Defense of Truth

O sociologists of fractal iterations of unmeasurable categories and of clever designs of dubious methodologies, you have inspired post #2 today.  Apparently it takes a "scientist" to turn the obvious on its ear and use a "study" to show that up is down.  This is easily accomplished when a gaggle of atheist PhDs put their heads together to design a way to disprove God.  Wait, that's not actually a scientific question, and they'd be flouting the fundamental boundaries of their own discipline to do so, making their credentials fairly worthless, so I guess they'll have to disprove the benefits of religiosity then--that's quantifiable, right?  Yes, religiosity!  It's something people have or they don't.  It's something that motivates some people, and not others.  It's something we can test--doesn't matter that some religious beliefs are more founded than others, that some religious beliefs produce behaviors that others don't, th...

My Facebook has been a tour de force of twisted logic, leaping to conclusions, extreme aversion to context and rigor in comparison, and ignorance over the last few days.  Sin is still sin, the definition of nothing changed, but in response to the legalization of same-sex marriage in the US, the LDS Church was now in the position of having to clarify a policy on how to deal with "families" and individuals from those families in a new edit to their leadership handbook.  The edits drew skewed headlines ranging from insinuations of homophobia (NYT: " Mormons Sharpen Stand Against Same-Sex Marriage " - no, they didn't--the stand is the same: it's sinful, and the LGBT is still welcome and invited to join and participate fully as long as they repent, just like with every other sin) to open accusations of homophobia, with a dash of xenophobia and even a little pedophobia thrown in just for good measure (WaPo: " Mormon Church to exclude children of same-sex ...

Bill Nye's a science guy, right?  Well, I mean, an electrical engineer entertainer familiar enough with science to produce a popular kid's show and get all kinds of speaking appointments to discuss scientific principles and knowledge counts, right?  Sure!  Why not? Well, it turns out that while he may be accurate on his science, what he does next with the facts runs counter to the pursuit of truth science is aimed for in the first place.  It's a tactic he's used to.  He's used it in global warming and against young earth creationism .  But it's still sophistry to carefully move the goalposts to make your debate opponent seem like he's missing the target when he's spot on. Here's what I mean: 1. This video begins with the truth that the union of sperm and ova is a necessary but insufficient condition for the development of a fetus.  Fair point, right?  That's a question of science, and science has answered it, so he's in-bounds at thi...