301. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #216171 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 7:58 pm

What is hard to explain away though, was that recent discovery of the dead sea scroll on the stone, from the first centery B.C.E. telling of Simon Christ, and his death and subsequent ressurection three days later.

You can look up the "Dead Sea Tablet". Which appears to tell of an existing messianic myth involving a resurrection that predates Jesus's. That one is a little more difficult to explain away, though the academics are not done battling it out over it. So I'll wait to see what they settle on, before I gloat.

302. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #216159 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 7:43 pm

589. Comment #216143 by Robert O'Brien

I agree, but I think that the types of claims, the decades of time between the events and their recording, the lack of contemporarious evidence, and the anonymity of the writers very much does.

Inference to the best explanation. Even if the evidence for the people, places, and events was extremely strong, and there were droves of first hand wittnesses. The best explanation would still either be deception or mistake, or unknown phenomena.

Equivolent claims are made by Gurus in our times, and millions of people buy it. People claim to see ghosts, aliens, and tons of stuff all the time. No amount of anecdote is ever enough to over turn well established knowledge about how the world operates (especially claims at supernaturalism, which is impossible to ever establish).

Accepting any such claim is unjustified until the evidence for them is stronger than the evidence for the knowledge about the world they contradict.

The lesser of the two miracles is always the most rational option.

Even beyond all of this. Hume destroyed any possible rational justification for accepting a supernatural explanation. In order to claim something was supernatural you most possess a complete understanding of nature, that allows you to say what can and cannot be attributed to it. Unless you can demonstate a complete knowledge of nature, or explain why you don't require it, then how can you rationally ever accept a supernatural explanation for any phenomena?

303. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #216144 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 7:26 pm

586. Comment #216139 by Robert O'Brien

Praise from Cesar is praise indeed.

304. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #216130 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 7:15 pm

I'm afraid I agree with Robert that the evidence for the christian myths being inspired from other mythologies, at least directly, and intentionally is flimsy at best. Any similarities between them are better explained by the limits of human imagination, origins in the same types of thought processes than direct cross over.

At the very least I think that the proposition strains credulity. It is like saying that Vampire Hunter D copied off of Hellsing because they both have vampires in them.

305. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #216125 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 7:10 pm

550. Comment #216094 by Robert O'Brien

Conspiricy theorist's papers are also usually reviewed by "peers of their chosing" and I'm sure that doesn't effect the veracity of their arguments either. It definitely doesn't help though.

306. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #216119 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 7:05 pm

543. Comment #216085 by Robert O'Brien

My atheist colouring book doesn't include god, because it is difficult to colour. Hard to stay within the lines. Perhaps I need colour-by-sophistry.

307. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215966 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 3:14 pm

466. Comment #215964 by decius

Though it won't stop me from never shutting up about them. ;D

308. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215955 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 2:51 pm

I also wouldn't hold it against you for not valuing the same things I do, or having the same desires, tastes, goals, or interests... unlike some people.

309. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215953 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 2:43 pm

463. Comment #215941 by decius

That is what I thought my calling was too. I have a 3d graphics design degree, and I then took Advanced 3D character animation. I got hooked on manga during my course, and was not enjoying it, so I dropped out in the middle. I expected it to be a lot more design oriented.

I have always written fiction as a hobby for years, but I didn't do anything artistic like. I got into graphic design and animation because I wanted a media to go with my writing. I designed after getting into reading a lot of manga, that this was it. I'm starting from the bottom. I can barely draw a stick figure, but I am practicing, and I hope in a few years it won't look like total crap. Also I plan on attending art school once I pay off my student loans.

None of her work is available in english, I still own it all, but I have to resort to scanlators for english versions.

There is no copyright infringement involved, they don't have any copyright holding in the west until they are licensed by a distributor. The scanlators remove them once they have become licensed. I still buy the ones I like to support my favorite artists. Plus, I plan to be able to read them someday.

Manga are Serialized in large magazines, along with several other mangaka's works.

"Even if we're not friends" is the one in this magazine that is hers, the others are by different mangaka. Strawberry shake sweet (although, not by Morinaga-sensei) is also excellent.

http://www.lililicious.net/projectDet.php?id=4

310. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215932 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 2:05 pm

460. Comment #215924 by decius

Morinaga Milk is why I want to become a mangaka. I'm completely addicted to her work. She rules the yuri manga universe.

I'll nerd-gasam all over the place when she gets an anime. I have no question about will she, it is only a matter of time.

311. The brain in love

Comment #215918 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 1:48 pm

That was "Candy Boy" it's the first of its kind, an ONA (original net animation). They made an original 8 minute ONA to promote the song "Candy Boy". Here is the video they released, with the actual song it was made for. http://youtube.com/watch?v=4wqKCidvMYw


It was a huge hit, so they announced that they would be releasing seven more episodes online (fifteen minutes a piece) two have so far been released. No schedule has been set for their release, but the first two were about a month apart, which means the third should be due soon.

It is an adorible anime.

312. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215901 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 1:25 pm

454. Comment #215896 by Teratornis

Isn't it great when everyone is judged with one's self as the standard. Surely it is unavoidable, but as least be conscious of how subjective, and unrefined these judgements are.

313. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215897 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 1:19 pm

My hero worship isn't mindless, I'm quite conscious of how great my heroes are. What I wouldn't do for a chance to meet Morinaga Milk, and get her autograph. I think I'd faint.

314. The brain in love

Comment #215886 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 1:11 pm

Everyone is so cynical about love.

Love is a word used to describe a powerful chemical dependance

315. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215856 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 12:42 pm

112. Comment #215766 by hungarianelephant

I don't think the misunderstanding was on your part. I definitely was not clear in what I meant, and I almost certainly would have interpreted it as you did.

I know someone who had his criminal record wiped clean. He came to Canada to avoid the Vietnam War. He put his wife through school (who is now a nurse) and then became a stay-at-home Dad. This is my nephew's grandfather on his mother's side. Really cool guy, huge hippie. I believe he said it took ten years of staying clean after applying before they wiped it clean. I also agree with this. I'm glad that this can be done.

I never even considered holding Obama's crazy pastor against him. It is pretty clear to me just how seriously he takes religion anyway.

316. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215826 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 12:18 pm

A list of my biggest fears, and my daily schedule.

317. Richard Dawkins on Al Jazeera English

Comment #215824 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 12:16 pm

123. Comment #215784 by black_fire

That cracked me up pretty good too.

318. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215760 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 10:08 am

108. Comment #215756 by black_fire

I don't think you're being fair. For one thing, holding a wrong, and disgusting view is not equivolent to murder.

You can't hold a 10-15 year old responsible for their idiocy, c'mon. Don't you regret stupid and foolish things you've done?

Kids are stupid.

319. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215755 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 10:02 am

102. Comment #215585 by hungarianelephant

I read my comments again, and you're right, I did come off as you interpreted.

That was however not my intention.

320. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215754 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 9:54 am

100. Comment #215558 by hungarianelephant

Since you paraphrased me, I feel I need to defend myself. If you look at my posts again, I think you will see that I was talking about his unprofessionalism, not his views.

Even if he still was a bigotted homophobe, as long as he didn't mingle it with his professional career, I wouldn't consider it relevent. I don't judge people's qualifications based on whether I like them, or agree with all of their views.

Also, my comment about mortally wounding his career, I meant to mean at the time of his writing the paper. He misused his position, he used poorly supported and fatuous data, to promote a propaganda piece. This should have suffered him a professional repremand of some kind, especially considering the possible harm it caused.

Seventeen years later, I find (as I already stated I believe) this grounds to thoroughly investigate the man to make sure he isn't up to his old tricks, but not grounds in itself to take action against him. I know you don't like it when I used legal terms outside of a legal context, but I think that a "statute of limitations" concept is appriopriate. He was however a 50 year old man at the time, so I do very much think that it warrents thorough investigation.

321. Losing Sight of Progress

Comment #215737 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 9:35 am

47. Comment #215729 by severalspeciesof

Yes, indeed, not automatic. It sneaks up on you. muahahahaha.

49. Comment #215736 by BicycleRepairMan

I believe they only mean "backwards" in that they have reverted to ancestrial traits, or morphologies.

322. Losing Sight of Progress

Comment #215703 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 9:09 am

Creationists will never accept any such arguments. At least not the really deep seeded ones. The problem is with their original premise "goddidit". So this means that it is impossible that he didn't do it. So no matter the absurd, ad hoc'd ludicrously ridiculously improbable and idiotic explanation they come up with for why god did it that way, it will always be (in their minds) more probable than the impossiblility that god didn't do it.

It is like the idea of "irreducible complexity" which postulates that there is a level of complexity that could not come about naturally. So they find things that they deem to have this level of complexity in nature. Instead of this falsifying their original premise, they deem it supernatural. Because of their original assumption.

It isn't like their position is illogical, starting from their premises, but they are completely unsound, and unjustified premises.

323. Richard Dawkins on Al Jazeera English

Comment #215605 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 7:25 am

103. Comment #215601 by MPhil

I thought it was "use a calculator".

324. The brain in love

Comment #215523 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 3:49 am

103. Comment #215412 by Broshiesq

Does someone have a white-trash secret they are sensitive about? Hmm?

325. Richard Dawkins on Al Jazeera English

Comment #215516 by Mitchell Gilks on July 22, 2008 at 3:35 am

54. Comment #215456 by Bonzai

Because he needs brains.

326. The brain in love

Comment #215410 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 8:19 pm

98. Comment #215395 by scooternyc

Only if it isn't reciprocated.

327. The brain in love

Comment #215406 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 8:06 pm

97. Comment #215394 by Radesq

Well my dumb older sister and dumb older brother both had children by twenty. I am now twenty four and I've made no similar mistakes. (did I ever mention that I'm white trash and have six siblings? Only half of them share both parents with me though.)

Perhaps you're right though, it didn't turn out of all that great for them. Though I actually resent people that treat their children like a side thing, and still continue to behave selfishly.

I may be pissed off that I lose my selfish lazy life, and this may be sensed by my kid, but I sure as hell would not treat them like a side thing, and continue to focus my attention on me. I've contemplated it before, if I did get someone pregnant (supposing we were suited enough to stay together) I would immediately start reading books on parenting and child pyschology. I would try to plan everything out, and make sure I did it right. Or at least the best that I could do it.

I may someday decide to have a kid, but I'm far too immature right now. I wouldn't want one until I was finacially stable, and a lot more grown up.

328. Richard Dawkins on Al Jazeera English

Comment #215405 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 8:01 pm

Pfft, do they have wolfie and the situation room? I don't think so.

329. The brain in love

Comment #215393 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 7:13 pm

93. Comment #215381 by Radesq

Oh, I'm actually quite happy, and think that I would do a hell of a lot better than most parents. The problem is that I'm too selfish to have children on purpose, and not dumb enough to have any by accident.

330. Richard Dawkins on Al Jazeera English

Comment #215377 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 6:21 pm

13. Comment #215360 by PristinePanda

His belief is quite reasonable. If we consider our species to be a successful species (which is pushing it being that we are only roughly 200 thousand years old) then based on past successful species, we should expect to last about eight million years. Given the precedent set by other successful species.

331. The brain in love

Comment #215375 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 6:14 pm

90. Comment #215367 by Quine

That is really really cool. RD's book is shown on GitS. I did not know that. I wonder if he does.

Usually whenever they make a reference to evolution in anime, it is so wrong that it is painful.

Though you have convinced me. I know that my brother has told me that GitS is really good. I will have to add it to my list.

Someday we will all be having sex with hot robots. Then society will crumble because we won't have to impress potential love interests anymore (like what happened on Futurama).

332. Nine face stoning death in Iran

Comment #215364 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 5:50 pm

275. Comment #215348 by Broshiesq

It is quite relevent. You can justify a lot in the name of "punishment" that you cannot justify with a goal solely of the protection of society.

I'm Canadian, not american. It is my understanding the a lot of prison systems in the states tends to turn people into harden criminals. We don't have as harsh a system (in fact we have a slight problem with drug smuggling in our ports, as smugglers are more willing to attempt to cross the boarder into the US and risk a canadian prison sentence, than go to an American port, that would be easiert to smuggle to and risk an American prison sentence) and we do focus more on rehabilitation. You are correct that some people may not be rehabilitatable. In this case, I would support indefinite imprisonment.

333. Richard Dawkins on Al Jazeera English

Comment #215359 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 5:36 pm

"You are entitled to your belief in Adam, it is however false."

I cracked up. RD is cool as shit. I just remembered why I love his public appearances so much.

334. Nine face stoning death in Iran

Comment #215322 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 4:16 pm

270. Comment #215231 by Broshiesq

I don't support the rule of law for punishments sake, nor do I think it is required to justify supporting the criminal justice system.

I support fines and short sentences as deterrents for further offences, and prolonged prison sentences to protect society from individuals that cannot be trusted to uphold extremely important laws. That involve extreme violent acts.

Under such a rationale it is perfectly coherent to reject capital punishment, both as unnecessary, and as excessive. Only in extreme circumstances when just keeping them in prison resulted in more over-all suffering than killing them.

I do think that the justice system needs to be reformed in a way that focuses far more towards rehabilitation. However, many programs I have in mind would be expensive, and may not be worth the benefit. Though I think the issue needs to be deeply investigated.

335. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215314 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 4:01 pm

54. Comment #215290 by Corylus

This sort of thing causes suicide.

336. The brain in love

Comment #215307 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 3:42 pm

84. Comment #215298 by Quine

They call it "Red Haired Anne" and it is hugely popular in Japan. Prince Edward Island gets lots of traffic from Japanese tourists.

I'm not a fan of mecha at all. Of course the Japanese tend to not draw a line between science and supernaturalism. So not only are they silly giant robots, but a large majority of the time, they are magic-giant-robots.

I have not watched either Ghost in a Shell or Hack//Sign (which are very similar as I understand it). Though they are both suppose to contain some yuri as I understand it.

I know I definitely have a good time getting those mirror neurons firing. It's rather addicting. My whole reason for trying to learn Japanese, and for wanting to become a mangaka centers around my obsession with yuri. There is only so much available in english. I need to keep up with all of my favorite yuri mangaka's releases. I can't go a day without reading yuri manga.

Mecha is entrenched in Japanese culture though, so it will always be present in some form in any si-fi they do. I've never seen one without a mecha of some sort.

If you want to waste 8 minutes of your life here is an AMV that includes clips from 13 of some of the best yuri anime. http://youtube.com/watch?v=-aBVjVV2Y_w

337. The brain in love

Comment #215280 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 3:05 pm

80. Comment #215273 by Dhamma

It's actually pretty funny (it's a comedy), and hugely popular. I didn't argue that it was bad, only that it wasn't yuri. I believe I called it "Kashimashi: transexual-guy meets girl".

I also found it sort of offensive, as it seemed to be trying to justify pseudo-lesbianism with the fact that he was a guy.

So, at best, it was just a transexual guy, and at worst, they were trying to justify homosexuality under that premise.

338. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215272 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 2:58 pm

multi-universe

339. The brain in love

Comment #215249 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 2:34 pm

77. Comment #215244 by Quine

Which anime have you seen?

I got kicked out of the yuricon mailing list because I made a topic where I talked about how terrible I thought Bakuretsu Tenshi was. Some people can't take disagreement.

Of course I also pissed a lot off people of when I argued that "Kashimashi: Girl meets girl" was not yuri, since the protagonist was male, and received a sex change by aliens.

340. The brain in love

Comment #215236 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 2:17 pm

73. Comment #215218 by Quine

It depends. I can't find the link to the demographics of the major yuri magazines, but I remember them. Yuri hime is targeted towards women, and has an audience of 70% female, and 30% male, which contrasts almost exactly with yuri hime S which is targeted towards males. Then the third major yuri magazine is Comic high, which describes themselves as "girly stories for guys and girls" and has a reader base of something like 40/60 male.

In my experience in the fandom, there are slightly more female yuri fans than males, many of which are either homosexual bisexual, or just say they like it.

Interestingly enough yaoi (which came first, and is homosexual male fiction) was originally targeted towards women, and a large majority of it still is. Also, there is a lot of cross over, many yuri fans also like yaoi, and vice versa.

As for the anime, well there are so few that generally all yuri fans flock, so my guess would be slightly bigger audience of female than male, but not by much. Some that are really strongly targeted towards women, and have almost zero sexual displays of effection, or "fan service" tend to have a disproportionately bigger female audience. Like the hugely popular poster child of yuri "Maria-sama ga Miteru." Which even spawned countless doujinshi (self published manga, and large majority of which is kind of like fan fiction, only it is done by professionals and sold, but only in limited supply to not draw the attention of lawsuits. Though they tend not to be too anal with intellectual property in Japan) manga.

Though in short, you can usually tell by the target audience. Marketing seems to know what we like. It is never hugely disproportionate. Usually 70/30 60/40 or something around those lines, with respect to which gender it is targeted at.

Manga in Japan is nothing like comics in the west. Manga is a 4.7 billion dollar a year industry in Japan, and there are manga focused towards every demographic imaginable. Everyone reads them. Marvel and Cap Com release issues monthly and claim about 50 thousand readers. The major dozen or so manga magazines (manga are serilized in large magazines with several different manga. These have chapters of between 8-36 pages each, these are later compiled into volumes which are sold by themselves) have weekly releases and claim more than a million subscribers each. The yuri magazines I mentioned are not this popular, and have monthly releases, but they still destroy western comic book sales.

341. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215226 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 2:00 pm

16. Comment #215221 by CocoCantare

I don't think there is anything that suggests he has changed. All that this suggests is that he lied, used fallacious reasoning and evidence to support his views, and suffered public embarassment at its thorough discrediting. The man was 51 years old. It was 17 years ago, and he may have changed his views in this case, but I would need reason to believe that he would not be willing to employ such tactics again whenever it suited him.

342. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215216 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 1:50 pm

11. Comment #215210 by kkelly

I think the more important thing is that he used fallacious and poorly supported data to support a preconceived and bigotted opinion. It doesn't matter (in my opinion) what specifically it was about. It is that he is willing to do something so unprofessional. This disqualifies him in my opinion.

343. Surgeon General Nominee Dismisses Homosexuality Paper

Comment #215211 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 1:44 pm

6. Comment #215197 by Mozglubov

Gay-cooties?

And women have those long sharp nails. Dudes would like get all greesed up and wrestle, then one could fall down.

344. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215172 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 12:55 pm

373. Comment #215162 by Teratornis

Sounds like someone holds rationality as sacred and reverent! :O

Anywho, perhaps you could pull that stick out of your ass, and fashion a cross, then make your own rationality religion.

345. The brain in love

Comment #215161 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 12:33 pm

64. Comment #215157 by kkelly

It takes both utilization of our short attention spans, and the ability to convincingly pretend we know what you're talking about when we haven't a clue.

The former is inborn, but the latter takes some skill.

" blank, blank, blank, 20% off, blank, blank, blank."

"That's a pretty good deal."

346. Richard Dawkins slaps creationists into the primordial soup

Comment #215158 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 12:26 pm

Are you a vegan aswell Tera?

I have given up almost all such substances for sometime, but I still can't manage to go a day without ingesting a large amount of coffee, diet cola, and tea.

347. The brain in love

Comment #215150 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 12:05 pm

I've never been in love. I've feigned it a few times though. I might be too big of a narcissist to ever fall in love with anyone else.

I am however deeply interested in the idea, and do very much hope to one day experience it. Even if it does end in rejection, though hopefully it will not.

I also read and watch a lot of romantic fiction and drama. Given it is all yuri, heterosexual equivolent stories don't interest me at all for some reason. I always just hate the guys, and resent the women for liking them. I'm weird like that.

348. Nine face stoning death in Iran

Comment #215131 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 11:03 am

252. Comment #215127 by Barry Pearson

Paternity testing wouldn't change our genetic predispositions. It merely makes such a disposition obsolete.

253. Comment #215128 by decius

I only whipped the other one together in about a minute. I actually spent a couple minutes on this one. Even if I went over the edges of the last one and gave it a black even boarder it would have looked a lot better. I'm just chronically lazy.

349. Nine face stoning death in Iran

Comment #215125 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 10:38 am

245. Comment #215119 by decius

That better?

350. Nine face stoning death in Iran

Comment #215118 by Mitchell Gilks on July 21, 2008 at 10:12 am

I guess I could have adopted his background. Maybe that is what I should have done.