a big Halloween update including the highly anticipated biomes and a rather nasty dimension you can use for fast (and likely dangerous) travel.

So anyway, I'm doing a bit of brainstorming for what I'll build, starting from scratch. Since multiplayer survival's going to be getting some bug fixes, and I may be able to invite other players to my map, I'm thinking about some standard features as well as unique ones.

1. Forts with biome-themed megastructures. I'm going a bit OCD on hexagons and the number 6. The hexagon remains my favorite shape, and it's fun to think of ways to play with this sort of thing.
---Desert: Giant hourglass with obsidian caps, like I've repeatedly failed to build in Dwarf Fortress. Unlike DF, I can fill this one with sand and make it look like it's in the middle of falling. The center of the top chamber will have a mini-oasis. The bases will be hexagonal, and the rooms inside will be 36 meters (blocks) from opposite corners.
---Tundra or Taiga: Something involving a giant six-pointed snowflake, possibly made of ice. It may be tricky to find a way to light it without melting any of the ice.
---Forest: ?
---Swamp: ?
---Ocean: Giant truncated tetrahedron (hexagonal face pointed up) floating in the air. I'm thinking of access by waterfall: Boats will float up waterfalls, and there'll be one in the down-pointing triangular face. The other three triangular faces may act as entry points for a minecart station on the top floor.
---Savanna/Grasslands: ?

I'll probably spend a long time getting all the resources together for just the desert fort and hourglass, but if I do get to the point that I can get other players on my map, I may give some of you creative control over the megastructures and the nearby support forts. Just remember: Do something with hexagons and/or the number six.

2. Cabins: Distributed cabins, including one at the spawn point (assuming my priority desert site isn't right there.) They're meant to be waypoints in case night falls while traveling from one place to another, or if the sun sets sooner than I expected. They'll have some nice decorations, chests with basic supplies, and generally be a nice quiet place to spend the night. They'll also be connected to nearby mines and serve as a base for mine workers.
---Standard features:
A. Cobblestone or brick chimney with a furnace (fireplace) inside for smelting.
B. Chests with basic equipment a lost/respawned player might need.
C. Cozy atmosphere (Decorations, windows with a good view)

3. Lighthouses: For navigation aid. Each will have an identifying rune made from lava behind glass. For easy memorization, make it look like a twist on a standard character.

4. For my desert fort, I was thinking of making it a big stone hexagon, maybe with glass extensions at the points. Inside, there'd be a ring of 12 hexagonal rooms with a large "lab" in the center for me to tinker with redstone, minecarts, and whatever else Notch might be adding. As for the purpose of the various rooms, well, I haven't decided on all of them. Some would be workshops for different materials, but others would be there to look good, like a library, swimming pool, dining room with makeshift table and chairs, sitting room in a glass point to watch the sunset, and so on. Floating above this fort, of course, would be the hourglass I described.

Picking Things Back Up

2010-10-26T17:52:00.002-05:00

I've been delving into the limits of my talent for procrastination, but I think I'll try to end that experiment: From this day forth, I'll try to post once a day. I have contemplated getting back in by goading Skeptico's recent troll, Peter Pan, but I'll ask for some input before I invite him. Ryan seems to think I struck one of his nerves (though, of course, that perception doesn't prove anything by itself), and I'm curious if I could force him to concede even the tiniest things.

Of course, troll roasting is just one possibility. I'll be thinking of other stuff to post:

1. New Doggerel entries. There's no shortage of cliches used to support bad logic. I'll try to get back to some regularity.
2. Gaming stuff: I've had some fun during my procrastination experiments. A few items: Master of Orion 2 (haven't tried any multiplayer, yet.), Metroid: Other M, and Minecraft.
3. New series concept: Denialist Doublethink. There are a lot of woos who say one thing, yet act as if they believe the opposite. It'll probably start out with heavy focus on alties.

To a Fucking Altie Racist

2010-09-07T14:13:00.003-05:00

I am not going to be the least bit polite to you in this post. Racism doesn't deserve gentle words. If you're reading this, it's because either I or one of my readers caught you saying something racist, but also because you said it in such a fucking casual manner. Polite language isn't going to grab your attention or force you to look in the mirror. I also think some of my fellow skeptics could use a bit of a nudge to pay attention to this sort of thing. It's sad that many of us have just gotten used to your brand of casual racism and/or gotten too tired to point it out.

"Eastern" people are not almond-eyed gods with wisdom beyond our "Western" understanding. They are human just like the rest of us, and thus they are subject to the same cognitive failings we are. I don't care how fucking long they've been using some herb or poking a particular spot with needles. The invisible hand of the market isn't that great at figuring out what medicines work. That's why we "Westerners" insist on rigorous, transparent safety and efficacy trials for medicine.

The only reason people like me place any trust at all in the local pharmacy is because we have all sorts of organizations keeping the manufacturers in check. We support the existence of regulations that force people to test medical claims before they unleash their product on the market.

Some people, most likely including you, dear racist, seem to think that "Eastern" people are just so magical and so wise that they are immune to the failings of us mere mortals. Because you think this, you can just trust the blind market traditions. Human perception is flawed, regardless of what part of the globe that human was born in. Because human perception is flawed, all sorts of bad and useless superstitions can persist over long periods of time.

I have little reason to doubt that there have been useful treatments to come from that region of the world, despite what your Big Placebo indoctrination would say. Just by sheer coincidence, there's bound to be some useful treatments out of any culture group. Of course, there's also going to be lots and lots of useless and harmful treatments as well. Remember the first emperor of China? Acute mercury poisoning by his alchemists. Why mercury? Because mercury dissolves the "immortal" metal of gold, and supposedly that's supposed to extend life because Ancient Chinese Tradition or whatever says the human body is like an ingot of gold. Even if I got that wrong, I doubt the actual answer makes better sense.

What we are demanding isn't a "Western" standard, it's a human standard. It's your fucking racism that makes you label it "Western." One of the chief premises behind science is that people are fallible, thus we undergo all those trials, retesting, verification, and statistical analysis so that we can be sure that it's more likely the force in question doing the work than our capacity to deceive ourselves.

But racist assholes like you don't want complex stories or the uncertainty of noisy data. You want superhuman god-men to look up to and obey, and ooooo! the East is so exotic and mysterious! They must be somehow fundamentally better than the boring old West.

That's how you come across when you say that "Western" standards can't measure "Eastern" things, as if the historical accident that caused modern scientific thought take its first steps on one location instead of another somehow magically contaminates the very concept of inquiry. Good science involves making the "who" of the experimenter completely irrelevant. Authoritarian epistemology does the opposite: Trust the authority because it's an authority, and it's an authority because it says so.

I don't trust the guys in lab coats because they have lab coats. I trust them because they're being forced by scientific insistence on rigor, peer reviewers, consumer protection laws, and government organizations to show their work as thoroughly and unambiguously as nature will allow. The "authority" is in the work, not the person. There are no gurus or priests, only the answers nature gives us when we take the time to ask the question properly.

So don't give us any more shit about how superhuman some people on a particular half of the globe are. Everyone is fallible, therefore every idea should be equally open to scrutiny. Race and nationality are not free passes.

Very sincerely,
Bronze Dog.

The Poverty of the Creationist Imagination

2010-09-03T19:46:00.004-05:00

This post isn't going to be about the usual shortcomings in a Creationist's imagination, like their inability to appreciate how long a million years is or how many living things there are on this world. It's about the inherent violence and hunger for power that drives their thinking.

In my experience (your mileage may vary, of course), the typical Creationist looks at science the way Hollywood and Saturday morning cartoons do: To them, science is just fancy magic people use to grab power.

Let's say someone actually invents a shrink ray. Your typical science and tech savvy person will be thinking stuff along the lines of "Does this mean I could install a gaming-quality computer into something the size of a pocket calculator?" at the very least. Others will be thinking of ways of fast transit: If you can shrink a payload's mass, it'll take less energy to transport it, assuming you can unshrink it later.

Your typical Creationist will instead be thinking, "Oh, noes! They're going to shrink the moon and hold it for ransom!"

That's the general illustration. One example I recall was a ban on research into mixing human genes into other species because the Creationists thought stuff along the lines of "Oh noes! They're going to make pig slaves and pig soldiers!" when those of us in the know were thinking of growing replacement human organs in livestock or bacteria that can mass produce vital hormones sick people need.

Another poverty that comes to mind is the Creationist idea that evolution is supposed to be a progression to bigger, stronger, and more badass. Complete bullshit. This kind of thinking is why you have idiots driving Canyoneros on big, flat cities to ultimately visit the corner convenience store, when a bike or *gasp* walking would be much easier. Bigger is not necessarily better. Bigger takes a lot of resources that might have better uses. Stronger doesn't matter if you don't need brute force.

This is especially true with humans. Just look at our civilization today. Our strength as a species isn't brute muscle, sharp claws, or fleetness of foot: It's our ability to cooperate and specialize. We're a brainy species. We can coordinate our efforts in amazing ways by communication. We're plastic enough that we can develop our own specialties to cover the weaknesses of others or enhance their strengths.

If we were as brutal as the straw men they implied, we wouldn't have doctors, and we wouldn't be constantly looking for new ways to improve medicine. When cooperation is your greatest strength, altruism comes naturally. Because we care for our sick, many of them get to grow up to be productive members of society and thus contribute to the good of our species.

This simple concept is often lost on Creationists who treat altruism like some sort of sacred (or profane) disadvantage with no practical value. Because they can't imagine altruism having a practical value, they assume evolution couldn't come up with it, and thus they start spreading their ignorance about evolution favoring individual selfishness. It's projection on a massive scale.

I find the eugenics projection particularly galling. After the fundie eugenicists started getting stigmatized and decided (for the sake of appearances only) that Darwin was right about it being immortal to impose livestock breeding methods on humans, they tried to turn it around, including a popular quote mine where they replace Darwin's disgust for the idea with ellipses, trying to claim that we're in favor of eugenics.

Uh, fellas, don't you know anything about our farming monocultures? You know that urban legend going around about how the modern dessert banana's going to be extinct within X years? There's a grain of truth to that: Seedless bananas are pretty much just clones of one another. At any time, nature could throw just the right kind of blight at the breed, and we'd have to start over from scratch. Aside from the natural altruism we have for our fellow sentient beings, we have a desire to avoid extinction.

Genetic diversity is a hedge against extinction. The more diversity there is, the more likely some members of the threatened species has some gene combination that overcomes whatever catastrophe eventually comes along. Eugenics reduces diversity, and with it, the chances something like a pandemic could cripple or wipe out mankind. Eugenics has a talent for creating stuff that serves a specifically desired function, but it has a bad habit of causing all sorts of problems. Founder effects can make rare recessive defects commonplace through inbreeding. You get livestock that couldn't survive without human supervision. And usually, with those favoring human eugenics programs, all you'd get out of it is a species that appeals to some guy's fetish for clones.

This culturally outdated alpha male craving for dominance and power just stands out whenever I hear a Creationist trying to tell me what I believe instead of actually listening. We've all got plenty of baggage from our simian ancestors, but we have to work past that sort of violent, selfish thinking if we want to prosper as a civilization.

The Creationists I know, however, can only offer strife and anarchy as an alternative.

Pushing the Product

2010-08-10T13:23:00.004-05:00

Denice Walter commented over at Respectful Insolence:

For years my SO has brought me a local new agey magazine ( actually, it's 75% advert and 25% "info-tisement"- i.e. articles promoting woo or practitioners), called "Inner Realm".

And it got me thinking:

In science, there is a LOT of literature devoted to basic research with no guarantee of a product on the horizon. You have to learn how to crawl before you make promises about your Running Man delivery service. Science isn't like Sid Meier's Civilization. You can't make plans to build a cavalry unit on the expectation that you'll finish research on Horseback Riding in 4 turns. In the real world, we don't know what fruits our research will bear, or even if it will bear anything. Every idea has to be extensively tested to see if it can be used effectively and practically.

This is especially true of medicine. Just because a drug works on a petri dish doesn't mean that it'll perform the same in a living body. It could be neutralized by some normal body process that doesn't occur in the cell culture. It could be absorbed by some filter before it gets to where it needs to go. It could have an unexpected side effect on another part of the body. That's why we demand so many tests before we unleash it on the market, and why we cringe whenever some newspaper cries "Cure!" over and over for everything that shows the slightest bit of promise.

In contrast, quackery seems obsessed with getting a product out as soon as they can. Instead of performing all the extensive tests we demand of any new treatment idea, they push directly to the market, as if their customers were their own guinea pigs. They get an idea and move right to human trials without bothering to keep extensive records. They get antsy whenever we ask basic research questions or show concern for the consumers: The same checks and balances we're in favor of using against "Big Pharma" in the form of watchdog institutions.

And they typically accuse us of being pro-corporate.

Tabloid Facepalm

2010-08-05T14:55:00.003-05:00

Just a small post, hopefully to help me get back into the swing of blogging. I used to strive to average at least a post a day. Anyway, onto an observation:

Yesterday, when I was buying some Dr Pepper bottles I saw a tabloid at the checkout line (I think it was National Enquirer or something like that) with the fake Kenyan Obama birth certificate on the front page. It's bad enough that printed media was writing an article on that hoax, presumably without any reference to the myriad deliberate anachronisms, but it's just sad that they were reacting as if they had just now read about it on their Twitter feed.

...Sounds like what I've seen of Glenn Beck, actually.

How to Deal With Drug Companies

2010-07-31T11:54:00.002-05:00

There are a lot of drugs out there and corrupt people who want to sell them for a profit, even if it harms the customer. Here are a couple of modest ideas on how we should deal with that problem.

Plan #1

Attitude:

Corporations are the enemy. They exist to make money, and have an insidious tendency to direct groupthink towards maximizing profits, even among otherwise normal people. Unfortunately, there are a lot of sick people out there who need effective treatments, and corporate greed can be a very effective motivation to put all the resources needed for mass production of those treatments together. On the whole, corporations are a necessary evil until someone can devise a better means of safely producing and testing drugs.

Culture:

Encourage scientific and critical thought. Require that evidence be easily available for review and critique. Encourage openness and international cooperation between parties of different backgrounds and motivation.

Don't trust anyone at their word alone. Don't trust in "common knowledge" or that gutter known as mainstream media, which has a habit of laying off or ignoring their science reporting division. Don't trust chain emails.

Corporations must be held in check by watchdogs, not just in the government, but by scientists, doctors, and other concerned individuals from multiple backgrounds.

Regulation:

In the past, caveat emptor capitalism led to shoddy production. Because people's lives are at stake, there is little room to allow for error. We must assume that corporations will cut corners wherever they can, and that will include safety testing. Given the placebo effect, corporations will be heavily tempted to cut corners on efficacy testing as well. As such, we must form an institution that will watchdog the corporations and force them to undergo a rigorous program to prove their products are both safe and effective. It would probably go something like this:

Step 1: Cell culture: This phase is mostly so the company can find promising treatments without involving a risk to a living being.

Step 2: Animal testing: Just because something works in a petri dish doesn't mean that it'll work within the context of a whole living animal. Living things are complex entities, full of conflicting forces. All too many medical claims that float around by word of mouth are based solely on preliminary studies that never involved an entire organism.

Step 3: Human trials: Because this is the most important and risky part of drug testing, it is divided into its own phases. It's especially important to be rigorous in controlling and blinding these experiments because human bias, coincidence, and the placebo effect can easily alter the results of a shoddy experiment.

Phase I: Safety trials: Experiments done specifically for the purpose of finding out if the human body can tolerate the drug in question. Animal trials aren't perfect, which means there could be unforeseen consequences in the human body.

Phase II & III: Efficacy testing: Trials done with a smaller and then a larger group. Without these trials, the patent medicine era of alcohol-induced placebo effects could easily return. The drug in question must prove more effective than a placebo.

Step 4: Approval: Only after a drug has passed all of these trials can a corporation be allowed to sell the drug.

Step 5: Post-market research: Reality has a way of throwing unexpected turns at humanity. It's quite possible there may be dangerous interactions with other drugs that were missed in earlier tests, unexpected dangers for people with certain conditions, a side effect that simply didn't show strongly in the test groups, or any other tragic surprises. If these are detected in the wider population, the drug may be subjected to recalls mandated by the regulatory body. Without this regulation, corporate bean counters could easily just market the drug willy-nilly and accept the loss of a few customers.

Plan #2: The Alternative Solution

Attitude:

Draw an imaginary line. Call one side "alternative" and the other side "conventional." The corporations on the "alternative" side are perfect angels, incapable of making a mistake or having a dishonest or greedy intention. The corporations on the "conventional" side are pure evil and just want to do stuff like poison babies for no reason whatsoever. Because, you know, that's how it is in the movies.

Culture:

Allow the "alternative" corporations to manufacture a culture predisposed to blindly trusting them. The imaginary line must be enforced as an absolute tenet of faith, because the "alternative" corporations rely on being granted special privileges to help them compete. Encourage people to be dismissive of safety and efficacy trials as a waste of time because treating people with blind shots in the dark is much more important work than being informed or understanding the problem.

Encourage doublethink. For example, nearly every member of the de facto "alternative" cartel says they have the one true solution to every health problem, but if it doesn't work for the customer, tell them that everyone reacts differently to absolutely everything and that they should shop around among other members of the "alternative" group and subjecting themselves to shoddy experimentation.

Encourage customers to think that they are infallible gods, incapable of mistaking placebo effects for genuine benefit. Encourage parents to think that simply producing a child makes them immune to human weaknesses of perception and memory.

Regulation:

Bog down the "conventional" corporations by making them go through all those regulatory hurdles in plan 1 and still doubt their results by pretending they're secretly in control of the regulatory body of this nation, as well as all the universities involved in the research. Pretend that there are no other nations out there to test the drugs, or that their analogous regulatory bodies are also in on the conspiracy, despite the untenability of massive conspiracies. Because we all know that, as Hollywood keeps telling us in its action thrillers, worldwide conspiracies of thousands of people are really easy to pull off.

Get a bunch of lobbyists to make an exception for some of the "alternative" drugs by calling them "supplements" instead of drugs and make them nearly immune to regulation. Because we all know perfect angels don't need to do rigorous safety and efficacy tests and can just be taken at their word. They need all the ~~profits~~ help they can get against the evil "conventional" corporations. Because they never make mistakes, this means that they can market their products directly without any study and let their ~~guinea pigs~~ customers experiment on themselves and their children.

Encourage parents to think of their children as their property, so that they can justify trying anything on their sick child under any circumstances, especially if there's no reporting or control group.

I don't know about you, but I'm leaning towards plan #1.

Doggerel #219: "I Did My Own Research!"

2010-07-17T14:43:00.004-05:00

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

The information age allows people incredible access to scientific data and exchange of information. Unfortunately, it also allows incredible access to urban legends and crazed rants that would normally be relegated to badly copied manifestos handed out on the street.

What separates real research from from what the typical woo does is discrimination: You have to know what forms of evidence are more reliable than others. A double-blind control study is superior to a case study, which is superior to an anecdote. A video recording is superior to human memory. Quality also matters more than quantity, most of the time. A thousand eyewitnesses are less objective than a handful of cameras.

Woo "research" typically involves collecting anecdotes, a form of cherry-picking. In alternative medicine, for example, positive outcomes for an alleged remedy are popularized, but, because of the culture, negative outcomes are generally ignored, usually leading to the patient to quietly change remedies. The result is a large collection of isolated positive anecdotes divorced from the larger context of the world.

Real research has to look at large numbers. With small groups, and worse, individual test subjects, there is little ability to rule out coincidences. Scientific studies require large numbers of subjects or trials because large numbers make coincidence less likely of an explanation. Most people simply have trouble thinking about the large numbers involved in the world, and how millions of people experiencing the world over many years can produce all sorts of "unlikely" events. We use the scientific method because of such shortcomings in our thinking.

Another form of false research comes in the form of blindly trusting people with fancy degrees or even Nobel Prizes. Being a scientist, earning a degree, or being awarded a prestigious prize is not a certification of papal infallibility. Scientists are people. People can make mistakes. Working in a manner that minimizes the chance of mistakes is what makes your conclusions more likely to be accurate. It doesn't matter who you are. High quality work is high quality work. Knowing how to distinguish real science from anecdote and hearsay is what separates a researcher from just another student of Google University.

Pointless Question #78

2010-06-19T19:26:00.003-05:00

Why is it that whenever a building or other large structure collapses, it usually does so in a way that allows a hero access to the next location for his quest?

Bombs Away!

2010-06-18T16:31:00.002-05:00

My brother's been feeling creative lately, so I'm plugging his latest creation:

Pop over and vote it up if you like.

A Little Story

2010-06-07T13:28:00.003-05:00

I was walking along the beach one day when I spotted a pair of strange creatures lying on the sand. One was covered in brilliant pink fluff. It had two legs and strange flattened arms without fingers. The other looked similar in shape, but without legs, and it was instead covered in strangely smooth red skin. I first approached the pink fluffy one. It seemed like a normal animal in most ways: It had two eyes, a mouth, nostrils. It hopped around a little, and made a high jump, flapping its arms to push itself up the last few inches. I got closer and even held it in my hands without it protesting beyond a few nips with its pointy mouth, almost as if it didn't know to be afraid of me. The other lay motionless, apparently dead.

I took a closer look over the pink fluffy one, lifting up its flat arm, looking at how it was shaped. It seemed good for meat, so I killed it, cooked it, and ate it. I pieced together the bones and noticed some tiny little bumps at the ends of the arm, almost like little fingers that hadn't fully grown. The bone seemed normal enough, though hollow. The meat tasted good, but not terribly exotic.

After that, I took the smooth red creature and examined it closely. It had an appearance similar to the pink creature, but only on a superficial level: It had a pair of eyes, but they were more like decoration, as if someone carved and painted them out of whatever this material was. There was even a straight line down the length of its body, like two halves joined together imperfectly. There were even strange geometric marks on its belly, lined up in a perfect circle. On its back was a strange white knobby protrusion. I gently pulled at it and ended up twisting it, hearing little clicks underneath the skin. When I let go, the creature sprang to life, flapping its arms a few times. I dropped it and watched as its flapping slowed to a halt. I picked it up again, turned the knob several more times and threw the creature forward. It flew through the air for a while before losing its strength and fell to the ground.

I retrieved the creature and gently cut open its belly with my knife. There was nothing familiar inside. No blood, no entrails, just strange, smooth objects made of the same material as the knob. There were some spiral-shaped pieces of a shiny material, and white wheels with little teeth that would lock together. I winded the knob and watched the wheels turn. The teeth at the end of one wheel would push another into turning. I also noticed the shiny spirals get pressed tighter when I turned the knob and loosen as the wheels turned and the creature flapped. I even pulled out some of these parts and found that the creature could flap its arms once they were put back. It was the strangest experience I ever had.

I thought about these strange creatures for a while and came to some conclusions:

The pink fluffy creature was most likely a natural animal. It had a mouth, real eyes, bones, flesh, and all the internal organs of other animals. All of these parts were made of materials other animals already grow in their bodies. It probably came into being like other animals, when its parents mated, made a home, and raised it. It most likely needed to fly, to eat, to drink, and to find a mate to keep making more of its kind. It also probably needed to think about how to do all of those things and instincts to drive it towards survival and producing young.

The red smooth creature was a toy made to look like an animal similar to the pink one. It had no legs, apparently no mind, no internal organs except those needed to make it fly. This simplicity of its design suggested it had a distinct purpose: To fly and look like a living animal when it did. Such a purpose implies a craftsman. Without a craftsman, a creature that can't eat can't produce a child. Even if it had a child, such a child would be unable to grow without an ability to take in food. Without a way to eat and make replacement material, if something damaged it, it had no apparent means of healing itself, save a person making an identical part and replacing it. The geometry of the parts was also suspiciously precise, with perfect circles, straight lines, and right angles. These things almost never showed up in nature, especially not at that level of precision. Nature and life are complex, messy processes, with all sorts of forces working against or with one another. Simplicity is a sign of design. Simplicity implies an understanding of the forces of nature and the ability to isolate or control them to form such unnatural shapes.

I gathered a few supplies and put them in my boat, rowing in the direction I guessed the animals came from. Eventually, I came across a forested island filled with many animals like the pink fluffy one, only with a dazzling variety of color combinations. I walked around, noticing some smaller varieties of these creatures would fly away when they saw me. Some larger ones, about the size of the pink fluffy one did not. Some even cawed, squawked, and otherwise looked to challenge my presence. I killed a few of those for lunch and dinner.

I found a nest of twigs made by two of these creatures will small, undeveloped babies begging for food. The parents were red and white, but the babies' think fluff was pink. In another nest with two pink parents, the babies were varied: Red, pink, and white. After some thought, it occurred to me that the babies inherited part of their color from either parent. A red and a white would only produce pink offspring, but two pinks could pass down a discrete "red" or the "white" part of themselves and produce any combination from the result. Children often looked like they had some parts of both parents, but this made the heredity for one factor more obvious. If someone were to try to breed only pink creatures, they could never eliminate the tendency for red or white to show up, since, if heredity was discrete like I suspected, you couldn't blend the red and white by mating alone.

Also noteworthy was a nest with a violet baby. I could only speculate at this point, but it seems reasonable to suspect something went wrong when the parent's color was copied into the baby, producing a new color that might just stand out a little more in their mating dances. Or repel the opposite sex. Or it could do nothing. Such changes, even if they are random could, with the right circumstances, provide an advantage. Little 'mistakes' now and then could do something better in an unexpected way. If the mistake ended up being a disadvantage, no long term harm would be done to the creatures, since the unfortunate creature would be more likely to die before passing on that disadvantage. Even if it did pass it on once or twice, the struggle for survival would still make it difficult for those offspring.

There were many other possibilities for how that baby was born with violet fluff, but for now, I moved on.

My thoughts turned towards the larger territorial variety. Until I arrived, they were the largest creatures on the island. It's possible that being alone on this island, there was no benefit to keeping an instinct for running away from much larger creatures. But if circumstances changed and my tribe moved over here for hunting, the fearless ones would likely die out. Those who retained the instinct to fear large creatures would be more likely to escape a hunt and live to produce children. Not long after such a move, nearly all of them would have the instinctive fear. For the smaller ones, that would be less of a change, since they already deal with creatures larger than themselves. In fact, they could come to dominate, since smaller, more nimble targets would be harder to catch.

I felt my conclusion about the pink fluffy creature was quite secure: I saw others similar to it finding mates, raising young, and otherwise engaged in the struggle to raise the next generation. They were just like other animals, even if they had some odd features. I still needed to find out more about the smooth red creature, though.

I traveled further in my boat, eventually seeing a sandbar with a large wooden box on it. I broke off a side and found a number of smaller boxes made with a stiff sort of hemp-like material. They were painted with pictures similar to the smooth red creature, though in five different colors. Inside each one was a copy of mine, aside from the color. I examined each closely and found the similarity among the members disturbing. The only difference between the creatures were signs of tool working: They all had a seam down their length, joined quite precisely, though not perfectly. There was almost no variety in color, all of them entrenched in the five base colors with the exact same highlights and contrasts.

This convinced me further that these smooth creatures were crafted by intelligent beings like myself. They were simple. They did one task very well and little else, suggesting they were created for that specific purpose and nothing else. They showed signs of the tools used to create them. Other people craft images of living beings, and if my people had the knowledge of this one's inner workings, would create similar moving contraptions for our children as toys.

In short, these artifacts were the opposite of living things. When an animal creates its young, there is no sign of a guiding intelligence shaping or planning the offspring, only the parents being together and letting nature take its course. For unintelligent life, the struggle to perform this act is, unfortunately, quite merciless. To survive and sire young, a living thing needs to perform countless tasks. Those creatures that can perform all those tasks produce more like them, while those who can't die off. There is no purpose or intent behind this, just a simple, logical truth. We, as intelligent beings, create purpose and use what we can to accomplish our goals. This ability exists primarily because it has the effect of making us able to devise and pass on new ways to survive and prosper. The feeling of empowerment that comes from creating art, culture, and seeking new forms of understanding is a side effect we can enjoy.

An artifact created for a specific purpose is not restricted by the demands of life: It can be created, used, and discarded. It only needs to perform its specific purpose. If another is needed, the craftsman can just make a new one. For this reason, a tool can afford to 'die.' It has no inherent need to survive or reproduce itself.

Anyway, pretty well moved off the story and into an author tract. I can afford to, since it's my blog.

Of course, a lot of Creationists are going to miss the major points and speak as if I intended this one thing to be the end-all argument. This is just specifically addressing Paley's watch, replacing it with a mechanical bird alongside a real one. The problem that should have been glaring Paley and friends in the face: It's not complexity that defines design. Simplicity is often a better guide.

Another huge problem is that a watch and a living thing are very, very different. We already know about natural processes that can make new living things: Reproduction. This is a feature that watches and other human creations lack. Watches do not assemble new watches. The parts of a watch do not have any sort of self-organizing affinity. The chemicals that make up living beings do, however.

If you change this, and simulate watches that can reproduce with variation and are made of parts that have affinities, it's much easy to produce an accurate watch using evolution and a natural selection criteria that favors accurate timekeeping.

Faith is a Euphemism for Gambling

2010-05-16T14:49:00.003-05:00

Qualia Soup and Theramin Trees said what I've taken to be the core of this idea pretty well in one of their videos.

Faith is equivalent to going to a casino, heading to a roulette table with an infinite number of numbers on the wheel, and betting on one based on a hunch. Probabilities are not considered, since one over an immeasurably large number is quite small. Books, relics, and so forth fill in the role of the "lucky" rabbit's foot.

The compulsive gamblers resent any effort to convince them to cut their losses. They even consider it a virtue to keep riding a losing streak, since they labor under the delusion that the laws of probability will bend to serve them and reward them for their stubbornness. This arrogance is encouraged to prevent change: Saying that you were wrong takes humility and courage. To a man of faith, these traits are signs of weakness. Humility cannot reside in a person who has delusions of perfection. To be humble is to acknowledge imperfection.

Science, on the other hand, is equivalent to getting a job at a stable company and doing hard, honest work in hopes of a paycheck. If the company goes bankrupt, you leave and apply for a job at a place that addresses the problems the previous one didn't.

Science plays for the best odds and knows there are no "sure things" in life: 99.9% odds means that there's a 0.1% chance you could be wrong. The fact that science-minded people know that they could be wrong means that they're willing to change if they find out they were mistaken. Humility is considered a strength because it acknowledges the need for change and improvement.

We all take on risks in this uncertain world. Science acknowledges our imperfections and works hard to minimize the dangers they pose. Science acknowledges that the universe is not limited to our self-serving imagination.

Faith is gambling on the "perfection" of your hunches. Faith is gambling on the arrogant belief that the universe is incapable of being beyond your imagination.

Pointless Question #77

2010-04-25T22:49:00.001-05:00

Do the superhero teams in Atlantis always have one pathetic guy with land-based powers?

Dwarf Fortress Thread

2010-04-20T15:43:00.002-05:00

I'm still new to Dwarf Fortress, but I suppose everyone's a little bit newer with the 2010 version still fresh. Like many players, I have big dreams. In my case, I'm thinking of building some giant clear glass hourglasses. The primary hindrance I face is not being sure how to get everything up and running. So, I'm trying to get some solid advice.

Location, location, location:

As much as I'd like to have those hourglasses standing in a nice flat, sandy desert, that'd probably be too much of a challenge for a beginner like me: Clear glass need pearlash, which needs wood. Unless I get lucky and find a desert adjacent to a forest (or a cavern where I can grow tower caps), I'd be in short supply. A sandy marsh might be better for that.

Rivers: Do I really need one? An everlasting supply of water would be nice, since you have to muddy underground farms now. Rain's probably another option if I can make some sort of collection spot.

Magma: The new version is supposed to have magma pools everywhere if you just dig deep enough. Since you can't search for magma pipes anymore, I'd need a bit of luck for mass production of obsidian, if I felt like making the mega hourglass out of volcanic glass.

Starting Dorfs:

I'm still not sure what starting skills I should go for. I read one suggestion now removed from the DFwiki that involved a Leader with all the doctor skills, who'd quietly build up his mining skill until he's needed at the hospital or trade depot. I also wonder if I should start with a proficient glassmaker who gets to work once I get a magma kiln.

Here's something of a first draft:
1) Medic Leader: One point in all the medical skills, with appraise, negotiator, and judge of intent. Spends the rest of his time as a secondary miner.

2) Outdoorsman: Woodcutter, Herbalist, Axeman, maybe hunter.

3) Farmer/Cook/Brewer

4) Mason/Stone Crafter/Building Designer

5) Carpenter/Glassmaker

6) Mechanic/Weaponsmith/Armorsmith

7) Miner/?

Early Building:

I'm still trying to figure out everything I'll need early on.
1. Food storage: Get everything out of the wagon so it won't rot in the wagon and that my dwarves won't need to go outside for a bite to eat.
2. Wood/Stone/Furniture storage: Keep supplies near the workshops.
3. First farm: Can muddy an area by digging into the side of a murky pool.
4. Workshops: Carpenter, Mason, Still, Kitchen, Craftsdwarf shop, Butcher shop, Leatherworks. For the latter two, I could use some advice on how to make sure my hunters don't leave their catch to just rot.
5. Barracks: Dwarves have to sleep. I neglected one on my last game, jumping a bit too directly to individual rooms.
6. Meeting room: Outside the main entrance, so that my dogs will gather there and spot thieves.

Magma workshops:

I plan to dig down until I reach magma so that I can build a workshop level with all the magma-powered sorts. Since I don't want to be overrun by fire imps and the like, I'd appreciate suggestions on how to safely go about this. One idea is to build an exploratory vertical shaft that I can block off with a locked door. Once I know what level the magma's at, I can build workshops with imp-blocking grates in the floor.

Lesser dreams:

Greenhouses: Some farms for above ground crops covered by green glass ceilings, safely below the surface.

Guard towers: Shaped like hourglasses, for the overall aesthetic.

A road paved with glass.

An overly organized 'garden' sort of look for the entire surface of my area. More "rock garden" than lines of trees or hedge mazes.

The big dreams:

Hourglass Megastructure: I'm still trying to think about the shape of my hourglass tower(s), since round isn't the easiest thing to do. The first idea is probably the simplest: A pyramid with an inverted pyramid on top. The other is similar, though with some straight vertical sections. I'd like some ideas for what to fill them with. Probably include some wood bases for the top and bottom.

Raised River: A six-tile wide river on a raised platform. The supports will be smaller versions of the hourglass tower, possibly doubling as guard towers. If I get a magma pipe, I may try another of magma that ends up forming obsidian where the two meet. I could probably use some help figuring out how to handle the pumps to get the water up there.

So, chime in with whatever.

This Isn't About Religion

2010-04-19T14:50:00.002-05:00

Imagine there's an organization that gives children something to do after school, like sports, games, school tutoring, and so on, so that they'll be in a safe place until their parents come home. Imagine one of the staff ends up raping one of the youths, and when the higher-ups hear about it, they start trying to cover it up and move the offending member to another district where no one knows about the incident. Imagine that they've been doing this sort of thing for decades in an effort to maintain their good reputation. Imagine that they've been caught. They belittle the crime as "gossip" or a coordinated attack by one of their competitors.

Would you consider it wrong to investigate the cover up, even if it leads all the way to the head of the organization?

Now change the organization to the Roman Catholic Church, and the head of the organization to the Pope. Suddenly, what should be absolutely clear to anyone with even a vestigial sense of morality gets muddled with people claiming that the organization is above mortal law, or that the organization's reputation is more important than preventing rape.

I only want some rapists and their co-conspirators brought to justice. There is no religion involved in that sentiment. It is the religious anarchists who want their group to be above the law who bring religion into it. They want the governments of the world to be accommodating and deferential to their group. They want special privileges. They don't want equal enforcement of the law. They want all this because their religion says their leaders can do whatever they want: The only restriction is whether or not they need to cover it up to maintain a facade of morality.

Religion deserves absolutely no special privileges. Everyone must be equally subject to the law.

Pointless Question #76

2010-04-12T23:28:00.003-05:00

What if the Transformers landed on Earth in the 12th century, instead of the 20th or 21st?

Springtime for Charlatans

2010-04-08T15:38:00.002-05:00

Neurologica has this post up. Alties never cease to disgust me in the ways they slime their way past basic ethics.

A Fundamental Problem

2010-03-27T14:15:00.005-05:00

Woos aren't aware of it. They don't know why we accept or reject various ideas. All they know is that we're often on the opposite side of the debate. They'll make up stories about how we weren't hugged enough as kids, how we were "hurt" by some member of their group, indoctrinated into a nonexistent philosophy, just want to be nasty, or whatever Hollywood narrative they like. They do this because they don't know how we think.

That's why so many woo trolls are unable to speak with us as people. They're ignorant of what it means to be a critical thinker, and often willfully so when they refuse to listen to our points. They can't attack our actual beliefs because they're unwilling to learn them. That's why they resort to straw men, ad hominem fallacies, repetitive propaganda, and defense mechanisms. Their unwillingness to listen to us serves to compound the problem.

By the same token, many, many trolls have an unwillingness to commit to or even speak of any claims. I've had countless arguments where my fellow skeptics and I repeat various demands for clarification on the beliefs in question, only to get stalling tactics and intentional vagueness, followed by another volley of ineffective attacks.

The bottom line: Most woos who engage in trolling are poor communicators and don't care if they are. They don't care what we actually believe. They don't care about defending their beliefs. They only want to beat up figments of their imagination.

At least we can try to have fun seeing if they'll actually react to something they don't expect. Half the time, I search for weird angles of attack in hopes of inspiring a Work Time Fun response.

Texas, Other Details on DOOMED! Status

2010-03-21T12:53:00.001-05:00

From Phil Plait. Something about Joseph McCarthy just pushes my berserk button.

Quote of the Time Being #26

2010-03-19T22:11:00.001-05:00

This one's a comment posted by thalesc on Neurologica.

Being a software engineer who works on large projects I find quite amusing how creationists look at a living thing and conclude it’s too complex to have evolved, therefore it must have been designed in a similar way to how humans design technological artifacts – intelligently, that is.

Clearly these people have never designed anything of significance in their lives – and no, putting together a display for the Creation Museum does not count.

If they had, they’d realize that the process of designing complex things intelligently looks a lot more like Evolution than the clean, purely top-down idealization of a guy that sits at a desk and draws the complete plans for something anew out of pure inspiration. On the contrary, design is a dirty process that involves a lot of experimentation, discovery, creativity (i.e., randomization), refinement and selection.

For instance, humans didn’t come up with today’s modern computers in a single try. If we look at the history of the computer we’ll see a progression from simplicity to complexity where each new machine was built on previous successful technology. More importantly, we’ll see lots of failures that were quickly discarded, and even more failures that never saw the light of the day. Of course if we look only at the successes we may get the wrong impression of intentionality and predictability. However, if we look at the failures too we’ll see a different picture, we’ll see that the technological progress is quite random and unpredictable, and that it happens mostly through the selection of the random ideas that worked.

Some people can’t see how one can arrive at functional complexity through evolution. I have quite the opposite feeling, I can’t see how one can get there otherwise.

The Historian's Fallacy and Conspiracy Nuts

2010-03-19T18:22:00.003-05:00

I've had to deal with a certain phenomenon with conspiracy nuts: When asked for evidence of a conspiracy, they start citing who benefited from the central event. The problem with this, of course, is that benefit does not prove that the person in question planned it. Hindsight is 20/20, but our past selves do not benefit from it. Neither do previous generations.

For one example of the fallacy, many 9/11 twoofers point out how much the Bush administration was able to expand their power and influence after the attack. To someone who thinks governments have a supernatural prescience, this is incriminating evidence. To a more sensible person, this is easily explainable by opportunism, rather than an elaborate conspiracy: They didn't plan it, but they were able to take advantage of it anyway.

People are people, and only have access to certain fields of knowledge. In war history, this is the fog of war: Decision makers don't have instant access to all the relevant information. It could be anything from enemy disinformation to accidentally skipping over a critical bit of a report. Some intelligence agencies prefer not to share information, preventing it from getting to the relevant people in time. This tendency was one of the reasons for the founding of the Central Intelligence Agency in the US. Of course, even with this, government secrets still run the risk of remaining secret to the non-CIA portions of the government.

Large organizations are made up of small parts, namely people, and their means of communication. All too often, conspiracy theorists are unwilling to even think about the difficulties involved in running them. Just because certain information is readily available today does not mean that it was always so. Confusion is, and always has been a part of civilization.

Logic is a Wreath of Pretty Flowers That Smell Bad

2010-03-17T18:06:00.005-05:00

Or so many woos try to argue. It's quite common when I deal with various trolls that they'll argue how "telling" it is when I point out a logical fallacy they committed. I've heard it pretty often with Creationists and the ad hominem fallacy: Rather than argue about the science, they'll make some accusation about a skeptic's or a scientist's sexual orientation, racism, or whatever, as if that somehow changes the color of a fruit fly's eyes or the constant radioactive half-life of a particular isotope.

I haven't performed any extensive sampling, but it seems to me that the vast bulk of logical fallacies are types of subject changes. Red herrings. A subtype of the non-sequitur. My being an atheist, for example, doesn't change the fact that multiple lines of converging evidence agree on a single phylogenetic tree. The fact that I own D&D books does not falsify the fact that the Big Bang theory accurately predicted the cosmic microwave background radiation before it was measured. Science, it works, bitches.

In the world of woo, it seems, emotion matters infinitely more than truth. Self-esteem matters more than learning. Certainty matters more than honesty. It reminds me of several episodes of the original Star Trek where Kirk and crew blew up "logical" computers and androids by behaving oddly. The only difference is that they're going for the tiniest expression of frustration, as if it's impossible to be logical and emotional at the same time. Being right and being stoic are completely unrelated things.

Of course, since most woos never pause to understand what logic actually is, they declare victory, even if they only contributed gibberish, contradictions, and transparent subject changes to the discussion. Science doesn't care about how you express your ideas, only if they're logically sound, and proving that often takes work. Woo and faith, however, only exist to prop up the believer's self-esteem or to make laziness self-justifying.

Sent By My Brother

2010-03-17T17:32:00.001-05:00

Psychic Drawing Fail.

Woo Enthymemes #7: "My Imagination is Superior!"

2010-03-15T15:34:00.002-05:00

This particular entry was inspired in part by Chopra Fan, Rachael Good, who vomited up a great deal of hate on Skeptico.

As was pointed out later in that comment thread, woos often act as if they have a monopoly on imagination. As if it's impossible to be scientifically minded and have imagination. The problem with this, of course, is that imagination was required to come up with all the theories we take for granted, and still is needed to make advances in the various fields.

In my view, the whole act is a temper tantrum: Their imagination was wrong, therefore they have the right to shit all over everything their opponents have done. That's what woo is often about, after all. Hell, whenever a skeptic imagines a non-supernatural explanation for something, they lash out against the very notion of creativity. They think creativity is destructive because it expands outside their tiny, gray box.

Creativity shouldn't be contained by preexisting ideology. Ideas should be treated fairly: Those with merit, those that agree with the evidence and make new predictions should be held in higher regard. Those that contradict the evidence or fail to say anything useful should be dismissed until they can correct those failings. The marketplace of ideas is supposed to be a meritocracy, and science is the best method we have for determining an idea's merit.

Texas, Filed Under DOOMED!

2010-03-13T21:14:00.001-06:00

I'm still sputtering from reading this.

Bioshock and Quackery

2010-03-06T15:37:00.003-06:00

Last night, I started watching a Let's Play of Bioshock. For those who don't know much about the game, I think I can say this much without spoiling the plot: The game takes place in an underwater city that was intended to be some sort of Objectivist paradise.

There, scientists weren't 'burdened' by ethics and developed some DNA modifying chemicals to give people superpowers like telekinesis or the ability to shoot bolts of electricity from their hands. Unfortunately, the scientists responsible apparently bought into 'greed is good, altruism is evil' rhetoric, and didn't bother with extensive safety tests. As a result, the city is now crawling with insane people swinging around monkey wrenches and climbing the walls with hooks and mad Science!-enhanced agility.

The city's leader response to the growing insanity? "Yes, people have died, yes, people have gone insane, but we can't abandon our ideals when they're being tested. The market is patient, and we must be patient, too."

This reminds me of all too many quacks I've heard from: "If it was dangerous/useless, people wouldn't buy it!" One of the biggest problems the caveat emptor philosophy has is the need for everyone to be an expert in whatever field is relevant to their purchase. The problem isn't quite so bad with simple purchases, but when it comes to our health, we shouldn't all have to be doctors to evaluate the safety and efficacy of a product. Contrary to what quacks will tell you, you are not born with innate expertise in your own body. The human body is a complex and intricate thing that was pretty much built to last a few decades. It's because people sought a deeper understanding than superficial pain/pleasure responses that we've been able to take 70+ years for granted.

Many people also tend to be poor at risk assessment. Someone who goes on a beach vacation might be more worried about getting attacked by sharks than about the much higher risk of getting into a car accident on the way. Anti-vaxxers, for example, are more afraid of the infinitesimal risk of exposure to trace amounts of everyday chemicals in the vaccines than the much higher risk of death by the diseases they prevent.

My conclusion: This sort of extreme capitalism, like Communism, could only work if the world was already perfect, full of well-educated, rational people. We need regulatory bodies made of experts to keep our food and medicine safe and effective.

Explaining Fantasy

2010-03-01T18:10:00.003-06:00

I've been busy with meatspace lately, so I don't remember if I've said something about this before, but I figure it's worth drilling home. In science, most people understandably focus on how theories are supposed to predict and explain the facts that we observe. I, however, feel the need to point out the opposite side of that: A theory also needs to explain why certain things are not seen. It's been said that "a theory that can explain anything explains nothing," and it's my intention to give the reason for that saying.

Let's use the familiar comparison between evolution and Creationism. Evolution has constraints: A generation can only build on or modify what it inherited from its ancestors. Evolution tells us that Crocoducks are absurdly unlikely: Birds evolved from bipedal dinosaurs, a different branch of the tree of life from crocodiles. A Crocoduck would be analogous to (but much more extreme than) a couple siring a distant cousin's child. For that reason, the discovery of a Crocoduck (barring origin by mad science) would completely dismantle everything we know about genetics and evolution.

Creationism, however, can perfectly explain a Crocoduck: God can do whatever he wants, and for some incomprehensible reason was in the mood to slap two very different species together. There is no mechanism of action to limit what God's tools can do. Thus the Crocoduck is explained by Creationism.

Of course, the problem this presents for Creationism is that there are no Crocoducks. There are no lion-eagle hybrids with a six limb body plan. There are no cloven-hooved horses with spiral horns or lion tails. Creationism is useless because it can be used to predict anything, including all the things that will never happen. Creationists have no method for sorting out true predictions from the infinity of fantasy predictions. They can only point out certain "predictions" after the fact has been observed. That, in a nutshell, is why Creationism's unfalsifiability makes it useless.

Often, I call Creationism "The Random Theory of Randomness." If you think in terms of a dice experiment, I think it's quite apt: If you roll a die a million times and get all sixes, it's perfectly reasonable to think the die is weighted in a manner to come up six. That theory has a comparatively narrow set of predictions: If you keep rolling the die, you will get mostly sixes. The theory of randomness, that the die roll just happened to come up all sixes by chance alone, predicts any outcome pretty much equally.

If you rolled the die some more and get a roughly equal tally of all six numbers, that would cast heavy doubt about the die being weighted. If you continued to roll sixes, it would support the weighting theory, but the randomness advocates could just as readily claim that it's possible random chance still favors sixes. Of course, I would think any reasonable person would bank on the weighting theory.

The Ban List

2010-03-01T17:34:00.005-06:00

It currently has one member: Gabriel. (WOMI was removed last time I changed the comment policy. He originally got on for doing a similar repetition act Gabe's doing now, only he was a Creationist.) The reason for his banning is essentially groaning boredom on the part of some of my readers, and I can't blame them: Gabriel hasn't learned anything about what we actually believe, and thus it's become pointless to read his repetition of straw men, ad hominem fallacies (why the hell does he think this is about ~~penis~~ passport dueling with some random guy on the internet?)

So, Gabriel, included below are a few ways you can get yourself unbanned by submitting comments:

1. Post a criticism of my actual views on the topic of race. There's no shortage of my commentary in the various threads for you to read.
2. Define what you mean by "race," "white," and "black." Are they based on genetics in any way?
3. A link and/or citation of a study showing some sort of meaningful neurological differences between people of different races.

Anything else is subject to rejection. If you had any idea of what skepticism and science really are, you'd understand why you've been failing so hard. Try doing something different and interesting for a change. It's been fun seeing you flail about in a useless and predictable manner, but I think it's time to move on if you can't show me something unexpected.

Once a week, I may drop a comment in this thread summarizing what Gabe tries. I predict it'll just be a stream of redundancy, and we don't need space wasted on stuff we've already been over multiple times.

Okay, Wow.

2010-02-28T14:52:00.002-06:00

Seems Blogger hasn't been informing me of moderated comments from old threads. Got 21 listed. Get ready for a flood of pent up Gabriel.

Another Game Ping

2010-02-28T13:49:00.003-06:00

Recently picked up a game on PSN called Greed Corp. It's a turn-based strategy game my brother and I are enjoying. Anyone interested in a few rounds with us?

Setting Up For a Letdown

2010-02-13T18:49:00.004-06:00

I like the movie, Pulp Fiction, but there's one thing I can think of that would improve it. For the two or three of you who haven't seen it, one of the MacGuffins is a briefcase that contains something unrevealed, and shines orange light onto the people who look inside. The improvement I have in mind: They should have left the lightbulb out of the briefcase.

Without the lightbulb, we could interpret the briefcase's contents as "anything." With the lightbulb, our choices narrow down quite rapidly to little more than "something most people would call supernatural." One of the resulting dominant theories I've heard seems a little too obvious: Marcellus Wallace's soul, thus the 'miracle' that saved Travolta and Jackson's characters was God intervening to make sure they save his soul.

It feels too restrictive to me. And I think that feeling carries over to real life science mysteries: Woos so often seem to love restricting the answer to what our limited imaginations can come up with. Science is liberating because reality isn't restricted to our imaginations. How does consciousness operate? The answer of "the soul" is restrictive and unsatisfying. Many soul hypotheses are little more than the process of ad hocking away the evidence, instead of making predictions and daring to risk being wrong. Being wrong is not something to be ashamed of in science. Every experiment scientists conduct is an act of bravery and humility: The results may not be to your liking because the universe does not exist to conform to your desires. Every scientifically-minded person knows that, and welcomes the opportunity to be surprised.

Some Problems With the Apologetics Gods

2010-02-13T18:21:00.002-06:00

Currently watching the Atheism Tapes on Netflix streaming, and felt something I needed to express: The various absurd gods Apologists want us to believe in.

The random god: Quite often, I've seen people define their god as being unpredictable in principle. The problem with this is that it makes it random: Science is very good for detecting patterns and making predictions. The only thing that should be unpredictable in principle would be something truly, truly random.

The impotent god: Another alternative depends on defining god as undetectable, which leads to the question of "how can he do anything at all?" We can't detect gravity directly, but we sure can detect (and predict) its influence on objects. Science is the best tool we have for understanding the invisible. It's done that for so many forces before. What makes the god force fundamentally different?

The arbitrary god: Often shows up with divine command theorists. They posit a baseless god as the foundation of morality: God exists without any previous basis, but for some reason is super-special-awesome to be the sole privileged entity to dictate morality. He has no previous basis to found his decisions on, and no reason to have this authority. Close relative to the random god.

SIWOTI!

2010-02-12T22:43:00.004-06:00

I've got a real case of it concerning a member of the Mercury Militia over on one of Akusai's videos.

I've worked up a nice sweat dealing with that troll. I need to take a shower.

A Substance Almost, But Not Quite, Entirely Unlike Tea

2010-02-08T17:09:00.004-06:00

I've been following a troll by the name of Young Apologist who showed up at Skeptico, recently. Mostly, I've been quiet while the others dissect his nonsense line-by-line. He ended up repeating one tired old thing about how you can't use material description to talk about "immaterial" objects like souls and such. And that gets to the title of this post.

Like so many other dualists, he's essentially trying to describe something, not by what properties it has or what it does, but by what it's not. Of course, that leaves him with an infinite amount of room to move goalposts.

In science, you have to define what you're talking about in a meaningful manner. You do this so that you have testable predictions: What will you see when you examine the subject? What will happen when you do X to the subject? If those predictions are wrong, then you can admit you're wrong. Faith works the opposite way: "I am infallible" is the underlying basis of faith. Laying out definitions for the things they have faith in can only create opportunities for them to be demonstrated as wrong.

That's why they use nonsense words like "supernatural" to avoid defining their terms. Of course, this has a nasty habit of removing evidence from the process. If there's no evidence, no predictions, or anything like that, how do they know? The typical response I get boils down to reassertion of their superiority: They can know the unknowable because they said so.

It's really pathetic.

Belated Link

2010-01-31T12:37:00.001-06:00

I meant to link to this bit of Tom Foss ownage earlier, but better late than never.

129th Skeptics' Circle

2010-01-31T12:14:00.002-06:00

It's up at the SkeptVet's Blog.

Open thread as usual, except taking me there is FORBIDDEN!

AC Ping!

2010-01-26T15:56:00.003-06:00

Just thought I'd see again if any of my readers play Armored Core. I've got For Answer on my PS3, and tweaked Aria to be more competitive with humans. That includes a fair increase in speed.

Had a good series of matches this morning where I ended up being the guy on the ground taking cover from a flying opponent. Normally, I'm the eye in the sky.

Mystery

2010-01-25T18:01:00.003-06:00

I try to go artsy-fartsy. Fair Warning: Poetry, including free form, was always my worst subject in English. And now that I've typed it all, it shows.

A mystery is a wonderful surprise waiting to happen...

A mystery is for everyone's enjoyment. No one can claim ownership of a mystery.

A mystery shines bright when the world shares their awe and confusion.

A mystery blooms into its greatest beauty when someone solves it.

A mystery only brings wonder when it comes with the promise of an answer.

A mystery's answer is always beautiful, whether simple and elegant or intricate and detailed.

A mystery must always be free and in the open, no matter who fears what the answer might be.

A skeptic accepts the solution to a mystery, for the answer always leads to more mysteries to solve.

A skeptic does not lock mysteries in a vault like a fragile, useless bauble.

A skeptic nurtures openness and inquiry, so that both mystery and insight can thrive under the sun.

Quote of the Time Being #25

2010-01-24T16:26:00.002-06:00

It's a long comment over at Orac's place by Antaeus Feldspar.

Pure ownage of a straw man factory who showed up in the thread.

Meme Discussion: Bubble Boys?

2010-01-24T15:46:00.003-06:00

Contrary to their typical rhetoric, many altie "detox" ideas and toxin scares seem to run on the idea that the human body isn't able to heal itself. This, of course, means that you need to buy all their books, supplements, etcetera, so that you can do the right ritual to purify your body, instead of leaving it up to useless vestigial organs like the liver and kidneys, which serve no discernible function.

I'm thinking about using the term "bubble boys and girls" to describe those sorts.

The first argument I can think of against the use is that it can be considered insensitive to those people who have genuine problems with their immune system and need to remain in sterilized environments. The reason I propose the term is that many of the alties I am referring to, if they took their policy about risk to its logical end, would need to isolate themselves from the environment: They worry about trace amounts of mercury compounds, but rarely see anything wrong with eating fish. They worry about 1 in 1,000,000 risks of vaccination, but not about the deadly diseases they're made to prevent. They worry about unspecified, unknown risks of anything remotely new (even after it's been safety tested for years or even decades), but accept old, well-known risks of everyday behavior without batting an eye.

It's not a perfect fit, but I think it should be emphasized that many alties would indeed need to completely isolate themselves from the world to meet their arbitrarily high standards, hence it'd be appropriate to exaggerate just how fragile they think humans are, and the ridiculous extremes they'd require if they applied their risk aversion uniformly. Of course, I don't mean to use the label as literal truth, but as a semi-comedic exaggeration to hurl at them in hopes that it will wake them from their intellectual torpor, even if only for a moment.

Any thoughts?

Netflixing Science

2010-01-23T12:49:00.003-06:00

I've been needing something equivalent to my earlier doses of the good Discovery and History channel shows, so I've been perusing the Historical and Science subcategories of Documentaries. Decided it'd be appropriate to one-star all the supernatural, conspiratorial, and alien-friendly shows. The ratings are supposed to be relative to the user, so I would like to get any of the crazy crap out of future recommendations.

You'll probably be glad to know that Expelled already had less than 1 1/2 stars (1 star minimum) before I put my vote in.

Wish they had The Critical Eye. The first episode that I saw was what introduced me to homeopathy.

Science and Humility

2010-01-20T17:05:00.002-06:00

I often like to say that science is a process of enforced humility when I compare it to the arrogance so often inherent in woo.

Science requires everyone to consider the possibility that they could be wrong. When a scientist proposes a hypothesis, he has to include an escape hatch, just in case it turns out to be a bad idea: They have to know something that could potentially prove the hypothesis wrong, whether it's in the form of a prediction that turns out wrong, or evidence against its premises.

These things must be acknowledged. That's why scientific papers tend to have an experiment's limitations openly described. That's why we have the peer review process to weed out possible errors, why experiments must be independently replicated when possible, and so on and so on and so on. By being honest about our ability to screw up, we avoid much of the trouble that comes from designating individuals as infallible gurus or prophets. It's not who you are that makes you a scientist or and "authority," but what the evidence says. There is no room in science for a cult of personality.

Of course, it's quite well known among us scientifically-minded individuals that publishing in a science journal is not for the faint of heart. Putting your work on the line, open to criticism is not easy, especially if you made a mistake. This is normal, and how science should be. All too often, I hear whines from milquetoast woos who complain about how they aren't given any special exemption from criticism, and how their ideas are so fragile that they need to be shielded from open discussion. It sickens me. Science may be harsh, but it's supposed to be fair: No one gets a free pass. No idea is above criticism. That's how science has gotten to where it is today: By knocking down all the weak ideas, the accurate theories stand out and prosper.

Gabriel, If You're Reading This...

2010-01-14T18:03:00.005-06:00

...Pay very close attention. Reread it multiple times if you have to. You may not realize it now, but this post is going to become very inconvenient for you. You've got a lot of psychological defenses erected that prevent you from even trying to pay attention to what I really think. That's the source of my frustration, and why I so often bury my face in my palm. It's also a great source of amusement for me to dissect the contradictions you end up trapping yourself in.

Of course, none of that has broken you out of your distorted modes of thought: Black-and-white thinking, reference to television stereotypes instead of the real people you're arguing with, a disdain for complex answers, and probably many, many others. That's why I'm going to provide some summaries of my actual views on the various topics (and relentless subject changes to your pointless obsessions) in one handy space. Any additions or edits will be accompanied by a time stamp.

Genetics and Intelligence:

I currently have little or no reason to believe there are any great differences between any large groups of humans on the genetic "hardware" level. Intelligence, knowledge, skill, and whatever other mental abilities others may care to bring up are primarily built on nurture, not nature.

In other words, if you're born and raised in a place that has easy access to good schools, libraries, experts, and laws that protect the free exchange of ideas, you've got a much, much better chance at being an intelligent, educated, and capable person. If, on the other hand, you're born into a place without schools, are forced to spend the bulk of your time and resources just staying alive, have limited access to modern knowledge and theories, are surrounded by superstitious, unscientific people, and live under an oppressive government that outlaws free speech, then you are very unlikely to prosper.

I see nothing controversial about this simple prediction. You can ramble on about personal responsibility, but that doesn't change the fact that human beings are profoundly affected by their environment. Individuals who can bootstrap themselves up from nothing by sheer will are true rarities, more suited for Mary Sue fiction than a discussion about the real world. You can raise complaints about the exact proportionate responsibility between internal and external influences, but a few percentage points won't wash away the full depth of human interdependency. If you can't get reliable access to good sources of knowledge, it's doubtful that you're going to be a big contributor to the progress of human civilization.

Equality:

No, I do not for an instant believe that someone raised in an impoverished nation without an education, without good health care, etcetera, like in many third world countries, is equal in ability to me. I know it's not "PC" to say so, and I am not one of those excessively sensitive TV stereotypes who thinks blunt truths should never be spoken. The good news, however, is that the inequality can be treated by education and a developed infrastructure. There is a difference in ability, but not for any of the reasons you think, Gabriel.

The only place we should be judged as equals is in the eyes of the law: We should both have equal rights. In an ideal world, we would have equal access to opportunity, In this hypothetical scenario, we should rise or fall by our own merits, which would not be overshadowed by accidents of birth.

Measuring us by genes alone, we're probably going to be quite close. The difference in our abilities comes primarily from upbringing, available resources, and so on. It wasn't my DNA that placed my birth in the US. It wasn't my DNA that paid for my college tuition. It wasn't my DNA that ensured the various doctors who looked over me were able to earn their credentials and save me from dying of measles or other childhood illness. It wasn't my DNA that put the books in the local library or good science shows on my television. My DNA had little, if anything, to do with my prosperity.

It's the difference in infrastructure that bears the lion's share of the responsibility for the disparity between people of developed and undeveloped nations.

Genetics and Race:

When it comes to the human genome, eugenicists like Adolph Hitler were idiots. There's no "pure" thing to be "diluted". Genes do not work that way. Genes are not a solvent that can be concentrated or diluted. Genes are more like cards: You copy and then shuffle decks together to produce a child. You can't get half a Jack of Spades. And people often have more than one child. If there's an advantageous gene in one of the parents, there's a fair chance it'll get passed on and copied. Maybe even multiple times. Now imagine this done with thousands or millions of decks that get copied every generation.

Sex is so popular with us multi-cellular organisms because it allows advantageous traits to propagate faster. An asexual organism with an advantage can only spread its helpful genes at the rate it personally can have children. Many organisms sharing DNA take advantage of variety in that way. If genes were continuous, instead of discrete, it could have been a death knell for evolution: Advantageous mutations would be diluted immediately in the next generation.

One of the most important things for the long term survival of a species is genetic diversity. Diversity gives a species a greater chance to have an answer to unforeseen problems. Right now, the place with the greatest genetic diversity is Africa: Those of us who descended from migrants are touched by founder effects: When a migrating tribe left Africa, they reduced the pool of possible candidates to reproduce with. It's a lesser form of inbreeding. Thankfully, as technology advanced, methods of travel became more commonplace, allowing people to potentially pick from the entire world. Given generations of crossbreeding, I think I have plenty of reason to believe that those ancient founder effects are only going to get weaker and weaker.

Infrastructure and Health:

Gabriel's often brought up long life expectancies in Scandinavia. Despite some of my reader's links that show a fair mix up at the top, even if Scandinavian nations had a solid hold on the best lifespans, there's no reason to attribute it to genetics. This may come as a shock to you, Gabe, but there are other reasons for people to live long lives. You know, like doctors. Europe has a lot of nations with better access to health care. Doctors don't just sit around twiddling their thumbs all day. They prevent and treat diseases. There's also law enforcement and national stability: Countries with capable police and stabilizing political influences tend not to end up with people being killed in their prime. There's also technology: Developed nations have all sorts of networks to keep food, water, and electricity available. Developed infrastructure begets progress. The lack of an infrastructure breeds stagnation.

None of these things are dependent on individual genetic variations, only on social and economic order. There is no clear difference in the "races" to cause social and economic change. I'd need an in-depth comparison between genetic samples to reverse that opinion. You, however, seem to prefer the laziness of casual observation over the hard work of science. This isn't about your knowledge versus mine, it's your knowledge versus the collective work of hundreds if not thousands of scientists. I just favor the scientists and the self-correcting nature of science over a self-declared authority who seems to pride himself on doing less than the bare minimum science demands. Is that so unreasonable?

What a Nation Needs:

A civilization is not something that just happens when people bump into each other. A stable, sedentary lifestyle requires an equally stable food supply. For agriculture, you need arable soil, predictable weather, steady rain, and some plants that are nourishing enough to be worth raising and breeding. Africa wasn't quite as graced with those things as other continents. And that's just for food. Founding a nation requires many, many things we so easily take for granted.

Gabriel, your conversations seem to utterly dismiss this. You place your concept of "race" as the one founding cause of everything. It reminds me of a Creationist argument about human population growth that treats it as only a function of time, as if food, disease, and war had no impact on the number of people in the world. The world is a messy, complicated place, full of events that have multiple causes. In science, things should be a simple as possible, but no simpler. Occam's razor is not a chainsaw.

Stay-at-Home Moms:

When you changed the subject to this, it was one of the biggest Whiskey Tango Foxtrot moments I had with you. It came out of nowhere, and there was absolutely no question that it was more desperate stalling on your part. My view is quite simple: Not all stay-at-home spouses are lazy. Cooking, cleaning, child care, accounting, home maintenance, volunteer work, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera all take time and effort. Whether or not you and the IRS call it a "job" or "work" is irrelevant. Whatever a homemaker's motives for scrubbing the floor, a choice of label will not change the amount of chemical energy or time expended. Calling it a "responsibility" will not make the work done less productive. That's my point. These things take time and effort, and fiat will not change that.

My Alleged Jealousy:

As implied by my links to Doggerel #2, this is utterly irrelevant. The Secret is pseudoscience. My emotional state, whatever it may be, does not magically alter reality. Science is about removing the effect a person has on the data. If I were jealous, it would not change the outcome of a genetic analysis. It would not alter the capabilities of the F-22 Raptor. It would not reverse the burden of proof in logic.

The fact that you keep trying to change the subject to your delusions about my mental state tells everyone that you've entered this debate unarmed: You can't cite genetic studies to back up your pseudoscience about "diluted" racial characteristics, so you resort to ad hominem. You can't even commit to answering my question about whether or not race is even genetic. You're all rhetoric, no logic or evidence.

Wikipedia:

I went over one of your other favorite Whiskey Tango Foxtrot subject changes in another post... In which you were unable to focus on anything, judging by your comments. It seems when the subject isn't Wikipedia, you're free to parrot your favorite television stereotypes by changing the subject to Wikipedia, but when I explicitly tell everyone my very pragmatic views about the site, you're too scared to respond in a meaningful way.

What makes your argument so pathetic is that my view is a null hypothesis: Wikipedia deserves no special treatment. You, on the other hand, imply that all the rules of scholarly research and even the objectivity of the universe are overturned when Wikipedia is involved.

Wikipedia is a big encyclopedia on the Internet. That's it. It is not a magical reality alteration device. Wikipedia is ordinary.

World of Warcraft:

I don't play it. Just not that interested. Even if I did, I doubt I could hold any stereotypical obsession that's friendly towards TV and newspaper "journalists" who like to show the crazy extremes in their efforts to call any new media evil. If anything, I'm growing more and more into the casual gamer category. Gaming is a hobby. Some people watch football. Some people like to soup up their cars. Some people paint. Some people read classic novels. Some play musical instruments. There is no fundamental difference between videogames and other hobbies.

Now that I've covered some of my perfectly ordinary, sane opinions on Gabriel's favorite topics and distractions, I'm curious just what to expect if he comes back. It's going to be rather inconvenient for him if I can clearly and distinctly point to my real opinions, rather than the ones he can only parrot, citing daytime television as his source.

Quote of the Time Being #24

2010-01-05T22:25:00.002-06:00

From James Sweet:

By the way, I recently coined the term The Quantum Gambit for the following argument:

1) My insane theory doesn't make any goddamn sense.
2) Quantum theory is supported by mountains of evidence, but even it's strongest proponents (e.g. Feynman, Schroedinger, etc.) have gone on record saying that it doesn't make any goddamn sense.
3) Therefore, my insane theory is probably supported by mountains of evidence.

The Reality of Wikipedia

2010-01-05T17:23:00.002-06:00

I've just about given up with trying to get Gabriel to stick to any subject, so this post will be about one of his favorite distractions. Wikipedia is to Gabriel as shiny objects are to ferrets.

Since I won't shy away from melting Gabriel's brain by saying what I actually think about Wikipedia (though his functional illiteracy will prevent him from comprehending what I say), I'll say it quite simply: Standard research principles still apply.

Wikipedia deserves no special consideration, despite Gabe's protests to the contrary. Wikipedia articles should be approached in the same manner you would approach any piece of information. It's that simple. Wiki pages aren't magically correct or incorrect on their own. They're only as good as the sources they cite, the logic they employ, and so forth. The internet may get more people together from wider areas and speed up their exchange of ideas, but doing something faster doesn't and shouldn't change the underlying process. It doesn't matter if you're talking about a prestigious library or bathroom graffiti. Science remains science. The principles you learned in your writing classes are still relevant, despite the essentially trivial addition of how to cite websites to your style books.

Gabriel, it seems, believes otherwise: Wikipedia is Automatically Wrong, no matter how much good evidence an article cites. If someone were to conduct a scientific study on the sky on a clear, sunny day, taking snapshots with accurate digital cameras and objectively measuring the hue from the resulting image files, all that scientific rigor is for naught if someone posts an article about the study on Wikipedia: If Wikipedia cites that study and summarizes the results by saying the sky is blue, it magically transforms all those collected image data so that the sky is chartreuse or magenta. In short, Gabe is telling us to screw epistemology, Wikipedia has ushered in a newage (rhymes with sewage) of contra-revelation: Instead of having allegedly infallible fairy tale books to inform us of the world (revelation), he believes we now have the Automatically Wrong Wikipedia to tell us how the world isn't.

I say otherwise: Wikipedia is just another reference source. Like all reference sources, it has its own biases, its own flaws, and so forth. It's only unique in that it's continuously updated, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worst. The presence or absence of Wikipedia has no impact on the core of epistemology. It does not overturn logic. It does not invalidate the scientific method. It does not magically transmute the data scientists so rigorously collect.

I simply fail to see why Gabriel is so pathologically obsessed with something that changes so little about the world.

Pointless Question #75

2009-12-29T18:11:00.003-06:00

So, where exactly do the villains get all that kryptonite? Do they have dollar store specials on it or something?

Goddamn Hippies!

2009-12-29T16:35:00.002-06:00

There was a time when I kind of liked the hippie counter-culture: Standing up for people's rights, rebelling against rigid structures and crazed, inflexible government. Nowadays, however, there's no shortage of people who have inherited all the negatives of the culture and none of the positives.

They use "arguments" that normal people would expect from drug-addled minds. They think that reality is subjective to the point of solipsism. They think science is just another "narrative" and has no value as a means of ascertaining the truth. They think words are more real than the things they describe.

I remember an episode of South Park where Stan temporarily joins some hippies at a concert where they talk about overturning the bad elements of society. They spend the whole time lazing about, just listening to the music and partying. Stan gets on stage and simply asks the crowd, "What are we doing?" followed by his disillusionment when the crowd seems to think that partying harder is the most productive means of getting "positive energy" or some such nonsense out. It probably didn't help that one of them was a "college-educated hippie" category who didn't seem to understand that a collection of people that trades services for mutual benefit is called a "town." He then proceeded to say that they don't understand his lofty thoughts because they haven't been to college, yet.

That's the sort of image I get nowadays when I think "hippie": An ineffectual lot with unearned arrogance, a de facto force for the status quo, utterly divorced from any sort of real world logic.

PETA Irony

2009-12-29T14:18:00.003-06:00

A while back, I had a thought about PETA's attitude towards pets: They want to take the average pet out of a life of comfort and safety, so that they can roam free in the wild, where they have to struggle just to survive, scraping for every tiny bit of food, engage in combat over territory, and face illness without the aid of a vet...

But they don't ask the same of humans. I guess it's irony (or at the very least, hypocisy) that they speak so badly of humanity, yet think humans are granted special privileges to live in a society where we can take food, health, and safety for granted. They seem to think it's horrible that we would allow animals to experience the benefits of our society, only requesting a little bit of companionship and an amusing trick or two in exchange.

Of course, it's more likely that they're just too high on the Disneyfication of wilderness to realize how good pets have it. To them, the wilderness is probably just a pretty picture, like camping out in a particularly well landscaped backyard, only larger. Life in the wilderness is no modern camping trip. Animals don't have the amenities or the intellect humans do. They have far fewer means of making their life in the wild more comfortable.

MST3K

2009-12-28T22:12:00.002-06:00

As you know, I'm on Netflix. I've watched a few episodes of MST3K on streaming, but they're rather limited right now. Any suggestions for the DVD'd ones?

Emergent Behavior

2009-12-28T20:51:00.002-06:00

One of the smaller gifts I got this year was a Hex Bug: This was a fairly simple walker that'd react to touch or sound. My brother mentioned some toy he once saw: Alien ships that would have a war: Some would run away from aggressors, which in turn would give chase. I'm interested in that sort of thing: Critters that react to one another. Anyone got suggestions for little bots or some simulation software?

Pointless Question #74

2009-12-28T19:54:00.003-06:00

Okay, so Dr. Chaos spread a virus that turns the infected into monsters loyal to him, complete with a painful-looking metamorphosis. Oh, heavens, one of the heroes got it! But now he's been cured! ...Why'd his clothes come back?

Cowardice

2009-12-28T17:51:00.003-06:00

Woo feeds on fear, and fundies invented fictional places like Hell to strengthen its grip. Pascal's Wager is a blatant, transparent appeal to cowardice. Instead of being allowed to suspend judgment until the evidence comes in, the concept of Hell exists to frighten us into rushing into an unwarranted conclusion.

It takes courage to be a skeptic: Uncertainty is something we face all the time. we know that we could be wrong about pretty much anything, and that if the right evidence comes in tomorrow, we'll have to change our minds. There is also so much we don't know about the universe, yet.

Fundamentalists take the coward's way out: Faith. They paint pretty (to them) pictures over the unknown, as well as over the evidence that doesn't fit in with their comforting beliefs. For those who invoke Pascal's Wager, it's even more blatant: They don't believe because of anything like evidence, but because they fear something their predecessors invented without evidence to keep them in line. Morally speaking, they're pitiful creatures who act not out of love or compassion but fear of arbitrary punishment and/or greed for equally arbitrary rewards. Instead of risking their comfort by standing up for justice or truth, they're only looking out for themselves.

Apathy

2009-12-28T17:15:00.003-06:00

When I was young, one of my Sunday school teachers said the opposite of love isn't hate: It's apathy, the utter lack of concern or compassion. I doubt she realized where that sort of thought would take me. My last Sunday school session involved a different teacher who spoke of Hell with complete apathy for those allegedly burning in it.

Hatred, despite its dangers, is at least understandable. A normal person can understand why someone would hate threats to their or their loved ones' well being. A normal person can understand the desire to take vengeance on something that has already damaged those things. Rage is a natural followup to sorrow.

Apathy, however, often mystifies me. I can understand apathy when it concerns, say, the local sports team rivalries, but not when it concerns the suffering of other people. I've run into countless neocon trolls who don't care in the slightest about non-Americans and their rights. I've encountered countless fundies who advocate apathy as the proper response to injustice. I've encountered some woos who seem almost sub-human or sociopathic in their inability to understand why we want to protect strangers from psychic scams.

Apathy, for me, can be seen as the most subtle and insidious form of hatred. It can stand for extended periods because it only requires inaction in the face of injustice. That inaction also makes it much easier for some to indulge in it. Apathy is a cold emotion, which is probably why I react to it with impassioned flames. What got me to blogging about skepticism instead of just rolling my eyes was the passion of other skeptics. They blogged about how woo hurts people and corrupts our efforts to find the truth. After that, I couldn't bear being silent.

Fear

2009-12-25T17:55:00.004-06:00

It's one of the key ingredients of woo. Health scares try to convince people that trace amounts of everyday chemicals or life-saving medical practices will irrevocably corrupt your pure body (unless you buy their product). Conspiracy theorists try to convince you that the omnipotent, omniscient government is planning to get you sometime next Tuesday. Religious fanatics invent invisible, allegedly inevitable horrors for your soul if you don't bow down to their arbitrary rules.

Fear and panic fuel poor decision making. Dramatic but improbable threats naturally seize our attention more than simple, everyday risks. The former also tend to have an urgency created about them to discourage a potential victim from thinking things through or performing genuine research. This quite often leads to sloganizing statements to spread the word: Don't think about the topic, just spread the word as fast as you can.

For those who dare question the supposed hazard, sowing distrust is the preferred method: Don't waste time debating the actual details, go straight for the ad hominem, make up connections between them and the eeeee-ville establishment out to get you, and denounce open-mindedness towards evidence as too limited and constrained to handle the issue.

This is what we as skeptics are up against much of the time.

Or Quantum Salad?

2009-12-25T14:51:00.003-06:00

Qualia Soup recently posted another good video.

I should definitely bring this up next time I come across a dualist trying to argue that something's "non-physical." I'm essentially a neutral monist who just calls that one type of stuff "physical" or "material." If we were to discover something that would now be called "supernatural," it wouldn't uproot too much of my general worldview: About all that could be said is that such things are made of some particularly exotic type of material/physical stuff. It'd be about like the confirmation of dark matter: Some weird stuff with limited interaction with what we're familiar with (baryonic matter).

I don't see any reason these sorts of things would be beyond science in principle. The only pragmatic barriers I can imagine are the sorts of things believers would not readily grant: Extreme rarity, inherent randomness (utter unpredictability), or ridiculously bad luck that prevented scientifically minded people from preparing tests.

I'm not pessimistic enough to think we can be defeated so completely by alleged weird stuff.

Pointless Question #73

2009-12-25T14:31:00.003-06:00

Okay, so Santa's elves make lots of toys. Back in the day of wooden trains, ball-in-a-cup, and stick ball, that was fine. These days, however, where brand recognition is everything, why isn't he, for example, getting his pants sued off by Hasbro for making a few thousand perfect counterfeit Optimus Primes?

And don't get me started on all the software.

Barking up the Right Tree #2: Cautious Optimism

2009-12-25T13:04:00.002-06:00

Knowing what I know about the skeptical community, when you strip away our curmudgeonly exteriors, we're optimistic in our basic nature.

Yes, we criticize a lot, have a laundry list of complaints about our adversaries, and so on. Given our opposition, it's natural for us to act with frustration. But that conflict isn't the entirety of our being. We believe that the open-minded nature of science, with the collective teamwork of mankind can solve just about any problem. Scientists are heroic figures to us. They solve problems not with brute force, but by achieving a greater understanding of the world.

The caution comes with the open-mindedness: We are open to the idea that we could be wrong. That's why we need controls and blinding to minimize our biases on the data. It's natural to hope for the best and see what you want to see. As skeptics, we're aware of that, so we exercise caution when we see what appears to be an easy solution. High standards exist to prevent mistakes caused by wishful thinking.

With our underlying idealism, it's only natural that we recoil at the cynicism we so often find in those who don't trust science. "Woo" as we call it, so often feeds on fear of imagined dangers, distrust in the motives of anyone who disagrees, arrogance that leads one to believe he's immune to normal imperfections, and closed-mindedness towards the very idea of changing beliefs.

2009-12-25T12:54:00.003-06:00

This time of year, we should remember someone, part human, part divine, who faced the wrath of Hell to save us all.

Of course, I'm talkin' about the GOD HAND!

My arm!
My arm!
My arm!
My arm!
My arm!
Summing up the power of the God Hand!

(Haven't played it yet, but saw a Let's Play and think I might try it out.)

Last Second Decemberween Shopping

2009-12-22T21:29:00.002-06:00

Trying to think of something for my dad. He's covered for data storage, my brother's covering him on his photography, and I'm not terribly sure what movies he might be interested in this year. Thankfully, my hometown doesn't go through a great deal of insanity, so I can shop pretty safely tomorrow.

Double Your Gold!

2009-12-22T18:22:00.003-06:00

Got a second gold crown. The percentage of Bronze Dog's gold makeup rises. Hopefully it'll be a while before I need more dental work: Got my biggest two problem teeth covered.