I've always been a bit skeptical of literary criticism

And this web page by Michael Fowler about ancient Greek science confirms it. Imagine the progress we would have made if it wasn’t for literary criticism:

Strato, like Aristotle, believed in close observation of natural phenomena, but in our particular field of interest here, the study of motion, he observed much more carefully than Aristotle, and realized that falling bodies usually accelerate. ...rainwater pouring off a corner of a roof is clearly moving faster when it hits the ground than it was when it left the roof, because a continuous stream can be seen to break into drops which then become spread further apart as they fall towards the ground. ... One is forced to conclude that falling objects do not usually reach some final speed in a very short time and then fall steadily, which was Aristotle's picture.

Had this line of investigation been pursued further at the Lyceum, we might have saved a thousand years or more, but after Strato the Lyceum concentrated its efforts on literary criticism.

The argument from banana

I can't remember how I came across this, but it's a hilarious example of Stacking the Deck, a False Analogy, and just outright stupidity.


[If the video is working try this link.]

If you can't wait to watch the video, and for those still on dial-up, I'll give a quick run down (caricature) of Kiwi reborn Christian Ray Comfort's "Atheists' Nightmare Banana":

Bananas are just like cans of soda. They fit in your hand, are packaged for your convenience, have a "tab" at the top to release the contents and are shaped perfectly to fit in your mouth. But they're even better than soda cans because god, in his infinite wisdom, made the skin biodegradable...

Now, it might seem a little over the top to bother analysing such an inane "argument"; it might seem I'm picking on an easy target. Well, yes, that's why I'm doing it.

An obvious point here, which has been made by countless others, why choose just bananas as evidence of god's benevolence? Oh yeah, you need to Stack the Deck. Hard to see how the analogy would work with coconuts or pineapples? And that's just fruit. If god is nice enough to design bananas for us, why not make a hot dog tree? It seems to me that we have to go to a lot of effort to make hot dogs. That is, grow wheat, mill it to get flour, process and bake it to get the bun, slaughter a variety of animals, harvest their lips and ..... other bits, grind the lips and other bits and stuff inside intestines, cook it, then put it in a bun with various condiments (which again, aren't just squeezed straight out of a plant).

I might be inclined to believe the argument from hot dog tree, but not banana. You'd have to prove such a tree exists though.

[If the video isn't working try this link.]

Well, if that proves god exists, it also certainly proves he is far from benevolent. Fancy growing hot dogs without ketchup.

Of course, the analogy with the Coke isn't entirely false. Modern bananas were designed by an intelligence - they were selectively bred by humans. Also, given Ray's a Christian, why isn't he disturbed by the fact god gave bananas to Muslims before Christians? Following his reasoning, doesn't that mean Muslims are favoured by god, compared to Christians?

Spooked911 moon landings not faked after all! But there is a secret moon base!

Readers of this blog may remember a few posts I did in 2006 on 9-11 conspiracy nut "Spooked911". Well, I thought I'd check up on him. One other "proof" he offers, that 9-11 was faked and is a government conspiracy, is based around his "challenge" to prove it's possible to fly a Boeing 767 into a building with no prior flight training in one. From the anti-conspiracy blog Screw Loose Change:

1) Obtain the Microsoft Flight Simulator Software and install it.

2) Learn to fly a Cessna 172 prop plane (if you already are a pilot, you can skip this).

3) Download and install the Boeing 767 plug-in, and take-off from Boston Logan airport.

4) Navigate to Manhattan as fast and efficiently as possible, then accelerate to 540 mph-- and on your FIRST ATTEMPT, fly perfectly through the middle of lower Manhattan, where the WTC used to be.

5) Let me know if you succeed.

If you DO succeed, also try a run taking off from Washington Dulles with a Boeing 757, going west for an hour, then turn around, and navigate to the Pentagon and try the "Hani Hanjour maneuver" (a 270 degree turn at 500 mph, then level off and approach the Pentagon on a flat approach, only a few feet off the ground.

Yet more ingenious WTF? logic from Spooked911. As per usual, he is an inspiration. I decided it is fair game to apply his reasoning to the faked Apollo moon landings (again). I couldn't believe it. I managed to land on the moon!

This was my first attempt too. Imagine how good I'd be if I trained for all the years the astronauts had. So contrary to my first experiment on landing on the moon, I've now realised it is possible to land on the moon. After all, a computer simulation is just like real life!
I then discovered there is a secret base on the moon! There is a cover-up after all! The beings that set it up must be alien; they were gibbering at me in some form of "alienease".

As far as the base goes - bloody goofy aliens. How the hell is anyone going to live in that? There's no furniture or anything!
I did manage to communicate in the end however, though it was still mostly pointless gibbering:

I also discovered that although the astronauts claim to have driven on the moon, I couldn't navigate my way over or around even the smallest crater in this tank.

Perhaps the aliens were controlling my mind and making me crash? After all, I wasn't wearing my ice cream container...

So good

The Great Tantra Challenge

I wish someone would knock up an English translation, but you still get the gist of it. Hilarious.

Here's the story:

On 3 March 2008, in a popular TV show, Sanal Edamaruku, the president of Rationalist International, challenged India's most "powerful" tantrik (black magician) to demonstrate his powers on him. That was the beginning of an unprecedented experiment. After all his chanting of mantra (magic words) and ceremonies of tantra failed, the tantrik decided to kill Sanal Edamaruku with the "ultimate destruction ceremony" on live TV. Sanal Edamaruku agreed and sat in the altar of the black magic ritual. India TV observed skyrocketing viewership rates.

Everything started, when Uma Bharati (former chief minister of the state of Madhya Pradesh) accused her political opponents in a public statement of using tantrik powers to inflict damage upon her. In fact, within a few days, the unlucky lady had lost her favorite uncle, hit the door of her car against her head and found her legs covered with wounds and blisters. India TV, one of India's major Hindi channels with national outreach, invited Sanal Edamaruku for a discussion on "Tantrik power versus Science". Pandit Surinder Sharma, who claims to be the tantrik of top politicians and is well known from his TV shows, represented the other side. During the discussion, the tantrik showed a small human shape of wheat flour dough, laid a thread around it like a noose and tightened it. He claimed that he was able to kill any person he wanted within three minutes by using black magic. Sanal challenged him to try and kill him.

The tantrik tried. He chanted his mantras (magic words): "Om lingalingalinalinga, kilikili…." But his efforts did not show any impact on Sanal – not after three minutes, and not after five. The time was extended and extended again. The original discussion program should have ended here, but the "breaking news" of the ongoing great tantra challenge was overrunning all program schedules.

Part 1 - Not much happens - find it on youtube if you want to watch it.

Part 2

Now the tantrik changed his technique. He started sprinkling water on Sanal and brandishing a knife in front of him. Sometimes he moved the blade all over his body. Sanal did not flinch. Then he touched Sanal's head with his hand, rubbing and rumpling up his hair, pressing his forehead, laying his hand over his eyes, pressing his fingers against his temples. When he pressed harder and harder, Sanal reminded him that he was supposed to use black magic only, not forceful attacks to bring him down. The tantrik took a new run: water, knife, fingers, mantras. But Sanal kept looking very healthy and even amused. After nearly two hours, the anchor declared the tantrik's failure.

The tantrik, unwilling to admit defeat, tried the excuse [see special pleading] that a very strong god whom Sanal might be worshipping obviously protected him. "No, I am an atheist," said Sanal Edamaruku. Finally, the disgraced tantrik tried to save his face by claiming that there was a never-failing special black magic for ultimate destruction, which could, however, only been done at night. Bad luck again, he did not get away with this, but was challenged to prove his claim this very night in another "breaking news" live program.

Part 3

During the next three hours, India TV ran announcements for The Great Tantra Challenge that called several hundred million people to their TV sets. The encounter took place under the open night sky. The tantrik and his two assistants were kindling a fire and staring into the flames. Sanal was in good humour. Once the ultimate magic was invoked, there wouldn't be any way back, the tantrik warned. Within two minutes, Sanal would get crazy, and one minute later he would scream in pain and die. Didn't he want to save his life before it was too late? Sanal laughed, and the countdown begun. The tantriks chanted their "Om lingalingalingalinga, kilikilikili…." followed by ever changing cascades of strange words and sounds. The speed increased hysterically. They threw all kinds of magic ingredients into the flames that produced changing colours, crackling and fizzling sounds and white smoke.

While chanting, the tantrik came close to Sanal, moved his hands in front of him and touched him, but was called back by the anchor. After the earlier covert attempts of the tantrik to use force against Sanal, he was warned to keep distance and avoid touching Sanal. But the tantrik "forgot" this rule again and again. Now the tantrik wrote Sanal's name on a sheet of paper, tore it into small pieces, dipped them into a pot with boiling butter oil and threw them dramatically into the flames. Nothing happened. Singing and singing, he sprinkled water on Sanal, mopped a bunch of peacock feathers over his head, threw mustard seed into the fire and other outlandish things more. Sanal smiled, nothing happened, and time was running out. Only seven more minutes before midnight, the tantrik decided to use his ultimate weapon: the clod of wheat flour dough. He kneaded it and powdered it with mysterious ingredients, then asked Sanal to touch it. Sanal did so, and the grand magic finale begun. The tantrik pierced blunt nails on the dough, then cut it wildly with a knife and threw them into the fire. That moment, Sanal should have broken down. But he did not. He laughed. Forty more seconds, counted the anchor, twenty, ten, five… it's over!

Millions of people must have uttered a sigh of relief in front their TVs. Sanal was very much alive. Tantra power had miserably failed. Tantriks are creating such a scaring atmosphere that even people, who know that black magic has no base, can just break down out of fear, commented a scientist during the program. It needs enormous courage and confidence to challenge them by actually putting one's life at risk, he said. By doing so, Sanal Edamaruku has broken the spell, and has taken away much of the fear of those who witnessed his triumph.

In this night, one of the most dangerous and wide spread superstitions in India suffered a severe blow.
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All I can say is WTF? - do people actually believe this...?