Skepticum

This week was a better week in terms of searches. 2 searches stand out:

1. “this is why science is useful”

2. “was there very much immigration in 1644″

What can I say, I don’t think my blog answers either one of those, but somehow google sent them to me….

Originally posted May 7, 2007 with update on May 12, 2007.

Mel posted on the violence of niceness a few days ago, as a reaction to the PBS documentary “The Mormons.”

What Mel is talking about is the most powerful quote of the documentary, coming from Margaret Toscano:

“That niceness, there’s something, there’s something vicious about niceness that struck me in this [excommunication]. That the niceness covered over the violence of what was being done. Because in fact excommunication is a violent action.”

[youtube="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmdZTJSFdJY"]

Update, May 12, 2007

There is another section of the documentary that talks about “perfect obedience,” as Judith Freeman says. I tie the concept of perfect obedience and violence of niceness together–the violence comes as a response to perceived un-acted obedience, and then it’s covered with niceness. Anyone who had to visit the bishop’s office for a disobedient act knows what I’m talking about. You are humiliated and then told you are a great person. It is exactly what Toscano talks about. Disobedience is being sought after. Questions about disobedience are asked, even when there is no need for such inquiry.

Freeman exemplifies in the documentary this concept with a polygamy story, where a first wife has to learn to accept taking on a second wife:

“They really did try and make [polygamy] work, because, again, the idea of perfect obedience. You simply can’t say ‘I won’t do this.’ You can’t say that and be a good Mormon.”

[youtube="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gH4Jj0YLt0A"]

For the full documentary, please visit PBS.org.

Here is the weekly run of interesting searches I see in my Blogstats:

1. I got most hits this week from the term “Funniest comedian”, and someone even searched for “who is the funniest comedian today.” On my blog you will find Frank Caliendo listed to be one of the funniest comedians today and the best impersonator today.
2. My favorite search this week has been for “Sibiu” or “Sibiu 2007″. Sibiu is this year designated as the cultural capital of Europe.
3. My least favorite search is “in illinois illegal aliens driving without a license”. Will you quit it already? I see a search like this every week (next to the “illegal immigrant driving rights pros and cons” “should illegal immigrants drive” and “why aren’t illegal immigrants allowed to drive”). And when you search for something by asking a long question like that… you end up on my blog.

Some of the other fun things I saw this week–someone searched for “Master of Mischief” (even with those same caps). I hope you found him. Someone searched for blogobeer, and I’ll drink to that.

So there you have it, another fun week thanks to Blog Stats.

May 2, eSkeptic published a piece by Robert Ehrlich about the open-ended nature of science:

Science is powerful because it often provides explanations before observations are made. As Yogi Berra once remarked, “prediction is hard — especially about the future.” The nature of scientific theories is to make surprising predictions — the more surprising, the more confident we can be in the theory should the prediction be fulfilled. Robert Ehrlich

And he concludes:

Because of this open-ended nature, any dream of a final “theory of everything” that would allow scientists to give explanations of everything — and hence make predictions about the world that would not even need to be tested — is plainly nonsense; at least as a working scientist I hope so!

I happened upon a collection of pictures of Romanian items from Ceausescu’s time and the first years of post-communism in Romania. You can see here everything from communist pins, grade report books, milk bottles and caps, a picture of people standing in line to buy bread and images of TV shows we used to watch. It’s an amazing collection of images.

This is all stuff I grew up with–books I read, cartoons I watched, chocolate I ate, games I played with.  And I doubt any of this stuff got recalled due to safety reasons.  The only recall we experienced was the removal of Ceausescu himself.

I just attended the interactive tract sessions at the CADM Marketing Days. I walked away with a list of 10 most-used concepts as well as some other interesting facts.

Here are the 10 buzz words:

1. Google

2. Blog

3. YouTube

4. Web 2.0

5. Customer reviews

Continue Reading »

Friday, April 27, The Letterman Show, Frank Caliendo does a wicked Bush impersonation, and talks about the Iraq plan,  “the planning stage of that plan,” and the “plannification.”

[youtube="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLhQHeyOrnY"]