This will be the last self-aggrandizing post of the week, but reader Diana “Your Toilet Paper is Backwards” MacPherson alerted me to something on Seth Andrews’ s(“The Thinking Atheist”) Facebook page.
You can listen or download that podcast (but only if you haven’t read WEIT) here, and the whole panoply of Seth’s podcasts can be found here. I’ve sampled a few, and they’re good.
By the way, we all get free drinks. I’m having a Woodford Reserve.
I’m having a double double because I didn’t sleep well last night. I was probably worried about all those bathrooms with backward toilet paper! 😀
Man, I wish I had a cool online reputation like you do.
I know, right?
🙂
It’s kind of badass.
Diana, the Bathroom Badass.
I bow before such web-cred.
It’s not just online.
Lol!
Yes, I suppose this kind of thing would garner one some notoriety in meat space as well.
Over the top or down the wall? I change them, too.
Please Wendy, don’t open that can of worms. It’s gonna be a bloody mess!
Under – down the wall.
Over, OFF the wall
Is Diana gonna be badass like the honey badger?
She is not invited over to my house and never will be. I will never allow wrong-way-toilet-paper evildoers to cross my threshold.
Maybe I’ve already been there & changed it without you noticing. Muhahaha! Stealth like a ninja!
On this forum shouldn’t that be “Stealth like nightjar?”
Ah, but can you change it as fast as the wheels on a Formula One car?
(I’ve been waiting for ages for an excuse to link that 🙂
I can’t even lift a tire on a rim!
Sorry I could not post this earlier; today’s Reality Check cartoon looks like it had Diana in mind. Well, anyway, I had her in mind when I read it…
Ha ha!
Jeez, I’d be happy if my family members remembered to just set out a new roll of TP when needed, let alone put it in the dispenser…
Or I love when people leave the roll on with just one square of tp…
Uh huh. That always means that your next trip will be of the, uh, urgent variety…
I’ll change it for you….
My young boys pee all over the toilet seat and/or the floor on regular basis and one has a toilet flushing phobia. Replacing the roll is the least of my worries.
My cousin’s cat used to flush their toilet all the time. Maybe you could train your cat?
I don’t have a cat. Just kids and plants. I don’t think I’d have much luck training the plants.
Well, there’s your problem right there.
If you’re anywhere near New Zealand, Jerry Coyne is in need of a slave. If that’s not convenient for you, there’re plenty of other Masters searching for slaves of their own….
b&
You could train ivy up or down the tank and around the handle. It might flush inappropriately, though, like my cousin’s cat.
Thanks Diana and the gang for lots of good laughs on this thread. I suggest that Professor Ceiling Cat should organise an online poll to settle this serious matter. Just don’t mention it over at Pharyngula.
I suspect the pole will reflect the current preference of orientation as over as this wikipedia article details.
OMG, a whole Wikipedia article with 130 citations, countless references, and a bibliography of more than a dozen books. Like I could give a shit!
Diana, you may take comfort from the fact that the survey Wikipedia cites was of *American* consumers, and we all know what they’re like 😉 In fact the article carries a specific warning banner that that this may not represent a worldwide view of the subject. So there’s hope for you yet.
(I don’t know why I’m telling you this, since I’m a committed supporter of the ‘Over’ faction. Just some compulsion to be fair, even though you’re worng).
Oh, and it specifically mentions compatibility with cats on line 12 of the article. This has to be the most scholarly and definitive work in the whole of Wikipedia.
LOL! Yes, discussions of cat-compatability ( catability?) clearly raise the credibility of sny scholarly paper. Cat-queue E D.
Whoops..compatibility
Surely you mean concatability. 🙂
Great minds…:-). ( or maybe warped minds?)
Yes, I noticed the wikipedia warning. I found that whole article funny in that there has been so much effort put in to correlate over & under preferences with political ideologies and socio-economic status. I seem not to fit in with the majority in those categories either.
If we keep this topic going for long enough, WEIT will end up getting cited as a reference on the Wiki page. 🙂
The Evolution of Toilet Roll Placement
Slaínte! Bravo!
Cheers!
Salute ! ( w/ one’s dominant / dextrous hand ! )
w/ at least a coupla’shots’ worth of central Iowa’s Capone – Special: T Rye’s the Good Stuff ( of thus: http://www.templetonrye.com/blog/2008/10/15/tr-stories-the-adventures-of-templeton-the-turtle ) —-
along w/, too o’course, > shots of that wicked – badass, black Romana Sambuca in a Zorro’s Vengeance.
Particularly on THIS day ( — whilst also, w/ one’s other [ sinister ] p.a.w., sabotaging one’s friends’ t – paper rollers ).
Blue
Wow, we have the same favorite Bourbon and the same favorite Texas BBQ places.
Enjoyed the interview
I listened to the interview on my walk today; and missed any references to bourbon or Texas BBQ.
But I did enjoy the interview a lot (the Q&A, not so much). I think I’ll add Seth Andrews book Deconverted to my list.
I already told you about that book so it’s already on your list. 😀
“… reader Diana “Your Toilet Paper is Backwards” MacPherson…”
I LOL-ed…still chuckling…
Oh, & congrats on the #1 ranking!
Congrats! Seth is very good, his book is excellent, and the video memorium he made for Hitch is among my favorite things ever–I watch it every once in a while for inspiration, and “We’ll take it from here” is one of my main mottos.
Hopefully won’t be long before we permanently overtake that certain anti-science bleargh….
b&
Wow! 3 wins for you this week. What’ll you do for an encore next week?
Congrats!
At least Diana’s tp fetish is harmless. Imagine what would happen if she thought people had their clothes on backward!
or their heads.
Ha Ha Ha!
This thread is making my day!
Where on earth did this stereotype of atheists as joyless Vulcans come from?!
Thanks a lot, Camus!
No, far before that — the Romantic Period, at least, rebelling against the Age of Reason. “Love is irrational! If we pursue reason then we will never love or feel! Knowledge of the heart!” Etc. etc.
Non-rational vs. irrational.
To be sure.
His is just the first angsty atheist name that came to mind.
Come to think of it, though, perhaps some of the stereotype is due to the fact that major works intended for posterity tend to deal with serious subject matter. To see jocular, at ease atheists, you often have to be there in person, witnessing mundane activities and interactions. It’s in this context that it’s easy to ignore the ills of the world and forget about Depressive Realism for a time.
Paul Kurtz’s writing & speeches were most often positive & inspirational, and often humorous, and his output was vast. IMO he’s unfortunately been kind of thrown under the bus of late, but I hope with the passage of time his life’s work will be revisited and his legacy resurrected and more widely appreciated.
(This is a reply to Diane G., hopefully just above)
The anthology that Kurtz edited, Science and Religion, is still one of my favorites, with excellent essays on a number of topics, and a really special appearance by William Dembski, who blithers on for a few pages, apparently under the impression that the truth of an idea is a function of how many adherents it has.
@ Mark
Dembski, eh? Well, Kurtz was always a big-tent type… 😀
Kurtz was there when there weren’t a whole lot of other places to look for encouragement–no web, for instance. I finally got to hear him speak not that many years ago at a MI-CFI meeting. Guess I was expecting some philosopher-gravitas-type, but he was warm, twinkly, contagiously enthusiastic, and occasionally sounded a bit like a Borscht-belt comedian. Despite my years in New York state I’d never really thought of the fact that he was a northeastern Jew by heritage. I’m glad I got to hear him while there was still time, and was saddened by the controversies concerning him that welled up right toward the end.
Probably because of me. Sorry about that. I’m much happier on weekends though.
Sophisticated “Я” Us.
Cheers, but I seem to have left my litre of finest Scots mountain dew at the office onshore. Where vultures are circling. Whisky vultures.
Mazel tov!
It’s coffee and bailey’s tonight.
I will definitely have to try Woodford Reserve. In lieu it will have to be Oban tonight. Fantastic audio.
I’m looking forward to listening to the podcast during a long drive tomorrow. Seth is a real pro.
“I’m having Woodford Reserve.”
Oh dear. I hope your cough is better soon. 🙂
Anyway, congratulations on your fame/notoriety this week!
(We lived in Ver-sayles for four years. I used Wild Turkey “Barrel Proof” as medicine for whooping cough when I was a graduate student.)
I’m having pink lemonade, made from my homegrown pomegranate syrup and the backyard lemons that are ripe now.
I finished my Woodford Reserve. Now I’m on to the Buffalo Trace. Costs less.
I thought this was a great interview even though the interviewer insisted on asking all the dumb questions, maybe because the interviewer asks all the dumb questions. This would be the podcast for creationists to listen to if they would. Dr. Coyne is as well spoken as he is well written. Go Ceiling Cat.
Seth was asking those questions so that Jerry could provide good answers to those dumb questions as a way to educate Seth’s audience. I think Seth is actually a very good interviewer.
No, no! The _paper_ isn’t backwards, it’s the mounting.
Else you have the wrong tp supplier.
And congrats to the air/pod/ceiling fame.
I am one of those people who downloaded this podcast for the 1st time. I thought it was good how the host asked introductory questions that a typical person (or indoctrinated believer) might. Good job.