Comments

  5. Janine says

    It is very pretty and striking. But I kind of see Satan frozen in the middle of the ice fall for me to believe it is an act of the big sky daddy.

  11. cm says

    There’s a giant squid frozen in there, right in the middle! See it? No? How about now?

    When he thaws, may we be worthy to do his bidding.

  12. Sastra says

    Oh. My. God.

    I’m having my book discussion group over this week, and I’ve been overwhelmed by the task of coming up with a dessert. As I logged on to Pharyngula and saw a beautiful and unexpected frozen waterfall, hundreds of feet high, I knew my search was over. That very moment, I knelt on the carpet by my computer and decided to make a cream cheese jello mold.

  14. Ichthyic says

    OT, but I hope, PZ, that you checked out the PBS special (Nova) on epigenetics.

    I rather think it would be a great subject for a thread here.

  15. Eric says

    Looks like a phallus to me. I think God’s just trying to boost his ego and pick up some chicks by showing off his package.

  17. Hamish says

    I hate these things – I have been staring cross-eyed at my computer screen for 5 minutes now and it *still* hasn’t gone 3-dimensional.

  18. Michael X says

    “Feeling trinitarian yet?”

    Um ….. wait for it ….. no.

    But I could use some of that ice to chill my beer.

  20. Skeptic4u says

    I’ve got a question: “Also bear in mind that creationists were the first to seriously question Lyellian Uniformitarianism and that the evolutionary geologists didn’t abandon it until the 1970’s, due to their realization by observation that canyons can be created extremely rapidly–in a matter of days or weeks, depending on a water source.”

    Is that true?

  22. Ichthyic says

    don’t tell me, let me guess, you went to a creationist site that posted something about “canyons” created by the floods of the Mt. St. Helens erruption?

    if so, short answer:

    “Is that true?”

    no. Creationists love to compare canyon formation between things like the St. Helens erruption and the grand canyon, conveniently leaving out the vast differences in size and compositions involved.

    btw, what’s an “evolutionary geologist”?

    a paleontologist, perhaps?

  23. Azkyroth says

    “Also bear in mind that creationists were the first to seriously question Lyellian Uniformitarianism and that the evolutionary geologists didn’t abandon it until the 1970’s, due to their realization by observation that canyons can be created extremely rapidly–in a matter of days or weeks, depending on a water source.”

    In theory, a canyon could be created in a matter of days by a sufficient quantity of water under sufficient pressure. No known mechanism for providing either exists.

  25. says

    “But I could use some of that ice to chill my beer. ”

    Heresy! I believe they burn you at the stake for that in some countries.

  27. zayzayem says

    Re: #24

    I only just realised it was a Francis Collins reference before I reached that post.

    I spent quite a while trying to see the Elder Gods in that waterfall.

    I guess it’s proof that they do exist and they have better things to do with their time.

    (Crit reason for 5000. Reason is slain. You gain 0 XP)

  28. Michael X says

    “Heresy! I believe they burn you at the stake for that in some countries.”

    Ah yes, those lukewarm Guiness drinking zealots! But, sayeth I, my beverage must be either cold or hot, but if it is lukewarm I shall spit it out of my mouth.

  30. says

    You know, now that you mention, I really hadn’t seen any sign of God in the structure of DNA. But when you shewed that picture, it became immediately obvious to me.

    Psalm 139 details God’s blueprint for our design. On April 2, 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick presented the structure for DNA. DNA contains all the genetic information to create our entire bodies. DNA encodes our red blood cells, and the heart that pumps them. DNA encodes our hair follicles, and the color of the hair in them. DNA encodes our bones, and the muscles attached to them. God knew the structure of DNA long before 1953 because God created DNA, and has used it as His “book” of our members.

    So, others also got the Collins connection before I came back to this post. I thought I was so smart. But at least I found a biblical reference…

  31. Bride of Shrek says

    Well I see the Virgin Mary beckoning me forward to anoint my head with her pristine grace…. Oh, hang on, that was in my pizza topping last night. My bad. I’ve got Virgins popping up everywhere and I’m buggered if I can keep a track on them.

  32. says

    Fuck, but I hate this kind of shit. Collins is indeed an idiot if a waterfall and CS Lewis converted him.

    I wonder what he’d believe if he came face to face with a scene like this from the 2004 tsunami in Indonesia?

    Really, I don’t care what your beliefs are, but if you come to believe in god because of some sort of “there’s so much beauty in the world” moment, you’re a self-centred asshole and you really need to get the fuck out of your bubble.

    Now I’m in a bad mood and won’t be able to get to sleep.

  33. Ragutis says

    [#17] I hate these things – I have been staring cross-eyed at my computer screen for 5 minutes now and it *still* hasn’t gone 3-dimensional.

    It’s a schooner.

    [#14] OT, but I hope, PZ, that you checked out the PBS special (Nova) on epigenetics.I rather think it would be a great subject for a thread here.

    Please do write about it, PZ. It was quite interesting.

  37. Don_Quijote says

    Must be some kind of Rohrschach-Test. You win salvation if you get the right answer. Most of the people here failed it though.

  38. David Marjanović, OM says

    the evolutionary geologists didn’t abandon it until the 1970’s

    If I simply ignore the meaningless “evolutionary” part, uniformitarianism has never really been abandoned. It has only been expanded to take events into account that happen once every 10 or 100 million years. (This started in 1980 when the first serious suggestion & serious evidence was published that a mass extinction had been triggered by a planetoid impact.) The present is not the key to the past — the past is the key to the present, and to the future.

  39. David Marjanović, OM says

    the evolutionary geologists didn’t abandon it until the 1970’s

    If I simply ignore the meaningless “evolutionary” part, uniformitarianism has never really been abandoned. It has only been expanded to take events into account that happen once every 10 or 100 million years. (This started in 1980 when the first serious suggestion & serious evidence was published that a mass extinction had been triggered by a planetoid impact.) The present is not the key to the past — the past is the key to the present, and to the future.

  40. Celandine says

    Er… am I supposed to be seeing something religious? Because all I see is a rather spectacular frozen waterfall…

  42. minusRusty says

    Nice photo. I fail to see anything remotely religious about it, though.

    You don’t see the halo around the guy on the right?? Look closer…

  44. says

    I hate these things – I have been staring cross-eyed at my computer screen for 5 minutes now and it *still* hasn’t gone 3-dimensional.

    It’s a schooner.

    No it’s not. It’s a sailboat.

  45. says

    If I simply ignore the meaningless “evolutionary” part, uniformitarianism has never really been abandoned. It has only been expanded to take events into account that happen once every 10 or 100 million years.

    Precisely. I’ve always felt that ‘Old School’ Uniformitarianism have been a little maligned anyway, although Steven Jay Gould has to take some of the blame for that one.

  47. David Marjanović says

    To be fair, modern uniform(itarian)ism only deserves that designation when compared to Cuvier’s catastrophism. When compared to Lyell’s or Darwin’s or G. G. Simpson’s uniformism, it’s utterly catastrophistic.

  48. David Marjanović says

    To be fair, modern uniform(itarian)ism only deserves that designation when compared to Cuvier’s catastrophism. When compared to Lyell’s or Darwin’s or G. G. Simpson’s uniformism, it’s utterly catastrophistic.

  49. Brian says

    I see that frozen waterfall, and I want to climb it. The bottom part looks easy, and the upper part is probably no harder than WI 3. Maybe WI 3+.

  50. Dahan says

    Obviously not enough people with art backgrounds here. You don’t seem to be able to decipher images correctly. Look at the center figure. Notice how it looks just like the abominable snowman in “Rudolf”? Only this time it’s not just claymation. God (the artist) is telling us we must all loose our teeth to become his true servants. Glad I could clear this up for you all.

  51. obscurifer says

    I sort of see a body smashed on the “rocks” near the bottom. Maybe it’s just some kind of Oedipal thing.

  52. ctenotrish, FCD says

    CM (#11) – Ha Ha Ha!!! Thanks for the ‘how to see the shape in the ice’ photo. I laughed out loud. :)

  55. heterocronie says

    “In theory, a canyon could be created in a matter of days by a sufficient quantity of water under sufficient pressure. No known mechanism for providing either exists.”

    Actually, the channeled scablands of Washington are an example of cataclysmic flooding from a glacial lake breach rapidly carving out “canyons”. However, in that case there is overwhelming sedimentological evidence for the flooding – evidence which is entirely absent in other canyons. If I were a creationist, I’d just leave out the second part.

  57. Owlmirror says

    Um. I understood that the Washington scablands do not have canyons, precisely because the sudden flood of water scoured everything, in precise opposition to a canyon, which is to say, a river that sinks lower and lower over millenia as the river itself floods, but not the surrounding channel and banks (for the most part, obviously).

    But correction from someone with more geological knowledge than myself would be welcome.

  60. Moses says

    What am I supposed to conver to? Höðr – the Norse god of winter? Skadi? Freya? Ull?

    Especially as it just looks like ice to me…

  61. says

    Two legs, and a… uh, and a torrent coming out of the… uh… ;-)

    It needs kleenix.

    (Hi, Rev. Paul Hipple! I’m still a “lebian Islamofacist harlot.” How are things?)

  62. Just Al says

    Bride of Shrek #31:

    I’ve got Virgins popping up everywhere and I’m buggered if I can keep a track on them.

    There’s something fundamentally wrong about this statement.

    “Fundamentally,” ha! I slay me!

  63. Inky says

    Damn you people with your links to God-tards’ mumbo-jumbo. My IQ dropped 10 points from reading that “God made your DNA and DNA is MAGIC, JUST LIKE GOD!”, only to have it plummet another 10 from “I found my sock! God exists!”

    I have a journal club this afternoon and now, thanks to this garbage crap idiocy input, my contribution to the scientific discussion will likely be as such: “Klotho inhibits Wnt signaling! Just like God inhibits … homosexual desires if you pray enough! God exists! And, look, today, I’m wearing TWO SOCKS AND THEY MATCH! Glory be to God!”

  64. says

    For some reason, this reminds me of an episode of ‘Everybody Loves Raymond’ when Ray’s mom produces an ‘abstract’ sculpture that clearly resembles something anatomical….I think, under the circumstances, that we should feel free to worship same….:)

  65. Will Von Wizzlepig says

    …is there supposed to be something remarkable about that photo?

    I’m not getting it.

  66. says

    If you squint, you can see the easter bunny.

    If you squint and turn your head sideways, it looks a little like a duck.

  67. Sastra says

    …is there supposed to be something remarkable about that photo?
    I’m not getting it.

    We’re making fun of Francis Collins.

    A while back, PZ reviewed his book, Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief. Collins was the director of the National Human Genome Research Project, and spends most of the book making good arguments for evolution and against Creationism/Intelligent Design. Then he explains why he was once agnostic, but now believes in God. That part is not as good.

    The big turning point for him turns out to have been his coming unexpectedly across a frozen waterfall while on a hike, and realizing that his “search was over.” He kneels and gives himself to Jesus — because the waterfall was in three parts. Three parts. Clearly evidence for the truth of the trinity. Get it?

  69. Barn Owl says

    Shorter Pharyngula–

    Christopher Hitchens: Atheism + Oxbridge accent + books trump racism, alcoholism, and war-mongering. Lauded.

    James Watson: Good science + Nobel Prize + CSHL trump racism, arrogance, and misogyny. Mixed reaction.

    Francis Collins: Christian beliefs + book + down-to-earth demeanor trump good science, contributions to medical genetics, and Human Genome Project. Reviled.

  70. says

    Wow, Barn Owl, you’ve sure got some twisted views there.

    My recent condemnation of Hitchens’ bloodthirsty and simplistic approach to the Middle East has some people demanding that I retract and apologize.

    My recent posts on Watson haven’t expressed a mixed reaction at all: he’s a repellent racist.

    As I’ve said several times before, Collins is a prime example of compartmentalization: good scientist with screamingly insane ideas about religion.

    If you’d like a short, simple analysis of the commenter known as “Barn Owl” that pretends you don’t have a mixture of different ideas, I could do that.

  71. Sastra says

    Shorter Pharyngula:

    Being reasonable, intelligent, and correct in one area doesn’t mean you get a pass when you blow it. Nor does blowing it in one area mean that everything else you believe is now tainted.

    I think that if we were allowing our dislike of Collins’ reasoning on religion to trump the rest of what he does, we’d be saying now his science is bad and his views on evolution are wrong. We’d be so annoyed by that waterfall crap we’d be willing to grant merit to Intelligent Design. Don’t see that happening.