Talking to relatives
quickmeme.com/meme/35oldq/
quickmeme.comPosted Jan 10, 2012, 5:41 PM UTC
1.2K244
quickmeme.comYesterday at work, I spoke with this woman for TWO HOURS trying to convince her that evolution is not whales turning into horses.
She's a dog breeder.
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But dog breeding is different .. dogs don't turn into cats, just different looking dogs!
EDIT: Seems I forgot to add a </sarcasm> tag on my post ..
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Check mate.
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IMasturbateToMyself
Check please! \o
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I really love you. Such a noticable username and great post content awards you this RES tag: http://i.imgur.com/eshHX.png
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MACRO VS MICRO!!!!
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look everyone, bold
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cllaaawwww
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[deleted]
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So brave!
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When breeding one is trying to "evolve" the dogs into an ideal candidate, but since it's not done in the way of natural selection it may just as well be called "intelligent design". ;-)
Not sure what my point is, though. :-o
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it kind of is though
whales elephants deer horses all have a common ancestor.
http://www.don-lindsay-archive.org/creation/dna_virus.html
but yeah a modern horse into a modern whale didn't happen
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0 points 24 minutes ago
Don't understand which imbecile did that. We're not Pokemon with a 3 stage evolutionary chain.
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Egg > Tadpole > Frog
Caterpillar > Pupa > Butterfly
Checkmate Pokemon deniers.
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Magikarp goes in, Gyarados goes out; you can't explain that!
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This is more akin to Eevee, no?
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I WAS LIED TO
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I know some dog breeders and they take genetics very seriously, amazing she doesn't have more knowledge.
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Maybe we should read dog breeder as puppy mill operator?
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She's a dog breeder.
When I read this I facepalmed so hard I have a headache now...What the fuck?
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When I was in college, I took a class on computer science theory. In it, we were randomly assigned papers of note to teach to the class. One student was assigned a famous CS paper on genetic algorithms and, effectively, using evolution to accomplish tasks in software. This student was also a creationist. The student had no problem justifying believing in both at once. They argued that they believed in MICROevolution, allowing things to become better versions of the things they are, but did not allow for MACROevolution, allowing things to become entirely different sorts of things.
Honestly I think this is a sign that we're winning. As we keep finding more easy to prove truths, they have to move the goalposts a bit. Eventually we'll reach "Okay, so we agree about Earth being round, evolution being true, the earth being older than 6000 years old, the big bang happening, but we believe that God meant for all of those things or something similar to happen when he allowed things to come into existence" and then we'll be cool.
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The irony is palpable.
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New band name: "Church Pamphlet Science"
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Faith + 1
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I want to get down on my knees and start pleasing Jesus. I want to feel his salvation all over my face.
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Gonna make it soooo dry for you, Jesus.
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I NEED YOU IN MY LIFE, JESUS!
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SANCTIFIEEEEDDAH!
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[deleted]
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Me, fail English?
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That's unpossible!
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Here is a plain-text transcript of this Quickmeme image:
Title: Talking to relatives
Meme: Creepy Wonka
OH, EVOLUTION HAS BEEN DISCREDITED BY SCIENTISTS? ENLIGHTEN ME WITH MORE OF YOUR CHURCH-PAMPHLET SCIENCE
^Background: ^[Quickmeme.com]
Posting this comment allows the meme's content to be found and enjoyed by more people. FAQ.
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I love you, please don't ever quit your job.
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...it's an automated bot. There's no one there to quit a job.
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I believe in the automated bot.
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He has responded to comments, so even if it's a bot he uses the account to read replies.
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All the quick meme transcribing jobs have been offshored and outsourced anyway.
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Quitting isn't part of his code, bub.
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Just wanted to remind everyone that most of the current Republican presidential candidates - including Ron Paul - fall into this category. That means we could easily have a US President in the year 2012 who doesn't understand or accept basic junior-high science.
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Oh, I'd bet they don't all actually believe evolution is false. It's something they have to say to get elected by the religious folks in the party.
Remember, bullshit is ok as long as you're just pandering for votes.
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Totally the case. It's definitely the case. The difference between what a politician actually believes and what they pretend to believe to stay in office is so immense that the cognitive dissonance would kill most people. Most of these people have top-notch educations; Ron Paul's an actual medical doctor - they at the very least understand the principles of evolution.
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Never underestimate the power of brainwashing and the ability of the human brain to compartmentalize or rationalize belief. I know a few college educated people who are creationists and believe in a young earth, along with all of the other bible myths. Yet in any other capacity they are normal, intelligent people with good logical thinking abilities and a sense of humor.
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It's probably the case with Mitt Romney, but I wouldn't doubt any of the other candidates.
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They must see it in practice, what with MRSA and antibiotics having to be modified..
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This is the truth. My brother was going to school for Political Science, and switched majors. His words: "I just couldn't come to terms with having to lie for a living."
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Wishful thinking is not acceptable in a skeptic's path to truth.
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Neither are non-sequiturs?
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This move is usually called the "Everything Mitt Romney Ever Believes Move".
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Yeah, it's kinda fascinating how completely Romney seems to lack convictions about basically anything.
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This could well be the case, but it hardly matters if their policies and statements reflect an anti-science administration.
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I will say this first I'm from Europe and I only know about Ron Paul via reddit so my view on him will be very colored.
But when Ron Paul did an AMA he talked about evolution and I have to agree with what he said does it really matter if you don’t believe in evolution or not when president ? as long as he doesn't force it on anyone he should be allowed to believe what ever he wants
I feel like disregarding ( might be a better fitting word in this context then not believing) in evolution doesn't interfere with your day to day life unless you are a biologist or something , same with the earth going around the sun as long as your job doesn't involve space does it have any impact on your life ?
Yes you might be ignorant but aren't we all on one subject or another ?( economics, math , languages , history , chemistry , physics etc. )
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When you are a doctor (like Ron Paul was), an understanding and acceptance of evolution is pretty much mandatory (which is probably why Paul hasn't practiced medicine in decades).
Also, I think that an understanding and acceptance of the most basic and important principle of biology is very much an important factor in determining who would and would not be a good president. In fact, I'd go so far to say it's a good litmus test for science understanding/policy of elected officials.
Also, Paul isn't ignorant with regards to evolution. He has gone right out to say that it's "just a theory" that "needs to be tested" and suggested that it's not something that is virtually universally accepted in the scientific community. Perhaps it is ignorant, but it's willfully ignorant. It has to be, because Paul was an MD. There is no possible way that he could be ignorant of what a scientific theory is. All of medical science depends upon the theory of evolution, as medical science is simply a subset of biology.
One of the biggest reasons I disapprove of Ron Paul is because he is, at the very least, willfully ignorant about the subject of evolution. Best case, he actually does accept it, and has straight-up lied when questioned on it, in which case, he's no better than Rick Perry.
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Belief is important because beliefs inform decisions. And when it's the president of the USA, those can be huge decisions that effect everyone. How will public science education fare under leadership that values superstition more than science?
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It's very telling of what kind of attitude one has regarding the truth. Someone who disregards evolution is saying that they know better than people who have literally dedicated their lives to studying it. What's that kind of person going to say when they're given recommendations by economists, or military officials? Will they trust the professionals, or go by what they arbitrarily believe is right?
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Someone who disregards evolution is saying that they know better than people who have literally dedicated their lives to studying it.
except ron paul doesn't say that at all. in fact he says that he doesn't know enough about the subject to comment on it.
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Ron Paul is generally a straight shooter, I'll give you that. But can you honestly tell me that doesn't sound like a cop out? It's on par with saying you haven't studied cosmology enough to have an opinion about heliocentrism.
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One could just as easily say that priests have literally dedicated their lives to studying God, so why do you disregard their views? It could be argued that most people who enter into priesthood already drank the Kool-aid. Ask 50 priests if they believe in God, see how many answers you get.
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A) On religious matters, sure, he can take the opinions of clergy. But show me the priests who have sincerely studied genetics and still deny evolution.
B) If you really want to have the discussion about the difference between hard science and philosophy/faith, we can do that. But to save some time: evidence.
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Its what charbo187 said , he seems opposed to judging either way because he has little knowledge to the subject. Yes as a President he might have to act with subjects he has little knowledge about. Only time tell us what he does when he has to do that
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Then we can only start to worry when he chooses a scientific advisor.
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He's still miles ahead of everyone else I've seen. If he doesn't force it on anyone, which I don't think he will, he can believe whatever he wants. Its almost impossible to find a candidate that you agree with 100%. I agree with him more often then not on issues that really matter.
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I think the most logical approach is to make the decision that will result in the best outcome (even if the best is bad). For instance, I voted for Gore instead of Nader only because it was the best possibility of beating Bush. Unfortunately it was futile.
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Is the scope of your political thinking really so narrow that extrasystemic options don't even occur to you? By all means, then, hold your nose and vote for a liar, a superstitious lunatic, or better yet, the two-for-one special.
Democracy: Love it!
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Yes, it is that narrow--it's called a 2-party system, and it's what we have. There isn't a viable "extrasystemic" option. It's delusional and futile. Your write-in candidate has exactly 0% chance of being elected. At least I'm actually having a tiny influence on the plausible outcome of the election.
And if you don't vote, then you're idly watching as the "liar / superstitious lunatic" collects votes.
TLDR - Refusing to choose between 2 outcomes is worse than choosing the better one.
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Like we haven't had one before? Lol.
GUYS LOOK, THE NEXT PRESIDENT COULD BE RACIST, OR RICH, OR WHITE
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SO he said he doesn't believe we know enough to have definitive proof of either side. I like a man who wants more facts to make said decision, before make the decision. So how about fuck you for that.
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You can get these facts in any general science textbook, or any other credible source of knowledge in the past hundred years. You sound like an idiot.
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I know evolution is fact, but just because he doesn't want to say it is and wants further evidence is no reason to say he supports it or denies it completely and is asinine to accuse him of it.
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I just don't think ignorance is a good excuse in this day and age, especially of a politicized topic like evolution, and especially for a presidential candidate.
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I actually managed to make my family accept evolution as a fact, except that it apparently only applies to animals and not humans, apparently because there's a "missing link" between apes and humans.
I'm stuck, I'm giving up hope.
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I refuse to think that cake ingredients turn into cake because I have yet to see the missing link between cake and cake ingredients.
"BUT UH DURR HURP KLAPAUCIUS", you might say, "WUT ABUTT UNDERCOOKED CAKE AHURR I'M RETARDED."
Have the kindly nurse who reads and writes for you explain that cake ingredients may seem to become cake-like. That much is true. Biologists can take a bit of runny goo and say "Clearly this was going to be a cake if we heat it up some more, because I hate God!" But we never see runny goo actually develop into cake. For example, have you ever seen a pan full of batter with chunks of cake in it? Have you ever seen batter form three layers, each with cream cheese and pineapple separating them? Have you ever found photographic evidence of batter covered in frosting that says "Happy Birthday Margaret"?
No, sir. Only God can bake a cake.
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Awesome analogy. I'm going to use this next time I get a chance.
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Have you talked with Trurl lately? He's built a machine which produces self-reproducing cake batter. Batter is poured into a pan, bakes, fills, layers, and frosts itself, then spits out another batch of batter.
But that's nothing compared with his efforts building an apple pie from scratch...
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...wut
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Do what I do to prove that we evolved from apes. I get a banana and make gorilla sounds.
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I was in the same situation with my mom, until I realized she was thinking of chimpanzees when I said "apes". So tell your family that we are not descendants of present-day-monkeys, but that once far in the past there was a common ancestor. That did it for my mom.
And if they ask "then why aren't there other types of humans?" or "where is our common ancestor?", well... we probably killed them all.
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There in fact are several cousin species which lay under the genus homo. However all of them are extinct except us humans. Some of them however only went extinct quite recently.
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Denisova hominin were dated to 41,000 years ago.
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Homo floresiensis would have gone extinct even more recently at 12,000 years ago.
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Neanderthals which was probably the most successful human-like species besides us humans went extinct around 25,000 years ago.
All these listed species are most likely descendants to Homo ergaster
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Show them some pictures of hominids. They're not 'just' apes, they're hominids (which are a subset of apes, but still.)
I think seeing that we evolved from species which looked very much like people will help them out.
If not, they just want to say they came from dirt, instead, because dirt > monkeys.
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You know what was a trip to look at? This bald ape.
I totally understand evolution, but that really seals the deal on the whole ape-to-human thing. I mean, that bald ape and us have a common ancestor, you have to explain that, but the connection is so goddamn obvious.
Or even an ape skeleton is pretty uncanny.
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'Do yourself and your faith the honour of saying it's faith. Don't say it's science-based; you won't get away with it.' - Christopher Hitchens
Honestly, I wish these kinds of jolly people would just say that they think scientists are wrong. It's insulting for them to say such things about the state of the scientific community today, in which evolution by natural selection has no contenders for theory which explains the abundance of species and how we are then descended from common ancestors.
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Yup, as long as the human race has it's thinking twisted by religion, we are at even greater risk of failing to deal with reality.
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Exact words from my mom at Christmas.
I think those liberal professors made you think like that, and that's why you don't understand.
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They honestly believe that liberal professors sit around, smoke pot and laugh about all the money they make off that big evolution hoax.
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"Reality has a well-known liberal bias".
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those damn professors and their "facts" and "observations". I CAN FEEL IT IN MY GUT
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Best version of this meme I've come across, can't upvote enough. As a geneticist, I hate it when creationists try to lecture me on science. They also love to through around that myth that Charles Darwin recanted his work on his death bead. All utter horse shit.
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Ya, Pythagoras recanted his theorem on his deathbed. So we can't use it ever!
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And even if he did recant his work on his deathbead, my great-grandmother kept trying to boil imaginary eggs on her deathbed! Dying people are often too far gone to take seriously anyhow.
Anyway he didn't, so whatever.
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Please don't say "even if..."; it gives that urban myth credibility in their eyes. The woman who started this tale was not only not at his death bed, she wasn't even on the same continent when he died.
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Okay fair enough. It's just that the story would mean nothing regardless of whether it was true, so it's stupid to use it as any kind of evidence against evolution.
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Please don't say "even if..."; it gives that urban myth credibility in their eyes.
...huh? If you're talking to these people and start a sentence "So if you were to burst into flames right now", do they start screaming and rolling around on the ground?
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I would peel and eat one of those eggs if it made her feel better.
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its not like saying "actually, its not true" will actually make it not true.
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Ahh... You've had a taste of the the Lady Hope story. Someone pulled that on me at my wife's church. I came the next week with a two grocery bags of documents and books supporting evolution. I was pretty new at being more outspoken atheist and this was probably not the best route.
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Lol, I bet you were a hit bringing (science) books to a church
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I remember the guy said "don't you just have a little book I can read". He evidence was produced by the reknowned scientist Kent Hovid. I brought pictures of his "university".
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I'm sure you already know this, but it's worth mentioning that whether or not Darwin recanted on his deathbed is irrelevant to the science of the matter - which has been tested hundreds of times over nearly 150 years of evolutionary science and is basically one of the most widely accepted scientific theories in the world and has some of the hardest evidence for it, too.
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Throw?
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I've never heard this one till this Christmas actually. must be something in the air
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Oh man. Over Christmas, my family was over at my very Christian Aunt's house and I was watching some show on various planets on I think The Science Channel.
My aunt and dad asks if we can turn it. My dad just finds it boring, but my Aunt questions it validity as to why we shouldn't watch it; asking questions like "How do they KNOW it does that?" "How do they KNOW that is what is it made of?" "So, its just a GUESS that that that is what would happen?"
I try my best to explain how we know what the universe is made of, how stuff reacts, satellite, telescopes, etc, etc. Her reply to everything is "so, they just ASSUME that's how it is"
I wanted to take her Jesus picture and slap her and yell "THIS IS WHAT MAKES YOU STUPID"
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lol. always such skepticism from people who can be made to believe just about any fucking bullshit story religion face fucks down their throat.
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Correction: Oh, evolution has been discredited by religious people? Please, enlighten me more with your stereo-typing.
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Also, according to my in-laws, global warming is a farce, and the economy has been ruined by illegal aliens.
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O'rielly said it. Must be true.
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More like "Those IDIOTS need to start teaching CREATIONISM in school, there are so many facts people have found for it!" ಠ_ಠ This was said word-for-word by my uncle.
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I am so very glad that I don't talk to my extended family. My mother believes a lot of silly crap, but I can be honest in my conversations with her - and have disabused her of many of her sillier notions.
On the other hand, one of my uncles believes in ridiculous pagan-style witch shit ("cutting" of pinworms and paying a person to wish tooth ache away are the two things I'm aware of), and one of my aunts is a devoutly hypocritical christian nurse who talks of her patients seeing the future and such.
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I usually keep them talking until they say something I can easily disprove with kitchen science. This usually takes about three minutes.
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My mother's a creationist and she has taught me some very important lessons, like know when to quit.
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you poor soul
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Willy Wonka is by far my favorite meme to see. Never a fail.
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ugh I gotta stop clicking on these Wonka Memes. This one just doesn't do Gene Wilder justice.
If you must go with Depp.
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I agree, Depp does make a creepier Willie Wonka.
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Upvote for "church-pamphlet science"
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[deleted]
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First person to completely discredit evolution would be the next Nobel Prize winner...Every scientists would want to be that guy if evolution was not true. That is how science works, everybody is watching everybody's work trying to prove them wrong, that's how you become famous as a scientists. Just ask Einstein, he discredited Newton's laws on empty space and the rest...is history.
EDIT: An entire paper on scientists competition , I'm not just making this stuff up.
"Abstract: Competition among scientists for funding, positions and prestige, among other things, is often seen as a salutary driving force in U.S. science..."
Totally concur. It's like they think science is about repeatedly and emphatically reiterating existing scientific 'dogma'.
In fact... if you discovered evidence disproving natural selection, or evidence to convince someone of the existence of a god or any of their other beliefs, you would be set FOR LIFE.
Probably because that's what religion is about.
I was about to say "but that implies that they are totally incapable of contemplating the opposite side's perspective"... but realized that if they had ever done that, they probably wouldn't still be believers.
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I think it's more likely due to their only hands on experience of "science" is doing some experiments in school. They view all scientists all repeating the same steps as everyone else, and if something comes out different from another experiment you obviously did it wrong.
I guess they skipped the hypothesis step of the experiments.
Actually, now you mention it that may not be far from the truth.
I remember experiments in school, I remember being taught to start with a hypothesis (which a teacher called a "theory" when we were younger - good way to confuse everyone later on, teach), write up a method and draw conclusions but I don't really remember anyone drilling into us what exactly we were hoping to achieve by writing up in that fashion. Certainly nobody ever explained that the whole point of the experiment was to find out whether or not the hypothesis was true and that an experiment that proved a hypothesis false could be just as valuable as one that proved it true or even one that was inconclusive - so therefore it didn't much matter whether or not the hypothesis was proven, the important part was that you had one you could test and that you could write an explanation that someone could use to repeat your testing method.
I think many of us just wrote the hypothesis to fit the results after the experiment, thinking you were trying to prove it true.
Some people just can't wrap their heads around an absence of agency in the world. They'll say shit like "Yeah, I get it, atoms and whatnot, but who's making them all go around?"
Closest I can come to conceptualizing this worldview is a kid's cartoon where every object has a face and sings songs.
I am loving your metaphor.
The Songs: You can HEAR EM and FEEL EM but they CAN'T BE SEEN.
That's PROOF you don't need to observe things to know they're real.
Checkmate, atheists.
That's a bit backwards.
Scientists aren't trying to prove the guy before him wrong, rather they're always building on top of the current realm of human knowledge. Admittedly sometimes you do get a complete 180, but more often than not you just have a more refined, nuanced version of the previous model
Yes, that is the ideal. The reality is much closer to think_free's description, I'm afraid.
I'm not so sure about this.
The filed of biology, we don't have legions of scientists trying to disprove DNA as the key to hereditary information, rather we have them trying to better understand how DNA is the key to hereditary information.
Same with
astrology(embarrassing typo edit) astronomy, most of the effort isn't spent on disproving the Big Bang theory, but rather understanding what exactly happened durring it.Same with physics, the amount of people trying to break apart the model of gravity pales in comparison to the amount of people working on a model that better explains the force of gravity as we know it.
In all of these cases, the scientific community is working to refine and better our current understanding, not necessarily toss out and disprove what we already know.
astrology, eh?
I think you are thinking too general. While both biologists accept that DNA is the key to hereditary information, normally there are multiple hypotheses being worked in different labs with part of the focus of each group on disproving the other group's hypothesis.
Firstly, you'll be meaning astronomy. I hope for your sake it's very, very late wherever you are.
Secondly, you do realise that the first barrier is getting funding, right? Scientists aren't self-employed, they need to put together a proposal with supporting current research, while demonstrating that this - with the right funding - will fill a gap in the human knowledge base.
astrology has nothing to do with BBT.
But the most revolutionary scientific discoveries are usually the result of a breaking down and then a building back up. We don't hear about the scientists that confirm evolution every day because that is what is expected. If someone actually disproved evolution it would be HUGE.
Maybe it's just a typo on your part and I'm no nazi or anything, but it's a common mistake that people think it's "Noble" prize when it's actually Nobel, named after Alfred Nobel who invented dynamites and wanted to be remembered as the creator of something good and not something that killed a lot of people. Interesting that his name sounds just like noble.
TIL...fixed, thanks.
What's a fist person?
the person that knocks everyone out with their flawless logic.
edit: damn he edited it. now our joke doesn't make sense.
original post he said "Fist person to completely discredit evolution" :)
Hehe..oops.
To add onto this, competition doesn't exist solely for individual recognition and prestige, but profit as well. There are thousands of companies out there trying to patent basic biological and functions and genetic code for the ability to profit on them. If the basis of evolution was wrong, much, if not all, of this research would be going in a very different direction.
Reminds me of the people who think scientists are all into some kind of plan to hide all evidence of the bible being real.
That stuff really cracks me up. Could you imagine how many scientists, teachers, politicians, laymen and on and on would have to be in on the "conspiracy"? The only group that has been able to perpetrate a lie that immense was the Catholic Church...seriously.
Wrong. That person would be ridiculed and discredited and his/her career ruined. Then, in about forty years, that person's work would be rediscovered and lauded. This has happened over and over in scientific history.
If they proved the assertion, submitted the testing methods, and it was replicated by other scientists probably not. Because evolution is sooo accepted there would be a lot of testing to prove it was wrong, but I assure you that if the original results were replicated a fuck load of phone calls would be being made the next day.
Yep. Look at general relativity. When experimental data matched Einstein's theory pretty much precisely, physicists basically sat up and said, "well I'll be damned".
A theory that was accepted for hundreds of years was tossed out when the evidence proved it wrong...I love science.
Gregor Mendel proved his assertions and was ignored until after he was dead. Alfred Wegener revolutionized northern hemisphere meterology but was ignored for forty years. Galileo's works were doomed to rot in obscurity during most of his life. All of these guys created excellent work that could be easily replicated, but they were laughed at by the scientific establishment.
Gregor Mendel: July 20, 1822 – January 6, 1884
Alfred Wegener: November 1, 1880 – November 1930
Galileo Galilei: 15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642
With the advent of mass communication through the internet it has become be very hard for the "scientific establishment" to ignore facts for long periods.
Try again using proper english and grammar. Thanks.
Try again without being an asshole. Thanks.
To prove someone wrong, you will have to prove something else right.
ಠ_ಠ You can't be serous. Something can be wrong without there being something right on the other end. That would be like saying "Dark energy is a unicorn fart" then expecting people to think it correct because we don't know what dark energy really is. Come on, this is simple stuff here. You judge a statements truth on the probability of the truthfulness, not if there is no counter to the statement.
Thank you. Judge every theory on its own merits, not on the merits of competing ideas.
I guess there is no need to read Popper, Hempel, Kuhn, Wimsatt, or anyone else now that we have you to explain the success of science.
What would philosophers have to do with my description of science success? Are you trolling or just confused?
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To be fair, those are philosophers of science and some were scientists themselves, so their opinions probably are relevant. Having said that, all bojang1es is doing is name dropping in a very uninformative way. Unnecessary too since said philosophers described normative systems, not descriptive ones, and you already acknowledged that.
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That happened years ago, where have you been?
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Being an atheist, unfortunately, won't make us automatically agree with you. We're not a church.