Oops!

No one is immune from making mistakes. We may carefully lay down our plans in great and painstaking detail, but the principle of unanticipated consequences is always lurking in the background, ready to mess with our designs. Of course, more often than not, the law of unanticipated consequences can just sit back and relax while our own stupidity takes over.

The following segment of RadioLab explores a series of hilarious linguistic mistakes that arise out of pure ideological laziness (what a concept!)... the kind of thing you should expect from trying to automate human communication.

But there's more: there's the story of a Harvard psychologist who devised a method to help safeguard American troops from being brainwashed by the enemy, only to later realize that the results might have backfired, in a big way...

And then there's the story of a scientist who chopped up a tree to figure out how old it was, and then discovered the tree he had just killed was the oldest living organism on the planet... well, not anymore...

Check out more fascinating entries from RadioLab.
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God and the Void

In the beginning there was nothingness, and out of that nothingness emerged God (also known, evidently, as El?-oh...him).

God, or Mr. Deity if you like (he goes by different names), apparently looked like a 70's porn star (with the creepy thin beard and dark goatee, though no sideburns), and even sported the quintessential pedophile silk robe. He had a serious case of personal insecurity and an insatiable need for social validation, but that's probably because his parents were Null and Void, and they weren't full of love... or anything else for that matter :)

Interestingly enough, this creature of emptiness had something of a philosophical disposition (though he still considered existence to be a predicate...), and in his infinite wisdom contemplated the conceptual problems behind the fact of his own omniscience. Never mind the fact that you could never throw a surprise party for God, or that he could never revel in wonder and curiosity, or enjoy the satisfaction of solving a difficult problem or making a new discovery, or experience the thrill of suspense and anticipation...

Could God know that he is all-knowing? Or might he suffer from a case of divine anosognosia, and not know about what he couldn't know?

Though not exactly on point, Elohim's soliloquy reminded me of Meno's paradox (also known as the paradox of inquiry), which is a question Meno poses to Socrates after the latter completely befuddles Meno's attempts to define virtue. Socrates summarizes the problem thus:

A man cannot search either for what he knows or for what he does not know... He cannot search for what he knows—since he knows it, there is no need to search— nor for what he does not know, for he does not know what to look for.

Here is a nice Philosophy Bites discussion of the apparent paradox:

And there is a related New York Times excellent five-part series on anosognosia (a condition in which a person who suffers from a mental/physical disability is unaware of said disability). It happens a lot more than you'd think...
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William Butler Yeats - Leda and the Swan

The other day I accidentally stumbled upon this risqué and evocative piece by sculptor Igor Zeinalov, and was instantly reminded of the story of Leda and the swan. Good thing, too, because that also happens to be the name of the sculpture.

This mythical story has inspired many artists through the ages, from Leonardo to Michelangelo and Cezanne, but no one, in my opinion, manages to convey the mixed feeling of awe and prophetic terror better than William Butler Yeats. This, I think, can be explained by the fact that, apart from Yeat's obvious poetic genius, the written word manages to conceal more than the visual arts while simultaneously inviting the imagination to take an active role. This is probably why I shudder every time I read the third stanza...

A sudden blow: the great wings beating still
Above the staggering girl, her thighs caressed
By the dark webs, her nape caught in his bill,
He holds her helpless breast upon his breast.

How can those terrified vague fingers push
The feathered glory from her loosening thighs?
And how can body, laid in that white rush,
But feel the strange heart beating where it lies?

A shudder in the loins engenders there
The broken wall, the burning roof and tower
And Agamemnon dead.

Being so caught up,

So mastered by the brute blood of the air
Did she put on his knowledge with his power
Before the indifferent beak could let her drop?

And if you don't get why this is such a big deal, here is a short introduction to the genius of this amazing work.
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Anthony Quinton on Wittgenstein

I just found out that philosopher Anthony Quinton recently passed away (you've seen him before talk about Spinoza and Leibniz), so I thought today would be an appropriate occasion to show a little appreciation for his intellectual and pedagogical contributions.

In the following conversation with Bryan Magee, Professor Quinton attempts the very difficult task of explaining the importance of that all-too-elusive German thinker Ludwig Wittgenstein, the man who Bertrand Russell once referred to as "the most perfect example I have ever known of genius as traditionally conceived, passionate, profound, intense, and dominating."

Wittgenstein's life was tragic, and to a large extent, it is difficult to understand precisely how it affected his intellectual development, so we'll skip that for now (but feel free to follow the links to The Philosopher's Zone to get an idea).

You'd think that coming up with a brand new system of philosophy that would consign you to intellectual posterity would be enough. Not so for Wittgenstein. After revolutionizing the world of philosophy of language with his Tractatus Logicus-Philosophicus, and consequently giving up on philosophy for a number of years, he became dissatisfied with his early work and decided to do it again with his highly aphoristic publication Philosophical Investigations. The result is a work that simultaneously seems self-evident and bizarrely counter-intuitive.

Check out more of these fascinating conversations with Bryan Magee.
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Kubrick vs. Scorsese

I probably don't have to tell you, Stanley Kubrick and Martin Scorsese are two of the most influential movie directors of all time, and they've been directing their masterpieces since the 1950's and 1970's respectively.

The following is a very nicely designed montage paying tribute to these giants of film.

And if nothing else, a little kick-ass Irish music is always a great way to start the weekend. Cheers!

I doubt anyone can understand how awesome it is to watch DiCaprio get shot in the head :)
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Giant Spider Crab Performs Strip-Tease

You've heard the totally hilarious lobster song before in one of Robert Krulwich's entries, so you know how important the molting process is for crustaceans, as well as how important it is to avoid the bisque :) If you haven't heard that excellent song, go do it now; I'll wait.

The following time-lapse video shows either the crustacean version of Alien, or how a giant spider crab molts. You'll probably end up both disturbed and fascinated.

And if you're curious about the molting process, there's a nice explanation over at the Pharyngula blog.
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Velociraptor is the Tonya Harding of Dinosaurs

What do you get when you mix a geek wearing an 8-bit ThinkGeek tie with an audience with various opinions on what constitutes the best dinosaur ever?

Give up? A hilarious (and surprisingly educational) paleontology comedy routine...

I'd warn you that this might be NSFW, but if that's the case, you should just quit your job right now.

And in case you're wondering, here is what ankylosaurus probably looked like:


Check out Lewis Black with some thoughts about creationists and dinosaurs :)
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All-Natural Food Preservative Causes All-Natural Cancer

Religiosity seems to be a human instinct. Even secularists and hard-core atheists are prone to engage in practices and beliefs that are fundamentally religious. One of these instances has to do with the belief, whose strongest philosophical articulation was provided by St. Thomas Aquinas, that whatever is natural is better, and, consequently, that whatever is unnatural must therefore be evil.

This is why social conservatives and the catholic church rage against homosexuality and birth control, but this is also why bleeding-heart liberals and hippie-type progressives are all about 'organic' and 'all-natural' food.

Leave it to The Onion to refute the faulty logic upon which these beliefs are premised...

Naturally :)
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Happy birthday, Alan Turing

The modern world runs on computers, and the idea of modern computers owes its birth particularly to Alan Turing, a British polymath (philosopher, mathematician, computer science visionary, mathematical biologist, marathon runner, etc.) whose ideas would revolutionize virtually every discipline he thought about.

During World War II, for instance, the Nazi's were basically kicking some major British butt, until that is, Alan Turing decided to get involved and crack the code of the Nazi Enigma cipher machine and even the score. It wouldn't be long until the tide would turn and the krauts found themselves on the receiving end...

Turing's ability to crack the German code was related to his work on computational theory. Instead of creating a domain-specific computer to perform a very limited set of functions, part of Turing's genius consisted in realizing (and proving) that a universal machine (now known as a Turing machine) could compute any string of operations that could be expressed in symbolic form, no matter how complex. This eventually gave rise to the idea of artificial intelligence, whose daddy, as you might already be able to guess, is Alan Turing. Here is a very short introduction to this man's genius.

To learn about his incredibly interesting work on mathematical biology (specifically his ideas related to the chemistry basis of morphogenesis), check out Jim Al-Khalili's documentary The Secret Life of Chaos.
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Penn & Teller - Circumcision Is Bullshit!

I don't know whether the practice of circumcision arose from sincere concern for the health of babies being born and raised in conditions less than optimal in terms of hygiene, or whether it arose from the dogmatic, arbitrary and superstitious religious beliefs of illiterate goat herders in the desert.

What I do know is that this practice has become the norm in Western cultures. Never mind the ironic self-esteem problems it produces for those whose loving parents have spared them this brutal procedure, the practice of child circumcision raises some very interesting ethical questions:

If there is no clear medical benefit to circumcision (and there is a growing body of evidence suggesting that, at least in developed countries, it is completely useless), is it okay for parents to impose, simply for the sake of some backward sense of social acceptance, what can only be described as a barbaric procedure on their obviously non-consenting boys? If circumcision desensitizes sexual pleasure, can it be compared (in kind, not degree) to the clearly objectionable practice of female genital mutilation?

Penn & Teller have a few choice words to share about the issue.

And if you feel self-conscious because you haven't been butchered, there are people who might find you sexy :)


Check out more of Penn & Teller's magic and irreverence.
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The Genius of Britain - Episode 1

The scientific revolution represents one of the most exciting developments of our species' history, replacing the traditions of dogma, authority, superstition and fear with the promise of true understanding, reason, knowledge and freedom. The Greeks had attempted this once before, but their amazing intellectual progress was obfuscated by the Roman conquest and the subsequent dominion of Christianity that would bring in the Dark Ages.

While the scientific revolution took place in various countries, it should come as no surprise that the BBC would want to pay particular recognition to the British men and women whose minds and discoveries helped shape the modern world, and to get this tribute started, they have brought in some of Britain's current big guns: Stephen Hawking, Richard Dawkins, David Attenborough, Robert Winston, Jim Al-Khalili and others.

This first episode tells the incredible and astonishing story of a small group of friends, colleagues and enemies (Christopher Wren, Robert Boyle, Robert Hooke, Edmond Halley and Isaac Newton) who, with the aid of their unquenchable curiosity, inexhaustible industry, rigorous thinking and astonishing ingenuity, would produce discoveries and develop theories that defied virtually everything that was known about the world at that time. These events are told in the context of the appearance of a strange object moving across the sky in the winter of 1,664...

To learn more about the birth, history and influence of The Royal Society, you might want to listen to this fascinating four-part series of In Our Time, with Melvin Bragg.
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What Obama Should Have Said

A few nights ago, President Obama spoke to the nation about the BP oil disaster affecting the gulf of Mexico. Unfortunately, the impressive rhetoric, common sense and moral virtue he displayed during the election seemed to be missing this time. Rachel Maddow presents her version of how Obama should have addressed us:

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Patricia Churchland - The Machinery of Mind

In this delightful and fascinating discussion, British philosopher AC Grayling talks to neurophilosopher Patricia Churchland about the history of the philosophical study of mind, starting with the double-edged contributions made to the field by the French philosopher Rene Descartes.

As you might already imagine if you're familiar with her work, Churchland presents the fascinating story behind the mating behavior of prairie voles, as well as the bizarre case of a pedophile whose outrageous behavior seems to have been completely determined by a tumor in his brain. The implications, of course, are nothing short of interesting and important...

Check more on the mind, free will or the masters of philosophy.
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Bow Down to Our Toxo Overlords!

Ok, so the arguments and evidence against the myth of free will just keep piling on... As the Baron d'Holbach famously argued in his The Systems of Nature, one of the reasons people usually believe they are free is simply due to their ignorance of the causes of their own behavior. We tend to think that if we want something and pursue it, we pursue it because we are exercising our freedom to satisfy our desire. Funny thing, we seldom seem to ask whether we have any control over our desires, and the answer to that question, of course, is a big resounding 'nigga please' :)

Now, to make matters worse (and you've already seen plenty of examples in this blog before), sometimes our behavior is determined by other organisms that have hijacked our nervous system for their own purposes. One of the most extraordinary and freaky examples is a parasite called toxoplasmosis. This bug can only reproduce sexually in the guts of cats, and in an effort to find its way there, what it does is take over the behavior and psychology of mice (and possibly humans) in truly and disturbingly bizarre and spooky ways. Robert Sapolsky explains:

And here are Josh and Chuck from the Stuff You Should Know podcast to add a bit of flavor to this madness:

And because I know you're still hungry for more of this madness, here is a RadioLab segment on toxo:

Check out more on the weirdness of mind control.
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God destroyed in Act of God?

You'd think that if you build a giant statue celebrating the son of God, God would be pleased, right?


Well, it seems last night the statue was struck by a bolt of lightning, confirming my suspicion that Zeus is still reigning supreme and kicking major Christian ass :)


And of course, none of this could be complete without a little YMCA blasphemy :)

Could it be that Muslims don't create representations of Allah because they know Zeus would totally kick his ass too? :)

Update: Do you know what was next to Touchdown Jesus and didn't burn down? The porn shop :)
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Why Do Viruses Kill?

You've gotten the quick intro to how viruses invade our bodies before (with Robert Krulwich, no less), but today we get the full BBC treatment, so to speak.

Viruses are way more ubiquitous than we normally realize, and although they have a bad reputation (what, with killing millions of people world-wide every now and then), these marvels of evolutionary molecular engineering actually seem to be responsible for a substantial contribution to the development of complex life on the planet (and to our understanding of the origins of life), so our relationship with them is rather complicated.

Say what you will about them, it is undeniable fact that they are a force to be reckoned with. And if we momentarily ignore the harm they sometimes cause us, we might even be able to see them as a thing of beauty... just keep your distance.

And if you don't think they could be a thing of beauty, check out this art exhibit based on glass sculptures of deadly viruses.
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Michael Shermer - The Patterns Behind Self-Deception

If you have a small child, ask him what he sees in the picture to the side if he looks closely enough. Your apprehension to do this betrays what a pervert you are, but your innocent child will see something radically different... and put you to shame :)

It should come as no surprise to you that part of the reason we see what we see has to do with the fact that we are pattern-seeking organisms. In his second absolutely fascinating TEDTalk presentation (watch the first one about 'why people believe weird things'), Michael Shermer analyzes two specific types of pattern recognition problems the human mind is likely to commit: Type I (false positives) and Type II (false negatives).

Although one may find superstition incredibly infuriating, we must understand that its prevalence is at least partly explained by the fact that, in purely evolutionary terms, the tendency to find patterns, even when there aren't any, would have benefited our ancestors' chances for survival (although it would have also helped them develop all sorts of looney beliefs). The key, of course, is to find that delicate balance between radical skepticism vs radical gullibility: you don't want to be too close-minded to new valuable ideas, but you also don't want to be so open-minded that your brain falls out...

Understanding the difference between these two types of pattern-recognition mistakes, Shermer provides a simple conceptual framework to understand why so many people believe in so many weird things. As if all the scientific explanations weren't awesome enough, the presentation ends with a hilarious little experiment totally worth being shared in the Philosophy Monkey blog :)

If I were a psychology researcher looking for funding, I would totally contact Candid Camera to invest in my research :)

For more on the ways the mind can assign agency and intentionality to inanimate events, or look for meaningful patterns in meaningless noise, check out the God helmet on the documentary God on the Brain, Richard Dawkins on The Purpose of Purpose, or Andy Thomson on Why We Believe in Gods.
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Peter Singer - The Life You Can Save, in 3 minutes

We all like to think that we are good, moral, compassionate people. Of course, that's always easier said than done. Often, we tend to consider ourselves good simply because we are not out doing evil stuff, but not doing evil doesn't make you good; it just makes you not evil. Being good requires active participation, and active participation requires that you take a hard look inside and ask yourself whether you could be doing more to help those in need. When you ask yourself that simple question, you are almost inevitably going to find that the answer is a very quick, obvious and embarrassing yes.

Are your actions consistent with your moral intuitions? Are your moral intuitions consistent with each other? Using philosopher Peter Singer's notion of the expanding moral circle, the following 3-minute animation brings home the important point that the very same reasoning you would provide to explain and justify your moral intuitions and behavior in one case should also apply to other cases that may not seem as similar at first glance, even though they are actually logically identical.

If you can resist the natural urge to want to rationalize your cognitive dissonance, the upshot is that you could become a better human being...

Click here if you want to figure out what your contribution should be based on your income, and here to make your pledge.
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Stephen Hawking - "Science Will Win"

In a recent interview with Diane Sawyer, theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking exalted the virtues of the scientific outlook, explaining its fundamental differences with the dogmatic and imaginary nature of religion.

Now, while I'd like to agree with Hawking that 'science will win' in the end, I would not ignore the important scientific lesson that we should never underestimate the power of stupid people in large crowds...

Anyway, check out more of Stephen Hawking, like the story of his life or that time he experienced zero gravity.
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Two Teams, One Cup - Let the Games Begin!

I don't have TV to watch the games on, time to even try, or knowledge of the different teams to be able to have a clue what's going on and how everyone stacks against everyone else. So, to everyone with whom I've wagered, just let me know how much money you'll owe me once the World Cup is over. I'm sure there's a five-dollar bill with my name on it somewhere :)

In the meantime, enjoy this kick-ass montage featuring the possible world-wide consequences of a single kick of a soccer ball. I'd try to explain the philosophical notions behind possible worlds and alternate universes, but I gotta go to work...

Here is a hilarious forecast of the first U.S. vs England game, reported by American/British correspondent John Oliver:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
World Cup 2010: Into Africa - Two Teams, One Cup
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Tea Party

Check out other entries in the sports tag.
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Bill Maher Schools Global Warming Deniers

I don't know how it got started, but there's a growing trend of people who argue that our belief in a given proposition ought to be directly proportional to the number of people who embrace such belief. This is why internet polls, despite being completely unscientific, have become ubiquitous, and why media outlets have made the switch from investigative journalism to audience polling.

The truth of a proposition, however, is independent of the number of people who believe it. To argue otherwise is to commit the fallacy of argumentum ad populum (also called bandwagon, appeal to popularity, appeal to the masses, etc.).

When it does make sense to listen to people's 'opinion' is when it comes to those who are experts in a particular field, but this is because their beliefs are informed by the research and literature produced by expert professionals in the relevant field. Instead of being quacks driven by some half-baked woo-woo ideology, experts have the numbers and the evidence to back up their claims, and their beliefs are based on the evidence; they don't try to make the evidence conform to their beliefs.

Though the message in the following clip is directed to global warming deniers, the core message is one that can be equally applied to other groups of scientifically illiterate ignoramuses: creationists, flat-earthers, astrologers, homeopaths, or, and here is the delicious irony, anti-vaxxers... like Bill Maher himself :)

That's right, Bill. Vaccines are a medical issue; you're not a doctor, so you don't get a vote. Please shut the fuck up!

Of course, on the other side of the global warming debate, the evidence sometimes presented is not always what you'd call water-tight :)




Check out other entries on the environment.
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Underwater Base Jumping

What's crazier than a dude who decides to base jump into the deepest blue hole in the world while holding his breath, no oxygen tanks or anything?

Apparently the chick who decides to film the whole thing while holding her own breath...

I don't really get how the guy deals with Boyle's law: sinking into the oceanic depths while holding air in his lungs, which he later exhales toward the end of his ascent, but if true, this is insane...

Update: It seems the video is an artistic work of FICTION. Nery never actually made it to the bottom of the blue hole, as that is apparently impossible: the hole is about 202 meters deep, and the world diving record (without fins, rope or other equipment) is 95 meters.

Still, it's absolutely stunning and well made, and I can't stop watching it and trying to hold my breath for the length of the video... unsuccessfully, but I think my brain is secretly glad :)

Check out more extreme and not-so-extreme sports.
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Michael Sandel - Philosophy and the Lost Art of Democratic Debate

In our modern world of social liberalism and libertarianism, we tend to think that questions of policy should be procedural rather than substantive: government should restrict itself to the protection of individual rights and the arbitration of conflict, and it should remain neutral with respect to moral issues. I think this approach is right for the most part, although it is usually driven by that relativistic wimpiness of which we should always be suspicious.

Harvard philosophy professor Michael Sandel, however, argues that we are deluding ourselves if we think we can extricate ourselves from substantive moral considerations when engaging in questions of public policy. Drawing on the work of Aristotle, Sandel argues, and rather persuasively at that, that moral considerations of justice are inevitably tied to other philosophical questions that get to the heart of our assumptions about social institutions. Starting with a debate about flutes, moving to a recent golf controversy that made it all the way to the Supreme Court, and ending with a discussion on gay marriage and the purpose of marriage, Sandel is able to show Aristotle's importance more than two millenia after his death.

Despite our positions on these particular positions, Professor Sandel rightly argues that it is high time the level of discourse in political debate resemble that of educated human beings and not the shouting matches so prevalent among pundits on TV.

If you're interested in these and other ethical questions, watch Professor Sandel's entire course on Justice.

Here is the list and links to all episodes: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12..
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Eyjafjallajökull Volcano Time Lapse

I don't know whether Iceland's Eyjafjallajökull volcano got its name when the geologist in charge of coming up with a name for it got up from his desk to get some coffee or find some inspiration, and while pondering on the majesty of the volcano's topological features, the guy's cat inadvertently walked across the computer keyboard, pressed a bunch of random keys, including the 'send' button and sent it to Iceland's equivalent of the academy of science. The rest, as they say, is history :)

Or maybe not... Regardless, I think we can all agree that the following time lapse video of the volcano is nothing short of mesmerizing.

And here is an impressive picture of the lightning produced by the volcanic ash


And if you still can't get enough of Iceland, have some more:

Check out more excellent examples of time lapse photography.
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BP's Corporate Doublespeak

You might be distressed by all the oil spilling into the Gulf of Mexico, but that's only the beginning: The Onion is reporting that A Massive Flow of Bullshit Continues to Gush from BP Headquarters :)

Here is a hilarious tongue-in-cheek example:

And Stephen Colbert has some advice for President Obama on how to deal with this situation:

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Oil's Well That Never Ends
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Fox News

And if you want the masterpiece on doublespeak, watch Nineteen eighty-four.
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Darwin - Evolution of a Madman

From the producers of Sherlock Holmes comes the incredible story of a bad-ass detective of nature whose insightful observations and unorthodox conjectures would one day change the world, threaten the church, kill God, get his first cousin knocked up, and drive a few species into extinction :)

Behold the rise of man! :)
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Stephen Fry - The Importance of Philosophy and Unbelief

While I'm somewhat suspicious of actors--always pretending to be someone else :), I do tend to admire the good ones for their ability to convey and explore the spectrum of human possibilities. Still, they're not usually the first group to whom I'd turn for intellectual stimulation, so it's especially refreshing when one of them is not only eloquent and worldly but sophisticated, subtle, perceptive and genuinely interesting.

In this short interview, Stephen Fry exalts the virtues of philosophy (the real kind, the one that requires systematic thought), and makes the case that the assumption of the absence of an afterlife becomes an imperative to lead a fuller, better and more interesting life. The ideas are probably already familiar to you, dear readers, but it's always nice to hear them expressed with a British accent :)

And as someone who loves books, it was only fitting for Stephen to make a wonderful documentary about Gutenberg and his revolutionary printing press.

Oh, and you don't want to miss him in this awesome debate (alongside Christopher Hitchens) about whether the Catholic Church is a force for good.

Spoiler alert: it's not :)
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Colbert Interviews Ayaan Hirsi Ali

If you're familiar with her writings and public appearances, then you probably already know that despite the fatwa issued against her, Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a fearless iconoclast who is courageously fighting to protect women's rights against the oppressive power of absolutist religious dogma on the one hand (things like Sharia Law and such), and the indolent Western attitude of relativism that's too scared to judge any culture lest it be considered intolerant, on the other.

In the following interview, she talks to Stephen Colbert, and confesses her love for certain philosophers. I'm not on that list, but I'm going to assume that's because she's being shy... or playing hard to get :)

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Fox News

If you haven't already, you should watch her short film Submission.
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Sharia Law

The plight of women in Muslim countries that have incorporated Sharia Law into their constitutional manuscripts and their cultural identity is one that ought to be consigned to history books revealing the backwards philosophy people from an ignorant epoch used to believe in.

Citizens of the 21st century ought to find it appalling that atrocities committed in the name of religion are not yet a thing of the past, and we must act to eradicate this evil. The following poem depicts the cruelty to which women are sometimes subjected under Sharia Law.

She's buried chest high
Her arms can't stop the stones that fly
or wipe the tears that have already dried
for a crime she so persistently denied.
She's buried chest deep
The moderates asleep
No matter how hard she weeps
Worth half of a man, her testimony's cheap
Allah subhana wa ta'ala has come up with such a fair rule.
Dictators of history couldn't be so cruel
Told by Mohammed sallahu alhe wa salam
Teaching us Allah's divine referendum
What becomes of those who have a sip of rum
Drinks to forget or wants to be numb
or those who play the game of chance
Poker buddies escaping the religious trance
Allah's prescribed in his merciful script
Their flesh be ripped, their blood be dripped
at the tip of a muslim's whip
She's buried chest high
Her arms can't stop the stones that fly
or wipe the tears that have already dried
for a crime she so persistently denied
And this is allah's eternal reply
1400 years of backwards law
A tragic flaw of the primitive claw
The tribe of homosexuals
Koum lot as they say
Sharia is clear on how they should pay
The price for their gay display
Life doesn't matter which way
Abu baker got them with a tumbling wall
Ali muhammad's cousin and son in law
Had people burned for their sexual call
An entire village children and all.
She's buried chest deep
The moderates asleep
No matter how hard she weeps
Worth half of a man, her testimony's cheap
Apostates remember those who have bled
To speak the word Muslims leave unsaid
Killed for the sake of those mislead
Submit now or be left dead
Allah subhana wa ta'ala has come up with such a fair rule
The devil himself couldn't be so cruel
She's buried chest high half way deep
While the moderates are still fast asleep
While the world stands silent
Her testimony's cheap.
Stones thrown by religious sheep.
Witches were burned long ago
till the flame of freedom began to glow
and we learned to say the word 'no'
No know that your laws are unjust
not worthy of respect, only disgust
Beheading those with a knifes thrust
Oh but in Allah we blindly trust.
She's buried head high
in a heap of stones.
No more crying no more moans
All that's left is skin and bones
Allah has come up with such a fair call
The true justice of sharia law

Check out Ayaan Hirsi Ali's short film Submission.
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Binge Drinking, Promiscuous Sex Good for You, Says New Orleans Journal of Medicine

I'm moving to New Orleans... doctor's orders :)

Just remember what happens when you try to be healthy...
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Do Brains Make Minds?

Despite a long tradition of scholars and lay people thinking (and wishing) otherwise, modernity has revealed a paradigm of materialism in which even the mind is somehow reducible to, caused by, or sustained by physical brain processes. Ontological and epistemological distinctions sometimes make this relationship difficult to ascertain: for instance, one could make the metaphysical claim that brains produce minds without having to be committed to any particular epistemic claims about how this process takes place, or even about whether it could ever be understood.

The following discussion tries to make sense of the intellectual and technological obstacles that need to be overcome in order to provide a satisfactory theory about the nature and origin of mind. Two of the guests argue for conceptions of mind that transcend the physical body, and their vacuous arguments may get frustrating rather quickly, but things finally get moving when philosophers John Searle and David Chalmers get in on it. They disagree with each other, but at least they are interesting!

You want poetry? How about this:

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Skepticism about a transcendent, special self
Makes people like you go boo-hoo!

If you don't think the the mind depends on the brain, see what happens when you cut the brain in half.
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"I like hores"

Being a philosophy professor, when I grade tests or papers, my focus is on the quality of the support presented to establish a given conclusion. If your logic is tight, even the most inane grammatical and spelling mistakes will not affect your grade, and vice versa. Fairness is of the utmost importance for me.

That is not to say, however, that on a purely personal level I won't want to strangle you and make you drown in a pool of your own irrationality and choke you with a dose of your own linguistic inadequacy. Other times, though, all I can do is laugh and hope you don't trip on flat surfaces...

And remember, always proofread your work!
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