"Missile-smuggling plot"? What plot?

God knows, I’m all for blowing to hell any terrorist fuckers than want to mess with the U.S. of A. However I suspect that this latest "missile-smuggling plot" is basically a PR stunt by the FBI, perhaps motivated by the upcoming elections. I was watching an interview with a former FBI chief investigator, and listened to him answer questions for several minutes about the "foiled plan." Guess what he said? NOTHING. He went on and on about how terrorists were bad (um, DUH!), how terrorism is a global problem, blah, blah, but nothing whatsoever about what this "plot" was about. Methinks, some undercover FBI agents promised this Indian guy a ton of money in exchange for smuggling a "package" into America. Meanwhile, the Russian security agents working with the FBI conveniently sold it to him. That’s all that ever happened — no plot to shoot down any airliners ever existed, and no sale would have happened if some poor sucker hadn’t been convinced to smuggle a package accross the ‘lake’. Meanwhile, while the FBI is pulling publicity stunts, Congress is restricting the military’s abilities to take out the real terrorists. Good planning, guys.

While you wouldn’t guess it on campus, Texas A&M really does have an active fundamentalist population. Depending on how you look at it, it’s either scary, silly, or plain stupid how seriously these guys take their fantasies. Some of them are quite intelligent, but debating Objectivism with them, I’ve realized that they’re quite hopeless.

In other news, portable tele-presence for doctors, another great Cox and Forkum, and Hong Kong Nazi Chic?

Three Proofs Against the Existence of God

I was feeling argumentative tonight, so I started a debate on God at the TexAgs forum. This post is mostly for my use in some future debate, but check out my arguments if you care to.

Edit: I realized that my arguments have some major flaws. While true, the background knowledge required to understand the concepts involved requires that the reader be an atheist/Objectivist before he reads them. So, I appreciate the compliments, but stand by for a rewritten version designed to respect the silly theist’s hierarchy of knowledge.
Continue reading Three Proofs Against the Existence of God

Speaking of mystics…

I’ve been reading a lot of Robert Heinlein lately. He really is an amazing science fiction writer, and his independent, productive, rational, and optimistic protagonists share many traits with the heroes of Ayn Rand. The only flaw I see in his writing is a pervading skepticism of all absolutes and ideals as such. His characters express their philosophy in specific (and usually true) “practical” principles like “Get the facts!” but never in terms of the broad abstract ideas needed to derive them. As such, they’re not the kind of individuals that could dedicate their lives to any idea (although a few do) or even one mate (Heinlen was a big fan of “free love” towards the end of his life). I think some of that came from his strong animosity towards any form of dogmatism, especially organized religion. His novels are full of lines like:

The most preposterous notion that H. sapiens has ever dreamed up is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of all the Universes, wants the saccharine adoration of His creatures, can be swayed by their prayers, and becomes petulant if He does not receive this flattery. Yet this absurd fantasy, without a shred of evidence to bolster it, pays all the expenses of the oldest, largest, and least productive industry in all history.

What Is Good For Iraq Is Good For Iran?

FOX:

The grandson of Ayatollah Khomeini…the late Iranian cleric who hated America and founded the Islamic state that rules Iran…is now blasting his own country’s clerical regime, calling it, ‘the worst dictatorship in the world’ and suggesting that U.S. military force might be needed to remove the regime. Hossein Khomeini, a Muslim cleric himself, says of U.S. military intervention, ‘I think the [Iranian] people would accept that. I would accept it, too, because it’s in accord with my faith.’ Hossein, now visiting Iraq, told the Scotsman newspaper, ‘I see that there’s security, that the people are happy, that they’ve been released from suffering.’

(Thanks, Steve)

Damn Fundamentalists

The first horse has been cloned. One would think that most people would be impressed by this amazing scientific achievement that will allow us to clone winning geldings like Funny Cide, but check out the results of this MSNBC survey:
What do you think of the prospects of cloning horses?
It should be forbidden. : 38%
It's OK, but there should be restrictions on cloned racehorses. : 27%
There should be no restrictions. : 22%
Don't care or don't know.: 13%

Someone please tell me, what the hell is wrong with cloning horses?? In the immortal words of Cornelius Vanderbilt, the public be damned!
Anyway, I thought this part of the article was interesting for more than one reason:

THE SMALL, sturdy work horse is now 2 months old, weighs about 220 pounds and is in excellent health, said its creators. Their announcement beats a Texas A&M team awaiting the birth of its own horse clone.
The cloned Haflinger horse is named Prometea after Prometheus, the character in Greek mythology who stole fire from the gods and gave it to humans.