What the deuce is going on now?
As you may have seen, Ray ' Not-a-science-degree-guy' Comfort posted a series of infantile questions about which came first; blood or the heart. He has asked this before and, quite unsurprisingly, didn't pay attention to the answers or research it for himself. Now he's at it again.
He received, for his troubles, a series of answers ranging from the best, modern scientific understandings of circulatory development:
-
" Steven J. said... As I understand it, blood came first, then blood vessels, then the heart..."
- " Irukandji said...
Ray, I hate to break it to you, but someone has to: this isn't a head-scratching, hair-tearing, brain-breaking conundrum capable of moving grown evolutionary biologists to tears; it's freshman level biology..."
- " Froggie said...
Ray,
That is a very common tactic of fundies all over the web.
Ask a series of questions that would take two years of formal study to answer. And you expect to answer it in a blog comment.
Get real, Ray."
... along with the predictably dumb responses from his ardent followers...
- " Wayne Dawg said...
Ray - Great questions......but the evolutionist have never explained whether the chicken or the egg came first, so why would you confuse them with hearts and blood?"
The questions then, are; What purpose does this serve? What is his next move? Why should we care? Who will be the first to say 'Great Post Ray!'? Call it if you can...
Points will be awarded for accuracy and graded on the Prophecy Scale:
0 - 3 points - Biblical
4 - 7 points - Pat Robertson
8 - 10 points - Nostradamus
11 - 13 points - Mystic Meg
14 - 16 points - Dani'El
17 + points - if you're that good, you shouldn't have ruined it for everyone else.
Have fun!
Matt
EDIT TO ADD:
Ray has now included the correct answer to his many questions on developmental biology and the synergistic nature of the circulatory system in living organisms:
"The only answer to these questions is that Almighty God supernaturally made the human body (and every other creature) with a heart, lungs (needed for oxygenated blood), kidneys (to get rid of bad blood) vessels, arteries, blood, skin (to hold it all in), etc., all at once. Unthinkable for an atheist, but true. "
Translation:
"Magicmandunnit"
Did you expect any less?
Posts
I'm thinking he's going to play the persecuted christian...why do I think that? because that's what he always does! Going by some of the responses he chose he will say something like they avoided the question just to insult me...Or going by his use of the word attempt he'll say that none of the answers are adequate and that atheists believe in something they don't understand..."evolution is a theory-tale", "this will go in my new book", "banana blah blah blah"...nothing he says will surprise me!
ReplyDeleteI'm inclined to agree!
ReplyDeleteIt's another version of the '10 questions Atheists can't answer' routine.
It's such a strange post though, because it gives a fairly representative cross-section of the responses; almost like he was being intellectually honest about the replies......no, that CAN'T be it!
I'm frightened.
I'm still confused. Some people wrote lengthy replies detailing the process by which simple circulatory systems can evolve into the current circulatory system we have today.
ReplyDeleteIt seems really rude to ignore those lengthy posts and post a bunch of "I don't know"s on the front page.
He asked a question, why is he posting the non answers? Is there something wrong with saying, "I don't know?" What is he trying to say?
What purpose does this serve? It's a standard creationist tactic: muddying the waters so that to an unskilled observer it seems like there's real doubt over evolution.
ReplyDeleteWhat is his next move?He thinks he has already made a great, decisive point, so he may not bother following up with this line of bad thinking.
Why should we care? Cocaine is a hell of a drug.
Who will be the first to say 'Great Post Ray!'? Me...Great post, Ray!!!
I'm not confused, that's how Ray is. He ignores actual answers and picks a safe non-comment to criticize.
ReplyDeleteKaitlyn, you seem to be confusing Ray with someone who is rational and honest. He's invested decades of time on this.
ReplyDeleteIt another of his "questions atheists can't answer" like expatmatt said.
No matter how many times people answer these questions, Ray will declare that the atheists have not given an answer.
Expatmatt, if he posts a "fairly representative cross-section" it even more impressive to his followers when he dismisses it all with a hand-wave....
The purpose is to mislead his followers into thinking that nobody was able to give an answer of course. At the same time pretending that he is not doing such thing. Simple trickery. His dishonesty is so damn obvious.
ReplyDeleteG.E.
Also as for who will be the first to tell him it's a great post, I hope it's me!
ReplyDeleteExpatmatt wrote:
ReplyDeletealmost like he was being intellectually honest about the replies......no, that CAN'T be it!
Ray considers an answer like, "The concept of oxygen transporting molecules is much older than any kind of blood vessels." to be very embarrassing for the evolution side. Anything nuanced, detailed, etc. will fall short of the simple, perfect "God did it" that he considers to be a satisfying explanation.
Matt,
ReplyDelete"The questions then, are; 1- What purpose does this serve? 2- What is his next move? 3- Why should we care? Who will be the first to say 'Great Post Ray!'?[I will not answer that one] Call it if you can...""""
1- OK, I took the better part of one minute to set back and visualize that question; try to find a common thread throughout Ray's seeming madness, and here is what I am feeling.
Ray profits from traffic to his blog, and controversy with non-believers attracts that traffic.
That is why the nice christian man is constantly confrontational.
Ray is to the fundy blogoshere what the Enquirer is the grocery store check-out line.
In place of hollywood egotists on the front page doing crazy shit, he attracts fundy egotists like Vera, TB, AFU, et & et &et, to do their crazy shit. Once they go over the line, Ray shitcans them. That is a very successful marketing model, but only to a select audience, which are dominionist, revisionist anti-science, close minded, fundamentalists.
2- More of the same. It is working or he would abandon the model in a heartbeat and throw all his minions under the bus.
3- Personally, as an ardent defender of the first ammendment, it is a personal effort that I make to help insure that the Rays of the world will eventualy quit their political aspirations and crawl back into the goat dung hut out of which they came.
But most importantly, because I signed on as a Raytractor and it has been a really cool place to meet up with some folks from whom I was sure I would learn from. And I have.
And I have a healthy outlet to deal with my revulsion to the likes of the Ray Comforts of the world, and the Benny Hinns, and the Joyce Myers............
Even us pedantic, introverted, non-clannish types like to have some cronies to mingle with.
Kaitlyn said...
ReplyDelete"I'm still confused. Some people...."
You know what? That's what I like about you [that matrix-like brain of yours, your power of perception while asking a question like that- I have to smile very widely] and I've been there -did that. Still doing it to a certain degree! :>
I hope you don't take this in a negative manner.
The frogsterguy
If no one ever replied to him he would still be posting rubbish. And thinking no one could answer him. Part of becoming a non-Christian for me was reading Christian blogs and realising how dishonest and silly they were.
ReplyDeleteI was going back and reading his posts before people started commenting.
---------
Off topic LOL from his blog last year:
I accidentally called Todd "God," and a little later I called Kirk, "Jesus."
Posted by Ray Comfort on 10/15/2007 12:13:00 PM
kaitlyn said...
ReplyDelete"He asked a question, why is he posting the non answers? Is there something wrong with saying, "I don't know?" What is he trying to say?"
Actually, I think in Ray's opinion, and in the general fundamentalist mindset, not knowing is very wrong indeed. The faith is built upon absolute certainty of the central tenets, and nonbelievers are easy to criticize for lacking this sort of ultimate knowledge.
It helps the faith-heads to maintain that their system must be superior, and some might even think that this is a good method of trying to convert people by showing to them how tentative their worldview is.
I see such selective editing as naive criticism of honest agnosticism that should be a central element of every honest mind.
Ray might think that "I don't know" is a horrible thing to say, while he himself has adopted the mantra "I don't know and I don't care". Todd Friel has often echoed this in his radio show, "I know what the science says, but I don't care."
I'm not sure who of us it was on AC that posted a bit of the "How is babby formed" schtick, thanks for reminding me of the goldmine that is the Flash Tub and especially this gem.
Sorry for not making sense, tired and ticked off by idiot kiwi.
Well, I broke my fast and checked out AC. The first thing I noticed is that Steve J wrote a fairly long reply, but Ray only quoted Steven J's first sentence. No surprise there. Ray doesn't want an actual scientific answer.
ReplyDeleteI liked Captain Howdy's reply:
captain howdy said...
So, let me get this straight, Ray.
When it comes to the theory of evolution, you demand proof and lots of it.
"Can you explain which came first (the blood or the heart) and why? Did the heart in all these different species of fish, retiles, birds, amphibians and insects evolve before there were blood vessels throughout their bodies? When did the blood evolve? Was it before the vessels evolved or after they evolved?..."
But when it comes to the question of 'Do invisible monsters called demons literally exist as the Bible says?' you're all "Oh, Amen, Jesus! Yeeeeeesss, Jesus! Hallelujah! God said it, I believe it, and that settles it!"
Now why do you suppose that is, Ray?
Now, who is Huntley Brown? I'd never heard of him. He doesn't even have a Wikipedia page. Now, I can only name three concert pianists, but I can name them because they're concert pianists, not because we share the same politics or religion. Mr. Brown can vote for whoever he likes.
Wow, he posted both of my copies of the same response! If you look, there is one difference, where I ask him why a comment of mine didn't get through.
ReplyDeleteThree times I posted a comment on his Huntley Brown entry quoting his September 3rd post where he said "Palin rocks!" and accusing him of being inconsistent with his "I'm open to both sides, not advocating anything" schtick. Three times it didn't get through, and it broke no rules. It merely proved Ray wrong.
Anyway, I fully expected him to censor another comment about it on this entry, so posted it twice. And he's posted both of them.
Guys, can you all jump on that for me? :-)
Just for the record, scmike is a brainless gnat.
ReplyDeleteCuntfort's just going to ramp up this kind of lazy shit from now on.
ReplyDeleteHe's collecting for his forthcoming book of lies, isn't he?
Did everyone see the recent Pharyngula post about Daniel Phelp's demolition of Ken Ham?
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/11/aww_his_feelings_are_hurt.php
That is the level of response that Cuntfort deserves from us.
Anything else is just playing into his hands.
surprise, surprise! He edited the post since I last checked. Now his conclusion is something like: You're all wrong because goddidit...
ReplyDeleteTilia: BAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH someone even challenged him to pull that answer, too!
ReplyDeleteHere's a pertinent line from a book I'm reading-
ReplyDelete"They won't listen. Do you know why? Because they have certain fixed notions about the past. Any change would be blasphemy in their eyes, even if it were the truth. They don't want the truth, they want their traditions."