Because of crap like this. And this.
I used to think there was a way to bring sides together. That reasonable people would put aside ridiculous rhetoric in order to grasp the greater good. Maybe I was wrong. The thought of another six months of garbage spewing forth is enough to dull even the sharpest pen.
The other night a young woman accused me of being too sensitive. She said my fault is always seeing the good in people. Maybe she is right. Maybe the only way I get the mojo back is to become the righteous bastard I was about 15 years ago.
Until then...
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
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15 comments:
At least Mike called out that idiotic tripe that Ben Stein put out.
Ugh. It is indeed enough to make you want to shrink from all potential contact with the rhetoric-smiths and just deal with a small circle of reasonable people. Or, it makes you want to rise up and smite the unreasonable fools with the twin destroyers of reason and logic! Who's with me?!?!
"So, Michelle Obama tells a crowd “Barack’s a lawyer, I’m a lawyer, everybody we know are lawyers.”
Maybe *that* explains why he relies on so many half truths and half facts and denial, non-denails to skirt the issue of whether he is in fact lying."
Sez Erick Erickson, the lawyer. If he's right, I shouldn't trust anything he says. Oh wait, do I even trust myself to write this?
"Some of you are still dwelling on the bit about Michelle Obama saying everyone they know are lawyers. Yeah, that whole “I’m just like you guys” thing is another we can add to the lie list with the Auchi one."
You're right - Michelle Obama is a liar because not every single person she knows is a lawyer.
Seriously?
It's very amusing to watch a lawyer work the "everyone hates lawyers" angle. Amusing in a god-what-a-f*ckin-hypocrite sort of way.
Pshaw, "too sensitive" is bullshit. It's a derailing tactic and just plain stupid. Whenever somebody uses that as an accusation or a defense, it's my cue to stop taking anything they say seriously.
And, uh, yeah, I'm not even bothering to follow the two links in your post... I know what BS those two fellas like to write. I don't pay attention to Republicans except for the very small portion necessary for "know your enemies" and such. Instead, I try to focus on proactive work to make GOOD things happen. It's why I don't read Peach Pundit... it makes me feel ill.
(YMMV, of course.)
"I used to think there was a way to bring sides together. That reasonable people would put aside ridiculous rhetoric in order to grasp the greater good."
Yeah, I used to think this too. I still hold out hope that it may be so again some day. I'm often discouraged when it looks like everything has devolved to the "I win/you lose" perspective.
I've always wondered just exactly what someone supposed to do in response to being accused of being "too sensitive"?
Your fault is seeing the good in people? Frankly, that is one of the things I respect and admire about you and wish I had a little larger helping of myself.
I've always wondered just exactly what someone supposed to do in response to being accused of being "too sensitive"?
Exactly. There's nothing one can do, except become defensive, and then the accuser is all, "See?? See?? You're being sensitive!!" That's why it's a bullshit tactic and only serves to derail a legitimate argument.
Sorry I ruined your life grift.
What's so wrong with saying scientists should follow the data and report what they find? That's the point of Expelled, people who poke holes in Darwin's theories (and there's plenty of places to poke) are being run out of town.
In every other area of our society we celebrate those outside the mainstream - those who question the prevailing theories. Shouldn't we do the same in the scientific arena as well?
If that makes me an "enemy" or worthy of a "smite" then so be it.
What's wrong with it Buzz? Other than the fact that it's complete and utter bullshit?
Please name me these scientists who are being run out of town?
The Smithsonian guy? You mean the one who had resigned his position not fired as Expelled implies? You mean the guy who subverted the peer review process by making one of his last acts publishing an unreviewed bunch of nonsense by one of the Discovery Institute stooges? You mean the guy who still has a job?
And about all those places to poke. Poke away. Nothing gets my blood coursing like tearing apart a bunch of creationist bullshit.
And Republicans actually wonder with a straight face why people think they hate science.
Found that missing link have you?
Saying that something a billion people believe is BS will really bring people together.
I'm sure you'll call it a cop out but I've got to get back to work. I'll be in touch though.
Cheers mate.
Which "missing links" would you like to discuss Buzz?
Ichthyostega?
Pakicetus?
Cynognathus?
Australopithecines?
Those are just a few of my favorites. I'd gladly talk about the hundreds of other transitional fossils discovered in the past 150 years.
What's so wrong with saying scientists should follow the data and report what they find?
Nothing is wrong with that. And in fact, not a single scientist should have a problem with following data and reporting, or allowing to be reported, the results of scientific research and experiments. But the beef that grift and others seem to have with ID is that it doesn't
You can't just install an unscientific theory in, er, science classrooms. Are scientists highly critical of nonscience? Yes. Is that some breach of academic freedom or a sign of a closed mind? Absolutely not.
Saying that something a billion people believe is BS will really bring people together.
Wait, it's about following the data. No, wait, it's about bringing people together. No, wait, it's about truth again!
Believe it or not, whether "a billion people" believe in something or not does not even move the Needle of Science a millimeter.
Oops--I should have finished that first paragraph...
But the beef that grift and others seem to have with ID is that it doesn't generate any research or data that you can actually call "science", and it's therefore irrelevant to the matter at hand.
This just in- the sequel to Expelled has already been announced...
Sexpelled: No Intercourse Allowed
Here's the trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ThQQuHtzHM
From the description:
There is also a late-breaking new development in the controversy, a new theory called Avian Transportation Theory.
Unlike the original Stork Theory, the modern, sophisticated "Avian Transportation Theory" (ATT) merely points out that there are gaps in the orthodox Sex Theory, and that current sonogram imaging is unreliable. Moreover ATT does not specify that babies are necessarily brought by storks but by "large birds unspecified" (although many individual ATT theorists PRIVATELY believe it is a stork).
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