I know the Christians who read this are going to make the argument that it’s not actual marriage that is referenced, but unions. But, I mean, c’mon. This is an excellent article and you should read the whole thing.
One of the most common arguments against same sex marriage is that “one man, one woman is the way it’s always been for thousands and thousands of years.” Yeah, but no. Humanity has and continues to practice almost every arrangement possible in the name of love, politics, religion and economics. While a man and a woman has been the most common due to biological impulse, it’s not everyone’s preference. Hell, between the 10th and 12th centuries, Christian churches had little problem performing same sex marriage.
This Is All Kinds Of Wrong of the Day: Their existence was widely reported last August, but the demand for pills made from dead human babies apparently hasn’t let up: South Korean customs officials revealed today that they have confiscated more than 17,000 of the pills from smugglers over the past nine months.
Hospitals and abortion clinics in China have continued to sell dead babies to medical companies that dry them out, grind them up, and sell them in pill form as alternative remedies to increase stamina. The dead babies are “mostly abortions or stillbirths” and are being used with the mothers’ consent.
Health authorities in Asia worry that if the powdered fetus trade continues, the capsules will find their way online, where the sick and gullible will be susceptible to super-bacteria and other harmful ingredients found in the human flesh capsules.
Badvertising of the Day: Right-wing, anti-science think tank the Heartland Institute has unveiled a new billboard campaign in its hometown of Chicago that compares those who believe in global warming to the Unabomber, Charles Manson, and Osama bin Laden.
What these murderers and madmen have said differs very little from what spokespersons for the United Nations, journalists for the “mainstream” media, and liberal politicians say about global warming.
It continues:
The people who still believe in man-made global warming are mostly on the radical fringe of society. This is why the most prominent advocates of global warming aren’t scientists. They are murderers, tyrants, and madmen.
Really?!
Thankfully, spot-on analysis by The Daily Beast‘s Andrew Sullivan wins the day:
In some ways, this is an almost perfect illustration of what has happened to the “right.” A refusal to acknowledge scientific reality; and a brutalist style of public propaganda that focuses entirely on guilt by the most extreme association.
Fiction seems to be more effective at changing beliefs than nonfiction, which is designed to persuade through argument and evidence. Studies show that when we read nonfiction, we read with our shields up. We are critical and skeptical. But when we are absorbed in a story, we drop our intellectual guard. We are moved emotionally, and this seems to make us rubbery and easy to shape.
If, like me, you watched The Daily Show last night, then you probably saw Jon Stewart’s interview with David Barton. They didn’t really discuss his book at all, they talked more on the subject of “Christian persecution” here in the US.
I was wondering more about Barton’s book after the interview and came across a video that Chris Rodda had put up. In the video she debunks a chapter of Barton’s book about the University of Virginia. Yes, the video is really long, but it is extremely informative. Also, if you want to read her book Liars For Jesus: The Religious Right’s Alternate Version of American History, you can download it for free here.
TED talk of the day: Why is our universe so finely tuned for life?
At the heart of modern cosmology is a mystery: Why does our universe appear so exquisitely tuned to create the conditions necessary for life? In this tour de force tour of some of science’s biggest new discoveries, Brian Greene shows how the mind-boggling idea of a multiverse may hold the answer to the riddle.
The country’s Islamist-dominated government has introduced a law that would allow a man to have sex with his wife for up to six hours after her death, the Daily Mail reports. Yes, after her death.
Some are calling it the “farewell intercourse law,” but this blogger is just going to call it what it is — gross. And thankfully, illegal if you happen to live in the U.S.
Egypt’s dead sex law can apparently be traced to a 2011 statement made by cleric Zamzami Abdul Bari. He believes that marriage is valid even after death, and according to the Daily Mail, that both men and women should be able to have intercourse with a dead spouse.
Soon we will no longer be eating the bananas that are the bananas that we are used to.
Bananas, as we know them, cannot reproduce. The ones we eat are sterile hybrids. Like mules. The only way that there are more bananas is that humans take offshoots from the stems of existing banana trees, transplant them, and allow them to grow into a tree of their own. It’s basically a cheap, low-tech version of cloning, and it has a long history in agriculture. (Note: This would be why Christian evangelist Ray Comfort’s video on bananas has become a classic Internet LOL. In the video, Comfort presents the banana—particularly its seedless flesh, handy shape, and easy-access peel&mash;as a testament to the perfection of supernatural design … completely ignoring the fact that all those things are the result of human-directed agricultural selection.)
The downside to this is that clones are, shall we say, not terribly genetically diverse. Turns out, a lack of genetic diversity is a great way to make yourself vulnerable to disease. Back in the 1950s, a fungus all but wiped out a variety of banana called the Gros Michael. Up until then, the Gros Michel had been the top-selling banana in the world. It was the banana your grandparents ate. You eat the Cavendish, a different variety that replaced Gros Michael largely on the strength of its resistance to the killer fungus.
Gros Michel and Cavendish bananas both look and taste different from one another. Born in 1981, I’ve probably never eaten a Gros Michel banana. And chances are, my grandchildren won’t know the flavor of a Cavendish. That’s because the Cavendish still suffers from the same, basic weakness as its forebear. Just like Gros Michel, all Cavendishes are exactly alike. So a plantation full of Cavendishes is highly susceptible being wiped out by disease.
The disease banana plantations now fear: Black Sigatoka, a different fungus that can kill trees and reduce yields in the survivors. The solution: Goldfinger, a new banana clone bred to resist Black Sigatoka. It’s surprisingly difficult to track down a verifiable photo of the Goldfinger online. The one used here comes from the website of a Vietnamese fruit company. Based on this, and other photos I found, it looks our grandchildren will know a banana that is decidedly squatter than the bananas we know today.
Gros Michel isn’t extinct. It is just really rare. FHIA-01 ‘Goldfinger’ isn’t a likely Cavendish (actually Williams strain) replacement. It will supplement our normal long dessert bananas. A more suitable replacement would be FHIA-02 ‘Mona Lisa’ or FHIA-03 ‘Sweetheart’. FHIA-17 and FHIA-23 are also suitable varieties. It isn’t true that Cavendish bananas are completely sterile or totally genetically identical. Something like 1 in 20000 fruit will contain a seed, and it is these seeds which can be used in propagation programs. Also, banana genetics are relatively unstable and genetic mutation leads to new strains of banana. Currently they are using the Williams Cavendish strain.
![Maybe China’s new obsession with taking aborted fetus pills will save rhinoceroses.
thedailywhat:
This Is All Kinds Of Wrong of the Day: Their existence was widely reported last August, but the demand for pills made from dead human babies apparently hasn’t let up: South Korean customs officials revealed today that they have confiscated more than 17,000 of the pills from smugglers over the past nine months.
Hospitals and abortion clinics in China have continued to sell dead babies to medical companies that dry them out, grind them up, and sell them in pill form as alternative remedies to increase stamina. The dead babies are “mostly abortions or stillbirths” and are being used with the mothers’ consent.
Health authorities in Asia worry that if the powdered fetus trade continues, the capsules will find their way online, where the sick and gullible will be susceptible to super-bacteria and other harmful ingredients found in the human flesh capsules.
[dailymail]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3nrueA0aR1qzpwi0o1_500.jpg)
![thedailywhat:
Badvertising of the Day: Right-wing, anti-science think tank the Heartland Institute has unveiled a new billboard campaign in its hometown of Chicago that compares those who believe in global warming to the Unabomber, Charles Manson, and Osama bin Laden.
From the group’s website:
What these murderers and madmen have said differs very little from what spokespersons for the United Nations, journalists for the “mainstream” media, and liberal politicians say about global warming.
It continues:
The people who still believe in man-made global warming are mostly on the radical fringe of society. This is why the most prominent advocates of global warming aren’t scientists. They are murderers, tyrants, and madmen.
Really?!
Thankfully, spot-on analysis by The Daily Beast‘s Andrew Sullivan wins the day:
In some ways, this is an almost perfect illustration of what has happened to the “right.” A refusal to acknowledge scientific reality; and a brutalist style of public propaganda that focuses entirely on guilt by the most extreme association.
[thinkprogress]
I know this video isn’t exactly on topic, but it is a good one to watch for science deniers.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m3ipc9JQGJ1qzpwi0o1_500.jpg)
