Wednesday, April 26, 2006

Behold the Amazing Jebusaurus!


Because stupid people need museums too.

This is about the distinction between form and function. Specifically about the talismanic power stupid people invest in the former in the hopes of conjuring the latter.

(Emphasis added)


Genesis of a museum
Creationists, saying all the answers are in the Bible, put their beliefs on display in $25 million facility


By Lisa Anderson
Tribune national correspondent

April 25, 2006

PETERSBURG, Ky. -- The recent fossil discovery of a 375-million-year-old fish that could lurch ashore on bony transitional fins--apparently a long-sought missing link between sea creatures and land animals--made a spectacular splash in evolutionary science circles. But it created nary a ripple on the placid American campus of Answers in Genesis, where an enormous museum chronicling the biblical six days of creation is rising fast amid rolling fields.

Ken Ham, co-founder and president of Answers in Genesis, believed to be the world's largest creationist organization, and most "young-Earth" creationists are as unimpressed by science's finding another piece in the evolutionary puzzle as they are with science's finding the Earth to be 4.5 billion years old.

Using biblical calculations, young-Earth creationists believe the planet is about 6,000 years old; old-Earth creationists believe it could be older. Both, however, take the Bible literally and reject Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory that all life, including human, shares common ancestry and developed through random mutation and natural selection. Evolution enjoys near-universal support among scientists.

Not so among the American public, about half of which endorses creationism, according to polls. While new concepts such as intelligent design, which posits that life is so complicated that an intelligence must have devised it, recently have suffered setbacks from court rulings and scientific findings, creationism thrives, and Answers in Genesis is a strong sign of that.

Just hours after the fossil fish, called Tiktaalik roseae, landed on the front pages of many newspapers earlier this month, it also surfaced on the Answers in Genesis Web site. In a posting titled "Gone fishin' for a missing link?" the organization, in effect, threw Tiktaalik roseae back.

"Because evolutionists want to discover transitional forms, when they find a very old fish with leg-bone-like bones in its fins, they want to interpret this as evidence that it is some sort of transitional creature. . . . It may be just another example of the wonderful design of our Creator God," the posting said.

Absolute certainty

For creationists, there are no transitional creatures and no doubts. In the Book of Genesis, the biblical calendar of creation is as clear and simple as it is sacred: God created creatures of the sea and the air on Day 5. Land animals and man appeared on Day 6. And all of this, including the creation of Earth, happened about 6,000 years ago.
...
According to nearly a quarter-century of Gallup polls, about half of all Americans consistently agree with the biblical account that "God created human beings pretty much in their present form at one time within the last 10,000 years or so." Polling also indicates that a majority of Americans say creationism should be taught alongside evolution in public school biology classes.

"It is strengthening. It's not adding more proponents, it's growing in terms of giving increased confidence to those who share that belief," said Ronald Wetherington, an anthropologist at Dallas' Southern Methodist University. He cited an American political climate in which creationists, who include many so-called values voters and evangelicals, feel politically and culturally empowered rather than marginalized.
...

"The 250,000 people going to it will go back to their legislators and pressure them to vote for Jesus," said Volney Gay, director of the Center for Religion and Culture at Vanderbilt University in Nashville. "There's a suspicion of science and a suspicion of intellectuals in general."

Said Ham: "What we see is if you can get information to people, their worldview will be changed, and the way they vote on issues, on a school board or whatever, will reflect that change."



The dinosaur replicas, many of them animatronic, are spectacular: Creationists say dinosaurs lived simultaneously with humans because their death came only after original sin. Some of the more compelling effects are in the key rooms depicting what are called "The Seven C's of History." They are: creation, corruption, catastrophe (the destruction of the world by Noah's flood), confusion (Babel), Christ, the cross and consummation (his death and resurrection).

Along the Creation Walk

For instance, soft lighting, gentle sounds and pleasant fragrances will mark the Creation Walk, where Adam and Eve chat with God in the Garden of Eden before they are corrupted to commit original sin by an animatronic serpent. The dimly lit Corruption galleries, by comparison, will feature videos of pain and suffering, noxious odors and the heat, literally, turned up.

"We're trying to make this the most uncomfortable place in the museum to show how original sin has corrupted the universe," Zovath said on a tour through the site.

...
- - -

Terms of debate

Evolution: Charles Darwin's theory, accepted nearly universally by scientists, says that all life on Earth, including human, shares common ancestry and evolved to its present state through random mutation and natural selection.

Creationism: Advanced by religious conservatives in response to Darwin's theory, creationism adheres to the biblical account that God alone created the world and all life in it, much as it is today, at one point within the last 10,000 years.

Creation science: Claims scientific evidence for the biblical version of creation.

Intelligent design: Considered a successor to creationism, intelligent design became popular in the early 1990s after the U.S. Supreme Court banned the teaching of creationism in public schools in 1987. Intelligent design posits that there are weaknesses in Darwin's theory and suggests that an unnamed intelligence must have designed some aspects of life.

-- Lisa Anderson

Future historians -- probably Indian -- will disinter this animatronic idiocy and admire the handiwork of the Pre-Columbian natives who fashioned such cunning, pre-literate totems.

Then they will note the date – the early 21st Century – and the location – at the heart of what was then the most technologically advanced civilization on Earth – and they will laugh and laugh and laugh.

Clearly the Americans, being a generous and noble people, had found a wise and humane was of dealing with the residuum of mentally stunted halfwits that every society will inevitably produce. Those few angrily underclocked child-men who cannot cope with the rigors of math or science or conjunctions or hitting the bowl when they pee.

Like Colonial Williamsburg or South Dakota, Americans had manufactured another wholly fake community for some socially intriguing reason that our descendents (or the descendents of the people we speak to when we call the 800-number on the back of our major appliances when they flake out) will theorize cleverly about.

That rather than efficiently generically engineering the incapacitating disease of conservative fundamentalism out of our blood, we humanely gave them their own s-l-o-w children’s camp. It was a dim-but-cheery place with its own, comforting fake history of the planet, its own cartoon God, and even its own news network that told the stupid people that God loved them better than anyone else. That they didn’t need sense enough to pound sand or as much compassion as God gave a Pitcher plant, as long as they were “Saved”.

And anyway, they weren’t really stupid.

The “elites” were stupid.

And maybe these “Flowers For AlgernonLand” designers even had a few chuckles at the expense of their devolved fellow citizens; perhaps once in a while laughing themselves to tears as the dense denizens of the place scared themselves over and over again scampering down “The dimly lit Corruption galleries, by comparison, will feature videos of pain and suffering, noxious odors and the heat, literally, turned up.”

Dumbing down by several orders of magnitude a complex allegory about the inherency of pain and loss in a dualistic Universe within the field of Time…into God’s own a Pull-My-Finger joke.

At least I hope that’s the tale they’ll tell themselves, because the truth is so much simpler and sadder.

The truth is that for all of its think tanks, fake media and Small Gummint bluster, the Republican Party would evaporate tomorrow like dew in a firestorm if it were not kept lavishly stocked with bigots and idiots. Without its bumper crop of racists yielded from the Southern Strategy, its millions of fanatically anti-Enlightenment Christopaths and the millions of garden variety stupids, the GOP would be one dead fucking parrot…and the people running the Party like a Long Con damned well know it.

Which is why every strategy is aimed at creating more stupid people.

Because the more logic-intolerant the base, the easier everything gets.

For example, imagine how much less you have to spend on marketing when you no longer have to worry about making a well-reasoned argument…about anything.

Piss in their hair and when they start to notice something is wrong, all you need to do is flash a picture of two men kissing and they’ll charge obediently off of whatever cliff they’re led.

Take a massive dump in their mouths and when the start to gag on it, and all need to do is scream “Ted Kennedy!” at them as loud as possible and they’re swallow your excrement like baby birds and beg for more.

Lie them into a ruinous war, send their kids off to die for the greater glory of Exxon, and when they verge dangerously on the edge of beginning to add two and two together correctly, all you need is (HT to the irreplaceable Billmon at the Whiskey Bar for his brilliant post from which I nicked this)…
The programmes of the Two Minute Hate varied from day to day, but there was none in which Goldstein was not the principal figure. He was the primal traitor, the earliest defiler of the Party's purity. All subsequent crimes against the Party, all treacheries, acts of sabotage, heresies, deviations, sprang directly out of his teachings.
George Orwell
1984
1948

However, in the end the stupids already have buildings -- constitutionally inviolate buildings -- in which they can enact their own, ridiculous creation mythology over and over again to their widdle heart’s content.

They’re called “churches”, so why do they need a museum?

Because this is about the distinction between form and function.

Deep, deep down these people suspect they’re morons, which is why they need the constant reassurance of their Leaders and their God that they are not. They’re a mob, and a mob can always provoke fear, but in the end they crave the one thing they do not, and never will have: respect.

Respect, and the matriculation into the halls of wisdom of their idiotic ideas.

And since that’s never, ever going to happen, they need an alternative. One that their leaders are happy to provide.

Because part of the tragic deficiency of these people is that they cannot comprehend the difference between an Idea and a Representation Object. A pathetic fact they prove over and over again.

This is what every American Flag Burning debate boils down to: the rage of people who reflexively choose to value a Symbol over the Constitutional Ideal for which that symbol is a proxy.

This is what every Confederate Flag Worship debate boils down to: the rage of people who demand that the fake, manufactured history of their hate rag efface its actual history as a calculated symbol of segregation, lynching and Southern terrorism for much of the 20th century.

This is what every Fundamentalist punch-up comes down to: the rage people who furiously fetishize the literality and inerrancy of a book which is neither, and demand that their Idol trump both the Constitution and genuine religious scholarship.

These are the people to whom the GOP panders because these are the people on whom every one of their victories depends. And to that end they are they are cultivated, fertilized and praised to rafters.

And since they cannot comprehend the distinction between a Building and the Academy, WTF? Animate a few dinos frolicking with Adam and Eve, call it a Museum and Bingo!

Instant parity with actual Science!

Sure it’s every bit as childish and ridiculous as me putting a pair of Eisehower’s underpants on my head and claiming that I'm the co-architect of the D-Day invasion.

But of course, I’m not the GOP’s target demographic.

(Oh and one correction to the actual article. Ms. Anderson explains the several words and phrases at the end of the article under the heading of "Terms of debate".

She is mistaken.

There is no debate.)

UPDATE: Welcome Crooks & Liars visitors.
Beer in the back, and bathroom on your right.

30 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh, sweet Jeebus, where to begin...excellent as always.
"...sin has corrupted the universe," Zovath said." sounds like a line from a really bad sci-fi story.

And..and..they'll go back to their legislators and ask 'em to vote for Jesus? Hate to break it to ya, Mr Legislator, but Jesus is not one of your constituents. He is not registered to vote in your district. Hell, he's not even a citizen. He's one o' them brown foreigners!

What is next for these people? Are they gonna start disbelieving in gravity, next?

Anonymous said...

No doubt about it, those paleo-scientists are all fucked up, taxonomically.

As any fool can see, it was a Jesus-fish.

Even with an opposed thumb, it's still the Xtian symbol. What else do we need to know?

Of course, if they were contemporaneous, why would god let his T-Rex's eat his christians?

Was that payback for Eve nibbling the apple? :o)

Anonymous said...

We share real estate will some serious imbeciles. I can't help but thinking we are witnessing the final crack-up of this whole belief system. Remember: a worldview is a terrible thing to waste!

cleter: Jeebus wasn't just a brown man, he was a Jew too!

tanbark: the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge wasn't an apple, is was a psychedelic mushroom. :-)

Melissa McEwan said...

That picture nearly ended me!

Anonymous said...

I think many of my fellow Christians fear that if the Bible is not literally correct about the origins of life, it may not be literally correct about the overcoming of death, either. I think this is the foremost, if unacknowledged, fear behind the hatred of evolution. Ironically, this signals that their faith is weak. They fear that if the Bible is not 100% literally accurate, then it is worthless, and then death really is THE END, with no ifs, and, buts, afterlives, resurrections or reincarnations allowed.

I can't accept the idea that the Bible is inerrant, because it contains passages that insult my intelligence, and more importantly, my conscience. Deuteronomy and Joshua contain passages in which God allegedly commands the Israelites to slaughter the people already in the Promised Land, even the children, and steal the land. I refuse to believe God would command the violation of His own commandments against murder and theft.

Too many of my fellow Christians seem to believe that the LORD does play favorites in this manner, that it's OK to persecute gays, lesbians, and other consensual erotic nonconformists, or nonbelievers, or other people who don't fit the Procrustean mold of Pharisaic Straight Anglo Whiteness. (I am straight, white, and Anglo, in case anyone's wondering) Too many also believe that it's OK, if regrettable, to slaughter those swarthy Muslims sitting on "our" petroleum. (Hmm, what were those commandments about murder and theft again?) In an odd way, the rank-and-file of these Pharisaic Christian movements could be called innocent, in that they only know what their preachers and McMedia outlets tell them. I guess the proper prayer here is "Father, forgive them; they know not what they do."

Let us not forget, there was a "Religious Right" in Jesus's society, too. They were called the "scribes and Pharisees". (Of course, the scribes and Pharisees were not monolithic blocs; some of them even supported Jesus, but I don't feel like opening THAT can of worms.) And on the first Good Friday, those "Religious Rightists" could be found in Pilate's courtyard, shouting "Crucify Him!" Again, "Father, forgive them; they know not what they do."

Of course, they only THOUGHT they had gotten rid of that troublemaking rabbi Jesus... :)

Grace and Peace, Kid Charlemagne

Anonymous said...

abso-fucking-loutly no. goddam. debate.

Anonymous said...

I have often wondered if the whole argument about using the Bible to create a mathematical formula to determine the age of the earth isn't wholly dubious based simply on the fact that people at the time of the writings simply had no concept for the numbers involved. How is God supposed to tell them the creation stuff happened 4.5 billion years ago and took billions of years to do when they simply couldn't understand that or have language to describe it?

Anonymous said...

Amazingly perceptive, driftglass. A good, reasoned essay.

Anonymous said...

Once again, driftglass, you have hit this one right outta the park. Well done! I really do, on some level, feel very sorry for these poor folks. I know that they are afraid of this world, and afraid that there is no world to come. I reserve my hatred for the conscienceless bastards (Republican politicians and 'Christian' preachers) who manipulate them.

Anonymous said...

Alyssa--exactly. Suppose the LORD had tried to tell some poor scribe way back when the whole story--not only all that we now know (DNA and trilobites and dinosaurs and such), but all the stuff we don't know yet? For one thing, the Bible would be a library rather than a book. For another, his peers would have concluded that he'd been out in that Middle Eastern sun too long. John Calvin, who was nobody's atheist, said that the Biblical account of creation was "babytalk"; an attempt to distill a complex truth down to something that simple people could understand. ("Simple" here does not mean "dull-witted", it means lacking in formal education, which in both ancient times and Calvin's time, meant the majority of people.)

Grace and Peace, Kid Charlemagne

roxtar said...

(Apologies in advance to whomever I stole this from.)

One of the repeated talking points of the IDiot crowd is that "Science is just another belief system."

So, if I'm 7 miles in the air on a Boeing 767, it's my belief in airplanes thsat keeps it from plummeting to earth?

I had a conversation with a Christian once, in which I asked if she believed that Poseidon was really a god. "No, of course not." she replied.

And Zeus, Jupiter, Venus, Ares? "No, they are just mythical creatures."

How about Lord Krsna and Lord Ganesha, and Vishnu and all those guys? "Nope."

"Cool", says I. "We believe almost exactly the same thing. We're only one god apart!"

Anonymous said...

KC -
In an odd way, the rank-and-file of these Pharisaic Christian movements could be called innocent, in that they only know what their preachers and McMedia outlets tell them. I guess the proper prayer here is "Father, forgive them; they know not what they do."

Innocent? I think the appropriate label is "Willfully Ignorant". They are culpable in their refusal to THINK FOR THEMSELVES!

I can accept the end of my existence in death, if that's what it is. What I have had a much harder time dealing with lately, in considering the potential lack of a hereafter, is the possibility that The Administration scum will NEVER be held accountable for their transgressions. By ANYONE. Not by God, or even a lesser god. It makes me want to cry.

Doc Johnson said...

Oh, Christ, Driftglass. I just got that spam on my site too, even after we talked about it. (see post above)

On topic, I lived in Kentucky from 2000 to 2004, and taught at a Baptist College. Very weird experience. During that time, I heard about a museum like this. I'm not sure if it's the same one, but they had displays w/ dinos and cavemen together in the same dioramas. The reptiles were referred to as "missionary lizards" by the curators (if they merit that description). I thought at the time that it was just another aspect of the culture of half-assedness (TM) that afflicts that state. As I left the state, crossing the borden into Tennessee, driving toward Georgia of all places, I took great relish in extending my arm out the cab of that moving truck. That arm was, of course, attached to my hand, and via that hand, to my rigid middle finger. That finger pointed toward the north with gusto and vigor reminiscent of the adult film star of the same stage/surname (North, I mean).

Escape has never been so satisfying. God, what a benighted shithole of a state. Some nice people there, but overall... ugh!

BitterHarvest said...

"The truth is that for all of its think tanks, fake media and Small Gummint bluster, the Republican Party would evaporate tomorrow like dew in a firestorm if it were not kept lavishly stocked with bigots and idiots."

LOL. Sweet, sweet Driftglass...

Anonymous said...

KC, f**k no, I don't feel sorry for them. As the other poster said, they are WILLFYULLY IGNORANT, and that is the absolutely greatest sin imaginable: to deny the truly greatest gift that god has given us: our MINDS, and the ability to reason. They should all be chained into their churches and then..... you get the picture. Godd**n them all, they will be the destruction of this once-semi-great country.

driftglass said...

Thanks, cleter.
These people are a writeoff. The best we can shoot for is to take the guns out of their hands, mummify 'em in bubble wrap and make them sit in a corner.

That's why I get so pissed at the Moderates. Because the converse is also true; without the Mods these freaks are just the Natural Law party with snake handling and Christian butt sex.

Tanbark,
Eve was a hero and Adam was a cowardly pussy.
Hoo-rah for strong women.

Shakespeare's Sister,
Glad you survived. You're a national treasure you know :-)

Kid Charlemagne,
They recrucify that poor man every time they open their mouths.

Alyssa,
They just counted the "begats". It was a guy named Bishop Ussher. Counted the begats backwards and decided that the Earth was created in 4004 B.C.
On a Tuesday.
'round 9:00 :-)

Lex,
Faith is belief in the absence of proof. OK, I'm cool with that. But this nonsense is belief in spite of proof.
Which is a fancy way of saying psychotic.

bkm,
Thanks.

Gentlewoman,
Thank you kindly.
I'd be much more inclined towards sympathy if these people weren'r fucking up my country.

gr8gol4
Conspiring! And right in front of me!
Good for you :-)

Bob Munck,
Just the idea of the phrase "Congressman Jesus" cracks me up or some reason.

Doc Johnson,
I'm glad you made it out. I did a little time in KY myself. A bar called "Charley Browns" and Drummond Brothers beer made it bearable.

BitterHarvest,
Many thanks.

ablbodyed,
Spencer Tracey's speech about the power of the mind of man from "Inherit the Wind" always gets me for just that reason.

jurassicpork said...

Try this on for size. It tackles te same subject matter and it's pure anger in the key of d r i f t g l a s s (yeah, I just happened to adopt your style this one time).

Of course, the "fact" that Creationists (Or Intelligent Designers, whatever the fuck they want to be called) never seem to want to face up to is, if everything on Earth is no more than 6000 years old, and if Man walked alongside the dinosaurs, then...

...what are we putting in our gas tanks?

SOYLENT BLACK IS MADE OF PEOPLE, PEOPLE!

That's right. If we're to subscribe to Creationism, then that means we're filling up our Humvees with the last earthly remains of great great great great to the eleventh power grandfather Og.

Which is a much more beautiful way to look at the cycle of life. Conceived in a act of love six thousand years ago, fazrted out the end of a Navigator's exhuast pipe by a soccer mom on her way to pottery class.

Soylent black. It's made of people, too. Spread the word.

Anonymous said...

Y'know, "Christian Butt Sex" would be a GREAT name for a rock band.

Anonymous said...

Driftglass, the archbishop (an Irishman to our everlasting shame), actually ran out of begats and had to make do with Assyrian and other records. This info (not too well remembered) comes from the National Library of Ireland which still has his records. So the Bible does NOT say the world is 6000 years old.

Anonymous said...

I have mixed feeling about these believers.
Some of the ignorant are so busy worrying about meeting their bills and feeding the kids, that they just reflectively regurgitate whatever the preacher says. Really, who has time to ponder the universe when you only work part-time for walmart, little billy is on meth, and little suzy is knocked up, again, while you are trying to raise her first kid?
I sorta love these people, because I know them. They are doing the best that they can, even if they are failing miserably.

It's the one who take the time to truely hate their fellow man, to beat-down any child who dares to ask an intelligent question, and to lash-out at science as a false god, these are the assholes that make my blood boil.

Did god not give us a big brain so we could ponder and reason?

I started to say that if god wanted unqustioning adoration, he would have stopped with the angels, but then I remembered that even in the christian mythos, Lucifer was cast out of heaven.


May I just say that I enjoy these religious posts? I visit one blog that is still too sunday-school-answer-ish on religion. The other blogs that I visit are all run by god-less atheists. ;-) The discussions over here seems to be a nice mix of godless/agnostic/believers who aren't trying to kill each other. Thanks for the break from the insanity.
(I hate emoticons, but how else to show that I sorta like godless atheists?)

Anonymous said...

well if they hate science so much then they should forego the benefits of science (like antibiotics)

epileptikitty said...

The Shoes of the Fisherman were stolen from the Fish 375 million years ago.

Anonymous said...

RE: penis enlargement. Complete the following sentence: "A (blank) and his money are soon parted."

Terrible said...

Have any of these crack smoking ID idiots ever explained were this Creator came from? Was he created by another Creator or did he evolve? That's what I want to know. ;-)

Anonymous said...

Yesterday I finished "Foxes in the Henhouse."

Interesting stuff on gun ownership and NASCAR culture, but that part seemed like the authors' pushing themselves as consultants ("What we did for Mark Warner we can do for YOU!").

Much of the rest was recitals of atrocities we've heard before. I mean, come on, if all that was necessary to make evangelicals vote Dem was to quote Leviticus and Matthew, wouldn't that have been done already? To prove W is no military leader, just show his record. Ask Dan Rather how that's working out.

Maybe Bubba can be reached, and maybe these guys know how; but they left some parts out.

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