Comments:

1. spaceman spiff on June 26th, 2009 at 16:48:

   Unfortunately, I suspected that Obama would waffle on his “intention” to provide greater “transparency” on these issues when as a Senator (my Senator, BTW) he reversed his stand against FISA. FWIW, doesn’t the word “transparency” mean “you can see through this”, or “it’s invisible, isn’t it”? So, if a government policy or actions are transparent, I suppose you can mean that they are not visible. Very nice double-talk Mr. President!

Comments:

1. Mark on June 26th, 2009 at 13:18:

   The only thing that might have made this funnier would be little stick people in the backgrounds getting blown up by drones, or maybe jumping off bridges after they lost all their savings, or maybe starving children. Well not funnier, exactly….

Comments:

1. Jan-Mark on June 26th, 2009 at 8:30:

   I sort of expected him to die before I did and I did not expect to feel much if anything. But when I heard of his death, I felt a mix of shock, and sorry. I guess the constant abuse when he was young and the constant pressure when he was famous, did not do much for his health. I was already wondering how (not why) he was going to do all those appearances. (No, I did not get tickets, they were all swept up by reseller-scum.) As to the child-abuse charges. Eventually I think, he was the victim there too. (Esp. After I read that the parents that sued him so relentlessly, had done so twice before with other rich people.) But what do I know? I just hope his children will be left alone somewhat, but given the total and utter panic mode of the US press core, I am not optimistic. Rest in piece Michael.

Comments:

1. Maarten on June 25th, 2009 at 22:31:

   I read Gerstner’s memoir of his IBM days a while ago; he had other suggestions to steer corporate executives away from pursuing short term profits. The one I remember is that Gerstner suggested that executives should have real “skin in the game” by investing a chunk of their own money in the company they run, linking their fortune with that of the shareholders. At the same time, I believe he also argued that competent executives have enormous impact on the bottom line, and thus deserve enormous salaries when the bottom line outperforms expectations.

   I can see that you might want to encourage long-term investing to promote long term corporate health. But I’m missing an explicit rationale for the suggestion that taxes should be high on same-day trades. Same-day trading doesn’t encourage companies to pursue short-term profits, does it? I’d think it’s likely to be either highly speculative (with high risk) or insider trading.

2. John Sinteur on June 25th, 2009 at 22:36:

   Same-day trading doesn’t encourage companies to pursue short-term profits, does it?

   Ask a random CEO, like, say, Gerstner. My guess is that the influence day traders have on the press about a company and the pressure a CEO feels to get this quarters numbers just right, that alone, is reason enough for Gerstners position on long term and short term trade.

3. spaceman spiff on June 26th, 2009 at 16:55:

   This is so stupid! If they taxed short term gains at such a rate, there would cease to be any stock or options market at all, since most of the traders and market makers who provide liquidity to the market would find a new line of work that will pay the bills. IMO, taxing it at regular income rates is reasonable. IMO, 80% would be the death-knell of the equities market system, at least in the USA.

Comments:

1. Mauro on June 25th, 2009 at 19:09:

   Where did you find this? It’s RIDICULOUS!

   In case you’re skeptical, by the way, do this: Save the image on your computer twice, open both copies in the same program side by side, and zoom in to a green region in one and a blue region in the other, regions that you’re SURE are different. Then compare the pixel color. I just did that, and holy crap… THE SAME COLOR.

Comments:

1. Gene on June 25th, 2009 at 12:11:

   I wonder if he is going to do what he wanted Clinton to do and resign!

2. Spoon Phillips on June 26th, 2009 at 18:57:

   Fox has been doing that “accidental” switch of the (R) to a (D) for years. When will the FCC tell them they must stop using the word News in their title, since it implies a factual reporting of events?

   Otherwise, in civilized countries voters understand that people have affairs, especially rich, powerful men. But these sleazy hypocrites are a new low. How many major players in the impeachment of President Clinton have since been found to have affairs? Sometimes I think America deserves the robbing and buggering they suffer at the hands of their leaders, for being stupid enough to believe the holier than thou crud people like this guy puke out at microphones on a daily basis.

3. John Sinteur on June 27th, 2009 at 11:16:

   [May 14 this year:]

   The attorneys for Fox, owned by media baron Rupert Murdock, successfully argued the First Amendment gives broadcasters the right to lie or deliberately distort news reports on the public airwaves

Comments:

1. Mudak on June 24th, 2009 at 19:43:

   Not that I’ve ever heard of it before this, but Synagogue of Satan sounds like a fun place.

   Or the name of a good heavy metal rock band.

Comments:

1. spaceman spiff on June 24th, 2009 at 15:36:

   “If shelter is not available, lie flat in a ditch or other low-lying area. Do not get under an overpass or bridge. You are safer in a low, flat location.” WTF??

2. HokieGeek on June 24th, 2009 at 18:51:

   See, I thought the joke was that they were calling it ‘cyberspace’

Comments:

1. matt w. on June 23rd, 2009 at 18:18:

   A good counter example to their question would be a reeses peanut butter cup. Clearly not natural and accidentally created…at least according to their commercials.

2. Maarten on June 23rd, 2009 at 18:52:

   Traffic jams?

3. Jim on June 23rd, 2009 at 19:58:

   First thing that comes to mind? There’s a satellite antenna that NASA is using. ( http://ti.arc.nasa.gov/projects/esg/research/antenna.htm ) It is a massive improvement on any other antenna out there in terms of cost, performance, size, and development time. The tool they used for its “design” is a Genetic Algorithm (GA) – which essentially is trial and error, patterned after Evolution theory, but sped up with the aid of computers.

   The way that a GA works is, pick a number of random designs, e.g. 100, then test the fitness of each one to the final goal. Take the top 10, and use them to create the next batch of 100 through cross-breeding and random mutation. Repeat as long as you want, or until you get something good enough.

   Note that at no point in this simulation is there an analysis or “intelligent decision” about any of the designs. There is simply a test of how well the design works to meet the final goal, and the fittest designs survive and propagate.

   In short, Evolution soundly beat out Intelligent Design for this antenna.

   Now, a counter-argument to this example is to say that someone designed the computer. While that may be true, it does not actually address the method, i.e. it was was a conscious choice on the part of the NASA scientists to use Evolution, rather than to tinker with it directly. Therefore, the conclusion is that, sure, there may be an Intelligent Designer, but that intelligent designer chose to use Evolution.

   Another counter-argument is that the resulting design is so complex that it requires a computer to build it, so “clearly” there’s intelligence required there. However, the original thought experiment was to show something artificial that had not been designed – and the antenna was clearly not “designed” by anything other than trial and error and survival of the fittest – which is to say, Evolution.

   I think the better way to look at the ID vs Evolution argument is to turn it around – if we, and everything around us, are the product of an external designer, then why are we broken? There’s of course the fragility of the human body, e.g. disease, death, the fact that the majority of the Earth’s surface is fatal to us, etc. The larger question in my mind is, if it is important to the designer that the creation recognize the designer, why didn’t the creator hard-wire that in? The result of free will is enlightened discussion and scientific advances that give us the potential to improve the living experience of everyone on the planet – although not enough of us have yet chosen to make that happen. The result of The Church has, on average, been to squelch individual thought, and to reduce the possibility of each individual to achieve his/her maximum potential.

   In short, if we are designed, we are designed in such a way that the average individual who claims there is a designer has a higher probability of increasing the global average level of pain and misery. I cannot think of an answer that does not boil down to “God demands faith despite hardship” – which correlates to making other people miserable in the name of improving their lives – or “God’s ways cannot be known to us” – in which case, there is by definition nothing that can be learned by studying the creator. The parameters of our design either mean that we are meant to be miserable or to evolve freely.

4. Mudak on June 23rd, 2009 at 23:03:

   I can give you a great example of something that came into being without intelligent direction: Bwinwright’s question / argument…

5. Leon on June 24th, 2009 at 7:25:

   The dutch philosopher Spinoza coined the phrase “Deus sive Natura” which means “God or nature”. He describes everything as being part of God. But because he also needed to differ between that which has it’s own cause, and that which is caused by something else, he introduced the difference between “natura naturans” and “natura naturata”.

   When someone asks about something outside of nature, they talk about this first term, natura naturans. It is that, which is it’s own cause, that raises a lot of debates.

   For Spinoza the issue is simple: there is no difference between the two, as they both obey the same endless natural laws and are made of the same substance.

   So the question for something “outside of nature” is limited to your definition of nature. A spinozist can simply point to the difference spelled out by Spinoza, and be done with it.

   If all creationist would be as stupid as Bwinwright, the debate would be long over.

6. Also Economics Major on June 24th, 2009 at 17:55:

   Economics, dude! The whole idea of free-market theory is that a lot of intelligences work in a massive way to do things that no one mind could have figured out. Not to say i’m a free-marketeer, but most creationists are…so…hypocrisy! or something

7. Wolfgold on June 24th, 2009 at 21:08:

   Unless evolution can be proven on a molecular level, it is pointless to discuss any organism of a higher order. The theory of evolution thus still has a looong way to go, since it can’t. So how about fixing your own problem first, eh?

8. John Sinteur on June 24th, 2009 at 21:11:

   Unless evolution can be proven on a molecular level

   What the fuck does that even mean? Is it something like “unless nuclear fusion can be proven on an atomic level, it’s useless to discuss what’s happening in the sun?”

9. Wolfgold on June 24th, 2009 at 21:19:

   No. It has NOT been proved even to work on a molecular level. It still remains a shoddy theory, at best. Every few years it’s back to the drawing room for another fancy theory in the frankly very humorous evolution saga. You should read up on it, it’ really very funny. The first ‘lizards’ learned to fly by catching insect? Really, that was seriously suggested not too many years ago.

10. John Sinteur on June 24th, 2009 at 21:22:

    You still haven’t explained what the fuck you mean by “work on a molecular level”.

11. nina on June 24th, 2009 at 22:07:

    there’s nothing that anyone can say that’s inside nature that came into being with intelligent design

    pointless question that just demonstrated the person asking it has no clue or logic capacity

12. Dinah on June 25th, 2009 at 1:14:

    I usually just lurk here occasionally, but thought I’d suggest you read Behe’s ‘Darwin’s black box’.

13. spaceman spiff on June 25th, 2009 at 1:38:

    I have to think that if the Universe was truly the product of Intelligent Design, then most of these boneheads would never have been conceived or born!

14. John Sinteur on June 25th, 2009 at 5:44:

    Behe? That same Behe and the same book that is the source of this whole “Irreducibly Complex” idea? Do you really think I’m not aware of it? The book is utter crap. May I offer you this link in return?

15. Tirzha on June 25th, 2009 at 12:29:

    I actually own and have read Darwin’s Black Box. It completely ignores evidence and makes unfalsifiable claims. This does not make it accurate, Dinah.

16. Cerberus on June 28th, 2009 at 16:32:

    Alright, so you say evolution can’t be proven on a molecular level, and every so often they go back to the drawing board. But what about divine creation? It can’t be proven on a molecular level either!

    What’s more, the creationists also go back to the drawing board every so often, i.e., Zeus, Odin, Horus, Jesus, Allah, Mohammad, Krishna, etc. How funny do you find that? (Don’t answer, it was a rhetorical question)

    Now, lets go one step further. Nature does not have a presence that allows it to communicate with humans in any kind of language format we understand; however, we have been led to believe that all of the gods have the ability to speak to us. Yet, there is no historical document that can prove there is a god or that he/she/it ever spoke to any man. Why wouldn’t a god communicate with their creations? Furthermore, if God is an almighty, all-knowing, omnipotent being, how is it that he created such an imperfect creature as man? That in itself disproves “His” omnipotence, and raises the question of his very existence. So, why has your God not revealed himself to humanity?

17. Richard Steeb on June 29th, 2009 at 0:19:

    IF some folks believe earthly life is way too complex to have arrived without the guidance of an Omnipotent Intelligent Creator, how do they explain the existence of said Creator?

    (Where’d SHE come from?

18. Scrunch Hat on June 29th, 2009 at 16:07:

    Wait, back me up a little. How does artificial equate to morally superior to natural? How does the perfection of nature argue in FAVOR of intelligent design? Intelligently designed stuff falls apart, poisons your body, rots your brain, cuts your finger. How is it advantageous, or even prestigious, to be an artifact and not a natural phenomenon? Lets clear this up before we invoke spooks in the sky, huh?

19. joe bob on June 29th, 2009 at 16:34:

    Bwinwright needs a more sophisticated argument so that I can understand what the hell he’s trying to say.

20. Martin on June 29th, 2009 at 17:23:

    “Every few years it’s back to the drawing room for another fancy theory in the frankly very humorous evolution saga. You should read up on it, it’ really very funny. The first ‘lizards’ learned to fly by catching insect? Really, that was seriously suggested not too many years ago.”

    This is how science WORKS. Our understanding of things is constantly revised and refined (that’s “back to the drawing board,” as you put it). The scientific process starts with a proposition (even a stupid one) and the proposition can be falsified (that is, demonstrated to be not true) or evidence in its favor can accumulate.

    Contrast this with religious dogma, which – as far as I can tell – can’t even manage to be internally consistent within a given belief system.

    You should read up on it, it’s enlightening!

21. bebe99 on June 29th, 2009 at 22:16:

    It’s arguments like Bwinwright’s that convinced me that raising my kids with religion was tantamount to raising them not to think correctly. Belief in the supernatural leads to illogical thinking, not just in relation to religion, but it also spills over to everything else. I don’t think you can just partition your mind with this stuff. In the end religion is dangerous to the thinking of all people.

22. Don on June 30th, 2009 at 1:58:

    Which does nothing, of course, to prove the existence of his Jesus Clause.

    Adults that believe in fairy tales should be banished.

23. Duane on June 30th, 2009 at 11:42:

    I was told when reading the bible to keep it simple and what you don’t understand take your time and in time it will be revealed to you. The Bible is like a living organism, it breaths life. Jesus spoke in parable to confuse the wise and make it plain to the simple.

    That why King Solomon said: Only a fool says in his heart there is no God (Creator). So if i’m to believe the entire bible as I do then there is no such person called an Atheist.

    According to Jehovah God and King Solomon an atheist is only a fool who refuses to accept the TRUTH about a Creator. Rebellion. I know who’s behind that thought.

    The Bible also says Jehovah God our Father does not lie and can’t lie. His thoughts are not are thoughts and are thoughts are not his thoughts.

24. John Sinteur on June 30th, 2009 at 11:51:

    The Bible also says Jehovah God our Father does not lie and can’t lie

    Pity then about Numbers 14:30, where god admits he lied.

25. John Sinteur on June 30th, 2009 at 11:53:

    According to Jehovah God and King Solomon an atheist is only a fool who refuses to accept the TRUTH about a Creator. Rebellion. I know who’s behind that thought

    So both Jehovah God and King Solomon are going to hell: Matthew 5:22, “but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire”

26. god on June 30th, 2009 at 21:40:

    Evolution has been proven on a molecular level. Dna & rna are molocules, dumbass!

27. Jeffersonbc on July 3rd, 2009 at 11:08:

    I think people have basically been brainwashed by evolution. It’s all they hear at school, on the mass media, museums, National Parks etc. and it’s all supposed to be “scientific”

    Its so sad that students never get to hear the Creation Science side of the story. Instead they are forced to accept a pedantic, one sided theory invented by Darwin in the 1840′s. Even Darwin questioned the concept of how an “eye” could evolve? An eye is totally useless without all of its parts working, that’s what irreducible complexity is all about.

    Of course creationists can accept the microevolutionary processes that Darwin observed on the Galapagos Islands. The different finches observed on different islands were due to mutations and we have absolutely no problem with this.

    Macroevolution however is a different story. The idea that birds evolved from reptiles seems such a preposterous idea. Reptiles have a totally different respiratory system to birds. With birds airflow in one direction is maintained in both inhalation and exhalation. With reptiles airflow is two directional, just like us.

    And of course there are so many examples of intelligent design in nature you’d have to be blind not to notice them. Scientists always gone to nature to find out all there smart ideas. For example the bats gave them their sonar technology. They’ve only just figured out how to make robots that replicate bird’s flight and they’re still trying to figure out how Polar Bears hibernate. So someone or something up there is one up on the scientists.

28. John Sinteur on July 3rd, 2009 at 11:53:

    Jefferson, the amazement you appear to feel about people who think evolution is correct is the same feeling we have when people tell us they believe in intelligent design. Welcome to the club.

    Well, except that evolution follows the scientific method and intelligent design uses the “because we say so” method. The difference matters quite a bit.

29. John Sinteur on July 3rd, 2009 at 13:31:

    You may also want to view this.

30. Roland Hesz on July 3rd, 2009 at 17:09:

    Jefferson: “one sided theory invented by Darwin in the 1840’s”

    Darwin has been working on a hypothesis, which was already known in scientific circles, and found a better answer to the questions that surrounded that hypothesis. Later that hypothesis became a theory because it has been supported by a lot of facts.

    The fact that Darwin did not invent the “theory of evolution” is supported by the existence of Natural Theology, a book written by William Palley, first published in 1802 – and it’s one of the first Intelligent Design theory books. Incidentally, he was the first person – as far as I know – who brought up the example of the eye, likening it to the telescope. And he was the good reverend who introduced the Watchmaker as a concept.
    Also, you may be surprised that the “theory invented” by Charles Darwin was something that Erasmus Darwin, the grandfather of Charles Darwin, wrote a book upon – Zoonomia – in which he was speculating about spontaneous changes in organisms.
    That’s about shows how much it was evolution was “invented” by Charles Darwin.

    The eye: You say the eye is useless without all it’s parts. That’s true. There never was “half an eye”. There was and are however eyes which are half as efficient as the human eye. Or even worse than half as effective. Even some bacteria have light sensitive enzime systems.

31. Roland Hesz on July 3rd, 2009 at 17:16:

    Some corrections and additions: “how much it was evolution was” correction “how much evolution was”.

    Also, Darwin did not question the evolution of the eye. He went out to answer the question posed by William Paley, and found that there is indeed a lot of different eyes, light sensing organs of different levels of effectiveness, from simple light/dark sensing ones to the human eye.

    So no, he did not question it. Someone half a century before the publication of Origin of Species questioned it.

Comments:

1. TheGaucho on June 23rd, 2009 at 13:36:

   This would be laughable if it wasn’t so tragic.

2. Spoon Phillips on June 23rd, 2009 at 15:06:

   or so frightening

Comments:

1. Mudak on June 23rd, 2009 at 17:40:

   If it’s risen, does anyone know what it was before?

   Of course, here’s the fallacy of statistics. Let’s assume that it was at an even 50%. Therefore, the increase of this magnitude would correspond to a 12.8% improvement in the graduation rate, and it would therefore look really good on paper to the bureaucrats and administrators who measure these things…..

Comments:

1. TheGaucho on June 23rd, 2009 at 10:56:

   Don’t tell me you would’ve expected anything else…

2. spaceman spiff on June 23rd, 2009 at 15:48:

   From a job application form for prospective politicians:

   Are you or have you ever been a Hypocrite? Yes [ ] No [ ] Don’t Care [ ]
   Have you ever taken a bribe? Yes [ ] No [ ] How Much? $________
   If offered a bribe in your official capacity, would you accept it? Yes [ ] No [ ] How Much? $_______
   Have you answered untruthfully anywhere on this form? Yes [ ] No [ ] Not Sure [ ]

Comments:

1. Mauro on June 23rd, 2009 at 15:36:

   Is ASCAP *trying* to lose money? If they pursue this they won’t make any royalties at all. I can’t see how this will help them.