It's OVER HERE

We've been through this before.

Which is, apparently, American Airlines' new corporate motto. The background: Meryl Dorey of the AVN has recorded an interview, in which she repeatedly herps on topics of which she is ignorant and unqualified. American Air picks up the segment for its inflight entertainment program and magazine. Public outcry, and right now, there's a twitter storm a-happening. PZ Myers (102,000 followers) and Phil Plait (174,000 followers) have picked up the story. Stop The AVN have been vocally hammering the twitter stream and email channels. Many prominent medical voices on social media are throwing their weight behind the message. This is not acceptable. American's response? The mind...

ACT ONE The scene: A tiny upstairs newsroom in one of Melbourne's less salubrious quarters. In it are crammed four desks, the largest and most imposing of which is lorded over by The Editor. The Editor's off-white striped shirt is stained at the pits with the sweat of editorial stress. His hair is thinning, but he retains the muscular frame of a weekend rugby player, though these days it's overlaid with a generous veneer of fat. His tie hangs from his chairback, and hasn't seen his neck in some time. Several stained whisky tumblers litter the desk, and the nearby wastepaper basket shows the neck...

So anyway, while I've been riding my bike around the place and losing fifteen kilograms or so of unwanted adipose tissue, the world of skepticism and atheism has been chugging on regardless. We have much action over at Stop The AVN, as Dorey and her dim-witted troop of flying monkeys continue to make shit up with gay abandon despite being thoroughly and eloquently rebuttfucked. We have #atheistcon approaching like a freight train toward Wile E. Coyote, and we have, as of the last week or so, a rapidly developing case of the Streisands, occasioned by the delivering by Francine Scrayen upon...

So saith Chiropractic Assistant Lily Phenomene, of Carine Glades Chiropractic*, in this comment from the Stop The Australian Vaccination Network Facebook page.  Why? Well, I had the temerity to equate homeopathy and chiropractic with "witch doctors". HOW DARE I? Well, here's the thing. Well, technically, here are the things. Chiropractic, in its original form, is little more than faith healing. Faith healing dressed as physiotherapy, but faith healing nonetheless. How so? Allow me to explain. D.D. Palmer, the originator of chiropractic, posited that health was maintained by a poorly-defined "energy" he referred to as "Innate Intelligence". Blockages - called subluxations by chiropractors - in the...

Meryl's latest absurd scrawlings concern homeopathy, and take as their theme the skeptical dismissal of this modality as "magic water". Meryl, it seems, is somewhat resentful of our stance on homeopathy, and she explains this. She then goes on to spin us a yarn based, apparently, on the experiences of a "friend" whose husband apparently had a miraculous recovery thanks to some sugar pills bathed in almost pure water. A friend-of-a-friend tale in the classic vein. I have a tale too, Meryl. When I was a young lad of perhaps ten years old, my parents took me to see the great Paul...

So. My checklist from yesterday's Newtown Festival Disgusted at Newtown Community Chiropractic's utter quackery - check Tell "psychic" to fuck off because you don't give a fuck about his sincerely held but deeply stupid beliefs - check Have argument with creationist; have creationist prematurely declare "victory" halfway through a sentence; call creationist an "arseclown" - check Sing song containing the word "cunt" on the ukulele - check    aaaaaaaaaand.... check Attempt to avoid festival altogether by hitting the pub instead - partial success ...

I have a mortgage. Very grown-up, huh? Yeah. My mortgage is currently with NAB, or more specifically, with Homeside, the NAB's mortgage division. We switched to them a while ago when it became clear that Macquarie Bank were taking the piss with constant rate rises, and were a pack of suit-wearing moray eels with Louis Vuitton briefcases and expensive coke habits. Anyway, I recently changed jobs. During the lead-up to the change-over some furious budget calculation went on, and it became clear that we were going to be a bit strapped for cash during the transition from job A (salary) to job B (contract...

Dear IT Guys I have a problem with you. Yes, I mean you. You people ostensibly providing information technology services. Especially those of you in government organisations. What exactly are you playing at? You've become an impediment to human productivity. How did this happen? IT was meant to be the shining future of humanity. It was meant to give us offices free of paper, instantaneous communication, systems that would know what we want and when we want it, machines that would do all the crappy stuff and leave us free to innovate and live a little. IT was meant to liberate us so we could achieve our...

Nimrod Weiner, antivax chiropractor from Newtown Community Chiropractic, who I've mentioned before, appears to be a veritable fountain of lulz. Today, someone dug up a piece from Weiner's fifth year at Macquarie School of Chiropractic in which the young weiner - sorry, Weiner - seemingly compares himself with Einstein, pleads for "paradigm shifts", berates his lecturers for not teaching the solidly debunked pseudoscience of subluxations and sets himself up as some kind of junior champion for the New Chiropractic Revolution* The original text is here. Here's the text, just in case someone deletes the original: And yet, as a 5th year chiropractic student at Macquarie University,...

Ever heard of Newtown Community Chiropractic? It's a chiropractic clinic in Newtown, and it's all about the community. So much so that it occasionally runs anti-vaccination "seminars" at which employee/owner of Newtown Community Chiropractic Nimrod Weiner uses Newtown Community Chiropractic's premises, marketing, budget and 'reputation' to push an untrue anti-vaccination message to impressionable parents from the Newtown Community and the surrounding Inner West. Oh, that Newtown Community Chiropractic, you say? Yes, that Newtown Community Chiropractic. Not very nice. Anyway, one of Australia's fine national broadsheets ran a story on Nimrod Weiner, and a seminar he held at Newtown Community Chiropractic recently, which has attracted the attention of some...

Over at Mike Stuchbery's blog, a comment fight is going on over Peter Garrett's letter to Evonne Paddinson, head of ACCESS Ministries and self-admitted winner of souls for christ through the NSCP. Garrett, of course, is a stealth christian, as I've pointed out previously, but oddly enough so are many of his defenders around the blogosphere. Take, for example, Philip Brookes. Philip is a prolific commenter over at Mike Stuchbery's blog, and in fact anywhere the NSCP is mentioned. Philip avoids any reference to christianity in his posts, and cultivates an outward image of the unbiased onlooker, all the while accusing opponents of the...

Seems Dana Ullman doesn't know what the Streisand Effect is. Dana wishes to quash suggestions that he is in fact a conman, so makes rumbling noises about libel. Pity he is, in fact, a vendor of sugar pills and water which he claims have magical curative effects which they cannot, in fact, be demonstrated to possess. This is the very archetype of the conman, fraud and quack. It is perhaps vaguely possible, though unlikely, that Ullman is merely trolling for attention - he does possess a somewhat narcicisstic personality - however I don't think that should stop us telling the world about Ullman's status...

There's now a simple test. Head over to Shellity's blog and try it out.

A few days ago, I posted a screenshot to Facebook. Meryl Dorey reported this to Facebook as a copyright violation. It's not the first. She's been abusing the Facebook system for several weeks now, but this is the first time she's reported one of mine. That she reported it at all is odd, considering the picture is not owned by the AVN, and neither is over half the text,which was pasted wholesale from an online journal syndicating "Neuropathology and Applied Neurobiology". It also doesn't actually say what she thinks it says, discussing as it does the outcomes of low-level, non-obvious trauma, not vaccination. All up, less...

This weekend, over at the "Vaccine Information Network (VINE)" Facebook page, an interesting graph appeared. This graph, as you can see, is an obvious fake-up. The "total meningitis reporting rate" is tacked on using a cheap graphics program such as MS Paint. It shows an incredibly  implausible trend - that Hib meningitis reporting rates rocketed but hospitalisations and deaths sharply declined. The legend has been clumsily tacked on, in an unmatched font with an unmatched background, and a typo, and the copyright claim, most damningly of all, is both incorrectly declared and purported to be from "fictuscorp". Fictus is a latin...

Via Twitter and Skeptical Canary comes a link to an online survey set up by antivaxers into the health of unvaccinated children. There are many things about this which are colossally stupid. One is the self-selection bias which is inevitable in antivaxers carrying this out. If the link is spread among ideologically-motivated antivaxers, then only ideologically-motivated antivaxers will answer, making it "a survey of the purported health of the children of people known to lie a lot" The other majorly stupid thing is that it's on the internet. Guess what else is on the internet? Yep, you guessed right. People like me. So I filled...

On top of everything else Meryl Dorey does, Meryl has today been revealed by Facebook as being the false copyright claimant behind recent removals of content from the Stop The AVN Facebook page. An email from Facebook admins confirms what SAVN Administrators suspected all along: -----Original Message----- From: ip+jgimsrn@support.facebook.com [mailto:ip+jgimsrn@support.facebook.com] Sent: Saturday, 5 February 2011 8:52 AM To: <redacted> Subject: Re: Copyright Counter Complaint: #254415615 Hi <redacted>, Thank you for bringing this matter to our attention. Please note that we removed the content in question because we received a proper notice of copyright infringement compliant with the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(3). If you would like to...

David Ould has taken to redacting posts now, in order to protect his own fragile ego WTF? Indeed. Long story short, this thread has been one long morrass of Godwinism, occasionally interspersed with logical failures and rebukes. Finally, it's reached the point where David is now redacting content which exposes his own logical flaws and retaining the final, entirely deliberate insult (not an ad-hominem, since I'm not using it to counter his "arguments") - which is frankly meaningless without the preceding content. So, business as usual then. Theist selectively quotes atheist in order to make the atheist look bad and the theist look...

6 If your very own brother, or your son or daughter, or the wife you love, or your closest friend secretly entices you, saying, “Let us go and worship other gods” (gods that neither you nor your fathers have known, 7 gods of the peoples around you, whether near or far, from one end of the land to the other), 8 do not yield to him or listen to him. Show him no pity. Do not spare him or shield him. 9 You must certainly put him to death. Your hand must be the first in putting him to death,...

Clarus Products, makers of the placebo pendant Q-Link have released a media statement emphasising that they do not pay third parties for endorsements. Here's the release in full STATEMENT BY CLARUS TRANSPHASE SCIENTIFIC, INC., DEVELOPER-MANUFACTURER OF Q-LINK™ PRODUCTS & SRT™ TECHNOLOGY (SAN FRANCISCO, California) –Recent media attention in Australia to energy products generally and particularly to our own Q-Link™ brand product line calls for our clear comment. As the developer and manufacturer of the Q-Link™ range of energy products – products that have been on the market for 19 years and sold to more than a million users in more than 50 countries – we want to make...

... Streisand Effect, meet Rodial Limited As this story outlines, Rodial Ltd, manufacturers of an expensive "boob job" gel, are attempting to stifle scientific comment through the use of UK libel laws. Good luck with that It is highly unlikely that this product, "boob job" by Rodial Ltd, works as claimed. Here's the original Daily Fail article upon which the case is being based.

Question. If abiogenesis is not science because you can't observe it, and evolution is not science because you can't observe it*.... Then how the fuck do you go about observing the creationist hypothesis? Time travel? Magic? LOLWUT?   * evolution has been observed, I know. Joe is just ignorant.

Several times recently I've had antivaxers cite thalidomide as a case of medical harm and/or failure. Well, I was just prepping some medication and I got to thinking. You see, there are two packs of thalidomide in my kitchen drawer. Whaaaa? Yep, two packs. You see, thalidomide is still in use. In the case of my kitchen drawer, it's being used as a treatment for Esther's GvH, an area where it seems to have some effect. These days, of course, the screening process is more stringent - you can't get it if you're pregnant, for a start, and there are regular checks on patients...

Dawkins wins

I'll just leave this here, shall I? Elaine Dow, you're an idiot.

  Not for the first time, supporters of the Australian Vaccination Network are off on a cyberstalking campaign. The image above is of a Facebook sockpuppet account, intended to be in the name of a Stop the AVN member's wife, publicising a private FB group intended to share sooper-sekrit "information" gathered on members of Stop The AVN. They googled up the wrong person, though. Ooops. The group in question "The Who's Who of Stop the AVN" is, I believe, the third or fourth incarnation of "Stop The AVN Exposed", a private facebook group for acolytes of the Cult of Meryl, in which they share what...

As regular readers will know, my focus right now is on the Australian Vaccination Network, an anti-vaccination group from Northern NSW whose president, Meryl Dorey, consistently claims that she is not anti-vaccination, but is merely pro-choice. Well, courtesy of a friend of mine on the Stop The AVN Facebook Group, here's something to chew over

Short attention span? Skip to the bottom for a version of this post designed specifically for you! Look, it's like this. I'm worried that this blog is turning into a single-issue publication, I really am. But demolishing the continued utter fail of the AVN is just too easy. It's like shooting fish in a barrel. No, scrub that. It's like dropping a grenade into a barrel of fish and running away very fast. Above is a screenshot, courtesy of my good friend Peter, from the AVN's Facebook page. This is Meryl Dorey posting a story she's found that she thinks supports her point of...

Courtesy of the NSW Healthcare Complaints Commission: The AVN’s failure to include a notice on its website of the nature recommended by the Commission may result in members of the public making improperly informed decisions about whether or not to vaccinate, and therefore poses a risk to public health and safety. Read the full release at the HCCC: Public warning about the Australian Vaccination Network.

 The link Meryl has tweeted comes from the conspiracy website nationalexpositor.com. It speculates about commercial-in-confidence agreements signed with vaccine manufacturers, something that's done to provide governments  maximum information with minimum commercial exposure. It's not, in principle, unlike an NDA between say, a software company and their developer partners. I've signed a lot of those. They're normal procedure. Of course, to the National Expectorator, this means they're secret contracts to cover up vaccine deaths. No kidding. As a taste of their usual menu of paranoia, their top story at the present time is: "False Flag Cyber Attack Could Takedown The Internet Billion dollar cybersecurity industry at...

 So, apparently, this big beardy guy in the sky already knows everything I'm ever going to do, ever. But also, apparently, I choose to sin. What's with that? Surely if god knows everything I'm ever going to do, I basically have no free will. And if the whole doctrine of sin relies on my free choice in the matter - my choosing to sin, or at least, choosing not to repent and all that - then surely I can't actually, in any meaningful sense, commit a sin. Ever. Because I have no choice. It's pre-destined. All I have is an illusion of choice, because...

Dear, dear readers! You're smart, numerate kind of people. Some of you will have read my previous posts on hokey maths. Some of you can even count. Can you see how Meryl is lying with numbers? Here's a tip. There's more than one lie. Tell you what, I'll help you out a little. Here's the NSW vaccination schedule. And Meryl Dorey's overall claim as that there are 31 doses of vaccine in the schedule by 12 months of age*. OK, you're seeing it now? No? OK, well allow me to explain. The first lie is in Meryl's claim that three doses DPaT equals nine doses total. This...

  The article Meryl cites is here The very first paragraph reads: Pertussis (whooping cough) is a mandatorily notifiable disease in Slovenia and since 1959, there has been an active national immunisation programmme. Since the start of this programme, the annual number of notified cases has fallen sharply [1] Does that really sound like the vaccine did nothing? Really? OK, that's just the beginning of Meryl's fail. Let's delve further. The study cited is of an outbreak in a kindergarten. Of the 12 kids in the kindergarten, two (16%) had confirmed pertussis, most likely picked up from either the parent cited in the paper*, or the same source as the...

Well, it is if you're an antivaxxer like our old friend Meryl Dorey. Just so you don't think I'm putting words in Meryl's mouth, here's a little screenshot from the Australian Vaccination Network's blog.   What Meryl and Tom are discussing here is a paper entitled "Measles outbreak in a fully immunized secondary-school population". It seems Meryl didn't read much beyond the title, since the actual article examines the difference between seropositive children in a fully vaccinated population (that is, those which had active antibodies against measles), and seronegative children (who didn't). There were 74 seronegative students and 1732 seropositive students. That's about 4.3% seronegative. 14...

Yet again, a post about one of Meryl Dorey's regularly scheduled SocialOomph tweets. And guess what? Meryl is lying again. Oh, sure, she's probably just repeating something she's heard somewhere else. Sad thing is, though, she's been told she's wrong repeatedly and she's still carrying on, so it's crossed from merely repeating a rumour without checking into the territory of outright lie. She's repeating this on the "official" twitter channel of the Australian Vaccination Network, which claims to be an independent watchdog. It's not a watchdog. It's a half-blind junkyard mutt with three legs. So, are pharma companies the biggest buyers...

Those words were spoken by Meryl Dorey, arch-antivaxer and chief fallacy-pusher of the Australian Vaccination Network, on Channel 7's "Sunday Night" programme. The segment was discussing measles and pertussis outbreaks here in Australia, and focused on the tragic death of little Dana McCaffery from pertussis. The non-factual basis of this quote is beyond question, however just for good measure, let's look at some mortality figures for measles and pertussis. First, let's see about 30 years ago. Here are some figures from the mid-1970s, a time when I, a 30-something, was making my first faltering steps into the world. The figures are from the US, and...

Copypastianity (noun): The tendency, during online debates, for christians to immediately google up the first apologetic website that suits their argument, and to paste the text wholesale into the comment thread, thus executing a perfect Gish Gallop without any of that tedious thinking and typing.

Episode 5 Episode 6  Yes, it's true. Meryl is an HIV denier too. She's tried to paint herself as an honest questioner, but after she's been handed evidence and research and is still asking the questions that research has answered, the only applicable label is "denialist". So, there we have it. Meryl Dorey: conspiracy theorist and AIDS denialist. Ooooooh, That Meryl!

Ethics Trial a Rees Throwback: Catholics A telling headline if I've ever seen one, as a representative of the local Catholic lobby attempts to tie the NSW Secular Ethics education trial, which has just begun, to Nathan Rees's premiership. The implication is of course that since Rees was forced out by a secret ballot orchestrated by the current party faithful, that obviously this is somehow a "bad" policy of a "failed' premiership that's only snuck through by the skin of its teeth. The truth, of course, is far from the fantasy promoted by Mr Robert Haddad and the church generally*. The ethics trial...

Well, yes. There's that much fail. Meryl tweeted a few hours ago. Here's what she had to say: Yes, Meryl. That's totally new research. Completely. Except that... oh, wait... let's look at the article, shall we? There's no date at the top. The Daily Fail does that. But look at the comments. The most recent is from.... ... - Helen, London, 13/6/2006 17:56 Wait, what? Yep, that's right. Meryl is trying to vindicate the work of the discredited, unethical, censured quack Andrew Wakefield with an article from 2006, nearly four years previous to the GMC decision that has seen Wakefield's public disgrace. Nice work Meryl. Oh, and that research? The...

Meryl Dorey recently had this to say on twitter: Skeptics - when I said that measles in Sanskrit is gift from a goddess - I meant the SANSKRIT word for measles - work it out for yourselves! Yeah, obviously it was us misunderstanding your statement, not you being wrong. For the record, here's Meryl's original statement, which she's repeated several times: Did you know: Measles in Sanskrit translates as "Gift from a Goddess" because huge developmental and growth spurts often followed infection. Protip, Meryl. The only places I can find that "fact" is antivax websites. You're just repeating, verbatim, the usual way. Here's what...

Most of the time, they're just funny and a little dumb. @DrNancyMalik is usually funny and dumb. Sometimes, though, things bubble to the surface that just make me angry. C0nc0rdance, recently, has triggered that. C0ncordance is one of the good guys, but his videos have poked me and reminded me of the Gloria Thomas Sam case, a case that happened in my chosen home city.       So don't come round here and ask me how homeopathy can be harmful.

Apparently, someone's been searching Skepticator for the word "fucktards". No results were found. Well, says I, why not rectify that? The following people have been alleged to be fucktards Dr Joseph Mercola Mike Adams Meryl Dorey DrNancyMalik Dana Ullman Each and every one a fucktard. Additions to this list can be sent to me in the usual way, or added to the comments below.

Scene: Garden of Eden. Newly built. Adam and Eve, sounding naive and newly minted, converse with God. Birdsong in background, gentle waters lapping.   God: So, Adam, Eve. You like it here? Adam: Oh yeah, it's great! Eve: Nice flowers! G: Good, glad you like it. Took me days. A: I'm quite fond of the trees. E: Oh yeah, just look at the trees. G: Yes, I like them myself, and speaking of trees, before I let you alone there's just one thing. A: OK. What? E: Oooh! Butterfly! G: There's this one thing, right? A: Ok.... G: There's a tree over there. With fruit on it A: The big one? G: Yes, the big...

Ruth Gledhill writes the "Articles of Faith" blog for the UK's Times newspaper. I've subscribed to her column for a while now, because as an activist atheist, it's always good to see what's going on around the world in the area of "faith". One of the problems* with Ruth is, though, that occasionally, she just doesn't get it. Take this headline, for example. Happy 'atheist bus' children are Christians Oh, Ruth! That's ironic! Those silly atheists have done a bus ad featuring children, but they're actually christians! Ho ho ho! Oh, those atheists, oh so wrong. Trouble is, here's what the ad actually says So in...

  Oh, Albert. That last paragraph has just earned you a coveted place in my "Raging Fucking Nutbags" Tweetdeck column, because let's face it, that 's a *really* stupid thing to say.   In fact, evolutionary theory predicts and demands compassionate behaviour in social species. Allow me to explain.   Your strawman of evolution, that the strongest survive, that there's no call to altruism and that "might is right" might be correct, if only we were an entirely solitary species. In your cartoon version of evolution, we're all meandering through life entirely alone, just looking for things to eat and things to fuck, and our...

... or not As my readers* may be aware, my recent skeptical focus has been all over the anti-vaccination lobby, a bunch of rabid, idiotic fringe-dwellers who think vaccines are the sole cause of everything bad in the world. One of the oft-repeated canards of the antivaxers is that vaccines contain thimerosal, which contains mercury, and that mercury is the second most toxic substance known to man. But is it? Liam Skoda, over at the Stop The AVN Facebook group, took up the challenge of this question and in short order demolished this piece of antivax nonsense. Liam simply looked up some known lethal dose...

I just got this email, via the blog's feedback mechanism, from someone calling themselves "Jando" (email address withheld). Interesting reading about all points of view is available. I can't help but think that these blogs are a bit too personal (ie riddled with one-liners, insults, comebacks, counter insults etc) from both sides to provide any real mature context for the debate on wether to vax or not to vax. What everyone here needs is a good shot of rationale open debate. I suppose I also wonder why one side is SO pro and one SO anti, maybe the pro's should let...

... of antivax morons   You'll recall from yesterday's post that Jane was the lovely lady wishing that my next shot was a lethal one. She then suggested that my good friend Peter should "gargle bleach [to] help with the smell of shit of your breath". Jane is a wonderful human being. She also later accused Peter of being incarcerated for 18 months for aggravated assault (untrue), and of being sued over a post on his "ratbags" webpage (also untrue). I hit my posting limit this evening, in addressing the pure idiocy of these folks. Today was perhaps a little less juvenile than...

If you saw yesterday's post, dear reader, you'll be aware that I've been flexing a little skeptic muscle on the Australian Anti Vaccination Network's Facebook page. The subject of yesterday's post, Erwin Alber, seems to have slinked off with only a parting Hitler reference to remember him by. But we've got a whole 'nother batch of crazy cooking up. Enter Jane, Lauren and Nicola, three rabid supporters of the Antivax movement. Through today blows were traded, statistics cited (our side), anecdotes rambled (their side), links provided (our side) and emotive fearmongering employed (guess which side) It eventually became clear that the strain...

One of the current targets of the Australian Skeptics is the Australian Vaccination Network. I will not stoop to link to them, though a swift search engine foray will either get you to their site or, depending on how the skeptics have reacted, a googlewhacked site explaining their work. Essentially, under the guise of "caring for the children", the Australian Vaccination Network is actively discouraging vaccination for children. Yep, that's what I said. They're discouraging vaccinating your kids. I don't wish to cover old ground, so I'll point you to my good friend Doctor Rachael Dunlop's blog, which has extensive coverage and...

The blogosphere's been all over this today, but I've been kind of offline. And had to spend some time responding to cosmological bollocks. In response to the weekend's horrendous bushfires throughout Victoria, we have possibly the biggest piece of  religious fuckwittery since Falwell blamed 9/11 on teh gayz. Brace yourself. Here's the epic religious fucktardery in its original form.  So, according to some dude with a fucking ridiculous moustache, Victoria is on fire, and many people are dead, and all because of a change to Victoria's abortion laws. God, in his mercy, has withdrawn his protection, and immediately the entire state has burst...

I have truly epic insomnia, so in a continuing series on ontological proofs, I present proof positive of the existence of Cerberus, monstrous three-headed hound of Hades 1. Cerberus is the most terrifying dog we can imagine 2. Hell-Hounds that exist are waaaaay more scary than ones that don't. 3. Therefore; Cerberus exists And he's going to eat your face off if you keep trying to claim ontological arguments hold any water at all. Remember this, dear readers. Also, new comment policy. If you can't fit it into one comment, either revise it or post a link to your own blog, where you can...

I'm on twitter. Twitter is a wonderful place. I've met some amazing people and I've been having an absolute blast, so when I sat down at the computer last night with a bottle of red, intending to surf and tweet, it was with a light heart. I was happy. Websinthe and I follow each other, and we had a great exchange in which both us big manly men admitted to being big bloody wusses really. I had a little cry, because of things said over twitter. It might well have been the high-point of my twitterlife so far. So I guess it...

Oh, for fuck's sake... Ontological Argument When you say that no evidence is offered by this argument, you seem to be ruling out immediately the possibility of an a priori argument for the existence of God. As a methodological conclusion, a bit more is required. In any event, I agree that there is something wrong with this argument. Then again, there may be forms of the argument that get past your objection that it also proves the existence of any imaginary kind of thing. Consider this simple form: 1. God is, by definition, the most powerful person. 2. Persons that exist are more powerful...

... but there is a political controversy, and a religious controversy. What brought this on? Well, as a couple of previous posts have intimated, Sydney Atheists popped on up to Toongabbie Anglican Church over the weekend. During the discussion afterwards, I was chatting with a member of the congregation, I believe one of the pastors. Sorry dude, forgot your name, but you'll soon know who you are. The conversation, paraphrased, went something like this. I'm 'J', Mr Christian is 'X' X: But evolution is just a theory, right? J: You're misunderstanding the word "theory". It does not mean the same as "hypothesis". X: But...

I've been meaning to post this for a few days, but today's collossal media fail on the Hudson River's newest boat has prompted me to step up and do the rant thing Stop throwing the word "miracle" around to describe things that are not miracles. Here is what a miracle is, according to dictionary.com an effect or extraordinary event in the physical world that surpasses all known human or natural powers and is ascribed to a supernatural cause. A highly-skilled pilot ditching a plane in a river without loss of life is NOT A FUCKING MIRACLE. A baby surviving against long odds is NOT A FUCKING MIRACLE Being...

Holy shit No, really. Holy shit At least, that's how I read Narelle Jarrett's post dated 13th January 2009. But wait! Before I wade in, let's just set some context. For one thing, What the fuck is an Archdeacon anyway? Teh Wikipedia delivers. So, an archdeacon is supposedly one step below a bishop. So Narelle, while having mastered sophistry, strawmen and non-sequiteurs, hasn't quite got the hang of moving diagonally. Unfortunately, neither has she mastered the art of the hyperlink, so throughout this post I'll be making some assumptions over Narelle's sources, and linking accordingly. Right, so let's get to the point, it's late and...

Many media outlets are reporting on this, most under their "entertainment" sections, and this being the case, you may wonder, if you're not already in the know, why I'm writing about it, on the homepage of a self-confessed atheist, geek, climber, curmudgeon. How can this possibly tie back to the topic this blog is ostensibly based on? Well, if you'll allow me to elaborate, this ties back to potential harm caused by religious dogma. Come with me on a journey into dogma unleashed. You see, Jett Travolta, in addition to being a 16 year old kid prone to seizures and exhibiting symptoms...

Those of you who know me well will be aware of my policy, held for quite a few years now, of not giving money or support to charities with strong religious affiliation. Some people have called this personal policy into question, pointing out that they're still charities, and surely they're still doing good things. Others have just shrugged and called me a curmudgeon. I commend those people into the care of the Sydney Morning Herald, particularly this article on the St Vincent De Paul Society's real mission. Finally the truth is out "The primary function of the society," said St Vincent de Paul's...

It's always a good day when someone PMs you with a threat of physical violence. jason please dont make this personal and your right about one thing i am not the worlds best speller and some times when i type fast i miss letters and dont check maybe i should use spell check but i didnt so shoot me . but to chastize me would be a mistake i would rather talk about the way religion is so evil and wrong not on how i should spell and hearing about flouride on a athiest group . i dont like fighting but i play...

A Muslim man is suing Tesco for religious discrimination because they asked him to handle alcohol. Now, I don't have every detail on this case, but it's a fair bet that one or more of the following predicates could apply: Our muslim friend is not smart enough to realise that working for a large retail store which sells alcohol may occasionally bring him into contact with, well, alcohol. Tesco are so cringingly culturally sensitive that they genuinely thought when hiring this man that they'd be able to work round this fundamental problem The hiring manager has...

The next person who says or writes "without further adieu", without it being a pisstake, or by way of example, is going to get stabbed, in the neck, with a pen. I mean it, fuckers.

No, really. It Is. Honest Via Frode: The end of the world is right upon us. Any minute now fiery death could rain down from der heavens and fuck us right up. What? Really? I hear you say.... well, according to Ronald Weinland, YES. And I quote: "By the fall of 2008, the United States will have collapsed as a world power, or it will have begun its collapse and no longer exist as an independent nation within six months after that time." Riiiiiiiight. OK - Full disclosure: I'm not American I'm not pro-american, yet at the same time, I'm not...

I've noticed. A lot of you out there on the internet are morons. You have trouble with simple, commonly used linguistic constructs in the English language. Many of you have jobs which pay you large amounts of money, not a penny of which you deserve. Some of you are 'management'. Others delight in the dubious job title of 'copywriter'. All of you are fuckwits; This is the reason: You have trouble with the very simple words There, Their and They're. It's a piece of cake, to use a rather hackneyed colloquialism, to distinguish between these three simple words. There denotes location. "It's over there". "There it is". "There's a bear...

I've been thinking a bit recently about the confirmation bias and the basis (basises? bases?) for irrational thinking. You see, a friend of ours is spruiking a 9/11 Conspiracy DVD and the Extremely Startling InfoTM within. I've been there, done that - after 9/11 I did quite a lot of reading, and a lot of the ground I covered was of the 'batshit mental conspiracy freak' variety. I won't gratuitously link to the sites, they're adequately linked elsewhere, but the common feature most of them share is a rather unhealthy dose of confirmation bias. What is the confirmation bias? Well, in...

In honour of Bill Donohue, head of the Catholic League: To fill you in, Bill called a sculpture called 'My Sweet Lord' by Cosimo Cavallaro [frontal shot here] "One of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever". This from a man whose professed religion was responsible for the Congregation of the Doctrine of The Faith. How about we sit down and have a chat about assaults on sensibilities, Bill? It also occurs to me - is this a body of christ which may actually be appetising? This one was possibly in apple juice, possibly not, but is this the first truly edible full-size...

... they also actively lie. To summarise: Dr. David Menton of Answers in Genesis has written the latest reaction to Tiktaalik roseae. Interestingly, the article makes almost no reference to the Tiktaalik fossils themselves, except where facts are made up. Follow the link. Not only does it outline mendactious lies from the creationist side, it also introduces some nice points about the fossils in question, which are graspable by those of us without biology degrees. p.s. Here's my Technorati Profile

I picked up my new NSW driving licence this morning (having been on a UK driving licence up until now), and this got me to thinking about a subject I've had some previous thoughts on. A lot of countries are currently looking at introducing National ID Schemes. Such schemes have been around before, notably in times of war when (possibly justifiable) paranoia brings forth a need to identify citizens and by extension, identify potential enemies. In times of peace (notwithstanding the putative 'War On Terror®'), the need seems less justifiable. Personally, I'm very much against the carrying of any kind of photo-ID day-to-day....

I've been cycling to work a bit lately, and the slower pace makes you notice the surroundings a bit more. I also go through a popular jogging area (The Iron Cove Bridge), and let me tell you something; Sydney has a BOBFOC problem. For those of you unfamilar, BOBFOC is an acronym which stands for Body Off Baywatch, Face Off Crimewatch. Side note: for those who don't know, Crimewatch is a TV programme in the UK during which timid viewers are terrified by reconstructions of unsolved crimes, usually with stereotypical villains and vulnerable, plain women out walking alone. You know what Baywatch is, though....

Dear SMH, News Ltd, and other Australian 'news outlets' Can anyone explain to me, please, why every time I go to your websites looking for news, I'm confronted with no-value famewhore spoilt party slut and general waste of oxygen Paris Hilton? What, exactly, has she EVER done that's newsworthy? Anyone? Can anyone answer me? Now, here's what I want. I want your websites to have a little checkbox at the top, which I can click, and which will allow me to immediately and easily filter out ANY mention of rich blonde attention whores and their oh-so-piss-boring lives. If I wanted that shit I'd...

Yes, today's punch in the throat is not dedicated to people who drive badly, or who wander around shopping centres in trances, or stay up all night praying to the tooth fairy for the health of a sick child resulting in inattentiveness the next day and subsequent mowing down of said child by a car*. No, today's punch in the throat, uniquely thus far, is dedicated to an entire nation. The United States Of America, please stand up. Why punch an entire nation in the throat? Well, there are many, many reasons, but I'll single this out for starters: Dates should be written dd/mm/yyyy, not...

... The benighted fucktards of Citibank's Australia Pacific call center, who seem congenitally unable to follow the instruction "call my accountant for any verification info you need". I just received the third call on what should be a simple verification process, if only the mouthbreathing cockwits they employ could get it through their heads that I don't deal with any of my own tax information, but let my accountants take care of it. Now, I understand that to offer a low-cost service to the customer, Citibank have to cut costs at the other end. But why does that mean they...

... of punches to the throat, also known as: People Who Really Shit Me Today's recipient of the Drunken Madman Punch To The Throat is: People who indicate, but drive straight ahead Fuckwits. A Punch To The Throat all round, I think.