To quote Michael Shermer, I “investigate paranormal claims, pseudoscience and fringe groups, and cults and claims of all kinds between science and pseudoscience, and non-science, and junk science, voodoo science, pathological science, bad science, non-science, and plain old nonsense.”
Nwanaokwo Edet was one of an increasing number of children in Africa accused of witchcraft by pastors and then tortured or killed, often by family members. Pastors were involved in half of 200 cases of “witch children” reviewed by the AP, and 13 churches were named in the case files.
2. New online game for radical right-wingnuts – The game takes place in 2011 after “Obama’s coup fails.” The game invokes the “New World Order” conspiracy and rewrites history, establishing Lou Dobbs as the “one brave newscaster” who first sounded the alarm bells of the evil Obama/NWO conspiracy and defining the Obama administration as engaging in “Marxist experiments.” Really, guys? On the plus side though, in this hypothetical future history, all the really annoying right-wingnut propagandists like Glenn Beck, Neil Boortz, Rush Limbaugh, Michelle Malkin, Bill O’Reilly, and Sean Hannity have all either been killed or have disappeared. So the future is looking brighter. . .
Well this time they’re totally serious! It turns out I guess that they didn’t carry the one or something because now the world’s going to end on October 21, 2009. And you know this time they’ve got it right because they’ve got such a great track record for predicting these apocalypes.
Like before, I recommend screen capturing this page again, so that you can compare it to what it says on October 22, 2009.
And while most would probably dismiss this as a blob of nothing, Adrian Shine thinks it warrents further study. Of course she also happens to be a researcher from the Loch Ness Project, so methinks she’s a little biased on the matter.
I found this paragraph particularly amusing:
Earlier this year it was reported that climate change may have killed the Loch Ness Monster. There have been “no “credible sightings” of Nessie for over a year.
Of course! Maybe climate change killed Nessie. After all, it killed all the leprechauns and unicorns, didn’t it?
There are clearly only 2 options here. Either it’s some sort of mysterious cryptozoological monster on Lake Champlain. Maybe it’s Chupacabra. I do love me a good Chupacabra sighting.
Remember waaaaaaay back in August, around the time I started this blog, there was that photo everyone was talking about of the alleged “Montauk Monster.” It led to a whole lot of ridiculous speculation about things like toxins, genetic engineering, and bioterrorism that sounded like dialogue from a monster movie.
Even with an all-powerful god on their side, Christians are still afraid of a little girl, and they’re still no match for one with a rational mind.
Despite their “faith” in their teachings and the absolute power of their god to control the universe, they feel threatened by chocolate sculptures and teenage girls with YouTube accounts. A strong belief system should value skepticism because it tests one’s faith, which leads to stronger faith when that belief is verifiable as the truth. Only false prophets, teaching a weak faith, fear the questioning of that faith, because they know they might be wrong.
Has a psychic stopped Stop Sylvia Browne? - Robert Lancaster’s great website exposing the truth about sham psychic Sylvia Browne seems to have been hijacked by a psychic. It’s a shame. The site partially inspired Stop Jenny, at least in name.
And speaking of despicable, lying sacks of shit, here’s a great parody:
“All I done was ask a question! I did not implicate anybody or anything, any party. I didn’t do anything,” said the official who wished to remain anonymous.
Riiight! Meanwhile, Victoria Jackson — the anti-Julia Sweeney — writes this on her website:
You see, what bothers me most, besides being a Communist, and a racist (Obama writes in his book, From Dreams of My Father, “I found a solace in nursing a pervasive sense of grievance and and animosity against my (white) mother’s race.”) (Obama’s “religion” of the last 20 years is Black Liberation Theology. What is that? “It is simply Marxism dressed up in Christian rhetoric. But unlike traditional Marxism, Black Liberation Theology emphasizes race rather than class. It’s leading theorist is James Cone who says Jesus was black, African-Americans are the chosen people, and whites are the devil. Cone says, “What we need is the destruction of whiteness, which is the source of human misery in the world.” The McAlvany Intelligence Advisor), is that he is a LIAR. He pretends to be a Christian and he incriminates himself everytime he speaks about Christianity. To lie about being a believer in Christ is very dangerous. Lightning could strike him at any minute! But seriously, he doesn’t have a clue what the Bible says and yet he pretends to be a church- going Christian to win votes. That is sooooo evil.
And speaking of Obama, even when he’s making an attack ad, Obama keeps it clean:
“The internet, in democratizing knowledge, has led a lot of people to believe that it is also possible to democratize expertise.”
The Cyprus Serpent -On the island of Cyprus people are frantically searching for their very own Loch Ness Monster, a sea creature reportedly roaming the depths near the Kouris Dam. Of course there’s nothing but anecdotal evidence for the creature’s existence, so I wouldn’t hold your breath.
AND NOW FOR A MOMENT OF SCIENCE:
Immune System Causes Common Cold Symptoms – “A University of Calgary scientist confirms that it is how our immune system responds, not the rhinovirus itself, that causes cold symptoms. Of more than 100 different viruses that can cause the common cold, human rhinoviruses are the major cause.”
Real Robinson Crusoe: Evidence Of Island Camp- “Cast away on a desert island, surviving on what nature alone can provide, praying for rescue but fearing the sight of a boat on the horizon. These are the imaginative creations of Daniel Defoe in his famous novel Robinson Crusoe. Yet the story is believed to be based on the real-life experience of sailor Alexander Selkirk, marooned in 1704 on a small tropical island in the Pacific for more than four years, and now archaeological evidence has been found to support contemporary records of his existence on the island.” So that’s where Locke took the island!
This led PZ Myers to bring up that Webster Cook, the student who unwittingly began Crackergate and was the first victim of Donohue’s wrath, didn’t make fun of Catholics or Catholicism at all. He merely took the Eucharist with him instead of eating it? The only thing tasteless I here was the cracker.
Oh, and for the record, the age-requirement on YouTube is a joke. It asks you if you’re over 18 and any idiot can figure out that they can view the content by simply pressing the button that affirms they are 18. If that’s all it takes to appease Donohue, I wish he’d said so sooner.
June Cartwright, chair of the commission, told the Associated Press that the sculpture was viewed simply as a piece of art and is not a religious endorsement.
“It’s a piece of artwork,” Cartwright said. “It doesn’t state that it is specifically Jesus. It is whatever you perceive it to be.”
Um, no. That’s Jesus no how much I want it to be Angelina Jolie naked. Fortunately, the mayor has decided not to spend taxpayer money on this. But am I the only one amused by the fact that Jesus is depicted playing with kids when this was to go up in front a Catholic gift shop? Or that the sculpture is titled, “Come Unto Me?” I guess Jesus is a fan of the money shot.
Lately Evolution-deniers have been quite predictably been exploiting the recent statements by lone scientist Steve Jones that humans are no longer evolving. They’re saying see, even the “evolutionists” are admitting that there’s no evidence of human evolution (how they interpreted that from Jones’ actual statement is beyond me), but Jones is a minority opinion on this matter. Here PZ Myers argues why “that is impossible.”
Speaking of PZ, the man rocks! – His blog has got an enormous readership and I contacted him earlier today and asked if he’d plug stopjenny.com and he came through.
Gnomes return to Argentina – That’s right, Argentinians have reported more sightings of a black-clad, sideways-stepping “midget monster” in a pointy hat. So if you see something that looks kinda like a dog and barks kinda like a dog, you’ll know that it’s really a gnome. I sense some implausibly blurry video coming on. Here’s the earlier video from last March:
“I see this financial breakdown, moreover, as being not merely a moral crisis but the monetary expression of the broader degradation of our values – the erosion of duty and responsibility to others in favour of instant gratification, unlimited demands repackaged as ‘rights’ and the loss of self-discipline. And the root cause of that erosion is ‘militant atheism’. . .”
It goes on for the longest run-on sentence in human history. Oh, and she’s also a denier of evolution, the safety of vaccines, and global climate change. The Trifecta!
“The only thing that was a bit disturbing was she had a pin (badge) on that said ‘God is not real’ and that was upsetting to me. But I still pray for her to this day. Hopefully she’s changed her mind.”
Wahlberg is reported as having a small chapel in his Hollywood mansion.
Only one of the 535 members of Congress, Representative Pete Stark, Democrat of California, publicly identifies as a nontheist, according to the Secular Coalition of America, a lobbying group based in Washington. For that matter, the coalition has existed for only three years and runs with two staff members and an annual budget of about $300,000. As both presidential candidates ardently court religious voters, atheist support is considered so controversial that several Democrats writing on the atheist blog Petty Larseny quipped that the best way to hurt the Republicans was to form a group called Atheists for McCain.
Actually, there are at least 22 members of Congress who admitted to Lori Lipman Brown that they did not believe in a god but only Stark was willing to be outed. But I have to say that that Atheists for McCain would be a great idea if McCain’s candidacy wasn’t sunk already. We’ll have to remember that though for the next election.
AND NOW FOR A MOMENT OF SCIENCE:
Emotion And Scent Create Lasting Memories – “In a series of experiments with sleeping mice, researchers at the Duke University Medical Center have shown that the part of the brain that processes scents is indeed a key part of forming long-term memories, especially involving other individuals.”
Radical Advances In Optical Technologies? – “A new research field called transformation optics may usher in a host of radical advances including a cloak of invisibility and ultra-powerful microscopes and computers by harnessing nanotechnology and “metamaterials.”
Einstein’s Relativity Survives Neutrino Test – “Physicists working to disprove “Lorentz invariance” — Einstein’s prediction that matter and massless particles will behave the same no matter how they’re turned or how fast they go — won’t get that satisfaction from muon neutrinos, at least for the time being, says a consortium of scientists.”
Sarah Palin – creationist sympathizer - In the past she’s stated that science classes should “teach the controversy” between Evolution and Creationism. I wonder if she thinks we should also teach these equally valid controversies:
Get ready for flu season – If you’re Kim Stagliano from the “Age of Autism” blog, you probably think the flu is harmless because you never saw anyone die of the flu in Leave It To Beaver, but it’s actually responsible for 35,000 deaths a year.
Autism “Research” Institute (ARI) announces Autism TV – Sounds like a great idea, right? Wrong. There’s a reason I put quotation marks around the word “Research.” Yup, this is a front group for propagating anti-vaccine misinformation. In fact, the Age of Autism blog says they’re sponsored by the ARI. What a depressing development. But I suppose Jenny McCarthy will probably have a job again.
Arctic Ice On Verge Of Another All-time Low – “Following last summer’s record minimum ice cover in the Arctic, current observations from ESA’s Envisat satellite suggest that the extent of polar sea-ice may again shrink to a level very close to that of last year.”
Why Flies Are So Hard To Swat – “Over the past two decades, Michael Dickinson has been interviewed by reporters hundreds of times about his research on the biomechanics of insect flight. One question from the press has always dogged him: Why are flies so hard to swat? … Long before the fly leaps, its tiny brain calculates the location of the impending threat, comes up with an escape plan, and places its legs in an optimal position to hop out of the way in the opposite direction. All of this action takes place within about 100 milliseconds after the fly first spots the swatter.”
Eyes Evolved For ‘X-Ray Vision’ – “The advantage of using two eyes to see the world around us has long been associated solely with our capacity to see in 3-D. Now, a new study from a scientist at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has uncovered a truly eye-opening advantage to binocular vision: our ability to see through things.” The article also says:
“All animals have a binocular region — parts of the world that both eyes can see simultaneously — which allows for X-ray vision and grows as eyes become more forward facing.
Demonstrating our X-ray ability is fairly simple: hold a pen vertically and look at something far beyond it. If you first close one eye, and then the other, you’ll see that in each case the pen blocks your view. If you open both eyes, however, you can see through the pen to the world behind it.
To demonstrate how our eyes allow us to see through clutter, hold up all of your fingers in random directions, and note how much of the world you can see beyond them when only one eye is open compared to both. You miss out on a lot with only one eye open, but can see nearly everything behind the clutter with both.”
And in monkey news…
Unexpected Monkey Population Found In Cambodia – “A Wildlife Conservation Society report reveals surprisingly large populations of two globally threatened primates in a protected area in Cambodia. The report counted 42,000 black-shanked douc langurs along with 2,500 yellow-cheeked crested gibbons in Cambodia’s Seima Biodiversity Conservation Area, an estimate that represents the largest known populations for both species in the world.”
Was there a hidden agenda behind the recent Big Foot hoax? – Steven Novella speculates on the role Tom Biscardi may have played in this incident. Biscardi is considered even by the “mainstream” Big Foot hunters as a conman. But has he made a monkey out of us all?
Interview with “pet psychic” dumbfounds Rebecca Watson – It never ceases to amaze me as well as others in the skeptical community how the media can treat such obvious tin-foil-hat-level nonsense so uncritically as part of a mere fluff piece to kill time. You can’t find a real news story? Really?
Pastor makes IRS mad by misusing pulpit – “An activist group has filed an IRS complaint against Cornerstone Church, accusing the megachurch’s pastor of endorsing three Sumner County school board candidates from the pulpit.”
“If an IRS investigation determines Davis violated federal rules, it could jeopardize the Madison church’s tax-exempt status. Since 2007, the IRS has revoked the tax-exempt status of about 190 organizations nationwide, according to its Website.”
Another classic Creationist quote mine – One of the most common techniques Creationists use to trick people is to take quotes out of context to suggest specific great minds were Creationists. (For example, on the top of this page here). And some great minds really were believers in a creator god. But of course, it’s all irrelevant as it’s an argument from authority. Even smart people can be wrong and in the end ideas stand or fall on their own merits, namely what the evidence shows. In this instance, Douglas Theobold demolishes creationist Berlinski’s claim that the famous mathematician John Von Neumann rejected Evolution.
Presidential Candidates on space policy – Find out where Obama and McCain stand…or rather how they currently claim to stand. Still no word on Paris Hilton’s space policy.
When “Big Pharma” REALLY is lying to us – Obviously “Big Pharma” has become a popular scapegoat for the grand conspiracy theorists in recent years. And while those accusations are mostly unfounded, sometimes the pharmaceutical companies prove they really are like every other corporations by using clinical trials designed by the marketing department to sell product. Here’s another skeptical blogger’s take on this issue. Sadly, this is just the sort of news story that the “Big Pharma” grand conspiracy theorists will latch onto and invoke constantly because it just so happens to be a rare news story that is in line with their agenda and seems to validate their every suspicion. That might be the biggest tragedy of this whole thing. But I’m reporting it, so let it never be said by the conspiracy theorists that I’m just a “sheeple” who blindly accepts authority. Big Pharma is wrong in this instance, wrong, wrong, wrong.
2. New online game for radical right-wingnuts – The game takes place in 2011 after “Obama’s coup fails.” The game invokes the “New World Order” conspiracy and rewrites history, establishing Lou Dobbs as the “one brave newscaster” who first sounded the alarm bells of the evil Obama/NWO conspiracy and defining the Obama administration as engaging in “Marxist experiments.” Really, guys? On the plus side though, in this hypothetical future history, all the really annoying right-wingnut propagandists like Glenn Beck, Neil Boortz, Rush Limbaugh, Michelle Malkin, Bill O’Reilly, and Sean Hannity have all either been killed or have disappeared. So the future is looking brighter. . .
3. Remember that website I blogged about last month that predicted the end of the world would happen on September 21, 2009 and then immediately afterwards changed the end of the world to September 23, 2009. . .or September 23, 2015?
Posted by mjr256 
Posted by mjr256 
Posted by mjr256 
