Darwin on the Right: Why Christians and conservatives should accept evolution

Scientific American ^ | October 2006 issue | Michael Shermer

[VadeRetro]

"He used me" placemarker.

[PatrickHenry]

I'm partial only to primes.

[PatrickHenry]

"He used me" placemarker.

Yes! And I now abandon thread!

[VadeRetro]

Primed and abandoned. And he wonders why I don't dance with him.

[Conservative til I die]

As an impartial observer, I recommend dropping the use of bullsnot disclaimers.

Why? It's the truth. I'm just saying that my criticism of the article doesn't come from any bias of being a creationist or an evolutionist. Why the big attitude, chum?

[VadeRetro]

The people who make long disclaimers about all the things they supposedly aren't--imploring that their listeners not dismiss them as some kind of nutcase--never live up to their billing. Usually it's some liberal who goes into a long discursus on what a main street, fiscal conservative and all-around patriot he is before entering the main body of his anti-corporate, Bush-bashing, Don't-You-Just-Hate-American-Imperialism rant.

But, like the baby brother getting hand-me-downs, creationists seem to copy every trick the left ever wore out. They have the "front movement" tactic--that's what ID (think "environmentalism") and the prestigious Discovery Institute (think "Greenpeace") represent. They have the postmodernist "It's-all-in-your-interpretation" wave-away of contrary evidence. And they have the BS disclaimer. Here on FR, there's a small but growing list of creationist posters who "aren't creationists." It gets to be a jaw-dropper of a silly joke.

[betty boop]

I've also heard there's something in much of our food tinkering with the hormonal hardware. That's another thing I hope is being looked into, etc. etc.

Okay. If you say so, VR. (Though I think you're just playing with me here.)

But if what you describe is actually so, then the problem definitely needs to be looked into.

Still I haven't before now exactly heard this new (for me anyway) rumor of a threat to human welfare, from a source abetting the systemic derangement of human hormones, transmitted via the food supply. To me, off the top of my head, that's right up there with space aliens landing in my backyard last night, who subsequently conducted detailed experiments on my pet cat.

In any case, I haven't at all studied this "hormonal" attack via the food supply (trained on young people???). In fact, I never heard of it before today.

Just goes to show: So little time, and yet so much to do....

Anyhoot, I really resonated to this statement: "I know you can't fix a software bug in the hardware. The reverse is true as well."

Sounds about right to me.

Thanks so much for writing, VR!

[VadeRetro]

Okay. If you say so, VR. (Though I think you're just playing with me here.)

Some kind of speculation surfaces from time to time about hormonal contaminants of a feminizing sort in the food supply. Steadily lowering sperm counts, rising obesity, breasts on men, earrings on non-pirate males, a tendency to flirt with boys...

OK, I can't talk about it with much of a straight face. But I'm not making it up.

[VadeRetro]

A Google with "'hormones', 'food supply', and 'sperm count'."

The lower sperm counts are really out there. Fill in your own cause and fleece the sheep.

[ahayes]

Laptop computers. Raises the temperature and stops spermatogenesis.

[VadeRetro]

Before that it was television. That, and whatever the commies were doing to our precious bodily fluids via flouridation of our drinking water.

[ahayes]

I'd like to start a class action lawsuit over laptop computers and low sperm counts, but I'm not sure I have standing as I'm not male.

[VadeRetro]

Still affects you directly. Fewer choices. ;)

[ahayes]

Ten million here or there, who's to care? ;-)

[Doctor Stochastic]

It only kills the weak ones.