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.
The woodies seem to fly in every day about 11 a.m. and are still here when I leave about 2. I still have no names for them, as nothing suggested struck the right chord. Here’s a preview of the next set of duck photos, which will concentrate on the wood ducks as Vashti is nesting.
Feel free to suggest names, which should reflect the fact that they’re perky and gorgeous. (The last pair was named “Frisky” and “Ruth”, with Ruth having a Jewish name.)
Click to enlarge:
The NYT “opinion” piece below is very long, and is in fact a transcript of a discussion of Christianity pitting Biblical scholar and atheist Bart Ehrman against dyed-in-the-wool Catholic Ross Douthat. If you’ve read this website lately, you’ll know that Douthat is all over the place touting Jesus: he’s published a new book, he’s debated Steve Pinker on God, he’s written a gazillion columns highlighting his book and its reasons why we should be Christians, and in today’s piece he and Ehrman discusses the “truth” of the New Testament.
I have little respect for Douthat because his case for a divine being in general, and for Christianity in particular, simply involves the same tired old (and not dispositive) assertions, many of them based on science (e.g. the “fine-tuned” universe, the mystery of consciousness, etc.). Douthat’s drunk the whole chalice of Kool-Aid, and is not self-critical.
Ehrman, on the other hand, is an impressive guy. He started out as a Biblical literalist and practicing fundamentalist Christian, eventually becoming a Baptist preacher. Then he realized, based on the existence of inexplicable evil in the world, that the whole Jesus-and-God story was largely bushwa, and he wrote a bunch of books showing why. He knows his Bible better than does Douthat, and can quote chapter and verse without even looking at the book.
Now Ehrman does think that there’s a factual core of the New Testament, in that he thinks the evidence for the existence of a Jesus person who taught disciples is an absolutely secure historical fact. So, he thinks, is the Crucifixion, though not the Resurrection: Ehrman has no truck with miracles, adhering to Hume’s argument that unless they are more probable than the reliability of their witnesses, they shouldn’t be accepted. Ehrman also has no truck with mythicists (I flirt with such a position) who aren’t convinced that there was a real Jesus person. Ehrman thinks that historical-Jesus believers, who are indeed in the majority among Biblical scholars, have a solid case. (The evidence for that, though, is based largely on what’s written in the Bible.)
[UPDATE: See comment 3 below by Roger Lambert, citing Richard Carrier’s critique of Ehrman’s view that a Jesus person absolutely existed. Carrier is a “mythicist” who doubts the existence of a Jesus person. You can see more of Carrier’s arguments here.]
At any rate, you can either hear the discussion (82 minutes) or read it (the latter is a lot faster for me) at the NYT link below. It is an object lesson (from Ehrman) on how to assess the Bible as “truth”, and also how a historian uses evidence when confronting Scripture. Ehrman spends a lot of time schooling Douthat on these issues, and Douthat comes off as a credulous schoolboy.
The main point that Ehrman wants to make in this discussion is that Jesus and then Christianity introduced to the world the idea that we should love people whom we don’t know, a view that has led to good things like hospitals and orphanages. Ehrman has just published a new book on this thesis: Love Thy Stranger: How the Teachings of Jesus Transformed the Moral Conscience of the West.
I have a few doubts about that, including the fact that Ehrman takes it for granted that this was one of Jesus’s teachings without good evidence for that claim, and that the idea of loving others whom you don’t know was not invented by Christians. Ehrman may be right with respect to the West, so his book (which I haven’t read) at least has the geography of love correct, but he’s on shakier ground saying that loving strangers was indeed a teaching of Jesus. Ehrman even notes that Jesus didn’t say to love everyone, only the members of one’s tribe—Israelites. And of course some of Jesus’s teachings, like “take no thought for the morrow” or “abandoning your family and loved ones to follow me”, aren’t ones we should follow. After all, Jesus did also say that the end of the Earth and his return was nigh:
Verily I say unto you, There be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom. (Matthew 16:28).
Ehrman would surely argue that the last verse, while Jesus may have said it, was simply untrue. But if Jesus did say it, Christians have to explain it. The fact is that, as even Ehrman admits, we have no idea what Jesus said. Ehrman sort of admits that, but then apparently has some secret way to separate what Jesus really said versus what people made up about him later.
Click the screenshot below to read, or see the article archived here. If you have some time, I think it’s worth hearing or reading.
I’ll give a few quotes from the discussion, most of them from Ehrman (indicated with an “E”; Douthat’s quotes are prefaced with a “D”). These quotes are indented, while my comments are flush left.
Ehrman’s argument:
I am absolutely not arguing that Jesus introduced the idea of love or the idea of altruism into the world. What I am arguing is that we, today, almost all of us — whether we’re Christian, agnostic, atheists, whatever we are in the West — when there’s a disaster that happens, we feel like we ought to do something about it. There’s a hurricane, there’s wildfires, there’s an earthquake, and we feel like we ought to do something. We might send a check, for example, or we retire and we decide to volunteer in a soup kitchen. We’re helping people we don’t know and probably never will know, and who we may not like if we did get to know them.
So why do we help them? My argument in the book is that sense, that we should help people in need, even if we don’t know them, ultimately derives from the teachings of Jesus. In Greek and Roman moral philosophy at the time, this was not an issue at all — you were not supposed to be helping people just because they were in need. Jesus based it in large part on his Jewish background, but with some transformations of what he himself knew growing up. He is the one who made this part of our conscience.
. . .The idea is that if you’re going to love your neighbor, it doesn’t just mean somebody who’s within your own religion or your own ethnicity or your own nation. It means, if somebody’s in need, that’s your neighbor. That’s what it means to love your neighbor as yourself.
So Jesus is getting the idea of love your neighbor and even love your stranger as yourself from his Jewish heritage. But within Israel, it’s “Love your fellow Israelite as yourself.” And Jesus is now universalizing it.
Part of the thesis of my book is that that mentality is what led to huge institutional changes in the West, including the invention of public hospitals — orphanages, old people’s homes, private charities dealing with hunger and homelessness, governmental assistance to those who are poor — all of those are Christian innovations you can establish historically.
. . . What I am saying is that if people claim to be followers of Jesus, they ought to follow his teachings. And his teachings are quite clear that you should care for people who are not like you — the other. You’re not supposed to bomb them back to the Stone Age, and you’re not supposed to make them suffer because you don’t like them or you don’t want them among you. You’re supposed to take care of them.
(Ehrman is referring at least in part to recent wars, and he admits that he’s a political liberal, but denies that his argument is in any way political. I believe him.) But yes, if you claim to follow Jesus’s teachings, you should follow Jesus’s teachings. And then you should leave your family and give away everything you have.
But of course the argument that The Love Everyone Idea came from Jesus is an untestable assertion, since we can’t repeat history without a Jesus person. But if Jesus didn’t teach that, then it came from somewhere else and can be attributed simply to humanism and not credited to Christianity. It could have simply been one of the many things made up by people who wrote the Bible. After all, Ehrman claims that much of the Bible is false.
How about these teachings of Jesus?
From Matthew 6 (King James version, which is the version I’ll use): take no thought for the morrow:
Therefore I say unto you, Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? 26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they? 27 Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stature? 28 And why take ye thought for raiment? Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: 29 And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. 30 Wherefore, if God so clothe the grass of the field, which to day is, and to morrow is cast into the oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith? 31 Therefore take no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal shall we be clothed? 32 (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. 33 But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.
Follow me, not your family or loved ones (Luke 14:25-27):
25 And there went great multitudes with him: and he turned, and said unto them, 26 If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple. 27 And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple.
Why are Christians supposed to follow the love commandment but not the others? I don’t know, nor does Ehrman tell us.
A further problem with Ehrman’s claim is, as he says below, to Jesus “your neighbor” doesn’t just mean anybody, but apparently only fellow Israelites— members of your tribe. But that’s not what Ehrman thinks we should do today; he think we need a new interpretation of Jesus’s words to fit the 21st century. And that means loving everyone:
E: You can’t simply take the teachings of the New Testament and transplant them into the 21st century. If any government tried to institute, as their governmental policy, the Sermon on the Mount, they’d last about two days, period.
I’m not saying that it’s this kind of simplistic equivalent. What I am saying is that if people in power claim to be Christian, they ought to take very seriously what that means. I’m not saying that it’s going to necessarily affect immigration policy, for example. But the Bible is quite clear, even in the New Testament, that “Love your neighbor as yourself” meant your fellow Israelite, or it explicitly states that anybody who immigrates into Israel is to be treated like an Israelite.
This baffles me. He is updating Jesus’s words here, and so we should follow Ehrman’s interpretation, not Jesus’s supposed teachings themselves. How do we know what, according to Ehrman, Jesus really said or taught, and what words were put into his mouth later? We don’t know from this interview, though perhaps it’s in Ehrman’s new book.
Ehrman: Well, I think there are credible historical narratives in the Gospels. I think we can find things that Jesus really did say and really did do. But I don’t think that you can simply read the Gospels and think: Oh, that’s what Jesus really said and did.
There are a lot of reasons for that.
Douthat: Give me three reasons.
Ehrman: They are contradictory to each other, describing the same event, where they both can’t be right because they’re contradictory. They are written by people who were not there at the time, who didn’t live in the Jewish homeland, who did not speak Aramaic. They’re living decades later and are recording accounts that they’ve heard. So that’s two things: The authors living much later, and the contradiction.
The third thing is: These authors got their stories from somewhere. We don’t know where the authors lived and we don’t know who the authors were. The Gospels circulated anonymously before they had names attached to them. So we don’t know. We call them Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. But we don’t ——
All true. But note Ehrman’s statement, “I don’t think that you can simply read the Gospels and think: Oh, that’s what Jesus really said and did.” He may think that the consistency of Jesus’s “love” message indicates that a Jesus person really taught that, but there’s also a consistency in Jesus saying that he was the son of God. Yet Ehrman believes the former but not the latter.
Here’s Ehrman explaining why he became an atheist: he couldn’t accept theodicy:
E: I taught at Rutgers for a few years, and when I was there, I was asked to teach a class called The Problem of Suffering in the Biblical Tradition. And when I got asked to teach the class, I thought it would be a great idea because I had long thought that every author of the Bible in one way or another is trying to wrestle with the problem of, especially, why the people of God suffer.
And I had realized by this time that there’s not an answer in the Bible — there are lots of different answers. And some of these answers are in conflict with each other.
. . .I came to think that the idea that any monotheistic religion has a problem with the existence of God, given the state of suffering in the world.
And I’m not a radical atheist who insists there is no God, but I don’t think there is. I don’t think there’s any kind of supernatural power that’s overseeing the world, that is active in people’s lives, that actually answers prayer. I don’t believe a God like that exists.
Douthat doesn’t have an answer for that.
Finally, is it true that Jesus did introduce the idea of loving your neighbor to the West? Well, my friend the philosopher Maarten Boudry, discussing this with me via email, decided to ask the bot Claude. Here’s the question (in bold) and Claude’s answer:
Is it true that there were a lot of Axial Age religions that promoted counterintuitive and challenging moral codes, like loving your enemy and turning the other cheek, apart from Christianity?
Yes, this is a well-documented observation among historians of religion and philosophy. The Axial Age (roughly 800–200 BCE, a term coined by Karl Jaspers) saw a remarkable convergence across several civilizations, where thinkers independently developed moral and ethical frameworks that challenged conventional human instincts like tribalism, revenge, and self-interest.
Here are some notable parallels:
Buddhism (5th century BCE) is perhaps the most striking example. The Buddha taught mettā (loving-kindness) toward all beings, including those who harm you. The Dhammapada contains passages urging practitioners to overcome hatred with love and to respond to anger with calm — very close in spirit to “love your enemy.”
Confucianism and Mohism in China offered related ideas. While Confucius was more measured (when asked about repaying injury with kindness, he replied “repay injury with justice”), Mozi (5th century BCE) went further with his doctrine of jiān ài (universal or impartial love), arguing that people should care for strangers and even rival states as much as their own — a radically counterintuitive position that was widely debated precisely because it cut against natural partiality.
Jainism developed ahimsa (non-violence) to an extreme degree, extending compassion and non-harm to all living creatures, including insects. This demanded extraordinary self-discipline and restraint even toward those who might threaten you.
Stoicism in Greece taught that all human beings share in a universal rational nature, and that anger and vengeance are failures of reason. Marcus Aurelius (though later than the Axial Age proper) wrote extensively about responding to hostility with understanding rather than retaliation, building on earlier Stoic foundations.
Zoroastrianism emphasized the moral duty to actively choose good over evil, framing ethics as a cosmic struggle that required personal sacrifice and integrity beyond mere self-interest.
The Hebrew prophetic tradition — figures like Amos, Hosea, and Isaiah — challenged their own society with demands for justice toward the poor, the stranger, and the marginalized, often at great personal cost.
What makes the Axial Age so fascinating to scholars is that these developments happened largely independently across cultures that had little or no contact with each other. The common thread seems to be that as societies grew more complex and urbanized, thinkers began reflecting more deeply on the gap between how people naturally behave and how they ought to behave — and many of them arrived at strikingly similar conclusions about the need to extend moral concern beyond one’s in-group.
So Christianity’s ethic of enemy-love, while distinctive in its specific theological framing, was part of a broader human pattern of moral discovery during this period. That doesn’t diminish its significance, but it does place it in a richer historical context.
Even in the West, then, there were antecedents to Jesus’s message of love.
While I have a lot of respect for Ehrman, I don’t understand how he managed to separate the wheat of “love they neighbor” from the chaff of “follow me and neglect your family and friends”. I do think, though, that the message of treating everyone with respect (I can’t bring myself to love everyone!) would have come from humanism as a guideline equal in force to that of “love thy neighbor.” Would we lack hospitals and orphanages if Christianity didn’t exist? (Go read about what Catholic Ireland did to orphanages!) Steve Pinker has pointed out the reason for this in recent years: we have no special privilege simply by being us. And remember that although love may have been the Christian message, for two millennia avowed Christians have flouted that dictum. It doesn’t, then have any pride of place over the similar dictum of humanism.
The latest Jesus and Mo, called “plan2” is an older strip but characterized as one “in which Christianity is explained”. When it’s put this way, the nonsensical nature of the story becomes clear.
Edmund Ault has sent us some photos of mallard (Anas platyrhynchos) ducklings, and you can never see too many of these. (We should have some in Botany Pond by April 19.) Edmund’s captions are indented, and you can enlarge the photos by clicking on them.
These ducklings are on the River Witham, in the centre of Grantham, Lincolnshire, and are the first I have seen this year. I regularly feed the ducks on this stretch of river, but I wasn’t aware that there was a nest until I saw the brood this morning; I think they must have hatched first thing this morning (31st March). And what a brood it is: 16 ducklings!
Most of the brood are sheltering under their mother:
More:
The mother duck led her brood for a walk away from the river; when she got back to the river she happily jumped off a small concrete wall (about 3 feet high) and expected her brood to follow suit – which all of them did, although reluctantly:
The brood moved upstream and tried to scale a weir; although the weir is only about a foot high the rush of water was far too great for them and eventually they turned around and went back:
Welcome to the first TGIF of April: Friday, April 3, 2026, and it’s Good Friday, the day on which, as the story goes, Jesus was crucified. I don’t believe a word of that story (your mileage may differ), but it was the subject of nearly all of the art of medieval Europe. Here’s a later painting of the crucifixion (1632), but a good one, and one by one of my favorite artists: Diego Velázquez. They sure took the trouble to make a fancy sign for the cross—in three languages! Later today I’ll post a discussion between Ross Douthat and Bart Ehrman where they differ on whether Jesus was the son of God, divine, and worked miracles.
It’s also the second full day of Passover, and I need to get some matzos, stat! (I eat them thickly slathered with butter, the only way they’re edible.) Further, it’s Fish Fingers and Custard Day (explained below, n.b. for Doctor Who fans), National Chocolate Mousse Day, and Tweed Day.
Fish Fingers and Custard Day commemorates the introduction of the Eleventh Doctor on the television series Doctor Who, as well as the memorable fish fingers and custard scene from the episode in which he arrives. The episode, which was released on April 3, 2010, is the first from Series 5 of the show, and is titled “The Eleventh Hour.” BBC declared the first Fish Fingers and Custard Day to take place on the second anniversary of the release of the episode. The following year, Birdseye even put the Doctor, who was played by Matt Smith, on their boxes. The day is marked by people eating fish fingers and custard and sharing photos and videos of them doing so.
Readers are welcome to mark notable events, births, or deaths on this day by consulting the April 3 Wikipedia page.
Da Nooz:
*Breaking news (well, sort of): Attorney General Pam Bondi has been deep-sixed by Trump—another cabinet member gone.
Attorney General Pam Bondi had a pretty good idea her days were numbered.
President Trump had complained too freely, too frequently, to too many people about her inability to prosecute the people he hates. She was falling short of Mr. Trump’s unyielding, unrealistic demands for retribution against his enemies. She had made mistake upon mistake in her handling of the Epstein files. Her critics were in the president’s ear.
Last month, Ms. Bondi told a friend that Mr. Trump’s willingness to fire Kristi Noem from her post as homeland security secretary meant she might be in jeopardy too.
But Ms. Bondi had not expected Mr. Trump, the man responsible for elevating her to one of the most powerful positions in the country, to drop the curtain quite so soon, according to four people familiar with the situation.
On Wednesday, the 60-year-old Ms. Bondi, downcast but determined, joined Mr. Trump for a glum crosstown drive to the Supreme Court, where they watched arguments in the birthright citizenship case. In the car, Mr. Trump told her it was time for a change at the top of the Justice Department.
Ms. Bondi hoped to save her job or, at the very least, buy a little more time — until the summer — to give herself a graceful exit.
She ended up with neither, and grew emotional Wednesday in conversations with friends and colleagues after she realized she was out. The next morning, Mr. Trump made it official, and fired her via social media post.
She is being replaced temporarily by Todd Blanche, Trump’s personal attorney who has defended him in several criminal cases. Neither Bondi nor Blanche has the qualifications to be an Attorney General, but so it goes.
*Yesterday morning’s NYT newsletter summarizes what Trump said in his speech about Iran, and I quote:
Here’s what he talked about:
The end of the war. Trump did not offer a clear timeline for that. He said that “discussions are ongoing” but that in the meantime, the U.S. would continue to bomb Iran. “We are going to hit them extremely hard,” he said. “Over the next two to three weeks, we’re going to bring them back to the Stone Ages, where they belong.” He also threatened to strike “each and every one” of Iran’s power plants, an act widely considered a war crime, if Iran refuses a deal to end the fighting. (Iran has said there are no direct talks with the U.S.)
The economy. “Remarkably, Trump barely acknowledged the economic consequences of his war, as Americans around the country continue to feel the sting of high gas prices,” wrote Tony Romm, an economics reporter. Trump’s sanguine about that: “This is a true investment in your children and your grandchildren’s future,” he said of the war.
Iran’s remaining nuclear material. Trump indicated that he was in no hurry to retrieve it after bombing Iran’s nuclear sites into dust. As my colleague David Sanger put it: “Perhaps this is deception, and he will attempt to seize that cache. If not, he will have left the nuclear material exactly where it was before the war started — underground, and within Iran’s reach.”
Venezuela. Trump recalled how well the operation to unseat President Nicolás Maduro had gone. It’s his model for success in Iran. “That hit was quick, lethal, violent and respected by everyone all over the world,” he said in the speech, adding that the United States and Venezuela were now “joint venture partners” and “getting along incredibly well.”
The Strait of Hormuz. That waterway is not America’s problem, Trump said, because our oil and gas does not move through it. He urged those nations that depend on oil moving through the strait to just go take it. “We will be helpful, but they should take the lead in protecting the oil that they so desperately depend on,” he said.
For context, it’s worth comparing those talking points with the five objectives for the war that Trump laid out on its first day. My colleague Ed Wong has an assessment of where the war stands based on those goals.
Here’s Wong’s summary of the regime-change goal:
This came near the end of Mr. Trump’s video address. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel had promised Mr. Trump in the run-up to the war that his country could help galvanize a popular uprising that would lead to the overthrow of the Iranian government. That revolt has not materialized.
Mr. Trump said he had carried out “regime change,” and pointed to airstrikes that have killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, and other senior officials.
However, the newly appointed supreme leader, Mojtaba Khamenei, the son of the deceased cleric, is a hard-liner aligned with a powerful arm of the Iranian military. The current government remains theocratic, authoritarian and anti-American, and continues to wage a war of resistance.
Of course the NYT would promote a negative view about how the war is going, and I didn’t hear Trump’s speech, but if he sees the present hard-line theocratic regime in Iran as “regime change” simply because the ‘Ayatollahs aren’t in control, well, he’s distorting things completely, and the Iranian people still aren’t free.
*The WaPo reports on a Republican plan to end the Department of Homeland Security shutdown without having to get Democratic approval.
The approach would allow him to bypass Democrats, who have spent weeks demanding new guardrails on those agencies in exchange for voting to fund them. Instead, Republicans could pass a funding bill with a simple majority and avoid a Democratic filibuster.
“We are going to work as fast, and as focused, as possible to replenish funding for our Border and ICE Agents, and the Radical Left Democrats won’t be able to stop us,” Trump wrote in a social media post.
Lawmakers have been at an impasse over DHS funding for 47 days in the longest partial shutdown on record, which the public has mostly encountered through long security lines at airports. Pressure has been building to resolve the shutdown, with polling indicating that Republicans are shouldering more of the blame.Democrats had been demanding new restrictions on federal immigration agents operating in major cities, after they killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January.
The approach that Trump endorsed Wednesday would also fund the rest of DHS — which includes the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Coast Guard — through September. Then Republicans would start work on the reconciliation process to fund ICE and Border Patrol, which would take weeks.
This circumvention going to get the Democrats hopping mad if it works (Republicans will still need a majority in both houses of Congress), but some of the Democrats’ proposed restrictions on ICE, like bodycams and not wearing masks, were fine with me. Remember, the government was not shut down as a whole—just the DHS part. But my friends who are flying say that those 5-hour security lines are gone now, for TSA workers are already back on the job.
*If you’ve been conditioned by the MSM to think that we’re mired in another Vietnam in Iran, the Free Press has a counterargument, “Victor Davis Hanson: The war—and the war on the war,” with the subtitle, “Militarily, the war is going as well as could be envisioned, yet Democrats seek to turn it into another Vietnam or Afghanistan—hoping to win control of Congress at the expense of national security.” (Hanson is identified as “an American classicist, military historian, and conservative political commentator.”) Trigger warning: overt conservatism. A few excerpts:
Are we “losing”?
This is the claim made by Trump’s political opponents. It is absurd, Orwellian.
Most of the military objectives are already met or soon will be. The campaign has been brilliantly conducted without substantial casualties. So popular outcry from Democrats and the global left arise not from military realities of the war, but mostly from both politics and existential hatred of Donald Trump.
The midterms are just seven months away. Historically, they should see the incumbent administration lose seats in the House and Senate, if not control of Congress. The left seeks to create such abject chaos that it can only be alleviated by the political destruction of Donald Trump. So the anti-war hysteria follows the pattern of the left’s embrace of Tesla vandalism, violent demonstrations against ICE, the incoherent “No Kings” protests, and three government shutdowns. Such nihilism shares a common trait of offering no positive counter-agenda.
What about regime change?
Critics are claiming that for all that ostensible American success, the regime remains defiant and in control. Indeed, the war’s opponents further state that the bombing only made popular protests more difficult.
Some supporters of the war argue that any cessation without the elimination of the mullahs would prove the war effort was all in vain, or at best is but a brief interlude in the Iranian theocracy’s otherwise long march to control the entire Middle East and blackmail the West with nuclear weapons.
But regime change was never listed as a Trump administration war aim. The reason was ostensibly our poor record at nation-building in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya, as well as our more recent success at removing Nicolás Maduro from Venezuela and leveraging the remnants of his dictatorship, without prompting an invasion or civil war.
That said, the continual Israeli elimination of dozens of theocratic and military officials has in itself been a regime change, at least in the sense that anyone associated with the regime who identifies himself is likely to be dead within days.
BOGUS! Regime change means a democracy with the Iranian people free. And Trump explicitly told the Iranian people in his initial statement that the government was theirs to take—and that they should go ahead and take it. I think he said that again the other night. At the end Hanson says that we don’t have regime change, but it’s more likely than before. True, but how much more likely?
What about the closing of the Strait of Hormuz?
War critics argue that without the American-Israeli bombing, the Strait would still be open for business. That simplistic rationale ignores the reality that Iran’s prewar non-harassment of Western shipping was implicitly predicated on appeasing the theocracy—mostly by Westerners staying quiet when Iran staged or funded terrorist attacks, or flagrantly multiplied its ballistic missile fleet and upped its uranium enrichment with impunity.
If the U.S. decided that Iranian control of the Strait is too egregious a danger to global commerce, then as it leaves the theater, it can threaten Parthian shots at Iran’s easily combustible oil industry to ensure they back off the Strait.
Or alternatively, America can tell our Western allies (who made it evident they want no part in demilitarizing Iran) that the hard work of neutering the Iranian military is now over. And as importers of Iranian oil, Europe and the Asian democracies must handle the easier task of internationalizing the Strait.
The other two questions asked and answered are, “Is Israel using Trump?” and “What about NATO?” You’ll have to see the answers for yourself. Here’s the pro-Trump ending:
In the end, we are left with an indisputable truth. Prior presidents all warned about the dangers of a theocratic Iran’s mounting efforts to become nuclear, witnessed its incessant terrorism, and feared its apocalyptic aims. And yet they did little or nothing.
Donald Trump did, and did so successfully, convinced alone among Western leaders that it was a now or never moment, and the U.S. military was more than up to the risky endeavor.
And history will likely prove him right.
*My friend the Belgian philosopher Maarten Boudry reports on Facebook that three Belgian universities, including the one he studied and worked at (U Ghent), have given honorary degrees to an odious woman, Francesca Albanese, the blatantly antisemitic and pro-Hamas UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories. His post (I’ve added the tweets he interpolated):
Three Flemish universities are disgracing themselves today by awarding an honorary doctorate to a mendacious antisemite. That’s what happens when academia gets hijacked by far-left ideologues. As Holocaust historian Norman Goda writes:
“The Flemish universities, whether they admit it or not, will convey the sanction of university-recognised expertise to a deeply dishonest and fraudulent individual who has vilified an entire society as well as those persons, including many in Belgium who view themselves as connected to it.”
And yes, I don’t shy away from the word “antisemite” this time. Before she was appointed UN rapporteur, Albanese liked to fantasize about how the world was “subjugated by the Jewish lobby”. She just learned not to say the quiet part out loud since her UN mandate. And of course, the blatant double standards she applies to the only Jewish state in the world is damning in its own right.
As I predicted yesterday on the Belgian TV shows De Afspraak, the ceremony is descending into farce. Albanese openly contradicts the rector’s assurance that the award is “not against Israel,” to loud hoots and cheers. Meanwhile, the usual anti-Israel activists—more emboldened than ever—are shouting over any speaker whenever anything falls short of their maximalist demands: “Stop funding genocide! Stop funding genocide!”
The rector was openly humiliated on the stage by Albanese and the audience. Well, what did they expect? Didn’t I warn them this was exactly what was going to happen?
Let’s hope the Flemish rectors will not be so inconsiderate as to say anything critical about Hamas in the presence of their Honorary Dr. @FranceskAlbs. An Italian mayor tried it once—and got eye rolls, facepalms, and a stern reprimand: “Don’t do it again.” https://t.co/TAYvZrEHFy
— Maarten Boudry (@mboudry) February 27, 2026
I didn’t watch the whole speech, but of course Albanese repeats the same litany of distorted quotes from Israeli leaders allegedly proving genocidal intent: the “human animals” quote (which was about Hamas, not Palestinians), the Herzog line about “an entire nation that is responsible” (which is exactly what Holocaust historians say about Germany regarding the Holocaust, and in eveny event Herzog insisted that there are many innocent civilians who will NOT be targeted). See my piece here..
More outrageously still, Albanese claims that casualties in Gaza are “75%-80 women and children”, a complete lie. Not even Hamas has ever claimed such a high figure, and its own fabricated “70% women and children” has been widely debunked and officially retracted by Hamas itself. Deaths are overwhelmingly male and combat age. None of the distinguished rectors and academics batted an eye. Pure desinformation again, certified by three universities.]
Did you notice that the myth of “70% women and children” has been quietly retreated, just like every other Hamas claim parroted by Western media, without any correction or accountability? Even according to Hamas’ (updated) lists, fatalities are overwhelmingly male and combat age. https://t.co/jARig0PkYc pic.twitter.com/M1qAtJ2aV9
— Maarten Boudry (@mboudry) September 27, 2025
And of course we only got obsequious softball questions from the interviewer. “How were you so right and prescient from the beginning?” “How is it so difficult for people to agree with you?” (I’m paraphrasing) Well, I sympathize with the interviewer. Any genuinely critical question would’ve been met with deafening jeers and shouts from the audience.
Honestly, I’ve never been more ashamed to be a UGent alumnus. This honorary PhD is a craven and foolish decision that will be ruinous to our international reputation.
Maarten also tweeted that “I just got a heartbreaking message from a Jewish professor who says that she will leave Antwerp and possibly the country. The hatred is too overwhelming, and even targeting young children.” (Have a look at the rest of the tweet.)
I hope you’re aware what’s happening in the Low Countries.
*Finally, there’s good news today—well, not really good but not dreadful. The AP’s Odd News tells us that a famous surfing dog—the first canid inducted into the Surfer’s Hall of fame—has died. But she had a good long life (16 years), and a good run in the waves:
Sugar The Surfing Dog, the first canine inducted into the Surfer’s Hall of Fame, who spent her days outside the water comforting veterans as a dedicated therapy dog, died Monday after battling cancer.
The 16-year-old rescue dog from Huntington Beach, California, who was a five-time dog surfing world champion, died “in her daddy’s arms,” a post on her Instagram said.
“She lived to put smiles on faces, volunteer, to send it !! to change dog surfing forever !!! thank you for loving Sugar,” the post said. “Good bye my Sugar., i can’t believe in writing this .. i’m going to miss you so much.”
Sugar was found as a stray and over the years her love of the waves and natural talent took dog surfing to new heights.
Dressed in a life jacket, spectators would watch the furry white canine in amazement as she balanced on her surfboard, riding wave after wave back to the shore, sometimes with her owner, Ryan Rustan, by her side and other times all on her own.
In 2024, her paw prints joined the hand and footprints of many other renowned surfers immortalized in concrete in Huntington Beach when she was inducted into the hall of fame.
“This is just incredible. Dreams do come true even for a surfing dog and guys like me,” Rustan said at the ceremony.
Here’s a video from better days:
Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Andrzej doesn’t like Hili trying to catch birds (note the extruded tongue; I’ve made this image into my Twitter avatar):
Hili: A sparrow has made a nest in the hedge.
Me: Fortunately, you can’t reach it.
Hili: And that’s a bit of a problem.
In Polish:
Hili: Wróbelek założył w żywopłocie gniazdko.
Ja: Na szczęście tam się nie dostaniesz.
Hili: I to jest pewien kłopot.
*******************
From Terrible Maps: the countries in red are anagrams. For example, “Spain” can be rearranged to “pains”. Figure out the rest of them!
From This Cat is Guilty:
From The Language Nerds:
From Masih: Iran hanged an 18-year-old protestor:
Heartbreaking 💔
This morning, right after President Trump’s speech, the Iranian regime moved fast and hanged 18-year-old protester.Yes, Mr. President @realDonaldTrump, there are no “less radical” leaders in Iran.
From the courtroom to the prison cell, from the interrogator to… pic.twitter.com/fk0gF6p1NQ
— Masih Alinejad 🏳️ (@AlinejadMasih) April 2, 2026
From Luana, and verified by CNN, who published this:
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said Tuesday she would vote against sending any military aid to Israel, including defensive supplies, a marked shift from a Democrat deemed a potential 2028 presidential candidate.
Ocasio-Cortez told members of the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America Tuesday that she would commit to voting no on any military aid spending for Israel, a spokesperson for the lawmaker told CNN.
I will never vote for her; I would write in some other Democrat instead (remember, I live in a reliably Democratic state).
Her remarks, first reported by City & State, were made at a private forum as members considered whether to endorse her re-election bid.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez just committed to voting to strip civilians in Israel of protection from rocket attacks.
This is not a vote against the government of Israel, or Netanyahu. This is collective punishment against ten million civilians, Jews, Muslims, and Christians.… https://t.co/wjvjnAoUz9 pic.twitter.com/lVO8mTv7Ez
— Eric Adams (@ericadamsfornyc) April 1, 2026
A funny tweet from Larry the Cat:
Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I present exhibit A pic.twitter.com/QA7Vw8sGaO
— Larry the Cat (@Number10cat) April 2, 2026
Two from my feed. First, a singing raven:
Ravens can talk but sometimes they even know how to sing, like this one trained by Giuseppe Cassini.pic.twitter.com/fRyhwSp8ym
— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) April 2, 2026
. . . and a wonderful plane’s-eye-view of the Artemis II launch:
Passengers on a commercial flight captured the launch of Artemis II on camera
The plane happened to pass near the launch trajectory at the exact moment of liftoff, giving passengers a rare view of the rocket launch right from their windows.pic.twitter.com/8Bewtm8aFg
— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) April 2, 2026
One I reposted from The Auschwitz Memorial:
This Czech Jewish girl was gassed as soon as she got to Auschwitz She was 14 years old.
— Jerry Coyne (@evolutionistrue.bsky.social) 2026-04-03T10:19:18.342Z
Two from Dr. Cobb. This is from a site that gives people’s favorite tweets from Twitter, though it’s on Bluehair:
MASSIVE fan of this one:
— Altrincham Dry Cleaners (@altydrycleaners.bsky.social) 2026-04-02T13:27:33.632Z
Be sure to check out the Science paper to see some lovely and bizarre animals, including the first bilaterians. For a quick link, go see the blurb and photos at the Oxford University site. The “Cambrian Explosion” of animals has been shifted back 4 million years, to the tail end of the Ediacaran.
At last! Ediacarans and Cambrian animals in the same site! Amazing! http://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/…
— Matthew Cobb (@matthewcobb.bsky.social) 2026-04-02T18:11:56.569Z
This is a question I’ve entertained for a long time, probably because I’m preoccupied with death. But I was curious about what would happen if astronauts, like the ones going around the Moon now, found themselves stranded in space with no way to get home, facing death from oxygen depletion or starvation. Or what would happen if the astronauts who were on the Moon years couldn’t start up the Lunar Module to get back to the Command Module and then back to Earth? Would they have been carrying something that would allow them to commit suicide quickly, avoiding a prolonged death?
I asked Jim Batterson, our resident NASA expert, and he didn’t know the answer. I then turned to the AI bot Grok, which I got for free when X (“Twitter”)—for reasons unknown—gave me a free blue checkmark.
My question to Grok is in bold below, and the short answer (indented) is that no, American astronauts don’t carry anything to do themselves in, though one Russian astronaut did. Grok went though the data in 11 seconds, and spat out the following. Note that there are references (the bot gives you the links, which I haven’t included) to check the statements.
Thought for 11s
No, astronauts do not carry cyanide capsules or any dedicated suicide pills as standard equipment.
iflscience.comNASA has never issued suicide pills (sometimes called “L-pills” or cyanide capsules) to its astronauts, including during the Apollo lunar missions or on current ISS and Artemis programs. Astronaut Jim Lovell (Apollo 13 commander) explicitly debunked this long-standing rumor: “Since Apollo 13 many people have asked me, ‘Did you have suicide pills on board?’ We didn’t, and I never heard of such a thing in the eleven years I spent as an astronaut and NASA executive.”
iflscience.comThe idea appears to stem from spy-movie tropes, urban legends, or sci-fi (e.g., the film Contact), but it has been consistently denied by NASA and astronauts. Multiple sources, including direct statements from astronauts, confirm that no such pills have ever been part of U.S. spaceflight medical kits.
quora.comWhy the rumor persists, and why pills aren’t needed anywayIn a worst-case scenario of being stranded in space with no rescue possible (e.g., a failed re-entry or detached during a spacewalk), astronauts have pointed out that the vacuum of space itself provides a relatively quick way to end life if someone chose to—by simply opening a suit valve or venting the spacecraft’s atmosphere. This would cause unconsciousness in seconds and death shortly after, making a pill unnecessary.
theguardian.comNASA’s focus is on prevention and survival: rigorous psychological screening, crew training, rescue protocols (e.g., multiple docked return vehicles on the ISS), and detailed medical kits. Those kits contain painkillers, anti-nausea drugs, antibiotics, etc., but nothing lethal like cyanide.
nasa.govIf an astronaut were to experience a mental health crisis in space (e.g., becoming suicidal or psychotic), NASA has written procedures: crewmates are instructed to restrain the person with duct tape and bungee cords, monitor them, and administer sedatives like Haldol or Valium (orally or by injection if needed). The goal is stabilization, not euthanasia.
cbsnews.comOne historical exception (Soviet side) The only verified case involves Soviet cosmonaut Alexei Leonov (the first person to spacewalk, in 1965 on Voskhod 2). He stated that he was issued a suicide pill for that specific high-risk mission—in case he couldn’t re-enter the spacecraft and his crewmate had to leave him behind in orbit. His suit ballooned during the walk, and he barely made it back inside after partially depressurizing it. This was not standard practice for the Soviet program overall, and no evidence exists of it being routine for cosmonauts then or now.
iflscience.comIn short, modern astronauts (NASA, ESA, Roscosmos, etc.) rely on engineering, training, and international rescue plans rather than personal suicide options. No agency equips crews with cyanide or equivalent for “stuck in space” scenarios.
In mid-February, Michael Shermer wrote a piece in Quillette called “The truth about free will,” the truth being that we have it, but in the compatibilist rather than the libertarian sense. This article was a shortened version of a free-will chapter included in Shermer’s new book, Truth: What It Is, How to Find It, and Why It Still Matters.
I thought that Shermer’s article was confusing, largely because his own definition of free will seemed to smuggle in a bit of libertarianism, but also because the argument for free will seemed to say this: “We have free will because we feel like we have free will.”
Shermer then responded in the pages of Skeptic, the magazine he founded in 1992 and still edits; his response was called “Free will, determinism, and compatibilism: Shermer responds to Jerry Coyne.” He once again argued for compatibilism, buttressing his argument with statistics showing that most philosophers accept compatibilism (59.1%), with minorities being libertarian free-willers (13.7%), determinists (12.2%, I’m in this camp though I’m not a philosopher), and those who are “other” (14.9%). The gist of his argument seemed to be this:
I agree with Jerry and Dan that we live in a determined universe governed by laws of nature. But I disagree with Jerry that this eliminates free will, or if you prefer “volition” or “choice” (again, this entire field is, to use Jerry’s term, “muddled” with confusion of terminology). My compatibilist work-around is “self-determinism,” in which while we live under the causal net of a determined universe, we are part of that causal net ourselves, helping to determine the future as it unfolds before us, and of which we are a part. My compatibilist position is based on the best understanding of physics today. Let me explain.
Physicists tell us that the Second Law of Thermodynamics, or entropy, means that time flows forward, and therefore no future scenario can ever perfectly match one from the past. As Heraclitus’ idiom informs us, “you cannot step into the same river twice,” because you are different and the river is different. What you did in the past influences what you choose to do next in future circumstances, which are always different from the past. So, while the world is determined, we are active agents in determining our decisions going forward in a self-determined way, in the context of what already happened and what might happen. Thus, our universe is not pre-determined in a block-universe way (in which past, present, and future exist simultaneously) but rather post-determined (after the fact we can look back to determine the causal connections), and we are part of the causal net of the myriad determining factors to create that post-determined world.
Free will, Shermer wrote, is somehow to be found in billions and billions of neurons, (to paraphrase Sagan):
Coyne is unhappy with my invoking of “emergence” and says I’m being rude to him and Sapolsky and Harris in accusing them of “physics envy,” but that’s what it is! Here, for example, is Sapolsky defending his belief that free will does not exist because single neurons don’t have it: “Individual neurons don’t become causeless causes that defy gravity and help generate free will just because they’re interacting with lots of other neurons.”
In fact, billions of interacting neurons is exactly where self-determinism (or volition or free will) arises. This is why I like to ask determinists: Where is inflation in the laws and principles of physics, biology, or neuroscience? It’s not, because inflation is an emergent property arising from millions of individuals in economic exchange, a subject properly described by economists, not physicists, biologists, or neuroscientists.
I found that confusing because I saw no freedom in simply saying that humans are part of the “causal net of a determined universe.” And I was confused by the claim that “while the world is determined, we are active agents in determining our decisions going forward in a self-determined way, in the context of what already happened and what might happen.” I didn’t understand that, and it seemed to smuggle some magic into the definition. And, as I’ll show below by quoting Sam Harris, I think that compatibilism misses the key feature of most people’s view of free will (yes, there are surveys): “We could have done other than what we did.” If you say, “yes,” then you are a free willer, but have to specify what aspect of the universe enables us to have done otherwise. If you say, “No, never,” then you are either a determinist or a compatibilist. Determinism needs no further explication, but compatibilism demands that you confect a new definition of free will—one that insists that we have it despite physical determinism.
Now there are at least a half-dozen versions of compatibilism, each proposing a different definition of the “free will” we supposedly have, so compatibilists themeslves have incompatible views about free will! It’s my belief from reading Dennett and others that compatibilism is pursued by people who think that if we don’t think we have some sort of free will, society will fall apart. People will think that without free will, we lack moral responsibility, and apart from that, we’ll all become nihilists unwilling to even get out of bed. After all, what’s the point if everything’s determined?
I have answered both of these assertions before, saying that determinists like me are not nihilists, that society can function even realizing that determinism is true, because people still feel like they have free will, and that we can have “respnsibility” without needing to have “moral responsibility,” which assumes we could have behaved otherwise.
But I’ve written about all this before. Michael was kind enough to allow me to respond to his response in the pages of Skeptic, and you can read my 2000-word response by clicking the screenshot below, or reading the article archived here. (The title comes from an old novelty song, “Yes! We have no bananas,”)
I’ll give just a few quotes from my piece; it’s short enough that you can read it in a few minutes.
[Shermer’s] smuggled-in dualism becomes clear when Shermer claims that although the action of individual neurons may be determined, “billions of interacting neurons is exactly where self-determinism (or volition or free will) arises.” But how can one neuron be governed by the laws of physics but a group of interacting neurons not be governed by the laws of physics. If they are, then there is no freedom, no volition, no “willed” control of our behavior, and no ability to have done otherwise. Yet Shermer argues that when a group of neurons cooperates, some kind of “will” arises. This dilemma won’t be resolved until Shermer explains the relevant difference between the behavior of one neuron and of a group of neurons.
. . .As Shermer notes, 59 percent of surveyed philosophers are compatibilists while the rest are almost equally divided between libertarians, determinists, and those with no opinion. He deems philosophers the “most qualified people” to pronounce on the problem, but are philosophers more qualified than neuroscientists or physicists? As Sam Harris (a neuroscientist and a determinist) said:
[Compatibilism] ignores the very source of our belief in free will: the feeling of conscious agency. People feel that they are the authors of their thoughts and actions, and this is the only reason why there seems to be a problem of free will worth talking about.
. . . Compatibilism amounts to nothing more than an assertion of the following creed: A puppet is free as long as he loves his strings. [JAC: I love that line.]
Importantly, the “folk” conception of free will—the libertarian version—is what most people think they have. It is that version that permeates society, the legal system, and, of course, religion, and is therefore the most important version to discuss.
And my ending:
Finally, Shermer poses what he sees as an unassailable challenge to my determinism:
In fact, billions of interacting neurons is exactly where self-determinism (or volition or free will) arises. This is why I like to ask determinists: Where is inflation [of the monetary sort] in the laws and principles of physics, biology, or neuroscience? It’s not, because inflation is an emergent property arising from millions of individuals in economic exchange, a subject properly described by economists, not physicists, biologists, or neuroscientists.
That is a red herring. Like all phenomena in human society, you won’t find monetary inflation in the laws of physics. Nor will you find academics, music, sports, or any other human endeavor. The question is not whether these phenomena are in the laws of physics, but whether they result from the laws of physicsas emergent phenomena wholly compatible with underlying naturalism. And Shermer himself said yes, they do: “we live in a determined universe governed by laws of nature.”
The problem of free will is “insoluble” only insofar as Shermer, trying to retain an idea of self-control, and ignoring the massive body of data on affecting volition, has confected a new definition that simply redescribes human behavior. The important question is this: “Is there physical determinism of human behavior or not?” Both Shermer and I agree that there is. In the end, however, Shermer seems to argue that we have free will because we feel like it. One might as well say that there’s a God because we feel like there is one.
That’s it; you can read the argument and come to your own conclusions. For some reason I can’t stop arguing about free will. I guess my persistence is also determined. . .
