RationalWiki:Saloon bar/Archive149

Cover-aspiring article
Be nice to get WND up to scratch. Please stop by Talk:WND and list all the hideous and glaring defects that jump out at you - David Gerard (talk) 00:04, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

A UK fundamentalist website?
freefaith.com - opinions please. "Tolerance for people of faith" is their strapline, but it seems more "woe is us! Us poor persecuted christians!". 17:33, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Definitely the latter. I like the section right under the header entitled "Anti-faith watch" with a headline "Boko Haram: we won’t stop until Nigeria accepts sharia law". Ohhh you meant "Anti-our-faith watch". Cow...Hammertime! 17:38, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Heh, I've just read that bit too. My comment is awaiting moderation, but "Peter" has already pointed out the hypocrisy and irony. That story is a perfect example of why secularism is so important. 17:48, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * God, the next time i hear the "we are persecuted" i will ask them to point to one single place we have physically beaten someone for being christian (in teh west, i get it goes on in the east and middle east); one place where we have gotten on the radio and used words like "slut" "pure evil", to describe their followers; one place where we have written into law that believers cannot run for office (knowing such laws are still on teh book the other way around). When did "religious perscution" become "we aren't getting our way all the time". or worse "someone is doing something we don't like". --[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 18:37, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Doesn't appear associated with the CLC or Christian Voice, unusual... Scarlet A.pngnarchist 23:32, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Briebart's amazing REVELATION
I'm sure this made the rounds beyond the CP pages, but that's where I found it so i wanted to bring it to Saloon. The video here, 13 minutes long, is soooooooo funny. I mean, you sit there and listen to him trying to say "the media lies". [media matters - watch the clip.[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot   oi, putain, genial, merci 21:42, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I love how a probably rather unprepared moderator can refute the Breitbart "journalist" who probably did some "research" live on the air. And now for the fun part, imagine the mainstream media not sorting out stories after relevance. No, seriously, imagine it for a second. -- 22:01, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The black chick pushing the "why wasn't this talked about" did pretty much annoy me. "It wasn't out there".  well, um, it could have been if anyone cared.  no one hid it. "We should have been talking about this in 2008".  Why?  the Jeremy Wright scandal was much worse, if you can say that, and it went no where.  Wright actually WAS a radical.  Bell is an intellecual trying to understand the importance, the unimportance of race in this country and the world.  There is not a single way to read him as a danger, or radical unless you are Briebart.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 22:09, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I kept thinking she was a plant from Breitbart & co. with all of the buzzwords she was tossing out ("Mainstream Media"? Who the hell is she talking about?). This whole thing is hilarious. Do they seriously think anyone is going to care about this? Cow...Hammertime! 22:14, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * MY GOD, THAT IS THE POINT. WHY DOES NO ONE CARE?  because teh MAINSTREAM MEDIA DECIDES FOR US.  "we the people" should be deciding!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Obama is FRIENDS with this man.  And WE HAVE MORE.  MORE MORE.  SO MUCH MORE.  LIke the fact that Obama is FRIENDS with him.  And that Bell is RADICAL.  and that Critical Race Theory is white suppremcy.  and we will show this.  Cause we even have MORE.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 22:24, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Holy shit I wasn't far off. Turns out that's Amy Holmes, who is apparently an anchor for Glenn Beck's latest crazyfest, The Blaze. Go me! I can spot a wingnut when I see them! Cow...Hammertime! 22:38, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Best summary of Breitbart's career I have read so far.-- 23:01, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Damn, I was expecting a snarky one-liner. I am disappoint. An American Fallacy  ( super crazy fun time! ) 23:03, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * TL; DR...except for the very last section ("What To Copy, What To Avoid"). In a nutshell: be passionate, but not a fucking jackass. -- Seth Peck (talk) 23:53, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Anti abortion bill in Kansas
Almost went a whole week without seeing something "anti abortion" from the Right. almost a whole week. sadly, we didn't make it. Kansas is debating two tax issues that would effect women who are seeking an abortion. The first is an add-on tax (a luxury tax, like a sales tax) for all abortions (the term is ill defined in the law, and there is concern it will be interpreted as all procedures at Planned Parenthood beyond annual exams - possibly including some types "one time" birth control like IUD, or the patch) and the second would be denying women the right to count abortions as a medical deductions on their income tax. Both taxes would apply in the case of rape and incest. But worse, both taxes specifically include abortions done to save the mother's life (which given that those are usually mid or late term abortions, are quite expensive) or those done when the child dies in utero but does not expel. Again, usually that is a later term condition, and it requires expensive procedures, often in the 10s of thousands. Yeah! (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/08/kansas-abortion-bill-sales-tax_n_1327301.html not a very clear article, but it links to the bills themselves)--Godot   oi, putain, genial, merci 21:55, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Jesus, aren't we the ones that are supposed to be 'pro-tax' and them the 'no-tax' ones? What happened here? Oh, I know -- they think taxing the big corporations is a huge moral sin, but taxing a female medical procedure that, in some cases, saves from psychological trauma or even death is a-okay.


 * If I didn't understand how it worked, I'd wonder how poor and middle-class Americans could vote for these fucks. GodothasArrived  ( super crazy fun time! ) 22:49, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I listened to Ron Paul this morning, and i "got it". HIs arguments sound so well thought out.  He's so calm and even spoken.  and it seems like a good idea at the time.  till you actualy hink about the repercussions of what he's saying.  but it's almost magical....  "Taxes are too high, we all know this.  And there are wars which are causing that.  we all know this.  So we have to get out of those wars."  and?[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 22:59, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Arizona Senate votes to let anti-abortion docs lie to pregnant women Anyone know which bill this is? Peter Monomorium antarcticum 02:43, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a wrongful birth bill, which in any normal country (canada, Uk, france) or era (10 years ago) would have been a good thing, as teh goal then was to prevent heartbroken families from suing doctors for not (in effect) "knowing" the child was deformed. no one ever contemplated their use for a doctor deliberatly lying to a patient.  Clearly, that is now the new target.  Doctors who are pro-life, lying to their patients about the nature of a child's deformaty, or not even mentioning it, so they won't abort.  --[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 02:56, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Let's talk funding and fees
So I wanted to go into a little more detail on my intercom post and let some of you guys know what is going on, plans and hopefully some exciting directions. As I said we are looking at about $1000 out of our budget going to the government. About 40 percent of this is finally bringing us up to standards with all our registration and filing issues with state government, no more Florida Department of Agriculture for us! But another big chunk comes from our plans to get our 501 (c) 3 status letter from the IRS.

This is a major development for a couple reasons, one of the biggest is that it opens new doors for possible funding opportunities. 501 (c) 3 is a requirement for applying for support from external agencies. Several of us have been talking for awhile about extending RW into different avenues of web 2.0. Some of these have a good chance of getting external support for their development. Just to touch on a couple, we have all ready talked about a potential pod cast style show looking at pseudoscience, woo, quackery and the media. Another fun one is I am in talks about developing a series of mini-docs about on-mission topics that embrace a lot of what makes RW special. Hitting the topics that are important but don't get the attention of bigger venues, or that haven't been critically examined.

The price tag on this stuff is bigger than just running our website, but the potential benefits are great. The key is to explore and push additional funding avenues, to do that we need the "seed" money which is why I am pushing so hard on this current fundraiser. While we are asking a lot now, we are in a position to leverage these resources in a way we have never been able to before. Tmtoulouse (talk) 16:59, 15 February 2012 (UTC)


 * Speaking of the idea of the video/podcast, I did get your email RE the animated logo. I've been living on my netbook and not been on my desktop for a couple of weeks or so, so haven't got around to checking yet. But I should still have it. Scarlet A.pngtheist 17:28, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

Found and re-uploaded it.

<font color=#CC0033>gnostic 20:25, 19 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Looks way too Hollywood, IMO. How about the left and right hemispheres connect, then the text and the "square brackets" fade in? Osaka Sun (talk) 03:02, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
 * What was that? Add more lens flares, you say? Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>d hominem 11:35, 20 February 2012 (UTC)
 * No...the twirling of the brain (after the two come together) seems unnecessary, as well as the collision of the rest of the logo (with all that Michael Bay-esque dust flying around). Just have the brain connect, then have the rest of the parts fade in from the white background.  Kind of like this, sorry. Osaka Sun (talk) 02:46, 22 February 2012 (UTC)

Complaints and other various bullshits

 * ...For a site that's main focus is stalking Conservapedia and talking about meaningless shit in the community portal. Fallacy (talk) 17:13, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * "Main focus is conservapedia and talking about shit..." When did The other WIGO's and everything NOT conservapedia vanish? We do a lot of Conservapedia watching but thats because most of us have experiences from there (a lot of people enter the site through WIGO:CP) but our main focus is debunking pseudo-x now; of which conservapedia is a bundle of. -- il' Dictator   Mikal  17:17, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm just saying that, on a list of sites I would readily give money to, this isn't exactly number one.
 * I just like to complain though. Fallacy (talk) 17:19, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * If you don't pay money... I'll give a negative review on you're work... yah... see, now im going after what matters to you!-- il' Dictator   Mikal  17:22, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * (EC) CP hasn't been the main activity on this site for a while if you actually look at the activity levels. There's no "we" anymore when talking about how much "we" watch CP. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>narchist 17:24, 15 February 2012 (UTC)

I just thought of something -- what is the full form of the contraction "that's main focus is"? Wouldn't it be "that has a main focus of", or am I missing something? Fallacy (talk) 17:34, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * I think, Fallacy, the main point is to move away from that image, and develop other areas. I've had contacts with people at NCSE who know who we are - and are interested in us to an extent.  And that's the kind of relationship we need to grow.  But it's one of those snow ball things.  To start, you have to have a bit of money to do the "next" thing, which opens up another thing.  It's also one reason many of us are de cp-ing the main space.  Making it slightly less "in-joke"ish.  Jokes and humor are great, but we can put a better face on what jokes we use, how much we just bash one thing or the next for the sake of bashing, how fair we are, while still being fully RW.  It's a change in tone, sure.  But a good one. [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    Grow a vagina 17:35, 15 February 2012 (UTC)(ec)
 * Humor and satire that everyone can get (and not just stuff about goats, which I don't even get) are great vehicles for delivering wisdom. Look at Feynman, Stewart, Colbert, Maher, Franken, Adams...even Dawkins, though perhaps more Britishly subtly.  I think we can maintain SPOV and enlighten the masses without resorting to bashing some guy and his followers who are, ultimately, quite irrelevant. -- Seth Peck (talk) 17:45, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * My interest in Andy and his dumb-witted cronies waned long ago. I only ever visit the CP ant-farm by following a WIGO link for the occasional lulz. RW is gradually changing direction and I welcome it. 10:29, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

Actually, in this issue I could use some help. I did have a monthly donation going to this site via Paypal, but the card's hit its expiry date. Do I just set up a new donation using the button on the left, or do we need to do complicated things like cancelling the old sub first?-- 23:48, 15 February 2012 (UTC)
 * You say "via PayPal" - do you mean just using PayPal's software but actually paying with a credit or debit card not a PayPal account? If so I've written payment system backend software before. After trying and failing to charge the expired card a few times, the recurring payment will get stopped automatically to avoid annoying the bank's computers, so you should set up a new donation. If you have an actual PayPal account with PayPal money in it, I'm not sure. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 00:22, 16 February 2012 (UTC)
 * The first option, paying directly from the card, but using Paypal to do it. If I don't need to cancel the old sub, I'll just go ahead and setup a new one.  Thanks for info.-- 14:27, 16 February 2012 (UTC)

''About 40 percent of this is finally bringing us up to standards with all our registration and filing issues with state government, no more Florida Department of Agriculture for us! But another big chunk comes from our plans to get our 501 (c) 3 status letter from the IRS. '' You have to pay the US gubbmint to work a website? How quaint. Try getting hosted somewhere else. I ain't contributing to the US war machine. 82.23.210.230 (talk) 19:36, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
 * No, it's running the foundation, which is registered in the US as a non-profit. Where the website is hosted doesn't matter. Anyway, only a proportion of the US government's income will "feed the war machine", you can say your contribution was forwarded to welfare instead. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>moral 19:53, 18 February 2012 (UTC)

Fund raising the fund raiser
if (fund_total >= 2250) then { TheCheat.donate(fund_goal - fund_total); } Make it happen people. TheCheatI run on alcohol 17:46, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
 * If you notice the value is above 2250 send me a PM or something :), I am a heavy sleeper. TheCheatI run on alcohol 18:01, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

Commons image resolution glitch
There is something wrong with using images from Wikimedia Commons. It looks like whenever an image from the Commons is used for the first time, it is imported with downscaling to the size required by its first use (for example, a 200px thumbnail). When it is later used in a larger size or when accessing its description page, a very ugly pixelated version appears. You can see this effect for example and the flag in the article for Poland. Is this some browser issue on my side? --Tweenk (talk) 23:55, 6 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a general glitch & we shouldn't keep using them (IMO). See Forum:Wikimedia Commons.  00:00, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Fixing the bug would, I assume, be a better idea. Is this a known general bug, or is RW doing something weird? - David Gerard (talk) 12:24, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It is all because of this. Тy rannis 12:59, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's to do with caching the rasterised versions of SVG images. It might be a client side problem, though. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>postate 13:25, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't think widespread use of Commons images has done anything positive for the site at all. When people had to upload images onsite if they wanted to use them, our image use was a lot more selective & individual.  Images & captions were well chosen & snarky.  Now we just get predictable generic images slotted in, making some of our articles look like a pale Wikipedia imitation.   01:35, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think it's been marvellous, and it's particularly amusing when you can note how awful the picture they managed to supply to Wikipedia was. "Not Invented Here" is a stupid attitude - David Gerard (talk) 07:52, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I suppose we could go back to stealing copyrighted images instead. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>bomination 13:06, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Could we remove the connection, but have a bot and page&mdash;like the Capturebot sandbox&mdash;where we can put the filenames of wikimedia images and have them uploaded automatically? Peter horas non numero nisi serenas 07:23, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

The KONY 2012 trend
Ok, I just updated my FB feed criticizing how the people have suddenly given a shit about the LRA after 30 years of brutality (aka. "sunday school" activism) thanks to this video and let's just say it didn't go well. Thoughts? Osaka Sun (talk) 03:00, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't know anything about this KONY thing, but that's generally not a good idea. Peter Monomorium antarcticum 05:46, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Ohh, thats what that was. I saw doug walker update his Fb about it, and noticed it while trolling runescape people. -- il' Dictator   Mikal  05:54, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * KONY stands for Joseph Kony, the head of a fundie terrorist group in northern Uganda. Obama sent 100 military advisors in October 2011 to train anti-Lord's Resistance Army fighters and El Rushbo actually started to defend the mutilators/cannibals.


 * The documentary has been up for only a few hours and it's already spawned an entire movement, but why now? Again, it seems we in the 21st century to care about world issues only if it's advertised and marketed properly, and then after a while it disappears back to obscurity and nothing good happens from it. Osaka Sun (talk) 06:11, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That explanation would be about right. But I'm not sure if it's a new phenomenon... Peter Monomorium antarcticum 06:25, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's not a new thing at all. It's more pervasive with facebook, but people will care about what they hear about.  to hear about it someone has to be talking about it.  and it 'catches on" or it doesn't.  The vast majority of the US would not even know where uganda is on a map.  Much less know anything about 30 years of violence and brutality.  But we do the same with teh "plight of the chinese worker", and "the plight of the north african sea monster" and the "plight of the american farmer".  think "Live Aid" and "feed the world", or Matthew Shephard.  or the turn of the century (last century) "plight of the orphan"[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 15:37, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * just have another celebrity die; world news and peoples interest will turn off for a few days while we mourn-- il' Dictator   Mikal  06:27, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The trouble is that even the people who aren't mourning, merely complaining that we're paying attention to some random celebrity, also contribute to the problem. Peter Monomorium antarcticum 06:30, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Exactly; it's annoying that the iranian protests vanished in the time it took for us to get over an overrated singers death-- il' Dictator   Mikal  06:35, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * On the plus side, I remember the protests but have no idea who the singer was. This is what Al Jazeera is for, anyway. Peter Monomorium antarcticum 06:58, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Well, I'd just like to think that people are simply ignorant and don't pay attention to it unless it has some celebrity or something media hogging, although it's not a good excuse. I've known about Kony for about 5 years, and in High school I was Historian, Vice President, and President of the Invisible Children's Club. It's something that not many people pay attention to, nor do they really understand the severity of it all. It's hard to bring people's attention to one place, without them being distracted and turning their eye to something else on the media. I'm glad that the video is up, and I'm glad it's getting the attention that it should be getting. Yes, it's sad that people didn't pay attention to it before, but its better that they actually care now. That they get it. I just hope that they understand what the goal is. Osaka, do not offend the people that don't know. Simply guide them to understand, and guide them well. As an active member of the Invisible Children, that's all I can ask for.--Dumpling (talk) 07:03, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I have no qualms with what IC is doing, it's just that if the only reason people learn about history is by following the status quo on social media, we're setting a bad precedent on how we educate ourselves in this day and age. You really shouldn't have to be doing this (the LRA could have been dealt with years ago) but apparently American Idol takes priority over a decades-long problem.  And like Mikalos and PeterL said, if another celebrity dies during this or KONY 2012 doesn't achieve it's goal, it'll be forgotten quicker than you say "the ongoing Horn of Africa famine."


 * Well, better really late than never, right? Osaka Sun (talk) 07:29, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The whaty what? Famine? MY GOD THATS TERRIBLE, WE SHOULD GE... -man on tv- ladies and gentlemen, look at this dancing cat!" OH MY GOD A CAT. why was i standing up again?-- il'  Dictator   Mikal  07:35, 7 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Ah, well then yes. I totally understand the disappointment. The priorities are messed up, and it's really scary to see. Sigh. I can only hope that it's not forgotten that easily. But yes, I suppose late is better than never.--Dumpling (talk) 07:41, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Although it is sort of sad that people don't hear about an issue like this... I sort of think that it's not entirely the public's fault. One of the most important phrases for investigating issues in Journalism is 'follow the money.' Indeed, most of what America cares about involves the investments of its people, its corporations, and its celebrities. The struggle in Uganda has little to no impact on American money, defense, or politics. People hear about what is exposed. And what is exposed in America are things that involve american interests. We have one of the lowest rates of coverage of world news in the world. People don't wake up in the morning and go 'Hm, I will investigate something I have never heard about today in a country I am barely aware exists.' I think of such a campaign as this a great victory for the citizenry not only in the USA but the world as a whole, moving back to what the media is supposed to do for the people: expose them to new ideas, ideas they need to vote on and ideas they need to make known to other people. The press is supposed to check and balance the government and business this way, but that utility has been pretty lost in many ways. Taking back the idea that the voices of the people actually reading the news matter, making issues known on a global scale, is a serious victory for journalism and I am very inspired by the man who made the campaign. With luck, this will catch on and soon those 'sunday school activists' will actually start demanding more world news and more involvement in the world instead of turtling in the safety of our mainstream media exposure. I'm really shocked that anybody could ever be disgusted by this movement. It's a victory for awareness. And I am pretty sure that everybody here is really tired of obliviousness. It's only one symptom of a greater social problem on whole. KnightOfTL;DR (talk) 12:54, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Also, everybody should see this, too. http://visiblechildren.tumblr.com/ I wouldn't donate to Invisible Children, as I already donate to Doctors Without Borders and others that have been in Uganda for more than a decade. Just for fullness of information. I guess my stance on this issue is complex? I support the media power and the visibility of criminals, but not really all of what Invisible Children is fighting for.KnightOfTL;DR (talk) 13:30, 7 March 2012 (UTC)

Not everyone is rosy on Invisible Children, Inc., however. 00:52, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think the worst thing that could come from this whole thing is that it will make people even more cynical about legitimate attempts at activism or just optimistic messages in general. Just look at the comments section in this video dedicated the ending speech from The Great Dictator.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WibmcsEGLKo&list=FLh-DBixhkSi7ybF1JsZpHsA&index=10&feature=plpp_videoRyantherebel (talk) 02:48, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

American Atheists billboard fail
They keep getting worse... Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 16:43, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Sometimes it seems like AA only redeeming feature is Silverman's "you can't be serious" face. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>narchist 16:46, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Seriously? WTF.  I love the ones "their might not be a god, get over it". or "if you don't believe, you're  not alone", or "Why not enjoy today" type.  mostly non proselytizing and focusing on support or identity.  this is just sick.  --[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 16:59, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * First animal rights and now this. You Americans have to fuck up all kinds of activism, do you? Vulpius (talk) 17:10, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

Is this the same "fly a banner over a closed Superbowl dome" AA? Might be worthy of a snarticle. Osaka Sun (talk) 17:05, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Actually, I don't see the problem with this billboard...should I? -- Seth Peck (talk) 17:58, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yeah probably. Colonial & Antebellum slavery is something that still evokes strong emotions for a lot of people in USA.  Here that's being exploited to make some tenuous out-of-context point about something else.  I don't think it's that much different from, say, a billboard with a big picture of Hitler saying "he believed in evolution too".  23:24, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think it is a good billboard - and I think Weasel's comparison misses the point: Christians say that the bible is the literal word of the creator and the universe, and it's from this were they claim to get "absolute morality". The bible also explicitly endorses slavery. This poster merely highlights that, albeit in a rather confrontational way.  15:32, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * To rehash PZ's complaint, it's really hard to do irony on a billboard. If you're driving past this, the message is probably going to come off as closer to "Hooray, slavery!" which is made worse by the design with the "punchline" being set off to one side in small type. @Delta: No, Biblical literalists say the Bible is the literal word of the creator. As Abraham Lincoln said in his second inaugural address: "Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God; and each invokes His aid against the other." Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 17:49, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I actually read the bottom of the internet for once. This would have been a much better design. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 18:41, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Stunning images of solar storm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-17295963 Ajkgordon (talk) 18:19, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I watched teh first part of Horizion on the storms and it seems really, "scaremongering" to me. Is this really something that serious?--[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 18:32, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Dunno, didn't watch Horizon. But they can be quite serious. Thing is the effects here on earth or in orbit are difficult to predict. One of the more recent ones knocked out a good deal of Canada's electricity grid. But I just liked those images. It looks like the whole star shudders when the ejection happens. Awesome. Ajkgordon (talk) 18:36, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It probably won't be a Y2K theorized-type of event. But I know that DirecTV (my satelite provider) already robo-called people warning of potential issues until the solar storm is over. not that I mind, though, because our local newspaper said we could see some "awesome-looking effects in the night sky" which will be far more entertaining to watch than my television. 18:56, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * If it's any reassurance, I heard the phrase "huge release of magnetic energy" in that and facepalmed. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>narchist 23:27, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * So the height of the storms were to hit today around noon NYC time. Anyone hear of any interruptions?
 * Most of it missed us. Ajkgordon (talk) 09:18, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

How much gender role?
As it says on my user page, my wife is carrying a parasitic spawn that has cunningly constructed itself from an amalgam of our DNA to activate our parenting instincts and get us to protect it. Clever. Anyway, we're engaged in a genial and ongoing debate about how much gender identity is appropriate in little Stormageddon. We completely agree that girls should be climbing trees, building forts, and playing Lego, and boys should enjoy toy houses, kitchen sets, and ... are there any other cool girl toys? But we disagree slightly on more minor things like "wearing pink". Aside from gifts from the family, should we eschew pink clothing in a girl? Should we get our little boy-Stormy a pink jumper?

I'm not asking y'all to make the decision for us, we're good there, but the controversy in our normally completely agreeable relationship made me curious what other RWers think about gender roles in the infant. If this gets a lot of replies I'll move it to debatespace. ERK ! | Complaints Hotline  19:10, 8 March 2012 (UTC)


 * First of all, congrats on the lil' parasite!
 * Anyways, cool girl...toys. Not really sure. The only thing that comes into my head from my childhood that was 'girly' were just the dolls and stuffed plushies. Other than that, most of my childhood consisted of books, coloring books, and shit-tons of art supplies, and chalk. Oh. My bike was pretty awesome. Haha. Anyways, I don't see anything wrong with pink clothing with either gender. My brother had a pink hat when he was little. --Dumpling (talk) 19:20, 8 March 2012 (UTC)


 * I was raised fairly neutrally. What it really boiled down to is that my parents let me choose what I liked. Some things, like gifts were unavoidable. But when we went clothes-shopping, usually mom asked me what color I wanted rather than picking it out for me. When I went to a toy store, they asked me what I wanted and I ran to the aisle myself to get it. Before I was old enough to pick, they usually went with 'whatever looked nice'; nothing too extravagant one way or the other, but mostly serviceable clothes I could romp around in and were easy to clean. Sometimes I wore pink and purple, sometimes I wore blue and red, sometimes I wore orange or green. I think the biggest suggestion I can make is to pay attention to what the kid likes when they get old enough, but before that time don't make any one color 'special' or more important than any color. This includes avoiding it. The point being that they can be exposed to many different colors, items of clothes, toys, and games and then pick what they like to do before they go to pre-school or kindergarten at which point teachers and other kids will begin telling the kid what to play with. Early socialization and all that: give them something of their own to share with the other kids, rather than letting the other kids impress their ideas on yours. KnightOfTL;DR (talk) 19:22, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Blocks are always good toys. I loved mine when I was a kid (as if that's changed). I don't think you can get good sets as easily as you used to be able to. When it became clear that I wasn't going to reproduce my parents convinced me to send them out to my sister for her kids. I still get to play with them when I visit. Anyway, I clearly have little first hand experience with the whole gender issue, but it seems it can be very hard to avoid. My good friends have a 3 year old girl, and certainly didn't purposefully raise her to like girly things. Nevertheless the entire year she was 2 was all about fairies and princesses. Once it was clear she liked that stuff they didn't try to fight it, but they didn't encourage it. It's possible her grandmother, who watches her during the day, did. I'd certainly treat pink as any other color. Don't refuse it entirely, but don't make it a staple. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 19:45, 8 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Cultural gendering starts incredibly early. And children are natural Platonic idealists, who want to put everything into a category according to its ideal. The very best thing you can do is lead by example, 'cos that's worth way more than words. My 4yo daughter is into princess dresses, anything pink, dinosaurs, museums and playing football, and has learnt from her mum that mummies hit things with hammers and have a shed full of dangerous tools - David Gerard (talk) 19:57, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * If I were to have kids, i'd fill their room and their closet with clothes of every color. Pink blankets, blue sheets, green walls, yellow suns.  And I'd have them dressed early on in "boys" and "girls" mostly netrual sex stuff. Then, I'd bring home a bit of everything when they are 2.5 or so, and let them choose.  sadly, most of gendering has nothing to do with the obvious and virtually everything to do with the subconcious.  How quickly you pick up a child when it cries.  How roughly you play wiht the child.  How closely you cuddle the child.  How much you offer a hand for first steps or say "atta boy you can do it on your own".  The differences we expect in boys and girls are so deeply seeded, it's quite hard to see them, and counter them. but congrats on the spawn!  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 23:31, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I have an extended family that would almost insist on pretty-pink-dresses if it's a girl and football-shirts-and-nothing-else if it's a boy... I would certainly resist that. But I wouldn't go as far as the kinds of people who think it's a great idea to raise their child perfectly Gender Neutral with no strong colours, perfectly Neutral toys, refusing to reveal the sex of the child at all, or doing anything even remotely or subconsciously gendered - because, while I think that's a very interesting social experiment, I can't see that ending up any way other than severe mental problems. My hypothetical children will already have to put up with me, I don't want them burdened with gender politics in addition to that. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>narchist 18:33, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I"ve spent a lot of time around lingusts, and each and every one of them talks about their children as scientific and linguistic studies.  I fear, ADK that you and many others here would delight in the prospect of watching your child grow up as an experiement in human umm 'ness". :-) --[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 19:57, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Maybe so, but I doubt they can beat psychologists in that department. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 21:09, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Don't think I'm not tempted, but it's the control group and blinding that's the royal pain in the arse. Making it so much more hassle than it's worth. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>d hominem 21:20, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Sometimes I wonder how many have a little mad scientist in them, because I've cooked up some pretty scary stuff in my own head. Then I wonder if everyone else is doing the same thing and I think "Thank fuck for IRBs and ethics committees." Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 21:42, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm with Godot on this one. For instance, I remember of a study, observations in a maternity ward, that showed that Mums made shorter eye-contact with female children than with male children.


 * But I think anyway, whatever you do, the main problem is going to be peer-pressure and social norms. I've tried to tell my kids they can like out-of-gender things, I occasionally wear pink myself (my brother and I have once contemplated creating a Pink Freedom Front to help men to reclaim pink), but in the end, there's no way the boys would be caught by their friends doing anything even slightly girly, and if I let the girl choose her clothing, she will always choose pink dresses.


 * The only case where one of the boys has given way is choosing a female character for playing pokemon, after seeing me doing the same, and accepting my explanation that "if you're going to stare at that character for hours, better be staring at a cute girl than at a snotty boy".


 * You'll soon notice that's the case in a lot domains (work ethics, risk-taking, racism, religion...): you don't raise children in a void. Peers and society have as much of an input than you do. You can help by showing a good counter-example and being supportive enough for them to get the courage to go against the grain when they feel it's the right thing to do, but you can't suppress these influences. They're going to take in some, whether you like it or not.dx (talk) 22:38, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

A Goat walks into a bar... no, seriously
Here's the proof. That is all. TerrenceKoeckring (talk) 22:02, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I guess guide dogs are too cliché these days. 99.50.96.218 (talk) 08:43, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Libertarians and birth control
Considering most of the recent attacks on contraception have come from the Religious Right, I was just introduced to an even funnier argument by someone on the "personal choice" side instead, saying that "insurance shouldn't cover for condoms just like they shouldn't cover toothpaste" and "if women don't want to pay for it, it's a disgrace to feminism!"

Are Americans so out of touch with what BC is that the first thing they think of is the rubber barrier? The ignorance never ceases to amaze me. Osaka Sun (talk) 23:59, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what libertarianism has to do with this or with the religious right--if insurance is meant to mean private insurance companies, then most libertarians would argue that those companies should be free to do whatever they think is best for their business. P-Foster Talk " "Santorum is the cream rising to the top." " 00:03, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The guy identifies himself as libertarian-leaning, so yeah, contradictions much. Osaka Sun (talk) 00:08, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * P-Foster's right. The libertarian perspective would be that the government shouldn't force health insurance providers to cover birth control. If people want it they should shop for a provider who does. Free market and all that. It's not an outrageous stance, really. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 00:24, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Outrageous? No, but still pretty dumb. An American Fallacy  ( super crazy fun time! ) 00:34, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Erm, nope. I don't think it's pretty dumb. A libertarian thinks a private company should operate how it wishes, hardly shocking is it; and next to nothing to actually do with birth control. 17:41, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Template
Please help tidy up Template:RationalWiki. Proxima Centauri (talk) 09:53, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Who messed it up? -- MtD Pinko Scum   09:57, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

I created it and don't know how to get it right. Proxima Centauri (talk) 10:00, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Congratulations, you are this week's Ed Poor. Sophie  because liberals  10:04, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Nuke it. Тy YAUA 12:07, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yep, much tidier! - David Gerard (talk) 20:05, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

MRA wingnuts profiled by SPLC
Scary stuff. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 18:10, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * This is why we can't have nice things. Thank you, fringe 5% of everything for ruining it for the rest of us. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>gnostic 18:23, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

"France has too many foreigners"
thank you Sarkozy-- il' Dictator   Mikal  07:08, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's a desperation move to get as many wingnuts on his side, he knows he's going to lose otherwise. Osaka Sun (talk) 07:38, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * "working more and more badly" - I hope that's just a bad translation. Peter Monomorium antarcticum 07:52, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, Nicolas, child of an Hungarian and a Greek immigrant, we sould keep the foreigners out. They are just talking stupid. -- 10:39, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Shit, I'm a foreigner in France. Should I look out for the gendarmes escorting me to the airport? Ajkgordon (talk) 10:52, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's depressingly common. Blighty's Michael Howard's father was a Romanian-Jew who fought against Franco; Michael is somewhere to the right of Genghis Khan, and has pulled up the drawbriges behind him. CS Miller (talk) 14:23, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I always heard that the problem with France is that it's full of French people. MDB (talk) 14:31, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Gah, you beat me to it. -- Seth Peck (talk) 17:08, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Actually, when I was in France last April, the frogs French people were all quite nice. MDB (talk) 17:38, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That's good to hear (I just like the joke, and I'm a big fan of France frogs too). I've never been, though I took four years of French in high school/college, and have always wanted to.  Well, I've been to St. Martin, so that's TECHNICALLY France...-- Seth Peck (talk) 17:41, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think the thing I most remember was when we were walking along the plaza in front of les Invalides, the museum of French military history (and no, smart-asses, it does not consist entirely of white flags.) There was a large group of people running, wearing similar T-shirts (in French, of course.) I remarked to my sister, "I wonder what that's about", and someone nearby responded, with a French accent, "it is a run to support AIDS awareness." But the clerks I spoke to in the Louvre gift shops were polite, the wait staff at the one actual French restaurant we went to were as good as any wait staff, and I don't think I encountered one stereotypical Frenchman. (Incidentally, the reason we only ate at one actual French restaurant was that we had my young nieces with us. They're finicky when it comes to American food; there's no way they'd eat French food. So, we ate at McDonald's and the Paris Hard Rock Cafe.) MDB (talk) 19:41, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Some of the perceived rudeness is more to do with slightly differing cultural habits. We had a German guest recently who was offered a cup of tea. Her response was simply "No". When told that in England it's more polite to say "No, thank you", she remarked, "Why should I say thank you, you haven't given me anything!" All very good natured, of course. Ajkgordon (talk) 21:34, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Hehe. One of the first lessons a school student in English learns is: "The English are friendly as fuck, so be friendly as fuck too because if not they are going to think you're an asshole." One of my teacher actually gave no points for negative answers in tests if you didn't repeat the sentence after the "No". Ahh, the good old German grading and repeating whip... -- 00:49, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I hear japanese is so polite, you are not allowed to say "no". You must say something like "Though it breaks my heart to consider any alternative other than the one you present, circumstances beyond my control suggest that our best course of action would be to do something other".  ;-)   ok, maybe not that bad, but still.  Dumpling?--[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 02:30, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Two comments - Seth, if you are in Paris, no one speaks french there, so it's ok. They speak some "never open my mouth" "slurr all my words" "soften all a's to 'uhs" french.  But other than store clerks, I've always had a great time with french people who are quite willing to listen to me babble.  I do find it funny, though, that human nature is the same world wrong.  I speak well enough, but even so, many of the older people will turn to my husband and say "Tell her I've had a lovely time meeting her".  And then they turn to me and in a LOUD voice say (in broken English)  "VERY NICE TO MEETING YOU!!!!"  I giggle, cause I've seen my dad and his generation do that to the husband unit. [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 21:48, 7 March 2012 (UTC)
 * True, it's some shop staff and functionaries who give the French the rudeness label. Most people are just like anyone else - varied individuals who are on average no more or less rude than most other cultures. I find it best to either be amusingly rude back (if they're not police or customs officers) or more often try to be overly friendly. That can disarm them and bring out the real person inside who isn't naturally rude. Doesn't always work though and can be terribly hard work just to get something done that should be simple and painless. Ajkgordon (talk) 11:25, 8 March 2012 (UTC)

I don't see anything wrong with what Sarkozy has said (and I don't even like the man). He has not said we wants do boot out all foreigners and completely stop immigration (so the "b-but he is the son of an immigrant! ha ha" argument is rather weak and foolish), he has said that he wants to see immigration controlled and done for France's benefit. I know here on RW it can be a "see? I'm more right-on than you" competition a-la a punch of pricks in a student union bar, but does anyone really think that uncontrolled mass-immigration is a good idea? It is this denunciation of anyone who even mentioned immigration as a zealot or racist that forced honest discussion of a very important issue out of the political sphere for the last two decades, and this has cetainly not helped things. 15:17, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * For France? It doesn't really make much sense at all.  Understanding the context, especially given their history in 4 major European wars, and their own history of colonizations, they have had a seriously bad reputation about how they deal with their immigrants - most directly cause BY THEIR ACTIONS, unlike US immigration which has much more to do with where the US sits next to a country with a bad economy.  There is a reason Sharko's views are taking so negatively in France by the majority.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 15:31, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Sarkozy has a habit of saying controversial things about immigration just before elections. The suspicion is that he's trying to off-set the appeal of the Front National to the more moderate right-wingers. And this time round he's pretty desperate with a significant poll deficit to his rival Hollande. Ajkgordon (talk) 18:54, 8 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Godot, I have no idea how your comment is relevant to either what Sarkozy has said, nor what I said. 00:36, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * There's a difference between uncontrolled and unguided. Without proper information where to go for a job, massive immigration will have bad effects. The difference between "we should control immigration tighter" and "we need less immigrants coming in" may appear to be minor semantics, but it says a lot about what approach is taken. Rather than sending people away from the metaphorical city wall simply telling them "we're full, come back in a few years" we should say "we're full for the moment, but try 10 km up North, they're saying they're doing great and could use some workers". So rather than just protecting our own markets (or it's labor supply) we should direct the immigrant flow towards places where they can be beneficial to the economical whole. One shouldn't forget that with the exception of Spain "foreigner" and "immigrant" have become a code words for "muslim" in continental Europe, so there is definitely some catering to the right going on here. -- 17:26, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

An Important Letter from Mr. Camping
[W]e now realize that those people who were calling our attention to the Bible’s statement that "of that day and hour knoweth no man" (Matthew 24:36 & Mark 13:32), were right in their understanding of those verses and Family Radio was wrong. Everybody seen this? Peter Monomorium antarcticum 02:28, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * And yet his cult lives on. Trolling the message boards of the people still making new predictions is pretty hilarious. They are now rejecting Camping as an apostate. Tmtoulouse (talk) 02:48, 9 March 2012 (UTC)


 * So old Harold has decided to pack up his tent and start the long march down Mount Mental, eh? I am disappoint. :( -- MtD Pinko Scum   04:17, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Wow -- now they're trying to say the world will end this month. These people really have no shame, do they? GodothasArrived  ( super crazy fun time! ) 05:02, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * 7th through 9th, didn't they say? i.e. now. Peter Monomorium antarcticum 05:03, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * No, really, I'm sure it'll happen this time -- third time's the charm, right? Or maybe this could be counted as the fourth. Hell, technically it's probably one of thousands of 'end of the world' predictions, so that means it's really probable this is the correct one. An American Fallacy  ( super crazy fun time! ) 05:08, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Wait, did someone just hit the wall with their cognitive dissonance and come out on the side of reality for a change? Baby steps, baby steps. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>gnostic 18:26, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm guessing something more likely. -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:31, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Ha ha..so when is Harold Camping going to write a best seller about it? I suggest the title I Was Wrong. Secret Squirrel (talk) 21:25, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Jack Chick disproves global warming
Well, I'm sold. Also: global warming experts pray to Ixchel and Gaia for guidance. Balaam (talk) 09:50, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't know if it's possible, but these tracts are just getting more and more ridiculous. I mean, previous ones were unbelievable but they're just getting more ambitious with the whole 'evil science' thing to the point where my Poe's Law warning bells are going off so strongly... if this wasn't Chick, I'd be totally sure it was a parodist. KnightOfTL;DR (talk) 13:00, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I was initially skeptical about his premise, but I was totally convinced when I saw Gene Wilder make an appearance as a scientist. ORavenhurst (talk) 13:59, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Funny, no Gore's Law, but the classic Ehrlich Gambit appears: Paul Ehrlich was wrong, therefore no environmental problems exist. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 17:15, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I beg to differ. That guy in the first panel is clearly Al Gore. Cow...Hammertime! 17:55, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Erm, yeah, so, erm, what? Is he saying climate change IS happening but it's because of his god rather than carbon emissions? That is some weird shit.  (Although I did like his digs at the catholic church)  18:00, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Hey, I don't have much time for the Catholic church but when I saw my first Chick tract I was gob-smacked by the anti-Catholicism. But that is what you get from extreme Protestantism, very Ian Pasley. 15:29, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Wow... that bitter old lunatic is becoming more like Andy by the day, especially his non sequitor about how "England is run by evil muzlims... therefore global warming is a pagan lie", his whining about the lieberal media, and his saying it is all because every world leader is an evil abortionist". Maybe we should make a new internet law relating to angry fundamentalist tossers, as to how as their old followers die out, drop out, or are cast out, and no new followers take their place, those who remain grow ever more extreme, insane, and increasingly obsessed with watching those who dare disagree be humiliated, tortured and ultimately cast into hell for the crime of opposing them/god. Its just a pity Andy is one of those dirty catholics or they would get along very well Judge HoldenThe Judge Smiles 01:40, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Also I don't think I will ever get tired of Jack Chick's patented SlenderGod, especially when he comes across as far more of a complete monster than the real Slenderman could ever hope to be Judge HoldenThe Judge Smiles 01:48, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It seems to me that this might be some facet of Poe's Law. As ridiculousness increases and similarity to over-the-top parody approaches 1, the fundamentalist will begin to resemble any other given fundamentalist regardless of actual faction or division of beliefs? As both Chick and Schlafly get more and more absurd, they begin to resemble each other even though one's a Protestant and one's a Catholic. KnightOfTL;DR (talk) 15:36, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Coyne's slide into silliness
Is it me or is the nonsense factor really going up on his blog website? Readers are already aware of his newly found evangelism for a naive form of determinism. Now we get some whinging about "politically correct" anthropologists on the issue of race. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 18:53, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Gal dang it: First they came for Pinker, and I said nothing; Then you came for Coyne, and i cringed but did nothing; next you will come for Cox, and I shall be left with only Tyson. STOP TURNING MY HEROS INTO HUMANS!!![[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 19:03, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * But there is so much profit to be made in the hobby of Coyne collecting. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 19:09, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's just you. The Plantinga stuff is delicious. And I found out that User:Tom Morris is doing a Ph.D in the bits of Plantinga that don't suck (apparently there are some) - David Gerard (talk) 20:07, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Speaking of the Plantinga stuff... Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 19:36, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Who said republicans are sexist.
They are an equal opportunity birth control hater. limit on vasectomies<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot   oi, putain, genial, merci 22:08, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Damn, got "bit". it's a female Democrat who is using it to "show" the imbalance in our laws.  I should learn to read at least two sources before posting.  wackado as the US is right--[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 22:11, 9 March 2012 (UTC) now.
 * Still not as funny as Every Sperm is Sacred. Osaka Sun (talk) 22:13, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Did they just add in "Satirical Bill" later? Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>gnostic 17:05, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

Carnitine
I am really confused. As far as I can see, carnitine plays a role in transporting fatty acid to mitochondria. So it definitely helps in fat metabolism. And this study cleanly shows carnitine supplement does increase muscle mass which is obviously due to increasing use of body fat during heavy work, and decreasing use of muscle carbohydrate. So carnitine seems to help reduce muscle catabolism. This is why carnitine seems quite fair among a lot of weight-loss/fat burning charlatanism. What others think? I'm asking because I'm considering taking carnitine supplement. But afraid of side effects. And will there be any problem after supplement withdrawal? --SupernovaExplosion (talk) 03:46, 10 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Can anyone shed some light? --SupernovaExplosion (talk) 15:52, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * it's all very nice for us to be "rational" and look at stuff like this, but you are going to take it into your body, not just wrie about it. So take the studies you've seen into a doctor, especially one who specialties in sports med if you can find one, and see what she or he has to say.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 16:40, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Support. If you still have doubts, do what Godot said. My not very informed opinion is that carnitine should be safe to eat, since it is approved as a food supplement in most countries. Certainly any side effects are far less severe than the sort encountered when using anabolic steroids. At worst you will waste some money. --Tweenk (talk) 23:13, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Well according to WedMD it is useless unless you have low L-carnitine levels already, kidney problems etc. One study evidence does not make. If you have one study for something and 20 studies against, I am going to say that the one study for was statistical chance. -  <font face=times color=black>π    02:22, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

The best "I told you so moments"
Stumbled on this definition of "wishy-washy"

...taken in 2005. Any more non-Iraq War statements taken by Republicans that are worthy of fractal wrongness lulz? Osaka Sun (talk) 13:23, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Scott Walker's plan to add jobs in Wisconsin by cutting school budgets and bust union collective bargaining rights turned out exactly as expected. -- Seth Peck (talk) 14:47, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

It really is annoying
how many people confuse en.Wikipedia to be "wikipedia america". Or that arguing gay sex is immoral and therefor harmful will get you anywhere on the main page-- il' Dictator   Mikal  21:40, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * How many other countries speak English besides America? I can't even think of one. GodothasArrived  ( super crazy fun time! ) 00:52, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Secret Ingredient
Stephen Fry just tweeted this. Now, I may be quite an adventurous chef, but I think I'll leave that one to the enthusiasts. <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 11:17, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * ...Why? Osaka Sun (talk) 15:22, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's natural and easily replenishable. And besides, don't tell me you've never thought what semen might taste like as a cooking ingredient -- I'm pretty sure we've all contemplated that at some point. An American Fallacy  ( super crazy fun time! ) 15:27, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Still waiting for that episode of Iron Chef. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 17:45, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Cod semen is a delicacy in Japan... ERK ! |  Complaints Hotline  17:56, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * @Fallacy/whatever: I shall defy you; I've never thought what semen might taste like as a cooking ingredient (until now...you asshole :D ). The biggest issue of course is that its consistency is never...well, consistent.  Also, remember that it came from a dick (which may or may not be clean), and it probably doesn't get homogenized first (that is, I'm not putting any in MY blender for fear of fucking up the components, even if it's mine).   -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:11, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * "Also, remember that it came from a dick (which may or may not be clean)"
 * That was actually my first concern. The second one was 'eww'. I mean, I can understand blowjobs, but after the semen is old and cold, it sounds like it'd be pretty gross. But I've never tried it either way. GodothasArrived  ( super crazy fun time! ) 02:31, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * But it's high in protein, and it prevents prevents breast cancer! Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 18:18, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Porn stars eat it all the fucking time. What's the issue? Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>sshole 18:22, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * There's no protein in a "protein shot". I'd find a source, but I'm at work, and I'm sure my Google search results will be less than helpful through the filters (and why do we NOT have that woo on our Fellatio article?). -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:27, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Prevents cancer, you say? My, how I love this game! Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>postate 18:43, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Why would you want to? It's hideous tasting stuff.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 20:41, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Because it prevents cancer, of course. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>d hominem 02:22, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

An old GF used to claim it would make a great steak sauce. Damn, what went wrong with that relationship??? 01:59, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

What are Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck doing these days?
Anyone know what happened to Glenn Beck after he lost his radio show and Palin after she vanished from her attempted start to her presidential campaign? I cant be arsed to trawl through google to find out, and it seems odd that two colossal publicity whores would simply disappear. Judge HoldenThe Judge Smiles 10:23, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Glenn Beck has his own interwebs TV show, on which he looks and sounds stoned most of the time. He certainly seems pretty depressed, poor bastard. I guess he took the crazy a bit too far that last time. Sarah Palin is still doing her best to hang on the coat tails of the Republican party and look like she's a credible politician. Expect her to have to go get a real job after the next presidential election. -- 10:32, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Nah, she's gonna be President Santorum's Secretary of State. -- PsyGremlin  13:30, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Surely you mean president Gingrich? -- 14:37, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * theblaze.com is still up and running. Not sure how much Glenn has to do with it. I'm guessing not that much, because it's not completely insane. Occasionaluse (talk) 16:20, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I stopped reading it since I value my sanity, but last I checked it was basically "Modern Web Design Freep Lite." The comments are always full of teabagger and Christian crazy, but you'd rather get the choice Grade-A nutbars from the original producer. --CoyoteSans (talk) 23:54, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Please don't even fucking joke about that. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>bomination 17:01, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Here is a sample of some of Beck's recent work: a lengthy interview with Rick Santorum.-- 02:34, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That video is full of win. Thank you! 01:57, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Pink Slime
Saw this, read this. Is there any evidence that food treated with ammonia gas or ammonium hydroxide is toxic? Why did mcdonalds, burger king, and taco bell stop using ammonium hydroxide? Is this a case of the internet mob overreacting? Can I sue the internet if I get e-coli from a taco? Given the amazing working conditions I am sure every single fast food franchise maintains this sounds like a great idea. TheCheatI run on alcohol 16:34, 10 March 2012 (UTC)


 * It seems to me like a combination of gross looking stuff coupled with dangerous sounding chemicals. I get why people are grossed out (looking at the stuff does make me thankful for being a vegetarian), but I have a feeling if people actually looked at 90% of what goes into their food they'd be grossed out by that too. The old "laws and sausages" axiom comes to mind. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 17:14, 10 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Some information on the chemical side of the story. First a digression: there is actually no such thing as "ammonium hydroxide". The existence of this molecule was postulated under the obsolete Arrhenius acid-base theory to explain why solutions of ammonia have a basic pH. Later spectroscopic measureents indicated that no such molecules are formed, which led to abandoning of this theory in favor of better ones, such as Brønsted-Lowry and Lewis acid-base theories. Now back to the point: concentrated solutions of ammonia in water are caustic and have antimicrobial activity. When eaten, non-caustic solutions of ammonia and its salts are non-toxic to humans. In fact, ammonium chloride is a traditional baking ingredient. See salty liquorice. Considerable quantities of ammonia are also dissolved in human urine as a product of protein metabolism.
 * Now about the meat itself. This "pink slime" sounds a lot like "mechanically separated meat", which is routinely used for pâtés, hot dogs and other downmarket meat products in Europe. It might not be very healthy, like all meat with high fat content, but it's definitely not toxic. This controversy is caused by people being shocked by simple realities and economics of food production. Leaving some meat on the bones is not only a waste, but also a liability. Clean bones are far simpler to dispose of. Fast food joints are simply following the pragmatic adage "the customer is always right".
 * The bottom line is that some ignorants made a lot of noise and tried to improve something, but ended up doing mostly harm. The hamburgers at McDonald's will not become more healthy. The likelihood of food poisoning will increase, unless another antimicrobial is added to the recipe. Some edible meat will go to waste, thereby increasing the carbon footprint of beef production. A loss on all fronts. This is actually quite typical of urban grassroots food efforts. Locavorism actually reduces economies of scale and increases the carbon footprint, while organic food turns mandated anachronisms and inefficiency into a fashion item. --Tweenk (talk) 23:05, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I heard a story on this on NPR, so it's probably pretty accurate (the reporter was a Pulitzer winner to boot). The pink slime is made from scraps, which are some of the least healthy parts, although apparently they put it in a centrifuge to separate the fat from protein, so it's actually healthier in a sense than you might think. The parts that go into it are some of the ones most likely to carry e. coli, hence the chemicals. Part of the problem is that regulators are still finding e. coli or other harmful bacteria in it, even after the ammonia stuffs. I'm pretty sure most opposition comes from people who think it looks gross (which it certainly does, and the "pink slime" moniker doesn't help in that department). I wonder what they'd think if they looked so closely at everything else they eat. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 15:54, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Nazis = Better than Beliebers
Some of the best trolling I've ever seen. Osaka Sun (talk) 15:16, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Ah Twitter. Is there anything on earth more idiotic? Turpis 3:16 (talk) 15:56, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's my understanding of Twitter than you can make pretty much anything into a hashtag, so the people saying "we should stop this" are only making it worse by actually using it. There's nothing really there to stop. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>pathetic 16:19, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

DST
I just read this column on Daylight Saving Time and I ain't buying it. It makes the argument that DST increases energy use because people use air conditioners more. How does that make any sense? I didn't see a study indicating it, and it makes me think that they saw an increase in air conditioning use during DST (AKA "Summer") and therefore co-relation means causation. They also argue that sleep deprived drivers lead to more accidents "during the Spring". So losing one hour on a day before most people don't work leads to a season of people basically asleep at the wheel? Then there's the negative economic effects because people watch less TV. I get that DST doesn't necessarily save much energy, and it has even been known to make people drive more, as there's more daylight hours in the evening, but come on, this appears just silly. I thought they might make the argument that in the first weeks of DST you have more people driving to work in the dark, which could increase accidents, but apparently that was too logical for them. Anyone know more about this stuff? Turpis 3:16 (talk) 16:46, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I guess i'm confused. who is turning on their air conditioner in the winter?  heater, sure, but AC?< nevermind, got them backwards--[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 20:02, 11 March 2012 (UTC)  Still don't make any sense thoug.  we are a night people now.  it's pretty much that simple.
 * I just read an article that claims studies show heart attacks increase on Monday mornings after daylight savings time (in Spring, when clocks are set forward). On the comments section a writer from India says that they just change their school schedule to account for seasonal changes, to begin at 7AM when it gets light early, and at 9AM in the season when it gets light later in the day. I was just pondering this, wouldn't it make sense to change external schedules to account for the seasons (school, work, etc.) than to change the time? <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 22:01, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes. 02:12, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Daylight Savings Time explained!
 * 22:06, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That's one side of the argument. Personally I find that the mild inconvenience of changing the few clocks that don't change automatically a mere nothing compared with daylight at 10pm. The whole "cost of lighting" thing is a red herring. Daylight is nice to be in. Why waste it at 3am? Why not have it at 10pm when more people are around. OK, so you have to live quite far north (like the UK) or that to be true but enough people do. In particular, as a keen cyclist, I love daylight as those bastard drivers might even notice me. Jack Hughes (talk) 22:38, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * DST should at least be uniform, consistent. Arizona & Hawaii don't do DST. I want to opt-out! <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 22:44, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I like DST in the UK. There is a debate at the moment to move wholesale over to Central European Time, i.e. +1hr in winter and +2hrs in summer. Personally I think that would be a mistake as it would mean it would still be dark at 9am at Christmas and still light at midnight at the summer solstice (at least in the north). While DST actually makes little practical difference and is mostly an aesthetic advantage, moving to CET is just to let the technocrats worship at the alter of "European consistency".

Spreading Santorum no longer #1
So from here, on a browser in porn mode (ie no history/preferences to shape the search), the term "Santorum" no longer gives the "frothy mixture" page as the #1 hit on a Google search. Am curious about other results. P-Foster Talk " "Santorum is the cream rising to the top." " 16:57, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Does anyone care? A once-minor politician now makes headlines as he tries to become president, so a rude joke about his name gets shunted down the page a bit. Big wow. Sophie  because liberals  17:07, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, I care in that getting it there, and keeping it there for so long was a pretty impressive coup for a particular type of online activism, and, given the unique nature of the campaign (I can't think of another instance in which a politician was successfully attacked via google search for so long...) I'm curious as to how it will end up. P-Foster Talk " "Santorum is the cream rising to the top." " 17:13, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * On my browser, the top result is WP:Campaign for "santorum" neologism. Not sure how much of SEO is based on search history these days. ERK ! |  Complaints Hotline  17:22, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Advertisers fleeing wingnut radio en masse
98 advertisers don't want their ads played in "environments likely to stir negative sentiment." Apparently, this includes Beck, Hannity, et al. It's almost as if whoever is in charge of advertising at these companies has never listened to the shows they advertise on. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 20:16, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Why would they? All they need to know is the size of the audience. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>gnostic 20:22, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * And many of them just pay their agencies to place them in those large-audience markets, without paying any attention to what those markets are promoting. Reading the many corporate responses to the "stop advertising on Limbaugh's show" movement shows a lot of this sort of behaviour.  02:02, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

We should have an article on True Freethinker
Yes. GodothasArrived ( super crazy fun time! ) 00:26, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Did no-one inform them that websites can have multiple pages so that you don't have to load up something the size of Texas in one shot? Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>postate 02:24, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Secret Ingredient
Stephen Fry just tweeted this. Now, I may be quite an adventurous chef, but I think I'll leave that one to the enthusiasts. <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 11:17, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * ...Why? Osaka Sun (talk) 15:22, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's natural and easily replenishable. And besides, don't tell me you've never thought what semen might taste like as a cooking ingredient -- I'm pretty sure we've all contemplated that at some point. An American Fallacy  ( super crazy fun time! ) 15:27, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Still waiting for that episode of Iron Chef. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 17:45, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Cod semen is a delicacy in Japan... ERK ! |  Complaints Hotline  17:56, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * @Fallacy/whatever: I shall defy you; I've never thought what semen might taste like as a cooking ingredient (until now...you asshole :D ). The biggest issue of course is that its consistency is never...well, consistent.  Also, remember that it came from a dick (which may or may not be clean), and it probably doesn't get homogenized first (that is, I'm not putting any in MY blender for fear of fucking up the components, even if it's mine).   -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:11, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * "Also, remember that it came from a dick (which may or may not be clean)"
 * That was actually my first concern. The second one was 'eww'. I mean, I can understand blowjobs, but after the semen is old and cold, it sounds like it'd be pretty gross. But I've never tried it either way. GodothasArrived  ( super crazy fun time! ) 02:31, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * But it's high in protein, and it prevents prevents breast cancer! Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 18:18, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Porn stars eat it all the fucking time. What's the issue? Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>sshole 18:22, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * There's no protein in a "protein shot". I'd find a source, but I'm at work, and I'm sure my Google search results will be less than helpful through the filters (and why do we NOT have that woo on our Fellatio article?). -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:27, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Prevents cancer, you say? My, how I love this game! Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>postate 18:43, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Why would you want to? It's hideous tasting stuff.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 20:41, 9 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Because it prevents cancer, of course. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>d hominem 02:22, 10 March 2012 (UTC)

An old GF used to claim it would make a great steak sauce. Damn, what went wrong with that relationship??? 01:59, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

What are Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck doing these days?
Anyone know what happened to Glenn Beck after he lost his radio show and Palin after she vanished from her attempted start to her presidential campaign? I cant be arsed to trawl through google to find out, and it seems odd that two colossal publicity whores would simply disappear. Judge HoldenThe Judge Smiles 10:23, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Glenn Beck has his own interwebs TV show, on which he looks and sounds stoned most of the time. He certainly seems pretty depressed, poor bastard. I guess he took the crazy a bit too far that last time. Sarah Palin is still doing her best to hang on the coat tails of the Republican party and look like she's a credible politician. Expect her to have to go get a real job after the next presidential election. -- 10:32, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Nah, she's gonna be President Santorum's Secretary of State. -- PsyGremlin  13:30, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Surely you mean president Gingrich? -- 14:37, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * theblaze.com is still up and running. Not sure how much Glenn has to do with it. I'm guessing not that much, because it's not completely insane. Occasionaluse (talk) 16:20, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I stopped reading it since I value my sanity, but last I checked it was basically "Modern Web Design Freep Lite." The comments are always full of teabagger and Christian crazy, but you'd rather get the choice Grade-A nutbars from the original producer. --CoyoteSans (talk) 23:54, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Please don't even fucking joke about that. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>bomination 17:01, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Here is a sample of some of Beck's recent work: a lengthy interview with Rick Santorum.-- 02:34, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That video is full of win. Thank you! 01:57, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Revelation of the Method
Okay, so I'm dealing with a pretty kooky conspiracy concept called the Revelation of the Method. It's sort of something that comes up a lot in conspiracy theories, but almost never by name, so I'm having a bit of a hard time finding examples of it. Basically, I'm just adding them as I come across them. If anybody would be willing to find more examples or critique my in-progress article, that would be great. Perceptron (talk) 02:00, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Left a comment on the article talk page. Also, do you want this article to be about the more general idea, or just about Hoffman's spin on it? As for examples, you can try mining GLP or ATS. The concept of gradual disclosure is similar, which reminds me that I still haven't written that article...--ZooGuard (talk) 18:43, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I'll try that. Also, I'll keep the particular conversation that was started on the talk page on the talk page. Anyways, I don't want to focus on just Hoffman's use of it, but every conspiracy theorists use. Perceptron (talk) 04:46, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Isn't this a case of limited hangout? Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 12:43, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Similar, but not the same. I'll give an example. Let's say that I'm part of the Illuminati and we're, hell, faking 9/11. With limited hangout, I

reveal after the fact that a CIA agent working for us helped create fake passport for terrorists, but the revelation is done in such a way that it appears that he was working alone. Limited hangout is a means of damage control after the fact. With revelation of the method, I would hide 9/11 imagery in TV shows, card games, and dollar bills before faking 9/11. This is all done because it's magic/subliminal mind control and this is all part of the plan to fool people. In other words, limited hangout is done after the fact and has a provable existence (even if it's overrepresented in conspiracy theories), while revelation of the method is done before the fact and is kooky magic/pseudoscience. Perceptron (talk) 15:00, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

I don't see where Microsoft is going ...
with windows 8; i mean sure tablets and touchscreens are big now but, microsofts core territory and strength is offices, schools and other places that need an easy to use GUI that can be put onto a couple hundred computers nd won;t have much custominzed features in it. Designing a OS built for a consumer with touchscreen controls seems to be a move in the wrong direction-- il' Dictator   Mikal  02:01, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Since the craphole that was Vista (still have it on my alternate PC, ugh), Microsoft is slowly becoming a turn-off. They have all the tools in the world to create a perfect modern OS, but they're beginning to get lazy. Osaka Sun (talk) 02:25, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * desktop has XP; laptop has 7. since i dont wanna wipe my HD and i dont wanna buy vista just to get to 7 and above... i dont think my computer will ever stop being xp; unless i get ubuntu -- il' Dictator   Mikal  02:39, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes, that is the correct move there, Mikalos.
 * But really, they're shooting themselves in the foot here. I very much suspect that the windows on the next computer I buy will never even be booted... Peter horas non numero nisi serenas 04:52, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not a hardcore code monkey by any means, but as far as I can tell, we've hit the top of the plateau as far as making GUI both visually appealing and practical with XP. Vista and Win 7 are examples of increasing polish at the cost of usability. The problem seems to me that all the innovation now needs to be done on the backend code, where the average consumer won't see any obvious improvements, especially in promotional materials. Linux distros have no problem with this, since a large percentage of that userbase is paying attention to those improvements anyway, but Microsoft has to sell their new OS model to a public that's mostly happy with "good enough to email/write documents/surf internet." Hence, these very pretty pieces of resource hogging annoying to actually use OSes. --CoyoteSans (talk) 07:20, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I'm not any kind of code monkey but isn't the trouble with Windows™ that it a) has a lot of useless legacy stuff buried deep that no-one's capable of rooting out; b) it has to maintain backwards compatibility with old versions? If they started out from new they might have something worthwhile but in that case why not just use Ubuntu (or any version of Linux)? Scream!! (talk) 16:28, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Have you seen Ubuntu lately? Saying that there's no room for GUI improvement is bullshit. An American Fallacy  ( super crazy fun time! ) 15:08, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I quite like Windows 7. Not only is it a huge improvement over Vista (which, to be fair, wasn't hard to accomplish) it's a solid OS by itself. I've never had any issues with it. Like, zero issues. I agree with Mikalos though; designing a new version of windows heavily around touchscreen technology seems quite bizarre when touchscreen isn't hugely useful for a lot of stuff. Public terminals, tablets etc... yes. A work desktop? Not so much. At least not to the extent of replacing a keyboard and mouse and if you've got those anyway, touchscreen isn't so useful. That said, maybe they're making it as more of a side-version designed mostly for tablets and the like rather than the next "proper" windows. X Stickman (talk) 17:43, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Legacy stuff
The answer to Scream's question is no, but yes. At the heart of every version of Windows released in the last ten years is the NT kernel (the project begun back in 1990 or so using people poached from VMS) which is a perfectly nice general purpose operating system kernel just as much as Linux. In fact NT and Linux are basically the only shows in town (and maybe you can argue about OS X ie Darwin, at the outside edge), everybody else is light years behind them. There's nothing wrong with NT that the kernel engineers can't or won't fix.

However, everything ordinary people think of as "Windows" lives on top of that kernel in a layer named Win32 (or sometimes now, Win64) and that is itself based on Win16, which pre-dates NT and was designed by people who probably thought digital watches were a pretty neat idea. Win16 in turn inherits some weird decisions from DOS. Microsoft's policy has long been what's sometimes called the "Raymond Chen school" of software engineering, providing as much compatibility as possible in the belief that this results in a better experience for users because their programs stay working. So as a result this does mean some of what you're seeing in Windows 7 is baggage that's been brought along since the days when programs ran from floppy disks and nobody you knew had heard of the Internet. But every piece of that baggage is probably ensuring that thousands or even millions of people can run the programs they expect to work.

"Starting out from new" is not a sensible plan for Microsoft either technically or in business terms. The fundamentals of NT are sound (unlike the Windows 9x series of products) and rewriting software from scratch is remarkably expensive and inefficient. The issue Microsoft faces is one Bill recognised back when he was still active (which is a long time ago now), their product has become a commodity because somebody else offers a reasonable substitute. That means low margins, which means poor stock market performance. Microsoft needs to diversify, as Windows and Office cease to drive growth they need the 360 and... something else. The problem is, what? They're hoping something in the handheld or tablet space is the answer and they're throwing money at that. They have a lot of money so they can afford to take several guesses before hitting on the right answer. 82.69.171.94 (talk) 18:42, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Just because theres competition doesnt mean they design an entire OS around a product the majority of people who buy windows (ie: people who need an easy to use OS without a lot of glamor that can be put on a couple hundred computers, and people who only casually use computers) wont be using. because this isn't a side project, they gave it a full title, so this is what they consider to be the successor to windows 7, not just some tablet OS. Also, they already failed at making legacy programs work: i cant play my copy of Civ II on my lapotop without a patch, and that's terrible. -- il' Dictator   Mikal  18:51, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks to the posters above who say some quite interesting things. It seems to me that the average user (Ok many users) (Ok then, me)  will really only want something which connects to the net, works for emails does a bit of word processing and perhaps a spreadsheet - and is able to play the odd game without falling over.
 * What is wanted is simplicity of use, minimum knowledge of what the hell is going on behind the scenes and no weird stuff happening. Really what XP gave people in the end.
 * But Microsoft would really like to sell a new copy of windows software every year if it could. Which is a hard sell as changing an operating system is, for most people, on par with carrying out their own root canal work. Interestingly though, Apple's business model seems to be based on selling people new hardware every year - so everything is possible I suppose.--BobSpring is sprung! 21:44, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Entirely relevant in any discussion about Windows and legacy applications:
 * Man upgrades through every version of Windows made:
 * 21:55, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Nazis = Better than Beliebers
Some of the best trolling I've ever seen. Osaka Sun (talk) 15:16, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Ah Twitter. Is there anything on earth more idiotic? Turpis 3:16 (talk) 15:56, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's my understanding of Twitter than you can make pretty much anything into a hashtag, so the people saying "we should stop this" are only making it worse by actually using it. There's nothing really there to stop. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>pathetic 16:19, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

On the positive side, this will distract attention from the whole Qur'an-burning thing...
US soldier goes on killing spree, murders up to 16 Afghan civilians. Can it get any uglier over there? P-Foster Talk " "Santorum is the cream rising to the top." " 15:37, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * WIGOed. ISAF should have left the minute bin Laden was gone.  There's nothing we can do now. Osaka Sun (talk) 15:45, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The guys I know in the British Army are really, really fucking pissed off about this. Not because it brings the operations in disrepute, but because they're going to have to now sit through a load of lectures and powerpoint presentations on why they shouldn't kill civilians. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>theist 16:17, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * On my way to work this morning, the headline of the Tribune claimed that the shooting spree "appalls Afghans." Apparently Americans are to jaded to be appalled as well. ORavenhurst (talk) 13:45, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Worse, though, is that this sort of shit is what causes people to join organizations like Al-Qaeda. Remember the Haditha massacre? Within days, terrorist organizations were sending out propaganda for recruitment. 14:13, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * If someone had actually concentrated the task at hand and properly utilized forces in order to complete the mission properly, we wouldn't be there at all right now. All that money wasted killing people when we could have been developing less-expensive, more fuel-efficient vehicles (no one would give a shit if gas cost $8.00 a gallon if all of our cars got 200 mph...the development, implementation and conversion of which is estimated to cost about 1/3 the war efforts over the last eleven years).  Show me a Republican politician that's good at maths involving percentages, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division of large numbers...and I'll show you an empty chair. -- Seth Peck (talk) 14:23, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * You're assuming that that they do the things they do because they're stupid. Contrary to Hanlon's razor, they're probably just greedy, power-hungry bastards. An American Fallacy  ( super crazy fun time! ) 14:27, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Being a fan of utilizing Hanlon's Razor, I realize the blade has two sides...and many politicians (not just Republicans, or at the federal level) are easily cut by both. -- Seth Peck (talk) 14:30, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * While you can say that a project to make the world Friggin' Awesome would have a similar budget to the wars, you forget two things. 1) Discounting future value, the tenacious human insistence to only think of things that will happen in at most a years time. War gets shit done now, 200 mpg cars would have to wait, as that's Science. 2) Infrastructure to go to war is already in place, making it comparably easy to do. No need to convert factories, or develop new technologies, the military-industrial complex is ready and willing to support your economy right here and right now. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>pathetic 18:42, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

DST
I just read this column on Daylight Saving Time and I ain't buying it. It makes the argument that DST increases energy use because people use air conditioners more. How does that make any sense? I didn't see a study indicating it, and it makes me think that they saw an increase in air conditioning use during DST (AKA "Summer") and therefore co-relation means causation. They also argue that sleep deprived drivers lead to more accidents "during the Spring". So losing one hour on a day before most people don't work leads to a season of people basically asleep at the wheel? Then there's the negative economic effects because people watch less TV. I get that DST doesn't necessarily save much energy, and it has even been known to make people drive more, as there's more daylight hours in the evening, but come on, this appears just silly. I thought they might make the argument that in the first weeks of DST you have more people driving to work in the dark, which could increase accidents, but apparently that was too logical for them. Anyone know more about this stuff? Turpis 3:16 (talk) 16:46, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I guess i'm confused. who is turning on their air conditioner in the winter?  heater, sure, but AC?< nevermind, got them backwards--[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 20:02, 11 March 2012 (UTC)  Still don't make any sense thoug.  we are a night people now.  it's pretty much that simple.
 * I just read an article that claims studies show heart attacks increase on Monday mornings after daylight savings time (in Spring, when clocks are set forward). On the comments section a writer from India says that they just change their school schedule to account for seasonal changes, to begin at 7AM when it gets light early, and at 9AM in the season when it gets light later in the day. I was just pondering this, wouldn't it make sense to change external schedules to account for the seasons (school, work, etc.) than to change the time? <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 22:01, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yes. 02:12, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Daylight Savings Time explained!
 * 22:06, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That's one side of the argument. Personally I find that the mild inconvenience of changing the few clocks that don't change automatically a mere nothing compared with daylight at 10pm. The whole "cost of lighting" thing is a red herring. Daylight is nice to be in. Why waste it at 3am? Why not have it at 10pm when more people are around. OK, so you have to live quite far north (like the UK) or that to be true but enough people do. In particular, as a keen cyclist, I love daylight as those bastard drivers might even notice me. Jack Hughes (talk) 22:38, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * DST should at least be uniform, consistent. Arizona & Hawaii don't do DST. I want to opt-out! <font color="#000066">Refugee <font color = "#00F0A20">talk page 22:44, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I like DST in the UK. There is a debate at the moment to move wholesale over to Central European Time, i.e. +1hr in winter and +2hrs in summer. Personally I think that would be a mistake as it would mean it would still be dark at 9am at Christmas and still light at midnight at the summer solstice (at least in the north). While DST actually makes little practical difference and is mostly an aesthetic advantage, moving to CET is just to let the technocrats worship at the alter of "European consistency".

Spreading Santorum no longer #1
So from here, on a browser in porn mode (ie no history/preferences to shape the search), the term "Santorum" no longer gives the "frothy mixture" page as the #1 hit on a Google search. Am curious about other results. P-Foster Talk " "Santorum is the cream rising to the top." " 16:57, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Does anyone care? A once-minor politician now makes headlines as he tries to become president, so a rude joke about his name gets shunted down the page a bit. Big wow. Sophie  because liberals  17:07, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, I care in that getting it there, and keeping it there for so long was a pretty impressive coup for a particular type of online activism, and, given the unique nature of the campaign (I can't think of another instance in which a politician was successfully attacked via google search for so long...) I'm curious as to how it will end up. P-Foster Talk " "Santorum is the cream rising to the top." " 17:13, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * On my browser, the top result is WP:Campaign for "santorum" neologism. Not sure how much of SEO is based on search history these days. ERK ! |  Complaints Hotline  17:22, 11 March 2012 (UTC)

Happy Birthday...
Douglas Adams. Shocking that we don't include this on RC. -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:31, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's not actually shocking. We mark Towel Day; I don't think Adams needs two Holydaze entries.
 * Here's Terry Jones on Douglas Adams. 20:18, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * At one time he was on our Holydaze list. I remember because he was born on the same day (and year) as myself. 20:00, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Advertisers fleeing wingnut radio en masse
98 advertisers don't want their ads played in "environments likely to stir negative sentiment." Apparently, this includes Beck, Hannity, et al. It's almost as if whoever is in charge of advertising at these companies has never listened to the shows they advertise on. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 20:16, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Why would they? All they need to know is the size of the audience. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>gnostic 20:22, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * And many of them just pay their agencies to place them in those large-audience markets, without paying any attention to what those markets are promoting. Reading the many corporate responses to the "stop advertising on Limbaugh's show" movement shows a lot of this sort of behaviour.  02:02, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Quality of reporting on Fukushima in retrospect
There's going to be a lot of anti-nuclear coverage in the media in the coming days, so I wanted to share this article which matches exactly the way I feel about the quality of reporting on Fukushima. --Tweenk (talk) 20:26, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * To add to the human side of the same argument, having lived in one of the affected cities in northeast Japan I was heavily involved in a lot of the disaster management volunteer work and some truly superhuman efforts on both side of the ocean to track down missing English teachers in the area. Think there has ever been any major media coverage of any of the human stories I heard? Not likely. All anyone wanted to know anything about was Fukushima. Hundreds of newsworthy stories were ignored in favour of nuclear panic. And now, a year later, instead of articles about how rebuilding is and is not progressing - something I dearly want more information on - I see article after article with a short blurb about the earthquake and tsunami and then three pages about how awful Fukushima was and how we should all switch to nice, safe, clean coal power. ERK ! |  Complaints Hotline  22:45, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It is strange isn't it. Usually the media will run with the highest body count, and Fukushima is currently at a nice round 0. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>narchist 23:03, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * To be 100% honest, a few people did die, but it was unrelated to radiation. IIRC, 2 drowned and 1 died of heart attack. One person died in a different plant crushed by a falling crane, and some hospital patients died during evacuations. --Tweenk (talk) 02:11, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Even though I became progressively pro-nuke after Fukushima, we were still very lucky. I'd say we start listening to France on how nuclear issues are handled. Osaka Sun (talk) 04:11, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * This reminds me: I need to read that opinion piece in today's paper. It promises to be quite funny. (here it is elsewhere) Peter horas non numero nisi serenas 04:17, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yep. Are you part of the "nuclear-industrial complex", Tweenk? Peter horas non numero nisi serenas 04:23, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Obviously, yes. I couldn't live without our annual Deformed Baby Cook-Off. I'm also a cheerleader of the Monsanto-UN agenda of global depopulation through GM food . Now that I outed myself, I expect the black helicopters any minute. Damn, there goes this year's prize for GM Tortillas with Cesium Spinach and Hydrocephalus. --Tweenk (talk) 16:38, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

We should have an article on True Freethinker
Yes. GodothasArrived ( super crazy fun time! ) 00:26, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Did no-one inform them that websites can have multiple pages so that you don't have to load up something the size of Texas in one shot? Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>postate 02:24, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Game Change
Just saw it on HBO. Rather interesting take on the 2008 election. It also brings to mind the fact that these politicians are actual people who are under a great deal of stress, not merely icons that we can arbitrarily attack. Mr. Anon (talk) 03:40, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I saw it myself, and I found it well done.
 * When I first heard about it, I wondered why they didn't cast Tina Fey as Sarah Palin. Now, I'm sure the real reason is that Tina Fey does a comic portrayal of Saint Sarah of Wasilla, and they wanted a straightforward portrayal. But watching the movie, I noticed the scene where Palin watches the SNL sketches, and I thought, "okay, that could have been Tina Fey portraying Sarah Palin watching Tina Fey portraying Sarah Palin", and that's just too meta. MDB (talk) 12:28, 12 March 2012 (UTC)

Hurlbuttttttt
Israel has existed since 1451 BC. The first of its effective heads-of-state was Aluf Joshua. Archaeology corroborates every word of this. I have been there. I have personally inspected archaeological digs that far precede 1948. (Including Herod’s fortress at Matzada, a Jewish fortress at Galma, and the Canaanite Gateway near Tel Dan.) And don’t you tell me about what the world will or will not tolerate. I don’t recognize the legitimacy or the goodwill of the United Nations. Since that outfit is now seeking to abolish private property worldwide, all in the name of “sustainable development,” they have forfeited every scintilla of legitimacy they once had. Frankly, sir, I would urge Israel to annex Judea and Samaria just to spite the UN on that account alone. So Dr[sic] Hurlbut, gonna give the land you're on back to the North American Natives? And where the fuck do you get it from that the UN is "seeking to abolish private property worldwide"? Talk about a world of his own, how does he manage to even breathe the same air as we communist, atheist, Islamists? Scream!! (talk) 18:28, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Should have said: I tried to log onto his webshite to make the points but couldn't. UK IP? Scream!! (talk) 18:36, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's entirely possible that my air has more nitrogen than his...otherwise I can't figure out why I'd be laughing so hysterically at him. -- Seth Peck (talk) 18:30, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * He has "personally inspected archeological digs?" They don't really let people into digs, if they aren't either an active archeologist, or affiliated with a school.  Again, as with most things he says, i'm calling BS on this one.  though i've no doubt he THINKS he been to such a sight.  [[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 22:35, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Meh. I bet anyone on a package tour of the Holy Land can go to some former archaeological site and look at it from a safe distance. I'm sure Hurlbutt has no qualms about calling that a "personal inspection of an archaeological dig." Turpis 3:16 (talk) 23:57, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * He talks about killing thousands of people just to "spite the UN." What a douchebag. I'm sure war's a fun little game for him to play in his easy chair back in Jersey, in between dressing up like a 18th century toff and pretending he's a not just a useful tool politicians use to get out the crazy vote. It's not so much fun for the people who are doing the dying though. -- 03:49, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

Kony 2012 redux. Creationists and professional homophobes pay their bills.
It just gets better and better. P-Foster Talk " "Santorum is the cream rising to the top." " 22:17, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Do you honestly think that will stop the mindless drones of slacktivists? Osaka Sun (talk) 00:12, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * This Lou Engle guy and New Apostolic Reformation sound unreal. Acts of martyrdom against gay marriage and abortion? This video of his rally is genuinely scary. --Tweenk (talk) 01:29, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

Lonely frogs
There's a frog outside in the pond that's been doing its mating purr for a good few hours now, poor bastard. If it goes on any longer I'm liable to go outside and offer to mate with him myself. Just out of pity you understand. -- 03:52, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * What is this mating purr you speak of? Osaka Sun (talk) 05:10, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Jeez Jeeves. Give em some grubs or something and get to know em a little. Already imposing gender roles just from the sound of eir ribbet. ~ Lumenis (talk) 05:53, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * So, you have me curious now. did it stop? did he find a girly frog to make little frogletts?[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 18:05, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, he's still around tonight though seemingly less prolific than last night. Whether from despondency or from being tired due to excess froggy nookie I couldn't tell you. For some reason the pond is also playing host, temporarily I'm sure, to an old married pair of ducks just back from their winter hols. It's funny because they can spread their wings and touch both sides of the place, and there's a perfectly serviceable river not 2 minutes as the duck flies from here. It's a regular hotbed of hot animal on animal action down there. -- 00:56, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Gorilla on the Loose in Alabama!
almost Just like it says on the tin.

I confess that at least 50% of the reason I posted this is because it amuses me greatly to say, "Gorilla on the Loose in Alabama!" MDB (talk) 17:21, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Elsewhere in the South... -- Seth Peck (talk) 17:39, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * ...That poor jellyfish.--Dumpling (talk) 05:53, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Several years ago, I was visiting my parents. They had the local TV news on, and I remarked about one story, "trailer park trash."
 * Mom remarked, "that may be all they can afford."
 * I replied, "Mother, this was about a twenty three year old woman who got her eighteen year old boyfriend to go into her trailer and shoot her estranged husband with a shotgun."
 * Mom thought for a long moment and admitted, "okay, trailer park trash." MDB (talk) 17:47, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

I like how all the comments on the gorilla story are about bigfoot. 21:40, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

Evolution lulz
This came up on Failblog After Dark today. I found it to be rather hilarious. -- 17:43, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * As did I. *sips beer* The Heidelberg Kid (talk)

Pink Slime
Saw this, read this. Is there any evidence that food treated with ammonia gas or ammonium hydroxide is toxic? Why did mcdonalds, burger king, and taco bell stop using ammonium hydroxide? Is this a case of the internet mob overreacting? Can I sue the internet if I get e-coli from a taco? Given the amazing working conditions I am sure every single fast food franchise maintains this sounds like a great idea. TheCheatI run on alcohol 16:34, 10 March 2012 (UTC)


 * It seems to me like a combination of gross looking stuff coupled with dangerous sounding chemicals. I get why people are grossed out (looking at the stuff does make me thankful for being a vegetarian), but I have a feeling if people actually looked at 90% of what goes into their food they'd be grossed out by that too. The old "laws and sausages" axiom comes to mind. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 17:14, 10 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Some information on the chemical side of the story. First a digression: there is actually no such thing as "ammonium hydroxide". The existence of this molecule was postulated under the obsolete Arrhenius acid-base theory to explain why solutions of ammonia have a basic pH. Later spectroscopic measureents indicated that no such molecules are formed, which led to abandoning of this theory in favor of better ones, such as Brønsted-Lowry and Lewis acid-base theories. Now back to the point: concentrated solutions of ammonia in water are caustic and have antimicrobial activity. When eaten, non-caustic solutions of ammonia and its salts are non-toxic to humans. In fact, ammonium chloride is a traditional baking ingredient. See salty liquorice. Considerable quantities of ammonia are also dissolved in human urine as a product of protein metabolism.
 * Now about the meat itself. This "pink slime" sounds a lot like "mechanically separated meat", which is routinely used for pâtés, hot dogs and other downmarket meat products in Europe. It might not be very healthy, like all meat with high fat content, but it's definitely not toxic. This controversy is caused by people being shocked by simple realities and economics of food production. Leaving some meat on the bones is not only a waste, but also a liability. Clean bones are far simpler to dispose of. Fast food joints are simply following the pragmatic adage "the customer is always right".
 * The bottom line is that some ignorants made a lot of noise and tried to improve something, but ended up doing mostly harm. The hamburgers at McDonald's will not become more healthy. The likelihood of food poisoning will increase, unless another antimicrobial is added to the recipe. Some edible meat will go to waste, thereby increasing the carbon footprint of beef production. A loss on all fronts. This is actually quite typical of urban grassroots food efforts. Locavorism actually reduces economies of scale and increases the carbon footprint, while organic food turns mandated anachronisms and inefficiency into a fashion item. --Tweenk (talk) 23:05, 10 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I heard a story on this on NPR, so it's probably pretty accurate (the reporter was a Pulitzer winner to boot). The pink slime is made from scraps, which are some of the least healthy parts, although apparently they put it in a centrifuge to separate the fat from protein, so it's actually healthier in a sense than you might think. The parts that go into it are some of the ones most likely to carry e. coli, hence the chemicals. Part of the problem is that regulators are still finding e. coli or other harmful bacteria in it, even after the ammonia stuffs. I'm pretty sure most opposition comes from people who think it looks gross (which it certainly does, and the "pink slime" moniker doesn't help in that department). I wonder what they'd think if they looked so closely at everything else they eat. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 15:54, 11 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Tweenk, can't we just use this stuff as fertilizer? It seems as though feeding it to children is wrong.  Children should eat quality food, not the ground-up dregs of it.--Tiberius Gracchus.jpg. 20:51, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * You've never had scrapple, hogs head cheese, dirty rice, or fried spam have you? Тy Ahoy! 20:53, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't think I'll like the answer, but what's dirty rice? --Tiberius Gracchus.jpg. 20:55, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Chicken giblets/livers in rice with onions, celery and bell peppers. Тy Serious Business Guy 20:57, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Not to mention foie gras, which is almost universally considered a delicacy. But yet, this "pink slime" appears to be made in large part from connective tissue, and if my memories from anatomy class serves correctly, the only connective tissue we consider edible is bone marrow (although I'm unsure if bone marrow is connective tissue.  I'd have to look it up).  And Ty, I'm still awaiting a reply.--  03:08, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

Still #1 with racists
Palin's latest dog-whistle. Wake me up when the black uprising starts. Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 14:52, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * "We are all created equally." Didn't anti-ERA GOPers think otherwise?Civic Cat (talk) 21:41, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Godlike Productions
Hmmm... I see my IP address is blocked over there. Not that I'm complaining, but they have a little caveat "You may upgrade your account now to get immunity from bans and to continue to browse the site."

Sounds like a cheap moneymaking racket to me. -- PsyGremlin  15:13, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * In other news, it's old, but hysterical to see the GLP crowd discover Nuke Lies and descend into "Nowai!" "Wai!" arguments. -- PsyGremlin  15:15, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Choice material... Somebody on that forum also dropped this link which is even more head-scratching: it attempts to refute the existence of atomic nuclei AND Einstein's theory of relativity in a style that is reminiscent of Abd. People on Conservapedia could be interested. --Tweenk (talk) 01:38, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * The preface reminds me of how I used to write before I started reading Reasoning with Vampires... I'll try to finish it, anything that tries to refuse the existence of atomic nuclei will provide entertaining reading around my office. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>theist 11:18, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * In fairness, it is dated 1962. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>narchist 11:24, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * We've got an aorticle about Godlike Productions. Proxima Centauri (talk) 12:40, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * We totally need something on Dewey Larson. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>bomination 19:00, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Done, but this is making my head hurt. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>d hominem 09:47, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

All Meat Is Bad for You study
Would someone with the necessary scientific chops take a look at this study? For obvious reasons, I'm interested in its validity and the idea that meat-eating is a serious health hazard. But I'm also deeply suspicious about lifestyle studies, even long-term ones with a big sample. Is this legit?-- 11:51, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

I've added this to Vegetarianism. Proxima Centauri (talk) 12:18, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * To be honest, this study isn't all that impressive when you get down to the raw data. Especially since there are any number of external factors that they don't take into account. It's long been known that eating too much meat is not good for ones diet (thus the need for balance in one's diet). But if you look at the raw data, how much meat the test subjects were eating is unclear. Especially in the cases where the subjects had health problems. Sure, they ate meat. But the study doesn't give us data on how much meat they were consuming compared to people in the study who ate meat but had no health problems. 12:57, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * It's nothing new. We've known for years that having too much red meat in your diet is bad for you. As the BBC article says "The British Heart Foundation said red meat could still be eaten as part of a balanced diet". It's all about not eating something to excess. <font color="#777777">Crundy <font color="#00F0A20">Talk nerdy to me 13:02, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Pretty much. If you do a study and say "Oreo Cookies will kill you" and then fill it with data showing that people who ate Oreos were more like to get diabetes than those who don't, it flags the question of just how many Oreos the people who were diagnosed with diabetes were eating. Was it just a couple Oreos every now and then, or were they pigging out on them every day? More curiosly with this meat study, though, is the failure of the researchers to take exercise routines into account. Someone who eats good portions of meat but bikes everywhere is going to have different results than someone who eats MacDonald's burgers every day and loafs around the house. 13:26, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I don't understand... this study appears to specifically take into account the amount of meat being eaten. Am I not reading this correctly?-- 20:08, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * If Ben Goldacre has taught me anything, any news article that throws around the words "all" and "any" like that is probably highly misrepresenting what has actually been found. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>moral 13:29, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Shit, any tenth-grader (that isn't being homeschooled in New Jersey) prepping to take the ACTs knows that...if a "true/false" contains absolutes (e.g., "In the 1800s, all slaves came from Africa"), unless it's a math question (e.g., "all squares are rectangles") or a property definition (e.g. "all mammals are warm-blooded"), it's most likely false. -- Seth Peck (talk) 14:18, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * My crackpot biology teacher LOVES this topic. He repeatedly gives us handouts of studies like this one trying to persuade us that we are eating blocks of steamy, meaty cancer. Although many studies have been done about the effects of a diet containing meat vs. a plant-only diet, none of them have been able to stand up to all scrutiny provided: not even the most sound ones. Many articles will data mine studies like this one and larger research efforts looking for material... the idea being: present something that most people take for granted as fatal, the people will go, 'OH NO, THAT'S ME! D8' and your production will critical hit for massive (but very cheap) emotional damage. One of the first things he showed us in class was a long meat-scare film titled Forks over Knives that is so bad I am considering putting it up as an article on this site: massively misrepresenting test results and research, spitting logical fallacy after logical fallacy, ignoring historical context in order to show off better-looking numbers and graphs, and heavily omitting the details of the 'whole-foods plant-based diet' it touted as a cure-all. It was so bad somebody managed to analyze it before I did. At length and in detail.It's a pretty interesting read. But yeah, no. From the perspective of a journalist/journalism major with insight to the field, this is what probably happened. A study landed on this person's desk and they had 40 minutes to turn it into an article to put up on the web. This person knows very little about the topic, and the phrase 'all meat is bad for you' sounds better than 'study shows that maybe meat isn't as good for you as other things, you might want to just have a salad.' KnightOfTL;DR (talk) 15:00, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Forks Before Knives is the stupidest goddamn movie I ever saw.-- 20:08, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Good science, bad science, good logic, bad logic...you watch something like Super Size Me or Fast Food Nation and you'll become a vegetarian pretty quickly, even if only for a week or two. Hell, about seven years ago I got my first kidney stone, and I didn't change my diet...until I saw SSM which grossed me out of eating ANY fast food for about three months.  The appeal to emotion (as well as scary-health info, true or not) is enough to make even the most skeptical individuals a little more aware of their own eating habits..."hey, maybe I should eat more carrots and less chips", etc.  -- Seth Peck (talk) 15:07, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * They interviewed "a scientist" on the BBC radio news about this and his analysis was that for two identical men, one a red-meat eater the other one not, the life expectancy of the red-meat eater would be 79 years compared with 80 for the abstainer. 15:43, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * When you’re 79 that one extra year will make a big difference. Proxima Centauri (talk) 16:20, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * @Genghis, is that even statistically possible to say, given the range of error in statistics? I guess a mean would be the number it is, but still.  I'm not even sure how you can do "lifestyle" studies that do not have to correct for a million other factors.  I could be wrong, but i would suspect the average person who does not eat meat has other factors in his life that could make living a longer life, more likely.  Many (not all in any case) are likely to have some "spiritual" side, which science proves is one of many factors in reducing stress.  They probably likely cook more of their own foods - we all know how processed foods are hard on your system; they are less likely to eat out, etc.  those are "just pulled from my ass" type possible issues, but it seems to me the only way you show meat is "dangrous" is to do short term studies of people and record everything, and find out of meat is actually harming any body part.  I suspect you'll find teh answer is "no".  ;-)  I would be curious, though, if there is a flip side.  Do humans need to eat any meat?  (I'm guessing 'no", and i'm guessing AD has even some studies (real ones) that show it's "no") --[[Image:Pink mowse.png|25px]]<font face="Estrangelo Edessa"><font color="Blue">Godot    oi, putain, genial, merci 16:27, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Well, you could say that since meat requires more GHG emissions in general to produce, it's bad for all of us. Don't you love sophistry? Nebuchadnezzar (talk) 17:36, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * What we hear from the news reports is that there is an X% increase in the risk of getting cancer and/or dying earlier if you eat/do one particular thing. That has to be put into the context of how many people who don't eat/do that particular thing also get the same cancer or die earlier. Our whole life expectancy is a combination of multiple factors which might combine or not to give a short or long life. What the guy on the radio was saying is that the current research (which apparently has a lot of data behind it) actually translates into about one year off an 80 year lifespan on average . Some red-meat eaters will live into their 100s. Are all those on the Queen's telegram list veggies? I don't think so. My parents are both in their mid-80s and eat meat. People die for a multitude of reasons and you don't know when you are born how long you will actually live. That "one year" difference for a red-meat eater is a statistic for the population as a whole and actually is less than the danger of an early demise for being 10 pounds overweight. It's not as simple as being on your deathbed at 79 and thinking "if I'd never eaten bacon I could have had another year". On a personal level I would prefer any extra years to be in my 20s and 30s rather than in my 80s; unfortunately, you don't get that choice. As for meat eating causing increased GHG, well let's just kill all non-productive animals! That would solve the problem.  17:47, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Other risk factors are also important context. For instance, these are the cancer rates for various countries. Obviously, more general lifestyle and location and how local laws alter the environment are extremely important. Now, do the specific risks people talk about alter things as dramatically as this? Usually not, because these are rates governed by countless individual risk factors combining. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>pathetic 17:54, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

So what I'm getting from you is that you don't think lifestyle factors like cancer rates and the like were sufficiently controlled for in this study? That is possible, although I don't have the background to judge the study effectively. But I don't see how you can reasonably call an average gain of a year's life to be negligible. Yes, you're not certain to live longer if you don't eat red meat, but neither are you certain to live longer if you smoke - that doesn't mean that either practice is healthy for you.

I slogged through all the numbers and science in this thing, and it seems to hold up okay. I don't see any flaws, although I can't check the math in the stats myself or assess their protocols. The press coverage may be bad, but does anyone see any reason why this study doesn't hold up in itself? Doesn't this prove fairly well that a healthy diet minimizes or excludes red meat - even if that's "common knowledge"?-- 04:42, 14 March 2012 (UTC)


 * Here is what I don't get. Correlative studies suffer from the lack of variable controls that a true experiment can offer. In order to attribute anything to red meat you would have to compare "eaters" and "non-eaters" that did not differ along any other factor than the consumption of meat. But a person who does not eat red meat at all is going to have many, many factors different from someone who does. Now some researchers attempt to deal with this with some sort of multiple regression analysis, or maybe even something fancy like an ICA or PCA type analysis that tries to isolate a single factor. But these only work if the other factors are independent of each other along some measurable axis. I guess I have to read the actual study but this just seems really really problematic for me. Tmtoulouse (talk) 19:09, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Read the actual study so you can tell me if it's valid, scientist! I was a goddamn English major!
 * I think this is what you're talking about?
 * "In multivariate analysis, we simultaneously controlled for intakes of total energy, whole grains, fruits, and vegetables (all in quintiles) and for other potential nondietary confounding variables with updated information at each 2- or 4-year questionnaire cycle. These variables included age; body mass index (calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared) (<23.0, 23.0-24.9, 25.0-29.9, 30.0-34.9, or 35.0); race (white or nonwhite); smoking status (never, past, or current [1-14, 15-24, or 25 cigarettes per day]); alcohol intake (0, 0.1-4.9, 5.0-14.9, or 15.0 g/d in women; 0, 0.1-4.9, 5.0-29.9, or 30.0 g/d in men); physical activity level (<3.0, 3.0-8.9, 9.0-17.9, 18.0-26.9, or 27.0 hours of metabolic equivalent tasks per week); multivitamin use (yes or no); aspirin use (yes or no); family history of diabetes mellitus, myocardial infarction, or cancer; and baseline history of diabetes mellitus, hypertension, or hypercholesterolemia. In women, we also adjusted for postmenopausal status and menopausal hormone use."-- 20:11, 13 March 2012 (UTC)


 * ...Speaking of meat...HAPPY PI/STEAK DAY?--Dumpling (talk) 05:33, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I can't celebrate one half of this holiday because I'm veggie. Have to try to convince the wife to double up on the other half.-- 09:51, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Back to the topic at hand, I think the biggest problem is that the LA Times article you sight seems to have an inherent bias in its tone. If you look at other news sources, CNN for example, they report that eating too red meat is bad for you, and that substituting poultry or fish a few times a week instead of red meat is actually more healthful than going completely vegetarian. In fact, the website for the original study (not the LA Times article) suggests that this conclusion, NOT that eating any meat at all is bad for you, is their conclusion. And this takes me back to my point that, what it means is, people should have more balanced diets. 20:00, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

The diseases you already know about?
You might be able to control your meat/fat intake but 2/3 of the population are dying of heart disease and stroke, the primary cause being atherosclerosis which is plaque in your arteries from eating greasy meat, cheese, etc, (and not exercising). Worried about Al Quaeda? You realize that twice as many Americans died of heart disease on 9/11? Fat/meat/cheese/milk is an acquired taste. People who are not trained to eat animal products often find them disgusting. Training your kids to eat grease/meat/cheese would seem to increase their risks of acquiring these diseases as well as cancer.

There is also this little issue of karma (assuming the mandatory corporate factory farming misery)... you scoff?

You can make anything taste good by adding fat/oil and sweet. I eat a lot of warm bread/rice with spices and canola/olive oil. Plates don't really need cleaning because oil doesn't stink and solidify. I put plates in stackable paper trays so the bottoms never get dirty as they would if the plates where stacked on top of each other. I have no pans to clean either (although this is true no matter what I make because this is why I use microwaves for everything). I lick my personal utensils clean and I never have to "wash dishes" except rinse the pressure cooker. Well some things (mushed potatoes or oats) dry fast on a warm plate so I have to lick it clean as I am eating. Then I eat meat all the time but I almost boycott it to minimize karma and health damage.

The one major problem I have is finding a supplier of beans with the gas-causing chemicals removed. This can be done by fermenting with two bacteria. Unicow (talk) 09:00, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * What the fuck is wrong with your brain?-- 09:50, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think that might have to get cited in my what-the-fuckery list. Scarlet A.png<font color=#CC0033>gnostic 15:56, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Yeah, that went from seemingly sound and sensible to holy fuck on a dime. Hey, Uni, do your guests know that all dishware has been personally licked clean? Turpis 3:16 (talk) 16:09, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I thought that just soaking them in water pre-cooking removed much of the compounds (not sure if carbohydrates or proteins that do it) that cause flatulence, but I don't know for sure if that's what it does. When you soak dry beans in water, when you change the water it smells terrible and is a strange color. Anybody confirm? Or is this goofy and I need to recalibrate my knowledge of bean chemistry? <font face="MS Sans Serif" size="3">[[File:knightoftldrsig.png]]KnightOfTL;DR longissimus non legeri 16:04, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Personal anecdotal testing (not extensive at all; maybe a dozen or so times) tells me that the more I soak beans before cooking them, the less they produce flatulence. I hear this has something to do with breaking down the the complex sugars or something? I dunno. The water after you're done soaking them is really dark to the point that it's almost opaque, but I've never noticed it smelling particularly bad. Cow...Hammertime! 16:31, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I suspect you're losing a lot of nutrients to the water as well. Turpis 3:16 (talk) 18:28, 14 March 2012 (UTC)

Looking at the title of this section, can I just point out that there is a difference between saying "All Meat Is Bad for You" and "All Red Meat is Bad for you.".--BobSpring is sprung! 21:14, 14 March 2012 (UTC)
 * Turpis, it helps improve the sanity of my previous statements if I follow up with some contrast. The plates are indeed licked clean yet some crustiness often remains so most would know what they are about to partake. The fruit flies sometimes complain. The ants are unable to reach the plates due to petroleum jelly on the legs of the standing shelf. Hard workers those ants, removing or locating the roach food, so I don't need roaches to remove the rodent food. I usually tell humans about stuff like that before feeding them. I suppose now would be a good time to publicly announce my worst sanitation problem. This is the fecal matter which drops forth. That is not so much the problem as what is left on the behind. I don't yet have a proper holder to make my shower head (with hose and center stream concentrator) into hands-free bidet while seated on the side of the bathtub. I can't seem to get away with simply dry paper wiping; I keep catching whiffs of imperfection when seated or in certain yoga positions. A rubber nodulual on a rod would deprive my soapy fingers of the satisfaction of knowing just exactly where the removed pieces are not, but it would of course prevent the microscopic unholies from hiding in my fingerprints. Unicow (talk) 05:29, 15 March 2012 (UTC)

The solution to global warming, animal suffering, 66% of human disease, etc

 * I've tried dumping the soaking water yet there remains leakage. I really need a zero-flatulence solution. (Incidentally wind is broken at this moment and again while re-editing this sentence. Brussels sprouts, nuff said.) It is the opposite of aroma therapy; aroma abuse. "The flatulence-producing elements [FPE] (alpha-galactosides, raffinose, stachyoseand verbascose and soluble fibre in the case of beans) can be reduced through natural lactic acid fermentation...The flatulence destroying bacteria are Lactobacillus casei and Lactobacillus plantarum." If no one has marketed canned beans with FPE removed, we must come up with a name brand and start the jarring business. This is vital to the ecology, environment, economy, and health of the planet. Microbiologists, please explain the equipment we will need. Will a bathtub covered with plastic wrap be sufficient? Godspeed fellow nerdlingtons. Unicow (talk) 05:29, 15 March 2012 (UTC)