"In Search Of" also did shows on UFOs, Bigfoot, and the Loch Ness Monster.

To me, the video sorta oversells the difficulty in identifying / escaping from "ridiculous claims", at least in comparison to my personal experiences.

I grew up in a very religious (Christian, Methodist) family / city / state / country. I was questioning the indoctrination at an early age (younger than 10), and rejecting it due to never receiving satisfactory answers to those questions by ~12. Actually, one of the most significant pushes for me was the ultimate reward/punishment thing. Zero consistency and open contradictions between different religions / sects / sources, etc. In symbolic logic, contradictions mean that one of your premises is wrong. Reconsider what you "know" and try again.

With regards to atheism vs (a)gnosticism, technically I'm an agnostic because I don't know with absolute certainty that there is no god / gods out there. However, in practice, I easily and comfortably would rather self-identify as an atheist. Why, when I don't know for certain? Because I also don't know that there isn't an Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, Tooth Fairy, Loch Ness Monster, or Leprechauns, yet I don't feel compelled to tell people that I'm "agnostic" about those things. No. They are pretty clearly human-invented bullshit, with readily apparent human motivations behind their invention. Sounds like religion to me.

That's basically Russel's teapot.

That is not a fact until you have EVIDENCE for it, until then, it's a claim.

In general, the requirement for evidence is inversely proportional to the probability of the claim. If I say the sky is blue, most people don't need evidence of that because it fits with their world experience. If I say I'm the second coming of Christ, I damn well better start turning water into wine to prove my case.

Your CLAIM is that no white male police officer has ever been convicted of murdering a black male in America's entire history. I'm willing to accept that it's possible, but I'm not willing to take it as a fact until you can provide a reputable source.

And no, it's nothing like big foot or the loch ness monster. Criminal convictions are a matter of public record.

As it happens, I can't find any records of a police officer being convicted of murder (although there are several for manslaughter).

Doesn't make your childish behaviour any better though.

There was no claim made. There was only a factual statement about a truth that was shared. Asking for proof of a white male police officer being convicted of murdering a black male is like asking some one to capture Big Foot or trap the Loch Ness monster. There will always be those who believe they saw it somewhere, but the fact is they don't exist.

Bernie or bust.


25 things I trust more than Hillary Clinton:
• Mexican tap water
• A wolverine with a ‘pet me’ sign
• A mixed drink served by Bill Cosby
• A straight shave from Jodi Arias
• An elevator ride with Ray Rice
• Browns going to the Super Bowl
• Brian Williams memory
• Pete Carroll coaching decisions
• Loch Ness monster sightings
• Pinocchio
• The Boy that cried Wolf
• A snapping turtle in a mud bath
• A Nigerian inheritance email
• A pilot alone in the cockpit
• A factory packed parachute
• A test fart in bed with the flu
• Tying Anthony Weiner’s shoes
• Harry Reid’s exercise equipment
• A kiss from Judas
• An Afghan wearing a backpack
• A Dana White apology
• Keeping my healthcare plan
• A North Korean trial
• A BIC pen that won’t leak
• A tuna fish sandwich left on a city bus

Oh no!!

Will Santa Claus still visit me there? Or the Easter Bunny?

Maybe the loch ness monster will be there! Or a republican presidential candidate with an IQ above 50....

creepy horror movie bird noises and the loch ness monster included!

Your video, Stewart Lee - The Loch Ness Monster, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

So the loch ness monster is a vegetarian...

At present this concept of design is just castle-in-the-sky nonsense. Empty piffle. A complete non-starter.

This is why the "mere mention" of "design" will get you "banned" from peer-review, because you could just as well have made a "mere mention" of Bigfoot and the loch ness monster in your zoology report, it's a big tell to your peers that you are a nut who fails to understand the nature of evidence and science, and a big sign that you are in for some fuzzy logic and dumb assumptions instead of solid science.

Design is a better hypothesis for the information we find in DNA, and the fine tuning we see in the physical laws. The reason design is a non-starter is because the idea this Universe was created by anyone is anathema to the scientific community:

Even if all the data point to an intelligent designer, such an hypothesis is excluded from science because it is not naturalistic."

S. C. Todd,
Correspondence to Nature 410(6752):423, 30 Sept. 1999

It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counterintuitive, no matter how mystifying to the unitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine foot in the door.

Richard Lewontin, Harvard
New York Review of Books 1/9/97

No evidence would be sufficient to create a change in mind; that it is not a commitment to evidence, but a commitment to naturalism. ...Because there are no alternatives, we would almost have to accept natural selection as the explanation of life on this planet even if there were no evidence for it.

Steven Pinker MIT
How the mind works p.182

After essentially nullifying and disproving everything we have learned about biology the last 200 years, you still have all the work ahead of you, I'm afraid. You now have to build a completely new framework and model for every single observation ever made in biology that makes sense of it all and explains why things are the way they are. Shouting that a thing is "complex" is not cutting it, I'm afraid. You need a new theory of DNA, Immunology, Bacterial resistance, adaptation, vestigal organs, animal distobution, mutation, selection, variation, genetics, speciation, taxonomy... well, as Dobzhansky put it: "Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution" That quote is more relevant than ever.

Your error here is conflating micro and macro evolution. Creation scientists believe in micro evolution and speciation. That is part of the creationist model of how the world was repopulated with animals after the flood. Macro evolution, the idea that all life descended from a universal common ancestor, is not proven by immunology, bacterial resistance, adaptation, animal distribution, mutation, seclection, variation, speciation, taxonomy etc. The only way you could prove it is in the fossil record and the evidence isn't there. They've tried to prove it with genetics but it contradicts the fossil record (the way they understand it). So Creationists have no trouble explaining those things..and common genetics points to a common designer.

You dont have to trust scientists, most of the EVIDENCE is RIGHT FUCKING THERE, in front of you, in your pocket, in your hand, around your home, in every school, in every home, in every post office or courtroom, in the streets. ACTUAL REAL EVIDENCE, right there, PROVING, every second, that the universe is billions of years old.

Every scientist since Newton could be a lying sack of shit, all working on the same conspiracy, and it would mean fuck all, because the evidence speaks for itself.

The earth is definately NOT ten thousand years young.

Have you ever heard of the horizon problem? The big bang model suffers from a light travel time problem of its own, but they solve it by postulating cosmic inflation, which is nothing more than a fudge factor to solve the problem. First, it would have to expand at trillions of times the speed of light, violating the law that says nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. There is also no theory compatible with physics that could explain the mechanism for how the Universe would start expanding, and then cease expanding a second later. It's poppycock. See what secular scientists have to say about the current state of the Big Bang Theory:

http://www.cosmologystatement.org/

As far as how light could reach us in a short amount of time, there are many theories. One theory is that the speed of light has not always been constant, and was faster at the beginning of creation. This is backed up by a number of measurements taken since the 1800s showing the speed of light decreasing. You can see the tables here:

http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/cm/v4/n1/velocity-of-light

If scientists are those that practice science then every creation scientist who has published a peer reviewed paper is a scientist.

Well, yes. you can be a scientist and a creationist. That doesnt make Creationism science. The link you provided referred to a biologist creationist publishing a paper without creation/god/whatever mentioned and a creationist physicist publishing non-biological papers. All fine.

The site also says/implies that mentioning ceationism/design will prevent publishing. This is probably true in most cases, but not for the conspiratorial reasons creationists think.

Suppose you are a biologist working on understanding say, a particular enzyme, what it does and how it works, now suppose you reach a point where you just cant figure the fuck out how the enzyme is made exactly or exactly how it works. Now suppose you are writing an article for peer-review about said enzyme. Suppose you note in the article that you hit a dead end in your research, unable to figure out the excact workings of the enzyme: Thats fine.

What is NOT fine, however, is to speculate that unicornpiss is required for the enzyme to work. Thats not because your peers are biased against unicornpiss, its just that there is no evidence for it, no detailed description of what it is, what it contains, how it works or that it even exists, nor is there any reason to link it to a particular enzyme.

Replace "unicornpiss" with "creation" or "design" or "god" or whatever, the example still works.

In science you need to be specific, descriptive, and evidence-based. The reason words like Creation and Unicornpiss does so poorly in the peer-review wordcloud is because they are essentially dealing with the imaginary.

So if you want more creationism published, start by defining exactly what is meant by creation, design etc, who? what? how? is there a designer behind the flagellum? describe him/her/it! define the limitations, the exact method used, the magic involved in detail, then present the direct or indirect evidence of the now precicely defined designer.

At present this concept of design is just castle-in-the-sky nonsense. Empty piffle. A complete non-starter.

This is why the "mere mention" of "design" will get you "banned" from peer-review, because you could just as well have made a "mere mention" of Bigfoot and the loch ness monster in your zoology report, it's a big tell to your peers that you are a nut who fails to understand the nature of evidence and science, and a big sign that you are in for some fuzzy logic and dumb assumptions instead of solid science.

Everyone's an atheist, if they're not a theist. One is active one is passive. This is what NDT hints at with his "why does this word exist". Recently Atheist has become a label for the more active, atheist "preachers" if you will, but that's a re-definition of the word. The conflation of meanings into that one word is confusing, and seems to get even NDT on thin ice.

Agnostic is not what he says it is. It is only "I don't know, I make no claim either way". Not a middle ground as so many people seem to think it is. Everyone is agnostic, unless they're will fully ignorant. Not everyone has made up their mind on theism, but I will make this bold claim, everyone lives as if one or the other, whether they consciously thoughtfully make the choice or not, I've not devoted much thought to the existence of a Loch Ness Monster, and I don't have to because it has never influenced my being in the world. I have made up my mind on bacteria, and I thin they're real, and I live as if they are real (wash hands etc). I have not really given much thought to UFOs, as in aliens in planes, but I'm assuming they don't exist and I live as if they don't exist.

When you talk about such an important claim as a god, a being that influences EVERYTHING, you do take it into account in your daily life, because if you don't you would, if you were wrong, already be condemned, so you live as if it doesn't exist (unless you actively live as if it does).

@GeeSussFreeK Entomology is the study of insects, I think you're looking for Epistomology.

In any case, whenever someone goes "I don't care" or "I don't want to spend/waste my time contemplating that" I count that as a win for secularism.

what kind of a 3d rate asshole would debunk the loch ness monster with a 2nd rate video that screams "i vote for for a 4th rate zombie, becauseI'm an uneducated piece of sh*t"???

damn you americans

"Agnostic" is one term that I think is unfortunately pulled in many directions in attempts to apply it to different meanings. I agree that at its core it means "unknowing", specifically with regard to theistic / religious queries. But I think that a refinement of the definition that adds some beneficial structure is to suggest that one is not only "unknowing" or "unsure" about theism or religion, but that they would suggest that it is impossible to have such knowledge.

The lighter definition can spring from ignorance; we're all uncertain about many belief systems or religions of the past (or future) because we've never really been exposed to them and don't know what they are about. The stronger definition is when I think a person that would proclaim themselves to be "agnostic" actually begins to have some real meaning. And I tend to agree with the precepts of that stance -- my preference towards scientific and logical thought tells me that many of the proclamations of religion that I am exposed to are untestable, so the only 100% solid statement that I can make is that I am "uncertain" about whether they are true or false.

However, I also think that stance is a fairly unnecessary cop-out. Religion is not the only source of untestable hypotheses in our world. Many people would have us believe in the factual existence of dragons, fairies, the Loch Ness Monster, or Santa Claus. Yet when confronted with questions about any of those, people very rarely feel any compulsion to be "agnostic"; they simply say "no, that doesn't really exist", thereby rolling the dice and being confident in their (self-evaluated) 99.9999999%+ odds.

I wish that more religious concepts were subjected to scrutiny and not just given a free pass for being too taboo to question or criticize. That is why although I cannot scientifically or logically prove that no god or gods exist (and in fact believe that it is impossible to do so), I elect not to use the term "agnostic" to describe myself, but stick with "atheist". Most importantly, I lose no more sleep over the possibility that I am incorrect about the non-existence of any god or gods than I do over the possibility that I am wrong and somewhere out there, if I looked hard enough, I might just find a unicorn.