Claims from outer space

A couple of days ago I finished Michael Ray Taylor's wonderful book Dark Life, about the search for microscopic life forms in unsuspected places -- in mile-deep cracks in the Earth's crust, in highly acidic or carbon monoxide-laden caves, and even in meteorites that originated on the surface of Mars.    Far from a dry, textbook-like read, this was a fascinating look at how science is actually done, putting a lens on the people, the conflicts, the biases, and the years of hard work that go into building a case for a claim.

It's worth it for non-scientists to read books like this.  Because by and large, popular media does a piss-poor job of portraying how science is done, and it leaves a lot of the public with the impression that scientists sit around in their offices making wild conjectures all day and pulling whatever scanty bits of evidence they have out of their nether orifices.  Science is seen as pot-shot guesswork, where any claim is as valid as any other, and "everything could be disproven tomorrow."

Sometimes, of course, the scientists themselves don't do the entire enterprise any favors.  Consider, for example, the current hype over Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, which was the subject of a press release from astronomer Chandra Wickramasinghe.  Wickramasinghe and his colleague, Max Wallis of the University of Cardiff, are claiming that the Philae lander, currently sending information on the comet's surface and composition, has discovered evidence that the comet hosts microbial life:

The data from Philae supports the presence of micro-organisms being involved in the formation of the icy structures, the preponderance of aromatic hydrocarbons, and the very dark surface...  These are not easily explained in terms of prebiotic chemistry.  The dark material is being constantly replenished as it is boiled off by heat from the sun.  Something must be doing that at a fairly prolific rate.

Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko [image courtesy of the European Space Agency]

The problem is, this isn't the first time Wickramasinghe has made such statements, and usually based on the flimsiest of evidence.  He claimed that the algal spores found in the "red rain" that occurred in Kerala, India were of extraterrestrial origin.  (They turned out to be the spores of a lichen, Trentepohlia, that is common in the area.)  He claimed that the virus responsible for severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) was extraterrestrial in origin.  He claimed that the devastating flu epidemic of 1918-1919 (the "Spanish flu") was extraterrestrial in origin.  He claimed that mad cow disease, and other spongiform encephalopathies, are extraterrestrial in origin.

Noticing a pattern here?

Most telling of all, Wickramasinghe -- despite being an astronomer -- has thrown his support behind creationism.  He was the only scientist to testify for the defense in the 1981 creationism trial in Arkansas.  He has written:

Once again the Universe gives the appearance of being biologically constructed, and on this occasion on a truly vast scale. Once again those who consider such thoughts to be too outlandish to be taken seriously will continue to do so. While we ourselves shall continue to take the view that those who believe they can match the complexities of the Universe by simple experiments in their laboratories will continue to be disappointed.

So we're not talking about someone who has built himself much of a reputation for credibility.  But of course, the slow, difficult, slogging kind of scientific research described by Taylor in Dark Life -- the kind that makes up 99% of the actual science done by researchers -- isn't nearly as sexy as the wild claims thrown about by people like Wickramasinghe.  So given a chance to report either on actual science or on loopy, zero-evidence claims, the media is always going to go for the latter.

And consider how this sort of thing is depicted.  Wickramasinghe isn't called "a nut with an axe to grind," he's called a "maverick."  And you know how people love "mavericks."  Mavericks are tough, they're strong, they're willing to buck the system (despite the fact that here, the "system" -- the scientific method -- has an excellent track record of establishing the truth).  They make exciting, bold statements that fly in the face of conventional wisdom.  They talk about thrilling stuff like "having to rewrite all the textbooks."

The problem is, these claims have a history of vanishing without trace.  There always turn out to be other explanations -- as a case in point, take a look at physicist Chris Lee's explanation for the carbon on 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, wherein we find that surface carbon layers are perfectly capable of forming, abiotically, in conditions such as those the comet experiences.

So the comet's dark surface might be biological in origin, just as there might be life in any number of other places -- Jupiter's moon Europa and Saturn's moons Titan and Enceladus usually being considered the best bets.  But as of right now, we simply don't know, and those claims aren't even at the level of verifiable hypotheses until we send out probes with landers designed to detect life, something that probably won't be done any time soon.  (A flyby probe is being sent to Europa, which will certainly return some interesting data but is unlikely to settle the question definitively.)

So once again, we have the problem of the popular media misrepresenting science as a long, meandering series of untested and untestable conjectures, leading to a significant percentage of the public coming away with the impression that the whole endeavor is some kind of flighty game that consists largely of making shit up.

The whole thing is unfortunate, because given the global problems we're currently facing -- climate change, food shortages, overpopulation, pollution -- we not only need scientists, we need a citizenry (and the politicians they elect) who are conversant in the basic methods of science.  Most importantly, we need to reestablish science as credible, so that we don't have anti-science knuckle-draggers like Senator James "Snowball" Inhofe being appointed to the Committee on Environment and Public Works -- and having their moronic statements given more credence than the painstaking, peer-reviewed work of researchers who actually know what they're talking about.

The zero-calorie diet

Today's question is: Is there any claim that is so stupid, so obviously ridiculous, that woo-woos will immediately recognize it is as bullshit?  Or can anything get published on Spirit Science and Metaphysics?

The answer is, unfortunately, that there is apparently no lower threshold for plausibility.  Because this week an article appeared over at SSaM that claims that an Indian "holy man" has not eaten for 75 years, and the majority of the people commenting didn't say, "Nonsense," they said, "Wow!  That's cool!  I'd like to learn how to do that!"

The article tells of Prahlad Jani, who lives in a cave near Ambaji Temple in the Indian state of Gujarat, who says he doesn't eat or drink.  Anything.  Ever.  At the age of seven, Mr. Jani was approached by some Hindu goddesses, who said, basically, "Yo, kid!  Knock it off with the food already!":

Three goddesses appeared to me and bade me to follow. Ma Kali, Ma Lakshmi, and Ma Saraswati.  I consented, prepared myself, and asked: ‘What about my food?’  They each put a finger on my lip and said ‘You need not be concerned about food ever again’.  I was seven, and from that day I stopped eating and drinking. 

How does he manage this?  Because his head makes nectar, or something:

Ever since that blessing, Prahlad Jani claims that he has gained his sustenance from the nectar that filters down through a hole in his palate... 

His claims were scientifically studied by a team of 30 specialists during three weeks of a variety of tests at a hospital. 

They took him into then Sterling Hospital in Ahmedabad, India.  They put him under 24 hour observation in front of cameras and found out that he did not take any kind of food or water in the 15 days that he was in hospital.  No food or water for half that time would be a sure death for anybody else.  And he did not pass urine or stool either. 

The doctors were completely surprised at this miracle.  “We believe that the sadhu Prahlad Jani’s body went through biological transformation as a result of meditation and powerful yoga in a completely natural environment that he stays,” said neurologist Dr. Sudhir Shah. 

The doctors in India are guessing that this phenomenon relates the Amrita Chakra (third eye chakra), as Hindu vedas speak of it being able to produce a divine nectar which sustains life.

Righty-o.  Let's let James Randi watch him for fifteen days, and I'm sure we'll find out that Mr. Jani is slipping out periodically for a cheeseburger and a large Coke.  And, I might add, making the normal number of trips to the bathroom.

And it wouldn't be a SSaM article if they didn't append to it a goofy quasi-scientific explanation for the whole thing:

This sounds crazy, but let’s think about it for a minute.  What do we need from food?  The minerals, which are made out of molecules, which are made out of atoms, which are made out of quarks, which are made out of superstrings, which is ultimately part of the Unified Field or Superstring Field. 

At a fundamental level of nature, nutrition is really just vibrating strings of non-local energy.  Could he somehow be receiving this information somehow without the need to physically ingest food?

Of course!  When I eat a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, it's so I can get my recommended daily allowance of superstrings!

If that explanation is correct, you have to wonder why people can't survive eating other stuff.  Rocks, for instance.  Rocks are, last time I looked into the question, made of minerals, which are made of molecules, which are made of atoms, which are made of quarks, etc.  And yet you don't see people noshing on chunks of granite.

I wonder why that is?

So here we have a claim that is obviously absurd.  And not only does it get published in SSaM... people believe it.  Here's a sampler of comments that appeared on the article.  Spelling and grammar are as written, because I got tired of writing [sic] every other word.

anything is possible to an enlightened person who clears their whole system of toxins and repels all negativity from there mind!!  To the ones who say bollocks,get off yr arse and do sum hard research insted of living your closed minded life! 

it's definitely real life possible... just not entirely necessary... it's a free world afterall... own self-imagery... 

Look up Sun Gazing.  It is said that if you stare at the sunrise or sunset with your bare feet on the ground for a few minutes a day for a year then you won't have to eat again.  I would love to try that theory but we have busy lifestyles that have nothing to do with nature.  Also, look up earthing!  When your bare feet are touching the ground, electrons pass through your feet and help heal and give you energy.  Maybe that's why most "primitive" cultures were always barefoot or wore shoes that were conductive to the earth.  It's not far fetched even though it sounds completely off the charts but you have to have a completely different mindset similar to an employee mentality compared to a business owner mentality.  An employee mind will say how much does it cost, a business owner will say how much will it make me.  Same subject, different perspective.  Anything is possible with the power of the mind! 

Also, this is why animals dig a hole when they are sick.  They lay in the hole to feel better although sometimes its just their time. 

I have met sadhus who can stop their heart or at least limit their pulse to 1 or 2 per minute.  Yoga and meditation is beyond the scope of biology yet.  Its an ancient art that should not be just ridiculed.  Science is yet to discover it yet.  A human in 1800's would have called todays' technology bogus or we can say it must have been beyond his scope of imagination or understanding.  We must look at it with a broad mind, although it may seem fake now but we might discover the science behind it after 50 years or so.

 I have only one response to all of this, which is:

*headdesk headdesk headdesk*

I think if I never hear the whole "science didn't know about X a hundred years ago, therefore anything is possible" argument ever again, it'll still be too soon.  Can we all, just once, apply a little logic, a little critical thinking, maybe one single fucking demand for scientifically acceptable hard evidence here?

*pant pant gasp*

The answer, apparently, is "No."  That's being "closed minded."  That's "ridiculing an ancient art."  That's calling "electrons passing through your feet and giving you energy" what it actually is, which is "being electrocuted."

Okay, I know SSaM exists as clickbait, for the sole reason that it makes money for them and their sponsors and advertisers.  I get that.  What I don't get is that there are people who apparently swallow everything that sites like that publish.  This goes beyond being credulous; this is taking the entire canon of scientific rationalism and throwing it out of the window.

So that's our excursion into the ether for today.  I hope you derived lots of nourishing quarks from reading this.  Me, I'm off to fix myself some bacon and eggs.  Unless I get visited on the way by three Hindu goddesses.  Which, I have to admit, would save me a lot of money and trips to the grocery store.

Incubi, hoaxes, and limelight

A long-time reader of Skeptophilia sent me a link yesterday to a story from Wales, in which we find out about a family who is allegedly being terrorized by demons and poltergeists.

The bare bones of the story, which won't take long to tell because it pretty closely resembles most such claims, is that Keiron and Tracey Fry of New Tredegar, near Caerphilly, Wales, have been visited by spirits who are making their lives miserable.  Jon Dean, author of an article about the haunting that appeared in Wales Online last week, writes:

Keiron and Tracey Fry say they have been terrorised by the poltergeist every night for months, in scenes reminiscent of supernatural chiller Paranormal Activity. 

Mum Tracey, 46, even thinks she is beaten up in the night by the 'incubus demon' - leaving her covered with bruises in the morning. 

An incubus is a demon in male form who, according to mythological and legendary traditions, targets sleeping people, especially women...

The family got in a specialist to "cleanse" the house and brought a vicar in to bless their home. 

The phantom, which has also been menacing the couple's three children, was summoned by a using a Ouija board in the house, they say. 

Dad-of-three Keiron says he took a pic of the ghost in his sons' bedroom which he says shows a small child in a white gown with a blue face and a tail.

Without further ado, here is Fry's photograph of the alleged ghost:

 So the family decided to take action:

The family, who moved into their house in July 2013, called in an investigator to tackle the spook. 

Ghostbuster Robert Amour, 43, arrived at the house with a bible and crucifix. 

He banned the petrified family from going upstairs after he shouted to them that he could "feel the evilness in the room." 

After 20 minutes the psychic returned to the frightened family - claiming he had slain two small demons.

Which is pretty hardcore.  Of course, we have the usual problem; the whole story relies on anecdote and flimsy photographic evidence.  So I'm very much inclined to disbelieve it, even if (I will admit up front) I have no proof that they aren't being haunted by a violent ghost that looks suspiciously like a knotted-up bedsheet.

The incident got me to thinking about hoaxes in general, and what is so appealing about them. Because whatever the Frys' claim turns out to be, it is a sorry truth that hoaxes are extremely common in the woo-woo world.  It seems like every other day people get caught out faking bigfoot photographs and tracks, using Photoshop to create realistic-looking UFO photos, and employing stage magic to convince people that psychic phenomena are real.  The whole thing pisses me off, because the human propensity for fakery makes it even harder for we skeptics to discern whether there's anything to all of the paranormal claims out there.  To paraphrase Michio Kaku (who was speaking about UFOs) -- if even 1% of the claims of supernatural goings-on are legitimate, it's still worth investigating, and hoaxes do nothing but muddy the waters.

So the hoaxers certainly aren't even doing the true believers any favors.  But it did get me wondering why people create hoaxes in the first place, because it's something I honestly can't imagine doing.

I know that part of the motivation is money, especially for the mediums and faith healers and so on, who are charging big bucks for people to participate in their nonsense.  But there is a lot of fakery that doesn't explicitly involve the money motive -- think of all of the UFO and cryptid sightings and reports of ghosts that turn out to be completely made up, and just result in one or two newspaper articles or television interviews before they die out as quickly as they started.

What on earth can motivate people to do this?

I expect the answer lies in the "fifteen minutes of fame" phenomena -- the drive that some people experience to get their names in the newspapers somehow.  As a person who is at the "very introverted" end of the spectrum, this is hard for me to imagine.  It's difficult enough for me to be the center of attention for things I've actually accomplished; the idea of manufacturing a lie, knowing I could be found out and humiliated as a liar, for the sole reason of getting interviewed on television -- well, it just strikes me as bizarre.

But I honestly can't think of any other reason that someone would do such a thing.  It's unlikely that most of these incidents generate much in the way of income, so the only other possible motivator must be fame.

Which brings us back to the Frys.  Again, I can't prove their claim is a hoax, but even the fact that that they mentioned that their experiences were "reminiscent of supernatural thriller Paranormal Activity" -- and the article ended with the movie trailer -- makes my Suspicion Alarm start ringing.  And if their claim does turn out to be cut from whole cloth, can you imagine what the repercussions will be?  They've been in the newspapers and online, with photographs (including their children, for pete's sake).  They'd be laughingstocks.

If that were me, I'd want to crawl in a hole.  Permanently.

So that's today's contribution from the I Really Don't Understand Humanity department.  I'm far from perfect, but a long habit of honesty combined with a hatred of being embarrassed render this sort of thing a sin I'm hardly even capable of comprehending.  So I wish the Frys the best of luck dealing with their two-foot-tall abusive pillowcase incubus.  If they are telling the truth, that's gotta suck.

The demolition of Palmyra

Something that conquerors have understood throughout history is that if you want to destroy a culture, you don't have to kill all of its people; all you need to do is to destroy its languages and its artifacts.  Time and the limitations of human memory will do the rest.

When the Spanish conquered Peru in the 16th century, they did exactly that.  Kill the leaders; wipe out the traces of the existing culture; mandate the use of Spanish and the conversion of the natives to Christianity.  By the time the last Inca king, Túpac Amaru, was beheaded by Francisco de Toledo's men in Cuzco, the downfall of the culture was already a done deal.  There are still traces left -- the Spanish never were able to completely eradicate the Quechua language, for example, and there are still about nine million speakers today, mostly in Peru and Bolivia.  But their actions broke the back of the rich culture that had existed, and the destruction of priceless artifacts -- such as almost all of the quipus, or "talking knots," a computational or archival system that no one now can decipher -- was so thorough we really know relatively little about the day-to-day life of the people who lived there only five hundred years ago.

So it goes.  The suppression of the Bretons by the French, the Basques by the Spanish, the Irish, Welsh, and Scots by the English, and damn near all the minority groups in mainland eastern Asia by the Han Chinese, have all been followed by eradication of native languages and artifacts, and the subsequent cultural amnesia that follows.

I find the whole thing horribly tragic.  Our cultural history is what makes us who we are; language and symbol define us as a people.  And conquerors understand that.  To bring a people to its knees, you destroy those pieces of the culture that are most representative of the conquered group, then let time do away with the rest.

Which brings me to ISIS.

As the members of the "Islamic State" sweep across the Middle East, they are doing precisely what the Spanish conquistadores did; they are killing the leaders and destroying the culture.  And now, they have taken the Syrian city of Palmyra -- a treasure-house of ancient relics, some dating back to the second century B.C.E., declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1958 -- and are systematically destroying its artifacts.

The Roman-era Grand Colonnade of Palmyra [image courtesy of photographer Jerzy Strzelecki and the Wikimedia Commons]

They have already publicly demolished statues and temples, declaring such things "unholy." The razing of the land has not spared pieces just because they're unique, beautiful or irreplaceable.  In fact, they seem to be targeting these relics first.  For example, they announced this week that they have shattered the "Allat Statue," which was a huge and nearly intact statue of a Roman-era god, shown with a lion and a deer between his feet.

"ISIS terrorists have destroyed one of the most important unearthed statues in Syria in terms of quality and weight," Ma'moun Abdul-Karim, Syrian Director of Museums and Anquities, said.  "It was discovered in 1977 and dates back to the second century A.D."

While these acts have been characterized as the wanton acts of ignorant savages, Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO, got it right.  "Violent extremists don't destroy heritage as a collateral damage," she said.  "They target systematically monuments and sites to strike societies at their core."

I know that the loss of things, however beautiful, cannot be compared to the loss of human life.  The depredations that the vicious evil of ISIS is visiting on the people they conquer -- the beheadings, rapes, beatings, and selling of women and children into slavery -- outweigh the destruction of stone and ceramic relics.  But still, just reading about the destruction of Palmyra, and before it the destruction of priceless artifacts in every city ISIS has sacked, makes my heart ache.

And the worst part is that it's not over.  ISIS is still pulling in new recruits, making headway, taking over village after village.  Here we sit, in the 21st century, watching a group of people who take their directives from a book written in the 7th century sweep across the Middle East, and we are largely powerless to stop it.  We are watching a huge geographical area that has, in less than a decade, been been plunged back into the Dark Ages by the adherents of a violent and disgusting interpretation of a medieval religious text.

I'm no expert in geopolitics.  I have no idea what, if anything, the West should do to intervene, to try to stem this tide of religious extremism.  All I can do is sit here, helpless, as irreplaceable archeological history that had survived for two thousand years is demolished.

And hope against hope that reason and sanity will eventually prevail against the horrible ideology of conquest and destruction that these people represent.

Shut up, Jim.

It would be really nice if we could stop giving credence to celebrities just because they're celebrities.

Just like any other slice of humanity, there are going to be some famous actors and singers and so on who are intelligent and sensible (Matt Damon seems to me to be one of those) and others who are either dumb as a bag of hammers, or else batshit insane (hello, Tom Cruise?).  Being in the limelight -- even being a brilliant actor or singer -- does not necessarily correlate with having brains.  So let's stop acting as if everything that comes out of a celebrity's mouth has to be divinely-inspired wisdom, okay?

The last in a long line of A-list stars to demonstrate a significantly low IQ is Jim Carrey, who recently went on a tirade in response to the passage of California Senate Bill 277, which outlawed personal and religious exemptions for parents trying to avoid having their children vaccinated before attending public school.  Carrey has long been anti-vaxx, and in fact was once in a romantic relationship with noted anti-vaxx wingnut Jenny McCarthy.  And now Carrey has launched into a diatribe on Twitter against the new law, saying that it legalizes "poisoning children."  Here are a few of his salvos:

California Gov says yes to poisoning more children with mercury and aluminum in manditory [sic] vaccines.  This corporate fascist must be stopped. 

They say mercury in fish is dangerous but forcing all of our children to be injected with mercury in thimerosol [sic] is no risk.  Make sense? 

I am not anti-vaccine. I am anti-thimerosal, anti-mercury.  They have taken some of the mercury laden thimerosal out of vaccines.  NOT ALL! 

The CDC can't solve a problem they helped start.  It's too risky to admit they have been wrong about mercury/thimerasol [sic].  They are corrupt.

First of all, if he doesn't like the stuff, learning how to spell it might be a good place to start for improving his credibility.  (It's "thimerosal," for the record.)  Second, although he's right that not all vaccines are thimerosal-free, all of the ones given as routine childhood vaccinations are (or are available in a thimerosal-free version).  (It's significant that the one the anti-vaxxers rail about the most often -- the MMR vaccine -- has never contained thimerosal.)

Third, of course, is that in any discussion of vaccines, we have to take a look at relative risk.  Have there been children who have had adverse reactions to routine vaccinations?  Sure.  No medical procedure, however innocuous, is completely risk-free.  There have been extensive studies of the relative risks of side effects, from mild to severe, for every vaccine that's commonly administered, and the vast majority of side effects from routine vaccinations are mild and temporary.  (Here's a summary of those studies -- oh, but wait.  It comes from the "corrupt CDC."  Never mind.)

What about the risk of childhood disease?  Again, the risk is known, and it's high.  Diseases like measles, diphtheria, tetanus, hepatitis A and B, and polio -- for all of which there are now safe and effective vaccines -- are killers.  It's significant that the boy that I wrote about a few weeks ago, the first person to contract diphtheria in Spain in 29 years, died last week, and that the parents are now blaming the anti-vaccination movement for their decision not to have him immunized.  "The family is devastated and admit that they feel tricked, because they were not properly informed," said Catalan public health chief Antoni Mateu.  "They have a deep sense of guilt, which we are trying to rid them of."

Interesting way of putting it.  Maybe they should be experiencing a deep sense of guilt, given that it was their decision that led to his death.  And it's hard to see how in this day and age, being anti-vaxx qualifies as not being "properly informed."  Falling for scare talk and pseudoscience isn't "not being properly informed," it's being anti-scientific and gullible, which isn't the same thing.  And there's a fundamental principle operating here, which is that you can't save people from themselves.  Humans are going to make dumb decisions and then cast around for someone to blame them on -- this is hardly a new problem.

It's just tragic when those decisions result in the death of an innocent child.

Which, by the way, is exactly why we should have mandatory vaccination laws.  Adults are going to make their own decisions, and some of them will be based in ignorance and fear, and some of them will result in people being injured or killed.  But society has a responsibility to step in and protect children when their parents won't do so voluntarily.

That's what Senate Bill 277 is about.

And as far as Jim Carrey: dude, go back to making movies.  You made some pretty good ones -- The Truman Show and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind are two of my favorite movies.  (You also made some pretty stupid ones, but let's be as charitable as we can, here.)  You are not only not a scientist, you have shown that you can't even make an intelligent assessment of scientific research.  Hell, you don't seem to be able to spell.

So maybe it's time to retreat to Hollywood in disarray.  Or failing that, simply shut up.  That would work, too.

Sharing the misery

I guess it was too much to hope for that the opponents of marriage equality would say, "Oh.  I guess it's the law of the land now, and we lost.   Bummer."  And disappear gracefully.

Things are never that easy, are they?  The dire threats of what's gonna happen to us, now that we've allowed LGBT people to have the same rights that the rest of us have always had and completely take for granted, are already ringing from the rafters.

First we had the ever-grim Franklin Graham, informing us that now that the Supreme Court has legalized same-sex marriage nationwide, there's gonna be hell to pay:

I’m disappointed because the government is recognizing sin.  This court is endorsing sin.  That’s what homosexuality is – a sin against god...  Arrogantly disregarding God’s authority always has serious consequences.  Our nation will not like what’s at the end of this rainbow...  The President had the White House lit up in rainbow colors to celebrate the Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage.  This is outrageous—a real slap in the face to the millions of Americans who do not support same-sex marriage and whose voice is being ignored.

Graham wasn't the only one who keyed in on the whole rainbow thing.  Over at Answers in Genesis, Ken Ham took a moment away from building a new Ark to make the following cheery assessment:

The president did not invent the rainbow; God invented it, and He put the rainbow in the sky as a special reminder related to Noah’s Flood.  God had sent the global Flood in Noah’s time as a judgment because of man’s wickedness in rebelling against the Creator...  (T)he rainbow was set up by God as a sign to remind us that there will never again be a global Flood as a judgment.  But one day there will be another global judgment—the final judgment—and it will be by fire...  (W)e need to take back the rainbow and worship the One who invented the rainbow, and every time we see it be reminded of its true message.

Which brings up a point I've never understood.  How does the whole Flood thing lead anyone to think that Yahweh of the Old Testament is worthy of worship?  It's more the action of a genocidal maniac, in my opinion -- killing everyone and everything, infants and children included, because of some perceived wickedness that couldn't be fixed any other way.

Oh, but rainbows!  There are rainbows, so it's all okay!

Isn't this a little like saying, "Hey, dude!  I know I drowned your family and pets and livestock and all, but look, here's a pretty rainbow in the sky as my promise I won't do it again!"  *glowers*  "At least not that way.  I might still start a fire and burn them all alive.  But if you bow down and worship me exactly the right way, I might let you slide, this time."

Doesn't that make you want to shout hallelujah at god's infinite goodness?

But no one demonstrated quite so clearly the truth of the old definition of Puritanism as "the desperate fear that somewhere, people are enjoying themselves" as Wayne Allyn Root.  Root, you may recall, is the one who said that the only way that Obamacare was upheld by the Supreme Court is that the president blackmailed Justice Roberts.  And now, Root has made a rather bizarre pronouncement -- that same-sex marriage is wrong, because marriage isn't about happiness:

Marriage is the most difficult thing in the world.  I’m talking to you as someone who has been married 24 years, marriage is so difficult that if you do not go to church every Sunday and your whole life isn’t built on a bedrock faith in God and you don’t have kids and your whole life isn’t built around those kids and none of that’s in place and you’re married, the odds of you staying married are close to zero.  Divorces will now triple.  Gays will never stay married.  They just bought themselves the biggest bunch of unhappiness and legal bills that they could ever imagine.

"Go ahead, LGBT people," Root seems to be saying.  "I hope you're satisfied.  Now you get to be just as miserable as the rest of us."

You have to wonder what his wife thought when she read this, don't you?

[image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

Besides just being ridiculous, his statement is actually exactly the opposite of the fact.  The highest divorce rates aren't among atheists.  The highest divorce rate of any of the main religious affiliations is the Baptists, at 29%.  (Atheists are at 21%, tying the virulently anti-divorce Catholics.)  Regionally the highly religious Southeast and Midwest have the highest numbers of divorces, with Tennessee, Alabama, Arkansas, and Oklahoma topping the list.  

Kind of funny, when the bible is even more unequivocal about divorce being sinful than it is about homosexuality.  Consider Luke 16:18: "Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and whoever marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery."  And adultery, recall, was punishable by being stoned to death.

And yet, the ultra-religious aren't pressuring the courts to make divorce illegal.  Funny thing, that.

So anyway, I'm sure we haven't heard the last of this.  We'll be revisiting it frequently, not only when individual clerks of court refuse to issue marriage licenses to LGBT couples (something that has already started) but every time there is a natural disaster, at which point we'll hear all about how it's "god's wrath."

I wonder what god will pick as a symbol this time that he still loves us even though he's willing to smite the shit out of us at the drop of a hat?  After all, he's already used rainbows.  Maybe flowers, you think?  Flowers are nice.  "I'm sorry you deserved being beaten to a pulp," he'll say.  "Here, have a dozen roses.  All better now?"

Jesus wept

A report is in from Bolivia that there is a statue of Jesus in a church that is "weeping real tears."

Of course, the devout are now flocking to the church, and church officials are declaring that it's a miracle.  Parishioners have spent hours kneeling and praying before the statue.  People are collecting the "tears" in vials, and claiming that they have magical powers of healing.

[image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

Such stories are not uncommon.  There have been enough claims of this type that "Weeping Statues" has its own Wikipedia page.  Weeping statues, usually of Jesus or Mary, have been reported in hundreds of locations.  Sometimes these statues are weeping what appear to be tears; others weep scented oil, or (in a number of cases) blood.  

The problem is, of course, that when the church has allowed skeptics to investigate the phenomenon, all of them have turned out to be frauds.

One of the easiest ways to fake a crying statue was explained, and later demonstrated, by Italian skeptic Luigi Garlaschelli.  If the statue is glazed hollow ceramic or plaster (which many of them are), all you have to do is to fill the internal cavity of the statue with water or oil, usually through a small hole drilled through the back of the head.  Then, you take a sharp knife and you nick the glaze at the corner of each eye.  The porous ceramic or plaster will absorb the liquid, which will then leak out at the only point it can -- the unglazed bit near the eyes.  When Garlaschelli demonstrated this, it created absolutely convincing tears.

What about the blood?  Well, in the cases where the statues have wept blood, some of them have been kept from the prying eyes of skeptics.  The church, however, is becoming a little more careful, ever since the case in 2008 in which a statue of Mary in Italy seemed to weep blood, and a bit of the blood was taken and DNA tested, and was found to match the blood of the church's custodian.  Public prosecutor Alessandro Mancini said the man was going to be tried for "high sacrilege" -- an interesting charge, and one which the custodian heatedly denies.  (I was unable to find out what the outcome of the trial was, if there was one.)

Besides the likelihood of fakery, there remains the simple question of why a deity (or saint) who is presumably capable of doing anything (s)he wants to do, would choose this method to communicate with us.  It's the same objection I have to the people who claim that crop circles are Mother Earth attempting to talk to us; it's a mighty obscure communiqué.  Even if you buy that it's a message from heaven, what does the message mean?   If a statue of Jesus cries, is he crying because we're sinful?   Because attendance at church is down?  Because we're destroying the environment?  (Pope Francis might actually subscribe to this view.)  Because the Saints didn't make it to the Superbowl this year?  Oh, for the days when god spoke to you, out loud, directly, and unequivocally, from a burning bush...

In any case, I'm skeptical, which I'm sure doesn't surprise anyone.  I suppose as religious experiences go, it's pretty harmless, and if it makes you happy to believe that Christ's tears will bring you good luck, then that's okay with me.  If you go to Bolivia, however, take a close look and see if there's a tiny hole drilled in the back of the statue's head -- which still seems to me to be the likeliest explanation.