Ken Ham: still whining, but an online poll supports him

Yeah, poor Ken — he’s still distressed that his attempt to prop up his credibility with the Cincinnati Zoo’s was foiled. He’s also complaining about an “atheist (a professor from the University of Minnesota-Morris)” who engineered his defeat. I wonder who that might be?

Even more foolishly, though, he cites an online poll to back up his claims.

The news website NKY.com (http://nky.cincinnati.com/) ran an online poll on the controversy. They gave the following options:

YES–The museum promotes a religious point of view that conflicts with the zoo’s scientific mission.

NO–The promotion does not mean that the zoo endorses the museum or that the museum endorses the zoo.

As of last night, 86% voted “NO–The promotion does not mean that the zoo endorses the museum or that the museum endorses the zoo.” I know this is not a statistically valid poll, but I think it does show, as we have seen many times before, that most people are not intolerant. Sadly, it is an intolerant minority that can intimidate people to give in on matters they should take a stand on.

Crazy innumerate wacko. He notes that it is not “statistically valid”, and then in the same sentence claims it “does show”. No, it doesn’t, Ken. All it shows is that creationist fans beat science fans to this particular poll.

But we can fix that, can’t we, boys and girls?

The poll currently stands at 17% yes, 83% no, with a bit over 400 votes total. I suspect we can scramble that all around within an hour.

Jam this signal, stat!

The Christian Coalition of America has created something called the 2008 American Values Survey. It is why we crash polls.

This particular poll is supposed to produce results that the Christian Coalition will present to congress as if it is a serious and representative sample of “American values” … which must be why they toss it out onto the web on a conservative website. This is not how you do a legitimate poll. This is how you bias your results.

So let’s all show them that American values include atheists and agnostics and humanists. More importantly, churn this badly designed poll so that either the results are far more ambiguous than they hope, or they have to start throwing out answers they don’t like selectively, further demonstrating the invalid nature of this method.

Bad arguments, useless poll

There is this strange site that has collected testimonials for the existence of god. If I were a believer, I’d be embarrassed at the painful lack of logic in these rationalizations. To the question “I believe in god because…”, answers are non sequiturs like “because he is the creator” or “because god is real” or “because I don’t do bad things”.

There is also, of course, a poll, because nothing says shallow like adding a pointless poll to a web page. The question is “ Does God exist?. The answers so far suggest that some doubters have already started pharyngulating it.

No! 51.6%

Yes 47.5%
Not Sure 0.9%

Another possibility is that random readers who stumble across the site read a few of the testimonials and are so appalled at their inanity that they immediately lose their faith in a sudden fit of enlightenment. Go ahead and read a few. They will simultaneously confirm your disbelief and disappoint you with the inadequacy of the average human mind.

Interesting wording on this poll

They really had to twist the language to come up with this question: Do you think the majority of Americans are okay with this sort of ‘change’ — an expansion of special protections for federal employees based on their sexual behavior? I think what they really mean is, “Do most Americans think it is okay to treat people equally, and that they should disregard their private sexual preferences?”

Sadly, only 4.38% agree, and 93.69% think discrimination is hunky-dory.

It’s like they’re just begging me to crash it

How can I resist when they name it THE GOD POLL? There are several questions there: Does god exist (currently tied between yes and no)? Is there life after death (roughly tied, with yes in a slight lead)? Do humans have souls (yes is leading, 50%:34%)? Can an atheist be ethical (Yes is way ahead, fortunately)? Is evolution accurate (yes is at 64%, not bad)?

Vote on ’em all!

I think we have discovered the most pathetic online poll ever. The creator is jacking around the numbers now to whatever he feels like; he has left a comment here to complain; he’s playing a little game of sockpuppetry (“Dorfus” and “tgp” are the same person); and he just sent me email saying, “I’ve asked seed to remove your blog. I hope they do.” Whatta maroon.

What? Someone else crashing polls?

I don’t know that I should be encouraging the troop at Dr. Joan Bushwell’s Chimpanzee Refuge to compete with me, but OK, it’s a poll, anyone can join in. This one asks, Do you agree with the gay marriage bans?. It does have an interesting twist, in that the poll also displays the states of respondents, so you can see where Redneckistan is. Or another way to look at it is that you can vote to defend the honor of your state.

I don’t know what it does with you non-Americans. Those bits of geography don’t seem to exist on this map.

Crash the polls!

Once you’ve voted in the poll that matters, you can go play on this Online Presidential Poll. I’m pretty sure the results won’t be binding, so you can vote for me or Immanuel Kant (wait, what? He left off Nietzsche?)

John McCain 4% 8
Barack Obama 17% 35
Rev. Jeremiah Wright 2% 4
William Ayers 1% 2
Sarah Palin 0% 0
A Moose 4% 8
PZ Myers, aka, “Pharyngula” 2% 5
Glenn Reynolds, aka, “InstaIgnorance” 0% 0
Immanuel Kant 12% 26
Any member of the PGR Advisory Board 0% 1
Any member of the Texas Taliban 0% 1
Jason Stanley 4% 9
Paul Krugman, Nobel Laureate 9% 19
Gary Becker, Nobel Laureate 3% 6
Saul Kripke, Schock Prize Winner 5% 11
The Anonymous Proprietor of the
Now Defunct “Dadahead” Blog		 0% 1
Stephen Colbert 10% 21
Ali G. 4% 9
A Philosopher Named Cohen
(G.A., Joshua, or Stewart)		 11% 22
Any Four-Dimensionalist 10% 21

I am troubled that I am being trounced by a moose, but at least I’m beating Palin.