Kanazawa pushback

I mentioned that Satoshi Kanazawa has a new column on Big Think. Now I’ve got two flavors of responses for you!

  1. Flavor #1 is spicy! Adam Lee, who is also on Big Think, is indignant that standards have dropped so low.

    I can only speculate as to the lapse in editorial judgment that must have occurred for Big Think to extend this racist, sexist, genocide-advocating pseudoscientific bigot a platform. Were they unaware of his views? Were they aware, but went ahead anyway because controversy is good for traffic? (Racism can’t be good for traffic, can it?)

    I don’t want to be accused of giving any extra publicity to Kanazawa, so I won’t be writing to criticize him again. However, I want to make it clear in the most emphatic terms that I think him utterly vile and contemptible. And rest assured, I intend to follow up with Big Think’s upper echelons to find out who made this decision and why, and I’ll update when I know more.

    Apparently, he did talk to the upper echelon at Big Think, because a nameless editorial source posted a response, which is Flavor #2.

  2. Flavor #2 is oleaginous, lumpy, and full of sugar — it’s a kind of lard-flavored ice cream, with bullshit chunks (Hmm, what would Ben & Jerry’s call that? “Fecal Globsplosion”?). The editors support Kanazawa with many adjectives.

    Having tracked his thinking for years, including having him appear for an interview on Big Think, we cannot help but admire Satoshi’s convictions to freedom of thought, even if sometimes we too have cringed at his missteps . At its best, it yields wondrous new perspectives on confounding aspects of modern life, such as the challenge of dating in big cities. At its worst, it yields the intellectual equivalent of shock-jock antics which serve as a call-to-arms for the legions of self-righteous self-promoters eager to decontextualize and oversimplify matters into stark injustices they condemn into oblivion across the cable news airwaves.

    Our support for his approach to thinking, and intellectual purview, should not be confused with an endorsement of his conclusions and prescriptions, to the extent that he actually argues on behalf of any specific outcome or conclusion in any given instance. The best and fairest criticisms of his work are truly academic in nature and involve just how far his cross-cutting postulates (one might call them intellectual mash-ups) can extend on the backs of the (current) consensus theories that underpin them and the empirical data he marshals alongside them (often circumstantially).

    Whoa. Read the whole thing. It reeks of desperate justifications, but it’s entertaining to watch this person twist themselves into knots trying to simultaneously praise Kanazawa while also trying to make sure they don’t get splashed with the slime from his certain eruptions.

Recommendations for cannibals?

Oh, please dear Gauss, not more of this hyper-adaptive crap.

It appears that men’s preference for more curvy women has quite a lot to do with the fact that curvy figures historically have possessed more of the healthy omega-3 fatry acid DHA, which is essential for proper brain development in children.

An article in the August 2012 issue of Psychology Today explains that men “know” something significant about women’s bodies that women don’t. And it all has to do with nature’s mandate to produce children with great survival skills. In fact, women are usually more like men’s ideals than they realize, and losing weight to meet the standard set by the fashion and modeling industries may not make them any more attractive to men.

Well, gosh then…if I were still trying to raise my kids and feed them a healthy diet, I guess I now know which of the herd to cull out and put on the dinner plate! At least, that’s where the first paragraph was leading me.

Look: if you are a woman eating a reasonable diet, if you aren’t abusing yourself with an eating disorder on either end of the spectrum, your kids will probably be fine. If you’re getting standard dietary supplements, vitamins and cofactors, that are routine in almost all standard pregnancy care situations (but unfortunately not routine for the poorest of the poor), your fetus is getting what it needs no matter whether you are slender or curvy. There is a broad range of tolerance here.

Also, in a normal, healthy relationship, men should not and are not judging you by either a conscious or unconscious assessment of how much DHA is available in your blood supply — if they are looking at you like a cut of meat rather than as a fellow human being who would make a good partner in living, you really don’t want to associate with them.

And this — this bullshit — is rank idiocy.

American children rank 31st out of 64 nations in tests of academic ability. The highest scores are in places like Japan, where women have slender hourglass figures and have four times the amount of DHA in their blood.

So…much…wrong. Not only the racism of categorizing an entire nation of women as possessing “slender hourglass figures”, but reducing academic ability to the product of your mother’s sexual desirability and biochemistry…jebus, let’s forget about tests and ability and background education and just let the children of MILFs into Hahvahd.

Also, guess who he cites as the source of this splendid information about men’s ability to assay DHA levels with a glance? Psychology Today. What, not Cosmo?

That’s a new one

Apparently, I am now a whore. I can’t be insulted by the accusation, though, since it seems to be applied in the same way as the frequent accusations that I’m gay and Jewish — neither true nor particularly offensive to me, although it does say a lot about the person trying to do the insulting.

Also, it comes from the awful Paul Elam, who seems to use “whore” as every other word. He has…issues.

But atheists can be secularists

Jacques Berlinerblau just really dislikes atheists. I don’t know how else to account for this bizarre article in which he announces that Secularists are not atheists. Oh, yeah, I say? We know. I’m a big fan of Americans United…and I know full well that it is not an atheist organization. I also know that the history of church-state separation in the US, and that it was driven not by atheists (who were nearly nonexistent until the last century), but by diverse religious interests.

So why is Berlinerblau complaining? Because of two factors: fundamentalist Christians who want to make secularism synonymous with atheism to demonize the cause, and because atheist organizations have risen in strength and numbers enough to have built lobbying organizations that fight for secularism. Who is the villain Berlinerblau will chastise? Guess what: it’s not the Christian fanatics who abuse the term. It’s atheists who dare to speak up in support of secularism.

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Crown Clade of Creation

I’ve been writing at Coyote Crossing/Creek Running North for nearly a decade, and in the decade’s worth of archives there are a handful of posts that really seem like they ought to live here. So every month or two I’ll dust one of them off, if it’s not too horribly outdated, and put it here for your delectation or dissection.

This one is a 2006 review of the abysmal “biology” “textbook” Biology: God’s Living Creation, published by the creationists at A Beka Books.

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I can learn more from an ant than I can from Christianity

Answers in Genesis gets email, and they recently published a critical message which they then thoroughly rebutted. Not.

Their critic pointed out the absurdity of believing the earth is only 6000 years old and that dinosaurs and humans lived together, and also made the point that an indifferent nature is not influenced by biblical beliefs. AiG answered, and it’s actually rather interesting as a condensed summary of their fallacies.

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Some days, it doesn’t pay to read the blogs

OK, I’m neck deep in work, and I browse Freethoughtblogs for a little light relief, and what do I find? Cuttlefish tells me this ghastly (but familiar) story about a man who murders his ex-partner and children because she spurns him. Then Stephanie has another horror story about the nightmare a woman suffered when she dared to tell a man “no”.

I think I’m motivated to go back to the books now.

Justicar: liar

This is rather outrageous. The ever dishonest Justicar has created a video that claims PZ Myers Hates Faggots, an assertion he supports by making stuff up. His two pieces of evidence are:

  1. That I called Chris Stedman an “Uncle Mary”, a derogatory term for a gay person who works against the interests of the gay community; it’s a counterpart to “Uncle Tom”. Justicar flat out says I used the term. I did not. A gay man in the comments did.

  2. He then claims that I called Stedman a “tinkerbelle”, a belittling term for a “fairy”. Again, and this is completely predictable with Justicar, I did not. I was talking about how in interfaith efforts “it doesn’t matter what BS you believe, as long as you really, really believe”, and suggested that they promote “tinkerbellism”. I was not talking about Stedman at all. It was a reference that had nothing to do with homosexuality, and everything to do with fairy tales.

I am astounded at how blatantly that dishonest jerk will lie.

The anti-atheist+ boobs on Twitter

I had some fun yesterday poking a stick at the anti-atheist+ mob on twitter. It was actually revealing: it became increasingly obvious that the people who really, really hate atheism+ are authoritarians who simply cannot imagine an egalitarian movement — even when they are already part of one. There was so much projection going on I was wondering how such low-wattage bulbs could be pretentious enough to think they could cast light on anything.

But let me show you a few examples to illustrate what I mean. These are all quotes from people who were yammering at me; pseudonyms have been removed to protect the stupid.

Ah – but therein lies the problem – who is the official #atheismplus endorser / keeper of dogma? @Pzmyers?

Why are #atheismplus cardinals @pzmyers & Richard Carrier privileged old white men?

There was a lot of that: apparently, these people cannot relate unless there is a boss to talk to somewhere. They cannot comprehend an organization without a dictator, therefore atheism+ has a secret dictator somewhere. They cannot understand how an idea could be advanced without being treated as dogma, therefore atheism+ is dogma.

I have a surprise for them: I’m not a member of the Atheism+ forum. I am not a leader of this movement; I have no position in it at all. I like the idea and I’m happy to encourage people to explore it, and I’ve long been pushing ideas similar to what has coalesced as the atheism+ movement, but I’m not even remotely “in charge”. And that’s the way I like it.

I am deeply amused by the idiot who thought he could point out the hypocrisy of a movement that values diversity by announcing that two privileged old white men are in charge. We’re not. He could only make that claim by ignoring the fact that the person who triggered the whole process and has put in a lot of organizational effort was a privileged young white woman, Jen McCreight, and the person who has been promoting it most wonderfully is a privileged middle-aged white bisexual woman, Greta Christina.

And then there is this level of cluelessness.

#atheismplus is @pzmyers and @rebeccawatson egos personified.

As I’ve explained, I’m not a member of atheism+ and am not engaged as a leader in any way. Similarly, Rebecca Watson has expressed interest and sympathy with its goals, but is not on the bandwagon. But apparently, we are two great villains, so the people who hate atheism+ imagine that it must be a reflection of our desires. How pathetic.

Another theme that emerged is that, when I said there isn’t a person in charge of atheism+ telling you what to think, well then, it can’t work. Without an authority defining every last nuance, it’s going to fall into endless schism.

I’m pointing out that a label is meaningless if people have multiple interpretations of what it is.

How do you not understand that nobody deciding what Atheism+ is makes it meaningless?

If there’s no leadership/hierarchy, who decides what Atheism+ stands for?

Like, umm, the word “atheist”? There is a straightforward dictionary definition of that word, of course, but one thing you quickly discover if you actually interact with a lot of atheists is that the meaning in practice varies a lot. I have met atheists who believe in reincarnation; atheists who think Chopra is on to something with his ‘universal consciousness’ claims; atheists who are activists and atheists who just want to be left alone; angry anti-religion atheists and atheists who want to build a church of atheism; stupid atheists and smart atheists; philosophical atheists and pragmatic atheists. We’ve got Atheist Alliance and American Atheists and CFI and the American Humanist Association, all promoting atheism with subtle differences in emphasis.

Does that make atheism meaningless? Of course not. I’ve been telling people for years that there is a diverse world of atheism out there, with different causes and different consequences. And I’ve been against this contrary and irrational effort to pretend they’re all the same.

By the way, this very same person who is demanding a single, specific definition of every interpretation of atheism+ also said this:

Agreeing with people 100% is a hivemind. It’s not healthy. Disagreements are good.

Get that? It’s not healthy to have a “hivemind”, defined as a situation where people are in agreement on something. But atheism+ is bad because it tolerates multiple interpretations. I don’t know how his brain keeps from exploding.

This guy also has a problem:

They should certainly drop “#atheism” from the name because a+ implies telling us what to believe.

Somehow, he’s able to embrace “atheism” without this terrible crime of the label telling him what to believe, but stick a “+” on it, and suddenly it becomes a dictatorial imperative.

Do the atheism+ haters understand yet that it is entirely opt-in, that people join because they find its causes appealing? And that you don’t have to join? And that it just states a general emphasis on social justice issues, and isn’t going to micro-manage your life? No, they do not.

Possibility: “I’m an Atheist+” “Oh, which brand?” “Brand?” “Carrier’s? Jen’s? Dawkins? Dillahunty’s? Which?”

That was an amazing comment, so revealing. My answer: “Mine. Yours.” I really do not understand a mind that cannot imagine taking an idea for its own, but instead demanding that a charismatic leader tell him exactly what it means. Somebody has been thoroughly poisoned by religion, that’s for sure.

Here’s what atheism+ means, as defined on the official atheism+ page. This is about as specific as it’s going to get.

Atheism+ is a safe space for people to discuss how religion affects everyone and to apply skepticism and critical thinking to everything, including social issues like sexism, racism, GLBT issues, politics, poverty, and crime.

You can see where it came from: it’s in part a reaction against the modern skepticism movement, which invests a lot of effort in putting up fences and telling you what you’re allowed to talk about under the umbrella of skepticism. It’s also a reaction to people shouting at atheists that they should shut up and stop talking about issues like sexual harassment, because it’s not important. So some people have stepped up and said, “We’re people who think social justice is important, and that secular thought has much to say about it. So we’re creating a space where like-minded people can talk freely about it.”

That’s it.

And the assholes creep out of the woodwork to find excuses to tell these people, indirectly, that applying critical thinking to social issues is bad. Oh, they can’t come right out and say that, of course, because that would make their stupidity obvious; so they invent bizarre excuses that it doesn’t have a pope, therefore it can’t work, or that it’s hypocritical because it made an old white man a cardinal, or that its a movement that is “divisive” — a favorite word in that crowd — as if their raging sexism and unconcern for broader social issues weren’t already divisive. And as if division weren’t a good thing — seriously, if an organization does not serve your interests, leave it or lobby it to do a better job. I left the church when I was 14; my atheism was “divisive”. Was that a bad thing?

Another theme of the day was the oppressive nature of atheism+. They’re going to have purges! I’ve heard this so many times, and I ask my usual question: who is going to purge you of what, and how are they going to do it? I mean, it’s not as if the atheist+ crowd has power over you or any aspect of your life, or that they’ve threatened to spray paint your property and shoot your dog. The first action Jen took was to set up a discussion board, not a standing army.

So, all you anti-atheist+ people, I challenge you: tell me what will happen to you if you don’t join atheism+? (Oh, and keep in mind that I haven’t ‘joined’ anything either; I’m more sympathetic than you are, but you won’t find my name on the atheism+ forum, yet.)

Here are the only answers that they came up with.

You don’t see it that way? The whole “Come to Atheism+ or we’ll leave you?” Carrier’s “Join us or we’ll never be friends?” Etc.?

Those evil atheist+ fanatics might unfriend you on facebook if you don’t join! Rarely has a tyranny had such awesome instruments of coercion. That’s really all we’ve got; we can decide you’re an asshole because you don’t share our values, and we can stop associating with you. Everyone does that. It’s not a special power, it is not the application of force.

And then they cite Jen:

From Jen McCreight: “Demand that your organizations and clubs evolve, or start your own if they refuse.” That’s a “must” attitude.

Yes, it is. If you want me to be part of your organization, it must reflect my interests; you could change to better address what I consider important, or I won’t join. That’s not a purge. That’s the nature of a voluntary association. What’s the alternative? “Jen, I’m sorry, we don’t think feminism matters and we really would like to gnaw on your leg, but you don’t get to leave our meetings.” That’s a totalitarian attitude, that you think you can tell us who are friends and associates must be, and that no one is allowed to reject an overture to pal up.

Are you that desperate to make Jen or Richard or me like you?

Conspiracy theorists showed up, too.

I’m surprised at how many people are trying to lie that it’s about a subset & not about taking over groups like JREF

Again, what are the mechanics of this? How does setting up a special interest group within atheism with a focus on humanist goals lead to the takeover of JREF? That makes no sense.

It’s like arguing that Doctors Without Borders has a secret agenda to take over the entire medical profession. Or that the Special Interest Group on Humanitarian Technology is an evil scheme to take over IEEE.

This same guy also reflected the authoritarian theme of all the other opponents:

Listen up douchebag, U make UR wages off of people like me. Don’t tell US what to think, we tell U what to do. Got it?

Oh. Gosh. So because the state pays significantly less than half my salary so that I will perform a service, random jerk on the internet ‘owns’ me and has the right to order me to do his bidding. When did teachers become slaves?

You get the idea. I spent an hour arguing with really stupid people. But then, I’ve spent even more time arguing with creationists, so I’m used to it.

The price of a hoax is too high

That’s a ghillie suit over on the right. It’s used by the military and hunters as camouflage, and they’re fairly easy to get. You can also see how it could be used as a kind of Bigfoot costume, especially if you wore it in dim light. If you wanted to fool people into thinking Bigfoot exists, you could dance around in it around the edge of town, at twilight, and get people wondering what the heck that big, shaggy, manlike form was. But that would be unethical, of course.

It would also be really stupid.

There’s kind of an obvious problem to wearing camouflage (it makes you hard to see) in the dark (it makes you even harder to see) while also wanting to be seen, which usually means making an appearance near high traffic areas, like, you know, roads. With cars moving rapidly on them.

A Bigfoot hoaxer, Randy Lee Tenley, discovered this briefly before his brains stopped functioning altogether.

A 15-year-old girl hit him with her car, another car swerved, and a third car driven by a 17-year-old ran him over, CNN affiliate KECI reported.

Tenley was “well into the driving lane,” and according to his companions he was “attempting to incite a sighting of Bigfoot — to make people think they had seen a Sasquatch,” Schneider said in the KECI report.

Right now, I mainly feel a deep sympathy for those two young people who blamelessly caused the death of a very stupid man. I’m sure they’re traumatized by the whole event.

Tenley was 44, old enough to know better. I also don’t get it: if you believe in Bigfoot, why would you try to fake a sighting?