From Godless Mom via reader John W:
Sunday Tw**t
August 9, 2015 • 4:10 pm
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
Why Evolution is True is a blog written by Jerry Coyne, centered on evolution and biology but also dealing with diverse topics like politics, culture, and cats.
From Godless Mom via reader John W:
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Very typical religious trait. Jesus is all-powerful, but also powerless to do more than shed a silent tear when he notices (if he notices!) one of his official representatives raping his umpteenth-dozen child. He knows everything and has revealed his intentions in his authorized biography, but it’s a mystery why nobody can make sense of the bloody thing. And, as a wise man once observed: Jesus has a special place for you full of wailing tooth gnashing, but he loves you! (And he needs money.)
b&
The late and great George Carlin
” . . . powerless to do more than shed a silent tear when he notices (if he notices!) one of his official representatives raping his umpteenth-dozen child . . . .”
I wonder if that is one of those bad things that William Lane Craig is all hunky-dory about re: God allowing bad things to happen so as to accomplish a Bigger Picture Greater Good. (Re: 2005 Craig-Grayling debate)
That “bigger picture” idea is ludicrous. But then the entire concept of the Christian god, IMO, comes down to Jehovah and Lucifer playing a board game with us as the pieces, trying to see who can win the most souls. In the religious big picture, we’re just the playthings of gods. And how does any religion that includes angels and devils in their belief system honestly call itself a monotheistic faith? A devil which can openly defy god, running around causing so much mischief after supposedly being locked up in Hell, is as much a god as any ancient pagan deity, although modern Jews, Christians and Muslims don’t like to admit it and try to claim that their big god lets Lucifer, aka Satan, run around as part of the “bigger picture”. Right, of keeping the big God from being bored out of his mind.
Don’t forget the patriarchs. If Romulus and Remus are gods — and they most emphatically are — then Abraham and Isaac are the functionally indistinguishable equivalents. And all the Roman ancestor gods are no different from the dearly departed becoming guardian angels, and on and on and on….
b&
All that “greater good” is is a baldfaced admission that the god is incapable of accomplishing an even greater good — namely, the intended greater good without first giving his priests lots of children to rape.
Or, to put it in ontological terms: imagine the greatest god; presumably, according to Craig, this god must exist because he just imagined it into existence. Now, imagine that same god without all the child-raping priests. That’s an even greater god, right? And I just imagined it, right? So where’s my pizza?
b&
Here’s another one, the world created by God is perfect, and yet believers pray all the time to change reality.
As Stanisław Lem once said: “From the perspective of God, it should be noted, it would be a very inconvenient thing for him to answer any petitions with miracles. As is known, God is omnipotent and omniscient, and the world he created perfect, even a button in your pants cannot fall off without God’s will. […] One cannot ask for anything: your health, good fortune, or your country’s independence. For if God rectified anything with a miracle, it would mean that the world isn’t perfect. A perfect state is when there is nothing to fix.”
Bierce’s take was particularly pithy: “Pray, v. To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single petitioner, confessedly unworthy.”
b&
O sweet !
As very many do, I am sure:
I adore Inigo Montoya … … aka Mr Patinkin !
“Prepare to die, Idiot M Z Fellowship!”
Blue
UNCONDITONAL: Spell fail, to boot.
Maybe it’s referring to Rice with a flat delivery…?
b&
aha… geniuses think similarly. (see my comment below)
It’s a typo. Should read ONECONDITIONAL
Of course the one condition varies with local gods.
“Obey me by killing the others.” seems to be the condition in all the religions I can think of at this time of night.
Actually, “Obey my priests by …” might be a touch more general (becasue it allows for the priests to re-interpret the Scripture-du-jour as they see fit.
Considering it’s the priests telling the flock that the gods want them to obey the priests…what else would you expect, really?
b&
Maybe “unconditonal” does mean what they think it means, and the joke is on us?
Ha ha!
Too perfect!
Yes…is it possible this is photoshopped?
Doesn’t look like it. Why would it need to be? – there’s a plentiful supply of fail emanating from the faithful.
cr
It could be one of the humorous church signs. You know, where it says something to give people a chuckle as they pass by.
In college, I once dated a woman who said she was a complete vegetarian, except for burgers.
I only eat meat on days ending in “Y.”
Glutton! I only eat meat on even- or odd-numbered days.
b&
Always with the asterisk.
It is possible the reader is being duped; the sign might be a simple statement regarding the length of the two phrases…
“G*d’s love is unconditonal” as long as “you are obeying Christ”.
Technically, it should have said “is at least as long as”, since the first phrase has 3 or 4 more characters than the second (depending on if you count the period at the end), and the entire sentence lacks a verb (according to my interpretation of it).
Furthermore, “unconditonal” could be referring to how G*d’s love is unlike Condolezza Rice’s musical abilities, but I admit that one is a bit of a stretch.
It is also possible that I am just reading too much into it.
So instead of making an error in standard English usage, they are making an error with the use/mention distinction?
Somewhat similar to the current xkcd, then?
http://xkcd.com/1562/
cr
Well, now that you put it that way, it does seem rather far-fetched. But still… those quote mark thingies do tend to get easily separated from the rest of the letters, and it is consistent with extremely disordered thought processes. Just *whose* thought processes, I’m not sure I’ve quite figured out.
Condi’s playing is unremarkable; competent, to be sure, but there’s nothing in the piece that gives her or would give any other pianist to demonstrate anything other than competence. Be interesting to hear her play something with more meat to it.
…but did anybody else notice all the death and destruction going on in the visuals in the background? I’m at a loss as to interpret the video, especially the closing line, as anything other than open bragging that the “amazing grace” gifted unto us by the Christian god is nothing less than eternal warfare. I mean, shouldn’t the visuals have been all about babies and butterflies and rainbows and that sort of thing? Former mortal enemies reconciling their differences and embracing each other? And not fleets of aircraft headed to indiscriminately firebomb German cities?
b&